Buy А Whisker

Chapter 2

I checked my watch. I needed to get back to the shop. I got Mac’s soup and sandwich, plus a cinnamon-cranberry muffin for myself. Jess wrapped herself in her chocolate truffle coat and wrapped me in a hug.

“We’re still on for Thursday-night jam?” she asked.

“Absolutely,” I said.

“If you get a better offer and you need to bow out, that’s okay,” she said as she pulled out of the hug, a smile twitching at the corners of her mouth.

I put a hand on one hip and gave her a wide-eyed look of mock surprise. “What could be better than spending the evening with you?”

She laughed and shook her head. “You’re such a suck-up,” she said. “I’ll see you Thursday night.”

Thursday-night jam was a musical jam session Sam hosted every Thursday night in the off-season at The Black Bear. You could count on Sam and the guys from The Hairy Bananas being there, and from time to time other people would show up with a guitar or bass and sit in for a few songs.

Mac was in the main workroom/storage area when I got back to Second Chance.

“You’ll probably need to warm up that soup in the microwave,” I said, handing him the brown paper takeout bag.

“I’m sure it’s fine,” he said, setting down the screwdriver he’d been holding.

I could hear voices, agitated voices, coming from the store.

“Do I want to know what’s going on in there?”

“I’ve been asking myself that same question,” Mac said with a smile. “So far the answer is no.” He hooked a nearby wooden stool that I’d just primed the day before and sat down, lifting the container of soup from the bag and pulling off the lid.

I leaned against the dresser he’d been working on. “You don’t have a spoon,” I pointed out.

“Not a problem.” He lifted the waxed cardboard cup to his lips as though it were a cup of coffee.

I glanced over toward the door that led to the main part of the building. I could still hear the voices. I couldn’t really make out more than a few odd words, but I recognized Rose’s voice along with Avery’s and Liz’s.

Rose was a tiny white-haired dynamo, barely five feet tall in her sensible shoes. She—along with Charlotte—worked part-time for me, mainly because they were both reliable and hardworking, and I wasn’t good at saying no to Gram.

Mac leaned over and set his soup down on the floor. “I’ll go see what’s going on, Sarah,” he said.

I put out a hand to stop him. “It’s okay,” I said. “I’ll go.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You sure?”

“This is not my first rodeo,” I said, straightening up and pushing back the sleeves of my sweater.

“Okay. Yell if you need backup.”

There were no customers in the store. Charlotte was behind the cash desk with a cloth in her hand and a set of sherry glasses on the counter in front of her. She still had the bearing and eagle-eyed gaze of the high school principal she’d been. Even in flats she was taller than I was. She had soft white hair and warm brown eyes behind her glasses. Right now those dark eyes looked troubled.

When I’d left for lunch, Charlotte had told me that she was going to dust and polish all the glassware in the store. Now she was frowning and her glasses had slid halfway down her nose. Rose had her apron in one hand. The other hand was on her hip, and she was looking up at Liz, who had several inches on petite Rose.

I knew by her stance and the way her chin was jutting out that Rose was arguing about something with Liz. Liz was standing in the middle of the room. She was wearing a vivid cardinal-red coat and a soft, butter-colored hat. As always, she looked polished and elegant. Her nails were manicured and her blond hair curled around her face. Unlike Rose and Charlotte, Liz refused to let her hair go gray.

“If the Good Lord hadn’t intended me to be blond, he wouldn’t have created Light Golden Blonde, number thirty-eight,” she’d said emphatically to Rose when the latter had suggested Liz let her hair “go natural.”

Beside Liz, Avery was engulfed in an oversize black parka I knew she’d bought for eight dollars at Goodwill.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Liz said, waving one hand as though she were shooing away a bug. “Just call him.”

“No,” Rose said. I knew that tone and that body language. Liz should have as well. The two of them had been friends for most of their lives even though they were very different. Rose dressed for comfort; Liz was all about style. Rose favored sensible shoes, and Liz had never met a pair of heels she didn’t like.

“Call who?” I asked.

Rose turned to look at me over her shoulder. “No one,” she said.

“Josh Evans,” Liz countered.

I looked at Rose. “Why do you need a lawyer?”

