Far Harbor Read Online Free Page B

fantasy of a gown was gone, but not forgotten, turned into pieces of a memory quilt she’d hung over the tester bed a Melrose antique dealer had assured her had once belonged to Lilian Gish. The quilt, which had also incorporated white lace squares from her high school graduation dress, a piece of shiny black silk from a negligee her mother had worn in a movie about female vampires that had opened on Savannah’s tenth birthday, and ivory satin ribbons from her wedding bouquet, was currently packed away with other sentimental items in a cedar trunk at Jack Conway’s U-Store-It on Spruce Street.
    Fat black-and-yellow bees droned lazily around the roses. Next door the neighbor’s cat was returning from his nightly rounds of the town. Ignoring Savannah, the fat old tom curled up into a ball in a slanting sunbeam on his owner’s front porch and began washing his marmalade fur.
    A familiar car turned onto the road leading up the hill. A minute later, it pulled to a stop in front of the house; the driver’s door opened, and Lilith emerged in a graceful swirl of skirt the hue of crushed blueberries. Along with the silk skirt and tunic she also wore a necklace of hand-strung crystals, a pair of lacy webbed dream-catcher earrings and a frown that made Savannah’s stomach knot.
    Having already pinned her hopes on her admittedly ambitious project as a means of reinventing herself, Savannah didn’t know what she’d do if her mother had come bearing bad news about the lighthouse she’d already come to think of as hers.

3
    “Y ou’re certainly up and about early,” Savannah greeted her mother with far more aplomb than she felt. “I thought we weren’t scheduled to meet with Mr. Hyatt until late this afternoon.”
    “Your grandmother’s on the committee for this year’s Sawdust Festival,” Lilith divulged as she climbed the front steps, bringing with her the exotic scent of custom-blended perfume that always made Savannah think of gypsies dancing around blazing campfires.
    “She roped me into helping with entertainment, so we’re going to Port Angeles this morning to check out a couple bands and have our fortunes told by Raven Moonsilver. Raven’s a friend of mine, and since the committee’s split on whether or not to hire her to read palms, as chairman, Ida gets to cast the deciding vote.”
    Her mother’s gaze took in Savannah’s blue mug. “Thank God you’ve made coffee. While I try to stick to herbal teas these days, my system definitely needs a jump start at this ungodly hour of the morning.” She disappeared into the house.
    The thought of the always practical Ida Lindstrom having her palm read was nearly as difficult to accept as the idea of this glamorous creature, who’d periodically blazed through Raine’s and Savannah’s lives like a comet, turning her creative talents toward something as prosaic as a small-town logging festival.
    Lilith returned with a mug of steaming coffee liberally laced with cream and sat down on the top step.
    “I ran into Dan yesterday at the lighthouse,” Savannah divulged. “He’d come with John Martin to plant flowers. He mentioned something that’s been worrying me.” She paused, hoping as she had all night that she was making too much of Dan’s remarks regarding the lighthouse owner.
    “What’s that, darling?”
    “That Henry Hyatt might prove a problem.”
    Lilith took a careful sip of coffee before answering. “I’m not certain problem is precisely the word I’d use.”
    Concern stirred again, along with a niggling suspicion. “What are you holding back?”
    “Absolutely nothing.” Lilith toyed with her necklace. “The Board of Realtors would take away my license if I failed to give full disclosure on a property.”
    “Okay. Perhaps you’re not hiding anything about the lighthouse. What about the owner?”
    “You always were my more intuitive child.” Lilith’s pansy blue eyes gleamed with affection. “I believe you take after the same Celts who