Читать книгу Nice To Come Home To - Liz Flaherty - Страница 14

CHAPTER FOUR

“SHE IS SO PRETTY.” Seth stared out over the windshield of Luke’s boat as they cruised Lake Miniagua after helping Father Doherty and Chris Granger trim the hedges at St. Paul’s.

“She sure is,” Luke murmured, lifting his arm to wave at Tucker Llewellyn as the big pontoon boat he and Jack owned glided past.

“That’s just sick.” Seth sounded disgusted.

“What’s sick?”

“What are you doing looking at a sixteen-year-old girl? You could be her dad.”

“Who’s talking about a sixteen-year-old girl?”

“We are.”

“Well, I wasn’t,” said Luke mildly. “Who are you talking about?”

“Royce Gentry.”

“Oh.” She was a beautiful girl. Prettier than her older sister, but not as striking. She worked hard, too, laughing at herself as the new kid, and falling into easy camaraderie with the others. She’d arrived her second day at work with enough lunch for Mary and herself and doughnuts from the Amish bakery that she shared with everyone.

“So, who were you talking about?” Seth passed him a sly look. “Someone Mom would get all excited about? She thinks there’s something wrong with a guy being thirty-eight and single. Dad says—”

“—leave the boy alone,” Luke finished in unison with him.

“Don’t you want to get married again?” Seth steered the boat carefully as they approached Luke’s dock. “I mean, I hope I don’t get married real young, either, but you’re kind of pushing the envelope on that, aren’t you?” He hesitated. “Jill has been gone a long time.”

“It’s Mom’s envelope I’m pushing. And her grandma buttons, too—that’s for sure.” Luke stepped out of the boat to tie off. “Jill died ten years ago, and she’d be in line behind you and Mom telling me it’s time to get married again. But, you know—” He stopped, staring toward where the evening sun was dipping into the water. “I wouldn’t give up a minute of the time we had together, but the truth is, I don’t want to feel that way about somebody again. Losing her was a kind of hell I’m not willing to chance going through twice.”

“She was so great.” Seth had only been seven when Jill’s faulty heart had failed for the last time. Luke thought his little brother’s grief had been nearly as intense as his own. The young woman who knew she’d never be a mother had been a sister-in-law extraordinaire to the little brother no one ever had enough time for. She’d been his first babysitter, had seen him take his first steps and heard his first words.

“She was.” He smiled at Seth and gave his shoulder a squeeze when he stepped onto the dock a lot more lithely than Luke had.

“So, she’d want to know, too. Who’s pretty besides Royce? And don’t give me the whole none-of-your-business thing. It’s my night to cook and I have no problem with build-your-own bologna sandwiches.”

Luke’s stomach growled as if on cue. “Her sister, Cass. She’s pretty.”

“Oh.” Seth thought over that for the length of time it took them to reach the back porch of the house. “She is, I guess. For someone nearly as old as you, I mean.”

“Keep it up and I’ll send you to Rachel for the school year.”

“Oh, no, say it isn’t so!” Seth threw himself up against the back door, his arms raised in supplication, and Luke pushed him aside, laughing.

“You should be in drama instead of football.”

He showered while Seth prepared dinner. Sometimes he felt guilty because the kid worked so hard, but he was also proud that Seth thrived on it.

“I want you to take this weekend off,” he said when they were seated at the bar in the kitchen eating spaghetti with meat sauce. “It’ll be the last one for a while, between football and apples coming on.”

“Can I use your car?”

“As long as I’m not in it, you can.”

“No curfew?”

“None at all.”

It was a safe concession to make because no matter how often Seth intended to stay up late, he was invariably asleep by eleven. Luke had even bought a TV for the cottage’s second bedroom that had a timer on it, because his brother was usually out for the night within ten minutes of lying down.

“I’m going to meet Cass for a drink at the Grill.” Luke loaded the dishwasher. “If you have friends come over, stay out of the liquor.”

“Nah.” Seth already looked sleepy. “I’m tired. Two-a-days are deadly.”

They were. Luke remembered that. Plus the kid had done more than his share of work at the church. “Get some sleep, then,” he suggested.

“I will.” But Seth was already reaching for his guitar, and Luke hesitated. They usually played music together for an hour or so—it was a habit he didn’t want to break.

“Go.” Seth waved him off. “The more I practice and you don’t, the better I get...and you don’t.”

“In your dreams, little brother.” But he left, a little puzzled by how eager he was to see Cass again. Admittedly, there was some sort of connection between them, but he thought that was probably because they both cared for Zoey. He was anxious to hear how both women felt about the lunch of the day before. They’d been affectionate with each other but also uncomfortable. He’d left them alone after lunch and hadn’t seen either of them since.

