Tess laughed, imagining him doing just that. “If you wear some earphones while you’re working, people will just think you’re singing along to your iPod.”
“Good idea. I’ll remember that.” He smiled at her, and she realized he was looking at her a certain way again. An admiring way, she’d say if she had to put a name to it. She had to dress up a bit for this job and hoped it wasn’t totally obvious that she had taken a little extra care with her appearance because she knew he would be here today. She had fixed her hair a little differently, gathered at her nape in a loose bun, and wore a black skirt and boots with a soft-looking blue-gray sweater that matched her eyes, and small pearl earrings.
She had also left her glasses downstairs, at the visitors’ desk. She only needed them for reading—and to put off guys who didn’t interest her. Jonathan definitely did not fall into that category.
“Can I get you some more coffee?” he asked. “I’m going up to get another cup.”
“Thanks, but I’ve got to get back to work,” she said, checking her watch. “Mrs. Fisk will be sending out the hounds in a minute.”
Jonathan laughed. “We don’t want that to happen. Not that I don’t like dogs,” he added quickly.
She had a feeling he was a dog person, as opposed to a cat person. She was a dog person, too. Not that it warranted discussion right now. Maybe at some point they would get to it. As she rose to go, she did hope so. “I’ll come up to the reading room in about ten minutes and find that Sophia Ames journal,” she said.
“Oh . . . the journal. Right. Yes, I’m excited to see it. I’ll wait there for you.”
She could tell by his expression, he had all but forgotten about the document while they were talking. Which gave Tess a good feeling. Had her company been so enthralling?
“Thanks for bringing me here,” he added. “I enjoyed our break.”
She smiled briefly. “Same here.”
He seemed like he wanted to say something more. Maybe ask her out on a real date? But finally he didn’t. He looked very serious and cupped his hand at his ear. “Uh-oh . . . did I just hear barking?”
Tess laughed. “I hope not. See you later.”
“Right. See you.”
She turned and quickly headed for the exit. At the doorway she noticed that he was still watching her. He smiled and she smiled back.
As she walked back to the office to sign in from her break, Tess felt a sudden rush of giddiness. Jonathan Butler was nothing like he had seemed at the diner. Nothing at all. And that was a good thing.
Just goes to show you, Tess. You can’t judge a book by its cover . . . especially if it’s all wet and soggy.
CHAPTER SIX
Joe, it’s Sam again. Won’t you answer it?” Marie Morgan was in the kitchen with her husband, eating a quick breakfast before setting off for work. Joe stood right next to the phone as the machine answered the call and their son Sam’s voice came on. But instead of picking up the phone, Joe just stood there listening.
“Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad. It’s me again. Thursday morning. I’m just trying to reach you, Dad. Will you give me a call on my cell, please?”
“What if it’s an emergency?” Marie said as the call ended.
“It’s not an emergency, don’t worry.” Joe sat down with his coffee and a bowl of oatmeal and started to read the newspaper.
“He’s left you messages all week. Maybe I should call him back if you don’t want to.”
Joe looked up at her. “You don’t have to call him back. It’s all right. I’ll call him when I’m ready. I know what this is about.”
Marie nodded and sipped her coffee. She eyed her husband over the rim of the mug. “I know. It’s about your mother . . . When is she coming here for dinner? Didn’t you invite her?”
“I did,” he insisted. “But I’m working every night this week. I’m not even sure how long she’ll be here.”
“Maybe I should call her,” Marie suggested, knowing that innocent sentence would get his attention.
Sure enough, Joe put down his paper. “Come on, honey. I told you what’s she’s up to. My mother has a way of twisting the evidence when she pleads her case. That’s how she got Sam on her side. I’d bet even money on it. Are you thinking about jumping ship on me, too?”
“Oh, Joe.” Marie shook her head. She could have predicted that last question. Sometimes her husband saw the whole world in terms of who was or wasn’t loyal to him. “I’m not jumping ship. You know that. But I have to say that I understand that your mother wants to see peace between her sons before she dies. And that she wants to see her family come together again. I can’t fault her for that, Joe.”
He nodded without looking up at her, pretending that he wasn’t really listening. But she knew he had heard every word.
At last he gave a heavy sigh. “It’s more complicated, Marie. You know it is. Tell you what, I’ll sleep on it.” That was Joe’s code for: I’ll forget we ever had this conversation.
“And what’s that going to do?” she began, but Joe’s eyes narrowed as he noticed something in the paper. “Wait,” he said, “let’s listen to the weather. The paper here says it’s going to snow this week.”
Her husband reached up and turned on the radio. A fast-talking announcer practically shouted out the weather report, conveniently cutting off their conversation.
Marie finished her breakfast and brought her dishes to the sink. It was time for her to leave; she couldn’t talk any longer anyway.
“Will you be late tonight?” she asked.
“Yeah, I will be. I’m not going to Spoon Harbor until three,” he said. Marie knew that meant he wouldn’t head home before eleven tonight, at the earliest. But she did wonder now why he was already dressed in his kitchen whites. Then he said, “I’m going to Molly’s shop this morning. Betty’s still out and she needs a hand.”
