Steve returned in short order with his plate loaded down with Shelly’s and her mother’s cooking. The crowd had dwindled to about half of what it had been for the dedication ceremony. Steve leaned against the tailgate as he ate, crossing his ankles.

“I heard you helped move the Youngs’ furniture,” Cassie commented, thinking that was a safe subject.

“Yeah, they didn’t have that much. We were able to make it all in one trip, which was easier than making three or four smaller loads.” He hesitated and jerked his head up to stare at Cassie.

“What?” she asked, taken aback by the change in him.

“The truck.”

“Yes?”

“I have a big truck for business. I don’t use it that often, but when I need it it’s there.”

Cassie still didn’t get the connection. “Then I imagine you’ve helped other families move.”

“Yes, and furthermore, I can help you. Didn’t I hear that you have a load of furniture that needs to be brought to Seattle from Spokane?”

Cassie pressed her hand against her heart, sure it was about to pound straight through her chest. She’d given up hope of ever having the opportunity to collect her parents’ things. The time was fast approaching when she would have no option but to let it all go.

“Cassie?”

“Yes … yes, I do, but once all the furniture is in Seattle, I don’t have any place to store it.” This was another complication that had plagued her.

“I can keep it for you,” he volunteered. “I have a warehouse and it wouldn’t be a problem to set aside whatever you have there. Why don’t you see if we can do it this weekend?”

Cassie was overwhelmed. She hardly knew what to say. “I can’t ask you to do that.”

“Mom,” Amiee cried, “why are you being so stubborn? Of course you can.”

“Of course you can,” Steve echoed.

“But it’s short notice and my sister—”

Steve removed his cell from where it was clipped on his belt and handed it to her. “Call her and find out.”

“But Amiee’s got an all-day track meet tomorrow—”

Her daughter cut her off. “I can go with Claudia and her mom; they won’t mind.”

Steve raised his eyebrows. “Well?”

She couldn’t refuse his generous offer, not when he’d made it effortless. She should be grateful. What was it her mother used to say about looking a gift horse in the mouth? Why she would even hesitate was beyond her own understanding.

“I’ll phone my sister,” she said.

“Aren’t you going to thank Steve?” Amiee asked.

“Yes, of course. I’m grateful, Steve, really.” But if that was the case, it certainly didn’t explain why her stomach had twisted into tight knots.

Chapter 16

When Steve came to collect Cassie at six on Saturday morning, Amiee was already up and dressed for her track meet. Cassie felt guilty about leaving her daughter on the day of her big meet. Amiee was fine, but Cassie had lingering doubts.

“Call me as soon as you finish,” she insisted.

Amiee rolled her eyes. “Mom, just go already, it’s no big deal.”

“It’s a big deal to me,” Cassie told her.

Amiee brushed off her mother’s concerns. “I’m not even that good. The only reason I turned out for track is because Claudia did.”

Steve glanced at his wrist and Cassie realized he was anxious to get on the road. With a five-hour drive across the state, making the trip there and back in a single day was bound to be exhausting. Even now she was overwhelmed by the generosity of his offer.

Cassie started out the door and then turned back. “I don’t know what time I’ll be home.”

“Mom!” Amiee protested again, tossing up her arms in frustration. “Would you just go?”

“Okay, okay.”

Once outside, Cassie was struck by how huge Steve’s truck was. She knew he owned his own electrical contracting business, but she hadn’t realized how large his company was. If he had both a truck and a warehouse at his disposal, then he was far and away more successful than she’d imagined. Steve opened the passenger door and helped her inside the cab.

Neither spoke on the way out of Seattle. When they hit I-90, Steve glanced over at Cassie. “Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?”

She wondered what had prompted this, and carefully considered her response. “You can ask, but I reserve the right to refuse to answer.”

“Fair enough.” He waited while he changed lanes, moving over to the far right-hand side of the interstate as cars whizzed past. “When you cut your arm and removed your jacket I saw several scars. Can you tell me how you got them?” He didn’t look her way, and Cassie was grateful.

She weighed her answer and decided to tell him what she told others. “Those scars were my stupid tax.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“That’s what I tell the women I mentor at the shelter.”

“Your ex gave you those scars?” He sounded incredulous.

“If I’d stayed with Duke I would be dead now.” She was convinced of that beyond a shadow of a doubt. “There were times when I wished he had murdered me.” She paused when she read the shock in his expression.

“You can’t possibly mean that.”

She was serious. “After a person has been beaten down time and time again they lose the will to live, to fight back. As outrageous as it seems now, there were times when I felt I deserved to be beaten.”

“What?” He didn’t bother to hide his shock.

“If only I’d paid more attention … if only I’d asked first … if only I was a better cook.”

Steve clamped his mouth shut and she could see that her words had upset him. “No woman deserves to be beaten, Cassie.”

It’d taken Cassie far too long to come to that same conclusion. “I agree, which is why I call it my stupid tax.” She regretted that she hadn’t been able to volunteer much time to the shelter these days—every spare moment she had went toward working off her hours. Once her home was built, she’d go back. She missed it, missed meeting the women there, missed showing them proof positive that they, too, could make it on their own.

“I hope your ex is in prison,” Steve said between clenched teeth.

“I wouldn’t know, and furthermore, I don’t care, as long as he stays out of Amiee’s and my life.”

An hour outside of Seattle they exited the freeway at the top of Snoqualmie Pass for a restroom stop and a cup of coffee. “Alicia and I made this trip often,” Steve casually mentioned, as they headed back on the road.

He rarely mentioned his wife, and she suspected the reason was the pain it caused him.

“She loved visiting the Yakima Valley and doing wine tours in the summer months.”

“And you?”

“I loved Alicia. That last summer, we both knew she didn’t have long to live—five, six months at the most—and so we squeezed in as much time together as I could manage. My business suffered, but I can’t regret a single minute I spent with her that last year.”

“I wish I’d known her,” Cassie told him. “I have the feeling we would have been friends.”

“I wish you’d known her, too,” Steve whispered. “It’s been three years now, and it seems like only yesterday that she was with me.”

No one needed to tell Cassie that when Steve loved it was with his whole heart. Any woman he loved would feel cherished.

“My one regret,” he said, speaking into the void, “was the fact that we never were able to have children. People tell me how difficult it would be for me as a single father. I wouldn’t care.”

Cassie couldn’t imagine her life without Amiee. “Alicia must have had a big heart. She’s the one who got you involved in Habitat, isn’t she?”

Steve nodded. “She spent countless volunteer hours at the office and the store. She was passionate about giving families a hand up. People loved her. You can’t imagine how huge her funeral was.”