California Homecoming (8 page)

“I’ll keep my cell phone on me at all times.”

“I’d feel better if you were here.”

“Mom, I’m alone at the inn all day. I only sleep here. I’ll keep nine-one-one on speed dial.” She grinned at her mother, hoping it was reassuring.

Elizabeth frowned. “I wish there was a man in your life. Raising a child is hard to do alone. Are you sure you and Rick can’t make it? Maybe he needed some time to adjust to the idea. He might come around.”

Sarah’s muscles tensed. “I don’t think I’ll ever hear from Rick again.”

“But if you did?”

“No. Not interested.”

“It would be better for your child if you were together.”

“Like you and Daddy? No thanks, Mom. I’ll be fine.” She took a deep breath. Her mother was only trying to help.

Putting her arms around her mother she said, “It’ll be okay, Mom. I know you mean best, but please let things be the way they are.” She released her mother and said. “Besides, I promise to come home once a week to do my laundry and have a real meal!”

Elizabeth laughed, but the sound was forced.

• • •

“You sure picked a heck of a day to move,” Mandy said as she placed a box of linens into the back of her friend Paul’s pickup. In contrast to the day before, Sunday was cold and damp, the worst of Northern California winter.

Paul had turned out to be a broad-shouldered sound engineer, his long dark hair neatly tucked into a braid. He didn’t say much, but moved with the assurance of someone who knew his place in the world.

Mandy’s eyes followed his every step.

Sarah smiled “It’s the middle of February. What do you expect? Only a few more months ’til spring.” Spring meant gardens. She was going to have to find a gardener.

She frowned. Too many details to running an inn.

“Now what’s wrong?” Mandy asked as she took Sarah’s suitcase from her hand.

“Just thinking of the garden. I need to find someone who can garden.”

“My mother does gardening for other people,” Paul said. “She’s a little strange.” He shrugged. “But she’s good.” He looked at Mandy. “Ready for the mattress?”

Sarah felt helpless as she watched the pair manhandle the unwieldy object out of her mother’s door and up into the truck. The box spring followed.

As soon as her meager belongings were packed, Paul and Mandy snugged a tarp over the contents.

They work well together.

A pang of jealousy went through Sarah. It was the kind of relationship she’d hoped to have with Rick.

“We’ll meet you at the inn,” Mandy called out as she hopped into the passenger seat.

“Okay.” Sarah turned back into the house. Damp cold seeped into her bones.

She gave her mother a hug.

“Are you sure about this?” Elizabeth asked.

Sarah nodded. “Besides, it’s a little late now.” She pasted a grin on her face. “Just wait until I invite you for dinner!”

“I’ll bring take-out,” Elizabeth said. Her eyes watered. “Now get out of here.”

Sarah walked out the door. Everything was changing.

A bouquet of red carnations in his hand, Hunter arrived at Sarah’s Inn at seven Sunday evening.

He shook his head as he walked to the door.
What the hell am I doing?
No woman in her right mind was going to want anything to do with a one-legged, unemployed man who succumbed to dark moments of depression, no matter how handy he was.

When she opened the door and smiled up at him from a too-pale face, he knew why he wanted to be around her. She was full of life and determination no matter what the cost, exactly as he’d been before he’d become a statistic, a casualty of war.

Her dark hair was loose around her shoulders and stone-encrusted baubles dropped from her ears, but there were dark shadows under her eyes.
She’s probably exhausted.
He wanted to take care of her, erase the cares from the lines on her face.

Instead, he handed her the flowers. “Hello.”

“Thank you,” she said. “That’s sweet. Come in while I put them in water.”

Daisy sniffed him once, wagged her tail, and disappeared down the hall.

He followed Sarah to the kitchen, admiring her swinging hips barely covered with a long purple sweater-dress. Her slim legs were encased in black skin-tight leggings. His libido stirred.

“Thanks for your help yesterday,” she said as she looked blankly around the kitchen.

Damn. Of course she didn’t have anything to put them in.

She finally grabbed a red hardware store bucket and shrugged. “At least it matches.” She laughed as she placed the flowers in the bucket and added water.

It was a nervous laugh. Probably first-date jitters. He certainly had them.

