Wisteria Island Read online

  Also by Rachel Hanna

  January Cove Series

  Waiting For You

  The One For Me

  Loving Tessa

  Falling For You

  Finding Love

  All I Need

  Secrets And Soulmates

  Choices Of The Heart

  Sweet Love

  Faith, Hope & Love

  Spying On The Billionaire

  Second Chance Christmas

  The January Cove Series Books 1-5 Box Set

  South Carolina Sunsets

  The Beach House

  Sunsets & Second Chances

  Fireflies & Family Ties

  The Inn At Seagrove

  The Wedding At Seagrove

  A Seagrove Christmas

  Lighthouse Cove

  Beneath The Willow Tree (Coming Soon)

  Sweet Tea B&B

  Sweet Tea Sunrise

  Sweet Tea & Honey Bees

  Sweet Tea & Wedding Rings

  Sweet Tea & Christmas Trees (Coming Soon)

  Sweet Tea B&B

  Whiskey Ridge

  Starting Over

  Taking Chances

  Home Again

  Always A Bridesmaid

  The Billionaire's Retreat

  Whiskey Ridge Boxed Set Books 1-3

  Standalone

  Back To Us

  Blue Ridge Christmas

  Wisteria Island

  Watch for more at Rachel Hanna’s site.

  Wisteria Island

  Rachel Hanna

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 1

  She stepped off the small boat, her heeled ankle boot digging into the wet sand. What a metaphor for her life. Walking into what was supposed to be a great new job opportunity, and she was already sinking. Just great.

  “Here, let me help you, ma’am,” the young man said as he jumped off the boat and grabbed her hand, steadying her before she walked right out of her brand new shoes. Why she had worn such an expensive pair was beyond her, but then again, she wasn’t exactly thinking clearly these days.

  She reached up and grabbed her large brim sun hat, trying to hold it to her head as the wind whipped around her. Who knew coastal South Carolina was this windy? She’d been to Chicago once as a kid and thought she might get swept into the sky like Dorothy from The Wizard Of Oz, but this seemed more forceful. Of course, what could she expect from an island?

  “I guess I thought there’d be a dock of some kind,” she shouted over the sound of the gusts. The wind whistled around her, sounding like a ghostly choir. Not a great omen.

  “Sorry ‘bout that. We have a small dock on the other side of the island, but the boat was a little lower on gas than I thought,” the young man said sheepishly, his southern accent thicker than most she’d heard. Having been raised in Atlanta, she’d heard plenty of accents, but she’d tried to rid herself of hers a long time ago.

  “No problem,” she muttered, just wanting to make it to the concrete parking lot she saw up the hill. He continued holding her arm until they made it there, and she kicked off her boots so she could tap them together and get rid of the sand that had already accumulated inside. Meanwhile, Jeremy - the boat driver whose name she’d just remembered - ran back to fetch her luggage. Poor guy could barely carry it all in one trip.

  He gingerly set it all down and blew out a breath. “You sure carry a lot of stuff, ma’am,” he said, forcing a smile, his chubby face red from exertion. She felt kind of bad. Kind of.

  “Sorry. Here’s a little extra something for your troubles.” She tried to hand him five dollars, but he shook his head and held up his hand.

  “We don’t do that around here, ma’am.”

  “Do what?”

  “Accept tips.”

  She stared at him, her eyebrows furrowed together in confusion. “And why is that?”

  “We believe in just helping each other. Kindness doesn’t cost a thing.”

  She smiled. “That sounds nice, Jeremy, but a man’s got to eat, right?” She slid the bill into his shirt pocket.

  “Thanks anyway, ma’am,” he said, returning it to her hand.

  Before she had the chance to try again, a man in a golf cart came screeching around the corner, almost toppling it over as he tried to avoid her luggage piled high beside her.

  “Well, you must be Dani!” he said with a larger-than-life laugh. The man was grossly overweight and way too big to be occupying the small golf cart. His hair, a mixture of black and silver with not much on top, was sticking out every direction, as if he’d never seen a hairbrush. He wore a short sleeve white dress shirt, the buttons stretched to their maximum capacity over his expansive belly. Khaki shorts, riding low below said belly, topped off the ensemble. Oh, and how could she forget the baby blue boat shoes that adorned his wide feet?

  “Danielle,” she corrected, reaching out her well-manicured hand. If there was something her mother had taught her, it was to always have a good manicurist. Sally had served her well over the years, and she hoped to find someone on the island who would do as good a job.

  “That’s a little formal for these parts,” he said, stepping out of the golf cart with a grunt loud enough to hear over the winds. She hoped it wasn’t this windy every day.

  “And you are?”

  “I’m Eddie. I guess you might call me Edward, but I sure wouldn’t answer to it!” He laughed loudly at his own joke and then coughed to catch his breath. She leaned back, unsure of what germs he might spew at her, although the wind would quickly carry anything away.

