high-end, puffed-up city life Heather had relocated their daughter to, Meg had retained her small-town ways, and he was grateful for it. So long as he could keep the Caroline Michauds at bay, Meg would be fine.
6
I n the still darkness, Cooper Moss shifted on the mattress, hot in nothing but a pair of boxers. The dormer sashes were as high as they’d go, but no breeze came through the screens. He’d found a fan in the garage, one of the old tanks he remembered as a kid that had lived atop dressers all summer long, and he was relieved to find it still worked, even if the blades were as loud as a propeller plane.
Staring up at the sloped ceiling and drawing in deep breaths of moist, warm pine, he could have been twelve years old again. The endless nights he’d lain awake under these eaves, listening to Hudson and his friends outside on the lawn, recently stumbled back from the beach, or holed up in one of the guest bedrooms, their laughter sailing down the hall with the faint smell of pot smoke that Hudson had told him was just candle wax, and for the longest time Cooper had believed him.
But he wasn’t twelve; wasn’t even close. His thirtieth birthday was two months away, and the house was silent, empty. No one to walk in on in the bathroom, no one to snake past on the stairs. No laughter, no fights. It was obscene, he thought. This much space for one person. As much as he loved the old house, he wasn’t sure his coming here to postpone its sale was in its best interest.
Of course, what Cooper was
really
doing in Harrisport was stalling. He had five months to come up with a first draft of a new book for his editor or be in breach of his contract. It wasn’t an unmanageable timetable—he’d written two drafts of his first novel in that time, but that manuscript had been inspired, a piece of his heart. He might have said the same about the books that had come after it. But after three Tide McGill mysteries, he was growing tired of his editor’s favorite beach-bum detective. He longed to write new characters, new settings. He hoped he’d find fresh ideas in coming back to Harrisport, but in the single day he’d been here, it seemed all he’d conjured were familiar pieces of his youth.
Like Alexandra Wright.
It had been great seeing her again. Cooper would admit he’d worried she might have had a change of heart once she’d arrived. He would have understood if she had, if the old house was too haunted for her to bear, but she’d seemed confident, not at all hesitant to step inside when he’d held the door open for her. He’d wondered whether she’d have remembered his part in that final evening in the guest house after Hudson had broken off their engagement, the kiss he, Cooper, had stolen when he’d taken her home. He
hoped
she might have remembered but he doubted it. She’d been so crushed by the heartbreak of Hudson’s dismissal—not to mention thoroughly drunk—Cooper suspected she barely remembered him there at all, let alone his ill-timed kiss.
The truth was, Cooper had never paid much attention to her those first few summers—but why would he have? When he was thirteen, girls and all the drama they seemed determined to stew in could never compete with the lure of books and the ocean. Alexandra Wright had been just a breezy, barefoot girl his brother couldn’t keep his hands off of. Then came the night Cooper found her at the guest house, a loose dory that had needed mooring before it floated out to sea.
It had been unusually stormy that last summer, raining in long stretches, relentless sheets that had filled the house with a terrible damp, sour and mildewed, like someone fanning out an old book every time a room was opened. Strangely, unfittingly, the bad weather had ceased when Laurel had come that final week in August, the arrival of Hudson’s new fiancée brightening more than the sky. Their mother’s blue eyes—up until then perpetually narrowed with displeasure—had relaxed the
6
I n the still darkness, Cooper Moss shifted on the mattress, hot in nothing but a pair of boxers. The dormer sashes were as high as they’d go, but no breeze came through the screens. He’d found a fan in the garage, one of the old tanks he remembered as a kid that had lived atop dressers all summer long, and he was relieved to find it still worked, even if the blades were as loud as a propeller plane.
Staring up at the sloped ceiling and drawing in deep breaths of moist, warm pine, he could have been twelve years old again. The endless nights he’d lain awake under these eaves, listening to Hudson and his friends outside on the lawn, recently stumbled back from the beach, or holed up in one of the guest bedrooms, their laughter sailing down the hall with the faint smell of pot smoke that Hudson had told him was just candle wax, and for the longest time Cooper had believed him.
But he wasn’t twelve; wasn’t even close. His thirtieth birthday was two months away, and the house was silent, empty. No one to walk in on in the bathroom, no one to snake past on the stairs. No laughter, no fights. It was obscene, he thought. This much space for one person. As much as he loved the old house, he wasn’t sure his coming here to postpone its sale was in its best interest.
Of course, what Cooper was
really
doing in Harrisport was stalling. He had five months to come up with a first draft of a new book for his editor or be in breach of his contract. It wasn’t an unmanageable timetable—he’d written two drafts of his first novel in that time, but that manuscript had been inspired, a piece of his heart. He might have said the same about the books that had come after it. But after three Tide McGill mysteries, he was growing tired of his editor’s favorite beach-bum detective. He longed to write new characters, new settings. He hoped he’d find fresh ideas in coming back to Harrisport, but in the single day he’d been here, it seemed all he’d conjured were familiar pieces of his youth.
Like Alexandra Wright.
It had been great seeing her again. Cooper would admit he’d worried she might have had a change of heart once she’d arrived. He would have understood if she had, if the old house was too haunted for her to bear, but she’d seemed confident, not at all hesitant to step inside when he’d held the door open for her. He’d wondered whether she’d have remembered his part in that final evening in the guest house after Hudson had broken off their engagement, the kiss he, Cooper, had stolen when he’d taken her home. He
hoped
she might have remembered but he doubted it. She’d been so crushed by the heartbreak of Hudson’s dismissal—not to mention thoroughly drunk—Cooper suspected she barely remembered him there at all, let alone his ill-timed kiss.
The truth was, Cooper had never paid much attention to her those first few summers—but why would he have? When he was thirteen, girls and all the drama they seemed determined to stew in could never compete with the lure of books and the ocean. Alexandra Wright had been just a breezy, barefoot girl his brother couldn’t keep his hands off of. Then came the night Cooper found her at the guest house, a loose dory that had needed mooring before it floated out to sea.
It had been unusually stormy that last summer, raining in long stretches, relentless sheets that had filled the house with a terrible damp, sour and mildewed, like someone fanning out an old book every time a room was opened. Strangely, unfittingly, the bad weather had ceased when Laurel had come that final week in August, the arrival of Hudson’s new fiancée brightening more than the sky. Their mother’s blue eyes—up until then perpetually narrowed with displeasure—had relaxed the
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