“Is that how you handled growing up with seven siblings?” Bo asked Ismay. “By bulldozing everyone to get what you want?”
“Being the oldest had its advantages,” she quipped, hardly penitent for dragging him back to the big house.
Remy would be furious when he found out Bo wasn’t where he was supposed to be. There was some pleasure in giving him the proverbial finger, but it didn’t come without risk...
Bo could’ve explained to Ismay that her fiancé had called to tell him not to go back to the main house. But he knew she’d feel as though she had to rise to his defense, and he would not put her in the middle.
After he’d stripped off his rain slicker and boots in the mudroom, and she’d kicked off the tennis shoes she’d been wearing—which were no kind of footwear for this weather—she led him into the kitchen and put his sandwich on the table. But then she seemed to think twice. “Why don’t you go take a hot shower first? It’s a cold sandwich, so it can wait.”
He was chilled through. The idea of a steaming hot shower—one where he wouldn’t have to worry about stepping into an inch of brown water on the floor afterward—definitely sounded appealing. But it also felt strange to be making himself so comfortable in the Windsors’ expensive vacation home. Although the cottage sat empty quite a bit, he’d never even been tempted to shower or sleep there. He had little interest in taking anything more than what the Windsors owed him. As long as he had his freedom, his health, a place to live, and plenty of books, he figured he was a rich man. “My clothes are wet.”
“We could go back to your place and get some dry ones,” she suggested.
No. Going to that much effort made him feel even more conscious of defying Remy’s wishes. “We just came from there. I’m fine.”
“You’re freezing. Get in the shower, and I’ll just throw your clothes in the dryer.”
He tried again to refuse, but she insisted there was no reason to be uncomfortable. “You’re making way too big a deal out of this,” she said, and maybe she was right. If he wasn’t who he was—so conscious of every sharp edge in life—this would be nothing.
“Fine. Which bathroom do you want me to use?”
“You can take your pick,” she said. “There are four in this house with fresh towels in each. Whichever you choose, I’ll be there to get your clothes in a minute.”
He wasn’t going to use the master, he knew that. There was a suite downstairs, too, but he decided to use the bathroom off the hallway at the top of the stairs. Besides the master, that seemed to put the most distance between him and Remy’s fiancée.
But, true to her word, he heard her voice on the other side of the panel just a couple of minutes later. “Are you ready to hand me your clothes?”
He wrapped a towel around his lower half, picked up what he’d dropped on the expensive marble floor, and opened the door.
She was waiting there with a thick white robe she handed over before accepting his clothes. “I realized I should wash this stuff before drying it, and that takes longer than a shower, so this will give you something to wear in the meantime.”
He was already regretting making himself at home in his employer’s house. “Whose is it?”
“I’m guessing it’s Mort’s,” she said as if it didn’t matter. “I found it in the master.”
“I don’t feel comfortable—” he started, but she broke in.
“It’s just a robe, Bo. I’ll wash it when you’re done and hang it back up. No one will even know you used it.”
Reluctantly, he accepted the robe and closed the door. But when he got out of the shower and pulled it on, he couldn’t help wondering if the storm was going to cost him his job.
Ismay had left a pair of slippers by the bathroom door after putting Bo’s clothes in the laundry. But when he came downstairs, he had nothing on his feet. Apparently, wearing Mort’s slippers was crossing the line for him. She could tell he wasn’t even happy about wearing Mort’s robe, which was too small for him, anyway. Mort was maybe five-nine and not nearly as wide across the shoulders, but she hadn’t been able to find a robe of Remy’s or Bastian’s.
“Coffee?” she said as he came into the kitchen. “Or I bought a six-pack of beer...”
“I’ll take a beer,” he said and sat down at the table.
“How was the elderly neighbor?” she asked as she got it for him. “Did you have a chance to check on her?”
He accepted the can. “Honey? She was doing great. No problem at all.”
“That’s nice to hear.”
“I mentioned your brother to her.” He popped the top and took a drink. “She didn’t make any commitments, but she sounded as if she might be willing to have him house-sit.”
“It’d be nice to get him a place that easily and that close. I’m so worried about him.” Jack had been on her mind all day. She’d tried calling him twice after she’d spoken to her mother, but he hadn’t picked up. “Thanks for broaching the subject with her.”
Bo took his first bite of the sandwich. “This is delicious,” he said after he’d swallowed.
“I love egg salad. That’s the way my mother makes it.”
“Honey gave me a bottle of blackberry jam. Wish I would’ve thought to grab it. You might like it on toast.”
“You’ll just have to have me over for breakfast after all this is over,” she teased.
He looked startled, as if that would never happen, and she felt silly for even suggesting it. Once the storm cleared up, they wouldn’t be sharing any meals. She was engaged. That didn’t necessarily mean she couldn’t be Bo’s friend, and yet...somehow it did. Something told her he wasn’t built for casual relationships. And Remy certainly wouldn’t like her associating with his parents’ caretaker. So maybe it was partly the fact that Bo worked for the Windsors that made it weird.
