God, the conversation they’d had earlier. Was it just her, or had it been ridiculously loaded? At one point she could have sworn he was going to bring up . . . but no. He would never mention the night in the park. Why would he? He’d never talked to her about it even back then. Leave it dead and buried, he was probably thinking. Hell, George had been trying to do that forever. She wouldn’t let a small thing like a visit to the scene of the crime, her hometown, wipe out all the progress she’d made in the intervening years.
But damn, he’d looked incredible today. Or, er, yesterday. (Whatever time it was, it was definitely tomorrow by now. Thanks loads, Amelia.) She had been telling the truth when she’d told Jaz and Sera she wasn’t interested in dating, but she’d lied—well, a lie of omission—when she’d skated over the issue of getting laid. Suddenly it became an option, as her traitor of a body had proven when Casey was next to her on the sofa—every single nerve ending of hers was tingling, and her brain (and other parts of her) were screaming to lunge at him, consequences be damned. And in her more confident moments, she thought maybe Casey might be receptive to what she had in mind.
But, as usual, she’d been a good girl and hadn’t followed her strongest impulse. So she’d never know whether he’d have lunged right back, intrigued, or pushed her away, horrified. Typical.
A sudden small
thud
behind her made her jump and turn around. The teething ring was lying on the floor; while George had been navel gazing, Amelia had fallen asleep. George pulled her head back to see the baby; her feathery eyelashes were fluttering, one drooly cheek was plastered to George’s shoulder. George wasn’t proud that she felt relieved the kid was finally asleep. Shouldn’t she have been more . . . selfless? But she couldn’t deny she was practically giddy at the thought of depositing Amelia in her crib and finally getting some shut-eye herself.
But once she was back in her bed, she realized there was no way she was going to go back to sleep. She just couldn’t relax. Amelia would be up again in about an hour and a half (at the most), so why should she bother trying? Plus she was still thinking of Casey, which just made her more agitated. Her mind racing, she stared at the ceiling and swore softly as she faced the inevitable: Circumstances like these demanded she bake a pie.
Chapter 9
“Oh my God, do you smell that?”
“What
is
that?”
George smiled at Amelia, who looked up wonderingly from her high chair and beamed back around a gooey hunk of zwieback. There was nothing George liked better than people enjoying the aroma of her baking, anticipating the—
“Is something burning?”
“Maybe we should call 911. That’s not natural.”
“You both suck,” George declared when Sera and Jaz appeared in the doorway, grinning like fools. “Just for that, neither one of you gets any pie for breakfast.”
“Lighten up, little sister.” Sera put her face into the steam coming off the pastry on the counter and inhaled deeply. “You’re too tetchy.”
“Oh, that’s something, coming from you, professional crank.”
“Didn’t you sleep well?”
“How about ‘not at all,’ thanks to your daughter? I swear, she’s part . . . what animal is nocturnal? A cat?”
“I always thought she was part raccoon,” Jaz said, rubbing Amelia’s nose with her own. “It’s that weird obsession she has with flipping over garbage cans.”
“When you chose the sperm donor, how many questions did you ask about his genetic history?”
“Sorry, kid,” Sera said, “but I don’t have much sympathy for you if Amelia’s sleep schedule—”
“She doesn’t
have
a sleep schedule.”
“Whatever—gave you time to bake. Although I am concerned about your mental state. More than usual, I mean.” To Jaz, she explained, “She must be stressed. She always bakes when she’s stressed.”
“Well, then, let’s throw some more stuff at her, see if she snaps. Then we might get quiches and soufflés and cupcakes too.”
“Sorry, Jaz. I only do pies.”
“Okay, that’s weird, but I could live with it.” Jaz eased into a chair at the table and Sera put a cup of coffee in front of her. “What are you stressed about? Besides living with your sister, I mean.”
George turned to the pie, pausing before she made the first cut to bid farewell to the baby foot-shaped vent in the center—her attempt at acknowledging what was important in her life at the moment.
Family,
she reminded herself.
Nothing else right now.
Her back to her sister and sister-in-law, she mumbled, “Nothing. Just found some extra time on my hands at four in the morning, that’s all.” She glanced over her shoulder just in time to see the other two women exchange looks. “Quit it. I’m fine. Except for that whole ‘no sleep’ thing, of course.”
“That’s why they invented naps,” Sera announced sagely, fork at the ready, eager to dig into the slice George handed her.
Jaz let hers sit for a moment. She was still studying George. “You know what? You should make another pie today.”
