upturned face and stroked her belly before turning to face Nadya. “Welcome back, Nadya. It’s good to see you again.”
“Thanks. It’s great to be back.” She hugged his tall, skinny form. His hair had darkened from the almost-white towhead she’d remembered to a sandy blond that was thinning at the top. “J.T., fancy meeting you here.”
“When Bill told me Mary Ellen was making chicken and dumplings, I had to invite myself over.”
“There’s always room for one more. J.T., do you want a beer while Bill gets cleaned up?”
“I’d love one. I’ll get it.” He helped himself to the refrigerator then sat next to Nadya on the bench seat. “Don’t you look fresh as a daisy? It’s hot as hell out there. You’d think those protestors would find something better to do when there’s ninety percent humidity and record highs.”
“Were you helping with the protesters? I thought this was your day off?” Nadya tried to act casual but her pulse raced at his nearness. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans, and his biceps bulged at the seams. When he lifted his beer bottle to take a drink, she saw the edge of a tattoo on his upper arm. She had a sudden desire to trace it with her tongue.
She gulped at her wine and scooched a little farther away on the bench.
“Technically, it is my day off, but with only three officers on the entire force, when there’s a big enough problem, we get called in.”
“I’m surprised the town can still support a police department. I noticed the secondary school is closed and the library.”
“The library will re-open in August. It’s open during the school year. The secondary school closed down before I came back. There just weren’t enough students to justify keeping it open. Now the kids go to a regional school near Canton.”
“That’s a long ride every day.”
“Yup. The town is arguing about what to do with the old school building. Some folks want to turn it into a town hall slash recreation center. Other people want to keep it as it is in hopes we’ll have enough students to re-open it.”
“Do you think that will happen?”
“I doubt it. Besides, even though they have to ride the bus an hour each way, the kids are getting more opportunities than they would at our little school. The regional school has a football team, a band, foreign-language classes and computers. We couldn’t afford any of that in Dale.”
“If that developer gets his way and builds a bunch of McMansions, we’d have more families than we could handle,” Bill said as he walked into the kitchen. He’d changed out of his brown uniform into jeans and a T-shirt.
“That’s not necessarily a bad thing,” Mary Ellen said, handing him a beer. “We could use some fresh blood around here. And building means jobs. Lord knows, we could use more of those as well.”
“There are better ways to spark the economy than cutting down acres of woodland and building a bunch of overpriced houses. Our infrastructure can’t support a new development of the size being proposed.”
Nadya tried not to let the shock she felt show on her face. Billy Michaels was using words like economy and infrastructure. Hell, he was speaking at all. She’d heard him use more words in the twenty minutes he’d been home than she had the entire time she’d lived in Dale.
“Where would the new development be, if it gets approved?” she asked.
“Right behind the cabin,” J.T. said. “Apparently, the only street access is my driveway. The proposal calls for widening it and expanding it.”
“But that would mean tearing down the cabin.”
“Yup.”
Dismay hit her heart like a bullet. Even though the cabin was never hers exactly, it was still where she’d grown up. More importantly, if the drive got widened, it would ruin the little grove along the creek and tear down all the woods around the house.
“Don’t look so sad. It’s not a done deal. The developer is still in negotiations with the owner of the property. I guess there’s been some probate issues or something. This could get held up in the courts for years.”
“Enough of this serious talk,” Mary Ellen declared. “Dinner’s ready and I want only happy conversations. Bill, call the boys in to wash while I ladle out the stew.”
“I’m stuffed. I don’t think I could fit another bite,” J.T. said as he leaned back along the bench. The only thing he wanted to bite right now was Nadya’s neck. With her hair all