The Promise (Thunder Point #5)(10)

“I don’t know, Scott. You did.”

“True,” he said with a laugh. “I don’t think our circumstances are similar. I don’t want you to be too disappointed, Devon. I think she’ll be great. And hard to replace. By the way, make sure she has my cell number. If she wants to call me while you’re away on your honeymoon, she should call that number.”

“I tried to give it to her. I got the impression she didn’t want to impose....”

“Sometimes that’s the only way to get my attention,” he muttered. “Get going. Go find your family. If I know you, you’re going to be out at that new house, tinkering around, getting it ready.”

That brought a big smile to her face. “We’re very close. There’s flooring to put in downstairs and painting to do and endless cleanup, but we have all the walls, doors that lock, appliances that work, and we’re sleeping there starting this weekend. Any work Spencer doesn’t get done before football practice starts in August will wait till play-offs are over.”

“Why? How many hours a day does he devote to football practice before school starts?”

Devon just laughed. “It’s not the hours! Have you ever seen Spencer during football practice? He might only be out there with those teenage boys a few hours a day, but he tries like the devil to keep up with them. He can barely move afterward!”

Scott smiled. “Pride comes before the fall.”

“In this case it’s not pride so much as pretending to be sixteen when you’re staring forty in the eye. I’ll see you tomorrow, Scott. Don’t stay too late.”

Three

Peyton didn’t expect to find adequate housing in Thunder Point; she was fully prepared to search out an apartment or duplex in a nearby town, even one as far away as North Bend. First of all, she was looking for a tailor-made lease—month to month or three months, but she couldn’t commit to anything longer. Second, she no longer had her own furnishings.

“This is an amazing coincidence,” Ray Anne Dysart said. “This absolutely never happens. I got a call this morning from a part-time resident. They come up here from Sacramento to get out of the summer heat—usually stay about five months, from May through September, but couldn’t make it up here yet this year and looks like they won’t. Health issues. They said if I could rent it for a few months to a responsible tenant, they’d appreciate it. I haven’t even seen the inside. Want to have a look?”

“Sure,” Peyton said.

“The daughter called. She said there might be a few personal items left in the house—they really thought they’d be back. And the daughter can’t get up here for a couple of weeks, but asked if I’d box up anything that’s real personal and she’ll come for it. I have no idea what that means. Let’s check it out.”

It was a very small two-bedroom, a duplex with a small patio with a six foot fence around it, just like many apartment complex patios. The decor was altogether too fussy for Peyton—crocheted toilet tissue cozies, driftwood accents here and there, a fishing net strung on the kitchen wall with hooks in it for oven mitts, dish towels and other paraphernalia. There were also family pictures on tables and walls, baskets holding shells and lots of seaside-themed throw pillows. But the furniture was attractive and comfortable. The place would have a welcoming air about it, once the crafty doodahs and family pictures had been removed. It was only a few blocks from the clinic—a few more to the marina and beach.

“This will do nicely,” she said to Ray Anne. “I told Dr. Grant I could give him three months. Can you check with the owners about that time frame?”

“Sure. Do you have a lot of stuff to move?”

“I’m not going to move furniture for just a few months, especially since this place is nicely furnished. I have a few things I want to fetch from my brother’s house where they’re stored—my own linens, a couple of rugs, a few kitchen items I’m attached to. You know—creature comforts. Can we poke around closets and drawers and see what kind of things were left behind that have to be packed up?”

Peyton would buy new before admitting she had left her last address with practically nothing. She had a turntable and valuable vinyl record collection, her grandmother’s lace dresser scarf that she’d tatted herself, linen placemats and matching napkins, her other grandmother’s antique hand-tooled serving platters, things she wouldn’t invite her sisters or sisters-in-law to use or she might not see them again. There were some old crystal wineglasses and a decanter. And she had some carefully chosen art that she’d had boxed at a gallery for storage because there had been no place for them in Ted’s house.

In fact, that’s about all that was left. When she’d moved in with Ted, she stored most of her furniture with George—he had room in the basement of his house. Little by little they’d gone the way of family members who needed them. Her four-poster bed was “loaned” to a niece who needed a bed; the dresser eventually made its way to the same bedroom. Her mother’s antique pie safe and dry sink was being used by Ginny. “It looks so perfect in my house!” Ginny had said. Her sofa, love seat and accent tables had gone into Ted’s game room where they were beaten to death by his kids. She no longer liked them and had left them behind. Her antique rolltop desk was in Adele’s little apartment in San Francisco where it was being loved. Her kitchen table and chairs were with Ellie and her family; it would never be the same. She wouldn’t loan the art—she knew how that worked. Although things were always “borrowed,” they seemed to never be returned. They weren’t thieves by any means. They were merely presumptuous relatives. And passive-aggressively forgetful.