“You and Sera are planning on eating this whole thing in one sitting?”
“No, I mean for Casey. It would be a great way to say thanks for fixing the sink.”
The sound of Casey’s name brought George up short mid-yawn, and she had to fake finishing it. She slid into the seat on the other side of Amelia’s high chair. “I guess,” she hedged.
“Good idea,” Sera said. “Or, better yet, we could invite him over for dinner or something.”
“No,” George snapped, before she could stop herself.
“What? Why not?”
“Be–because,” she stammered, “he’s busy. With the farm. He’s wasted enough time over here. I’m sure he doesn’t have time to come back over for dinner and everything.”
“Boy’s gotta eat.”
“Really, Sera. He said he’s busy. Lots of things to do. Don’t bug him.”
Jaz eyed George with something that might have been suspicion, but she only said, “Okay, let’s go back to the pie idea, then.”
“Yeah, sure. I can make another one.” George kind of felt bad for denying Casey a full dinner, but she wasn’t certain she could deal with having him at the house for an entire evening. The way she’d reacted to him yesterday, so viscerally . . . it wasn’t helpful for her peace of mind. She was finally comfortable being on her own; the last thing she needed was to have her head turned—and her neo-virginity threatened—by some guy. Not interested, she reminded herself. In anyone. Not even Casey. Especially Casey. But if he kept turning up, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to keep denying it. What if she acted the same way she did the last time he was always around—mooning over him, crushing hard? Not helpful. Not useful.
Jaz finally took a bite of pie, and George watched her closely. Pie making may have been just a hobby, a stress reliever like Sera said, but she was still committed to doing it well. She hadn’t baked for anyone since Thom (Ingrid’s thieving boyfriend, Long A, didn’t count), and she wanted to make sure she still had that particular knack for turning flour, fat, fruit, and sugar into happy. Judging by the blissful look on Jaz’s face, George figured she hadn’t lost her touch. Good. It was a concrete success she could be proud of. Right up there with improving on her latest record diaper-changing time—and the diapers didn’t immediately drop to Amelia’s knees when she picked her up, either. She was achieving all sorts of goals she didn’t even know she had.
Jaz and Sera devoured their pie in silence and asked for more. When the second helpings were gone, Jaz finally sat back, dipped the crust in her third cup of coffee, and ran her bare foot along Sera’s leg. “So the order’s done? Ready to go?”
“I just have to pack up the last box.”
“What is it?” George asked, collecting the empty plates and putting them in the sink.
“A beautiful set of dinnerware,” Jaz said. “Big custom order—service for twenty, including serving dishes and stuff. She’s been working on it forever.”
“Wow. Who for?”
Sera started to answer, but Jaz jumped in before she could get a word out. “A new place opening in the fall. Something like a tearoom, but I hear it’s going to become an inn when it grows up, maybe next year.”
George nodded. “Good idea.”
“This place has been letting the leaf peepers and the art buyers bomb into town just for the day for too long. We need more places like that—get the tourists to stay overnight, spread the wealth after the sun goes down. I hope this one works. Then maybe others will start up.”
“Nice to see the chamber of commerce still has its thinking cap on.”
“Oh, Marsden is trying to change with the times, all right.”
Sera snorted. “And yet it intentionally manages to stay mired in the early twentieth century. That’s some feat of contortionism right there.”
“Have some more pie, crabbypants,” George interrupted Sera, sensing an impending rant.
“I would, but you took my plate away.”
“You
actually
have room for a third piece?”
“I didn’t get a chance to find out.
Because you took my plate away.
”
“Don’t you have to pack your shipment?”
“George is right,” Jaz said. “Skip’s coming early to pick it up. It’d better be ready, or he’ll wander off to do something else and never come back.”
Sera growled as she pushed herself away from the table, lovingly palmed the top of her daughter’s head, kissed her wife, and went back upstairs to dress.
“What have you got planned today?” Jaz asked George. “After you bake the second pie, that is.”
“Dunno. Maybe Amelia and I will go to the park,” she answered, surprising even herself. The park?
That
park? Was she intentionally picking at a scab on a wound she’d spent this long trying to heal?
“Sounds like a plan. I wish I felt up for a drive. I’m itching for a picnic, even if I can’t play frisbee.”
“At least promise you’ll try to get some fresh air today. I cleaned the lounge chairs and hosed off the patio. And I’m pretty sure the umbrella won’t fall on you.”
“That’s reassuring.”
“Promise!”
“Yes, Auntie George. I promise.”
