Fifteen minutes late. Well, at least Emily was consistent. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d gotten to a place on time.
Her sister, Anne, looked up from a rare quiet moment at the Orchard Diner’s register. “Oh good. You can help Caden with his homework.”
Emily remembered not to make a face as she turned to see Caden Harper staring at her from the back booth. She shot the kid a short little wave and called out, “Sorry, Caden. I can’t tonight. I’m meeting someone for dinner.”
“That’s okay,” Caden said. “It’s just biology.” He sighed gustily, as if the weight of the universe rested on his narrow shoulders. He hunched over his textbook, and another aggrieved sigh made it clear that the authors of said book hated him. His father, who worked in DC each week, hated him. His mother, who had fled Harmony Springs years ago for a more exciting life than she could find in the Apple Capital of the Shenandoah Valley, hated him. He turned a page and sighed again.
Anne shook her head. “Rachel said you and Matt would be eating here.” Of course Rachel had. Why even bother publishing The Herald? Rachel broadcast news every minute of the day.
“I just want to get it over with,” Emily said. “Eat some dinner. Tell Rachel I met her stupid first date challenge. And get home to finish a few repeats on the Malabrigo scarf I want to finish for the store.”
“Sure,” Anne said with a knowing nod. “That’s why you got here early.”
“I’m not early. We were supposed to meet at six.”
“That’s not what Rachel said. She said six thirty.”
Huh. Well that explained why Matt wasn’t here. How could Emily have gotten the time wrong? It wasn’t like she wanted to be here. “What else did Rachel tell you?” Emily asked warily.
“That you’re not getting any younger.”
Emily made a face at her baby sister. “Don’t you start in!”
“Don’t shoot the messenger!” Anne held up both hands. “I’m just supposed to remind you that Matt Dawson is Harmony Springs’s most eligible bachelor.”
“Don’t even—”
Anne smiled sweetly. “You’ve got ten minutes, and I know you’re not going to use it to brush your hair or put on fresh lipstick. Why don’t you help Laurence Olivier back there?”
Caden was flipping pages in his textbook, each snap of the paper more melodramatic than the one before. Emily braved the drama zone. “Okay,” she said, dropping onto the leatherette bench across from the kid. “What’s the topic?”
“Cellular Reproduction.” He looked thoroughly disgusted.
“Other types of reproduction are a lot more fun,” Emily said. Crap. That was probably an inappropriate comment to make to a fourteen-year-old boy. Even a fourteen-year-old boy whose father had decided he was old enough to stay on his own all week, every week, while Mike Harper worked at his prestigious Washington DC law firm. Emily decided to ignore the bright red embarrassment that flooded Caden’s cheeks. “What’s your homework?” she asked.
The kid gulped down half his glass of milk before he managed to speak. “We looked at slides in class, under the microscope. I have my drawings, but I can’t figure out the stages.” He passed her a rumpled piece of notebook paper that looked like a slaughterhouse for Rorschach tests.
“What did you use for this? A red felt-tip?”
“I didn’t have anything else in my backpack.” He sounded defensive.
“Make sure you put in some blue or black pens tonight. Along with a pencil or two.”
Caden poked at the green beans on his plate. “I looked for some last night, but I couldn’t find any with erasers.”
Emily didn’t bother glancing at the clock again. She already knew Simon McCall had closed the General Store for the night. Simon headed to his mother’s house at five o’clock sharp every night, for cocktail hour and Jeopardy! Emily dug in the over-size tote bag she carried instead of a purse. “Here,” she said, producing an ancient mechanical pencil.
“It’s purple!”
Caden’s protest immediately made her think of the last purple thing she’d seen, the Pleasure Parade. Yet another topic inappropriate for discussing with a minor. “You’ll live,” she said. “Now, let’s see what you have there. Let’s find telophase first; it’s the easiest to see. Do you remember what telophase is?”
“The cells use telephones?”
She gave him a dirty look. “Look, I don’t have to pass Mr. Radford’s biology class. I got my A fifteen years ago.”
The kid looked chastised. “I can save my questions and ask Dad when he’s back Friday night.”