“That’s nice of you. I hope she appreciates you working so hard on your time off.” Marie put on her coat and grabbed her purse and keys.
“She just needs me to bake a few things. I don’t mind. A few more years in the head office, and I’ll forget how to cook altogether.”
“That’s what happens when you’re the top chef, honey,” Marie teased him. She kissed him good-bye and headed out the door.
Once outside, Marie took a few deep breaths of the cold, bracing air then got into her car. She started the engine, but didn’t drive off right away. She needed a few minutes to clear her head and collect her thoughts.
Joe was a good man, but he had a stubborn side that was as impenetrable as granite. Especially when it came to talking about his angry parting from his brother.
I should have known it was useless to talk about it, she thought, but I had to try. Maybe Sam will catch up with him and have better luck. Maybe I should say a little prayer for both of them on my way to work.
* * *
By Thursday morning, Sam was sure of it—his father was avoiding him. Sam had invited Joe to have a beer and watch some football on his big, new flat-screen TV. The Patriots were battling for first place in their division, for goodness’ sake. Joe brushed him off. Then Sam had asked his dad to come by the shop. He even tried to find him at home on one of his rare mornings off. No luck. Sure, the man worked like a dog, but Joe had always managed to fit in these visits before.
A wind swept off the harbor, and the fancy burgundy-and-gold-striped canopy over Molly’s shop fluttered in the breeze. Sam saw the usual crowd of customers inside, though it wasn’t yet lunchtime. He walked around the back to the employee entrance. His mother had told him that Joe was stopping by this morning to help Molly catch up with orders, since Betty Bowman, Molly’s partner, was out again.
Sam was hoping that Molly was out. In fact, he was counting on it. He knew that on Thursdays she didn’t come in until noon. He wanted some
time to talk to his father without taking on both of them at once.
As much as he loved his dad, and agreed he had been wronged by the terms of his grandfather’s will, Sam also knew that there was a time when wrongs had to be forgiven. Friendship, marriages, the relationships between parents and children . . . There always came a moment when it all hung on a thread, and forgiveness was the only way to mend it back together.
Sam’s faith was central to his life, and his faith taught that the world could not survive a single day without forgiveness, for small slights and great ones. Still, he hesitated outside the shop. He didn’t want to be in this position, going against both his father and his sister, but he couldn’t avoid it. Sam knew he had to argue for love and forgiveness. Anything else was wrong. Anything else was turning away from the divine love that was every person’s birthright. He sent up a silent prayer. Dear Lord, I’m going to need some help here. Please give me patience. Help me get my dad to listen. Or maybe you could just open his mind to the idea of forgiveness? We all need to find a way back to Your love if we’re ever going to find our way back to being a family again.
Sam squared his shoulders and walked up to the back door. It was unlocked. Is that a sign, he wondered wryly. He opened it and walked in. The workroom was empty. He wondered if he had missed Joe after all. “Hello?” he called. “Anybody around?”
Joe came out of the walk-in fridge. He wore an apron and carried a big metal mixing bowl.
“Hey, Sam. Looking for your sister? She’s out in Essex, visiting a client.”
No, I’m looking for you. Didn’t you get any of my phone messages this week? Sam wanted to say. But he checked himself from starting off on such a negative note.
“You just helping out today?” Sam asked, easing into the conversation.
“That I am. Betty is out with a bad back, poor thing. I had a little time before I have to get over to Spoon Harbor. It’s funny, I hardly ever get to do any real cooking anymore over there, ever since the promotion. It’s a lot of paperwork now, meetings with the managers, menu planning . . . managing all the nut jobs who work for me.”
Sam had to laugh at his father’s job description. “Come on, Dad. I know you love being the big boss. Besides, you had plenty of practice, bossing all of us kids around.”
“Don’t remind me. Your mother took the brunt of it. I was just the enforcer,” he joked. “By the time I got home, you would be asleep in your beds, looking like angels, and she would be telling me what a rotten bunch you’d been all day and I could hardly believe it.”
Sam remembered being a boy and feeling as if he never saw enough of his dad. His father would leave early in the morning and come home late at night, with only one day off a week to play with them. He often had cooking jobs at two or even three places, taking on different shifts and cobbling his income together. And he often took side jobs during the holidays to make a little extra money. Joe Morgan rarely had time to read them stories and tuck them in, or go to school events and baseball games.
But Sam always knew that his father loved them. That was the important thing. It was love that drove Joe, not ambition, love and a bone-deep sense of responsibility. That’s the way his father was—hardworking, responsible, consistent. What you saw was what you got with Joe Morgan.
Sam began to understand this once he had his own children. It was hard to find any fault with a father who was so devoted to his family, that was for sure.
Now Joe began taking eggs from a large carton on the table that held over a hundred. He cracked them with one hand into the big metal bowl.
Sam tried to think of a way into the difficult conversation, but his father spoke first. “I saw your grandmother the other day, Tuesday morning. Up at the inn on the island. She must have told you.”
Sam nodded and stuck his hands in his pockets. “She did say you stopped by.”
