The blue shoal inn, p.1
The Blue Shoal Inn, page 1
the Blue Shoal Inn
Coral Island
Book Three
Lilly Mirren
Contents
About The Blue Shoal Inn
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 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Also by Lilly Mirren
Cast of Characters
About the Author
Free book
* * *
A FREE book as my gift to you.
The Waratah Inn
The smash hit first book in the bestselling, heartwarming series.
* * *
"Wow, this series just gets better and better. I do not want to see it end. Looking forward to the next book."
* * *
Download your copy of “The Waratah Inn”.
About The Blue Shoal Inn
The Blue Shoal Inn faces its biggest challenge yet. Will it close its doors, or will Taya find a way to save it?
Taya’s inn is under threat. Her father’s company has built a five star resort in Blue Shoal and is taking her business. She renovates the inn, as a last ditch effort to keep it afloat, but will finally have to make a decision about whether to hold onto the past or embrace the future.
When her father hires a handsome manager for his new resort, Taya wants to hate him but witnesses him do something unexpected that causes everything she thought she believed to unravel.
Rowan reconnects with his estranged stepfather, Buck, but questions still hang over Buck’s head about the murder of Penny’s grandmother. He was once a suspect, but was cleared of any wrongdoing. Still, Penny and her friends do some digging and will discover that not everything is as it seems. When, Rowan and Penny have a decision to make that could mean big changes for both of them, they'll learn a truth about their past that has been hidden for far too long.
* * *
Please note: this book is written using Australian English. Some words, spelling and phrases may be unfamiliar to you.
One
There was a slight breeze along the beach when Taya Eldridge stepped outside the Blue Shoal Inn’s back door and onto the large deck that edged the wide, sparkling blue infinity pool. She’d had the pool installed five years earlier to try to keep pace with the developments in Blue Shoal before they put her quaint seaside destination out of business. And for a while, she’d succeeded. Keeping the building updated but retaining the rustic, retro appeal of the place had made it a must-visit destination for returning families and romance-inspired couples. But times were changing.
There were no guests in the swimming pool area, since it was the end of autumn and the weather had turned cooler. The afternoon sun set the ocean ablaze as Taya slipped out of her towel and into the pool. The water was cold, but the sun still warm enough that it was pleasant to be out of doors and spending some time relaxing. She hadn’t relaxed much over the past twenty years. Caring for her sick husband, then managing their affairs and running the business after his death, had occupied all her time. But lately the inn had been quieter, with fewer guests every week. She’d had more time to herself. More time to think.
Mostly what she thought about was how to save her business and whether it was what she wanted. She’d never have believed that would be a question. It’d been her and Todd’s dream to renovate the old place when they’d bought it two decades earlier. But now that she was in her mid-forties, she was tired. It was such a struggle to keep the inn afloat. There was always something broken or needing an update, some customer complaint to follow up on. And she’d lost the zest she had for it all.
She dipped beneath the surface of the water and swam a few laps up and down the length of the pool. Her body glided through the water, her arms curving in arcs. She spun with a somersault at either end, letting the water cascade over her, the tiredness seep from her muscles and the kinks from her neck. She spent far too much time these days perched in front of her computer doing accounts and running through ledgers. What she missed was having a chance to interact with people, to get out and about and enjoy her life. She’d become something of a hermit since her husband’s death, and if it wasn’t for her girlfriends, Beatrice, Eveleigh and Penny, she’d likely never do anything fun now that her daughter Camden had left home.
Out of breath, she paused her swim to stare at the ocean. Balancing her arms along the edge of the infinity pool, she watched tourists walking the length of the beach. A few children swam near the ocean’s edge, splashing and playing. Some built sandcastles. There was a retired couple lying on towels on the sand. She seemed to recall them being in the same place hours earlier and wondered if they’d fallen asleep there. No doubt they’d be very red tomorrow.
At the other end of the beach was the resort her father had built. It was finally operational. They’d been constructing the modern white condos that stepped down the tree-covered hill for over a year, but now it was truly a thing of beauty. Taya couldn’t help admiring it even as irritation flashed through her chest. She shook her head slowly as she took in the glimpse of blue pools, the perfectly shaped palm trees, the tasteful tile roofs tilting against the hillside to help the resort fade into the bush landscape around them. She hadn’t walked through the completed resort yet— was still too angry that he’d chosen to build his latest resort only two hundred metres from her business. He knew how much the Blue Shoal Inn meant to her.
When she’d pointed out this oversight, he’d smiled and embraced her. “What’s the matter, sweetheart? Afraid of a little competition? I’m not worried—I know you have it in you. You’re an Eldridge, after all!”