Yeah, right. Like either father or son would give a damn about cellular reproduction three nights from now. Mike Harper’s part-time parenting sucked. And if Emily thought that, she could only imagine what Caden believed.
“Telos,” she said. “It’s Greek for end. So you just have to figure out which of the cells on the slide has the chromatids at the end.” Caden squinted at his blood-red notebook paper. The Purr started humming at the back of Emily’s mind. She said, “I’ll bet you dessert you can do this.”
That got his attention. Caden caught the tip of his tongue between his teeth as he leaned closer over the table. His eyes narrowed, and his pencil roamed from one scribbled drawing to the next.
Emily leaned forward too. She could make him figure it out. She could win. And her competitive spirit must have called to something in him, because he finally pointed at the right batch of red lines. “Exactly!” she said.
Caden looked proud as he labeled the tangled mass.
“Excellent,” Emily said. The Purr rose in pitch. “Okay, you’ve got ten seconds. What’s the stage before telophase?”
“Anaphase?”
“Right! And can you find it on your drawing?” She saw the blob that was supposed to represent the step, the one with the shadowy chromosomes lined up on their opposite polls. It had been ages since she’d done this stuff but now that she thought about it, the designs were really like an intricate knitting pattern. She could represent the chromosomes with lace, implementing a simple yarn-over every second line… It would be like a game. A science-based victory. The Purr approved.
“There!” Caden said.
“And the next one?” Emily asked, leaning forward.
“Metaphase. This one.”
The Purr surged. “And with your choice of dessert on the line, Mister Harper, what is the last phase of cellular reproduction?”
Caden grinned. “Prophase!” He bent close to his page and punched up fresh pencil lead to add clean labels.
The Purr roared in approval at her success in inspiring the kid. “Now you can redraw the entire thing, so Mr. R. will give you an extra point for neatness.”
“Awww,” Caden started to complain, but he was already taking out another piece of paper. Emily purposely laid her fingers flat on the table to keep from reaching across and ruffling his hair. Caden was about four years too old to accept ruffled hair from anyone who wasn’t his mother. And his mother had left Harmony Springs in her rear-view mirror too long ago for anyone to hope she’d get over her gypsy phase and return.
“I never got any of those extra points.”
Emily startled and the Purr stuttered to a stop. Her heart hammered into overdrive even as she recognized the voice behind her.
“Mad-Dog Dawson,” Caden breathed.
Emily turned to see an easy smile spread over Matt’s face. He held out a hand to the kid and said, “This is where I give you the stay in school lecture. But it looks like Emily has that under control.”
Caden’s audible gulp annoyed her. He didn’t act like she walked on water, even though she helped him with his homework at least once a week. God knew he didn’t spare a glance for Anne, who let Caden take over the back booth every day. Mike Harper might have paid for meals, but he was getting a full-time babysitting service. Or whatever you called it, for ninth graders who would never admit they didn’t want to be left to their own devices five nights a week.
Anne came to their rescue. “Here you go,” she said to Caden, setting down a slice of coconut cream pie. “Now you better get going on The Scarlet Letter. Let these two eat their own dinners.”
Anne led Emily and Matt to a booth at the front of the diner. “Menus?” she asked, already handing over the laminated list of offerings. “And I’ve got meatloaf on special tonight. Just like your mother makes it.”
“I hope not,” Matt said dryly.
Anne laughed. “I’ll be back, once you’ve had a chance to decide.”
Emily barely kept herself from grabbing at her sister’s arm, from begging Anne to join them. But Emily didn’t need her baby sister to protect her. She was perfectly capable of holding her own with a man. Even with Matt Dawson. Especially with Matt Dawson.
She just needed some time to study her menu. Even though she was the one who’d done the layout, each and every time Anne updated the damn thing. Even though Anne had tested half the recipes on her, tweaking spices a dozen times—just… one… bit… more. Even though Emily ate at the diner at least three times a week.
But there was only so long she could pretend the printed list held her interest. Eventually she needed to be brave. She needed to put the menu on the table, take a deep breath, look up… And get lost in eyes such a dark brown they seemed black. Her breath whooshed out of her.
