“Lord above!”

“Yeah, one thing after another,” he lamented. “But imagine losing your mother at only eleven years old.”

“I lost my parents pretty young,” Kelly said. “I understand that it can be hard. But I have to admit, I know almost nothing about kids. Especially teenagers.”

“Have you thought about having a family?” he asked.

She shrugged. “Not really. I always thought the subject might come up if I ever met the right guy.”

“You thought you had,” he reminded her.

“Uh-huh—and he was fifty years old with five grown children. The thought that I wouldn’t have children never even bothered me. Being a mother was never a driving urge.” Then she smiled. “I wanted a restaurant.”

He smiled back. “They probably don’t talk back as much.”

“Oh, you don’t know restaurants!”

“It was really nice of you to invite me to stay, even though I dropped in without notice. I enjoyed myself. And the food…” He rolled his eyes skyward. “I like to cook, but I’d be embarrassed in front of you.”

“We’ll get you over that. Take a pie to dorky Amber’s house as a thank-you. Maybe we can get Courtney invited back, free you up for an encore meal.”

“I’ll take you up on that. I admit, I need all the help I can get.”

Lief and Kelly passed through the kitchen. When they gathered up a pie for Amber’s parents, Lief scored one for himself, as well. He said good-night to Jill and Colin, and they each carried a pie out the front door. Lief opened the passenger door and put the pies on the floor of the truck, suggesting that as the safest place. Then he closed the door to face her. She put out her hand to say good-night.

He took the hand, pulled and brought her into his embrace. Turning with her in his arms, he pressed her up against the closed door of the truck and, for just one blissful moment, held her there. “God,” he said, feeling everything he thought he might feel if he could hold her body against his. Plush, erotic, sweet. He put a finger under her chin to lift it, then kissed her—just a brief kiss. Her eyes were round and large, watching his. So he went for it, covering her mouth in a powerful kiss, a penetrating kiss. He urged her lips open; ah, she was delicious. And when he felt her arms come around him to keep him close, the arms of this brokenhearted woman, he tasted victory, as well. His desire escalated and suffused his entire being.

He moved his lips just a fraction of an inch from hers. “You taste even better than the pie.”

“Wow,” she said. “Nothing Disney about you.”

He plunged his fingers into her silky blond hair, tilting her head back so her mouth was slightly open and ready. He took that mouth once more, amazed by how natural it felt. When he pulled away, he said, “That was the point I hoped to make. Is tomorrow too soon to see you again?”

She shook her head, her eyes still round.

“Good.” He gave her another short kiss.

“I’m working on blackberries,” she said a little breathlessly.

He smiled at her. “I’ll see you sometime tomorrow. No 1950s Betty Crocker about you.”

She grinned at him. “Toldja.”

Courtney’s dinner experience at the Hawkinses was very different from those she had at home with Lief. Amber’s older brother, Rory’s dad, came to dinner with another of his kids because his wife was working. It was a pretty full and loud table, and the food was more country than she got at home—pork chops, mashed potatoes with dark gravy and greens. She never got gravy at home—Lief used a minimum of fats in his cooking.

Courtney was seated next to Hawk, and he was in her business the whole time. While she was putting the gravy on her mashed potatoes, he leaned over, pointed and said, “You missed a spot.” When she passed on the greens he said, “You’re gonna want to try those.”

“Because they’re vegetables?” she asked.

“Naw. You can get your vitamins from ice cream for all I care. Because they’re good. Nothing in the world like Sinette’s greens.” He put a small dollop on her plate. “First off, she grows ’em. Then, she makes ’em with bacon grease and garlic. Have one tiny taste, then if you pass on ’em, you can have more potatoes.”

That made her lift her eyebrows. It wasn’t like If you don’t eat your vegetables, no dessert. The greens were delicious.

“There,” he said. “Know what I’m talking about, don’t I?”

After dinner and dessert, Amber and Courtney finished up their homework from other classes. It was the first time Courtney had all her homework done, and done well, since school had started the end of August.

Then Lief came, bearing gifts. “A friend of mine made ten rhubarb pies today and a couple came my way. This is for you,” he said, putting it in Sinette’s hands. “She—my friend—said to try it and if your rhubarb pie is better, she’ll need a recipe exchange.”

Sinette laughed. “Well, she better be at the top of her game because my recipe came from my grandmother!”

So Lief asked Amber’s parents how homework had gone when what Courtney believed he meant was, Was Courtney bad? Did Courtney make trouble?

“I think they’re all caught up and Amber said it helped. She’s had a time with that algebra!”

In the car on the way home, Courtney said, “So, who is this friend?”

“Huh?” Lief asked.

“This friend who made ten pies?”

“Oh,” he said. “Her name is Kelly and she’s a chef from the Bay Area. She’s visiting her sister and invited me to dinner.” He looked over at her and grinned. “Since my usual date was busy, I accepted and got a pie out of the deal.”

“Oh. And so are you dating now?”

“Not yet,” he said. “Do you think life could be that kind?”

“You’re saying you want to date?”

“Why don’t you ask me what you really want to ask me, Courtney. Stop beating around the bush.”

“If you’re so smart, what do I want to ask you?”

He sighed. “No, I am not over your mother—I miss Lana every day. And yes, I would like to have another adult relationship in my lifetime—I’m lonely. And no, no one will ever be more important than your mother. Or, for that matter, than you. I promise you I won’t be less of a father if I ever get lucky enough to actually have a girlfriend at some point.”

She thought about that for a moment. She wasn’t sure how he did that—answered every question she wasn’t sure how to ask. So she said, “Like I care.”