His words had aggravated her beyond anything else he could’ve said because he was right — if the inn was such a good business, as she’d asserted when she reprimanded him, it should be able to stand on its own two feet, even with more competition in Blue Shoal. The tiny town couldn’t stay small forever. Gradually people were discovering it, and the more they did, the better she should profit from her tourist business, surely. That’d been her experience over the past two decades as she built a solid returning guest list — people who came back every year or two, who said it was their favourite place to holiday. She had guests who’d raised their families spending every summer at the inn and now returned regularly as grandparents. It was what she loved most about her business— she, the staff and her guests were like one big happy family.
When Dad built his insanely romantic, luxuriously appointed and extremely tempting “Paradise Resort at Blue Shoal,” their happy haven began losing guests. There were Paradise Resorts dotted all up and down the Queensland coast and around the world. Why did he have to build one here?
His argument had been that he’d always intended to build in the hamlet, since he lived here and was sick of travelling all the time. Also, he wanted the world to experience the Blue Shoal he loved. She often pointed out that the world was already enjoying the town when they stayed at her inn, but he only agreed with her. So instead of labouring the point, she’d said goodbye and taken a long run around the headland to calm her nerves.
Even as she studied the outline of the new resort, burnt pink by the setting sun, a man stepped out through a white gate and descended the staircase from the resort to the beach. He wore long black pants and a blue shirt tucked in at the waist. His shoes were in one hand and he tented the other hand over his eyes to cut the glare.
She watched him traverse the beach, unable to take her eyes off him. There was something very striking about his tall frame, black hair and business attire — he stood out from the crowd of swimsuit-wearing tourists. Who was he? She’d never seen him before. There weren’t many men who looked or dressed like that on the island, and certainly none in Blue Shoal. The local men were generally surfers or fishermen and preferred board shorts and T-shirts.
He strode in her direction, then stopped beneath her vantage point and stared up at the building behind her. She pretended to be looking out at the ocean, but snuck a glance at him every now and then. It was disconcerting the way he studied her hotel, as though he knew everything about it. Perhaps he did. When she looked at him again, she found he was gazing at her with a broad smile lighting up his handsome face.
“Enjoying the sunset?”
Her face flushed with warmth. “Yes, very much.”
“That inn is really something special,” he said, letting his gaze flicker back over the structure again. He had a soft accent and pronounced his words precisely.
She spun halfway around to look at it herself. The paint needed to be redone. The roof was clearly in need of repair, and there were parts that sagged. But the bones of the building were excellent, at least according to the inspector she’d hired to check it over every year. And she loved the intricate moulding around the windows, the steep lines of the roof. There was a character and strength to the place that she found very appealing and always had.
“They don’t make them like that anymore,” he continued. “I’d love to buy it.”
“Really?” H er heart sank. Perhaps he was an investor with an eye on her property. She had no intention of selling it. A developer would be just as likely to tear it down and rebuild a modern monstrosity in its place as they were to remodel it.
“Mmmm…” He rubbed a hand over his chin. “But I bet the owner wouldn’t sell. Apparently, she’s quite a dragon.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Really?”
“So they tell me.”
“And who are you?” She did her best to hide her irritation with a friendly expression.
His eyes met hers. Deep brown that seemed to reach down into her soul and read her very thoughts. “I’m Andrew Reddy. I manage the Paradise Resort. Are you a guest here? Perhaps next time, you should try the Paradise. You might enjoy our twenty-four-hour spa service.”
She wanted to snap that she had no need of his spa service since she had her own, but the two hours per day that she brought someone in to offer massages and facials didn’t seem quite so appealing in light of what his resort could offer. She raised her chin. “Perhaps.”
“Lovely to meet you,” he said. Then marched back up the beach to the resort where he’d come from.
Her nostrils flared. So, Dad had hired a new manager to take over the running of his resort. That had always been his intention—she knew that. He wanted to retire, to have other people managing the various aspects of the business that he’d previously kept tightly under his control. He’d asked her to head up the resort — she’d been his first choice—but she hadn’t been willing to give up on her inn. Partly because he’d scoffed at the purchase she and Todd had made so soon after they were married, telling her that she had a duty to take over the management of the family business. He’d changed his tune since then and had been nothing but supportive in recent years. And when she turned down his offer, he’d been polite and hadn’t seemed bothered by it.
Now, it seemed Andrew Reddy would manage the Paradise Resort. He was to be her competitor, and he had his eye on her hotel as a possible acquisition. But there was no way she’d sell the Blue Shoal Inn to a slick city operator. He wouldn’t understand her guests or the business and its history. No doubt he’d tile the floors and put hot tubs in every room. He wouldn’t respect the integrity and character of the building. And she hadn’t built her business for twenty years only to let someone like him tear it down overnight.