“I’m sorry,” she said, before she could weigh the pros and cons. At his questioning look, she forced herself to rush on, because if she didn’t say the words now, she was never going to say them, and if she never said them, she couldn’t possibly sit through an entire meal with Matt. “I’m sorry about Jon. When I heard what happened, I couldn’t believe it. And on Christmas Eve, too. With so many of the troops already out. I wrote a note to your parents. But I should have sent something to you too. I wanted to, but I… I’m sorry.”
What was it about Matt Dawson that made her spurt out endless words? With every other person in Harmony Springs, she talked like a normal human being. With Matt, it was like someone turned on a faucet and walked away.
Especially when she had to talk about Jon. To Matt.
Matt said, “Jon loved the Army.”
“No wonder. With your Dad’s service and all. Jon was a hero.” And then she had to go on, because Matt—of all people—knew how difficult it was for her to make that statement. “We’ll miss him. Everyone in town will, I mean. The Herald ran a full page article when we found out, with pictures and everything.” Pictures of Homecoming, twelve years ago. She dived back in, before she could see herself in her formal dress. “People took up a collection for the veterans hospital in Winchester. Not that Jon ever made it back to the VA. We just had to do something. We had to—”
Enough. She had to stop babbling.
She was long past missing Jon. Had stopped missing him twelve years ago, when a misdirected text shattered three years of what she’d thought was love. Shattered her faith in her own judgment. In herself.
But that didn’t mean Jon’s death hadn’t torn a jagged little hole in her heart. He was the only person she knew who’d been killed.
Thank God Anne had the good sense to come back and take their order. Ham steak for Matt. “I’ll have the club sandwich,” Emily said. “Extra—”
“Yeah, yeah, extra mayo. And fruit salad instead of fries.”
“Actually—” She was going to order the onion rings. She always ordered the onion rings, the crisp golden rounds dusted with Anne’s patented mix of Parmesan, garlic, and pepper. Anne winked, though, and turned toward the kitchen.
Great. Her own sister was pimping her out to the great Matt Dawson.
Crap. Now she had to come up with something new to say, another idiotic torrent to fill the uncomfortable conversational gap so Matt didn’t ask what she’d been about to order.
At least he looked as strapped for words as she was. He reached out to line up the napkin dispenser with the salt and pepper shakers. He glanced back toward Caden. At the clock on the wall. At the complicated knit cabling it had taken her three weeks to master for the front of her sweater.
Emily sat back in the booth and raised her chin in a wry challenge. “Hey. My face is up here.”
~~~
What the hell was he thinking of, going to dinner with Emily Barton? It would have been awkward under any circumstances. But when she kicked off the meal with a round of condolences for Jon…
Matt had collected kind words about his brother like baseball cards, each offering branded with bitter statistics. Forty-seven percent of all women told a story about Jon, about some mess he’d gotten into as a kid. Seventeen percent of the guys hit their fists against their chests twice as they concluded their little mourning speech, offering up a testosterone salute. “Hero” was the most common word used, but “warrior” was right up there.
It would have been a hell of a lot easier if Jon had been an asshole. Matt could have absorbed the words of sorrow with his own soundtrack running in his head: You didn’t know the real Jon. You only think he was a hero. You only believe he didn’t deserve to die.
But Jon was a hero. He’d been brave. He’d been true to his country. He’d deserved to come home to Harmony Springs, to a parade down Main Street, to some girl who would love him till they both died of old age, surrounded by a couple of dozen grandkids.
Instead, Harmony Springs was stuck with Matt.
And if he didn’t get off his ass and say something to Emily, something right now, she was going to walk out of the diner and tell everyone in town that he was a conceited, cidiot asshole who couldn’t keep his eyes where they belonged and his mind on a basic conversation. Which would really suck for business, once news got out about American Discount.
So he said, “You really remember all that stuff from bio? What did you do? Major in it at college?”
“I didn’t go to college.” She said the words slowly, like she thought he was pulling her leg. He’d seen wary looks like that on other girl’s faces. On girls who thought they were being mocked in a bar, picked up on a dare, the usual bullshit when guys had a few too many.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I just assumed…”
She fiddled with her silverware. “I was always okay at school, but I didn’t love it, you know? And after…after senior spring, I decided to take a year off. Mom didn’t fight too much, just said I had to get a job. She called it my gap year. It’s amazing how fast twelve years go by.”