“She told me why she came, so I can guess why you’re here.” Joe flipped off a cardboard divider and took out more eggs.
Sam felt the side of his mouth curl down in a self-conscious smile. “You got me, Dad. I told Grandma I would try to talk to you.”
“No surprise there. Molly said you were on their side.”
Sam bristled at the us-against-them terminology. “Is that why you’ve been avoiding me all week?”
His father just laughed. “I was hoping I’d tire you out and you would give up. I guess that tactic didn’t work. Did you and your grandmother come up with a new strategy?”
“Why do we have to talk about it like that, like it’s some battle campaign? And why do there have to be sides? Aren’t we one family?”
His father was frowning now. He picked up a whisk and began to beat the eggs with a skillful, ferocious power. “I don’t want to talk about it at all. You’re the one who brought it up, you and your grandmother.”
Sam found it hard to talk above the sound of the metal whisk hitting the side of the bowl. He waited a moment, but it didn’t seem his father would be done any time soon.
You’re not going to make this one bit easy for me, are you? Sam said silently. Resigned, he plunged ahead. “I know Uncle Kevin and even Grandma did you wrong. I know your folks, your father especially, went back on his promise. I know you had the rug pulled out from under you by your own brother. I know that hurt a lot . . . I saw it with my own eyes.”
“You’re darned straight. I’ll tell you what hurt the most, Sam. That it was my own family. My own flesh and blood. I could have understood it all a lot better if these were strangers, people I knew in business, or people who pretended to be my friends. I could have understood that. But my family? You might say of an old friend, ‘We were so close, we were like brothers.’ But Kevin and me, we were brothers. You see why that makes it even worse?”
Sam nodded slowly. “Yeah, I do see. But you and Uncle Kevin are still brothers. And Grandma is still your mother. What would you think if I got mad at Mom for something and stayed angry for almost ten years? And you were gone and she had no one and I called once a week but didn’t pay much attention to her otherwise . . .”
His father abruptly stopped stirring the batter and put down the spoon. Sam could see the little scenario had gotten under his skin. “I get the point. But ‘what-ifs’ don’t matter. This really happened to me. You don’t understand. It changed something deep inside, Sam. It’s—” He spread one hand out, as if searching for words, then clenched his fist and said, “It changed something deep inside. It’s like something twisted inside me, down in my heart. I don’t think I can ever get it back the way it was again. I’m not just making an excuse.”
Sam didn’t know what to say. He had heard his father shout about the situation, but never talk like this, with so much emotion. He knew his dad was telling him that there was no solution, no way to bring everyone together. But Sam decided to press on. Maybe getting his father to express his grief was part of the process, like squeezing the poison out of a bite.
“I believe you, Dad. It was a huge loss for you. You had to let go of a dream, a new life that you’d imagined and anticipated for a long time.”
Joe nodded, measuring brown sugar with a glass cup. “That’s right. For years, I was hoping to move up to Vermont and get out of this cooking grind. It was the light at the end of a tunnel, that store. I was set up like a bowling pin . . . and knocked right down. Your uncle knew the store was mine. It was like he stole my entire future from me. I not only lost my father back then, I lost my brother, too. I didn’t recognize him anymore, who he had become. To be a person who could do that to me . . . and your grandmother just stood by. She kept saying she thought it was the right thing. The right thing? For who? Not for me.”
Sam was quiet a moment, watching his father work, adding spices and pouring in vanilla. The smell was sweet and soothing, in contrast to the difficult conversation. Joe added sugar from a big metal sifter tha
t he squeezed over the bowl. He was either making cake batter or cookie dough, Sam couldn’t tell which.
“You know Uncle Kevin was sick, Dad. He couldn’t stop drinking. Grandma and Grandpa were worried he’d never earn a living for himself without the store. And they were wrong. He lost the store when it should have been yours. But that was years ago, and now Uncle Kevin pulled himself together and he’s changed. He’s a different person.”
Joe glanced at him. “Because your grandmother says so? Take it from me, pal, that’s a lot of wishful thinking. She always says that about Kevin—while he’s lying in a gutter somewhere, not knowing which way is up.”
“Maybe that was true in the past,” Sam said carefully. “But Kevin’s got his act together now. He hasn’t had a drop for nearly five years, he has a really good job, and he got married again.”
Joe shook his head. “Your grandmother should have been in public relations. If she can say all that about Kevin with a straight face, she ought to be able to tell people I won the lotto and was elected president.”
Sam had to smile. “I know she tends to exaggerate to make a point. A family trait, I think,” he added. “I spoke to Uncle Kevin yesterday. I called him at his office, and I checked him out on the Internet. Grandma wasn’t lying. He does have a big job and is being transferred to New Zealand. The company even put out a press release . . . and I didn’t see Grandma’s name anywhere on that one.”
“Ha-ha. Very funny.” Joe yanked a sheet of plastic wrap off a big roll and covered the mixing bowl. “Just because he’s holding down a job doesn’t mean he stopped drinking.”
“Well, he said he did. He said it a few times,” Sam added. “He had no idea Grandma came down here. He said he was going to call her.”
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