the problem, she tossed her arms around her son, gave him a warm squeeze, then began to run through the list of safety precautions he needed to take at camp.
Eli nodded for a while before interrupting, Mom, I got the memo. Literally. He looked at Derek and splayed his fingers. “She wrote five pages.”
Izzy blushed. “It’s easy to forget things when you’re away.”
Mom, I’ll be safe, respectful and aware of my surroundings. I won’t lose my hearing aid, ’cause it’s really expensive, and I’ll be back in two weeks with all my body parts. And then, just so she would have a memory to reduce her to tears every day that he was away, Eli kissed her on the cheek and said with his most careful enunciation, “See you, Skipper.”
She refused to cry. Until he was out the door.
After exchanging a manly hug with Derek, Eli jogged out of the deli. Izzy didn’t start sniffling audibly until the glass door closed behind her only child, leaving her with her worries and a sense of loneliness that made her feel hollow as an empty tomb.
“Aw, come on, Pickle. He’ll be home soon.” Derek’s arm went round her in what turned out to be a kind of stranglehold. “Do you know pickles have no visible shoulders? Makes it hard to be friendly.” He adjusted his arm a bit more companionably. “If I wasn’t on duty tonight, I’d keep you company. I’ll bring pizza tomorrow. The works?”
“Sure.”
Willa walked by carrying a lox platter, and Derek’s attention instantly swerved to the petite redhead. “For pity’s sake, ask her out already,” Izzy whispered. “You stare at her every time you come in.”
“She doesn’t stare back.”
Izzy shook her head, content to focus on someone else’s fears instead of her own for a while. “Sheriff Neel, are you telling me a big, strapping lawman like you is afraid of a tiny, little woman who hasn’t uttered an unkind word since she’s been here?”
Derek grunted.
“When was the last time you went on a date?” she needled. “You can’t be a sheriff 24/7, buddy. You need a reason to wear street clothes once in a while.”
One of Derek’s brows arched. “Look who’s talking. You’re a pickle. How’s your date card these days, Isabelle? Do I need to find someone else to watch Shark Tank with?”
The last time Izzy had felt motivated to take a good hard look at her love life, she’d wound up alone in the back office, eating a quart of matzo ball soup and putting a sizable dent in a chocolate chip babka. “Fine. Never mind,” she muttered. “I was trying to be helpful.” She and Derek lapsed into grumpy silence for several seconds, disgusted far more with themselves than with each other.
Finally, Derek spoke. “If you need something before tomorrow, call me. I mean, with the kid leaving.”
She nodded. “Thanks. I better get back to work,”
“Me, too. Lives to protect and all that.”
“Yeah. Pickles to serve.”
With one last, not-very-subtle glance at Willa, he headed toward the coatrack at the front of the deli, where he’d hung his hat.
Izzy sighed. All right, so they were both terminally pathetic when it came to romance. At least Derek had a town to watch over, and she—
I have a restaurant and a family to save. Here in this dying deli were people she loved who loved her back. That was something. More, in fact, than she’d ever thought she would have. She intended to protect what was hers, no matter what.
First, though, she had to get out of this pickle suit, which felt like a personal sauna, and go somewhere alone so she could think clearly.
Waddling to the counter, she told Audra, who had worked at the deli longer than she had, “I’m leaving for a couple of hours. If you can hold down the fort, I’ll be back in plenty of time for the dinner shift.” Without Eli at home, she’d be better off working instead of worrying. Maybe if she took a break, she could figure out what to do about Nate Thayer and the child they’d made together.
* * *
“We can do this, no problem,” Izzy grunted, standing on the pedals of her bike. “Going uphill is good...for...us.” Her teeth ground together. Every downstroke was harder to come by than the one before as she pumped determinedly up Vista Road. “We’re going to start...doing this...every...day,” she panted to her beloved dog, Latke, a Shar-Pei rescue whose ambivalence toward physical activity gave credence to the distinction nonsporting breed.
Her heart and head both thudded painfully, but even that was better than the avalanche of questions that buzzed in her brain on the heels of Nate Thayer’s return. So far, she had not a single answer, not even a clue as to what was going to happen if and when her son discovered that his father was in Thunder Ridge...or vice versa.
Nausea and dizziness the likes of which she hadn’t experienced since she was pregnant overwhelmed her. Eli had questioned her about his father a few times, mostly during the tween years when his own identity was in minute-by-minute flux. The answers she’d provided hadn’t been satisfying, but at least they had cooled Eli’s incessant wondering about the man whose life goals had not included a pregnant teenage girlfriend.
“’Kay, I think I’m going to puke now.”
She had to stop pedaling, hop off the seat and close her eyes. Latke accepted the rest stop as an opportunity to prostrate herself in the bike lane.
Izzy leaned over the handlebars. “We’ll get going in a sec, baby, just as soon as Mama’s heart attack is done.”
“Would rehydrating help?”
On a fresh surge of adrenaline, Izzy’s eyes popped open. A clear plastic water bottle, icy cold with condensation dripping down the sides, dangled in front of her.
“Bike much?” Nate Thayer arched a brow, lips twisting sardonically.
Silently cursing fate, Izzy stared at him. She had deliberately ridden away from town and in the opposite direction from the dairy farm where Nate had grown up. “What are you doing out here?” The question sounded like an accusation.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” He shook his head. “We need to polish our welcome committee skills. This is the second time in one day that you haven’t greeted me on my return home.”
“Home?” Izzy felt as if a giant fist were squeezing her stomach. “You’re here to stay?” Her distaste for that possibility was clear as a bell and drew a deep frown from Nate.
Unscrewing the top of the water bottle, he held it out again. “Take it. You’re about to keel over.”
“No, I’m not.”
A smile tugged his lips. “Take it anyway.”
Willing her fingers to stop shaking, Izzy plucked the bottle from his hand, careful not to touch him. Lowering the kickstand, she stepped away from her bike with Nate observing her every move. Even when she stopped looking at him, she could feel his eyes on her, the way she used to sense him watching