Not if this conversation was anything to judge by. It seemed like Matt had been sitting in this booth with Emily Barton for about four centuries. The guys on the Rockets would have ragged on him for days if they heard about his being knocked silent by a girl he’d known practically his entire life.
“Yeah,” he said. “Time flies.”
Emily gave him a strange look. “So?” she asked. “What about you? What did you major in at Richmond?”
“Business Admin, officially. But really, baseball. I was a pretty crappy student.” And that was true. He had been. In college.
He’d focused on the game, on season and off. If he wasn’t training, he was watching tapes of old games. He’d practically lived at the Weinstein Center, haunting the gym in Spider gear, working his ass off to make sure he’d be a first round draft choice after he graduated.
He’d ended up going sixth round. Which meant he’d had more of a chip on his shoulder, more to prove. But the World Series ring sitting in his dresser drawer at home meant it had all been worthwhile. The ring and a pair of Cy Young awards for best pitcher in the league, two years running.
So there was no reason for him to feel defensive about slacking off at Richmond. He wasn’t a dumb jock, no matter what people thought about big-time ballplayers. He’d gone back and read most of the books he’d ignored in college. And he’d made it through business school. He had his crossword puzzles, too. It might be too late to make his college degree mean anything, but at least he knew a five-letter word for a Greek muse: Erato.
He didn’t need to think about Erato right now. Or anything that sounded like Erato. Thinking like that would only get him into deeper trouble where Emily Barton was concerned.
Right. Yet another silence. But it wasn’t his turn to talk. Before Emily could drum up another awkward back and forth, Anne arrived with their food.
“Thanks,” Emily said to her sister.
“Holler if you need anything.”
And then Anne headed back to Caden’s table, bending over some paper the kid was working on. Before Matt could ask, Emily passed him the pepper, no salt.
She remembered. Twelve years since he’d eaten a meal with Emily Barton and she remembered what he put on his food. The considerate gesture tightened strings in his chest like laces on a new glove.
“So,” Emily said, wrinkling her nose and pushing her fruit salad to the side. She gathered up a quarter of her club sandwich and wrestled with the stack of bread, compressing it into something manageable. Before she took a bite, she said, “You bought the old Marshall place. That must mean you really plan to stick around.”
Maybe it was her surprising gesture of familiarity with the pepper. Or the fact that she had the guts to bring up Old Man Marshall’s place, when they both had to be thinking about that footbridge, about the apple orchard on the other side of the creek. Or maybe it was just because he’d been in Harmony Springs for two weeks, and he still hadn’t talked to another human being about anything other than baseball. But he heard himself say, “I’m opening the American Discount.”
She dropped the sandwich. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
He shrugged. “Nope. I’ve always wanted to do something for Harmony Springs.”
“So you’re going to drive us all out of business?” Emily’s green eyes flashed a warning.
“Of course not.” He purposely took a bite of ham, chewing slowly while he planned his response. This was his first chance to explain why he’d come back, to tell an actual resident of Harmony Springs what he was doing and why he was doing it. He took a slug of sweet tea before he settled into his windup. “It’s tough living here in the middle of nowhere. If the places on Main Street don’t have what you need, you have to drive all the way to Winchester. To DC even, if it’s something major. I want to change that. I want to give back to my community.”
“You want to get rich quick.” Emily pushed away her plate.
That was exactly the type of thing his father would say. But Matt had practiced his answers. Not the private one, the one he’d never say out loud: The Rockets paid me millions. But the public one, the more humble explanation: “It’s not about the money.”
“Of course it’s about the money! It’s bad enough we Main Street merchants have to deal with the Internet, with people ordering things online instead of coming into our stores.”
He meant his laugh to be disarming. “Hey, my store’s on Main Street too.”
“Main Street isn’t just an address.” She crossed her arms over her chest and threw herself to the back of the booth.
“Come on,” he said. “I’m not the bad guy here. I’m trying to help people. I’ll be selling stuff people need at prices they can afford.” He’d practiced this argument too, because it would make sense to his father, because dollars and cents were a hell of a lot easier to measure than emotions. “Think about the Horton sisters. They’re what, ninety-five now?”