When Arthur Fenety had been murdered back in the fall and their friend Maddie Hamilton was arrested for the crime, Rose, Liz and Charlotte—unhappy with the way the police were handling the case—had investigated, with some help from Alfred Peterson, who had to be the world’s oldest computer hacker, and, well, me. Nick had argued vehemently with his mother about it. I’d tried my best to rein them in, but somehow I’d gotten pulled into the investigation myself. Josh had taken on Maddie’s case when I’d asked, and Liz had quietly covered the bill.

“I don’t need a lawyer, dear,” Rose said. “As usual, Liz is overreacting.”

“What would be the harm in at least talking to him?” Charlotte asked. As a former school principal, she was often the voice of reason.

Rose pointed a finger from Liz to Charlotte. “Both of you need to have your hearing checked because I’ve told you twice now. Josh is a very nice young man, but I don’t need a lawyer.”

Liz made an exasperated snort and shook her head.

I turned to Avery. “What’s going on?”

She shrugged. “Rose got kicked out of her apartment. Nonna and Charlotte want her to make a stink about it.”

I turned back to look at Rose again. “You were evicted?” I said.

Silently, she pulled an envelope out of her pocket and held it out to me.

I took out the single sheet of paper inside. It was an eviction notice. Rose had until the middle of February to vacate her apartment at Legacy Place. There was no reason given.

Legacy Place was the former Gardner Chocolate factory—“A little bite of bliss in a little gold box.” In the early nineties the company had built a new manufacturing facility just on the outskirts of North Harbor. The old factory had had a number of lives in the next twenty years, and then about three years ago the Gardner family had renovated the building into a much-needed apartment complex for seniors. Rose derisively called the place “Shady Pines.”

“Rose, they have to at least tell you why they’ve asked you to leave,” I said, gesturing with the envelope. “Maybe it’s not a bad idea to call Josh.”

Josh Evans had grown up in North Harbor. Not only had he been Maddie Hamilton’s lawyer when she was accused of Arthur Fenety’s murder, but he’d known Rose—and Liz and Charlotte and my grandmother—since he was a kid. I knew he’d be willing to help.

Rose laid a hand on my arm. “I don’t want to fight this,” she said. “I don’t want to make a big fuss.”

I knew she’d only originally agreed to the move to the seniors’ apartment complex to put her daughter’s mind at rest. Getting evicted was the perfect out for her. I looked at her without saying anything. Her cheeks grew pink and her gaze slipped away from mine. I was right.

I looked at the letter again. It was dated the second week of January—two weeks earlier. “How long have you known about this?”

“A while,” she hedged.

“Why didn’t you say something?”

“She’s stubborn,” Liz said, a frown forming between her perfectly groomed eyebrows.

I turned my head to look at her. “Pots and kettles, Liz,” I said, raising one eyebrow.

Her mouth moved, but she didn’t say anything else.

“I wanted to get my ducks in a row before I told you all,” Rose said, looking around at all of us. She sounded a little less defiant and a little more embarrassed than before.

“And did you?” I asked gently.

She sighed. “Not exactly.”

“Rose, do you have somewhere else to live?” Liz asked.

“Not yet.” Her chin came up. “I’m still weighing my options.”

“Well, while you’re weighing them, you can move in with Avery and me,” Liz said, nodding her head as though everything were settled, which I knew it wasn’t.

“Say yes,” Avery immediately said, a huge smile stretching across her face. “Please. Right now I’m the only one who cooks. If Nonna made a cake, even a dog wouldn’t eat it.”

Liz shot her a look. She could actually cook. She just didn’t see why she should.

“Sorry, Nonna, but that’s true,” Avery said with an offhand shrug.

“Thank you both, but no,” Rose said firmly. She looked directly at Liz. “How long have we been friends?”

“Not as long as it feels, sometimes,” Liz retorted.

“If we lived together, I’m sure I’d try to smother you in your sleep by the end of the second week,” Rose said, her expression completely serious.

Liz narrowed her blue eyes. “Are you implying I’d be difficult to live with?”

“I’m not implying it,” Rose retorted. “I’m coming right out and saying it. You would be difficult to live with. I don’t want to ruin our friendship, and I don’t want to go to prison because I put a pillow over your face.” She leaned toward me. “Although I could probably get off for justifiable homicide.”

“I heard that,” Liz said. “And I am not difficult to live with.”

Beside her, Avery gave a loud snort.