“George!” Jaz called from outside a couple of hours later.
“Yep!”
“How serious were you about going to the park today?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, did it have to be today?”
“What? Wait.” George scooped up Amelia, who was sitting on the kitchen floor bashing some plastic measuring cups together, and went outside so she and Jaz didn’t have to keep bellowing through the window over the sink. “Okay, start again.”
“Do you absolutely have to go to the park today? I might need you to do something else instead.”
“I don’t think Amelia would be too disappointed if we didn’t go. She’s not too clear on the difference between ‘today’ and ‘some other day’ just yet.” She looked at her niece, who was busy tangling her fist in George’s ponytail with one hand, clutching a yellow measuring cup in the other while she gnawed on the handle. “What do you think, kid? Today? Tomorrow? Doesn’t matter? You flexible? What does your schedule look like?” To Jaz, she said, “I don’t think she cares. So what’s going on?”
Jaz squinted up at her, phone in hand. “I was just talking to Skip. He can’t make it today—his truck’s on the fritz. Can you deliver Sera’s pottery?”
“I didn’t hear the phone ring.”
“It . . . I . . . I called Skip. To make sure he was coming. He’s kind of . . . flaky. And I guess it was a good thing I did, right?”
George studied her sister-in-law. There was a lie in there somewhere; she could smell it.
“Please,” Jaz wheedled. “It’s important.”
“I guess.”
“And is the pie done?”
“You’re giving me a headache. I thought we were talking about Sera’s stuff.”
“We are. You could deliver both.”
“Not following you.”
“It’s all going to the same place.”
Chapter 10
“Casey. Delivery.”
Casey didn’t look up from his computer. “So handle it, El. That’s what I pay you for.”
“You’d better do this one.”
With an aggravated sigh, Casey pushed himself away from his desk and moved past Elliot hovering in the doorway of his office. He pounded through the echoing Gothic monster of a house and out the back door to what was now the delivery entrance. Last year, he’d extended the pea-gravel drive so it wound around the side of the house, went under the portico where coaches used to draw up a couple of centuries ago, and ended short of what had once been the formal gardens (and would be again, as soon as the roses were planted).
He stopped wondering why this delivery was so important when he spotted Sera and Jaz’s beat-up van. Of course Elliot would be skittish about handling Sera’s pottery. “Need some help with that?” he asked, rounding the open back door—only to plow right into George. He jumped back. “Oh. Hey. Didn’t expect to see you here.”
She smiled grimly. “Didn’t expect to be here.”
“I thought Sera would have . . .”
“You would think that, wouldn’t you? But for some reason I got ambushed, the baby was wrenched out of my arms, and I was shoved into the van and handed the keys. Like a do-it-yourself kidnapping. Anyway, here.” She grabbed something from inside and turned back around. “Take this.”
“Er . . .”
“It’s a pie,” she said bluntly, almost belligerently.
“I can see that. To what do I owe the honor of baked goods?”
“Sera and Jaz wanted to say thanks for fixing the sink. It’s apple. Out of season, but we didn’t have any other fruit to make filling with in the house. If you like a different kind, I can—”
“Okay, whoa,” he interrupted her rambling, taking the pie from her. Even though George was in a weird, agitated state, he was really glad to see her again so soon. “You made this? Excellent. Thank you. I love apple pie.” He smiled at her. “And I don’t care about what’s in season if it’s dessert. I’ll definitely enjoy it, I swear.”
George put on what looked like a forced smile, did that familiar move of putting her wrist to her forehead, and turned away again. “I’ve also got your dinnerware here—”
“I can’t believe Sera finished it already. Just leave it,” he rushed to add, as she reached into the van to haul out the first of several boxes. “I’ll have the guys get it. Come on inside.”
“I—I should get back—” Then she stopped, looking up at the house and around at the land. “Wow. Things sure look different around here.”
“That was the idea.”
“What idea?”
“Come on. I’ll show you.”
Casey led George up the back steps and into the house. While he put the pie in the kitchen, she hovered in the hallway.
“You know, I’ve never seen the inside of your house before.”
“It’s a ridiculous place, isn’t it? We never needed this much room—not for just me and my parents—but there was no talking my dad out of it once he saw it. It’s always been pretty run-down—we never could manage to keep it up, it needed so much work. It was beat up to begin with, when we moved in—do you remember that?”
“Sort of.”
“I’ve been working on it, and it’s looking a lot better than it used to, trust me. But it’s not perfect yet.”
