The House on Olive Street Read Online Free

too late to become aunts. Even holidays, from the Fourth of July to Christmas, found the place a haven for family and friends. Since Beth’s husband traveled often and both Elly and Sable were unmarried, it was only Barbara Ann who was booked for all family occasions. Gabby’s had become a writers’ house, a women’s house. They had somehow managed to keep each other pumped up and productive despite the fact that no two of them wrote inthe same genre…or perhaps it was that very diversity that kept them stimulated and interested in one anothers’ work. And their mutual support had gone far beyond their works; they shored each other up through every personal crisis of their daily lives.
    The house on Olive Street, Elly assumed, would be sold. And the friends, altogether too different to be close friends in the first place, would scatter without Gabby to hold them together.
    “I don’t even want to think what all we’re losing today,” Elly said.
    “Looks like you’re stuck with me,” Sable consoled.
    Elly peered at her over the top of her glasses. “But look at what you’re stuck with.”

TWO
    S able didn’t speak to Dorothy after they dropped off Elly and the dog. She left her in the backseat, clutching her purse like someone was about to steal it, and drove in silence all the way back to Hidden Valley, forty miles from Elly’s. Sable had always taken extra pains to treat Dorothy companionably, something she hadn’t done for other employees, but her efforts went unrewarded. The woman never responded.
    Sable had hired Arthur and Dorothy, a retired couple, four years ago. In addition to a little house on her property, she gave them a good salary and benefits. Arthur was sweet, handy with the yard and simple household repairs, friendly and a little too talkative. He often voiced his appreciation for this arrangement. Arthur was not the greatest gardener and handyman, but he was kind. Dorothy, by comparison, was the best housekeeper and cook she’d ever had. It was a challenge to find a speck of dust, a smear or smudge. But Dorothy did not stretch herself. There was nothing extra to be got from the woman. She frowned from morning to night; she rarely spoke; she never said thank you—not even for gifts. On those evenings when Sable told Dorothy she was notvery hungry and would fix herself some salad later in the evening, Dorothy would nod and walk away. Sable did not once venture to the refrigerator to find that a salad had been thoughtfully prepared for her.
    Sable parked in the drive behind her house. She popped the trunk and left Dorothy to worry about all the grocery sacks by herself. She grabbed her purse, slammed her car door and stomped toward the house. “She was my best friend,” she said aloud to herself. “To not even offer condolences is just fucking cruel.” Sable decided then, for the hundredth time, that she was going to fire them. Too bad about sweet old Art, but she’d had enough of that sourpuss. “Why couldn’t I have hired a goddamn Hazel? Why the hell do I even try with her?”
    She entered the house through the kitchen, the shining white kitchen. The house spread softly before her—thick white carpet, flashes of rose, violet, steel-gray, a tiny dash of soft blue and pale peach. And glass, lots of glass. Her house sat on a foothill lakeshore lot so that the great room and dining room, where she entertained guests, faced the lake. There were French doors along the lakeside wall that led to the deck, and from the deck there were stairs and walks that led down across the plush, manicured lawn to the lake. The back of the house contained the kitchen, laundry and a large, pleasant room that Sable could not bring herself to identify as a family room. All this faced the back property—yard, patio, pool, spa and sauna, guest house and Arthur and Dorothy’s cottage. There were two guest rooms in the main house divided by a bath on the east end. The private drive came around the lake and up