Aloha With Love Read online

  Grace fingered the pearl necklace strung around her slender neck. “Actually, May had something else in mind.” A smile tugged at the corner of her lips. “She left the house, and thus all of her assets, to Jenna and Sarah.”

  Sarah and Jenna stared dumbfounded at each other for the space of a few breaths. Jenna had to blink a few times before she was sure she’d heard Grace right.

  “The house?” they both echoed.

  “The place is a wreck!” Sarah added.

  Jim cleared his throat. “Sarah!”

  Sarah spread her hands out before her. “Sorry, Dad. But after Aunt May moved into the retirement home ... the house sort of fell apart.”

  Unfamiliar tension filled the space between her father and her sister, and Jenna cut in before it could implode. “Ms. Miller, did Aunt May say what she wanted us to do with the property? Are we supposed to sell it?”

  “How could we even consider selling it?” Jim’s voice was thick with emotion. “She was like a mother to you girls after your mom passed, and May’s house is all we have left of her now.”

  “But it’s a house,” Sarah argued. “And it’s a lot of house. We can’t just—”

  Grace stacked her papers sharply on the desk, capturing the family’s attention. “To answer your question, Jenna—” She cut her eyes at Jim, and then Sarah. “If you decide to sell the house, then she wanted you and your sister to split the proceeds. But, there is one condition.”

  A condition? Jenna blinked. “What?”

  “If you girls want to sell the house, Jenna has to renovate it first.”

  The sisters shared another surprised look. This time, Jim joined.

  “Renovate the house?” Jenna shifted her gaze from Sarah to Grace and back. She didn’t have time for this. Taking a few days off to mourn and handle family matters was one thing, but Patti would expect her back in the office pronto. There were designs to finish, pitches to perfect, clients to land. Dreams to achieve. She could pause her life in the city for a day or two, but a month wouldn’t be nearly long enough to revive her Aunt May’s estate. Not even close. “I live in Los Angeles. Taking time off to stay in Maui and renovate May’s house isn’t exactly in the plan.”

  Grace gave her a patient, if a tiny bit condescending, smile. “I’m afraid May’s will is rather specific. You have to supervise the work. Otherwise, the house cannot be sold.”

  Jenna swung her gaze back to Sarah for help, who shrugged. “If you think about it ... it’s kind of the perfect plan, Jen. You’re an amazing architect and designer.”

  Jenna huffed. “What’s not perfect is I have a job twenty-five hundred miles away I have to get back to. Aunt May knew that, too. I don’t understand what she was thinking. Renovating her house could take weeks. Months.” She shot her eyes to her sister. “Why not Sarah?”

  Sarah bristled beside her, and Jenna hoped she hadn’t taken umbrage. Just because Sarah was a full-time stay-at-home mom didn’t mean she wasn’t busy with her own life, although Jenna couldn’t imagine what could possibly occupy her time.

  “Seriously, Jenna? I do spatulas, not hammers. I wouldn’t know the first thing about renovations, not even enough to supervise. That’s all you.”

  Though Sarah hadn’t said it, Jenna heard the implied, “And Dad.” The sisters had danced around the divide between them—how Jenna had been a daddy’s girl with her hammers and tools while Sarah had been closer to their mother and her love of baking—but never had it seemed so stark as it suddenly did at this moment. It would seem Aunt May’s house wasn’t the only thing in need of a bit of renovation, but Jenna hardly had time to think about her relationship with her sister now.

  “I haven’t held a hammer in years,” she said, hoping to ward off her sister’s ever-tightening glare. “I don’t understand, Grace.”

  Grace slipped her papers back inside her leather portfolio and closed it with an authoritative snap. “Regardless, these are May’s wishes. The will says once Jenna’s done with the work, you girls can do whatever you want with the house. Rent it. Sell it. Live in it. Your choice.”

