Page 7 of The Deadbeat Next Door

“I’ll pick you up, sugar.”

“Great.” I hung up and headed to the kitchen to make breakfast. I loved to cook and I loved to eat, so my refrigerator was well-stocked, even if the rest of the house made it appear that no one lived there. I stirred up some eggs with spinach and red peppers and popped two slices of bread in the toaster. I had a fruit salad from the day before still in the fridge and I pulled that out and munched on it while I cooked the eggs. When it was all ready, I sat down at the little table in the breakfast nook, in the chair across from the window that faced Carrie’s house.

I got my seat just in time to see her step outside carrying a purse, a laptop bag, and about ten books. I might have considered going out and offering to help, but I doubted she’d accept it. I’d offered to help, once, a few weeks ago, when she’d come home with three huge bags of topsoil. She’d claimed she could handle them herself and proceeded to drag each of the bags into her garage, clearly struggling. Even when she’d dropped one of the bags halfway to the garage, she’d still insisted it wasn’t heavy and she didn’t need help. She was independent and self-sufficient to a fault.

I watched as she bobbled the books and the laptop and walked carefully to her car. She reached for the door handle and they all toppled out of her arms and to the ground with a crash. I couldn’t resist. I left my seat, my eggs likely going cold, and went out my side door to stand on the porch there. “Ever consider making multiple trips?”

“Ever consider minding your own business?” she growled, her eyes narrowed. She was in slacks and a filmy blouse with a bow at the neck. Her wavy hair was pinned back behind her ears and she was wearing dark-rimmed glasses that did nothing to hide her gorgeous blue eyes.

“Where would be the fun in that?” I knew I should apologize, should stop pushing her buttons, but telling her the truth, that focusing on anything but her was virtually impossible, didn’t seem like a good option.

“Don’t you have anything better to do than ruin my day?”

Okay, that one hurt just a bit, because seeing Carrie, even when she was pissed off or pissed me off, was undeniably the best part of my day, of every day. “I could help you load up those books.”

She bent, swooped up the books in an easy armful, and plunked them into the back seat. “As I’ve told you before,” she said. “I can take care of myself.”

“I can see that. But it doesn’t mean you have to do it all yourself, all the time.”

She looked at me and her anger faded, only to be replaced by a sadness I hated to see on her face. “Yeah, it does.” She got in her car, started the engine, and pulled out without a look back. I went inside, ate my cold eggs and toast and wondered why she looked so sad and what had happened to her that made her believe she couldn’t accept help.

Mary Ellen showed up on my doorstep fifteen minutes later. She was early and she looked beautiful. Her skirt was tasteful, but tight and her blouse had too many buttons undone, revealing a good bit more cleavage than was necessary in her line of work. Really more than was necessary in any line of work that didn’t involve taking off your clothes for money. Seeing as how Mary Ellen had beautiful, lush curves, I was the beneficiary of her sartorial choices and couldn’t complain. She’d straightened her naturally curly hair and had on a subtle amount of make-up. If she wasn’t helping me find land to buy, she’d normally be exactly the sort of woman I’d go for, but I’d mixed business and pleasure once with disastrous consequences. I wouldn’t make that mistake again.

I followed Mary Ellen out to her environmentally-friendly two-door and got in the passenger’s seat. “What have you got for me today?” I asked. I was surprised she had three properties to show me, since I had very detailed specifications. I hoped she wasn’t trying to pull my chain or get me to buy a more expensive property than I’d planned. I’d picked this town as the site for my winery and vineyard over a year ago and I’d moved to town a month ago, because I’d found the perfect property. I was on the cusp of making my dream a reality, when the property owner’s daughter found out she was pregnant and decided she wanted to move back to Catalpa Creek. The owner pulled out of the deal and I was stuck. I’d already signed a lease on the rental house where I was living and I’d already invested time and energy into marketing my wine to the local business owners. To say my investors and the bank loan officers had been unhappy when I lost the property was an understatement of epic proportions. I needed to find a new property and fast.

The town was adorable, with plenty of cute shops on the main drag and not an overabundance of chain restaurants or chain stores. It was in an extremely rural area, but the university brought enough people and traffic here for local businesses to be able to thrive. I’d been working with Mary Ellen on finding a property for three weeks and she’d shown me several different ones, but nothing I’d fallen in love with. My dream property didn’t seem to be on the market, yet. And I couldn’t afford to pick up and start over in a new town or new state.

“The first one is a bit farther out than you said you’d like,” she said. “But it fits all your specifications, so I think it might be worth the drive.”

I’d been thinking I might have to look for property farther afield, but going too far from town would decrease traffic to my winery considerably. “I’m willing to travel, as long as we don’t get too far from town.”

“Great.” She pulled onto the interstate and turned the radio up. She preferred pop music that didn’t appeal to me, but I didn’t complain. It was her car and she was doing me the favor of chauffeuring me around so I didn’t have to put more miles on my old truck. The old relic was on its last legs, or wheels, but I wasn’t ready to give it up. We’d had a lot of years together, and, until I knew just how much this property was going to cost, I couldn’t afford to buy a new truck.

“How do you like little Catalpa Creek?” Mary Ellen asked.

“It seems like a great town,” I said. “Maybe you could tell me a bit more about the local festivals.”

That got Mary Ellen talking about fairs and festivals and her own experiences as a beauty pageant contestant. Her stories were surprisingly entertaining and gave me a pretty good idea of what to expect of the town events.

I glanced down at the clock on the dash and realized we’d been on the road for over an hour. “How far out is this place?” I asked.

“We’re here.” She pulled down a gravel road to what looked like an old hunting cabin. We were halfway up the mountain and surrounded by trees.

“This piece is twenty acres, just like you asked,” she said.

“Okay. But it’s on a mountain and I asked for valley land. I’ll be clearing as many rocks as I will be trees.”

“Well, it might be a little more work, but let me show you something.” She opened her door and I got out with a sinking feeling that Mary Ellen didn’t understand what I was looking for.

I followed her down a narrow dirt trail, surprised by how well she got through the brush and forest in a tight skirt and heels. She stepped out onto a rocky ledge and spread her arms at the valley below. It was a gorgeous view. “Very nice,” I said. “But this isn’t going to work for me.”

“You said you want to build a destination,” she said. “A place people can go to get away from life for a bit. This would be the perfect spot for a bed and breakfast or small hotel, the views would be unbeatable.”

“You’re not wrong,” I said. “But I also need to have land where I can grow grapes and space to operate a working winery. I’m going to need a lot of water. Trying to get this land to meet those requirements will take more money and time than I’m prepared to spend.” Or could afford, but she didn’t need to know that.

Mary Ellen shrugged. “Oh, well, it was a pretty drive, anyway.”

“Right.” I wondered if this whole trip had been an excuse for Mary Ellen to spend more time with me. I’m not particularly vain or self-centered, I don’t assume every woman wants me, but Mary Ellen had straight up told me she wanted me, no strings attached. Hard to misinterpret that message.

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