Kyle somehow thought he had to be the man of the house. That realization brought more tears to her eyes, but Stella held this batch of sobs back for her son’s sake. “Thank you, honey, for entertaining our guests. You can tell them to meet us in the dining room. Breakfast will soon be served.”
“Did this man cook all that food?” Kyle asked, clearly impressed.
Stella sent a shy glance toward the big man washing dishes. “He sure did.”
“Sweet,” Kyle said, his eyes bright with unbridled delight. “I’m starving to death.” Then he looked back toward Stella, his big brown eyes breaking her heart with love. “Can I go get Papa?”
“Yes, go tell Papa to come and get it while it’s hot.”
Kyle grinned. “Ain’t he gonna be surprised?”
Stella smiled. Answering her son with an example of correct English, she said, “Yes, Papa certainly is going to be surprised. Not ain’t gonna.”
“Whatever,” Kyle said with kid practicality. “He ain’t gonna believe his eyes, that’s for sure.”
Stella shook her head, then tossed her hair back.
Adam eyed her over his shoulder. “He’s a handful, I reckon.”
“You can say that again.”
“What’s your husband do?”
“He’s dead.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. He’s probably better off that way. And I know we’re better off for it.”
Realizing the man was staring at her with such intensity it bordered on shock, Stella waved a hand in the air. “I shouldn’t have said that. Lawrence was a no-good, cheating, drinking vagrant who pretty much robbed me blind, but I guess he had a soul. Or at least I hope so, anyway, for Kyle’s sake. He had a bad wreck on I-30 one rainy Saturday night about a year ago. Wrapped his souped-up Mustang around a steel pole on an embankment. And that was that.”
“Is that why you moved here?”
“No.” She wondered just when he’d get enough and leave. Everybody usually did. “I moved here after my mother died last year. This was her house.” She shrugged. “I mean, she lived here, but somebody ran the place for her. She spent most of her time out back in the studio. She was…an artist.”
He nodded at that, his expression blank as he rinsed a now-scrubbed muffin pan. “And Papa?”
Well, the man didn’t miss a thing. Figured, him being a cop. Always aware of his surroundings, she reasoned. She knew how cops operated, since her dearly departed husband had several run-ins with the law over the years she’d been with him. “Papa is my daddy, Watson Clark. Everyone calls him Wally, though. My mother left him when I was ten, but they never divorced. After she died, I brought him here to live with us and help out. But he can’t do a whole lot. He has a lot of health problems.”
She finished wiping down the counter, then prepared the plates for the guests, careful to make sure each plate was distinctively different in style and pattern, just to mix things up. She’d read somewhere that it was okay to do that, and besides, she didn’t really care about proper etiquette at this point.
“Got any fruit?” Adam asked over her shoulder, causing her to almost drop a delicate blue-etched plate.
“In the refrigerator. Strawberries, I think. And maybe some grapes.”
“We’ll add a few bites to each serving,” Adam said, already digging through the stuffed refrigerator. “You need to clean this thing out.”
“I’ll get to it,” Stella said, thinking one day she’d get to every little thing around here. “Soon.”
“Let’s get in there and serve our guests,” Adam said, holding a silver tray full of food in his hands. “Got the coffee ready?”
“Yes, I do know how to make coffee at least.” Then she winced. “Well, you might want to test it before we take it out.”
“I think I just might.”
He grinned, then headed through the swinging doors to the dining room. Stella grabbed another tray of food, thinking she liked the way he’d said “serve our guests.”
Don’t be silly, she admonished as she served the pleasantly surprised guests who were loyal customers from past years, bless them. He’s just passing through. He just happened up when you were in a fix. He just happened up when you needed him the most. And he’ll be gone before you even miss him. But the sweet smell of those incredible blueberry muffins made Stella hope Adam Callahan wouldn’t be in too big of a hurry to keep moving.
Chapter Two
“So…can I get my room now?”
Adam stood in the kitchen with Stella, watching as she put away the last of the breakfast dishes. The meal had been a success. The older couple from Florida and the honeymooners from Texas had all raved about the breakfast, all four of them fascinated and in awe as they asked Stella over and over how she’d pulled it off.
“First breakfast we’ve had in two days that wasn’t either burned or raw,” Mr. Gilchrest said with a wink. “Stella, did you find a new cookbook somewhere?”
“No, just a new friend,” Stella told the senior citizen, her eyes glowing with pride while her father and her son looked on with that same pride.
“Are you gonna keep him?” Joyce Gilchrest asked, her hazel eyes full of curiosity as she gave Adam the once-over.
Stella laughed and tossed her incredible hair. “I’m sure gonna give him that room he came looking for, you can count on that. Adam has to be exhausted after whipping up this great breakfast so lickety-split.”
Joyce smiled over at Adam. “We’ve been coming here every spring for the last ten years. We miss Estelle, but we love Stella just about as much as we loved her mother. So we came back this year to lend her our support.”
“It’s mighty nice of you to be that loyal,” Adam said.
“We love it here,” Joyce replied. “I think you will, too. Don’t you think so, Wally?”
Wally Clark gave Adam a long appraising look that was part gratitude and part protectiveness. Stella’s father was a quiet man, unassuming and undemanding, but Adam sensed a steel-encased dignity behind the calm, stoic exterior.
“Hot Springs—you either love it or hate it,” Wally replied, his smile serene.
“I liked those muffins,” Kyle offered up, his big eyes solemn. “But not the burned ones.”
“Kylie, finish your breakfast,” Stella said, turning red in the face. But she sent her son a sweet smile, all the same.
The honeymooners sitting across the dining room cooed and grinned, obviously too in love to expect anyone else to have problems in this life. “It was good,” the pretty blonde said, smiling