Once she was finished with the flowers, he took her hands. “Relax. We’re simply going to dinner. I’d like to get to know you.” He put his finger under her chin, lifted her face, and brushed her lips with his. “And see if something develops.” He kissed her again and then stepped back.
No sense in scaring her off.

“Sure,” she said, smoothing her unwrinkled dress. “Um … can we hold off on the kissing thing? I’m not sure I’m ready for this.”

The faint blush on her cheeks told him she wasn’t totally adverse to his gestures, but wanted to slow things down.

“Sure.” He had all the time in the world to court her.

Court her? He was getting way too ahead of himself. “Shall we go?”

“I’ll get my coat.” She walked back out of the kitchen, putting ample distance between them when she walked by him.

Maybe it was a bit more than pre-date nerves.

Once they were settled in the Jeep, he asked, “When do you think you’ll open?”

“Oh, God.” She groaned. “I’d hoped to do a slow open in April. You know, rent out one or two rooms and get the kinks out. Make an arrangement with Gayle’s or something to deliver breakfast. Then maybe do a full open in July or August or … ” She became silent.

He glanced over. Her lips were pinched in a frown.

What’s up with her?

“But now Annie wants to have her wedding here in June,” she added.

“Can’t you tell her that’s not possible?”

“She’s my mother’s best friend.”

“Oh.” He understood her problem.

“Oh, indeed.” She laughed, a more relaxed laugh this time.

He pulled the Jeep onto Highway 1 northbound, grateful the car handled well on the rain-slicked roads.

“How long were you over there?” she asked. “If you don’t mind telling me.”

“No.” He set his jaw. “One tour. I was about to come home for some rest before I re-upped when … ” He gestured to his leg and forced the image of Lauren being blown to bits from his mind.

“What happened?”

Everyone always wanted to know, but few people asked. Of course, Sarah had to be one of them. How little could he get away with saying? Their relationship was too new for gory details.

“IED — mine — exploded.”

She was silent. Would she let it go? Or want more.

“I’m ready for spring,” she said. “Of course that will mean a whole lot more gardening.”

The tension left his body. “Do you need to do it all yourself?”

“I have to watch the funds. But gardening may be beyond me. Just like cooking.” Her laugh was rueful. “My friend, Mandy, may know someone. I’ll definitely need someone from August on when I — ”

“When you — ?” he prompted.

“Um … when I … um … need to prepare for the wedding.” She finished in a rush.

They pulled up next to the restaurant. Hunter got out and went to the passenger side of the Jeep to help her out. He reached up to place his hands on her waist to help her jump down.

“Don’t!” Her words were harsh and he pulled away so fast she almost fell out of the vehicle. She grabbed his arm to steady herself. Panic was scrawled across her face.

“It’s okay.” He tried to reassure her. “I didn’t mean anything. I was trying to help.”

She took a deep breath. “I know.”

“Then why? What’s the problem?”

She shook her head and rewarded him with a dim smile. “I … um … I pulled a muscle yesterday and it’s very sore, that’s all.”

She couldn’t look him in the eye.

This was becoming one of the weirdest dates he’d ever been on.

“Sure.” He offered an arm. “This okay?”

She let her breath out. “Yes. Thanks.”

He led her from the dark rain to the pale yellow warmth of the small restaurant. The polished wooden floor creaked under his feet as he followed the hostess and Sarah to a small table in the corner. The hostess seated them, handed them menus, and cleared the extraneous table setting from the white tablecloth.

“Thank you for coming with me,” he said. “For giving me a chance.”

She smiled and picked up her menu. “The food’s really good here.”

“Oh. Come here often?”

Her hands gripped the menu, but she managed a tinkle of a laugh that merged well with her pixie features. “Not hardly. It’s way beyond my budget.”

Mine, too.
He looked at the prices on the menu and rapidly calculated how much was left on his credit card.

“What do you suggest?” he asked.

“My name is Kathy.” A young, bright voice interrupted before Sarah could answer. “I’ll be your server this evening. We have some specials … ”

Hunter watched Sarah as the waitress rattled off the chef’s creations for the night. Her hands relaxed on the menu and her eyes became bright with attention and happiness.

“Thank you,” he said when the waitress finished her perky recitation.

