A Promise Remembered

by Elizabeth Mowers

  He’s finally back...

  but time doesn’t heal all wounds

  William Kauffman is back in his Michigan hometown, but not for long. When he runs into his high school sweetheart, Annie Curtis, she’s a reminder of everything and everyone he left behind, without an explanation, years ago. Are a sick mother, a failing diner, two adorable children and the woman he’s never stopped loving enough to make him right past wrongs and stay?

  “Are you in a bad place now, William?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Annie shrugged. “Breezing back into town and then readying to leave again... What haven’t you told me?”

  He paused, his hands grazing over hers before pulling away. “Nothing.”

  Her wide eyes slowly narrowed. “Something.”

  “You and I haven’t gotten off on the right foot, Annie, and I’d like to make a fresh start with you.”

  “I don’t really know what to say.”

  “Consider this gift a peace offering for all the times I should have been with you staring up at the moon. I really wish you would.”

  “You missed a lot, William. And to suddenly start a friendship now...”

  “I’m sorry. I should have been here.”

  “No. You should have called me, instead of dropping off the face of the earth. I didn’t know what had happened to you. I assumed you didn’t care about me anymore.”

  “I always cared,” William whispered. “I care.”

  Dear Reader,

  A long time ago, I heard the adage “Friends are the family you choose,” and as I have friends I embrace as sisters, I believe this to be true. As far as families go, sometimes they hurt us and sometimes we lose our way.

  In A Promise Remembered, I wanted to imagine a community that would become family for Annie and William, who loved each other once upon a time but think a second chance at happiness is out of their reach. As Annie fights to protect her family and William runs from past mistakes, they might think they’re each too broken to choose a new life, a happier life. And yet, they have a cast of supportive friends—from Dan and Earl, to Margie and Joe—who love Annie and William enough to nudge them along to the happily-ever-after they both deserve. Because we all deserve friends who love us as family and a family that pulls us closer to love.

  I wish that for us all.

  I’d love to connect with you. Find me on Facebook on my author page or visit my website, elizabethmowers.com.

  Wishing love to you and yours,

  Elizabeth

  A Promise Remembered

  Elizabeth Mowers

  Elizabeth Mowers wrote her first romance novel on her cell phone when her first child wouldn’t nap without being held. After three years, she had a happy preschooler and a hot mess of a book that will never be read by another person. The experience started her down the wonderful path of writing romances, and now that she can use her computer, she’s having fun cooking up new stories. She’s drawn to romances with strong family connections and plots where the hero and heroine help save each other. Elizabeth lives in the country with her husband and two children.

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  To Mom, who always knew I’d be a writer.

  To Dad, who was proud of me no matter what.

  To Danielle, my moon baby.

  To Michaela, my water baby.

  And to Kevin, who won my heart in Marquette all those years ago.

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  EPILOGUE

  EXCERPT FROM IN THE DOCTOR’S ARMS BY CAROL ROSS

  CHAPTER ONE

  WILLIAM KAUFFMAN CLUTCHED his right hand in his lap, rubbing a thumb over the tops of knuckles that still carried the scabbed gash from the latest in his line of regrets. Slouched in the driver’s seat of his rusted-out Chevy truck, he carefully examined the wound. It was the only one visible to the world.

  It wouldn’t be a long visit. Quite brisk in fact. Chinoodin Falls, Michigan, was the last place he wanted to be, but he owed it to his mother to make one last visit before hightailing it west and possibly out of the country. The thought of rescuing the 1981 Indian motorcycle rusting away in her shed, which should have passed directly to him, was highly motivating, too. If he could sell his truck for a few bucks, he could travel farther on his true father’s wheels—undetected.

  Parked along the street, with the Chevy’s engine gently idling, William eyed the illuminated windows of the greasy spoon where he’d been trapped most evenings and weekends as a child. A bland storefront with a faded green awning over the entrance, the dimly lit Pop’s Place sign hung crookedly over the front door. The sight, so long forgotten, now aroused in him a giddy fantasy of the words coming unfastened and crashing to the ground. He silently wished it to happen. If it did, perhaps he’d know in his heart that burying his ugly past spent there was somehow genuinely possible.

  As the early summer sun sank beneath the Lake Superior shoreline, casting hues of oranges and purples over the charming downtown Main Street, William grimaced at patrons shuffling through the diner’s open doors. The only thing slower than their moseying walk was their drawn-out Upper Peninsula accent, a mimic of folks from Northern Wisconsin and Minnesota. They carried on into Pop’s Place as if they hadn’t a care in the world: he despised them. His eyes darted along the storefront window, straining for a glimpse of his mother and some sign that returning to Chinoodin Falls after a twelve-year absence wasn’t the terrible mistake he feared it to be. He was an older version of the angry kid who’d taken off years ago, but as he shook out his aching right hand to turn off the ignition, he didn’t feel any wiser.

