“I’m sorry,” Callie said, shutting the door. “I...I didn’t realize you’d moved into my...into this room.”
“The new baby’s getting my room,” Becca said. She was still scowling and Callie wasn’t able to tell if she was happy with the move or not.
Her twin, Brandon, stuck his head around his sister’s shoulder and stared at Callie’s bedraggled appearance. “What happened to you? You’re all wet.”
He had the same strawberry blond hair and blue-gray eyes as his sister, but the resemblance ended there. He was three inches shorter and twenty pounds heavier than his sister, with a linebacker’s build and a round baby face that would be the bane of his existence well into his thirties, Callie guessed.
“Hi, Brandon.” She smiled, and it wasn’t quite as forced as when she’d greeted Becca. Brandon was a lot less hostile than his sister, even if she had disappointed him at Christmas by buying him a Detroit Tigers baseball jersey when his favorite team was the Cleveland Indians. Lesson learned, she’d promised herself. From now on she would consult Ginger before picking out gifts for her children. “I stopped at the clinic. There’s a broken water line in the ceiling. There’s water everywhere.”
“We heard,” Becca said. “Zach called us. Mom and your dad are going to the clinic to help as soon as the dinner rush is over.”
“You weren’t supposed to get here until tomorrow,” Brandon said. His blue-gray eyes were clouded with worry. “Everything was supposed to be cleaned up. You weren’t supposed to see the mess.”
“I wish I hadn’t,” Callie said frankly. Brandon seemed to be one of those kids who always felt as if everything that went wrong around them was their fault. Another reason she found it easier to relate to him. She remembered being the same way at his age. “It was an accident. We’ll get it all squared away.” She smiled again, although she wasn’t all that confident of her own words.
“Oh, dear, Callie? It is you.” The light, musical voice belonged to her stepmother. “Mac thought she saw you sneaking up the stairs. I sent the twins up to check, and when they didn’t return, I figured she was right.”
“I wasn’t sneaking,” Callie said, defending herself. “Hello, Ginger.” She spread her hands. “I wasn’t too keen on being seen this way.”
“Goodness.” Ginger took Brandon by the shoulders and moved him out of her way. Becca flattened herself against the wall, pointedly avoiding any contact with her mother’s protruding belly as Ginger moved forward to get a closer view of Callie. “What happened?” Her eyes narrowed as understanding dawned. “You’ve been to the clinic.”
“The door was open. There were cars in the parking lot when I drove by. It seemed unusual for this late on a Saturday. I thought I should check it out.”
“It’s lucky Zach stopped in when he did. It could have been a lot worse.”
“He seemed to have things pretty well under control when I left.” The way he’d dismissed her offer of help still bothered her slightly, but she didn’t say anything more. It was obvious her stepmother held the man in high regard—as did her father, she reminded herself. Professional courtesy and self-preservation warned her to keep her less flattering opinion of the PA to herself.
“Nothing’s going the way I planned it,” Ginger lamented. “Nothing’s ready for you.” She furrowed her brow, as if trying to figure out what to do next. She was a small woman, several inches shorter than Callie, with strawberry blonde hair the same shade as Becca’s but cut short and feathery, and with Brandon’s rounded face and snub nose. There were tiny laugh lines at the corners of her generous mouth and blue-gray eyes, another trait she shared with her children. She was pretty and petite and she laughed a lot. Maybe that was why her dad had fallen head over heels in love with her, even if she did come with a ready-made family in tow.
“Should we tell Dad she’s here?” Brandon asked.
A tiny needle prick of jealousy shot through Callie, an unsettling sensation. It was the first she’d heard either of Ginger’s children refer to her father that way. She hoped her involuntary reaction hadn’t been evident on her face or in her eyes. She was a grown woman. She could share her father’s love and affection. It was just going to take a little getting used to, that was all. “No, Dad’s probably busy behind the bar. I’d rather he not see me this way. Really, all I want now is to shower off this fiberglass and get into some dry clothes. I didn’t know where else to go. I’ll call around and find a motel room.” Callie was mortified. “It was thoughtless of me not to call you about the change of plans.”
