by Hart, Gemma
There was a pause between them. Each one looking the other over carefully. Jason could only imagine what she was thinking of him. He remembered how it had all ended.
Kat finally shook her head, as if waking herself up from a reverie. She looked up at Jason, the dark smudges underneath her eyes breaking his heart, and gave him a faint smile that was nowhere near reaching her eyes.
“It doesn’t matter now,” she said again before turning around and disappearing down the street.
Jason wanted to stop her and to tell her how much she still mattered. How much every single letter, every word had mattered and still mattered to him. But he remembered his nightmares. He remembered his bloodsoaked hands. And he wouldn’t dare sully her like that.
Chapter Six
Kat took a deep breath as she stepped towards her front door. She held her keys tightly in one hand so they wouldn’t jingle, alerting the boys she was home. She needed a moment to compose herself.
Steeling herself, she opened the door. Immediately, her brothers’ loud and eager voices assaulted her.
“Well? Well?” Malcolm asked, rushing into the entryway, all arms and legs. “Did you meet him? Did you get to speak to him?”
Dillon, a few steps slower, looked towards his sister with reserved hope. “Was he there?” he asked, his voice breathless.
Kat first put her purse and keys down on the entry table and quickly ushered Dillon back into the living room and onto the couch. “First, you need to sit down,” she said with as much authority as she could muster. He looked too pale for comfort.
But then again, he was constantly pale now. Having had a relapse, he was going in regularly as an outpatient for chemo treatments. The scant amount of weight she had managed to force onto his body had melted away, leaving him nearly skeletal.
Dillon sighed as he sat. He rolled his eyes at her mothering but she could see the lines of his face ease as he leaned back onto the cushions.
“Well?” Malcolm persisted. “Did you meet Reggie? What was he like?”
Dillon’s eyes perked up, clearly dying of curiosity as much as his brother.
Kat sighed as she ran a hand through her hair. “I didn’t get to meet him,” she said finally, unable to hide the disappointment in her voice.
Malcolm frowned. “Was he not working that night?” he asked. “Are you going back tomorrow? If you go back, can I—”
“He’s dead,” Kat interrupted, wanting to cut Malcolm off before he got too carried away.
There was a moment of frozen silence between the three of them.
“He’s dead?” Malcolm said, echoing the same words Kat had whispered just a few hours ago.
Kat nodded, feeling a sudden overwhelming wave of nauseating panic take hold. She took in a deep breath to calm herself.
“He died about a year ago,” she said. She purposely left out the other surprise of the night.
Jason’s dark green eyes flashed across her mind.
Malcolm shook his head. “He can’t be,” he murmured as if to himself. “He can’t be dead.”
Dillon stared off as he slumped against the couch cushions. “So what does that mean?” he asked. “What are we going to do now?”
Kat sighed. She looked towards the fireplace where on the mantle stood several photographs. She looked at the center one. It was the three of them, the Ryans siblings, all crowded around Uncle Doughy. Uncle Do is crossing his arms, looking a little annoyed by the antics of his grown nephews and niece but anyone could clearly see the glimmer of amusement and quiet love in his hooded and rough eyes.
Oh Uncle Do, Kat thought with a longing sigh.
He had died nearly two years ago. A sudden and powerful heart attack had stolen him right from their grasps. He had died almost instantaneously on the kitchen floor of Doughy Pop’s.
It had devastated Kat and her brothers. Uncle Doughy had been everything to them. Having lost both parents at such a young age, they had looked to Uncle Do as their parent, their guardian, their teacher, their protector.
And now he was gone.
The town had mourned with the Ryans siblings. After all, Doughy had been a local character for decades in Peytonville. People had at first been scared by his rough demeanor and gravelly voice but over the years, they had learned to love him as their own gruff uncle.
“The bank’ll be calling again tomorrow,” Malcolm said quietly, sitting on the edge of the couch, his shoulders slumped forward in defeat.
Uncle Do had been a shrewd businessman and had saved up quite a bit of money that he had willed to his niece and nephews, who had become the children he had never had.
The money was to cover Malcolm and Dillon’s college expenses and to give Kat a cushion as she ran the diner. It had always been understood Kat would be taking over for Uncle Do when he retired.
But then a horrible surprise had greeted them a month after Uncle Do’s passing.
A letter had been sent to the house from a New York law firm offering the Ryans $40,000 to buy Doughy Pop’s.
Kat had been confused. After all, how would a New York law firm even know about Doughy Pop’s, let alone want to buy it? And she also felt insulted. $40,000? They wanted to buy an entire diner for the price of a car?
She had immediately dismissed the letter as some kind of odd hoax.
