Expectations. Brenda Novak
he wanted. He’d become a huge success in the big city; he was rich, powerful, happy.
She couldn’t even keep her marriage together.
“Mom?” A sleepy-eyed Ryan hovered behind the Durhams. “What’s wrong? Is it Dad?”
Jenna hurried to her eight-year-old son and, putting a reassuring arm around his shoulders, brought him into the light. “No, honey, it’s the Durhams’ grandson, Adam. You’ve heard them talk about him before, haven’t you?”
Ryan scratched his tousled head of wheat-blond hair. “Yeah. He’s the real busy guy from San Francisco, right?”
If Ryan’s words implied an accusation, Jenna knew her son wasn’t aware of it, but the adults shifted uncomfortably.
“I’m a defense attorney,” Adam explained. “With the number of bad guys running around these days, not to mention the wrongly accused, there’s a lot of work to be done.”
Ryan nodded and covered a yawn. Had Adam said he was a football player or a cop, the boy might have been more impressed. Jenna doubted he knew what a defense attorney was.
“This is my son, Ryan,” she explained, proud of the one good thing her years with Dennis had given her.
Adam focused on the boy, an unreadable expression on his face. “I went to school with your parents,” he said. “Used to play ball with your dad.”
That he had played far more intimate games with Jenna went unsaid, but the look he gave her indicated he hadn’t forgotten.
Neither had Jenna. The memory of his kiss, warm and insistent, skittered through her mind, creating the same old flutter in her stomach. How could so much time pass without changing anything?
Then again, those same years had changed everything.
Suddenly Jenna wanted to get away—and stay away—from Adam Durham. The history books were closed. She wasn’t ready to think about the old times, the good times.
Mr. Durham lifted one gnarled hand to smooth back the gray hair above his ears, the only place he had any, just as Mrs. Durham waved them all toward the kitchen.
“I’ve got a fresh pumpkin pie—”
Adam grinned. “I know. I found it.”
Jenna remembered the sounds she’d heard coming from the kitchen and blushed. While Adam had been raiding his grandmother’s refrigerator, she’d thought he was searching the freezer for a juice can full of cash.
“I thought you were eating a Twinkie.”
“I went easy on the pie, in case Gram had big plans for it. The Twinkie was just to finish me off.” He stretched, accentuating his size. “I’m a growing boy, after all.”
Hardly a boy, Jenna thought. “Well I wouldn’t want to keep you from your second piece of pie. You three go ahead.” She began pushing Ryan up the stairs in front of her. “I’d better get this boy back to bed.”
Yes, the Durhams had always made her feel like part of the family, but Jenna knew she wasn’t part of this. As soon as Adam appeared, she’d become the intruder—understandable, considering their history and what had just occurred, but awkward all the same.
“Jenna, wouldn’t you like a slice of pie? You’re getting far too thin,” Mrs. Durham said.
“She looks good to me,” Adam muttered.
Jenna felt Adam’s dark eyes on her like the heat of a campfire, and again she tightened the belt of her robe before turning back to face them. “Go ahead and enjoy yourselves. There’s school in the morning, and Ryan agreed to tidy up the woodpile afterward. I’ve got to be up early to interview waitresses if we want to replace Gayle before the holidays.”
Adam smiled, his teeth glinting against his darkly shadowed jaw. “Maybe I’ll help Ryan. When I was a kid, I used to collect the spiders I found out in that old woodpile.”
Ryan brightened. “Great! I found a tarantula once when we visited the Grand Canyon.”
“We’ll see if we can find another one tomorrow, though we’ll probably have better luck coming up with a black widow.”
“Black widows are cool.” Ryan resisted his mother’s hand long enough to add, “Hey, save me a piece of pie, okay?”
“You got it, kid.” Adam winked at Ryan, and Jenna shooed her son on his way.
“I’m sorry about your, um, neck,” she said to Adam, then followed Ryan up the stairs.
“OKAY. WHAT’S JENNA doing here?” Adam took the milk from the stainless-steel restaurant-style refrigerator and set it on the large oak table. Taking a seat, he crossed his legs at the ankle and angled them out in front of him, trying to appear patient as he waited for the explanation. He’d never dreamed he’d see Jenna again. Not here. Not after all these years. And certainly not minus his old friend.
What was more, he’d never expected the sight to land him a blow in the gut with twice the impact of those she’d landed elsewhere on his body tonight.
Grandma Durham busied herself uncovering the pie she’d reclaimed from the fridge. “She’s working here, dear. She’s our new manager. Didn’t you know? I could swear I mentioned it on the phone a time or two.”
She stood on tiptoe to reach the cupboard where the plates were stored, and Adam swiftly stood and retrieved them for her.
“You said nothing of the sort—and you know it.” He leaned down to see her face, which was worn and lined and pleasant to look at, like a treasured old book.
“Why? What’s going on?”
With a smile and a shrug, she sent a glance her husband’s way. Pop Durham sat across from Adam’s seat, rattling the pages of yesterday’s paper as though absorbed in what he read there. But Adam wasn’t fooled. Pop listened to every word they said, all the while pretending his grandson’s visit wasn’t that important to him, just the way he did whenever Adam came home.
“In August, I think it was, she moved back to town to sell her stained glass—”
“Her what?”
“She makes the most beautiful windows and lampshades, dear, in stained glass. You really should see them.”
“That’s how she was planning to earn a living?” Adam couldn’t keep the skepticism from his voice, and Gram reacted with a dose of defensiveness.
“She could, you know. She’s good enough. She’s just getting her business set up. So it was perfect that she could come and work here. We needed the help and she needed the extra income.”
His grandmother gestured him back to his seat, and Adam stretched out again. “What, exactly, does she do for you?”
“Oh, whatever we need, actually. She fills in if the maid doesn’t show up, or the waitress, or she helps Mr. Robertson in the kitchen if the restaurant gets busy. She does some bookkeeping for a few hours the first part of the week, then basically manages the restaurant and inn from Thursday to Sunday.” Gram frowned. “I told you we were going to hire someone, that Pop and I are getting too old to handle this place alone.”
With a twinge of guilt, Adam loosened his collar by unfastening another button. Her meaning was clear. His grandparents wanted him to come home and work, and eventually take over the place when they passed on. They had never understood his desire to make something more of himself, and he couldn’t seem to explain it to them, though he’d certainly tried. As the illegitimate son of a drug addict who’d abandoned him when he was only five and then killed herself, he knew what a psychologist would say. He’d dated one once who’d sent him her analysis of him after he’d broken it off. She’d said he was an overachiever, acting out of a desire to prove himself valuable to society. Because he’d been rejected at such a young age he had no faith in his intrinsic