She belatedly remembered that the Physican’s Committee had arranged a place for her to live, but no one had given her the details. She’d been so busy packing away her things and finalizing the sublet on her tiny apartment in Ann Arbor that it had slipped her mind to inquire further. If pressed she’d admit she just assumed she’d be staying in her old room until she got settled in. A miscalculation in line with everything else that had happened today. She had nowhere else to go except to her mother’s, and she wasn’t up to dealing with Karen tonight.
“Don’t be ridiculous. You’ll stay right here. No more arguing. Of course you’ll be wanting a shower.” Ginger laid her hand on her stomach, glancing across the hall at the bathroom door. She was wearing a pine-green top over slim white slacks. The top was fitted below her breasts and elasticized at the bottom so that it flared gently over her baby bump and fitted snugly on her hips. The shade of green that washed out her daughter’s pale skin tone flattered Ginger’s warmer complexion.
Her stepmother was getting quite big, Callie noticed, but she was already in her third trimester.
Callie wouldn’t be delivering any babies while she worked at the clinic—the hospital was too far away to make that practical, and to be truthful an ob-gyn practice had never been what she wanted—but she would be seeing prenatal patients and coordinating their care with the obstetrician in Petoskey. Ginger, however, was family, and medical ethics prohibited her from treating or prescribing medications for family members. If she was honest with herself, she was relieved not to be forced into such an intimate relationship with her stepmother, who was, when she got right down to it, a virtual stranger. And sleeping with her father to boot.
“Mom, our bathroom’s trashed, remember,” Becca said acidly. “We were going to clean tomorrow. You and J.R. made us work on the cottage today.” She shot Callie an accusing glare as though the messy bathroom was somehow her fault. So, her dad evidently hadn’t made as much progress with Becca as he had with Brandon.
“I’m not fussy,” Callie said. “A few dirty towels lying around won’t bother me.” She’d only stayed with her new extended family on the one previous occasion—the not-so- successful Christmas visit—and then only for two nights. The apartment had been spotless. Callie had been impressed and said so. Neither she nor her dad were particularly good housekeepers but evidently Ginger was.
“I wanted everything to be just right,” Ginger said under her breath. “I’m sorry. We changed Becca’s room because I wanted the one closest to us for the baby. Your dad hasn’t been sleeping well lately. I...I decided it would be better for the little one to be in a room of his or her own.”
J.R. and Ginger had decided against learning the sex of the new baby. That was fine with Callie, but she was disturbed to hear that her dad wasn’t sleeping well. Was it stress or, worse, some kind of health problem he was keeping from her? It seemed every few minutes something else served to remind her just how long she’d been away, how little she was aware of what went on in her dad’s life these days. It hurt.
But she could begin to do something about it now that she’d returned to White Pine Lake. Being close enough to spend time with her dad was one of the reasons she’d taken the job. She had to keep reminding herself of that.
“It’s fine. I don’t care what the bathroom looks like. I’m the one who should be apolo
gizing for not telling you I was coming early,” she repeated, sincerely remorseful. “If there’s a clean towel and hot water, I’ll be fine.”
Ginger smiled and almost got it right. “Stop apologizing for wanting to come home a day early. Just pretend you’re the first person to take a shower after a hurricane blew through the bathroom, okay?”
“I promise not to notice a thing.”
“Have you eaten?” Ginger caressed her stomach absently as though soothing herself as well as the baby inside her.
“No, and I’m starved,” Callie said, grinning. “I hope you aren’t sold out of the bluegill tonight.”
“I’ll go down right now and have Mac set some aside.”
“And a spinach salad,” Callie said, “oh, and a baked sweet potato. I’ve been craving one for a couple of weeks.”
“Cravings have taken over my life,” Ginger said, seeming to relax a little.
“You’re craving sweet potatoes? That’s a new one.”