But then the bank had called a week later, asking what Kat intended to do about their diner.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Well, the lease is up,” Mr. Rilkes, their personal business banker for over a decade, said matter-of-factly.
“We don’t have a lease,” Kat said slowly, as if speaking to someone who was hard of hearing. “We own Doughy Pop’s.”
“I know, dear,” Mr. Rilkes said, using the same tone of voice. “But what about the land it sits on?”
Doughy Pop’s sat on what used to be a vacant lot. Over the years, it had grown a charming little array of old knick knacks out in front with a little pathway up to the diner door made up of tiles from old soda pop bottles.
“We own that land, Mr. Rilkes,” Kat said. “We own everything Doughy Pop’s sits on.”
There was a pause. Kat felt her heart thumping. She could tell the other shoe was about to drop.
“No, you don’t,” Mr. Rilkes said softly.
He then explained how several years before he had become Doughy’s personal business banker, the previous banker had failed to explain the new lease contract for the diner.
Doughy had wanted to buy the land for a long time and had finally saved enough money to do so. He had put his trust in his then banker to put the proceedings through. Except there had been a failure of communication and instead, the banker had handed him a lease giving him unlimited usage of the land until if and when the owners of the land decided to sell.
Doughy, usually quite meticulous about business matters, had signed without reading the fine print. Unlimited usage sounds very much like unlimited ownership.
Kat wondered how he could’ve made such a huge mistake. But then it hit her. A little over a decade ago was right around the time she and her family had first taken up residence at Doughy’s.
It had been a huge adjustment for everyone involved and no doubt Uncle Do had been a little frazzled. He might not have been in his right mind when he had signed the contract. He had assumed his banker had done his job.
Kat gripped the phone tightly.
“Someone’s buying the land?” she asked in a tight voice.
“Not just your land but nearly everything around Peytonville,” Mr. Rilkes said. “There’s talk of it being turned into a planned community. You know, condos and apartments.”
“But they can’t do that!” Kat protested. Fear gripped her. Not only could she potentially lose Doughy Pop’s, she would lose her home, her town!
“Oh they can,” Mr. Rilkes confirmed sadly. “You know how the town has been lately. Business has been declining rapidly for most everyone. More families are moving away. It might
be a mercy for the town to be bought out.”
But she could hear the note of heartbreak in Mr. Rilkes voice. He had been born and raised in Peytonville and then had moved to Chicago for college. But he had returned almost immediately to his hometown, missing the trees and the clean, sweet air.
“Then what do I do?” Kat asked in defeat.
Mr. Rilkes’ sigh crackled across the phone line. “Try to get them to raise up their offer for as high as you can and then take the money and go,” he advised.
Kat shook her head. Go where?
But Mr. Rilkes had been right. Offers began cropping up overnight throughout the town for their buildings and businesses. Some gave in and took the money and left. But many didn’t. Many were proud of their small town and wanted to stick it out. They believed if just given the right opportunity, they could turn Peytonville around.
So many came to Kat for small loans to keep their businesses afloat while they tried to ward off the big city buyers. Banks wouldn’t give them any money when they could see the looming shadows of their new owners coming in. And they knew Kat had some money after Uncle Doughy’s death.
And Kat, who loved the town as much as her family, could turn away no one. So the small fortune Doughy had amassed for them slowly dwindled over the two years as they worked to keep the town afloat.
Malcolm refused to think more about college when their livelihood was on the line. It broke Kat’s heart to see Malcolm push back his education even further but she was secretly grateful to have his support.
And then Dillon relapsed.
It was as if the universe wanted to see just how sturdy Kat’s back really was. Would one more crisis finally break it?
Dillon, the baby of the family, was immediately rushed to the hospital where he received treatment as an inpatient for three months before being moved up as an outpatient.
Sick and thin, he took one class a week at the local college just to give him something to do besides sitting at home all day. He was bright and independent but Kat could see even his stalwart will slowly breaking down as he endured another round of chemotherapy.
Kat looked up at the wall. It was four in the morning. “Guys, we really should get some sleep,” she said, trying to avoid all the tough questions for the night. “You guys shouldn’t have even been up. Especially Dill.”
Malcolm put out a hand to help his brother off the couch. Kat’s heart ached to see the twenty year old’s knees quake as he tried to gain his balance.
“Dill was the one putting up a racket the whole night to wait for you,” Malcolm said, putting an arm around his brother. “He finally wrestled me downstairs to wait up.” He grinned and knuckled Dill on the head.
Dillon snorted, his thin frame not enough to wrestle a feather. But he grinned up at his big brother, clearly glad to have him for company.
