Billy reached out, catching his elbow to steady him. “Easy, sir.”
The man flinched away, impatience wrenching his features. “I had a stroke. I’m not an invalid, boy.”
He understood the flare of anger. He guessed Bear had once been as fierce as his name—such a man wouldn’t appreciate growing feeble.
But the behavior also worried him. The man had tottered on his feet. Was Billy witnessing one too many Budweisers or something else? He was well-versed in first aid—all sheriffs were—and he was particularly on alert where a history of stroke was concerned.
He decided to keep the man talking to assess. “What’s on her mind then?”
“Huh?” Bear settled back on his stool, leaning both elbows on the bar.
The man had a startled look on his face, and Billy knew a wave of sympathy. He kept his voice light and easy. “You said your daughter has things on her mind. What’s got her so preoccupied she was forced to retreat into the kitchen?”
The man sniffed. “She found some letters and has it in her head we’re all related to Buck Larsen.”
The unexpected turn in the conversation took a moment to register. “Pardon?”
“Yeah. Who knows with that girl?” Bear’s expression softened. He spun his bottle around and around on the counter, shaking his head. “She found some old letters in the attic, and now has a bee in her bonnet about the whole thing. Says my great-granddad was the natural child of Buck Larsen.”
“The Buck Larsen?”
Bear shrugged, but the faint smile on his face said maybe, just maybe, there was indeed something about Sorrow that made him proud. “She’s at the house, doing her stirring and chopping. Go see for yourself.”
Eight
She dried her prized butcher knife till it gleamed. It was German, used by professional chefs, and had cost her a pretty penny. She hated when even the most minor of water spots marred the surface. Sorrow tilted it up to the light, wondering if it could use a sharpening. After all, a chef was only as good as his—or her—sharpest blade.
“Remind me not to cross you.”
The voice in the doorway startled her. Her knife froze, midair.
Sheriff. The man filled the doorway, those broad shoulders making her pounding heart skip a beat.
She darted her eyes back to her task, giving it her whole focus. The sauce was simmering, and she’d taken a moment to clean up. A dirty kitchen was one of her pet peeves. “You know better than to surprise a woman wielding a big knife.”
“It’s safer than a woman…” His eyes flicked in the direction of the tavern as he made a funny, frightened sort of face. “Well, never mind that.”
She smirked. “Been at the bar, have you?”
“How’d you guess?”
She shrugged, sliding her tools back into the knife block. She knew what he’d been about to say. Helen worked as their part-time waitress and part-time bartender, but she was a full-time flirt. Billy Preston was a fine man—the woman had probably been on him like white on rice. The thing with Helen was, most men seemed to run to her. All except for her husband. And that, Sorrow guessed, was the crux of the issue. But it wasn’t her place to gossip.
Although she did file in the back of her mind the fact that Billy appeared the sort of man who ran away from such a woman.
He wandered closer and gave her knives an appreciative nod. “Nice.”
She loved her knives and had to temper her smile as she thanked him.
He glanced around the kitchen, quietly taking it all in, and Sorrow wondered what he might be thinking. “Your mother let me in,” he said after a moment. “I hope you don’t mind me showing up so late in the day.”
“On the contrary.” The sound of a rapid boil startled her from her thoughts, and she jumped to turn down the burner. She stirred her sauce, relieved it hadn’t burned. She used an arm to brush the hair from her brow. “Your timing is perfect. You’re just in time to clean out that dish for me.”
He gamely jumped into action, shrugging out of his coat and rolling up his sleeves. “What are we making?”
“Beef bourguignon.”
He scraped bits of onion and bacon fat from the casserole into the sink. “Don’t you mean boeuf?”