  He pulled his grease-stained baseball cap down snugly over his forehead and shoved his fists in the front pockets of his worn-out blue jeans before jutting across the street. He reminded himself that nobody in this little town knew what he had done, and they wouldn’t find out unless he was foolish enough to tell them. All he had to do was make a quick visit to appease his mother, persuade her to give him the motorcycle and then sell his truck. He’d only have to invest two to three days tops before he could be on his way. If he kept his head down and stuck to the plan, no one could stop him from escaping west.

  * * *

  ANNIE CURTIS WIPED perspiration from her brow with the top of her shoulder while carrying a tray of dinners to table four. She slid the plates to each patron with a brief nod before noticing the lone straggler sauntering through the front door.

  “Take a seat anywhere, honey,” she called, as he had seemed to miss the Seat Yourself sign. Without acknowledging her, he sidled up to the end of the counter and stood a menu in front of him, partially shielding his face from view. Annie refilled soda glasses for table three before cruising along
the counter, order pad in hand.

  “What can I get you?” she asked the cracked menu cover as the stranger ducked behind it.

  “Joyce,” he said in a barely audible grumble.

  Annie frowned, cocking her head closer. “Excuse me?”

  “Send Joyce out, would ya?”

  “Joyce isn’t working the dining room tonight. You’re stuck with me. What can I get you to drink?”

  The stranger readjusted the menu and peered over the top of it, the whites of his eyes darkened by the shadow of his baseball cap.

  “I need to see Joyce now.”

  Annie hesitated, narrowing her eyes to study him. He was tall with a broad frame and a muscular build, but if she was pressed to give a detailed description to the police, she wouldn’t be able to manage more than “gray T-shirt and faded Levi blue jeans.”

  “What do you want with her?”

  The stranger dipped his head and grumbled, “It’s important.”

  Annie tapped a pen on the top of her order pad for a moment before sauntering back to the office for her boss.

  “A fellow at the end of the counter wants you,” she called. Joyce, a round woman well into retirement age, hoisted herself out of her desk chair and scurried past Annie to the dining room, trying to catch her breath along the way.

  “Miles,” Annie whispered, slipping back to the kitchen’s order window. The young cook craned his bandana-covered head to see her. “Grab me a frying pan. There’s some weirdo out there asking for Joyce.”

  “What’s he want with her?”

  “I don’t know, but he’s acting dodgy.”

  Miles raised a discerning eyebrow. “What do you wanna do?”

  “Miles,” Annie said, holding out her hand. “Come on.”

  “Annie Curtis, you’re gonna hit a guy with a frying pan?”

  “No...” she said as her subconscious protested. “Maybe.”

  Miles paused. “Seriously?”

  “There’s something about him that’s very familiar, but I can’t put my finger on it. Did a convict escape from the prison?”

  “How would that be familiar?”

  “Miles, sometimes you see a story on the news, but it doesn’t register in your consciousness until later.”

  “You’re going to need more than a frying pan if there’s a convict sitting out there.”

  “I don’t know if it’s a convict, Miles. That was just one theory. Something about him reminds me of...” Annie gasped and touched her fingertips to her lips.

  “Oh.”

  “Annie?” Miles’s eyebrows pinched together. “Are you okay?”

  “Keep the pan on standby,” she muttered before scooting to the kitchen door and peeking out the porthole window. A cool sweat pricked every dainty hair down her neck as if someone had opened the door and let in a draft. It had been almost a dozen years since she’d waited anxiously on her mother’s back porch for that man to come for her, and now that he had finally returned home, he’d brushed her off. Sitting coolly behind the counter and hiding under the shadow of his cap, he was merely yards away and yet still so distant.

  Annie watched Joyce spring into his arms and clutch him in a bear hug. His profile was an aged, heavier version than the boyish one she’d hopelessly spent hours admiring so many years ago. She had run her fingers along the scruff of his chin and nipped at his mischievously curled lips for an entire summer, back when she’d been young and careless. It had been the last summer of her youth, the last summer of innocence, the last summer before...

  Annie drew a sharp breath and thrust open the kitchen door with a surge of adrenaline she didn’t yet know how to expel. Storming up behind the counter to size up the heartless cad who basked in his mother’s enthusiastic affection, she clenched her jaw and squared off in front of him. Joyce had quickly worked herself into a tizzy, clasping William’s face between her palms and shrieking with joy as patrons jumped in equal parts amusement and alarm.

  “Baby boy, where have you been? I can hardly breathe. Look. Look! My hands are shaking.” Joyce turned to nearby patrons and announced for all to hear that her son was home from the Navy, and her prayers had finally been answered. Folks nodded and smiled politely, turning attention back to their Salisbury steaks and Reuben sandwiches.

  “Did you decide?” Annie asked in a strained voice, attempting to interrupt Joyce’s hysterics.

  “A coffee, please. Decaf, if you have it,” William said without casting his eyes in her direction. Annie scowled as he squeezed Joyce’s tear-stained face into his chest. He had a lot of nerve showing up with that easy grin plastered across his face. For a moment she imagined smacking it clear off him with the frying pan, tiny white teeth scattering to the ground like it happened in cartoons.

