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  “You’re selling the house, I see.”

  “For a pittance.” Priscilla sighed. “She’d gotten to the point that she couldn’t keep up the maintenance. It’s a real mess, needs painting, and it’s stuffed to the gills with old papers and pictures. We’re asking a lot less for it than we would if it were fixed up, but Roger and I stay so busy…”

  “And Priscilla’s dreading going through her mother’s things,” the senator said sympathetically.

  “I’m sure,” Abbie said. “All those old memories. It’s so hard to throw away any of them.”

  “Yes. Well, I’ll have to do it someday, when we have a buyer.” For a moment, Priscilla looked despondent. Then she said, “Let’s talk about you. I heard you were back in town. Is anything wrong?”

  “Nothing except my decision to go to med school,” Abbie said. “It just wasn’t right for me. So I’ve come home to regroup, try something else when I know what it is.”

  “I know you’ll make a good choice,” Priscilla said gently and patted her arm. “I, well, you know how small the valley is, and I did hear that your mother’s not happy about your leaving school.”

  “It was a shock to her,” Abbie said, “but she’s trying to understand, although I know she’s still determined that I’ll be a doctor.”

  Priscilla smiled sympathetically.

  “I feel so guilty about upsetting her, and I feel worse now that she’s being so kind to me. Too kind. I feel like a four-year-old again.”

  “Mothers do that,” Priscilla said. “Maybe it’s time to leave home.”

  “I wish I could, but I’m broke.”

  Roger and Priscilla exchanged a meaningful glance.

  Uh-oh, what was this?

  “Would you like to stay here for a while?” Priscilla asked. “We could postpone the sale until I feel more like cleaning things up, repainting and that kind of thing.”

  Abbie’s mouth dropped. “It would be like a dream come true. I’ve always loved this house. Um, it would depend on the rent, of course…”

  “No rent,” the senator said. “We couldn’t rent it to anyone in its current condition.”

  It was too good to be true. “I’ll clean it up,” Abbie said in a hurry. “I’ll really get it into great shape.”

  “You’d better take a look at it, make sure you can stand even walking inside the way it is now.”

  “I can stand anything,” Abbie said fervently. “When could I move in?”

  Priscilla laughed. “As far as I’m concerned,” she said, “right this minute. I love your mother, but I know how determined she can be.” Then she smiled. “Just like you, Abbie Jackson.”

  Abbie realized that what Priscilla said was absolutely true. She and her mother were like two mules trying to share a stall. As she followed Mrs. Banks inside, she felt like dancing. Her life was definitely taking a turn for the better.

  6

  Jake had been dreading the lawyer’s call for two-thirds of the day, and now, looking at the last third, he felt he couldn’t stand another minute of suspense. He’d forgotten to turn the heat down under a pot of rice, and Maury had noticed in the nick of time.

  Maury had snatched the sugar caster out of his hand when he’d picked it up instead of the sea-salt box, which didn’t look anything like the sugar caster.

  Each time the phone rang, he twitched. At last, he picked up the receiver to hear, “Mr. Galloway? Earl Ritter here.”

  “Yes, Mr.—”

  “I’m so sorry I’m just now calling. A family crisis and no cell phone, as my assistant told you.”

  “No problem,” Jake lied.

  “I’m afraid there is,” Ritter said. “I’m sorry to be calling with some very bad news.”

  Jake felt his gut tighten. “Go ahead,” he said.

  “My client, Thomas Galloway, died yesterday morning.”

  Jake’s hand froze on the receiver. Thomas Galloway was his father, the man who’d shaped his early life. Now his nemesis was gone, just like that. It was over.

  He should feel relieved. Instead, he felt deprived of the opportunity to prove himself to the man.

  “How did he die?” he asked as calmly as he could.

  Ritter sighed. “A dreadful car accident,” he said. “His wife died with him. She was so young. It’s such a tragedy.”

  His father remarried? A young wife?

  “The funeral is tomorrow, and the reading of the will is on Friday. You’ll need to be there.”

