The Women of Bayberry Cove

“Look, while you’re joking about skirmishes with copper pipes, I’m fighting real germ warfare. Do you think I could come in and use the universal antidote to all this grime?”

“What’s that?”

“Soap, Mr. Chemist. Plain old bacteria-eating soap. There is soap in this place, right?”

He moved aside. “Oh, sure. Plenty of soap.”

She stepped through the door while digging her car keys out of her pocket. Her first look at the interior of the small kitchen confirmed the plumber’s story. Sections of old pipe and numerous tools stood in puddles of murky water on the floor in front of an open cabinet, along with various lengths of shiny new PVC tubes waiting to replace their worn-out predecessors.

Louise picked her way across the disaster area and turned around. “Can you do me a favor? My car’s out front. Would you bring in the smaller of the two suitcases from the trunk?”

“Bring in a suitcase?”

She almost laughed at the expression on his face. “Don’t panic. I won’t disturb your work. I’m not moving in this minute. I haven’t even signed a lease yet. But I do need to change clothes.” She tossed the keys, and he snatched them in midair. “Good reflexes, chemist. I’ll be in the bathroom.”

WESLEY FLETCHER DIDN’T like chaos in his life. He’d spent years eliminating as much of it as possible from his daily routines. He started every day with the same rituals. He ate his meals at the same times. He hardly ever watched a new show on television, preferring a select number of tried and true ones.

That’s why he was determined to fix the pipes in Buttercup Cottage before it was time to prepare dinner. He glanced at his watch as he walked around the side of the house. He had only two hours left to accomplish the task, or after eating his thick, juicy T-bone, he’d be cleaning the broiler in the bathroom sink. This day would have gone so much better if the one plumber in Bayberry Cove hadn’t told him it would be forty-eight hours before he could make a house call.

And now Wesley was carting a suitcase weighing at least twenty pounds back to his home, where a half-crazy lady was occupying his bathroom and making claims about moving in. That was chaos of a sort that could turn his already cockeyed day upside down.

It wasn’t that he didn’t owe her a favor. He did. Nearly drowning her in liquid muck was a pretty nasty thing to do to a woman. A woman whose clothes and demeanor indicated she was not from around here. And that was the biggest mystery of all. Who was she and where had she come from?

He entered the house and set the suitcase by the bathroom door. Tapping lightly to get her attention, he realized he didn’t even know her name. “Ma’am?”

She opened the door about ten inches and, now hatless, presented him a view of a face that could rival any movie star’s. “Call me ma’am one more time, chemist, and I may have to slug you. The name’s Louise.”

Through the opening he saw her reflection in the small mirror over the bathroom sink. For the last twenty years he’d lived by a code that, had this particular situation actually been in the books, would surely have demanded that he look away. But he didn’t. His gaze was riveted to a smooth ivory spine that curved delicately to what was no doubt a well-proportioned posterior. Unfortunately, verification of that hypothesis was impossible, since that body part was abruptly cut off by the end of the mirror.

“So what’s yours?” she asked him.

He snapped his attention back to her face. “My what?”

“Name,” she coaxed. “I should at least know who to send the bill for my new pants.”

Maybe she wasn’t kidding. He couldn’t tell. Maybe he should buy her new pants. He didn’t know the protocol for this circumstance. But he did know his name, and he told her. “Wesley Fletcher.”

“Okay, then, Wesley. Move away from the door so I can open it and get my case inside.”

He went back to the kitchen and scowled at the sink. His first day back in Bayberry Cove was certainly not going according to plan.

LOUISE TWISTED THE TAILS of her floral print blouse into a knot at her waist and zipped up her peach-colored shorts. She brushed her hair, gathered it at her crown and whipped the mass through a thick elastic band. In her mind she listed all the details she should consider before contacting Haywood Fletcher about renting the cottage. “Obviously some repairs are needed,” she mumbled to herself, and then froze with her hand on the doorknob.

“Haywood Fletcher!” she said aloud. “The guy just said his name was Wesley Fletcher. He’s no clumsy, blue-eyed plumber. He’s Haywood’s son, the navy man who Jamie said might have his sights set on my cottage.”

She left the bathroom prepared to negotiate for Buttercup Cottage. Finding her adversary flat on his back under the sink, she tapped the sole of his sneaker with her big toe. He pushed himself out and sat up, leaving his cap behind collecting drops of water from the faucet above.

Draping well-muscled arms over bent knees, he looked at her for a second and then ran tapered fingers over close-cropped, wheat-colored hair.

“Damn.” He groped under the sink and retrieved his cap. The gold insignia had taken on the same rusty hue as Louise’s capris, and he frowned at the ruined embroidery.

“Looks pretty bad,” Louise said, allowing herself a little smile. “I know how you feel.”

“I have others.”

“Navy officer issue, right?”

He nodded and stood up. “You look better.”

“I think I washed off anything that might enter my bloodstream and communicate a fatal disease.”

He smiled. “I apologize again. I really didn’t see you. The back door was just the easiest way to dump the corroded water, and I never expected anyone to be outside.”

“Isn’t this the type of town where folks just pop up on their neighbors’ doorsteps for a piece of apple pie?”

He smiled again, revealing even, straight teeth. “In town I suppose that’s true, but out here on the sound, visitors are pretty rare. Besides, nobody knows I’m here. This place has been vacant for so long there’s not a soul who would have a reason to stop.”

“Except for me, you mean.”

“I guess except for you, and I’m a little curious about why you’re here.” He went to an old wooden kitchen table and lifted the lid on a red cooler. He pulled a can of Coke from a pool of melting ice and held it out to her.

She sat on one of the four spindle-back chairs—the one with all its spindles—and popped the top. “I wouldn’t have snuck up on you except I didn’t see a car when I drove up.”

He opened a can for himself, sat across from her and nodded toward the backyard. “My Jeep’s in the shed. I put it there because the salt in the air can be rough on the paint.”

They each took a few sips of soda before Wesley spoke again. “So…why are you here? And even more important, I suppose, who are you?”

She set her Coke down and folded her hands. “My name’s Louise Duncan. I’m a friend of Vicki Soren—” She stopped when she realized she was about to give Vicki’s maiden name, the one she’d used until six months ago. “Make that Vicki Malone.”

“Malone?” He nodded in recognition. “Jamie’s wife? The one who married him so he could get a green card all those years ago?”

“That’s the one.”

“My dad told me those two found each other after something like thirteen years. He said he had a hand in keeping them together after all that time.”

Louise scoffed. “I guess you could say that. I was Vicki’s lawyer, and I drafted the faultless divorce settlement she presented to Jamie. And then your daddy took it upon himself to concoct a number of loopholes. No offense to your father, but he’s a crafty old buzzard.”

Wesley chuckled. “None taken. In the Fletcher family, that’s a compliment.” He eyed her over the top of his can as he took a long swallow. “So you’re a lawyer?”

“That’s right.” She looked directly at him. “And I’ve heard every shark and bottom-feeding joke you can think of, so you can keep them to yourself.”

He affected an innocent shrug. “Believe me, I wasn’t going to make any cracks.”

She relaxed. “Okay then. Now as for why I’m here in Bayberry Cove, I’m on vacation, sort of.” Seeing no reason to delay the inevitable, she announced, “And I’ve come to Buttercup Cottage because I want to rent it for a couple of months.”

He set the can down with a metallic thump. “Sorry. It’s not available.”

“Why not?”