1105 Yakima Street

“I can’t leave you like this,” Bruce muttered. “If anyone needs to go, it’s Jolene and her entourage.” He looked pointedly at his daughter, demanding that she give him some privacy.

Jolene folded her arms rebelliously and refused to budge. “No way.”

“Just go,” Rachel pleaded, easing away from Bruce. “Like Jane said, you’re causing a scene.”

“I don’t care.” He ignored his daughter and focused on Rachel. He understood now that he hadn’t really grasped the extent of Jolene’s selfishness. He didn’t know how his daughter’s dislike of Rachel had reached this point. Nor did he know what had torn the two of them apart in the first place. At one time they’d been so close.…

“Don’t worry, Jolene,” Rachel said. “You can have your father all to yourself.”

His daughter’s smile could have lit up the entire mall. “Good.” To his shock, she and her posse of friends exchanged high fives.

With that, Rachel started to walk away, then apparently had a change of heart because she turned back. “Bruce, it would be better if you didn’t come here again.”

“I can’t promise that.”

“If you do show up, I’ll get a job somewhere else. This is embarrassing to me and the salon.”

Bruce shook his head, unwilling to stay away.

“If anything like this happens again, Jane’s going to find an excuse to fire me.”

Bruce had trouble believing that. But before he could respond, his daughter grabbed his hand. “Let’s go,” she said. “We don’t need Rachel.”

“I need Rachel,” he countered, pulling his hand free. “And our baby needs his or her father.”

“What about me?” Jolene demanded. “What about my needs?”

Rachel’s eyes locked with his. “Don’t come back here.”

“Okay, fine, but we need to talk.”

“No, you don’t,” Jolene inserted.

“Jolene, leave me and Rachel alone,” Bruce said furiously. He refused to have her interfering in his life like this. It was time she recognized her role in the breakup of his marriage. And, he told himself, it was time he admitted that he’d allowed her to do the damage she had.

“We need to talk,” he said again, wanting Rachel to know how important she was to him. Somehow, some way, they’d find a solution.

“No.” Rachel’s voice was adamant. “If this … incident today did anything, it solidified my reasons for leaving. I won’t go back to a house filled with tension and strife. It isn’t good for me or the pregnancy.”

“What about—”

Bruce didn’t get a chance to finish as Rachel left him standing in the center of the mall with a dozen faces staring at him.

“Come on, Dad,” Jolene said, all sweetness now. “Let’s go home.”

Bruce couldn’t bear to even look at his daughter. If he opened his mouth, he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to curb his anger. So he simply turned and walked away.

Five

“Mom, you’re wearing that goofy look again,” Tanni Bliss said as she strolled into the kitchen and selected an apple from the fruit bowl on the table.

“What look?” Shirley asked, although she knew exactly what her daughter meant. She’d just spent nearly two hours on the phone with Larry Knight, a nationally renowned artist—and the man she was now seeing. Although “seeing” wasn’t quite the right term, considering how much he traveled. They’d met at the Seattle Art Museum a few months earlier and been in frequent touch ever since.

Larry was a widower of five years’ standing, while Shirley had lost her husband to a motorcycle accident the January before last. She’d thought she’d never recover after Jim’s death. She’d been convinced that falling in love again was out of the question.

Then she’d met Larry…. The problem was that he lived in California and traveled a great deal—with his art exhibits, doing the lecture circuit, taking part in panels and interviews. They spoke every day now and emailed between conversations. They saw each other whenever possible, which wasn’t nearly often enough to suit either of them.

“So, where’s Larry now?” Tanni asked.

“He’s in New Mexico.” He might as well be on the moon. Without email and phone calls, she felt she’d slowly go insane. Or maybe not so slowly! She’d forgotten what it was like to fall in love. She’d been a college student when she met and married Jim. He’d been in the air force at the time and was about to be discharged. Eager to get on with an airline, Jim had set his sights on living in the Pacific Northwest. Once she’d visited the Seattle area, Shirley had agreed. This would be a lovely place to live and raise their children.

After Jim had been hired by Alaska Airlines, they’d settled in Cedar Cove and turned the basement of their large sprawling home into a studio for Shirley. She would’ve been content to remain exactly where she was for the rest of her days. Until the accident.

And, even then, she couldn’t imagine moving. But she’d met Larry, and that changed everything.

“When are you two getting married?” Tanni asked, breaking into her musings.

“Married!” Shirley gasped. “We hardly know each other.”

“Oh, come on, Mom. You haven’t been yourself ever since the day you first laid eyes on him.”

No use denying the obvious. “I know.”

“It’s not like I haven’t noticed. You’re crazy about Larry.”

“True.”

“So what’s holding you back?”

“Well, for one thing, Larry hasn’t asked.”

“Oh?” Tanni made it sound like she had insider information.

Shirley was tempted to ask if her daughter knew something she didn’t. Larry and Tanni chatted frequently, although she assumed her daughter had been looking for information about Shaw, the boy she’d once dated. The boy Larry had assisted in securing a place at the art institute in San Francisco.

“Has … has he mentioned that he’s going to ask me to marry him?” Shirley didn’t make eye contact. She felt guilty for even asking.

“No.”

So much for that.

“But if he did propose, what would you say?” Tanni asked.

Her daughter was teasing her. Playing along, she shrugged as if the question was of no real concern. “I’d probably tell him it was too soon and we should date a year or two first.”

Tanni burst out laughing. “You’re joking.”

She was, but that was irrelevant. Larry hadn’t proposed and, even if he did, it would be far too soon to make such a major decision. Besides, it wasn’t as if she could just move to California. Tanni had a year of high school left, and Shirley’s home and life were here in Cedar Cove.