“Would you like another sandwich?” she asked when he finished.
“Maybe for dinner,” he said.
She glanced at the clock. “That would be in an hour.”
“Yeah. Sounds perfect.”
“You want to eat again in an hour?” she said as she started to laugh.
“Why not?”
“Okay,” she said with a shrug. “Egg salad is easy enough to make.” She gave him the once-over. “I wish I had a picture of you in that tiny robe.”
His face finally relaxed into a smile. “You must be trying to get me fired.”
No wonder he’d left the slippers alone. But could he be right? Certainly, Remy’s parents would understand that she and Bo were in a difficult situation and want them to be as warm, dry, and comfortable as possible. Wouldn’t they?
Ismay had to admit...she didn’t really know the Windsors—not as well as Bo did. “You think Remy’s parents would fire you for borrowing a robe?”
His smile disappeared. “I don’t think it would take that much.”
Jack squinted against the evening sun as he stared out over his father’s fields. This farm was all he’d ever known. He’d been born in the house—he’d come quickly in the middle of the night before his mother could make it to the hospital—he’d been baptized and married at the local church, and he’d gone to the closest college. He’d assumed he’d spend the rest of his life here with Ashleigh, who would never be willing to move away from her family. With such a traditional, conservative upbringing, he’d never dreamed he’d be divorced, especially at such a young age—and for a reason like this.
He’d tried so hard to make his wife happy. He’d treated Ashleigh a lot better than his father had ever treated his mother, he thought. Buzz had never been mean to Betty exactly. He treated her with respect, as an equal, but he certainly didn’t baby her and try to make things nice the way Jack had with Ashleigh. Buzz expected Betty to be tough, and she’d hung in there and borne him eight children while working just as long and hard as he had.
Although Jack had graduated from Utah State, Ashleigh had dropped out and taken a course that would enable her to become an eyelash technician. Lash extensions had become all the rage in Utah, and she’d decided to cash in on the trend. Problem was...she wasn’t the only young woman in the area with the same idea. Competition had been stiff in their small town, so she’d wound up working only a few hours, at most, per day.
Apparently, she’d been getting to know Jessica Davidson the rest of the time. While he was at work...
He rubbed his neck as he watched the plume of dust that followed his father on the tractor. He should be out there plowing, not Buzz. He suspected Buzz had insisted on finishing up himself because he felt sorry about what’d happened with Ashleigh. His father never really addressed emotional issues—certainly not head-on—but there could sometimes be a little give in what Buzz normally expected.
Jack didn’t think anything could make him feel better, though. He was so shocked, he was numb; it was as if he’d walked out of the house and been struck by a semi.
That didn’t stop him from trying to think back and pick through the rubble, however. To look for all the signs he must’ve missed. And imagine Ashleigh with her new lover. He’d been the one to encourage her to go out and have a good time with Jessica...
“Hey, you okay?”
Jack hadn’t heard Hank’s approach. Hank had been helping on the farm since he’d finished his bachelor’s a couple of weeks ago, so he’d been around a lot lately, but until his brother spoke, Jack hadn’t realized there were tears running down his face, either. Embarrassed, he used the back of his hand to quickly wipe his cheeks and turned away without answering. He couldn’t deal with having a conversation right now. The pity in his brother’s voice was almost as excruciating as the rest of it.
Perhaps he wasn’t so different from his father; he was also a private man, preferred to bury his pain. But everyone in town would soon know Ashleigh had left him—for a woman, which would only make it more sensational—and that would mean he’d soon have nowhere to hide.
“Jack?” Hank called uncertainly.
Jack didn’t stop. Lifting his hand, he waved to at least acknowledge his brother, climbed in the old Ford he’d bought from their father when Buzz had upgraded, and drove away wondering what he was going to do once he got home. Everything in the house reminded him of Ashleigh. His wife had taken some of her things but not all of them. That would have to happen at some point. When? What was she doing now? Did she regret destroying his life? At least a little? Or was she reveling in the freedom she said she’d been craving to be her authentic self?
Had she left him because Jessica could give her children, since she already had three little girls and could probably have more babies? She was still young. All it would take was a sperm bank.
A text came in. He heard the ding. But he left his phone in the seat beside him. Whatever someone was trying to tell him—or ask him—he couldn’t face it tonight.
“Still no word from your brother?” Bo asked as he walked back into the kitchen, where they’d been playing chess.
Ismay looked up from her phone. “No.”
“Is that normal?”
Since he was so much better at the game than she was, he’d been teaching her various strategies instead of just beating her over and over again. But when he’d excused himself to use the bathroom, she’d immediately thought of Jack and checked to see if her brother had responded to any of her calls or texts. “I don’t know. He’s never gone through anything like this before,” she said, laying her phone back on the table.