Cass was at the bar in Anything Goes, talking to Mollie, the bartender, and sipping from a tall mug of hot chocolate.

“You do know that chocolate comes loaded, right?” He took the stool beside hers, waving at Mollie.

Cass flashed him a smile that had his heartbeat moving around the way his parents did when they danced the jitterbug. “I do, but I’m on foot. I can take it.”

“If you two kids want to sit at a table, the lake view ones are emptying out,” said Mollie. “I’ll bring your drinks over.”

“Good idea.” Luke got up. “Thanks for the ‘kids’ thing. Having Seth in the house has added considerably to my age.”

Mollie flipped him with the business end of a bar towel. “Shame on you. That’s a good kid there and you know it.”

“He is.” Luke held up a hand to protect himself. “Mom and Dad were already over the having-babies thing by the time he came along, so Rachel, Leah and I take full credit for how he’s come out.” He smiled. “We all admit Jill got him off to a good start.”

Mollie’s face softened. “She sure did. What a mom she would have been.”

The bartender was one of the few who didn’t avoid talking about Jill, something Luke appreciated.

“Royce thinks he’s a good kid, too. The word hot entered the conversation about ten times.” Cass followed him to a booth beside the window-lined wall. “She hasn’t been nearly as bored as she anticipated when we drove in. Of course, it’s only been two days. Things could change.”

When they’d sat down and Mollie had brought their drinks and a bowl of popcorn, Cass asked, “Who’s Jill, or shouldn’t I ask?”

“My wife. She died of heart disease ten years ago.”

“Oh.” Cass withdrew the hand that had been reaching for popcorn. “I’m sorry. How awful.”

“It was.”

“How long were you married?”

“Nine years and change.” He waited for the pain to strike, even knowing it wouldn’t anymore. He’d loved his wife and he missed her, but time had faded the memories to where they were a gentle kind of pleasure.

“I hope you had a great time every minute.”

He nodded, a smile breaking loose. “We did that. We knew there wasn’t much time, so we were able to make the absolute best of it.” It had been hard when they’d argued, because he hadn’t wanted to waste that time, but Jill had argued anyway. She was unwilling to miss out on any of life’s experiences just because she didn’t have enough time for all of them.

“Children?”

“No. She couldn’t, but she and Seth worshiped each other from the day he was born, so he was as much like our kid as my little brother.” He met Cass’s eyes and held her gaze, thinking how strange it was that despite their acknowledged connection, he had no clue what she was thinking. “You were married, too?”

“Yes.” She looked almost embarrassed, and reached for the popcorn again, taking a handful and dropping it onto a napkin. She ate a few bites. “He had the ideal family. They stayed in one spot, stayed married to each other and had enough money to buy anything they wanted. Not rich, but more comfortable than I was used to. Tony always said I married him to get his family, and he was probably right.” She shrugged. “It only took us fourteen years or so to figure out it wasn’t working. Eventually he settled in on someone younger and prettier and we got a divorce ten years after we should have. I got sick while it was going on, so it was an eventful few years there.”

Luke could think of absolutely nothing to say. “Wow.” It was weak, but it was accurate.

She looked appalled. “I am so sorry. I can’t believe I just did that. People have been asking me how I’m doing ever since I got sick and I have managed to say ‘doing fine’ a gazillion times, even when I was bald and the color of cigarette ashes. I just blew that record for nobility in one short conversation and you didn’t even ask how I was.”

“You have hair and your skin’s a nice golden color, too.” Luke was laughing. He couldn’t help it. “You know, nobility’s overrated anyway. I tried that with Seth the last time he used my car. He said the only reason I let him use it was that it always came back cleaner than it left. He was pretty much right.”

She laughed, too. “I’ll remember that the next time the martyr cross gets too heavy to carry.”

“Seriously.” He caught her gaze again. And held it. He thought he might very well get lost in those ocean-colored depths. “How are you doing?”

“Seriously, doing fine. I had my two-years-after-diagnosis testing done this spring and am still clear. At least until November, when I go back into full-scale panic when they test again.”

Relief cleared the air between them. “I am so glad for that.” He reached for her hand and squeezed it, wanting to touch her and hoping it didn’t come across as creepy. She squeezed back, so it must not have. “So we can talk about important stuff then, right? Like what you think of everything we’ve done at the orchard.” He rested his forearms on the edge of the table and did his best to look macho—an automatic fail. “I am a guy, you know. My sisters say I am the master of making things all about me. I don’t want to disappoint them.”

Cass beamed, her eyes lighting. The expression opened a place in him he’d thought was permanently closed. Oh, boy. “I love the orchard, and I love everything you’ve done to it.”

