the door...but it wasn’t the same, familiar smell of cooking from her childhood. This was different, and had been ever since her mother had retired.
“You’re home,” her mother said as Grace came inside and stepped out of her boots.
Connie Beverly was a short, round woman with eyes that crinkled up and sparkled when she smiled. She wore a loose sweater over a pair of leggings, an apron tied around her ample waist and a pair of slippers. She stood by the counter with a potato masher held aloft.
“Smell this,” her mother demanded. “Seriously. Smell it.”
“I can smell it,” Grace chuckled, slipping off her coat. “That’s not mashed potatoes.”
“You’re just being a cynic now!” Connie retorted, turning back to the bowl. “It’s almost like mashed potatoes.”
Grace winced. Her mother had been saying for years that she didn’t lose weight because she worked full-time and she was too busy to bother. But this year, she’d retired and sworn that she would drop the extra weight.
Grace went over to the counter and looked down into the bowl.
“Mom, cauliflower isn’t a carb,” she said.
“That’s the point. You smash the cauliflower up to look like mashed potatoes, and you don’t miss the extra calories.”
“It looks like sadness to me.” And it smelled like boiled cauliflower.
“It looks like health and longevity.” Connie smiled in satisfaction and turned back to her cautious mashing. “You should give this a try, Gracie. Our genes being what they are—”
“Mom, please...”
It was an old conversation. They came from a long line of “big-boned” women who never had any trouble finding husbands, and whose love language was cooking. Grace had never been thin, and neither had her mom. It was easy enough to love herself, but a little harder to compete with the likes of Tracy. There were times she wished she could be naturally slender.
“You’re turning thirty next week,” her mother reminded her.
“I know,” Grace replied with a grin. “And I’ll turn thirty with real carbs, thank you very much.”
“Well... I’ll agree to that,” her mother replied. “What’s birthday cake if it isn’t sinful, right? So, how was your day?”
“Good,” Grace replied, and she flicked the switch on the electric kettle. “Actually, this afternoon, I saw Billy Austin.”
“Billy Austin?” Carol turned from the sodden cauliflower and frowned. “He’s back in town? Did you see Tracy?”
“Tracy wasn’t with him. They broke up.”
“Ah.” Her mother’s eyebrows climbed, and then she nodded. “What’s he doing back in Eagle’s Rest?”
“He found out he had a daughter, and the mother had some modeling plans in Germany, so she dumped the little girl on his doorstep. Tracy took a big step back, and he came home to raise his daughter.”
“Billy’s a dad!” Connie headed to the fridge and pulled open the door, staring into its depths. “How old is his daughter?”
“Four.”
“Wait—the mother is a model? She’s not from Eagle’s Rest, then, is she?”
Grace had done the same math. “No, it was that summer he spent working a ranch in the foothills. Remember that?”
“I remember the two of you missed each other more than you’d admit,” her mother quipped.
“Apparently he wasn’t quite so lonely,” Grace replied with a wry smile, pushing back a sense of betrayal she had no right to. They’d been friends—nothing more. Her heart in knots hadn’t been his fault.
“You were always too good for him,” Connie said. “You know that. I told you so from the start.”
Was she? Grace didn’t believe it. Billy had been fun and sweet. He might not have finished high school, but he was a hard worker, and he’d worked his way up in the ranks of any ranch that employed him. Those strong hands and laughing eyes—they’d been enough for her.
“I remember Tracy told me that she was going to make a gentleman out of him—My Fair Lady style.” Grace shook her head. “It doesn’t surprise me that she left him at the first sign of a challenge.”
“They deserved each other,” Connie retorted.
“No, he didn’t deserve that. If they could have been happy, that would have been one thing, but as soon as Tracy found out about his daughter, she walked out on him.”
“Maybe she’ll come back.”
“Maybe.” But Grace’s heart gave a squeeze at the thought. She wanted Billy to have a full and happy life, but somehow giving him up for Tracy was harder than it would have been to see him move on with some woman she’d never met. “Anyway, his little girl’s name is Poppy, and she starts in my class tomorrow.”
“Two weeks, sweetheart,” her mother said. “You probably won’t see him except for drop-off and pickup.”
The kettle started to boil, and Grace pulled down two mugs. She could get through this, but it wouldn’t be easy. The problem with Billy wasn’t just her feelings for him. Grace had learned some valuable lessons through allowing herself to fall in love with a man who didn’t reciprocate her feelings. No good could come from it! She’d spent too long hoping that he would suddenly see her in a different light and recognize that his best buddy was actually his perfect romantic match. Now she knew she’d never thought it all through.
What happened if he did see her differently? She’d still be the woman who hadn’t been enough to draw his eye for literally years’ worth of friendship. Yes, Grace was plump and round in an age of lithe models, but she didn’t suffer from low self-esteem. Everyone had a type they were attracted to. She seemed to like lanky cowboys. And Billy liked the model type. He always had. There was nothing to apologize for here.
“How did you feel seeing him again?” her mother asked, passing Grace a tin of tea bags.
“I’m okay,” Grace replied. “Billy was a good friend, and our lives have both moved on.”
“Very mature of you,” her mother said, shooting her a smile.
“Thank you. I thought so, too.”
Connie chuckled. “What is his little girl like? Does she favor him?”
“You can see him in the shape of her face... His daughter is gifted, though.”
“Are you serious?”
“It sure looks that way. She’s four, and she sat down and wrote a letter to her father about how she liked his cowboy hat. She called it ‘extra special beautiful.’ She said how she’d never had a daddy before, but she said he could use his muscles to keep her safe,
