Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 76517 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76517 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
“I’m meeting with my attorney at three,” he says. “Trying to kill a couple of hours.”
“Your attorney?” I ask. It’s happening. He’s actually doing this. Not that I doubted him, but a part of me hoped maybe he’d get to know me a little better first and get to know my situation before moving full speed ahead with kicking me out.
“Yes.” Our eyes meet. “I told you, the house is legally mine, and I’m going through the proper channels. Did I not make myself clear the first time?”
I swallow the hardness in my throat.
“We completely redid the electric,” I say. “Which was thirty grand. And we did some foundation repair, which was ten grand. We ordered cabinets. That was another thirty grand. But they haven’t installed them yet because they were waiting for us to refinish the floors in the kitchen and bathrooms. If I walk away now, they get to keep that money. We also ordered several thousand in light fixtures—which are in storage. The rest of the money—as far as I know—is sitting in an account in Donovan’s name at Arcadia Grove Savings and Loan, and they won’t let me access it since we weren’t married and my name wasn’t on the account.”
“Wait, wait, wait. You gave him more than seventy grand of your personal savings and let him put it in an account in his name?”
I take a breather. “It’s not that simple.”
The heaviness of his stare pulls my attention back to him.
“Your brother lied to me,” I add. “He took my money, put it in an account that only he could access . . . and then he died.”
Lachlan’s full lips press into a flat line as he exhales. I’m not sure if he feels sorry for me or if he thinks I’m the world’s biggest fool at the moment. Either way, it doesn’t matter. What’s done is done, and he doesn’t owe me a thing.
“I can get you your money back,” he says. “Once I get through probate, I’ll have access to everything of his.”
“I don’t even know if there’s much left at this point. Most of it’s wrapped up in the house.”
His posture shifts.
“I take it the house means entirely different things to each of us,” Lachlan says.
Placing my hand over my heart, I say, “I know it’s where you grew up, but it was where Donovan and I were building our life together before. Now that he’s gone, I’ve got no reason to stay in Arcadia Grove. At least let me fix it up and give it the renovation it deserves. Then we can sell it and split the profits? Actually, I don’t even need the profits; I just want to get my initial investment out of it so I can move back to Chicago.”
“What makes you think I want to sell it?”
My nose wrinkles. “Oh. Did you want to live there?”
“Not at all.”
I’m confused. “Then what do you want with it?”
Last I checked, the place assessed at forty grand—mostly due to its deteriorating condition. The city was on the verge of condemning it until we stepped in and promised to restore it to its full glory.
“I want to burn it down,” he says.
My stomach sinks, and I study his face, waiting for some indication that he’s messing with me, but his stoic expression remains.
“You can’t be serious,” I say. That house might represent a mixed bag of emotions for me right now, but it doesn’t deserve to burn to the ground. All that history, all that hard work, all that potential . . .
“Unfortunately, Blue Eyes, I am.” He heads for the register, but I cut him off halfway there.
“But why? Why would you want to destroy a perfectly good home? I mean, it’s not perfectly good yet, but it will be. Another family should get a chance to enjoy it and make their own memories there.”
“I have my reasons.” He steps around me and continues on. After placing his greeting card on the glass countertop, he then reaches for his wallet.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t allow that.”
Lachlan waves his Visa and points to the iPad as if to silently tell me to stay on task, but I’m too astounded to function right now.
“Wouldn’t that be arson?” I ask.
“Not if I donate it to the fire department. They’ll do a controlled burn and use it for training.”
“I don’t understand . . .”
“And you don’t need to.” He taps the card and glances at the iPad screen. “Looks like I owe you three ninety-five and tax. Should I ring myself up or . . .?”
I swipe his card with trembling hands and complete the transaction.
“What did that house ever do to you?” I ask.
While Donovan and I only lived together in that house for a couple of months, he told me enough stories about it to fill an encyclopedia. The first night we arrived, he led me around by the hand, giddy as a schoolboy, as he showed me his childhood bedroom, where his initials were scratched into the back of the closet door. He then pulled me outside, where he demonstrated how he used to climb the big pine tree in the backyard. When he was finished, he was covered in sap and smelled like Christmas, but every part of him was a contagious sort of shiny and euphoric. He also showed me the red peony bushes his mother had planted decades before along the east side of the house, the shed where his father used to work on his welding projects, and the peg in the garage where his favorite bicycle—an emerald-green Schwinn—used to hang.