Encouraged, he asked the question that had lingered uppermost in his mind since they’d toured the orchard earlier in the day. “Do you know what you’d like to do? Stay a silent partner like your mother was? Sell out? I don’t have the money, but having a financially savvy brother-in-law has ensured I have good credit.”

It was as if he’d slapped her. The light left her eyes and her beam faded to a polite smile. She started to speak, then stopped, turning her head to gaze out at the lake. Spangled with moonlight, starshine and colored lights on boats cruising the calm water, it was a good thing to look at. Calming and exhilarating at the same time.

What had he said? Whatever it was, she was neither acknowledging nor answering.

“Cass?”

“I’d like to try the coffee-shop thing. I talked to Neely at the tearoom this morning, because that would be the most direct competition, and she thought it was a good idea.” She turned back to meet his eyes again, and he thought she looked defeated. He hoped he hadn’t caused that.

“In the round barn,” she specified. “It wouldn’t need to be a big shop. Maybe ten or twelve tables. Wi-Fi. Coffee and pastries in the morning. Soup and sandwiches at lunch. Just coffee and packaged things in the evening, unless it works out really well, in which case we could continue the lunch offerings.”

He hadn’t wanted her to be defeated, to feel like a stranger in a strange land. He also hadn’t expected—or wanted, his snarky inner voice muttered—her to want to change things. She was being naïve. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t considered having a café on the premises, but it hadn’t seemed to be a viable use of resources. He’d been running the orchard for three years. She’d been at the lake for two days and had taken exactly one tour of the premises.

She also owned half the orchard. Exactly. There was no 51 percent or anything like that to give him a louder voice in negotiations. He wasn’t a proponent of loud voices anyway, but...well, he’d expected her to pick up where her mother left off. That amounted to cashing the checks, signing things that required both their names and exchanging Christmas cards.

“We could think about that,” he said slowly. “Maybe you could come up with some numbers.”

“I can do that. I’ve spent hours of many hundreds of days in coffee shops for the past fifteen years. I already know a lot and I know where to find out the rest. As far as numbers go—” she scrambled in her purse for a pen, wrote on a napkin and pushed it across the table “—I can invest that.”

* * *

“SHE’S YOUR AUNT. Why are you so nervous?” Royce scowled at the table Cass had set in the dining area of the cottage. “I thought we were the beer-and-brats segment of the family. This looks like the way Dad used to want the table set when officers came to dinner. There are too many forks and glasses.”

Cass laughed. “You’re right. Okay, let’s back it off.”

They started from scratch, using the jewel-toned placemats that had come with the house instead of the embroidered tablecloth Cass had bought at an antiques store on Main Street. They left water glasses on the table, but set wineglasses and cups and saucers out of the way on the counter. They replaced elegant tapers with squatty candles and set the autumn centerpiece back on the end table in the living room where Royce had put it when they brought it home.

Dinner was a combination of their talents. Cass had cooked a pot roast with vegetables and Royce had made a salad and deviled a pretty little platter of eggs. They’d bought dessert and dinner rolls at the Amish bakery and wine at Sycamore Hill. Cass had promised her sister she could have a glass if she wasn’t going out afterward, but a phone call from Seth Rossiter asking her to go to the late movie in Sawyer put an end to that.

Zoey was right on time. One shoe on and one shoe off, Royce opened the door. “Aunt Zoey! I’m so glad to see you!”

Cass watched the two tall, slim women she loved as they hugged each other, drew back to take a good look and hugged each other again. She was happy for Royce, she told herself, that Aunt Zoey’s love for a girl who wasn’t actually her niece was so unrestricted. She was jealous, too.

“Come here.” Zoey stretched her arm toward her. Her eyes were awash with tears, something Cass didn’t remember seeing before. Even when Marynell had died, grief had made new lines in Zoey’s face, but Cass hadn’t seen her cry. “I know we have issues, but right this minute, we don’t.”

Zoey smelled like pink Dove soap and the same kind of shampoo Cass and Royce used. Her hug, complete with strong, thin arms and a soft, wrinkled cheek against her own, made Cass know more than anything else that, at least for now, she was home.

By the time they reached the table, Zoey had handed Royce a handful of photographs. “A record of your sister’s life you can use for blackmail if the need arises.”

Cass laughed, although it took all she had not to snatch the pictures away. They were a record of a childhood she didn’t want altered by someone else’s perception. “Did Mother do that with you?”

She could have cut her tongue out as soon as the words left her mouth. She’d forgotten that Zoey had been engaged to her father first, before he’d met her younger sister. Marynell had been the first of the young, beautiful women he’d pursued and caught. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have—”

Zoey shook her head. “No, it’s all right. I wouldn’t say she blackmailed. She never had to. Marynell was so beautiful we all enabled her.” She met Cass’s eyes and grasped her hand. “It didn’t make any of us bad people.” She grinned wickedly. “Even your father.”