She wandered down the hall toward the front of the house, looking around curiously. “So this is going to be a tearoom?”
Casey laughed. “I can never get it through Jaz’s skull that it’s not going to be a tearoom.”
“Yeah, you don’t look like the tea-sipping type.”
She entered an empty, half-painted sitting room. Casey leaned in the doorway. “What type do I look like?”
She shrugged. “Rare meat?”
“Well, it just so happens I like a good cup of oolong while I’m snacking on shanks of bloody beef.”
“Mm. I was picturing bison. I hear Earl Grey pairs well with it. Who stole all your furniture?”
“Yeah, the place is pretty empty at the moment. My parents decided to move to Florida a few years ago, and they wanted to travel light. They had a huge estate sale and got rid of everything they couldn’t fit into a small U-Haul. It was no big loss; our furniture was never all that nice to begin with. I’m planning on getting different stuff pretty soon.”
“So what is your plan, then, if this place isn’t going to be a tearoom?”
She walked past him, across the hall, into another room. He watched her go, admiring the view, and had to work hard to keep his voice casual.
“A meeting center. For parties, conferences. Someday I’d like to turn this huge pile of bricks into an inn, but I have to get what you could call ‘phase one’ up and running first, see if the initial plans work out.”
“Oh yeah. Jaz said something about it becoming an inn next year.”
“That’s . . . optimistic. But someday.”
“What about the farm?”
“It still exists. Just . . . in a different form.”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“I’ll show you, then. There’s more to see outside than inside, anyway.”
Casey couldn’t wait to show off his new and improved Bowen farm. The house was a burden he had to force himself to spend time on, when what he really wanted to do was be working outside. He didn’t get nearly as much time to muck around in the dirt as he wanted.
On their way outside, Casey brought George up to date. He knew she would remember the battered, messy version of the property his parents had bought when he was a teenager—an old house and a haphazard, neglected farm the Bowens thought they could rescue. They were proud they’d purchased the place before the previous owner sold the property to a developer who would have torn down the house and put an apartment complex on the land or carved it up into one- and five-acre lots with a custom home on each. The problem was they were city folk, and even though they’d gotten it into their heads that they wanted to do something “meaningful” and “productive” with their lives, they didn’t have the first clue about how to run a farm. Casey had been firmly against the whole idea, but his parents weren’t about to listen to a fifteen-year-old.
So they moved in and his parents subscribed to a lot of farming journals, but it didn’t take them long to realize Casey had been right—they had no idea how to run a farm. No amount of research had prepared them for the
Green Acres
existence they had plunged themselves and Casey into. And the whole experience went downhill pretty rapidly.
Casey escaped the frustrations of farm life by immersing himself in high school—sports, studies, his friends—although he did his daily chores without complaining much. His parents had enough problems without his causing trouble. When it was time for college, he went eagerly, feeling only slightly guilty about leaving his parents short on help. He did what he could when he came back for the summers, but he saw the writing on the wall long before his parents did: sell or go bankrupt. But still they hung on, and Casey knew he had to get out and stay out, or spiral down with them and their losing battle.
“So wait,” George said, panting beside him as he led her toward the largest of three barns on the property. He heard her labored breathing and slowed his long strides to make it a leisurely stroll instead of a power walk. “You were gone for a long time too?”
He nodded, sneaking a glance at her. “I can’t really give you grief for leaving town, because after I graduated from college, I did the same thing. Didn’t come back for years. I majored in finance, got a job in New York, even got transferred to the London office.”
George made an impressed noise.
“And then, after a bunch of years doing that, I realized I was missing something.”
“Which was . . . ?”
He laughed a little. “Marsden, if you can believe it. My friends. My family. Everything familiar. Everything I loved. I realized having piles of cash and doing all sorts of high-profile wheeling and dealing wasn’t a replacement for any of that.”
“Bullshit.”
He laughed again, louder. “I had this great place in Chelsea, ate out every night, nonstop clubbing, went to Paris for weekends away . . . but I was lonely, Goose.”
“You were an idiot.”
“I know it looks that way—”
“You built a life out there—outside of this place. A good one, from the sound of it.” She paused. “And didn’t you . . . you know . . . have—”
“Girlfriends? A love life?”
“Yeah, that.”
He shrugged. “Well, I was hardly a monk. But I never felt strongly enough about any of my girlfriends to want to build a life with . . . Well, obviously, right? Because here I am. When I thought about moving back to Marsden, it just . . . made sense. The idea of living here again really appealed to me. And I could solve my parents’ problems so easily at the same time.”