“Have you talked to anyone else in the family today?” Bo had changed into his own clothes as soon as they came out of the dryer, and she was washing Mort’s robe. She knew he’d hated wearing it, but now he had clean dry clothes, he’d eaten his second egg salad sandwich for the day, as well as a salad, and he was safe instead of risking his life on the roof of a home he didn’t even own. Ismay felt good about all of that and refused to consider it meant she was supporting his position over that of the rich family who was hosting her—her prospective in-laws, no less.
“My brother Hank texted me to say he’s worried, too,” she replied. “And I spoke to my mother this morning.”
Bo sat down across from her again. “How’s everyone taking the news?”
“They’re just as shocked and upset as Jack is.”
“Would you say you’re a close family?”
“I would. I mean...my parents never had a lot of money, especially when we were little. We had to use our imaginations and get creative to have fun.” She remembered playing hide-and-seek in the barn and other outbuildings, driving the tractor and helping to pick whatever fruits or vegetables her father felt he could sell. “A farm is a good place to grow up.”
“I bet.” He started to move the pawns back to their starting positions on the board. “What does your father grow?”
“Pumpkins, onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, peaches. Brigham City, which is nearby, is known for its peaches. It even has a peach festival that started as a day off from the harvest and has been going since the early 1900s. So he put in an orchard about ten years ago.”
“I love peaches,” Bo said.
“I’ll have to send you a box when they’re ripe. There’s absolutely nothing better than the ones my father grows.”
“Did you work on the farm as a child?”
“Some. But as I grew older, I was relegated to the kitchen to help my mother cook, clean, and can.”
“Your folks are traditional.”
“Very.”
“How old are your siblings?”
She finished the last of her beer. “Jack is twenty-five. Hank is twenty-two and recently graduated from college. Ryan is twenty and chose to attend the University of Utah instead of Utah State, which is as radical as my family gets,” she said with a chuckle. “Liam is seventeen and will finish high school next year. Terrence is fifteen, a sophomore. And Oliver and William are twelve and thirteen, only eighteen months apart. They’re in middle school.”
“That’s a big family.”
“It is.”
“How’d your folks manage having so many kids?”
“My father’s strict and can be a bit harsh now and then, but feeding and clothing so many isn’t easy, and we know he loves us. That’s the important thing, I guess.”
As he finished lining up the other chess pieces, Ismay wondered if Bo was comparing her family to his own and couldn’t help feeling she should’ve made hers sound less idyllic. But she had to be fair to her parents at the same time.
“What’s Tremonton like?” he asked.
“It’s in the Bear River Valley of northern Utah. Has a population of about nine thousand people, which is small, but it’s not far from bigger towns like Logan. Low crime rate. Religion is a big part of the culture.”
“Are you religious?”
“Not anymore. I was never really interested, even when I was young, and became even less so when I went away to college.”
“And that’s okay with your parents?”
“Not really,” she said ruefully. She knew they were disappointed, but to her, what was most important was having integrity and being a good person. “They’d like to see me come back to the church.”
“Is Jack still in?”
“He is, and that’s going to make what he’s going through both better and worse.”
“What do you mean?”
“Word of Ashleigh leaving him will spread fast. Almost everyone he sees on Sunday will know what happened by the time he shows up for his church meetings. But many in the congregation will try to reach out to support him, too.”
“Double-edged sword,” he said. His biceps bulged as he sat back and folded his arms. “That’s rough.”
“What about you?” she asked as she got up to toss her can in the wastebasket.
“What about me?”
“Why don’t you tell me a little more about your family?”
“You don’t want to hear about my family,” he replied.
She scowled at him. “Everybody’s got drama.”
He leaned forward again and gestured at the board. “Maybe after we play another game. You can start.”
When she just stared at him and didn’t make a move, he met her gaze. “What?”
“You just might be the most guarded man I’ve ever known,” she said with a dramatic sigh.
His eyebrows gathered over his topaz-colored eyes. “What are you talking about? I’m an open book.”
She could tell he knew better, which made it funny, and she’d had just enough to drink that once she started laughing, she couldn’t seem to stop. He didn’t laugh with her, but his lips curved into an affectionate, indulgent smile, which made her wonder why she hadn’t thought he was the most handsome man she’d ever met the first moment she laid eyes on him.
“What is it?” he asked when she suddenly sobered.
“Nothing.” She focused on the game. But the truth was she felt guilty for the first time since she’d met him. Last night, she’d thought it was ridiculous that Remy would demand they not stay together. Because of the storm, it had simply made sense that she give him shelter.
Letting him stay again tonight also made sense; it was storming just as badly and because of the tree that’d fallen on his roof, his house was flooding. And yet...something was different—something that made her slightly short of breath whenever she looked at him.