The Last Guest

Chapter 1: The Off-Season

The wind came off the Atlantic like something with teeth.

It tore across the headland, rattled the storm shutters on the second floor, and found every crack in the old clapboard siding that James Shelton had been meaning to caulk since October. February in Dyer's Cove was not a month for tourists. It was a month for endurance—for watching the thermometer dip below zero and wondering if the pipes would hold, for scraping ice off the front steps before dawn and again after lunch, for sitting in a drafty kitchen and pretending the silence between husband and wife was comfortable rather than strained.

The Gull's Rest Bed and Breakfast sat on a bluff overlooking the harbor, a three-story Victorian painted the blue-gray of a winter sky. In summer, every room was booked. Couples from Boston and New York came for the lobster, the lighthouses, the picturesque village with its clapboard shops and rocky shoreline. They left five-star reviews on travel websites and promised to return. Some of them even did.

But summer was six months away, and the Gull's Rest was hemorrhaging money.

Amy Shelton stood at the kitchen window, watching the harbor through glass fogged with her own breath. The fishing boats were tied up at the dock, their hulls crusted with ice. The sky was the color of dirty cotton. She held a mug of coffee in both hands, not drinking it, just absorbing its heat.

Behind her, James sat at the kitchen table with his laptop open and a legal pad covered in numbers. He'd been at it since six that morning—three hours now—and the furrow between his eyebrows had deepened into something permanent.

"How bad?" Amy asked without turning around.

James exhaled through his nose. "We can make it to April if nothing breaks. No new furnace problems, no plumbing emergencies, no surprises."

"And if something breaks?"

"Then we're having a conversation I don't want to have."

Amy turned from the window. Her husband looked older than forty-three. The past two winters had carved lines into his face that hadn't been there when they'd bought this place five years ago, full of optimism and the naive belief that running a bed-and-breakfast on the Maine coast would be romantic. It was romantic in July. In February, it was a slow-motion crisis.

"We could list it," she said, the words tasting like ash.

James looked up. "We're not listing it."

"James—"

"We're not listing it, Amy. This is our home. We put everything into this place."

She didn't argue. He was right—they had put everything into it. Their savings, the inheritance from her mother, three years of sweat equity replacing floors and rewiring outlets and stripping seven layers of wallpaper from the guest rooms. Walking away would mean walking away from all of it.

She sat down across from him and pulled the legal pad toward her. The numbers were grim but not yet catastrophic. They had four months of operating expenses in the bank. If they could get to Memorial Day weekend with the house intact, the summer bookings would carry them through another year.

"We'll make it," she said, and she almost believed it.

The phone rang at eleven-fifteen.

Amy answered it in the front parlor, where they kept the reservation desk—really just an antique writing table with a phone, a computer, and a leather-bound guest book that Amy had found at an estate sale in Portland.

"Gull's Rest Bed and Breakfast."

"Good morning." The voice was male, measured, pleasant. "I'm looking for a room for an extended stay. A month, possibly longer."

Amy blinked. In February, they hadn't had a single inquiry in three weeks. "We certainly have availability. When were you thinking?"

"Tomorrow, if that's convenient."

"Tomorrow would be fine. Can I ask—will it just be you?"

"Just me. I'm a writer, working on a novel. I need somewhere quiet, away from distractions. Your inn came up in my search, and the location looks perfect."

Amy glanced at the window, where sleet was beginning to tick against the glass. "It's certainly quiet this time of year. I should mention, we're the only ones here—my husband and I. You'd have the run of the place."

"That sounds ideal."

They discussed rates. Amy quoted the off-season price, which was already forty percent below summer. The man—he gave his name as Richard Lynch—didn't negotiate. He asked about the room options, and she described the three guest rooms on the second floor: the Harbor Room, which faced the water; the Garden Room, which overlooked the frozen backyard; and the Lighthouse Room, at the corner, which had both views.

"The Lighthouse Room, please," he said. "And I'd like to pay in advance. Cash, if that's acceptable."

Cash. A full month. Amy's pulse quickened. She did the math in her head—thirty nights at the off-season rate came to just over four thousand dollars. It wouldn't solve their problems, but it would buy them breathing room.

"Cash is fine," she said, keeping her voice professional. "We'll have the room ready for you. What time should we expect you?"

"Early afternoon. And Mrs.—?"

"Shelton. Amy Shelton."

"Mrs. Shelton, I appreciate the accommodation. I'll see you tomorrow."

He hung up. Amy stared at the phone for a moment, then walked back to the kitchen.

"We have a guest," she said.

James looked up from his laptop. "What?"

"A man. Richard Lynch. He's a writer, working on a novel. He wants the Lighthouse Room for a month. He's paying cash."

James's face went through a rapid sequence of expressions—surprise, relief, suspicion, and then something that settled into cautious hope. "A month?"

"A month. He'll be here tomorrow."

"In February? A writer wants to come to Dyer's Cove in February?"

"Apparently writers like solitude."

James leaned back in his chair. "Four thousand dollars."

"Four thousand and fifty."

A smile broke across his face—the first real smile she'd seen in weeks. "Well, let's get the Lighthouse Room ready."

They spent the afternoon preparing. Amy stripped the bed and put on fresh sheets—the good ones, the Egyptian cotton set they saved for guests who were staying more than a night or two. She cleaned the bathroom until the tile gleamed, set out fresh towels, and placed a small vase of dried lavender on the nightstand. James checked the radiator, which had a tendency to clank, and tightened the valve until it ran silent.

The Lighthouse Room was the best room in the house. It occupied the northeast corner of the second floor, with tall windows on two walls. From the bed, you could see the harbor and, on a clear day, the lighthouse at the tip of Pemmet Point. The room had wide pine floorboards, a queen bed with a wrought-iron frame, and a writing desk positioned beneath the window—a detail Amy had arranged specifically for guests who said they wanted to work.

By evening, the room was immaculate. Amy stood in the doorway and surveyed it with the critical eye she'd developed over five years of hospitality.

"It's perfect," James said from behind her.

"The curtains need pressing."

"Amy. It's perfect."

She allowed herself a small nod. "I want him to feel welcome. If he's happy, he might extend. Or recommend us to other writers."

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves."

But she could see it in his eyes—the same calculation she was running. If Richard Lynch stayed two months instead of one, if he told friends, if they could build a reputation as a writer's retreat during the off-season—it could change everything.

That night, lying in bed while the wind howled outside, Amy stared at the ceiling and thought about the stranger who was coming to save them.

Not save them. She corrected herself. He was a guest. He was paying for a room. There was nothing more to it than that.

But the timing felt providential, and Amy Shelton, who had stopped believing in providence around the time her mother died and left her just enough money to buy a crumbling inn on the edge of the world, allowed herself a small, private moment of gratitude.

Tomorrow, the house would have a guest.

Tomorrow, they wouldn't be alone.