frowned. “Maybe not.”
“The kid’s father doesn’t even know that he’s a dad?”
“Tucker, how would I know? All I know is what people say.”
“And that’s what I want from you. What people say…”
Molly looked down into her teacup, and then back up at him. “Rumor has it some stranger came through town at the end of Lori’s senior year. Lori disappeared one night in May, in one of Heck’s cars. It wasn’t like her, to take off like that. You know how she was. The shy, quiet, one. Hardly dated. Heck got worried she’d been kidnapped or something. He had the police out looking for her. They found her way up at the North Fork of Cook Creek, parked right on the bank, staring out over the water, crying her little heart out. She claimed that she’d done nothing wrong—and that nothing had happened to her. She’d just driven around, that was all.
“But then, a couple of months later, when she turned up in the family way, everyone in town naturally assumed it must have happened that night she disappeared. They all figured she must have met someone, that he got her pregnant and then headed out, never to be seen or heard from again.”
“And when Heck found out she was pregnant, he packed her off to San Antonio.”
“That’s right. And she’s made herself a good life there, from what I’ve heard. She hardly ever comes home.”
Tucker got up and poured himself another cup of coffee. As he sipped, he turned and leaned on the long jut of counter that divided the breakfast room from the kitchen.
Molly said, in that way she had that cut right through the crap, “So. You got you a yen for your old girlfriend’s twin sister, Tucker? You thinkin’ you might like to try convincing her to come home a little more often—even to stay home?”
Tucker didn’t answer. There was no need. He could see in Molly’s eyes that she knew he did.
And he was.
“Daddy makes you crazy, huh?” Lena lay sprawled face-up on the bed in the upstairs room that had been Lori’s when they were growing up.
It was after dinner. Everyone else was downstairs watching Sunday night TV. Lena had hung around before going home to her cute little apartment on Oak Street. She’d wanted some one-on-one time with Lori.
Lori dropped to the side of the bed. “Yeah. Daddy does get to me. Sometimes. Like when he tries to override me with Brody.”
Lena kicked off her shoes and scooted farther up onto the mattress, grabbing a pillow and tucking it under her head. “You just never did accept the fact that you have to use your feminine wiles on Daddy.”
“Feminine wiles?” Lori made a gagging sound.
Lena giggled and slapped her lightly on the knee. “Stop that. There’s nothin’ the least wrong with a woman using what the good Lord gave her to smooth the way with the men in her life.”
“I am going to wisely withhold comment on that one.”
Lena rolled to her side and studied her sister. “I still can’t believe you went red—red.”
Lori smoothed a hand over her own hair. “Yeah. I kind of like it.”
Lena nodded. “Me, too. It looks real good.”
Lori made a threatening face. “Don’t you dare even consider going red, too.”
“But if it looks that good on you, just think how incredible it’s going to look on me.”
They both laughed at that one. And then Lori said, “Hey. Go for it.”
“I might. I just might…” Lena let out a long sigh, rolled to her back again and gazed up at the light fixture overhead. “Tucker was givin’ you looks today at the diner.” She rolled her head to face Lori again. “Don’t even try to tell me you didn’t notice.”
Lori had no idea what to say—and her pulse was racing, her stomach drawing into knots, the way it had been doing since she first ran into Tucker yesterday at the Gas’n Go…
Lena said, “Amazing.”
“What is?”
“Oh, just the way life can go sometimes.” She lifted her right hand and studied her manicure. “Tucker’s interested. Really interested. In you. I could tell.”
Lori tried a little teasing, hoping that would lead the subject elsewhere. “I’m surprised you noticed. You’ve got eyes only for Dirk.”
“It’s true.” Lena raised both arms in a lazy stretch. “Dirk is the center of my world and I couldn’t be happier about that.” She let her arms flutter down and folded her hands on her stomach. “But at the same time, true love has made me more observant. And since Tucker moved back to town, I’ve made it a point, I truly have, to make amends for the tacky way I treated him—you know, back when. Last winter, when Dirk decided to change his will to leave everything to me, I took him to Hogan and Bravo and had Tucker do the work. Tucker is Dirk’s and my own personal family attorney now and I like to think that he and I have become friends.”
“Good for you,” Lori said, for lack of anything better, hoping they could now leave the subject of Tucker Bravo behind.
But no. “You haven’t said what you think. About you and Tucker.”
“I don’t think anything. I haven’t seen him for years and years. I hardly know the guy.”
“Lori. Come on. I mean, it seemed to me by the way you looked at him at the diner that you maybe kind of like him, too—and don’t give me that huffy look. Okay, he was my boyfriend. But that was centuries ago. And it was pure puppy love, anyway. I know that now. It was nothing like I have with Dirk—and it’s not like I slept with Tucker or anything. I mean, that might be kind of icky. To think of you getting together with some guy I’d seen naked, but—”
“Lena.”
“Um?”
“That is altogether more information than I need to have.”
Lena gave her another light slap on the thigh. “Oh, come on. I know what you’re doin’. Acting all snooty to push me away. You’re just too…private. You always have been. Even for me, it’s tough to get through. And, as your twin, I should be the one who understands how your mind works. Lori Lee, you need to…open up a little.”
“Thank you for the input.”
“Oh, now, don’t go getting snippy on me. Look in your heart. You’ll see that what I’m telling you is true. And I miss you, gosh darn it. We don’t see you often enough. It’s like, since all that mess eleven years ago, you never want to come home.” What could Lori say to that? Not much, since it was true. Lena went on. “I swear, sometimes I think if Mama and I didn’t call you all the time, if we didn’t keep you up-to-date on what’s going on in town and stay on you until you come home now and then, we’d never see you at all.”
Lori caught