Royce laughed, delighted, and Cass joined her. In his own way, Ken Gentry loved his daughters, but they’d both always known where they stood in his line of priorities. Even Royce, gorgeous as she was, was a testimony to his aging. He’d been fifty-two when she was born, and inevitable queries about his “grandchild” were still hard for him to take. He was generally happier just being able to show off her pictures.

“Everyone has weaknesses,” Zoey concluded, “and mine combined with your parents’ created quite a cluster of pain and sorrow.”

Seth came as they were finishing dessert, and Cass excused her sister from cleanup duty. Before the cottage’s front door closed behind the young couple, awkwardness slipped inside.

“I should go.” Zoey pushed back from the table. “Let me help with the dishes.”

Cass almost let her leave. That was how she’d spent most of her life, wasn’t it, walking the long way around to avoid being hurt more than necessary? She’d learned to live without her beloved aunt’s emotional support. Why take a chance of regaining it only to lose it once more?

Because she was thirty-five, not sixteen, that was why. Because she had a little sister she needed to set an example for. Because there were steps out of loneliness and she was ready to take a big one.

“No,” she said. “Please.” She stood up. “Will you make coffee while I clear the table? Or would you rather have more wine?”

“Coffee would be good.”

“Yours always was, even when it was half cream and two-thirds refined sugar. Did Nana know you gave it to me like that?”

Zoey chuckled. “I doubt it. It didn’t seem to have taken, though—you’ve been thin as a rail your whole life.”

When the coffee was done and they were once more sitting across from each other at the table, Cass revealed, “I got chunky in high school, when we were in Korea. Dad found a doctor who put me on a program that un-chunked me in a matter of months. I took pills that were illegal here, but that was during the Barbie-stepmother time and she used them all the time. We both survived and I stayed thin until after I was married.”

“You gained weight then? It’s hard to imagine.”

“Some. Enough to make Tony panic. So I became an exercise and fasting addict. I couldn’t stop losing weight when I was ready to and it scared me to death. My metabolism was so messed up, and it pretty much stayed that way until I got the breast cancer diagnosis.” Cass smiled, although the gesture cost her—there was nothing funny in the memories. “So now I’m your basic slug. I walk for exercise, but I do it better if there’s ice cream at the end of it.”

Zoey laughed, a big sound that filled Cass’s heart and gave buoyancy to her own chuckle. “I’m with you, sweetheart.” The older woman sipped from the coffee in front of her, then leaned her forearms on the table and met Cass’s eyes. “Where did you go, Cassandra? Did you really believe I didn’t want you here? That I ever didn’t want you at all? That the people at the lake didn’t want you? Gianna Gallagher used to ask me, but I never said where you were, just that you were all right even though I was never really sure you really were.”

“Mother could be pretty convincing. You know that. It wasn’t until she got sick that she admitted she’d made most of it up, that you’d only been concerned about me staying with Nana and Grandpa because they weren’t all that well. I should have talked to you then.” Marynell had made other confessions, too, all in one long, pain-ridden night. She’d asked her daughter’s forgiveness and Cass had given it.

She hadn’t meant the words of forgiveness, but she’d said what a dying woman needed to hear. Six months and change later, she thought she’d done the right thing, but a pardoning heart had come harder than the words had.

“Will you forgive me?” she asked. “For believing her and for not making it right even when I knew better?”

“Oh, honey.” Zoey got up, came around the table and drew Cass out of the chair and into her arms. “Marynell was who she was and she couldn’t help that. We all fell prey to her at one time or another. Let’s just concentrate on not losing each other again. What do you say?”

“I’d like that a lot.”

When they were seated again, their cups refilled and second servings of dessert on plates in front of them, Zoey said, “What do you think of Luke?”

“He must be a good businessman. The orchard looks great.”

She thought more than that, of course. Noticed more. Thought about him before she fell asleep in one of the cottage’s two little bedrooms. She knew he had beautiful, sun-streaked dark brown hair and thickly lashed eyes the color of milk chocolate. That he would probably be a little taller than she was even if she was wearing heels. That he was built really nicely but not as if it was on purpose—it was more like the muscles were a by-product of pruning and picking apples. That his voice warmed places in her that hadn’t known warmth in a long time. Maybe ever.

She took a deep breath. “I suggested a coffee shop on the premises, in the round barn. I don’t think he likes the idea.”

Zoey shrugged. “Convince him, if it’s something you’d like to do that you think would be successful, but remember that he’s run the place by himself for several years. As long as your mother got her checks, she never offered any input. I’m sure Luke expected the same thing from you.” She smiled, her eyes twinkling. “I’ll be so delighted to see him be wrong.”