The Sweetheart Bargain (A Sweetheart Sisters Novel)

by Jump, Shirley

  “You don’t have to be a pilot. You can—”

  “All I’ve ever wanted to do is fly. You know that.” His lifelong dream, jerked from him in a split second, one bad decision. “I’m done.”

  Greta sighed. “Life is about change, Luke. And part of that is what makes every day an adventure. And when life hands you lemons, you make limoncello.”

  He smiled. “Another bit of wisdom from your daddy?”

  “Of course. And a useful tip. How do you think I survived that move to the retirement home?”

  His gaze went to the open window, to a yard that no longer held crisp green grass and bright yellow flowers but had blurred into dark spheres and pyramids like a twisted geometry problem from God. His entire world cast in shadow.

  Some days, his vision cooperated and he could see the world through a gauzy film. Those were the good days, the ones when he thought maybe this wouldn’t be so bad. He’d find a way around it, maybe a way back to the Coast Guard. Other days—the dark days—his eyes refused to show him anything beyond shades of gray. At first, the bright days had filled him with hope for recovery, and then he’d begun to curse them as a cruel, temporary gift.

  His grandmother’s hand was on his shoulder again, but he barely felt it. Didn’t hear her words. His mind saw another darkness, one teeming and churning like an angry machine, the sea reaching up in whitecapped waves, a growling beast below him. The helo pitching and rolling in the storm, the flight controls shaking in his grip, and the white faces of the crew.

  Lowering the rescue litter, hearing Joe shouting through the headset that they were burning through fuel too fast. Hurry the hell up, it’s getting bad out there—

  Then watching the cable whip in a wild arc, then catch in the mast, and like a rebounding yo-yo, jerk back up. Luke tried to shift the helo away, but the cable was faster, snarling in the transmission hub and the rotor blades, rendering the flight controls useless. After that, nothing but black. A void in his memory. A blessing and a curse.

  “I’m sorry,” Luke said softly, to the breeze dancing over his skin, wishing the words could carry far enough to reach those he had left behind.

  And the one he would never see again.

  “I know you are,” Grandma said. “I know you are.”

  The coffeepot beeped the end of the brewing cycle. Luke started toward it, but Greta stopped him. “I’ll get it. You sit. Have some cookies.”

  Luke turned toward the table, crossing the kitchen in a memorized number of steps. On a good day, he could see the checkerboard pattern in the tile. On a bad day, the checkerboard became a runny puddle of color.

  Outside, a bark sounded, then something scratched the back door. Luke peeled back the curtain, and for a second, the bright sun blinded him. He blinked, drew farther into the shadows of the house, then glanced down, concentrating until the blur became a shape, a form, an animal.

  The dog. Back again.

  “What’s that?” Grandma asked.

  “A dog. I bet a hundred bucks it’s that stray the new neighbor’s been looking for.” As soon as he said the words, he knew what his grandmother was going to suggest. Damn.

  “Well, then here’s your perfect opportunity to do a good deed. You know what my daddy always said. Favors done for the neighbor fine—”

  “Are best accompanied by a bottle of wine.” Luke shook his head and let out a chuckle. Leave it to his grandmother’s quirky sense of humor to bring a little lightness to his day. It made him glad—some—that he had opened the door to her and her cookies. “Does most of Grandpa’s advice come attached to a bottle of liquor?”

  Greta thought for a second. “Yup. You know your grandpa. He looked at the world through whiskey-colored glasses.”

  Luke released the curtain and it swung into place over the window. The dog scratched again. Insistent. Needy. For a second, compassion swept over Luke.

  He had no business caring for a dog. Hell, he could barely take care of himself. He stepped back. “Well, if she wants her dog, she can get it herself.”

  Grandma swatted his arm. “I raised you better than that, Luke Winslow. Now go be a good person and help poor Olivia out.” Before he could stop her, his grandmother undid the lock on the door and tugged it open.

  He started to argue, but the damned dog had already wriggled past his legs, into the house, and then dropped to the kitchen floor. Luke opened his mouth to order it out, then stopped.