  Jenna rose from the couch to pace the length of the small room. How was she possibly going to deal with this? Perhaps her aunt had put too much faith in her. After all, she couldn’t even sell her own ideas—how was she going to live up to May’s? “But—”

  “Jenna,” Grace interrupted. She lifted a hand into the air as if her delicate wrist and five slender fingers could ward off the hundreds of questions and contingencies already queuing up in Jenna’s mind. “In my very first case, a man left his prized possession—a 1957 Chevy—to his youngest, thirty-year-old, unemployed son who didn’t even have a driver’s license. His three other grown sons did, and by all accounts were successful men who loved cars. We were all scratching our heads, but within a few weeks the youngest son had his driver’s license and applied for a job so he could make money to maintain the car. He’s been driving that car around town ever since.”

  “Mr. Hayes?” Jenna asked, thinking of the older gentleman a few years ahead of her father’s age who’d driven by when she’d arrived yesterday morning. Everyone who’d grown up on the island knew the old man and his car. It didn’t matter what time of year it was—he was always out and about in the old Chevy.

  “That’s right. And the car looks as good as it did the day he got it. The point is, there’s a reason May left things the way she did. A will is a request—a way for those who have passed to affect those who live on.”

  With a sigh, Jenna sat back down and resisted the urge to wring her hands. She really needed to get back to the city, but she also didn’t want to disappoint Aunt May—or dishonor her last request.

  Thanks, Aunt May. It didn’t look like she had any options. At least it was a renovation, not a reconstruct. A renovation wasn’t a new build and it didn’t require her usual attention to architectural design, but it was a job—and all jobs had a finish line. They also needed a team. “I’ll need help finding a contractor.”

  Grace’s lips tightened into a line, as if she were biting back a secret. “That’s already been taken care of. Your aunt was very specific about whom she wanted to assist you with the renovation.”

  Electricity prickled along Jenna’s skin, causing little goose bumps to rise along her flesh. She was the architect here. The contractor should be her choice. “What if I don’t like him?”

  “May was always a good judge of character,” Jim assured her. He laid a finger on Jenna’s arm, smoothing away the goosebumps. “She was right about Darren,” he added knowingly.

  “Aunt May didn’t like Darren either?” The empty space on Jenna’s ring finger went cold. Apparently, her whole family had disapproved of her ex, but all had seen fit to let her figure it out on her own. Was she really so hard-headed—or had she just not been paying attention?

  There was mischief in her father’s eyes. “She would never tell you herself, but she knew he was no good.”

  “So, what are you going to do?” asked Sarah from Jenna’s side. Her sister’s voice was devoid of the soft warmth their father’s had. Instead, her tone was cold and hard, and more than a little impatient.

  “It’s Aunt May’s last wish,” Jenna relented. “I don’t really have a choice.”

  Grace slid a piece of paper across the coffee table to Jenna to sign, acknowledging her aunt’s will had been shared and she understood the conditions of her inheritance. She signed.

  Chapter Nine

  “I don’t get it. Why would Aunt May leave me a giant, dilapidated house I wouldn’t be able to live in even if it were livable?”

  Jenna had slept on Grace’s surprise news, and yet Aunt May’s last wishes still hadn’t become any clearer. Slept on is a bit of an exaggeration, she thought. It was true. In fact, Jenna had barely slept at all, her mind too busy to relax, much less fall asleep, with all the questions she wished she had answers for piling up. She’d spent half the night tossing and the other half turning, and by the time the sun had pee
ked over the horizon, Jenna had already been on her third cup of tea in her sister’s kitchen and was still just as confused in the morning sun as she’d been when she went to bed the night before.

  “It just doesn’t make any sense,” she continued, looping Sarah into the conversation as her sister made her way into the kitchen. Her sister dropped into the chair across from Jenna with a yawn.

  “No matter how I try to puzzle it out, I can’t figure out why May would leave us the house. No,” she corrected. “I guess leaving us the house I can understand, but why require we fix it up before selling it?” Jenna shook her head and moved on to cup number four, draining what was left in the kettle into her teacup. She reached for the sugar bowl and scooped another heaping spoonful into her mug. At this point, she needed all the energy she could get, even if it came with a bunch of unnecessary calories. “Why put so much energy—and so much hassle—into something neither one of us plans to keep? It just seems like a monumental waste of time and resources.”