The two marched upstairs. Once Kat heard their door shut, she headed over to the kitchen to pour herself a healthy glass of wine, which she carried upstairs to her room. For months now, she’d needed a good glass or three of wine before she could fall into a fitful sleep. During the day, she could hide the stress of fighting every day but at night, it all unraveled like yarn.
Once inside, she took a long gulp before sitting down at her small vanity desk. Pulling open the tiny drawer beneath it, she pulled out an old manila envelope.
Taking in a deep breath, she opened it and dumped the contents out. Well worn and well read letters from another lifetime ago poured out across the small desk.
Kat picked the first one up. Some of the ink from the front of the envelope had smeared off over the years.
She hadn’t read or opened these letters in a long time. She had learned to put this part of her history behind her. After all, she had told herself countless times, it had only been one night.
But even still, she had kept the letters. She couldn’t bring herself to throw them away.
I prefer those North Carolina stars. They’re warmer. And beneath them, there’s a pretty girl and some blueberry pie waiting.
Kat took another gulp of her wine.
Had she really seen Jason tonight? It had felt like a ghost had come back to her. And of all places, in a dive bar like Reggie’s.
Uncle Doughy had told her that if ever she was in trouble to go find a man named Reggie Black. He would help her no matter what. She had gone to find this man to ask for a loan. She needed more money to keep the diner afloat. With decline in business all across the town, Doughy Pop’s was having a harder time making ends meet.
But instead of a possible angel investor, she had found the devil of her dreams.
Jason.
He seemed taller than she remembered. And broader. And more powerful. She remembered his arm around her as he had pressed her against him, protecting her from the brawl. She remembered his strength as he easily kept her near, not letting her scoot even an inch away until they had reached safety.
But his face was darker. His scruff was thicker and his face more lined. He looked like a man who was living a haunted life. His eyes, which had always been sharp and potent, now looked absolutely lethal. He seemed honed to a razor blade’s edge. Cross him wrong and he would cut you.
Yes, a man like that would stop writing, Kat deduced finally. She finished the rest of her wine.
It was just as well that that dream died as well. There was no room in her life now for princes and fairy tales. Her uncle had died. Her brother was sick. And she was about to lose the only semblance of a home she had ever had.
Lying down her bed, Kat realized maybe it was finally time to throw those letters away.
Chapter Seven
The diner door chimed as Kat walked in. Malcolm was in the back cooking. He had taken over the role of cooking after Uncle Doughy’s death. Kat had originally wanted to be cook but management of the home and restaurant took too much time for her to be behind the stove.
Malcolm’s head popped up through the order window and nodded at his sister.
Kat quickly threw her purse under the register and grabbed an apron. She had had to drop off Dillon at the hospital for his treatment in the morning. A year or two ago, she would’ve been worried about leaving the diner short, but these days, with how slow business was, she knew Malcolm would be okay.
Janelle bustled by, smiling. Janelle was a local high school student who Kat had quickly hired after Uncle Do’s death. Janelle was sweet and hardworking and a blessing to Doughy Pop’s.
Looking around, her prediction had been right. The place wasn’t even a quarter full and Janelle was covering all the tables. So tying her hair back, Kat quickly hefted the tray of clean glasses to stack below the soda machine.
As she worked, she heard Malcolm’s voice through the order window, “How was Dill?”
“Oh you know him,” Kat replied, carefully stacking the glasses. This was not a time she could afford any broken glasses. “Taking it like a champ as usual.”
If anything, she wished Dillon would complain more. His quiet strength and resolve broke her heart. He had missed so much of his childhood because of his illness. And yet, he worked to keep any hardship to himself because he didn’t want to add to the burdens of his brother and sister.
Kat shook her head before a tear could escape. “You know,” she said, quickly changing the topic, “have you seen the bank recently? On my way in, I saw all these trucks outside the bank with like new furniture and equipment. Like new ATM machines.”
“That’s nothing,” Malcolm countered. “Haven’t you seen Hoyt’s?” Hoyt’s was the local grocery store. “They’ve torn down the whole front face of the store. I asked Hoyt what was happening and he said that he was redoing the whole front. There was a stack of lumber out back.”
Kat paused, squatting on her haunches as she processed this new information. “How is that possible?” she asked, thinking aloud. “Where’d he get the money for so much work?”
She couldn’t see him but she knew Malcolm had shrugged in the pause of
silence.
“But he looked excited about the work,” Malcolm said. “No wonder, of course. That place was sorely in need of a makeover. But I still don’t know where the money came from. And the bank—I don’t know where they’re getting all that new stuff either.”
Kat didn’t either. The bank was an independent credit union. They weren’t even part of a huge national chain. So where did this money for sudden renovation and improvement come from?
Kat gasped as a thought hit her. She jumped up to her feet so she could stare at Malcolm through the order window.
