An Allegheny Homecoming. T. McClure R.
me.”
Josh met his gaze and nodded before glancing away. “Thanks.” If he talked to anyone it would be to Matt, a man he trusted with his life. But Josh had managed to stay quiet for eight years; no sense dragging up the past at this late date.
Matt slapped his hat back on and tilted his head. “You know, you’re starting to look like a crazy mountain man. You ever gonna shave? I can hardly recognize you.” Matt’s grin dissipated the tension in the air.
Josh propped an elbow on a fence post and ran a hand over the dark, bushy beard. Four months with no rules and regulations to follow with regard to shaving. For the first time in eight years, his hair touched his collar. “Maybe I don’t want to be recognized.”
“Oh, I almost forgot. You had some mail at the house.” Matt pulled an envelope from inside the heavy duster and waved it in the air. “You keepin’ secrets from me, bro? You got a girlfriend back home?”
“Nope.” A shiver ran down his spine at Matt’s timely question. He wished his secrets were as innocent as a girl back home. Taking the piece of mail from Matt’s outstretched hand, he stuck the envelope in the back pocket of his jeans, wondering who he knew who would write a letter in this day of texts and emails. “Thanks.”
“So we’ll see you for dinner?” Matt leaned forward on the saddle horn and waited.
Josh had promised twice already this month to come for dinner and had apologized by saying he had fallen asleep. He nodded. “I’ll be there.”
“Sounds good.” Matt pulled on the reins, and his horse whirled around on his hind legs. The clatter of the hooves on the rocky hillside faded into the distance.
Josh clambered up the bank to the old ranch truck, a forty-year-old mechanical miracle. A sturdy wooden bed had replaced the original, which had probably rusted away years ago. His own truck was parked in the garage at the main house. After years of owning a vehicle for a year at the most, selling and then moving on, he had purchased a new dark green truck with an extended cab to store his things, and a short bed for anything else he might have to carry.
The job here at the MacDougal Ranch, as much as he appreciated working in the outdoors, was temporary. He just hadn’t decided on his next step.
He looked around. The big cat had disappeared. He maneuvered the truck up the hill, washed in the stream, changed his shirt and jeans for the only clean pair he had and settled down by the empty fireplace to read his mail.
He ripped open the envelope. A news clipping and a piece of pink notepaper fell out. The pink paper was decorated with a picture of scissors, the Hair Today logo and Megan Martin’s name.
Hi Josh, I thought you would want to see this. Text or call if you want to talk. Megan.
Josh smiled, thinking of the woman with the curly ponytail who could argue sports statistics with him all day. Neither had a romantic interest in the other, but when they had worked together backstage on the senior class play, they had discovered a common interest in sports of all kinds. He unfolded the newspaper clipping. A group of people stood in front of a business. Why would Megan think he cared about this?
He brought the paper closer and peered at the faces. He still didn’t recognize anyone. He had been gone from home too long. He read the caption: Local Businesses Plan Holiday Party. Holly McAndrews, proprietor of The Wildflower. Now he remembered. She had been a few years ahead of him in school. Three years in a row she and her bay quarter horse had won the barrel racing contest at the county fair. He grinned at the sight of the pregnant belly. Didn’t look like she was doing any barrel racing these days.
Next to Holly was Megan. And next to Megan...he did a double take, before reading the caption beneath. Suzanna Campbell, proprietor of The Cookie Jar. He almost didn’t recognize his own mother. Her formerly bright yellow hair was more of a platinum blond, and she must have lost at least forty pounds. And she was using her maiden name. What was going on?
He took a deep breath and stared into the ashes of the old stone fireplace. He had stayed away, focusing on his own demons. Eight years as a medic, patching up his fellow soldiers, had done little to assuage his guilt about what had happened in Bear Meadows. He’d even finally gotten out of the military, hoping to find the answers elsewhere.
But the picture indicated something else was wrong. Was his mother sick? The weight loss... The white hair...
He was only half joking when he told Matt he didn’t want to be recognized. He had no desire to return to Bear Meadows, especially after his last visit. He had burned that bridge. What he wanted was to be left alone to sort out his thoughts. How did the last eight years figure into the direction of the rest of his life? How would he move on from the incident that kept him away from his hometown?
But something had happened at home. Maybe he wasn’t the only one having trouble figuring out what to do next. His parents had been married twenty-five years. Didn’t they know by now?
Apparently they didn’t. He had to get back to Pennsylvania.
But first he had a date with a plate of lasagna.
“NONFAT VANILLA LATTE. And make it a double.” She deserved it after the morning she’d had. Standing at The Wildflower counter, Wendy swiped her debit card and studied the woman behind the cash register. “Are you still working out? You don’t look like you’ve gained an ounce.”
Holly Hoffman McAndrews grinned as she pushed Wendy’s latte across the counter. The sweet scent of vanilla wafted from the ceramic cup. “I can do limited exercise. And I walk a lot.” She patted the round protrusion underneath the brown apron. “But I gave up riding horses for a while.” Her smile got wider as the bell jingled over the door. “It’s all his fault.”
“What are you blaming me for now?” Mac McAndrews, the chief of police and Holly’s husband, strode across the floor.
Wendy looked from one to the other. She may as well have been invisible.
She’d never spotted the love affair coming, what with Mac having a little girl from his first marriage and Holly thinking she wasn’t the maternal type. But somehow things had worked out for the couple and, two years after they laid eyes on each other, they were a happy family, with Mac’s seven-year-old daughter, Riley, and a baby on the way.
Wendy carried her cup to the low table in front of the picture window and settled into an overstuffed chair. Brown-and-yellow plaid, the colors of the local high school. Rather than go home to an empty house, Wendy had decided to research job opportunities on her laptop in the comfort of the cozy coffee shop. She would do the noon report from the bridge, with a couple shots of a still unfrozen creek, and then go home.
She sipped her latte as she waited for her laptop to connect. Ever since Holly had opened the coffee shop the previous year, Wendy had been a steady customer. She had watched Mac date a series of women, looking for the perfect partner for himself and mother for his daughter. He had even taken Wendy out to dinner, but they both knew before they finished their salads they were going in completely opposite directions.
Wendy watched the two former military members hold hands across the counter. Holly had been a great choice for Mac and vice versa. It just took them a while to figure that out.
Glancing down at the computer screen, she typed television news jobs in the search bar. How long would it take for her to figure things out? She couldn’t stay at WSHF past January. She had to find something else. A year was long enough to wait for an opportunity. She clicked on the first listing. Broadcast Technician, Shipboard, Worldwide. Get ready for an exciting life at sea!
She skimmed the job requirements—which she met—and then the long list of responsibilities. The any other job-related duties assigned moved her finger to the delete button. She pictured herself swabbing the deck with a smelly mop. She was reading about a TV Spot Producer in Burbank when the bell jingled