  The dog’s breath was coming in fast, shallow pants of distress. Its tail thumped a weak patter against the tile. Friendly. Grateful.

  The dog needed help. Poor thing. That damned compassion returned in a stronger wave. Luke bent down and reached out a hand. The dog didn’t growl—heck, it barely moved. Then, a quick, friendly flick of the tongue against Luke’s thumb. Help me, help me.

  Luke’s hand hovered over the furry body, then descended in a tentative pat. The dog leaned closer, panted faster. “Grandma, I think you better go get the neighbor. Dog’s sick or something.”

  “Oh, goodness, where does the time go? I’m supposed to be at bingo. I’m calling the B-4 . . . and after.” Greta pressed a kiss to his cheek, then spun on her heel, moving insanely fast for a woman with a hip replacement. “I’ll see you soon, Luke.”

  And just like that, she walked out the door, leaving him with the dog, and a problem he didn’t want. A problem that was going to require the very thing Luke avoided.

  Involvement.

  Four

  The drill screeched in disagreement, then sent the stripped and now useless screw spiraling away, pinging off the stepladder and rolling onto the floor. It spun off into a dark corner, then plink-plinked through the floorboards.

  “Okay, okay,” Olivia said to the stupid yellow hand tool. “You win. I’m not smarter than a ceiling fan.”

  Miss Sadie watched from her perch on the worn blue-and-white-striped sofa, little nose twitching. Above Olivia, multicolored wires dangled from the ceiling fan motor. The metal cylinder hung askew and swung back and forth, secured by the single screw she’d managed to install. Another screw had also gone AWOL, joining the first two deserters she’d lost earlier. In the wall across from her sat a saw that had lodged itself into the framing. And beneath it all, a pile of building supplies she’d bought with good intentions and no instructions.

  Olivia sighed. “Good thing I’m not working as a carpenter or I’d be broke.” A break was in order. Maybe a drink, too, or two, regardless of the hour. She’d been at this most of the morning and hadn’t made any kind of dent. The house looked, if possible, even worse now than when she’d walked in that first day.

  Not to mention, she’d scoured the ramshackle bungalow top to bottom and found nothing besides a collection of dog curios, a lot of clothes in a size eight, financial records for the shelter, and a business card for a lawyer. No notes, no cards, no journals, nothing that told her who her mother had been. Maybe she’d missed something. Behind the peeling wallpaper or loose floorboards there could be a secret stash, but Olivia doubted it.

  For the past few days, Olivia had tried a dozen times to get up the courage to ask about her mother. But every time she tried to broach the subject at Golden Years or any other place she went in Rescue Bay, the questions lodged in her throat. What if the answer hurt more?

  Her mother had, after all, left her a house, an object as inanimate as a shrub. No notes. No letters. She’d never come looking for Olivia, never tried to explain. Instead, she’d dumped a money pit in her daughter’s lap, and like she had at the hospital more than thirty years ago, Bridget had left.

  Tears brimmed in Olivia’s eyes. Miss Sadie hopped down, then came over and nosed at Olivia’s leg. She chuckled, then came down from the ladder and patted her intuitive dog. “You’re right. Self-pity doesn’t help anything, does it?” And self-pity wasn’t part of the kind of person Olivia was. Even if the last year or so had felt like being tossed into a hurricane, then hung out to dry, then tossed back again. She acted, she didn’t d
well. “Okay,” she said with a determined sigh, “let’s try this again, Sadie.”

  Olivia started to reach for the drill when the soft creaking above gave way to a louder screech. She scooted back, just as the screw unraveled itself from the hole and the fan’s motor came down, bounced off the top of the stepladder, then dropped like a stone onto the wood floor. On impact, the motor split in two and regurgitated wire guts.

  Damn.

  “Great. Now what?” Olivia put a hand on her hip. Miss Sadie scrambled off the couch and danced around the motor, barking at it for scaring her and nearly taking out her mistress’s toes.

  Olivia sighed. “What I need is help, Miss Sadie.”

  The dog didn’t put up a paw.

