The place was crowded, mostly with men in various permutations of denim and cotton jersey. Over a constant stream of good-natured insults and laughter and you-reckon-it’s-ever-gonna-rain-agains?, dishes clattered and bacon sizzled on the grill behind the counter. And, despite the inauspicious start to the morning, Jenna started to feel better. A little.
Then she picked up her cup. And there, shimmering like a mirage in her decaf, stood Hank Logan, half-naked and freshly aroused. Awake. Awake, she corrected herself, quickly lowering the heavy ceramic cup back into its saucer.
Blair frowned. “What’s the matter? Your cheeks are all pink.”
“Nothing.” Jenna tried a smile. “Did you sleep okay?”
That got a shrug.
“Charmaine told me we had visitors,” a rich voice intoned over their heads. Jenna looked up into a round, dark, beaming face topped with short white hair. “How’re you folks doing today?” As Jenna and Blair mumbled their “fines,” the woman, dressed in a loose white shirt and pale-blue polyester pants, topped Jenna’s still-full coffee cup, then said, “Glad to hear it. I’m Ruby Kennedy. My husband Jordy and I run this place, so if there’s anything you don’t see on the menu, just go on ahead and ask, and we’ll see what we can do. Although I’m thinking seriously about making up some blueberry pancakes, if that might be of interest to anybody.” She looked pointedly at Blair, who in turn looked pointedly at Jenna with something almost like interest flickering in her blue eyes.
Jenna chuckled. “Go for it, sweetie.”
“C’n I have coffee, too?”
“Nice try, and you know the answer. Juice or milk.”
For a second, the grump face reappeared, but then, on a sigh, Blair said she’d like the blueberry pancakes with orange juice. Please.
“How about some bacon or sausage with that?” Ruby asked.
Blair visibly shuddered. “I don’t eat meat.”
Ruby’s brows lifted, but all she said was, “And what about you, baby?” to Jenna. “You want the blueberry pancakes, too?”
“Actually, no, I think I’ll stick with a bowl of Special K and a grapefruit half.”
Now Ruby laughed. “Lord, no wonder you’re so skinny. But if that’s what floats your boat, who am I to say? Okay, we’ll get that right out to you—”
“Oh, wait!” Jenna called out to Ruby as she started to leave. “I just remembered—I’m supposed to bring back breakfast for Mr. Logan, too.”
“Mr. Logan? Which one?”
She and Blair exchanged glances. “There’s more than one?”
“Three, as a matter of fact. Brothers. Although one’s a doctor, not a mister. Which one you want breakfast for?”
“Uh…Hank.” Shouldn’t the P.I. have told her there were brothers? “The one who runs the Double Arrow.”
That was worth a frown and a pair of crossed arms underneath a prodigious bosom. “You stayin’ out there?”
“We’re renting one of the cottages for the month, yes.”
“Where you from, honey? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“D.C. Why?”
“And you came all the way out here to stay in one of Hank Logan’s cottages?”
Jenna tried to staunch the uneasiness beginning to fester in her stomach. If her and Blair’s staying there looked odd to this Ruby person, who else might find it suspicious?
Then Blair chimed in with, “My aunt’s a writer. She’s here doing research for her next book.”
Ruby’s gaze drifted back to Jenna. “Is that a fact? You written anything I might have read?”
Feeling the familiar panic rising in her throat as several heads in the vicinity turned in her direction, Jenna mumbled her pen name. Ruby’s face lit up.
“You’re kidding? You’re Jennifer Phillips? Who writes those Stella Moon books? Land, honey, I’ve read all of those so many times, they’re like to fall apart. Hey, Jordy,” she yelled back toward the counter, where a big, bald black man in a sparkling white T-shirt and apron was manning the griddle, “guess who’s sitting right here in our diner? Jennifer Phillips, that writer I’ve been telling you about!”
“No fooling?” Jordy glanced over his shoulder, never missing a beat as he flipped what looked like dozens of pancakes onto several plates, garnishing them with bacon or sausage before setting them out on the counter and hollering to the two waitresses. Then, wiping his hands on a towel, he came out from behind the counter and over to Jenna’s table, his wide grin showing off a gold tooth that coordinated quite nicely with his earring.
“You sure do write some good books, Ms. Phillips. I never can figure out whodunnit until the end, and I almost always do with other mystery writers.”
After a minute’s conversation, Ruby and Jordy went back to the kitchen, but not before five or six other patrons left their seats and came over, all apparently tickled to death to meet her, asking if she’d mind autographing their copies of her books for them while she was there and what her next book was going to be about and if she needed any ideas, you know, in case she got that writer’s block.
To Jenna’s surprise, the panic that invariably made her palms sweat and her stomach knot up so badly she’d stopped doing book signings altogether never really developed. Why, she didn’t know, other than maybe, even though it didn’t make any sense, these people didn’t really feel like strangers.
Ruby brought their breakfast over to them herself, shooing everyone away “so these people can eat their breakfast in peace.” Then Ruby asked Blair how old she was, and when Blair said thirteen, Ruby said Sam Frazier had a girl the same age, he had a farm just out behind the Double Arrow, and wouldn’t it be nice if Blair and Libby Frazier could get together, since Ruby imagined that Libby, who apparently had five younger brothers, might appreciate having another girl to talk to?
Not until a young woman came in, her arms loaded with what looked like pie boxes—“Six apples, three peaches and three cherries, right?” she called out to Ruby, who went to relieve her of her burden—did peace finally descend. About halfway through her grapefruit—which was plump and sweet—Jenna looked over to see Blair looking at her with a funny expression on her face.
“What now?”
“Nothing. It’s just that it must be so cool, to have all those people saying how much they like your books and stuff.” She crammed a huge bite of pancake into her mouth and said around it, “I mean, I would think it was, anyway.”
“Well, yes. It is.” A wry smile tilted her lips. “It’s certainly a nice change from rotten reviews.”
“Then why don’t you do book signings anymore?”
Jenna’s fingers tightened around the serrated spoon. “You know why, honey.”
Her brows dipped. “How come it’s
