RaeAnne Thayne - Brambleberry House

“I’m not sure the dog lives there,” she answered. “He might belong to the man we talked to this morning. Will Garrett. He doesn’t live there, he was just doing some work on the house.”

“I’m glad he doesn’t live there,” Maddie said in her whisper-soft voice. “He was kind of cranky.”

Julia agreed, though she didn’t say as much to her children. Will had been terse, bordering on rude, and for the life of her she couldn’t figure out why. What had she done? She hadn’t seen him in sixteen years. It seemed ridiculous to assume he might be angry, after all these years, simply because she hadn’t written to him as she had promised.

They had been friends of a sort—and more than friends for a few glorious weeks one summer. She remembered moonlight bonfires and holding hands in the movies and stealing kisses on the beach.

She would have assumed their shared past warranted at least a little politeness but apparently he didn’t agree. The Will Garrett she remembered had been far different from the surly stranger they met that afternoon. She couldn’t help wondering if he treated everyone that way or if she received special treatment.

“He was simply busy,” she said now to her children. “We interrupted his work and I think he was eager to get back to it. We grown-ups can sometimes be impatient.”

“I remember,” Simon said. “Dad was like that sometimes.”

The mention of Kevin took her by surprise. Neither twin referred to their father very often anymore. He had died more than two years ago and had been a distant presence for some time before that, and they had all walked what felt like a million miles since then.

Brambleberry House suddenly came into view, rising above the fringy pines and spruce trees. She slowed, savoring the sight of the spectacular Victorian mansion silhouetted against the salmon-colored sky, with the murky blue sea below.

That familiar sense of homecoming washed over her again as she pulled into the pebbled driveway. She wanted to live here with her children. To wake up in the morning with that view of the sea out her window and the smell of roses drifting up from the gardens and the solid comfort of those walls around her.

As she pulled into the driveway and turned off the engine, she gave a silent prayer that she and the twins would click with the new owners. The one she’d spoken with earlier—Sage Benedetto—had seemed cordial when she invited Julia and her children to take a look at the apartment, but Julia was almost afraid to hope.

“Mom, look!” Simon exclaimed. “There’s the dog! Does that mean he lives here?”

As she opened her door to climb out, she saw the big shaggy red dog waiting by the wrought-iron gates, almost as if he somehow knew they were on their way.

“I don’t know. We’ll have to see.”

“Oh, I hope so.” Maddie pushed a wisp of hair out of her eyes. She looked fragile and pale. Though Julia would have liked to walk from their hotel downtown to enjoy the spectacular views of Cannon Beach at sunset, she had been afraid Maddie wouldn’t have the strength for another long hike down the beach and back.

Now she was grateful she had heeded her motherly instincts that seemed to have become superacute since Maddie’s illness.

More than anything—more than she wanted to live in this house, more than she wanted this move to work out, more than she wanted to breathe—she wanted her daughter to be healthy and strong.

“I hope we can live here,” Maddie said. “I really like that dog.”

Julia hugged her daughter and helped her out of her seat belt. Maddie slipped a hand in hers while Simon took his sister’s other hand. Together, the three of them walked through the gate, where the one-dog welcoming committee awaited them.

The dog greeted Simon with the same enthusiasm he had shown that morning, wagging his tail fiercely and nudging Simon’s hand with his head. After a moment of attention from her son, the dog turned to Maddie. Julia went on full mother-bear alert, again ready to step in if necessary, but the dog showed the same uncanny gentleness to Maddie.

He simply planted his haunches on the sidewalk in front of her, waiting as still as one of those cheap plaster dog statues for Maddie to reach out with a giggle and pet his head.

Weird, she thought, but she didn’t have time to figure it out before the front door opened. A woman wearing shorts and a brightly colored tank top stepped out onto the porch. She looked to be in her late twenties and was extraordinarily lovely in an exotic kind of way, with blonde wavy hair pulled back in a ponytail and an olive complexion that spoke of a Mediterranean heritage.

She walked toward them with a loose-hipped gait and a warm smile.

“Hi!” Her voice held an open friendliness and Julia instinctively responded to it. She could feel the tension in her shoulders relax a little as the other woman held out a hand.

“I’m Sage Benedetto. You must be the Blairs.”

She shook it. “Yes. I’m Julia and these are my children, Simon and Maddie.”

Sage dropped her hand and turned to the twins. “Hey kids. Great to meet you! How old are you? Let me guess. Sixteen?”

They both giggled. “No!” Simon exclaimed. “We’re seven.”

“Seven? Both of you?”

“We’re twins.” Maddie said in her soft voice.

“Twins? No kidding? Cool! I’ve always wanted to have a twin. You ever dress up in each others’ clothes and try to trick your mom?”

“No!” Maddie said with another giggle.

“We’re not identical twins,” Simon said with a roll of his eyes. “We’re fraternal.”

“Of course you are. Silly me. ’Cause one of you is a boy and one is a girl, right?”

Sage obviously knew her way around children, Julia thought as she listened to their exchange. That was definitely a good sign. She had observed during her career as an elementary school teacher that many adults didn’t really know how to talk to kids. They either tried too hard to be buddies or treated them with obvious condescension. Sage managed to find the perfect middle ground.

“I see you’ve met Conan,” Sage said, scratching the big dog under the chin.

“Is he your dog?” Simon asked.

She smiled at the animal with obvious affection. “I guess you could say that. Or I’m his human. Either way, we kind of look out for each other, don’t we, bud?”

Oddly, Julia could swear the dog grinned.

“Thank you again for agreeing to show the apartment to us tonight,” she said.

Sage turned her smile to Julia. “No problem. I’m sorry we weren’t here when you came by the first time. You said on the telephone that you knew Abigail.”

That pang of loss pinched at her again as she imagined Abigail out here in the garden, her big floppy straw hat and her gardening gloves and the tray of lemonade always waiting on the porch.

“Years ago,” she answered, then was compelled to elaborate.

“Every summer my family rented a house near here. The year I was ten, my brother and I were running around on the beach and I cut my foot on a broken shell. Abigail heard me crying and came down to help. She brought me back up to the house, fixed me a cookie and doctored me up. We were fast friends after that. Every year, I would run up here the minute we pulled into the driveway of our cottage. Abigail always seemed so happy to see me and we would get along as if I had never left.”

The other woman smiled, though there was an edge of sorrow to it. Julia wondered again how Sage had ended up as one of the two new owners of Brambleberry House after Abigail’s death.

“Sounds just like Abigail,” Sage said. “She made friends with everyone she met.”

“I’ve been terrible about keeping in contact with her,” Julia admitted with chagrin as they walked into the entryway of the house, with its sweeping staircase and polished honey oak trim. “I was so sorry to hear about her death—more sorry than I can say that I let so much time go by without calling her. I suppose some foolish part of me just assumed she would always be here. Like the ocean and the seastacks.”