  Being raised with two doctors as parents had given her way too much information about viruses and bacteria. Her mother, a noted epidemiologist, had worked at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta for almost a decade before moving to New York City for more hands-on work at a research lab. Her father, before their big, ugly divorce, had been a neurosurgeon specializing in hard to treat brain tumors before dying of one himself six years ago. Irony wasn’t always funny.

  “Nice to meet you, Eddie,” she said, as Jeremy quickly loaded her luggage onto the back of the golf cart. After seeing Eddie’s driving capabilities, she wondered how it would stay on without flying off into the tornado-like winds. Surely, some dolphin would use her make-up bag as a flotation device before long.

  His hand, both sweaty and sticky at the same time, enveloped hers. She’d been petite her whole life, relegated to the top position of the pyramid in cheerleading and always the one everybody wanted to pick up like some kind of baby. Being only five foot two meant always needing a step stool and working hard to get anyone to take her seriously. After the year she’d had, her reputation was of great importance to her. This job would give her the opportunity to rebuild her life, if that was even possible.

  “Hop on! I’ll take you over to your cottage.” He wiggled his big body back behind the steering wheel, much to Danielle’s amazement. One button, already barely hanging on, finally popped open, his hairy belly button region on full display. She sat down next to him, her head turned so she wouldn’t see that again. “Hang on!”

  As they zipped down the small streets, the first thing Danielle noticed was how clean this place was. There were no trash bins on the streets, if they could even be called stree
ts. They were more like paved pathways, only large enough for golf carts and bicycles. Of course, there were no cars here, and certainly no easy way to get one to the island.

  At just over five-thousand acres, the small island had been uninhabited and undeveloped until three years ago when a very wealthy tech entrepreneur had come up with an idea that seemed crazy at the time. The media had a field day with it, from what Danielle found while doing her research. Of course, she’d been busy working at the hospital, so she had paid little attention to the news back then.

  Now, here she was, zipping around the island and wondering if she’d made the right choice. After all, it wasn’t like she didn’t have choices. None of them had allowed her to disappear from her problems like this one would.

  “Your place is just around this bend,” he said, reaching his arm across her chest, being careful not to actually touch her. “Hang on!” he repeated.

  She reached up and held onto a bar that stretched across the ceiling of the golf cart, not wanting to reach forward and have this strange man’s hands on her breasts. That wouldn’t have been a great way to start her first day.

  Without warning, he slammed on the brakes, coming to a screeching halt in front of a small cottage. The first word that popped into her mind was “weathered”, although that was being kind. It reminded her of when her mother had gone through that farmhouse phase, redecorating everything in their kitchen to look old and worn, even though they lived in one of the most expensive neighborhoods in Atlanta. Of course, it didn’t last. Before long, she was replacing everything with ornate gold frames and crystal chandeliers.

  This little place was truly weathered, and she didn’t understand. Everything else in sight was brand new, with bright white or yellow paint. In fact, it all looked like a movie set from the nineteen-fifties. She fully expected to see a milkman delivering on the street at any moment.

  Not surprisingly, there was also wisteria everywhere, planted in yards and sometimes running up the sides of buildings. The island was awash in purple.

  “Um, I don’t mean to be ungrateful, but…” she said slowly as Eddie slid out of the cart.

  “Yeah, she needs some fixin’, but her bones are good.”

  “Her bones?”

  “The original owner of this island, a Mr. Herman Lanafort, built this house for himself and his mistress back in nineteen-hundred and twenty-eight.”

  “His mistress?”

  “As the story goes, Mr. Lanafort was very rich. He had a mansion in Atlanta somewhere, but he bought this island to spend some… quality time… with his mistress, Roxy Lou.”

  Danielle stepped out of the cart and stood there, trying to decide between hijacking the golf cart to get back to the boat or forcing herself to stay in the abandoned hook-up shack.

  “Roxy Lou?”

  He leaned against the golf cart, his weight pushing it sideways a bit. “Legend has it that Roxy Lou was an exotic dancer.” He said it so softly, as if Roxy Lou’s family were living nearby and might beat him up. “Anyway, it all came to a tragic end in nineteen-twenty-nine when the market crashed and the Great Depression happened. Old Mr. Lanafort lost Roxy Lou to another rich man who hadn’t lost all his money. He ended up jumping off a bridge somewhere in Atlanta, and his family inherited this island.”

  “Nobody wanted it?”

  “Nope. They just kept it in the family until the current owner found out about it and bought it a few years back. And that’s how this very unique place was born!” He held out his arms like he was a proud papa, showing her his new baby.

  Trying to procrastinate about going into the rickety little cottage, she continued asking questions. “What exactly do you do here, Eddie?”

  “I’m the property manager. I used to live over on Hilton Head Island managing big condo complexes, but I enjoy this a lot more. It’s really about the people, ya know?”

  “I suppose so. How big is this island?” She knew the acreage, but that meant nothing to her in terms of how big it actually was.

  “Only about six miles long and about three miles wide. We’ve got over five-thousand acres here, give or take.”

  “Right. And how many residents?”

