In the Cradle Lies

by Olivia Newport

  To Jillian, it looked very much as if he didn’t have anything under control, but she reminded herself—again—that this was his cooking style. She was more likely to clean up as she went along and always have a clear spot for the next food she needed to chop or mix. Nolan described himself as a visionary chef who couldn’t be bothered with such mundane details, so the kitchen was likely to look like a tornado had blown through. But his end result was far superior to hers, and he wouldn’t go to bed before the kitchen was spotless, so she had nothing to complain about. He did have a simmering pot on the stove, and ingredients for biscuits were open on the breakfast bar.

  “Go put your feet up in the living room, Jilly,” Nolan said. “Keep an eye out for them.”

  “I could roll out the biscuit dough.”

  “No need. Go relax.”

  Jillian took a paper napkin and wiped flour off his cheek and then kissed it before going into the living room to turn on the porch light. She sat for a few minutes in the comfortable purple chair with the companion ottoman, her favorite place to relax, and flipped pages of a magazine. A few minutes later the sound of an approaching vehicle and then closing car doors called her to look out the front window. Tucker offered an open hand to Kris, who laid her own in his. Fingers entwined, they swung their arms while they progressed up the walk. Tucker’s backpack dangled casually off one shoulder, as it always did when he wasn’t wearing it.

  Kris, who was so often all business and whose shop had suffered significant damage in the last twenty-four hours, was laughing. Jillian didn’t imagine she would be doing the same under similar circumstances. Then again, she didn’t have someone in her life who made her relax and laugh the way Tucker apparently did for Kris.

  Jillian was pretty sure she and Kris could never make fun of a Hallmark movie together again.

  “Dad, they’re here,” Jillian called.

  “Good, good, good,” came his response.

  She pulled open the heavy main door on one side of the house. “Come on in.”

  “It smells amazing in here,” Kris said.

  “Is it true Nolan does most of the cooking?” Tucker asked.

  “Lucky for me, yes.” Jillian put out her arms. “Let me have your coats.”

  Nolan came out of the kitchen. “Welcome to the Parisi-Duffy home, where a delectable menu awaits your taste buds in just moments.”

  Jillian hung the coats in a closet, and Kris handed a sack of goodies to Nolan.

  “Dessert!” His eyes lit up.

  “He’s going to sing, isn’t he?” Kris said.

  “I think so,” Jillian said.

  “On top of my sundae, all covered with sauce, I lost my poor cherry, it really got lost.” Nolan’s tenor filled the room.

  “How did you know he was going to do that?” Tucker asked.

  “Sometimes he just can’t help himself,” Jillian said.

  “It rolled off the table, and onto the floor, and then my poor cherry, it rolled out the door.”

  “Dad, the ice cream.” Jillian pointed to the package in his hands.

  “I shall endeavor not to let it melt,” he said.

  “You’d better not,” Kris said, “after what I’ve been through to keep it solid up until now.”

  “It rolled to the garden and under a bush, and then my poor cherry, it turned into mush. If you… if you…” Nolan faltered. “Can’t quite remember the last bit.”

  “I do,” Tucker said. “Old camp song.”

  “Oh no,” Jillian said.

  Tucker sang in a baritone octave. “If you like your sundae all covered with sauce, hold on to your cherry, or it will be lost.”

  “By golly, that’s it. You’re a fine man.” Nolan wagged one eyebrow and disappeared back into the kitchen.

  Tucker laughed. “This looks like a fantastic house.”

  “We think so,” Jillian said. “I work from home all the time, and Dad’s here two or three days a week. The layout gives us both the space we need.”

  “You never think about getting your own place?” Tucker asked.

  “Nah. I’d have to cook and pay my own internet bill.”

  He laughed.

  It wasn’t that Jillian never imagined living away from Nolan. Maybe someday she’d find somebody and the time would be right. But for now, this was where she belonged.