  “I wish I could, but I run a restaurant and have to be here. I want to send flowers, of course, if you’ll tell me the name of the funeral home.”

  “Jake, you must be here.” Ritter wasn’t impolite, but he spoke so firmly that it took Jake aback.

  “My…Thomas and I weren’t really close,” Jake hedged, “so I, um…”

  “He certainly thought of you as a close friend,” Ritter said. “He’s made you the guardian of his child, Lucas Galloway.”

  Jake felt as if he’d been caught by a tide that was tugging him too far from shore to swim back. He needed to make some response to Ritter, but his mind had shut down. “Huh?”

  “So, you must be here, of course,” Ritter repeated, “to take the appropriate legal steps before you can take charge of the child.”

  The tide released Jake for a second. If he didn’t go, if he didn’t take those appropriate legal steps, he didn’t have to take charge of the child? It was a tempting thought.

  But not an honorable one. “Of course. I understand. I need to make arrangements.”

  “Make them quickly. Celine’s family is…”

  Jake rubbed his forehead. A migraine was in the works. “Whose family?”

  “You didn’t know her? Celine is…was Thomas’ wife. Lucas’ mother.” Ritter’s voice tightened. “If you don’t mind my asking, what exactly was your relationship to the deceased?”

  If he told the truth, surely Ritter would understand that he had no idea how to be a good parent.

  With his heart making a big lump in his throat, he said, “Thomas Galloway was my father.”

  Ritter’s gasp hissed from the receiver. “He must have had a reason for not telling me he had a grown son.” Jake wasn’t surprised to learn that his father had never mentioned him. “We’ve been estranged since I was sixteen. He couldn’t possibly have wanted me to bring up his son.”

  “The will is quite clear,” Ritter said stiffly. “I assumed he’d informed you.”

  Jake fell heavily onto one of the stools that flanked the big butcher-block table. “No,” he said, “but I’ll come to the funeral and the reading to see what’s going on. Give me the details, where and when the funeral is—”

  Ritter named a funeral home and its address, droned on about the time and whatnot, then said, “I will see you there.” It was half question, half command.

  “Yes.” He had to do it. He had to find out what madness had overtaken his father to cause him to leave his child to Jake.

  Even without the background garbage, how could he raise his half-brother—good grief, he didn’t even know how old the kid was—and run a restaurant? It was at least a sixteen-hour-a-day job, and when he slept, he dreamed about the diner.

  Forget the restaurant, even. He hadn’t the slightest idea how ordinary, caring parents, parents unlike the ones he’d had, raised a child.

  The back door banged shut behind Maury, returning from football practice. “Maury,” he said, “Barney, we’ve had a slight change in plans.”

  “What?” Rafe and Clint spoke in chorus.

  “My father and his wife—number three, four, seven, I don’t know—died in a car wreck and appointed me guardian of their son.”

  “How old is the boy?” Rafe asked.

  “Did you know you had a half-brother?” came from Clint.

  “In order, I don’t know, and of course not.”

  “How can we help?” A typical reaction from Rafe.

  “I don’t know that, either, not yet.” Everything
was happening so quickly it was overwhelming. “I’m going to Dallas tomorrow and coming back Friday afternoon. I’ve set up a plan for Maury and Barney. I’m pretty sure they can handle Jake’s Place for two days. I explained to Barney and Maury what happened.”

  “Sure,” Clint said. “But what are you going to tell the boy? He needs to know you’re his half-brother.”

  “Maybe my father already told him about me,” Jake said. “I won’t know until I meet him.”

  “Are you going to be honest with him about why you and your dad never spoke?” Rafe asked this question, knowing how much Jake hated thinking about his childhood.

  “I’ll decide later what to tell him,” Jake said. “Maybe he was a different type of father to this child than he was to me.”

  He could only hope so. It would have been hard for Thomas to be a worse father.

  Jake was so distracted during the dinner hour he could hardly put on his “Hello, folks, glad to see you” face. Abbie had shot him several curious looks. He didn’t want to tell her or anybody else, so he’d avoided her all evening.