  “Or maybe something to help relieve this . . . stress.” Olivia stretched right, left, but it didn’t ease the tension in her shoulders, her neck. The move, the new job, the search for answers, coupled with the long days and late nights spent on the renovation had left every muscle in Olivia’s body achy and tired. “You know what my friends would say? I need a fling. One good, no-strings-attached night with a good-looking man.”

  Miss Sadie barked, wagged her tail.

  “Oh, you think that’s a good idea, do you? Well, I’m not going to disagree. But if I have a fling, it’s going to be with a man who knows how to use a hammer.”

  A sharp banging sounded on her front door. “Hey, maybe that’s him. You think, Miss Sadie?” The dog barked. Olivia laughed, then crossed to pull open the door. Or rather, yank open the door, which had stuck like an elephant in a cow chute.

  She’d expected another delivery from the hardware store, or the mailman, or a new care package from her mother. Instead, she got her neighbor. Mr. Ray-Bans.

  Every time she saw the man, she had to suck in a breath and remind her heart to keep beating. A couple days’ worth of stubble dusted his chin, while those damnable sunglasses kept his eyes hidden from her view. Coupled with thigh-hugging jeans and a worn pale-blue T-shirt featuring a logo for a beer company, the whole effect was . . .

  Devastating. In that sexy guy-next-door kind of way.

  And she was not interested. At all. The last thing she needed to complicate an already complicated life was a man. But a part of her wouldn’t mind spending a few hours finding inventive ways to forget the growing list of DIY projects.

  Oh yeah. That would relieve her stress. And then some. Her face heated and she hoped like hell he hadn’t overheard her conversation with the dog and couldn’t see the crimson burning up her cheeks.

  “Your dog is over at my house,” he said, before she uttered a word.

  “My dog?” Olivia glanced down at her feet. Miss Sadie had plopped her tiny butt on the entry rug, tail swishing back and forth, an invitation for the guest to come in and play. “She’s right here.”

  He arched a brow. “That? That’s not a dog. That’s a hairball.”

  “Hey—”

  “Sorry, hairball,” he said to Miss Sadie with a tender tone, then lifted his gaze to Olivia’s. “I meant that other dog. The one you keep tearing up my yard to find.”

  He’d found the golden? Relief surged in Olivia’s chest. For a while there, she’d worried the dog might have died. Olivia put a hand to her heart. “Oh, thank God. I’ve been putting food out and calling him every day.”

  “I know. I hear you.”

  “Sorry.” She gave him a teasing grin. “Am I disturbing your beauty sleep?”

  “That’s a lost cause for me.” He shifted his weight from foot to foot, then grimaced and extended his hand. “Anyway, if I don’t at least introduce myself, I’ll catch hell from my grandmother. Luke Winslow.”

  “Olivia Linscott, in . . . in case you forgot.”

  “I didn’t forget your name, Olivia.”

  The four syllables of her name rolled off his tongue like a song. Very, very nicely. Her face heated, and she cleared her throat before she shook his hand. He had a warm, firm grip. “Greta’s grandson, right?”

  “Guilt by DNA.” Something that could almost be a smile—but wasn’t—flickered on his face. “She says she knows you.”

  Olivia nodded. “I work over at Golden Years, me and Miss Sadie. I love your grandmother. She’s a hoot. And a half.”

  “A barrel of trouble is what she is.” He let out a snort of amusement that contradicted his words, then thumbed toward his house. “Anyway, I think you’re right about that dog being hurt. I don’t know anything about dogs or taking care of one, so you need to come get it.”

  “Okay, let me grab my keys.”

  Luke started down the front steps, moving slow, cautious. The second tread creaked a warning before cracking under his weight, but the step held. He turned back. “You should get that thing fixed before someone gets hurt. In fact, this whole porch sounds like it’s about to fall off.”

  “It’d save me some demo work if it did.” She grabbed her keys off the table by the door. “I would fix that step if I knew how to use a power drill. Or a receptacle saw. Or—”

  “Receptacle saw?” Confusion arched his brow, and then he chuckled. “Do you mean a reciprocating saw?”

  “Whatever it’s called, it sure isn’t reciprocating with cutting when I use it.”

  “Maybe it doesn’t like you.”