  Tucker had his hand on the small of Kris’s back as they moved into the living room, and when they sat on the navy sofa, they didn’t leave more than six inches between them. Kris did live on her own, and maybe she was ready to change that circumstance.

  “Canyon Mines is a great place,” Tucker said. “I see a lot of old houses that remind me of the small town I’m from—not as small as Canyon Mines, but the same kind of charm.”

  “And where’s that?” Jillian asked. Maple Turn, Missouri. She knew the answer. She just wondered whether he would say.

  “Near St. Louis.”

  “East? West?”

  “Sort of south. It’s like so many towns in the Midwest. It’s been there a long time. Maybe once upon a time it had a chance to be bigger than it is, but time passed it by.”

  Nice dodge.

  “I suppose that’s true of Canyon Mines,” Jillian said. “In the mining heyday everyone had great expectations. But here we are, a sleepy little mountain town with mining history and not much else.”

  “Great access to ski slopes,” Tucker said. “You have that in your favor.”

  “I suppose. Why do you live in—where is it?”

  “South of St. Louis.”

  “Right.” He wasn’t going to give anything away. Had he even told Kris the name of the town? “Do you stay for your work?”

  “It’s a family business, so I have to.”

  “Do you like it?”

  “It was Grandpa Matt’s business, and I loved him.”

  Jillian nodded, though it wasn’t really an answer.

  “If you could live somewhere else,” she said, “where would it be?”

  Tucker glanced at Kris. “Probably ski country. But realistically, I’ll have to settle for vacations.”

  Nolan emerged from the kitchen with a soup tureen and set it in the middle of the dining room table. “Dinner is served. I’ll just grab a few things, and we can say the blessing.”

  Kris didn’t wait for instructions about the seating arrangement. She automatically chose a place beside Tucker. While Nolan ferried the biscuits and butter and a pitcher of ice water, Tucker leaned back and stretched an arm across the back of Kris’s chair.

  How can they possibly become an old couple from Friday to Wednesday? But they had. Kris was relaxed, comfortable, as if her place had been beside Tucker Kintzler for years, not days.

  “I think that’s everything.” Nolan pulled out his own chair. “If I may, I’ll share a family blessing. May you always find nourishment for your body at the table. May sustenance for your spirit rise and fill you with each dawn. And may life always feed you with the light of joy along the way.”

  “That’s an Irish blessing if ever there was one,” Tucker said.

  “Straight from one of my Irish grandmothers.” Nolan passed the biscuit basket. “So Tucker, you left the museum to go meet someone you hired to look at Kris’s building. What’s the report?”

  “They’ll be at it first thing in the morning,” Tucker said. “The first step is to fix the pipe, which surprisingly they believe they can accomplish in one day, along with drying up the floors downstairs.”

  “They see no reason why the shops can’t open again on Friday,” Kris said. “We already have power back, and once we have water, we’ll be ready for a grand reopening!”

  Nolan chuckled.

  “Then they can work on the damage upstairs without interfering with anything,” Tucker said. “Carolyn and Kris can choose a day to close in order to have the floors downstairs refinished, but that can be at their convenience.”

  “Carolyn’s convenience, really,” Kris said, “since it’
s her shop that loses more business at this time of year than I do.”

  “Dad, Tucker was telling us a bit about his business before you announced dinner.”

  Tucker ladled stew into his bowl. “Not much to tell. It’s been around a long time, so it’s well established and seems to weather the bad times and come out on top. I’ve only been at the helm a little while and haven’t rushed to fix something that isn’t broken as far as I can tell. Just building on the assets we have and keeping people employed.”

  “Seems like a sound strategy,” Nolan said.

  “Are you staying in fairly close touch with the office while you’re out here?” Jillian asked.

  “I’m on vacation,” Tucker said. “What’s on my mind is skiing.”