Five

Kelly had only been in her sister’s house for a short time, but things began to change for her in small but meaningful ways almost immediately. It all began with a cooking show. She hooked up her very small, portable kitchen TV on the counter so she could see it while she cooked. Of course the very first program she viewed was Luciano Brazzi’s Dining In. While she peeled and cut up apples to can some applesauce, Luca was preparing his famous eggplant rollatini. She watched his handsome face, his playful and engaging manner as he dipped the eggplant slices in beaten egg, then seasoned bread crumbs, then Parmesan… He joked with his pretty kitchen helper; his hands smooth and confident; his white teeth gleaming against his tanned skin, his robust laugh so seductive. He was at ease, comfortable, at peace, self-assured. Clearly he was not suffering from a broken heart.

She began to cry, and then, before the rollatini went in the oven, she was sobbing. He was perfectly fine! The man did not have a trouble in the world. He wasn’t lonely or depressed or suffering with the misery of longing. If there was anything to get over, he’d gotten over it.

He opened one of those famous jars with his face on it, Brazzi Spaghetti Sauce, warmed it and poured it over the whole magnificent meal and that was it. “You bastard,” she screamed right to his televised face. “You led me on, made promises to show me opportunities and sent your wife to deal with me! As if I were a common tramp you had bored of.” She sniffed, blew her nose and said, “I am so done!”

To which the TV responded, “And that is my eggplant rollatini! Brava! And ciao my bellas!”

“Ciao, dickwad,” she said, turning off the TV.

Then things improved daily, if not hourly. No pressure; no crazy kitchen to go back to, and the relief in this was magnificent. And though three of them shared the house, everyone went their own way. Jill spent almost all her time either outside or at her computer in her office while Colin was either prowling around the mountains with his camera or painting upstairs in the sunroom. It was the first time Kelly could remember feeling freedom like this. Even on past visits or vacations she’d constantly been thinking about getting back to the grind and was usually worried about some work-related issue.

Almost all meals and certainly all dinners were prepared by Kelly and she thrived on her small but special audience. Jill’s farm assistant, Denny, often joined them for lunch and sometimes for dinner. He was a handsome young bachelor of twenty-five, perpetually cheerful and funny. “I thought I’d stumbled on the perfect job in Jilly Farms, and that was before you showed up, Kelly,” he said. “Now I have the perfect job and restaurant! I don’t think I’ve ever eaten this well in my life! Kelly, you’re not only a genius but a gorgeous genius.”

And Kelly looked at the square, dimpled jaw, bright eyes, hard-muscled physique on his six-foot frame and said, “Oh, Denny, I wish I’d met you ten years ago!”

“Well, I’d have been fifteen, but that’s no big deal,” he said with a sly grin. “I’ve always liked older women.”

Older woman? She wasn’t that much older! She glowered at him and said, “You wanna eat, smarty pants?”

Rather than short nights or sleep that came on the heels of exhaustion, she slept a good, peaceful eight hours or more. Her head was clear; she didn’t face daily conflict.

She’d only been at Jillian’s for a week when Jill said, “When the movers empty your flat of household goods, have everything brought here. Take the whole third floor—it’ll give you space for your sofa, favorite chair, TV, desk—it’s more spacious than your flat was. You’ll have as much privacy as you want and if you want to be around people, you know where we are.”

“I wasn’t planning a long stay—”

“Listen, you could live in this house for a year without even bumping into anyone, if that’s what you want. But let me tell you what I want,” Jill said. “I want you to give yourself enough of a break to be sure your health is good, your emotions level and positive and your poor heart mended. The first thing to do—let Dr. Michaels give you a quick checkup to be sure your new blood pressure medicine is doing its job. My guess is that once you’ve had some time away from that nuthouse of a restaurant, you won’t even need it anymore.”

Kelly had spent most of her adult life avoiding doctors, and she hadn’t had a single symptom or incident since moving into Jill’s house. But it made sense to see the local doctor.

As for her positive emotional state and poor broken heart? She was working on it. Things were coming into perspective—all her fantasies about life with Luca were a mistake and she should have known better.

Getting herself kissed by a sexy guy didn’t hurt. Whatever it was with Lief—not quite a romance but something more than simple friendship—it made her feel better about herself. When he was near, she just couldn’t stop looking at him—that thick, burnished blond hair, expressive brows, warm brown eyes all combined to make him so handsome. But that body and what he did to a pair of jeans just knocked her out.

Lief dropped by daily. Determined not to be a drain on the household, he took it upon himself to chop wood, getting Jillian started on a big pile that would get her through winter. He’d show up in the morning and split logs for a while before sitting at the work island while Kelly was cooking. Problem was, it was pretty hard for her to focus on her project of the day while he was hefting that ax out by the storage shed. The beautiful strain on his shoulders, back and arms could send her right into an erotic trance.

And he caught her staring out the kitchen window every time. He would flash her that wide, white grin before getting back to work.

He never mentioned it, though. Once his log-splitting was done for the day, he was content to sit in the kitchen and talk.

“Tell me how one goes about writing a movie,” Kelly said.

“Just about the same way one creates a recipe,” he said. “You experiment with taste, I experiment with words and feelings and settings. I have an image in my head that I try to get on the page. The script is like an architectural drawing with details and directions to build a movie.”

“How many have you actually sold?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Half a dozen. The selling isn’t the important part—it’s the filming and releasing. Lots of original scripts are optioned, which is kind of like ‘reserved’ for a period of time. Then when there’s principal photography, when they begin to actually shoot the movie, they’re officially sold. But they still have a long way to go before a viewing public might see them.”

“But when do you write them? Late at night?”

“I haven’t been doing that much writing lately—I’ve been setting up a home, spying on Courtney, fishing, chopping wood, thinking and trying to get things under control. Like things were once upon a time.”

“I take that to mean, when Courtney’s mother was alive.”