  Finally, he retreated to the kitchen and began getting things ready for Maury and Barney for when he’d be gone.

  He was worried about the diner, but deep down, he knew he didn’t have to be. The last words Maury and Barney had said to him before the dinner customers began to arrive was, “Don’t worry about anything,” from Maury, and “Nobody’s even going to miss you,” from Barney.

  He wasn’t sure he didn’t want anyone to miss him, but their supportive attitude touched and cheered him. He was lost in thought when Abbie moved up behind him.

  “Guess we’re about through for the night,” she said. “Everything okay?”

  “Sure is,” he said.

  He could tell she didn’t believe him, but she said, “Good. Hey, guess what? I found a place to live today! It’s absolutely perfect if you don’t mind dust and clutter, and—” She interrupted herself with a sheepish laugh. “Sorry. I don’t want to bore you with the details.”

  “No, I want to hear about your house, but it turns out I have to go out of town tomorrow, and I’m trying to do some prep work for Barney and Maury.”

  “Is there a problem?” She frowned, and her voice was filled with concern.

  He knew why she was worried. It was a well-known fact that he never went out of town. He was always at the restaurant, downstairs in it or sleeping above it. “Sort of,” he told her. “My father died. We haven’t been close in decades, but I still need to go to the funeral.”

  “Of course you do.” The kindness in her voice made the tension inside him ease a little bit. “I’m sorry, Jake. Even if you weren’t close, he was your father. Hopefully, you do have a few good times to remember.”

  He didn’t have any great memories, but he didn’t want to share that with Abbie. Her parents were loving, so she wouldn’t understand what it had been like.

  “Thanks,” was all he could think to say.

  “Maury and Barney will handle the restaurant all by themselves?”

  “I hope.” He hesitated, then said, “I know. I know they can handle it.”

  “If I can do anything to help them out, I will.”

  “They should be fine,” Jake said. “Barney’s been with me since we opened, so he knows Jake’s Place inside out. And if Maury wants to be a chef, he’d better find out early what a big responsibility it is.”

  “Call me if you need to talk to somebody, okay?” She scribbled on a scrap of butcher paper and handed it to him. “That’s my cell. Sometimes these things affect us more than we think they will.”

  That shook him, too, the way things had been rattling him from the time he learned his father was dead. “Thanks again,” he said, controlling the tightness in his throat. “I will.”

  And then with a sad, sweet smile, she said, “You’ll be okay, Jake. I’ll be thinking about you.”

  He nodded. “Thanks.”

  After Abbie left, he spent a few more hours doing prep work that would make tomorrow and Friday easier for Maury and Barney. At one in the morning, he went upstairs to his apartment.

  His entire life was in this small, one-hundred-year-old brick building on Falling Star’s picture-postcard town square. Years ago, when he’d been was the lowest chef on the totem pole in a fancy restaurant in Dallas, he’d been miserable. He was a good chef, although it was hard to tell working under a demon boss who demanded perfection, but he knew it would be years before he rose to sous chef, then at last, chef in some less well-known restaurant.

  He’d wanted his own place, something less stressful. He also had hated to admit it, but he actually missed his friends, Clint and Rafe, however maddening they could be. More than that, he wanted to move to Falling Star. Life seemed so simple and peaceful in the small town where Rafe had started his veterinary practice.

  When the letter, written in a formal tone, arrived from his mother—how she’d found him he couldn’t imagine—asking him to visit her in Fort Worth, he’d been reluctant to go. He hadn’t been any closer to her than he had been to his father.

  Still, he’d gone to see her and found that she wanted to make peace with him. She’d finally understood why he’d turned into the petty criminal he’d been as a teenager, understood that his father’s and her neglect had contributed to his downfall.

  He’d left feeling better about himself than he ever thought he could. He’d noticed how thin she was, but she’d always been thin, beautiful, sought after, the classic socialite, her involvement in “good works” stretching far beyond Fort Worth. He’d grown up in an elegant house, largely occupied only by him, his nanny, and servants.

