him in his sleep like she often did—but nothing, nada, zilch.
He jerked on a pair of possibly clean jeans and pulled on a stained, mustard-colored work coat over a long-sleeved knit shirt frayed at the wrists. Covering his eyes against the bright sunshine, he hurried out to his truck, climbed inside, and flipped the visor down to get his sunglasses. Once he had them on, he shut the door and started the engine. He grabbed a bag of sausage biscuits at a drive-through window and then drove north toward Jefferson. Maybe something would hit him and tell him whether or not to buy the place—or at least half of it.
When he turned down the lane toward the Magnolia Inn, he braked and turned off the engine. He opened the sack and removed a sausage biscuit. He’d never been inside the inn, but Melanie had talked about going there for a tea that the Chamber of Commerce had put on for the girls when she was a high school senior. She’d gotten a dreamy look in her eyes the first time she pointed it out to him from the highway. He smiled as he remembered their conversation that day.
“Someday we’re going to have a house like that, and a dozen little Malone boys will slide down the banister from the second floor to the first one,” she’d said.
“And what if we have a dozen little Malone girls?” he’d asked.
“Then they will sit on the porch in fancy dresses and you can polish up your shotgun and wait on the swing to scare off the boys,” she’d giggled.
A picture of three or four teenage girls on the porch and a couple of boys playing football in the front yard popped into his mind. But that would never happen, because if he bought the house, it would be to run the place as a bed-and-breakfast. Melanie had been his soul mate, and he’d had five wonderful years with her. It was insane to think that a man ever got two chances like that in a lifetime.
“You could help me out here, Melanie,” he said.
He’d barely gotten the words out when Sassy crawled out from under the passenger seat and stuck her head into the sack of biscuits. She cocked her head to one side and then the other before she turned to meow at him.
He’d had to tranquilize the stupid cat to move her from Dallas to Marshall, and even then she’d awakened before they arrived. He could still hear her moaning and groaning from the carrier in the back seat of his club-cab truck. So why was she hitching a ride when she was supposed to be staying at the trailer?
“How did you get in here?” he asked.
Then he remembered putting on his sunglasses and his gloves before he shut the door that morning. But still, she should have been throwing a fit by now.
“Is this my sign, Melanie?” he finally whispered.
A bird flew down from the pine trees and landed on the hood of his truck, and Sassy made a noise in her throat as she tried to tease it into coming closer. She’d love it out here in the country, maybe as much as Melanie had thought she would when she’d talked about living in a place like this.
“Okay, I hear you,” Tucker said as he pulled his phone from his hip pocket and dialed Belinda’s number.
“What’s he askin’?” he said when she answered.
“Hello to you, too,” Belinda said. “There’s a house in Jefferson about that size that’s up for two hundred and fifty thousand. But it’s in pristine condition, so I’ve already told him there’s no way he’ll get but maybe a quarter of that amount for the Magnolia, since it needs a complete overhaul. You seen the inside yet?”
“Nope. Tell him I’ll go seventy-five thousand for half of it,” Tucker said. “Cash, so we can make it happen sooner than if I had to go through the bank for a loan.”
“He’s pretty anxious to sell.” Belinda drew out the words.
“Then tell him sixty-five,” Tucker laughed.
“I’ll relay your message. Should have a counteroffer within an hour or two. You should go inside to get a look at what all it needs before you make a second offer,” Belinda said.
“I’m looking at it right now from where I turned down the lane. I don’t need to see any more than this right now.” Tucker hit the “End” button on the phone, laid it aside, and ran a hand over Sassy’s