Ginger laughed. “Nothing so healthy, I’m afraid. Anything salty and crunchy and sweet.” She threw up her hands. “Every kind of junk food. It’s driving your dad crazy. Thank goodness we live above a restaurant. I can always raid the snack rack by the cash register, even in the middle of the night.”
“She set off the alarm once.” Brandon snickered. “The fire department came and everything. You can ask Dad.”
Ginger flushed an unbecoming red. “Oh, let’s not,” she said. “Go tell Mac that Callie will want dinner in, oh, about twenty minutes or so?”
“Twenty minutes. Great.”
“And I’ll remind her not to forget the cinnamon butter for your potato,” Brandon offered. “It’s my favorite.”
“Mine, too.”
“All right.” Brandon gave her a thumbs-up and took off at a trot.
“Are you sure it’s not too much trouble for me to shower here? I could drive out to Mom’s farm.” She was embarrassed. Ginger must assume she was as unreliable and unprepared as her mother. She didn’t appreciate the comparison one bit.
“That was going to be part of the surprise tomorrow,” Ginger said. “The elderly couple who always rent half the double cottage for six weeks had to cancel due to health issues. It’s small but so much nicer than the ‘mini suite’ at the Commodore Motel the committee picked out for you.” Her tone of voice when she said “mini suite” suggested the Commodore Motel wasn’t the nicest in town by a long shot. Callie was relieved she wouldn’t be staying there. “The cottage is all ready for you to move into as soon as you’ve cleaned up and eaten dinner. Peace and privacy. Well, a place of your own, anyway,” she added cryptically.
“Thank you.” She couldn’t quite keep the relief out of her voice. She loved the tiny duplex cottage on the lakeshore. And it was within walking distance of the White Pine and only half a mile from the clinic. She could bicycle to work—if her old bike was still hanging from the rafters in the garage.
“I’m glad you’re pleased. Your dad said you would be.” Ginger didn’t sound as convinced as J.R. apparently was. “The other side is rented, so it won’t be all that private, but it’s the only property not booked solid for the season.”
“It is my favorite, and I’ll love it, neighbor or no neighbor.” But the duplex was income for her dad. She couldn’t just move in during peak tourist season. “I’ll make up your shortfall on the rent. I’m sure the Physician’s Committee bullied Dad into giving them the same rate they were getting from the manager at the Commodore.”
“Settle that with your father over dinner,” Ginger said, waving off Callie’s suggestion.
Dinner with Dad. Callie couldn’t believe how much she wanted just that. There would be no expansive emotional display from J.R. when she came into the bar. When he caught her eye, he would smile at her, jerk his head in a signal to meet him in the kitchen at the old Formica table with its eight well-worn chairs—the “Cook’s Corner,” as her grandmother had named it years before Callie was born—where the staff ate. He would give her a quick, awkward hug, pull out her chair, set a steaming plate of fish before her and straddle the seat beside her so he could watch her eat. He wouldn’t scold her for not calling to say she was coming a day early, but she would apologize anyway because she had caused Ginger distress. He would tell her not to worry, that it was okay. It’s good to have you home, Callie girl, he would say. And that would be all she needed to hear. She would be home, and everything would be right with the world, because J.R. Layman could make it so.
At least, it had seemed that way to her when she was a child. But she wasn’t a child any longer, and J.R. had new responsibilities and a new family to keep safe from the big, bad world. She was on her own now, and that was the way it should be. She couldn’t pretend it didn’t hurt to be the outsider in this new family grouping—it did hurt—but that didn’t mean she intended to stand aside and do nothing to improve the situation, if for no other reason than to make things easier on her dad. She would do what she could to make them all a family.
“C’mon, Becca, you’re on the clock until nine, remember.” Her stepmother’s strained voice brought her back to the moment at hand. Ginger held out her arms, attempting to gather her daughter close. Becca sidestepped the embrace. Ginger hesitated a moment, her arms still outstretched, and then she dropped them to her side. “We really are happy to welcome you home, Callie.” Her smile didn’t falter but her eyes were bleak. So, the unhappy vibe Callie had picked up on when Becca had told her about switching bedrooms hadn’t been her imagination. There was some tension between mother and daughter over the new baby’s arrival, and perhaps between her father and his new wife, too?