Two
“Buck Clements built my beach cottage?” Beatrice Rushton gaped at Betsy.
She couldn’t grasp for a moment the full implications. Buck had built the cottage? The same cottage where she’d found the stash of fifty-year-old unprocessed photographs? The same Buck who was Rowan Clements’s stepfather and a suspect in the murder of Penny’s grandmother, Mary Brown, back in 1976?
“That can’t be a coincidence…” she muttered, her hands steepled together in front of her mouth.
“What’s that, dear?” Betsy had her attention half on Bea and half on her granddaughter, who was colouring with markers and getting red ink on the counter. “Don’t do that, sweetheart. Here, I’ll get you a piece of cardboard to lean on. That way, we can keep the counter nice and clean.”
Bea gathered her thoughts while Betsy settled Samantha back into place at the counter with cardboard beneath her colouring book. Then she wiped down the counter, setting everything back to rights again.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “We were in the middle of talking about something. What was that…?”
“Buck. He built the cottage where I found those photographs.”
“Oh, yes. The photographs,” Betsy replied. “How are you going with those? Did you figure out who was in them and why they were there?”
Bea shook her head. “Not exactly. We know who most of the people are, of course, since they’re Penny’s family—and Rowan’s as well, it seems. In fact, Buck was in several pictures himself.”
“Lovely — I forgot to wear my glasses when you showed them to me, so I couldn’t pick anyone out. Where are my glasses now?” she asked, patting her pockets.
Bea arched an eyebrow and pointed to the top of Betsy’s head. “Up there.”
“Ah, yes, of course. Thank you, honey. Now, I’d better get along with putting together this flower arrangement or I’ll be late and the client won’t thank me for it.”
Bea started for the door. “I won’t keep you. It was nice to see you again, Betsy.” Her thoughts were in a whirl. So many questions sprang to mind that she wasn’t sure where to begin. Why did Betsy wait until now to tell her about Buck’s involvement with the cottage?
She spun on her heel to study the florist, who’d returned to clipping the ends off a bunch of white lilies and arranging them in a tall glass vase. “Do you know why Mum would’ve hidden the photographs at the cottage? Was there anything significant about them?”
“Who knows? They seem like normal-enough photos to me — family, friends.”
“But they were Penny’s family and friends.” Bea’s nose wrinkled.
“That’s true,” Betsy mused. “It is a bit strange that Luella hid photographs of Penny’s family and friends in the wall of a cottage she didn’t own. But then, your mother was an odd duck sometimes.”
“Saying it out loud that way, it’s hard to wrap my head around,” Bea admitted.
She left the flower shop and strode back to the café, her footsteps echoing on the hard pavement. The town was mostly empty of people, since the afternoon ferry had already left and school had long since finished for the day. Samantha had begun walking from the primary school to the florist’s shop to spend the afternoons with her grandmother in recent weeks, and Bea could tell Betsy was over the moon about it. She’d developed something of a glow that had never been there before. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes sparkled, and she smiled far more readily than she had before when she’d been kept from seeing her granddaughter by a disgruntled son.
They’d had some kind of family conflict—Bea wasn’t sure exactly what—that had kept them apart for years. She was glad they’d managed to resolve it enough that Betsy could help care for Sam, who’d been left on her own a lot of the time while her father worked on the mainland.
Bea closed up the café and farewelled her staff, then spent half an hour doing the books before giving up and heading home. On the way, she stopped off at her father’s house up on the hill, overlooking the ocean. It was dark by the time she arrived, and the front porch light was on. He knew she often stopped by on her way home from work and left the light on for her. Something she appreciated given her fear of spiders and their tendency to lurk on the stairs and around the door.
The door wasn’t locked, so she stepped inside, calling out to him as she did. She found him shucking oysters in the kitchen, a pair of glasses perched on top of his balding head. It reminded her instantly of her earlier conversation with Betsy, and she hid a grin as she reached into the fridge for an open bottle of white wine.
“Hi, Dad. How are you?”
“Good, thanks, love. Happy hour?”
She waved the bottle in the air, then searched for a glass. “It is indeed. I’ve had a long day.”
“I found some oysters over at Point Prospect. They look nice and juicy.”
“Sounds great,” Bea replied.
She poured two glasses of wine and carried them out to the back deck, where her father was already setting up a plate of oysters on the half shell, hot sauce, crackers and horseradish.
“Where did you learn to eat oysters like that?” she asked as she sat.
“When I was in the Navy, we spent some time in Florida. This is how they do it there. It’s delicious. You want me to make one for you?”
