baby,” I said as I unlocked the passenger door of my big ol’ GMC van, “I’ve got my fingers crossed that you’ve got better taste in men than your mama and me.”
After meeting Reggie, though, I was afraid poor Alice had inherited the family curse: a penchant for males who didn’t make good mates.
chapter 6
Monday morning, Alice and Bree decided to spend some quality mother-daughter time opening the A-la-mode. More precisely, Bree wanted a chance to pry into her daughter’s romantic interest in Reggie Hawking and Alice didn’t get a say in the matter.
Either way, it meant I got to enjoy a few moments of peace at the house. Alice, Bree, and I all live in a crumbling Arts and Crafts bungalow in Dalliance’s historic district, just a few blocks from the downtown courthouse square. The house is technically mine, a huge chunk of my divorce settlement from my husband of seventeen years, Wayne Jones. But Alice and Bree are family; they make it a home.
That day, I decided to savor the downtime before my hellishly busy summer got into full swing. I camped on the living room sofa, snuggled beneath a patchwork quilt Grandma Peachy made me when I was five, and watched an ’80s romantic comedy on cable. My adolescent orange tabby, Sherbet, perched on the couch cushion behind me, purring loudly and occasionally chewing on my hair.
I nearly jumped out of my skin when the doorbell rang. Sherbet simply yawned and stretched out a paw.
“Who’s that, Sherbet?” I slid out from under the quilt, grateful that I’d bothered to change from pajamas into sweats, and shuffled my sock-clad feet across the hardwood to the front door. I peeked out the side-light window.
Finn Harper stood on my doorstep, dark hair and white oxford both deliciously rumpled, a foil-covered pan in his hands. He spotted me, smiled his crooked smile, and gave me a little wave.
I grabbed Sherbet off the couch and draped him over my shoulder, so he wouldn’t bolt, and then pulled open the wide wooden door. “Finn.”
“Morning, Tally.” He held up the pan. “I brought banana cake. With cream cheese frosting.”
Finn’s a wiz in the kitchen, at least when it comes to baked goods. I kid you not—he looks like a movie star and bakes like a pastry chef.
I snatched the pan out of his hands and stood aside so he could come in. With Sherbet over my shoulder, I led the way to the kitchen. “Watch out for the crap on the floor,” I warned.
“Are you folks moving?” Finn asked.
“Ha ha ha. No, Grandma Peachy finally gave up the farm and moved into one of those assisted-living places, so we’ve just inherited another houseful of stuff.” I pointed to a heap of plastic shopping bags mounded against the kitchen island. “Like thirty-five years of unfinished craft projects. And we’re working like a million hours a week, so none of us has had the energy to start sorting and pitching.”
“Ah. Is Peachy okay? Did something happen?”
Finn had moved home the year before after his widowed mother had her second stroke. As her only surviving child, he had shouldered the responsibility for her care. She’d been in a holding pattern for nearly a year, not getting worse, but not really improving. I knew it bothered him more than he let on.
“No,” I assured him. “Peachy’s healthy as a horse and ornery as a fried toad. She just got tired of feeding the animals and rattling around in that house by herself. At the home, she’s got people she can torment.”
Finn laughed.
I dropped Sherbet next to his kibble, washed my hands, poured us mugs of still-warm coffee, and sliced the banana cake. The cake had a dense, moist crumb, yellow flecked with black, and the scents of vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg made my mouth water. Technically, it was a little early in the day for cake. But it would have been rude not to have a slice, right?
Finn shifted stacks of Grandma Peachy’s old bank statements aside so we could sit at the kitchen table.
“I know better than to look a gift cake in the mouth, but I have to think you’re here for a reason.”
Finn looked up at me through his sinfully long lashes as he tucked in to his cake. “Guilty,” he mumbled around a mouthful of silky cream cheese frosting. He swallowed, took a sip of his coffee, and then got down to business.
“I want to talk to you about Emily. What do you think