  “Or maybe it’s just stubborn. Like most men.” She blew her bangs out of her face as she stepped onto the porch. Miss Sadie barked disagreement about being left behind, but Olivia wasn’t going to chance spooking the golden again. Geckos scattered across the walkway, and in the distance, birds called to each other. “If I had the money, I’d hire someone to do all this. I thought it would be easier. I thought—”

  As Olivia tugged the door shut behind her, the handle popped off in her hands, slipped out of her fingers, and dropped to the porch. Hardware followed in a clatter of metal on wood.

  The last straw fell in an almost imperceptible whisper.

  Tears blurred her vision. Tears of frustration and regret and worry and a million other emotions. It was hot, she was tired, and there was a ceiling fan in pieces on her living room floor. Her bank account was bordering on anorexic, and the list of things the house still needed ballooned more every second. Before she could stop them, the tears spilled over in a noisy snuffle.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Luke said.

  She sniffled and swiped at her face. Oh damn. The last thing she wanted to do in front of a near-stranger was break down. “Crying. I’m sorry. It’s been a really bad day and this house, this move . . . it’s not going how I expected.” Though she made a valiant effort to suck it up and quit crying, the tears refused to stop.

  “Cut it out, will you?”

  She didn’t. She couldn’t. The dam had broken, and there was no plugging it again. She tried to apologize again—the man barely knew her and here she was, a blubbering mess—but it came out as a choked sob.

  “Oh, hell.” He hesitated, then took a step forward and placed a hand on her arm. The touch lasted a second, no more. A second of heat, of connection. “Do you have any duct tape?”

  “Wh . . . what?” She blinked, fat teardrops blurring her vision. “Did you say duct tape?”

  “Slap some duct tape on, and your problem’s solved. It works for everything. Electrical, plumbing, structural.”

  “I . . . I don’t have any duct tape.” Apparently she hadn’t bought everything in Home Depot.

  “I’ll make you a deal. Get that dog out of my kitchen and I’ll give you some. I’ve got an extra roll . . . or ten.”

  “Because you’re a guy, right?”

  “Of course. It comes with the testosterone. In fact, they hand it out at puberty.”

  She laughed, and finally the tears stopped. They started walking down the sidewalk, in the kind of odd comfortable stroll between two people who didn’t know each other but had something in common, even if it wasn’t much more than a zip code.

  Luke intrigued her. This handsome, mysterious, wounded man with an
attitude the size of Toledo, tempered by a soft spot for dogs and damsels in distress. There was something very, very appealing about that. Either that or her hormones had kicked into overdrive when he showed up.

  “So you work at the retirement home with Miss Sadie?” he said. “Is she a therapist too?”

  “Sort of. She’s my bichon frise, aka ‘the hairball,’ as you dubbed her. She and I are a registered team, doing animal-assisted therapy.”

  “So she’s a useful hairball, huh?” He paused when he crossed from the concrete sidewalk to the crushed-shell driveway. “What’s animal-assisted therapy? Is the dog doing all the heavy lifting?”

  “Not exactly. Sometimes, patients living in retirement homes, nursing homes, rehabs, have trouble getting excited about therapy. They’re in pain, or they’re depressed, or just plain unengaged. Animals can bridge that divide, and not just get people smiling, but encourage them to interact. There’s something about handing Miss Sadie a dog biscuit that’s so much more fun and rewarding than handing a therapist a toothbrush.”

  He considered that, then nodded. “And sometimes, people who don’t want to talk will talk to a dog instead of a person.”

  “Exactly. A lot of these patients had to give up their pets when they moved into Golden Years, and just seeing Miss Sadie can change their attitudes. Studies have shown that spending time with a dog can lower blood pressure, reduce anxiety, and just increase overall well-being. It’s amazing how much a little ten-pound dog can do.”

  “Too bad she can’t use duct tape.”

  Olivia grinned. “For a guy who doesn’t say much, you really know how to deliver a punch line.”

  He headed down the driveway, pulverizing shells along the way. “That’s me. A man of few words, and even fewer witty comments.”

  “Put that in a personals ad and you’ll attract every woman in the tri-county area.”