Lost Lake (Lost Lake, #1)(10)

“What are you going to do?” Bulahdeen asked.

“Inventory. Then figure out where to move and where to put all this stuff. Then travel, maybe. George and I always wanted to go back to Europe.”

Bulahdeen snorted. “I can guess Lisette’s reaction to that.”

“She doesn’t want to leave.” Eby’s eyes shifted to the front door again, as if waiting for someone else to come through.

“Jack’s not with us, if that’s who you’re looking for,” Bulahdeen said.

“Now he I would have picked up,” Selma said.

Eby turned to the wall of key hooks behind her. She hadn’t realized until that moment how much she’d been counting on Jack coming. She’d dropped hints. But Jack, for all his wonderful qualities, did not always grasp subtleties. Eby should have been clearer. This was his last chance. She grabbed two keys with heavy brass fobs attached. “Here are the keys to your regular cabins. I’ll grab some linens and bring them to you. I haven’t cleaned the cabins. Just giving you fair warning.”

Selma walked over and took her key from Eby. “Yes, our last summer here is certainly going to be special.”

Bulahdeen took her cabin key and picked up her purse. “Selma, has anyone ever told you that you complain too much?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

“So this is how I’m going to spend my summer?” Selma said, opening the front door and waiting for Bulahdeen. “Being insulted by the likes of you?”

“By the likes of me? Look who thinks she’s so high and mighty.”

“Watch out, old woman, or I’m going to leave you here.”

“No, you’re not.” Bulahdeen reached into her purse and brought out a set of keys and shook them. “I’ve got your car keys.”

“What are you doing with those?”

Bulahdeen cackled as she walked out the door.

“Bulahdeen, if you try to drive my car, I’ll have you arrested!”

Eby walked to the kitchen with a smile. She was glad they came.

When she entered the kitchen, which she had to pass through to get to the laundry room, Lisette was standing in front of an empty chair beside the refrigerator, her hands on her hips. She often did that—stare at that chair.

“Well, you’ll be glad to know that Selma and Bulahdeen came anyway. All this food won’t go to waste.” Eby gestured to the colorful array of enamel-covered cast-iron pots on the stove in the remarkable kitchen, Lisette’s domain. The appliances were cobalt blue, and the walls were stainless steel. Bright white lights shone overhead.

Lisette’s father had passed away a few years after Lisette left Paris. He’d obviously forgotten to change his will, or he thought Lisette would finally come back. Or maybe he didn’t even think of her at all, which was a strong possibility, given what Lisette had told Eby of him. Either way, Lisette had inherited half of her father’s modest fortune. Her mother, the other half. Lisette’s money explained the lovely kitchen in the otherwise shabby main house, and how Eby never had to worry about the cost of food. Lisette took care of all of that. To be happy, all she needed was a roof over her head and someone to cook for, which George and Eby had always given her.

Lisette raised her brows and gave her an I told you so look.

“You did not tell me so. They’re just here to say good-bye.” Eby hesitated. “Lisette, I’m going to need your help with inventory. I’m going to need your help with this move.”

The fine bones of Lisette’s jaw were set. She wrote on the pad around her neck, I told you. I am not leaving.

“But I am. Come with me. You can take the chair,” Eby offered.

Lisette had never fully acknowledged that Eby knew about the chair. She always gave a little start when Eby mentioned it, like a child caught doing something she shouldn’t.

I am staying. Go away. I have lunch to make for our guests.

Eby left the kitchen thinking this would be so much easier if Jack had come. Now she had to find another way to make Lisette—and her ghosts—leave.





3


The roadside stand ahead on the highway had been promising fresh fruit, peach cider, and cinnamon pecans for miles. They had passed at least six signs for the stand, each hand-lettered and littered with exclamation points. Kate found herself looking forward to seeing the next sign, a tension building in her body that only the truly lost can feel, starting in her stomach and spreading to her shoulders and fingertips, where her hands clutched the steering wheel. In twelve more miles, there would be fruit. Ten. Eight.

Kate and Devin began to yell with each sign, the closer they got.

Six more miles!

Four!

Two!

Finally, like magic, the stand appeared, and Kate pulled to a stop in front of the gray shack on a dead circle of gravel just off the highway. Dust, gnats, and wavy heat surrounded the place like a bubble, as if it could float up at any moment and travel to another spot of land on another stretch of rural highway somewhere.

She cut the engine of the Outback, and the sudden lack of vibration made her limbs feel heavy. Devin jumped out and ran to the tiny front porch of the shack, which was covered with rusty advertising signs for RC Cola and Pink Lady apples. This reminded Kate so much of hot, sticky road trips with her parents when she was young. Her father would fill the tank with gas and drive until the gauge went down to half, then they would drive back. They’d scoured back roads all around Georgia, finding motels with pools, highway junk shops, and old fruit stands.