  “At the moment, we have about ninety-seven, although we’ve had as many as one-hundred twenty-five before. Given our age range, we lose a few from time to time,” he said, softly, his face serious for a moment. “That’s always hard.”

  “Of course.”

  “That’s why you’re here!”

  “Well, I’m definitely hoping to make a difference, but I can’t stop the hands of time.”

  He chuckled. “Sure. Well, let’s get you settled in. Sun’s about to set, so you’ll want to get ready for dinner.”

  “Oh, I’m not really hungry. I usually skip dinner.”

  He stopped in his tracks, his eyes wide. “Oh, you have to eat dinner with the residents. It’s part of the job.”

  She stared at him. “Part of the job?”

  “I’m sure the boss man will explain it all tomorrow when you meet. I guess it’d be okay for you to skip it tonight. Just don’t tell anyone I said that.”

  She grabbed two of her smaller bags while Eddie took the others, and they headed for the front door. The porch, which had seen better days, spanned the front of the cottage. Maybe she could get the wood repaired and sealed so she’d feel comfortable sitting in a chair out there for her evening coffee. Right now, she felt like she might slip straight through the rotting wood and into the sand below.

  Eddie opened the door, revealing a small, dark, musty space with furniture covered in drop cloths and tarps. She looked around, immediately regretting her decision to come to this godforsaken island.

  “Wow,” she said softly as they walked toward the back of the house. She set her bags on the kitchen counter, which seemed to be the only place not covered in dust or sand. The sound of her heels clapped against the floor, getting stuck in a hole along the way.

  “Look at that view!” Eddie proclaimed when they got to the back window. It was a nice view, unobstructed all the way to the ocean. She could now see the dock that Jeremy had mentioned. There was a small boat tied up there, maybe the one she’d ridden in on, but she hadn’t been paying close attention.

  “Very nice. Listen, Eddie, this place isn’t remotely livable.”

  Eddie turned to her and laughed, the sound echoing and bouncing around the room like a pinball. “Tell that to our last eight nurses!”

  “Wait. They lived here? And you’ve had eight in the last three years?”

  Eddie paused for a long moment, obviously wishing he could take back his previous sentence. He cleared his throat. “Well, yes, and yes. It’s been a few months since anybody lived here, though, so I’m sure it just needs a little freshening up.”

  Danielle looked down at the floor, which was covered in at least a quarter inch of white sand. “Eight nurses? Why?”

  “Well, living here has some wonderful advantages and also some unique challenges.”

  She puckered her lips and cocked her head to the side. “That was a party line statement if there ever was one. Tell me the actual truth, Eddie.”

  “Eddie? You in here?” The voice of an older woman permeated the cottage. Danielle turned to see her standing in the living room, her hands on her hips. She had to be in her eighties, but she was wearing a square dancing outfit and glittery tights, her hair dyed a pale pink and swept into a bun on top of her head.

  “Oh, hey, Janice. This is Dani, our new nurse!”

  “Danielle. It’s nice to meet you,” she said, reaching out her hand to shake Janice’s.

  “Oh, sugar, I don’t shake hands. That’s how you get germs, and I’m not ready to croak yet!”

  Danielle drew her hand back and smiled. “That’s quite an outfit.”

  Janice laughed and twirled around. “It’s the square dancing championship tonight. I’ll be darned if that old biddy, Mabel, is going to win again this season!”

  “You ha
ve square dancing seasons?”

  Janice laughed loudly. “Oh, you’ll learn the ropes here soon enough! Say, Eddie, we need you over at the dance hall to call the dances. You’re very late, you know?”

  Eddie looked down at his watch. “Oh, man! I didn’t know my watch stopped. I’ll have to get a new battery when I’m back on the mainland again. Listen, Dani, can you settle in on your own for a bit? I’ll check back with you after the championship, okay?”

  He trotted toward the door, following Janice back onto the sidewalk. “Wait! What am I supposed to do here?” she called as they hurried to the golf cart.

  Eddie just waved as they rounded the corner, Janice’s little pink bun bobbing in the breeze.

  What had she done? She turned back toward the cottage and walked inside, all the while wondering if she could possibly hot-wire the boat out back and get the heck out of this crazy place.

  No amount of cleaning was going to do it, she decided. As she wiped her brow with the back of her hand, she imagined herself standing in her old condo, all shiny and clean after the housekeeper left. The sparkling jetted tub. The shiny granite countertops in the kitchen. The hardwood floors that glistened in the bright light of the beautiful dining room fixture. Very unlike the beat-up wood floor beneath her feet right now that felt as if it would cave in at any moment.

  What had she done to her life? Just a year ago, it was all so different. She’d been at the top in her field, running the ICU unit at the best hospital in Atlanta. Working alongside her fiancé, a doctor in the same ICU, her life had been right on track.

  Sure, her mother had encouraged her to accept Richard’s proposal even though she’d had second thoughts the moment she’d said yes. She’d been dating him for almost two years, after all. It wasn’t like it was a rushed thing, but something had never felt quite right. That internal feeling she’d thought she would have when she met the love of her life just wasn’t there.