  “William,” Joyce said, slightly releasing the death grip she had on him. She retrieved a tissue tucked between her bosom, dabbed her eyes and scowled up at him. “Dontcha recognize who this is?” William paused and studied Annie for a moment as she reciprocated with a cold glare. She had no desire to supply any word of help to the self-centered jerk. Joyce finally filled the awkward silence. “It’s Annie.”

  Annie waited as recognition fell over William’s sun-kissed face. There had been a time when Joyce would have described her to William as “your Annie,” but those days had long passed. Though as she stood before him, memories thundering toward her like a freight train, she doubted they would be long buried.

  “Annie Curtis?” he said, his smile fading to a wince. “H-how are you? I didn’t know you worked here.”

  “Obviously,” she said, pouring his coffee with a jerk to splash it over the rim of his cup. “How long’s it been now?”

  William faltered, raising the brim of his hat to reveal those pool-blue eyes in which she had once swum laps. They were the one thing that hadn’t aged a day and were still just as hypnotizing. If the rest of his weathered face blurred so all she could see were those eyes, she might as well be peering at the eighteen-year-old boy she’d once called “her William.”

  Joyce hugged William again and pulled his face down for another smooch, snapping his gaze away and releasing Annie from the spell. Pressing her round nose against William’s, Joyce giggled.

  “Oh, shucks, sweetie, I’m so excited to see you. I almost had a heart attack when I saw that face. Can you drop dead from pure happiness?”

  Annie glanced up at the ceiling as she turned to place the coffeepot back onto its burner. The prodigal son appeared, and Joyce was itching to throw him a ticker tape parade. Between running the diner, worrying about losing business and...well...other problems, times had been hard on Joyce. Annie wanted to be happy for her friend. She wanted to make Joyce’s joy her joy, because she loved that old woman as much as she had loved her own mother. Instead, she flexed the muscles in her clenched jaw.

  Perhaps Joyce was eager to forgive and forget, but Annie had a long memory and wasn’t about to pretend William Kauffman had done anything other than abandon his mother when she had needed him most. Besides, Joyce hadn’t been the only person William had bailed on; her own pride suddenly felt very tender and bruised, recalling the memory. She had stood there for hours and hours...

  Joyce patted William on the arm. “Whatcha hungry for? You musta been eat’n junk on the road. Let me wrap some things up real quick while Miles fixes you anything you want. And when we get home we’ll celebrate with sometin’ fancy.”

  “What’s good?” William asked, finally focusing on Annie as Joyce hurried to the back.

  “Everything,” Annie said. She pursed her lips to bite back every scathing remark for William she’d dreamed up when she was crying into her pillow all those nights ago.

  “I’ll have that,” he said with a smirk, flashing his baby blues at her. Annie mocked his reply under her breath as she strolled back into the kitchen to place the order.

>   “Egg salad on rye, Miles,” she called, strumming her fingers on the wall and shaking her head in disgust. Maybe William thought he could act the part and simply charm people into forgiving him, but she certainly wasn’t going to fall for it. She’d had one too many men fool her in the past to be made a fool of ever again, and he had been the first.

  Miles leaned into view. “It’ll take me a few minutes to whip up a new batch of egg salad. The carton in there is past its peak.”

  “Ripe, is it?”

  “It needs to be tossed.”

  “Even better,” Annie said with a shrug, walking to the refrigerator to fix the sandwich herself.

  “I was listening for shouts of attack, you know,” Miles said, directing his attention to the grill. “Who was looking for Joyce?”

  “Nobody worth mentioning.”

  “So, you don’t need the frying pan?”

  Annie’s mouth turned into a smile, though her eyes had darkened. “Nope. I’m taking care of it.” She scooped out a heaping portion of egg salad and flicked the spoon over a slice of bread with a plop. “Perfect,” she said before waltzing out to the dining room.

  * * *

  WILLIAM DEVOURED HIS SANDWICH, his ravenous appetite suddenly apparent as he sized up his old stomping ground. At first glance it had all the basic amenities of a greasy spoon: heavy white mugs with varying degrees of coffee stains; slices of pie displayed attractively in a countertop dessert case; and tables adorned with ketchup bottles, sugar packets and coffee creamer. But unfortunately it hadn’t changed much since he’d left, and the wear and tear, which had been noticeable years ago, was now grossly evident.

  The tiny entryway was cluttered with empty vintage gumball machines he’d once kicked over as a kid. A large, opaque glass-globe light fixture hung awkwardly low at the entrance, caked with a heavy film of dust and dated 1960s’ appeal. The three perimeter walls of the long, narrow diner had large bay windows to catch the warm, cheery glow of the morning sun, but by nightfall, the fluorescent overhead lights, sterile and intrusive, made William shudder. He tried to ignore the childhood memory of being forced to work in the restaurant most evenings as his stepfather, Dennis, disapprovingly scrutinized his every move.