Conflicting Evidence. Lena Diaz
small inheritance that she’d received had gotten her through so far. She’d paid a repairman to do the bare minimum to make it functional, like install a new garage door opener because she could barely lift the door otherwise. And she’d had no choice but to use a chunk of the money to renovate the kitchen. That was a necessity for her fledgling business, an investment in her future. Unfortunately, fixing everything else that was wrong with the house wasn’t an expense that she could justify, or afford. Fixing them herself wasn’t feasible either. She was far from handy in the home improvement department. If she tried to repair a leaky faucet she’d probably end up flooding the entire house.
Of course, even if she’d been handy, by the time she got home every evening, she was too tired to do much more than grab a bite to eat before collapsing into bed. Then she had to be up before dawn to bake fresh delicacies for the café and start the whole cycle all over again. There wasn’t enough time, energy or money to make a dent in her long to-do list at home.
Thankfully, tomorrow was Saturday, the one day of the week when she had two full-time helpers at the shop instead of just one. With Joan and Melissa taking care of things, she could sleep in. But it wasn’t like she could relax and do nothing all day. She had to use her day off to catch up on laundry, clean the house, work on the books for the store, order new supplies. In some ways, she worked harder on her “day off” than during the rest of the week.
Blowing out a deep breath, she parked inside the garage and then forced her tired body out of the SUV. If an aching back and bruised-feeling feet were what it took to make a business profitable, Peyton’s Place should have been a roaring success by now. Unfortunately, success was coming much more slowly than she’d hoped. Sometimes the only thing keeping her from quitting was the worry over where Melissa and Joan would end up if she had to close the shop’s doors.
After slapping her palm on the garage door button on the wall, she headed into the mudroom. As always, when she continued into the kitchen, the creamy yellow walls and white shaker-style cabinets embraced her like a hug, helping to ease the tension that had built up in her shoulders all day. This was her domain. This was where she felt most at home. And it was one of the few things that could always make her smile.
She hung her purse on a peg beside the door. But instead of heading through the cased opening on the left into the family room, she smoothed her hand over the cool marble island. If she was honest with herself, renovating the kitchen and bringing it into the current century wasn’t just to enable her to supply her café with fresh baked goods. It fed her soul as well.
The sinfully luxurious stainless-steel Sub-Zero refrigerator, the double ovens built into the wall, the high-end finishes helped make this room her happy place. The treasured memories within these walls were priceless. Especially now.
I miss you so much, Mom.
Her father had labeled her and her mother obsessed. Maybe they had been. But there was no denying that her happiest memories revolved around cooking. Either they’d been making s’mores in the family room fireplace or she and her mom had been in here baking cakes, cookies and pastries. Somehow, kneading dough or making frosting from scratch could help Peyton forget the arguments, the trouble her brother kept getting into, even her mother’s eccentric tendencies and unpredictable mood swings. When Peyton was working in the kitchen, all her troubles seemed to melt away.
Even now, just smelling a loaf of bread baking in the oven could transport her back to her high school days, when she was young and in love, happier than she’d ever been and probably ever would be again. To a time when her family was relatively whole, when she was still whole. But those days were gone and could never be recaptured. One horrific event had fragmented their lives forever. She’d lost everything that mattered that night. Or, at least, that’s what she’d thought, until a slippery, rainy road just a few months ago proved she’d still had more to lose.
I love you, Mom. Wish you were here.
Her shoulders slumped as she reluctantly turned from her homey, comforting kitchen toward the opening to the family room. She needed to head to her bedroom, shower, change into her pajamas. But just looking at the cave-like gloom beyond the doorway was already making her feel down. Had it always been that dark? Or did it just seem that way now that the family who’d once lived in this place no longer existed? The only warm body around here at the moment was Peyton. Unless she counted the rats and squirrels that had taken up residence after she and her parents moved to Memphis.
She’d lost count of how many critters she’d either chased out or carried out after setting traps. Based on the scratching sounds she sometimes still heard in the walls, there were a few stubborn holdouts she’d yet to evict. Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to recapture her earlier contentment. Remember the scent of all those candles her mom used to set around the house on evenings when it was too hot to light a fire in the fireplace. She could almost picture it, see her mom’s sweet smile, hear the rustle of fabric as her mom put on a crisp white apron.
“Hey, Peyton.”
Her eyes flew open. She automatically grabbed the broom that she always kept propped against the wall just in case another rat made an appearance. But she froze when a painfully thin man with strawberry blond hair a shade darker than hers emerged from the shadows to stand in the kitchen opening. Her jaw dropped open in shock as he watched her, his sheepish grin not quite reaching his haunted eyes.
“Long time, no see, huh, sis?”
“B...Brian?” Her voice came out a choked whisper as she struggled to make sense of what she was seeing. Of who she was seeing. “I don’t understand. Is that really you?”
A sound behind her had her whirling around to see another man emerge from the laundry room. She pressed a shaking hand to her throat as she drank in the achingly familiar short dark hair, shoulders that had broadened and filled out since she’d last seen him. He was taller now too, towering over her, making the kitchen seem much smaller than it had moments ago.
He was dressed in light gray pants, a white button-up shirt and a tie. His sleeves were long in spite of the warm temperatures outside. Little white scars on the backs of his hands left no doubt about the reason for those long sleeves. Her heart seemed to stutter in her chest and her throat tightened.
“Colin?” The once treasured name that she hadn’t allowed past her lips in years tumbled from them in a whisper that was a dash of pain and a huge dollop of guilt.
He didn’t even glance at her.
He slid a pistol out of the holster on his hip and leveled it at her brother. “Brian Sterling, you’re under arrest for felony escape and the murder of Officer Owen Jennings.”
Peyton drew in a sharp breath. What was Colin talking about? He was arresting her brother? Dear God, no. This couldn’t be happening. Not again.
The blood seemed to drain from her brother’s face, leaving him a gaunt, frightened shadow of the person he used to be. His haunted gray eyes, the same ones that Peyton saw every time she looked in a mirror, pleaded with her to help him. The same eyes that had stared at her in bewilderment from the back seat of a squad car as a barn burned to the ground in the distance. The same ones that had blurred with tears on the other side of a thick glass partition in the prison’s visiting room when Peyton broke the news about their mother’s death.
She stood frozen, the broom clutched in her hand. It was ten years ago all over again. And just like then, she was forced to make a choice that no one should ever have to make—the choice between the man she loved and her own flesh and blood.
She slammed the broom against Colin’s forearm, knocking the pistol out of his hand.
“Run, Brian! Run!” she choked out.
He whirled around and took off toward the front door.
Colin swiped his pistol up off the hardwood floor and gave her a furious, searing look that burned right through her heart. Then he sprinted through the house after her brother.