Suddenly all the insecurity she’d been experiencing since she’d agreed to take the position at the clinic returned in a rush, almost overwhelming her determination to help her family. Developing relationships with her stepmother and stepsiblings and finding her own place in a new blended family was yet another complication to add to the weight of uncertainty over her sojourn to White Pine Lake. At least she had options if she couldn’t stay.
It was going to be a very long summer.
CHAPTER THREE
THUNDER RUMBLED OVERHEAD and Zach swung his feet over the edge of the bed. He rested his elbows on his knees and dropped his head into his hands, staring down at the scarred pine floor. It was barely daybreak but he wouldn’t be sleeping any more. Something about the long, rolling rumble of a storm coming in off the big lake reminded him of Afghanistan. There weren’t a lot of thunderstorms in that far-off, arid country, but there was a lot of gunfire. The one aspect he didn’t like of living near a big body of water was the really loud thunderstorms. Occasionally, they still triggered a bout of PTSD, and he didn’t want that happening with his brand-new roommate just on the other side of the wall.
He’d grown up on the edge of the California desert, shuffled from one foster home to another. He had no idea who his parents were, his people, but he suspected somewhere in his lineage there had been at least one sailor. He’d been fascinated by the sea as a child, and now as an adult by the great inland seas so nearby. The day after he graduated from high school, he’d left the last foster home he’d been placed in and joined the navy. He’d thought he’d spend the next four years surrounded by water, maybe even assigned to an aircraft carrier, but instead he’d ended up in Afghanistan. Twice.
In White Pine Lake there was water everywhere he looked, exactly as he’d envisioned as a child, but he still didn’t like thunderstorms.
He pulled on a pair of sweats and a T-shirt. Rudy had advised him early on not to wander around in his skivvies while he was living in White Pine Lake, and his old Marine buddy had been right. It wasn’t unheard of for someone to come knocking on his front door at any hour of the day or night for free medical advice. He wondered how his new neighbor, the uptight Dr. Layman, would handle that aspect
of a small-town practice. Not well, he’d guess. He wondered what she was doing here at all.
Actually, the answer to that one was easy enough. She was a Layman. Knowing J.R., hearing the praises of J.R.’s father and—from the old-timers who remembered that far back—his father sung throughout the town, it was because of an overdeveloped sense of duty, not because practicing medicine in a small town was what she wanted most in life.
Well, it was what he wanted, and he intended to hang on to this job with both hands, even if it meant butting heads with her at every turn.
He’d been willing to make amends after their less-than-stellar first meeting when he’d heard her Jeep pull into the parking space behind the duplex that first night. He’d gotten up off the couch, even though he was bone tired, and walked out into the cool, humid night to greet her and offer a hand to help unload her Jeep. He could hear a radio playing in a nearby cottage, and traffic sounds from Lake Street intermittently drowned out the chirping of crickets and the eerie wail of a loon calling for its absent mate. A small tingle of uneasiness prowled at the edge of his consciousness. A motorcycle going by had masked his footsteps on the gravel, so she whirled in surprise when he spoke, hitting him in the thigh with a big overstuffed duffel bag as she swung around.
“Oof,” he said.
“Good heavens, you scared the life out of me. What are you doing here?” She dropped the duffel with a thud, barely missing his foot in the process.
“I was coming to offer my help unloading your Jeep.”
They were standing under a streetlight. He could see her face clearly. Surprise at his appearance had widened her eyes momentarily. Now they narrowed with suspicion. “Where exactly did you come from?”
He hooked his thumb over his shoulder toward the duplex. “Didn’t your dad explain? We’re neighbors. Real close neighbors.”
“No.” Her lips thinned. “He did not. He just said he knew the cabin was my favorite place and since it had become available—” She put her hands on her hips. “This isn’t acceptable,” she said.
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