  Tucker’s next comment had to do with how knowledgeable he found Leif Mueller on ski equipment and how satisfying it was to come to Colorado for some challenging skiing. The curtain closed on talking about his life in Missouri. But it hadn’t opened on discouraging him from skiing Hidden Run. Jillian stirred her stew gently, watching steam rise, and sized up the pair across the table, unsure whether her starry-eyed friend was still committed to persuading Tucker not to ski the dangerous run.

  They ate stew, warm biscuits, fudge, and ice cream. They swapped what information they had about recovery efforts around town. They yawned and debated the virtues and vices of caffeinated coffee in the evening.

  “The crew’s coming early,” Kris said at last, “so I’d better have an early evening.”

  Once Tucker and Kris were gone, Jillian helped Nolan clear the table and clean up the kitchen. Then, after he’d dragged up the back stairs saying he still had work to do before he could sleep and had to drive to Denver in the morning, she went into her office and powered up her computer. She had to find out more about Tucker. She wouldn’t use any secret portals of the internet not available to anyone—say, Kristina, if she was curious. But the local and regional newspapers that ran obituaries of Matthew Ryder were full of links to archived articles about the family and the business, and it was time to do more than scan the highlights. The articles only went back to a certain date. Before that, articles were available on microfiche at St. Louis regional libraries. She could make requests for copies, which might take a couple of days or a few weeks to fulfill. In the meantime, Jillian settled in to read what she could and, as was her habit, used a yellow legal pad to keep handwritten notes of the bits of information that caught her interest.

  Just in case.

  In case of what?

  In case she needed to tell Kris.

  For what purpose?

  She wasn’t sure.

  Just in case.

  The whole point of “just in case” is you don’t know what the circumstances might be.

  Tucker spoke of the business being his grandfather’s, but Jillian was fairly sure it went back at least one generation before that. Surely Tucker knew that. Jillian smelled a story.

  Accounts of the organization’s history praised “bold investments of capital in the early days” for paying off rapidly in profits that were reinvested in the company and formed the core of its financial strength for decades to follow.

  Ryder Manufacturing had been a steady and growing employer in Maple Turn that brought economic stability to the town along with a tradition of philanthropy around children’s causes. It was true that Tucker’s grandfather got the credit for the philanthropy.

  An old newspaper photo celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Matthew Ryder’s marriage indicated that his best man, Jackson, had been a childhood friend. Jackson had still been alive on the date of the Ryders’ fiftieth anniversary ten years earlier. The two men had their photo taken together at the more recent occasion.

  A quick search of death and obituary records suggested Jackson was still alive.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Nolan stood in front of Ore the Mountain two days later and laughed out loud.

  Kris opened the door and stuck her head out. “Like it?”

  “Where did you get that thing?”

  “Tucker. Not sure where he pulls his magic from, but it’s eye-catching.”

  “That it is.” Nolan stepped back to the edge of the sidewalk for the full effect of the giant red lettering of the GRAND REOPENING sign strung across the front of the building. “Not a bit much for only being closed two days?”

  “Three, if you count the day of the storm.”

  “Three then.” Nolan stepped inside.

  “Fun, don’t you think?”

  “Absolutely.” Nolan looked around. The wood floor showed water damage, of course, but between the mopping he and the others did on Tuesday, the fans they left running on Wednesday, and the work the professional crew did on Thursday, it was dry and could be sanded and refinished at a convenient time. The worst-case scenario was that some planks might have to be replaced. Otherwise, the shop looked the way it always did. “Looks like things are coming along well.”

  “The cleanup was so fast! Tucker thought the sign might drum up some winter business,” Kris said. “I guess he’s heard me whine enough times in the last week about how slow this time of year is for selling ice cream.”

  “Let’s hope it works.”

  “I’ll keep it up for the weekend traffic and make extra hot chocolate.”

  “Good idea.” The sign was visible halfway across town. “And the weather warmed up, so that’s in your favor.”

  “It’s perfect timing. Carolyn’s daughter had her baby last night, so she’s gone down to Golden for a month to help. I can’t depend on traffic from the candy shop spilling over into my store for a while.”