Liz fixed her gaze on her granddaughter and held up two perfectly manicured fingers. “Two words. Boarding school.”

I knew she wasn’t serious. So did Avery.

Avery held up her hand, the fingers spread wide apart. “Five words, Nonna,” she countered. “You can’t program the DVR.”

“Rose, would you live with me?” Charlotte asked.

Rose half turned to smile at her friend. “Thank you,” she said, “but you don’t have anywhere to put me, and I’m not putting you out of your room.”

An ice dam on the roof of Charlotte’s house just after New Year’s had caused a leak in her spare room. The roof had been patched and Nick had pulled up the soggy carpet, but the ceiling and one wall still needed to be repaired, and given Nick’s schedule, who knew when that would be.

Rose held up a hand. “And before anyone gets any ideas, I’m not living in sin with Alfred. He already offered.”

Avery opened her mouth to say something, but Rose cut her off.

“And we’re not getting married, either, in case anyone has any ideas.” She leaned toward me again. “Remind me that I need to get some Bengay. I think Alfred pulled something getting up off his knees.”

I couldn’t help smiling at the thought of stoop-shouldered, bald-headed Alfred Peterson, whose pants were generally up around his armpits, getting down on one knee to propose to Rose.

“Everyone, please, there’s no need to overreact,” Rose said in a louder voice. She gestured toward a notepad sitting on the counter by the sherry glasses Charlotte had been dusting. “I went online and made a list of apartments for rent. I’m sure I’ll find something.”

“You wouldn’t have to find something if you’d stop being so pigheaded and move in with me,” Liz retorted.

Charlotte had been studying Rose’s list. She looked up, caught my eye and gave her head a slight shake.

Charlotte knew North Harbor better than I did. If she didn’t think any of the places on that list were acceptable, that was good enough for me.

I rolled my neck from one side to the other. My shoulders were tying themselves in knots. “We’ll find something for you somewhere,” I said to Rose. Maybe Jess would know of a place, I thought. Or Sam.

“Why can’t Rose just take that extra apartment you have?” Avery said.

Elvis had wandered in from somewhere, and he loudly seconded her suggestion as she bent down and picked him up.

“Oh, I can’t do that,” Rose said. “And Sarah’s not finished renovating that apartment anyway.”

My house, an 1860s two-story Victorian, was divided into three apartments. I lived in one. My grandmother lived in the other when she wasn’t traveling with her new husband, John. The third apartment was where my family—my brother, Liam, my mom and my stepfather—stayed when they came to visit. I hadn’t finished the renovations in that space, but I wasn’t that far from being done, either.

Liz walked over to the cash desk and picked up the pad with Rose’s list. She scanned the page.

“You can’t live in any of these places,” she said. “Two of them are too far from downtown, and another is so—” She made a face. “Well, let’s just say even the cockroaches won’t live there.”

“We don’t have cockroaches here. It’s too cold,” Rose said matter-of-factly, shaking out her apron.

I sighed softly. Rose was family. They were all family—Rose, Charlotte, Liz and Avery. A family that was more like the Addams Family than the Waltons sometimes, but family nonetheless. I loved them all.

I turned to look over my shoulder at the door to the workroom. Somehow I’d known Mac was there, leaning against the doorframe, arms folded over his chest. A look passed between us.

Sometimes it felt as though Mac could read my mind. This was one of those times. I dipped my head ever so slightly in Rose’s direction. Mac gave me an almost imperceptible nod in answer to my unspoken question.

Rose and Liz were still arguing. I came up behind them and wrapped my arms around Rose’s shoulders. “Come live with me,” I said. “Mac will get the apartment ready, and since we won’t be living in the same space, you won’t have to put a pillow over my face in the middle of the night.”

“I can’t,” she said. “You’re young. I’ll cramp your style.”

I laughed until I realized she was serious. Then I gave her a hug. “Rose, I don’t have a style. I work. I run. I go home. Say yes. Please. It’ll get Liz off your case, and it will put my mind at ease.”

She hesitated. “All right. Yes.”

Charlotte and Liz beamed. Avery cheered. Even Elvis gave an enthusiastic meow.

I glanced back at Mac, who smiled at me as well.

It really was the best solution. And really, what could go wrong?

You’d think I’d know better than to ask that question.