Renita tapped her pen on the table. “She must teach geometry, maybe algebra. Only Wilson teaches trig. Too bad. I could have put in a good word for you.” She waggled her eyebrows at him again.
“There are no good words strong enough to sway her, I’m sure.” Based on his few encounters with Jen Neil, Luke would say she had backbone and enough loyalty for a dozen people. “Still, it’s helpful to know the neighbors.” Luke pointed at his sister’s headphones. “No rest for the brilliant. Back at it.”
She winked. “Sorry about leaving my bike out on the driveway. Won’t happen again, bro.” She pulled his hand until he leaned down so that she could hug his neck. “I forget sometimes.”
If there was any sign that Renita had crossed over, become a full Hollister, that was it. Forgetting as if she truly were Connie’s baby.
Luke patted her back, awkward with the hugs as always, and tapped her book. When she stuck her nose in between the pages in an exaggerated move, he wagged his finger at her and then followed the quiet sound of running water into the kitchen.
His mother was bent over the sink, washing dishes. “We have a dishwasher for that.”
“I’m better at it than any machine.” His mother handed him a dripping plate. “And now I have you to dry. We’ll be done in no time.”
Since he’d been heading to the peaceful deck that lined the house, Luke was less than thrilled, but he refused to sound like Joseph.
“Have you missed Mari?” he asked casually.
“She was with you. Said very clearly Luke before she hit the door at a dead run. Now she’s under the table.” Connie motioned with her chin. “I assume she’s waiting to defend herself against whatever you’re going to tell me she did.”
Luke bent his knees to stare at his niece. She was pretending not to listen but not well.
“Introduced herself to the neighbor at a dead run.” Luke opened the cabinet to stack the dried plates inside.
They both turned to look at Mari, who said very clearly, “Dog.”
His mother sighed. “Of course. I should have known that she’d be unable to resist for much longer. Every day when the crazy rich lady comes out to get her mail, Mari watches the window like her favorite cartoon. Kid’s dog crazy.”
Luke continued to dry and stack as he thought about how to bring up the subject. With Mari listening, the whole conversation could be dangerous.
“I guess it’s time to think about adopting a c-a-n-i-n-e,” his mother said, spelling out the last word. They both glanced down at Mari. She was watching them suspiciously but she hadn’t learned to spell that well. Dog would have been too easy.
“Your father always wanted one. I told him no, no, no.” She didn’t tear up as she’d been doing every time she’d mentioned her husband, a sign of progress, but the grief was still so close to the surface.
“The house in Austin wasn’t good for canines, Mama. You were right about that.” Luke tossed the towel over the dish drainer and leaned against the counter. “This place? Perfect.”
She glanced down at the little girl, who was intently listening. “You are right. And this family could use a new member, one who doesn’t have homework to fight over.”
Luke smiled. “We’ll figure that out. He’ll figure it out. You know that.”
She smiled back. “I do. I’ve fought harder battles than this.” She poked his arm. They’d had some legendary shouting matches when he’d first arrived at the Hollisters’ house.
Until his brother, a brawny kid named Alex, had taken him outside, hung him up by his jacket and made some very creative threats. That was all it had taken for Luke to get the picture. From that day until his brother had been shot by a stray bullet during a street fight, he’d done his best to follow in what had been his cooler older brother’s footsteps.
August 14, 2000. That was the day everything had changed.
Luke had become the older brother. And he’d decided then and there that he’d spend the rest of his life doing his best to make sure criminals ended up behind bars.
No matter what it took.
Did that make him popular? Not always.
But it was satisfying at the end of the day.
“What did the crazy rich lady have to say?” his mother asked absentmindedly. She washed and rinsed in a comfortable rhythm. Maybe she was better at this than the dishwasher.
“She wanted to know about Sarah Hillman. They’re friends.” Unless he concentrated, he’d fall behind in his drying duties and his mother would frown. Luke quickly opened cabinets and put things away.
His mother hummed.
“She didn’t seem all that crazy.” Luke wasn’t exactly sure when his mother had started calling Jen crazy. It had been before the fence people showed up at the crack of dawn, though, and that was the only real sign of psychosis he’d seen. “Turns out, she’s a teacher. She might have a suggestion to help Joseph. Renita thinks she teaches math.” The unease he’d felt ever since he’d moved back in and been cast in the role as head of the family lightened a bit. Having something to do instead of a list of worries was good. He waited for his mother to say it was a good idea, a bad idea, or...something. She was the real head of this crew. He wanted her to be in charge.
“Pretty. If you like that sort of thing.” His mother cut a sly glance at him out of the corner of her eye.
“Angry redheads aren’t my type,” Luke answered, although in Jen Neil’s case, that wasn’t strictly true. Something about her was impossible to ignore.
His mother’s forlorn huff was the first warning that he’d strayed into dangerous territory. “You need to find someone nice, Luke. A woman who might distract you from your job.”
Jen Neil wasn’t nice. Nice made him think of puppies and daisies.
Jen had a rescued pit bull and plans for a spiked fence. In the garden of life, that woman was a cactus.
Nice? No. Interesting? Yes. Maybe even exciting. She had personality to spare.
“Holly Heights is an excellent place to raise a family. You told me that yourself, remember?” she sang in a teasing tone.
While it was good to have a touch of the old Connie Hollister back, this wasn’t the subject he wanted to stick with for long. If he told her he wasn’t sure he wanted a family, she would wilt completely, and lying to her was next to impossible.
“I remember.” Luke took the last dripping plate from her and listened with relief as the water drained. He could make it out of there.
“Being a police officer is a wonderful thing, son,” she said as she cupped his cheek, “but you were meant to be a father, too. You wait and see. She’s close, whoever she is. I can feel it.”
Luke didn’t have the right words so he smiled at his mother and watched her bend to speak to Mari. “Come with me, young lady. We have some bushes to trim the right way.”
After they left the kitchen, Luke stepped out on the deck that had sold him on the house. Here, all there was, was the faint sound of birds chirping and the breeze rustling through the trees. He took a deep breath as he braced his hands on the railing. “One year. You do this for one year and everything will be fine.”
A boring job. A cluttered, cramped house. All the problems that came along with angry teenagers.
He could do anything for a year.
CHAPTER FIVE (#ubfd31712-645a-50a8-91f4-44513ce7c533)
“THE FIRST WEEKLY MEETING of not talking about Paws for Love can come to order. All discussion is postponed until our next board meeting or else,” Sarah said as she banged the salt shaker on the table for emphasis. Rebecca had gotten to the diner early and claimed the best table in Sue Lynn’s. The rest of the Wednesday dinner crowd flowed around them, but the three of them were tucked away in a corner booth with a good view of the sidewalk.
Which was helpful. Without the shelter to talk about, conversation might be sparse. They could do a running commentary of everyone who walked down the street if worse came to worst.
Jen patted the purse she’d settled carefully next to her in the booth. Her whole life, she’d lived with second or thirdhand things from her mother and thrift store finds. She’d gotten good at that. Having money was taking some adjustment. This brand new purse? It cost four student loan payments.
As soon as she’d collected her lottery winnings, she’d paid off every cent of debt she’d been carrying for years, but it was difficult to get out of the habit of measuring everything in terms of those payments.