  “She loved her house.” Sarah’s voice was still thick from sleep as she mumbled through a second yawn. She stretched and yawned again, then reached for the kettle and attempted to pour herself a mug. Empty. Shooting her sister the evil eye, Sarah pushed herself up from the table and shambled to the sink to refill the pot. “Remember, you and Dad would be over there all the time fixing stuff up. Aunt May liked it in top condition, but with a house that size—and age—it was a lot even back then, and that doesn’t even take into consideration the rest of the property. With you gone and Dad getting older, the house and everything else kind of fell into disrepair, especially after we talked her into moving into the assisted living center.”

  Sarah paused, considering, and her face darkened. “I’m sure Aunt May felt the house deserved better, like she wanted everyone’s memory of her home to be like it used to be. Maybe she thought being the architect in the family, fixing it up would mean something to you.”

  Jenna followed the sugar by adding a little more cream into her mug, hoping it would take away the bitterness clinging to the roof of her mouth. The way Sarah spoke, it sounded like she was blaming her ... but what for? Moving to the city? Living her life elsewhere while Sarah was still in the suburbs, taking care of their dad on top of her own family? For not being around to look after Aunt May’s house?

  She avoided Sarah’s gaze as her sister dropped into her chair across the table. The last thing Jenna wanted to do was argue. Not now, not right after losing Aunt May. And not coming off a night of no sleep. “May wants me to do the renovation, but she left the house to both of us. You’re part of this, too. We could use your help.”

  “You think it was easy for me?” The sound of sleep was gone from Sarah’s voice. “I felt left out when you and Dad went off to work on her house. Always just the two of you. Not me.”

  Jenna’s shoulders tightened. “Why didn’t you come? You were always welcome.”

  Sarah shrugged, sipping from the mug she’d brought back to the table with her. “Because it wasn’t for me, really. I never saw the fun in all that banging and painting and sawing. I just wanted to be included, I guess. It was easier for me to stay back with Mom. Being with her in the kitchen was how I discovered my thing, even if it didn’t exactly amount to anything special.”

  “Baking.” Tears stung behind Jenna’s eyes. Growing up, Jenna had gotten all the time with their dad and Aunt May, but Sarah had been closer to their mom. Jenna had always envied the relationship her older sister had with their mother, and after Nancy Burke had passed away, Jenna had always thought she’d never really gotten to know her mom—not like Sarah had. Jenna had been a teenager, but Sarah had already headed off to college and taking years’ worth of memories with her that Jenna had never had time to make. She’d never considered how Sarah might envy the relationship she’d built with their father and aunt in the same way Jenna had Sarah’s relationship with their mother. Apparently, they’d both envied what the other had.

  “Do you know why I used to love to go over there and help Dad fix stuff?” Jenna asked.

  Sarah shook her head, hiding her expression behind a sip of tea.

  “Because Aunt May always made cookies and lemonade. It was all about the cookies and lemonade. You got that gift from her and Mom, not me.”

  An unexpected smirk pushed the shadows out of her sister’s face. “And it’s just a coincidence you eventually became an incredibly successful architect while I became a stay-at-home mom and home baker.”

  Jenna clicked her tongue. “An architect, yes. But I don’t know about the incredible part—or successful.”

  “Why would you say that?”

  “I presented a project the other day for a luxury condominium. It was perfect. I did everything right, gave the potential investor everything they asked for and more. I poured my soul into the concept. But in the end, they went with a competing proposal. Want to know why?”

  It felt good to get this out, to share the disaster that was Terrace Pines and Orville Barrington with someone other than people who had a vested interest in the project. No matter how supportive Patti had been, at the end of the day she was still Jenna’s boss, not her friend. She’d tell Jenna to work harder, that losing deals happened every day, but none of it really made her feel any better. Kind of made her feel worse, actually. She wasn’t sure how she felt about having to work so hard only to face the possibility of constant disappointment.

  At least you don’t have Darren’s opinion to worry about anymore. The thought burned.