  He’d had no idea she was sick until he received notice that she’d died, leaving a sizeable amount of money to “my good friend, Jake Galloway.”

  The rest was history. Much too young to do anything grandiose, he’d bought the crumbling building in Falling Star, fixed it up, started his restaurant, and made a success of it.

  Now it seemed to be happening all over again, but this time, there would be no forgiveness, merely an inheritance that would turn his life upside down.

  His senses honed by anxiety, he saw the apartment, where he’d lived from the beginning, when it was in shambles, through sharper eyes. It had been Abbie who’d said, “You could make this place look so pretty,” when he’d invited his skeleton staff upstairs for an impromptu party after an exhausting weekend.

  Meaning, “How can you stand living in this hell-hole?”

  The memory made him smile. He’d gotten the message. Abbie and her mother had volunteered to be his “decorators.” They’d helped him create a comfortable bachelor pad with leather-covered furniture and a large worn Oriental rug, a bedroom and small office, a tiny, high-tech kitchen, and a minuscule bathroom.

  He was happy here. He couldn’t imagine living anywhere else, living any other life. When he was ninety, he’d have an elevator chair installed in the wide staircase and sweep down to the kitchen to get things going in the morning.

  What if he couldn’t stay in the apartment with a half-brother to raise? His stomach muscles tightened again. It figured that his father, who’d done nothing but ignore him when he’d been young, was now messing up the comfortable life he’d made for himself.

  In twenty-four hours, he’d know.

  Feeling like a felon on death row, he packed quickly and, tired beyond belief, got a few hours of restless sleep. Long before the first rays of morning sun appeared, he was in the kitchen, waiting for Barney.

  “What’d you do, stay up all night?” Barney asked when Jake showed him what he’d done the previous evening.

  “Nope, didn’t take me any time at all,” Jake lied. “I just knew how busy you and Maury would be and wanted to help a little.”

  “We’ll get along fine. I’ve been here so many years I know how to run Jake’s Place almost as well as you do,” Barney said.

  “I know, I know,” Jake said and sighed. “I’m just a littl
e jumpy today.”

  “Losing somebody’s never easy,” Barney said, “even when you haven’t seen that somebody in years. Goodbyes are tough, especially when it comes to family.”

  Barney was an authority on that topic. He’d been devastated by his wife’s death.

  “Now go on and get out of here,” Barney said. “It’s gonna be a peaceful, ordinary day.”

  Jake only wished he could say the same thing about the day ahead of him.

  Jake had probably just left for Dallas, and Abbie was already missing him. She was sure it was because he was such a fixture in Falling Star, always there, that even a few days away left a gap only he could fill.

  Her mother had been unusually understanding about Abbie wanting her own place. Who knew? Maybe her mom was tired of waiting on her hand and foot. She’d been happy to help Abbie pack, so early that morning, she’d moved into Mrs. Langston’s house with two suitcases and a computer bag. Her worldly possessions.

  Even though she was now living in squalor rather than in her mother’s cozy, spotless house, filled with the scents of beeswax, lemon polish, and baking brownies, she felt at peace. She sat in one of the velvet-covered wing chairs in the parlor, watching a cloud of dust rise as she squished into the cushion, and made a plan. She would have to clean. Buy groceries. Learn to cook a few things for herself.

  Filled with purpose, she explored the closets and found a vacuum cleaner and plenty of supplies. She’d start in the kitchen, getting ready for her first cooking experience. She opened a kitchen cupboard. Yuck. Dust under and over the plates and glasses. She emptied the cupboard, cleaned it out thoroughly and ran water in the sink for washing its contents. She’d never been without a dishwasher. She was about to find out why someone had invented them. With a stack of plates in her hands, ready to deposit them in the sink, she suddenly felt lonely.

  How silly. She was thrilled to be alone after years of roommates and after two days of feeling guilty around her mother, wasn’t she?