  “Then this will be just the boost you need.” Nolan rubbed his hands together. “Now, what have you got on offer today?”

  Kris narrowed her eyes. “I’m thinking you want pralines and cream.”

  “But of course.” Considering that he rarely varied from his three favorite flavors, she had a one in three chance of being right. “Jillian’s coming down soon. Any excuse to eat ice cream in the middle of the morning, you know.”

  “I do know.” Kris had a dish in her hand and filled it with two scoops, just the way Nolan liked it. “I feel like I should give you a prize for being the first customer at the grand reopening.”

  “Balloons dropping over my head, perhaps?”

  “Something like that.” Kris handed him the bowl.

  “All the ice cream I can eat for the rest of my life?”

  “I’ll make you up a certificate.”

  “In the meantime, take my green certificate.” Nolan left cash on the counter and moved to a small table near the window. “Who’s that out there?”

  “Who?”

  Nolan chuckled. “A dancing ice cream cone.”

  “What?” Kris came around the counter and hustled toward the window. “I didn’t know anything about this.”

  “A little more of Tucker’s magic.”

  “He never said a word.”

  “The ice cream cone’s hands are cherries. Nice costuming touch.”

  “An ice cream cone has hands?”

  “How else can he wave the customers in?”

  Kris’s thumbs were busy texting when the door opened.

  “Have you got hot chocolate?” A young man with an infant in his arms, two children behind him, and a woman bringing up the rear made the inquiry.

  “Absolutely.” Kris shoved her phone back in her pocket. “I can add extra milk to cool it down for the little ones.”

  “That would be great. We’ll have four, two with extra milk. I’m glad you’re open again. We were afraid the damage would close you down permanently.”

  “No way.”

  Nolan flashed a smile of encouragement at Kris and dug into his pralines and cream.

  Tucker arrived next. “Hey, great! Customers!”

  “Your little old-school promotion scheme seems to be working,” Nolan said. “How in the world did you do all this so quickly?”
/>   “I know people who know people. There are benefits to being in business.”

  “Apparently.”

  “Do you plan to stay awhile?”

  “Awhile. Jillian is coming down.”

  “Perfect. Keep sitting near the window. It’s better if people walking by see people inside.”

  “Will do.”

  “Do me a favor and keep an eye on this.” Tucker pushed his backpack into a corner between the window and Nolan’s table. “I’m going to go out and do some street duty. You can’t let it out of your sight.”

  Nolan laughed. “Go for it.”

  Tucker waved at Kris and went back outside. While the door was open, Luke O’Reilly came in.

  “Just the man I wanted to see,” Nolan said. “Now, about the theme of your winter party.”

  “Forget it,” Luke said. “Need-to-know basis, and you don’t need to know, my friend.”

  “I’m sure I could advise you on the legality of something or other. Quid pro quo.”

  “Your fancy lawyer words don’t work with me.”

  “Fine. That’s how you are.” Nolan heaped his spoon with ice cream and raised it to his mouth. Luke joined the line.

  Jillian came in—with three other people who went directly to the counter.

  “We all want an ice cream cone, ice cream cone, ice cream cone!” Nolan sang to the tune of “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” He held nothing back on the volume. Three little girls giggled.

  “Dad, we came to an agreement about public singing when I was in high school.”

  “I wish to renegotiate the terms.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “Perhaps you’d like to join the dancing ice cream cone.”

  “It’s been quite an entertaining morning so far.” Nolan eased another luscious spoonful of ice cream down his throat. “Much better than reviewing the final mediation agreements on my desk.”

  Jillian dropped into a chair beside Nolan. “Is that Tucker’s backpack?”

  “I have been authorized to supervise it.”

  Jillian drew back. “He’s more protective of that thing than most women are of their purses. He didn’t even give it to me with his coat when he came to dinner the other night.”