  “Will it make me angry?” Sarah asked, big sister voice fully engaged.

  “Furious,” Jenna promised. “After I pitched, a competing firm came in ten percent under budget. I was only five. Five percent under, instead of ten. But my proposal would have saved them a ton of money down the line—far more than a lousy extra five percent. The little bit of difference upfront would have been pennies in the bucket the first time they looked at a balance sheet. Didn’t matter. The investors had absolutely no foresight, just looked at the number and walked.”

  “You’re right, that’s ridiculous,” her sister agreed. “You’d think investors would be more interested in long-term earnings than making a quick buck.”

  “You’d think.”

  “I’m sorry, Jen.” There was a pause. “You never told me about the cookies and lemonade.”

  Jenna sighed. “The moral of the story is that spending all that time with Dad and Aunt May working on the house helped me grow into who I am, even if I’m still working to achieve my particular dream. Maybe it’s the same way for you—you have so much talent. I think you could make a brick taste like heaven.” She paused to consider her words, and her stomach rumbled. “I miss Mom’s blondies.”

  Sarah smiled for the first time that morning. “They were one of my favorites too. I know the recipe by heart. I’ll make them for you.”

  “You would? Thanks.”

  Sarah sniffed. “You’re going to need every advantage you can get. You have your work cut out for you with Aunt May’s house.”

  “So, I take it you’re not coming along this time either? I can teach you how to swing a hammer.”

  “Oh, not a chance,” Sarah shot back. “You renovate. I’ll keep you stocked with baked goods and sugar.”

  “The house can’t be that bad,” Jenna wondered aloud. “Can it?”

  

  Apparently, it could. In fact, the condition of Aunt May’s once-beautiful home was worse than Jenna could have imagined. She had expected the home to need a bit of maintenance, a definite scrub and shine, but this...

  “Wow.” Jenna stopped beside her sister in front of Aunt May’s home and stared. If she hadn’t been looking at the house with her own eyes, she’d never have believed it. May’s house wasn’t a home anymore. It was a ruin.

  Sarah exhaled a deep sigh and grabbed Jenna’s hand, pulling her onward. “Told you.”

  Jenna had a hard time putting her thoughts into words as she let he
rself be led up the rickety front steps. What she remembered as a sprawling Victorian with vibrant paint, delicate gingerbread trim, and curling ivy that crawled up front steps to wide double doors was now a ramshackle heap with peeling paint, gaping shutters, and slanted steps. The wooden wraparound porch was missing planks and several windows were either cracked or broken. Most of the trim was gone. The garden was weeds.

  So much for curb appeal. Any hope Jenna had of fixing this place up quick and getting it on the market evaporated. The house didn’t so much need renovation as it did a total overhaul. Best case scenario, they’d have to gut and redo. Worst case ... she didn’t want to think about worst case. Her dad might faint if she so much as breathed the word demolition—not to mention Aunt May would haunt her dreams forever.

  “If you listen really carefully, you can hear the structure groaning,” Sarah said.

  Jenna noticed a crack in the section of roof overhanging the porch. “No, that’s me actually groaning.”

  “It’s not so bad. Some new windows and a coat of paint, and you’re in business.”

  Jenna rolled her eyes. Now she knew why her sister was so quick to volunteer to stay home and make blondies. “You mean we’re in business.”

  Sarah wasn’t having it. “Oh, no. I told you, I don’t do hard labor. I’ve never even picked up a hammer in my life—that was always your thing, and Dad and Mike have saved me from a lifetime of manual labor ever since. I don’t even know which end of the hammer is the part you hold, and which is the part you slam down on the screw.”

  Jenna gave her sister an exasperated look. “Don’t get carried away with hyperbole, Sarah. Anyone who’s ever seen a hammer knows which is the business end, and I’m pretty sure you’ve seen a hammer. I don’t bake, and even I know there’s one on the cover of every box of Arm & Hammer baking soda.”

  Her sister lifted her hands, protesting ignorance. “All I’m saying is I have two teens at home who need more attention than the average toddler. This is all you, sister.”