Dream Lake (Friday Harbor #3)(7)

The ghost had felt a mixture of shock and sorrow, even though he had never met Victoria. She had died young—the cruelty of that, the unfairness of such loss, struck a chord of compassion. The ghost had wished for the luxury of tears, the relief of them. But as a soul without a body, he didn’t have the ability to cry.

Apparently neither did Alex Nolan.

Out of the tragedy of Victoria Nolan’s death, something remarkable had happened: Mark was granted custody of her daughter, Holly, and the two of them moved in with Sam. The three of them were now living together at the house on Rainshadow Road.

Prior to Holly’s arrival, the atmosphere in the house had resembled nothing so much as a football locker room. Laundry was done only when all other clothing options had been exhausted. Mealtimes were scattershot and hasty, and there was rarely anything in the fridge beyond half-empty bottles of condiments, a six-pack of beer, and the occasional leftover pizza in a grease-spotted box. Doctor’s visits were something that happened only if you needed stitches or a defibrillator.

But somehow Mark and Sam had managed to make room in their lives for a six-year-old girl, and that act of compassion had changed everything. The junk-food-loving bachelors had started to read nutrition labels as if it were a matter of life or death. If they couldn’t pronounce an ingredient, it was banned. They learned new words like “rickets” and “rotavirus,” and the names of at least a half-dozen Disney princesses, and how to use peanut butter to remove a wad of gum from long hair.

Before long, the brothers discovered that when you opened your heart to a child, it also left you open to other people. In the year after Holly had first come to live with them, Mark fell in love with a red-haired young widow named Maggie, and all his long-held prejudices against the idea of marriage collapsed like wet toast. After the August wedding, Mark, Maggie, and Holly would live in their own house on the island, and Sam would have Rainshadow Road back to himself again.

It seemed only a matter of time before Sam, too, would decide to take a chance on love. His fears were understandable—the Nolan parents, Jessica and Alan, had demonstrated to their four children that the seeds of failure and destruction were sown at the beginning of every relationship. If you loved someone, sooner or later you would reap a bitter harvest.

After a nasty legal battle, Alex and Darcy had agreed on terms that would allow their legal separation to be converted to a divorce. She cleaned him out financially, winning most of their assets, including the house. At the same time, the economy took a downturn and the real estate market plummeted. The bank had foreclosed on Alex’s Roche Harbor development, and put his plans for developing property at Dream Lake on indefinite hold.

Alex drank until he had acquired the young-old look of someone burning out too early. He wanted numbness. Oblivion. The ghost could only surmise that as the youngest child of alcoholic parents, Alex’s survival had depended on detachment. If you never felt anything or trusted anyone, if you denied every need or weakness, you couldn’t be hurt.

Every day eroded Alex a little more. How much longer, the ghost wondered, before there was nothing left of him?

With his Roche Harbor project gone and his other development at a standstill, Alex spent most of his time working on the vineyard house at Rainshadow Road. Some of the rooms had been so damaged by water leaks that he’d had to gut and rebuild them, starting with new subflooring. Recently he’d installed silk-screened reproduction wallpaper in the living room, after hand-cutting the panels and border from a master roll. Although Sam had tried to pay Alex for the work, Alex had refused. He knew his brothers didn’t understand why he’d taken such an interest in the place. Mostly it was to assuage his conscience—or what was left of it—over not having volunteered in the past to help raise Holly. There was no way in hell Alex was going to have anything to do with taking care of a child. However, making the house safe and comfortable while she lived there was something he could do, something he was good at.

It was midsummer, and the crew at Rainshadow vineyard was busy tending the vines and pruning leaves to expose more of the ripening grapes to the sun. Alex arrived in the morning to do some work in the attic. Before heading upstairs, he went to the kitchen with Sam for some coffee.

Scents of the previous evening’s meal—chicken soup flavored with sage—lingered in the air, subtle but comforting. An antique glass bell jar covered a pale wedge of cheese on the counter.

“Al, why don’t you let me fry you a couple of eggs before you start working?” Sam asked.

Alex shook his head. “Not hungry. Just want coffee.”

“Okay. By the way … I’d appreciate it if you’d keep the noise level down today. I’ve got a friend staying here, and she needs rest.”

Alex scowled. “Tell her to take her hangover somewhere else. I have some trim work to do.”

“Do it later,” Sam said. “And it’s not a hangover. She was in an accident yesterday.”

Before Alex could reply, the doorbell rang. It was one of those old-fashioned rotary mechanical bells that worked with a turnkey.

“That’s probably one of her friends,” Sam muttered. “Try not to be a dick, Alex.”

In a couple of minutes, Sam brought a woman into the kitchen.

Alex understood in a flash that he was in trouble, a kind he’d never experienced before. One look into a pair of round blue eyes, and it was a knockout punch, an instant defeat. Alarm and desire froze him where he stood. “Zoë Hoffman, this is my brother Alex,” he heard Sam say.