“Would you like something special to drink?”

“Sparkling water for me,” Sarah said immediately.

“Nothing else?” he asked.
Didn’t women always want wine on a first date, especially if they were nervous?

She shook her head.

“I’ll have a Santa Cruz Mountain Pinot,” he told the waitress. He looked at Sarah. “Are you ready to order?”

“I’ll have the pasta special.”

The mushroom-laced nutty pasta had sounded good to him, too. “I’ll have that as well.”

Hunter leaned back and studied Sarah, sure she was hiding something. “What made you decide to start an inn?” he asked.

“It’s a long story.”

He gestured around the room and smiled at her. “We have time.”

“I was at Berkeley for environmental studies until last spring when I decided to switch to Davis to get a degree in hospitality management.”

“Quite a change.”

She smiled. “Like I told my mom, I couldn’t imagine spending the rest of my life in a field studying mouse droppings.”

He laughed at the image. “But why hospitality?”

“I liked the idea of creating destination inn. Rick — ” The blush was back. She shrugged. “He was my boyfriend at the time. Well, he and I were going to find a place, maybe in Sonoma or the foothills, where we could have a small inn, three or four rooms, and an exclusive restaurant like The French Laundry. I was going to develop a well-rated wine list.”

“But you’re not having wine tonight.”

“I’m … um … not in the mood.” She looked at the table.

He contemplated her answer and knew it wasn’t true. But there was another question he needed answered. “How long has it been since you broke up with — what was his name? Rick?”

Her startled eyes met his. “Why?”

He shrugged. “I don’t really want to be a rebound guy.”

“We’re just having dinner.”

“It could turn into something else.”

She shook her head.

“Humor me,” he said. “When did you break up?”

“December.”

Definitely rebound territory.

“How about you?” she asked. “Was there anyone special overseas? Or waiting for you back home?”

That was the problem with asking probing questions of smart women. They retaliated.

“Here you go!” The perky waitress was back with their drinks. As soon as she left, a black-clad busboy whizzed by to drop a basket of rolls and butter on the table.

Hunter took a sip of his wine, racking his brain to figure out how to derail her train of thought.

“Well?” she asked. “Was there someone?”

No way around it.
“Yes. She was killed when I lost my leg. It was over a year ago. Rehab takes a while.” He took a deep breath. “If you don’t mind, I don’t like to talk about it.”

She studied him. “Okay.”

“Your plan for the inn sounds ambitious.”

“Yeah, I guess it does. Maybe too ambitious,” she said.

“But if you don’t dream big, how do you know what you’re capable of achieving?” His words echoed in his mind. He was going to need to ask himself the same question sometime soon.

She smiled. “I guess you’re right. That’s what my mom and Marcos are always saying. ‘Dream big! Go for what you want!’” She enclosed the expressions in air quotation marks.

“Who’s Marcos?”

Sarah grinned. “My mom’s boyfriend. It feels so weird to say that. She met him in Italy. He’s a winemaker and he bought some land here and — ” she shrugged.

“So he moved here?”

“Not really. They go back and forth. I think they’re still trying to figure out how to make it all work. My mom has a day spa in Costanoa she started when my dad died. What about your family?”

He lingered on the last sip of his wine. “I’m an only child. My dad and mom live in Sausalito.” He bit a piece of bread, chewed, and swallowed. “How did your dad die?”

Sarah groaned. “Is every answer going to be like this? You’re giving me as little information as you can and then you ask me another question. Why did you want to go out to dinner? Are you in the CIA or something? Need to know only?”

He had to laugh. “No. Sorry. I don’t like to talk about my parents much. My dad and I don’t really get along.”

“Why not?”

Shit.
How was he going to answer that?

He carefully buttered another piece of bread, but before he could answer, the waitress arrived with their meals and clunked them on the table. “Bon appetite!” she said and scurried off.

He raised his glass to Sarah. As they clinked, he looked into her eyes. He could tell she wasn’t going to let up until she got the answers she wanted.

The breakup must have been bad.

“So why don’t you get along?” she asked again, watching the pasta she twirled it. She put the forkful of linguini in her mouth, delicately catching the strands with her tongue. He felt his long-dormant libido stir again.