“By buying the farm from them and taking over.”
Casey didn’t want to make it sound like he’d bailed out his parents with one saintly monetary miracle. He’d spent enough time away from the farm, selfishly living his own comfortable life while his parents struggled, that he didn’t feel he’d earned any sort of savior label, and he wasn’t going to make it sound like he deserved one.
Instead, he said, “Yeah, but I didn’t want to be stuck with it, either. I was going to sell it off to developers like the old guy we bought it from.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Would you believe I actually got attached to the place? Surprised even myself. I spent some time here, really examining it, and I realized I wanted to keep it. And the idea of making a home here in Marsden was suddenly really appealing. It happens to some of us. Not everybody, of course,” he added, with a wink at her. She smirked but said nothing, so he went on, “Still, I knew I couldn’t keep running the farm the way my parents had. It wasn’t working. So I banished Mom and Dad to retirement in Florida. I only allow them to come back up north for Christmas—”
“You do not.”
He gave her a sly grin. “No, not really. They’re there by choice, I swear. Frankly, they’re relieved they don’t have to deal with the place anymore.”
“So they’re relaxing in some condo in Miami—”
“Jupiter, actually.”
George laughed. “Seriously? From Mars to Jupiter?”
Casey’s stomach flipped. He made a mental note to pick up some antacids if he was going to spend much more time around this woman. “You remember that.”
“‘Welcome to Mars.’ I always preferred the sign that way. Almost made a motion at a town council meeting to change the town name officially.”
“You did not.”
“Finish your story.”
“Right.” He stopped outside the barn doors. “Well, I decided if it couldn’t compete as a traditional farm—God knows we’ve got enough cornfields and herds of dairy cows in this state—then it would have to be nontraditional. So over there are the pumpkin fields.” He pointed off in the distance, where low tendrils were creeping over brown dirt. “And over there are the Christmas trees.” He pointed in another direction, to fields full of lonely little sticks jutting up forlornly in rows. “Well, not this year. But eventually.”
“Tearoom—”
“Meeting center.”
“Sorry. Meeting center. Future inn. Pumpkin farm. Christmas tree farm. And just how do all these things fit together?”
“What’s our greatest asset around here, Goose?”
“Artists.”
“Art
buyers,
” he corrected.
“Oh,” she said, smiling. “You’re going into the tourist trade.”
“Agritainment.”
“Sounds like a disease.”
“It’s a good thing. The filthy rich will always be with us. I’m just here to relieve them of their burden of too much cash. And show them a good time in return.”
“Wait a minute—I haven’t heard this part of the plan,” an overwhelmingly loud voice shouted from behind them. “Who’re you showing a good time? Is there something you want to tell me, Case?”
George spun around. “Oh my God. Big D?” she cried.
“George Down!” the big guy, Darryl Sykes, boomed, extending his arms. “I heard you were in town. Gimme some sugar!”
She hugged him tightly, and he lifted her off her feet. “It’s so good to see you! What are you doing here?”
“Are you kidding? The lord of the manor over here begged me to work for him.”
Casey put on a smile. “Somebody’s got to keep this guy on the right side of the law.”
“Spent three years bossing me around on the basketball court, now he’s bossing me around in the farm fields. It figures, right? But don’t let any pesky job titles fool you—I manage his ass.”
George gave him another hug. “I’ve missed you.”
Huh—that was something George reserved for Darryl but not him, Casey noted. First a hug, now this. She’d never hugged
him,
never once said she missed him . . . Then he pushed the thoughts away. He was being ridiculous.
“I’ve missed you too, little girl. Why haven’t you ever come back to visit?”
“You’ve gotta ask?”
Darryl laughed. “I guess not. I love your sister, but she can be—”
“Prickly.”
“As a porcupine trying to mate with a cactus. So how’s the whole being-back-home thing going?”
“I love my niece?”
Darryl’s laugh was loud enough to rattle the old barn’s windows. “And what are you doing with this delinquent today?”
“I got put to work, making deliveries for Sera.”
“Good for you. Whatever keeps you around here is okay by me.”
“Aw, you’re a sweetheart.”
Casey felt compelled to interrupt the love fest. “So, D. Did you get the tractor running yet?”
Darryl jerked a thumb at Casey. “See what I mean? Lord of the manor.” To Casey, he said, “Yes, sir, sir. Tractor’s working just fine. I took care of it. I’ve got most of the crew working on the hay bale mountain. Some of the guys are putting in the new fence posts at the petting zoo.”