“Ninety-six,” Emily muttered.
“Ninety-six. And they can’t have two pennies between them. Their daddy sure didn’t leave them anything, not after he drank away the money from selling his orchard. They’re living on social security. And spending a dollar on a bottle of shampoo is a hell of a lot better than paying Simon McCall five bucks for the exact same stuff at the General Store.”
“But Simon is part of this community! He orders Forbes Peanut Brittle for the twins on their birthday every year. They don’t mind paying a little more for shampoo. That’s part of living here in Harmony Springs. That’s part of belonging.”
“I belong here too!” Matt said, even though he’d vowed not to let his emotions get the better of him.
“Oh, right. You graduated what, fourteen years ago? And you haven’t been back for twelve? You belong in North Carolina with the rest of the Raleigh Rockets.”
“No,” he said, and now his voice was deadly quiet. “I don’t.” Because he wasn’t a ballplayer anymore. His bum throwing arm had seen to that.
“Well, you certainly don’t fit in here. Not if you think you can win us over with a store filled with cheap plastic crap.”
Another answer he’d prepared, because he’d been sure quality would be his father’s first argument. “There will always be people who want high-end products. But if all they need is a discount store item, why shouldn’t they get that? Why doesn’t Harmony Springs deserve value?”
“Value!” Her voice was sharp enough to bring Anne out of the kitchen. Even the kid was looking up from his schoolbooks at the back of the diner. “Why don’t you tell Simon McCall about value? Because you’re going to carry clothes, right? You’ll have some Made-in-Outer-Mongolia crappy jeans and T-shirts that’ll put Simon right out of business.”
“Simon deserves to be out of business. His store window looks like it’s still 1975!”
“His store window looks like Harmony Springs! I’ve walked by the General Store every day of my life!”
“I know you’re not stupid, so you’re either naive or romantic. Because a clothing store that hasn’t changed its stock for four decades doesn’t deserve to stay in business.”
Emily sprang to her feet, her face a mask of fury. “Don’t tell me who deserves to be here. I’m the one who stayed in Harmony Springs! I’m the one who’s worked in half the stores you’re trying to kill.”
“I’m not trying to—”
“Thanks for a wonderful evening, Matt.” She spat the words and slid out of the booth.
“Come on,” he said, reaching for her arm.
“Don’t touch me!” She jerked away, digging for her wallet in the huge bag that slumped on the bench seat.
He snatched his hand back, feeling like a criminal. “Sit down,” he said, trying to sound reasonable.
She fished out a handful of cash.
“Come on, Em,” he cajoled.
“Do not call me that.”
And she was right. Jon had called her Em. He’d had the right to use her nickname. Matt never had.
He hauled himself to his feet, the better to apologize. Attempting to appear disarming, he spread his hands by his sides. “Emily,” he said, purposely keeping his voice low. That should make her catch her breath. Calm down. Step closer to hear what he had to say.
Fat chance.
She threw her money on the table. “Have a good night,” she said.
“Come on,” he said again, gathering up the cash and handing it back to her. “I’ve got this.”
“No,” she said. “You don’t.” She turned on her heel and stormed out of the restaurant.
Matt stared after her as the jangling bell above the door mocked him. He’d known this was a bad idea from the second Emily Barton had asked him to dinner.
Well, he had two choices.
He could follow her out and they could fight in the middle of Main Street. With his current luck, Chief Carter would come along in about seven seconds flat and throw him in a cell for disturbing the peace.
Or he could sit down, put his napkin on his lap, and finish eating his ham steak. The ham steak Emily Barton had paid for. The ham steak cooked by Anne Barton, who was glaring at him from the register as if he spent his spare time drowning puppies.
He glanced at the kid in the back of the diner. The boy’s eyes were as big as home plate. Great. Chalk up another one for crowd-pleasing Mad Dog Dawson.
Matt had been wrong about one thing. He had a third choice at least. He could toss his napkin on the table, turn on his heel, and walk out of the diner. Stomp out to his truck and jam his key in the ignition. Gun the engine and pull out of his hard-won parking space. And blare Metallica through his speakers all the way home to the Marshall place.