Baby, Come Home

But they didn’t. They just looked at him with such pity, he couldn’t bear it. He was pathetic, he conceded. Amy Bradshaw had left Sweetness over twelve years ago, before the tornado had struck. He’d come home from the Air Force to attend her aunt’s funeral, and Amy had expected to leave with him. But he wasn’t ready to get married. When he’d suggested she stay in Sweetness for a while to give herself time to grieve her aunt’s passing, she’d turned cold. Her parting words were branded in his brain.

You think I’m going to sit in this podunk town and wait for you? Forget it. Goodbye, Kendall. And don’t ever try to contact me.

She’d left. Climbed into her beater Chevy and drove away without looking back.

He hadn’t known where she was for the longest time. She’d left a few distant relatives in Sweetness, but none of them had been close to Amy—or forthcoming about where she’d moved, if they’d known. He’d almost gone mad with worry until a buddy in the Air Force with superior computer skills had tapped into some kind of national database and traced her social security number.

“Broadway, Michigan,” the man had announced. “Want her address and particulars?”

Kendall had passed. He hadn’t wanted to violate Amy’s privacy. And he really didn’t want to know if she was living with someone, or perhaps even married and hadn’t changed her name. It was enough to know where she’d landed, that she had found a new place to call home. But he’d thought of her every day for the past twelve years.

And when Marcus had charged him with attracting one hundred single women to Sweetness to help them grow the town, he’d reasoned that Broadway, Michigan, had seemed as good a place as any. The economy was depressed, and the unemployment rate was high. It seemed likely that women in a cold climate would find the Southern sun appealing.

And yes, he’d hoped that Amy would see the ad and answer the call to come home to Sweetness.

Come home to him.

But she hadn’t. As luck would have it, Amy and Nikki Salinger had been friends in Broadway. Amy hadn’t told Nikki that she’d grown up in Sweetness, but the women had stayed in touch after Nikki had relocated and subsequently decided to stay. Nikki had inadvertently exposed Kendall’s strategic placement of the ad when she’d mentioned Amy’s name to Porter who had, in turn, confronted Kendall and outed him to Marcus.

Now that his brothers knew why he’d picked that particular town for the ad, Kendall’s humiliation was complete.

“It’s been a long time,” Porter said quietly. “Maybe Amy’s changed her mind about you contacting her.”

Kendall’s temper flared. “Porter, I did contact her! I put a damn ad in the newspaper, didn’t I?”

Porter pressed his lips together. “Maybe she’s waiting for something more personal. Like a phone call.”

Marcus grunted. “Since Amy still hasn’t told Nikki about her ties to Sweetness, that kind of proves the woman has no intention of ever setting foot here again, doesn’t it?”

Kendall’s heart bottomed out.

Porter reached over and boxed Marcus’s ear.

Marcus pulled back, then looked contrite. “I’m just saying.”

“Ignore him,” Porter said to Kendall. “He’ll get his someday. Look, I know you said you didn’t want to know anything about Amy, but Nikki said—”

Kendall held up his hands. “I don’t want to know, Porter, unless Amy tells me herself. I don’t need details to obsess over. And I’m not going to stalk her.”

“Right,” Marcus said drily. “Placing an ad in her local newspaper isn’t stalkerish at all.”

Porter glared at him. “Shut up already!”

Marcus jammed his hands on his hips. “It needs to be said. I’m sorry, Kendall, but you had your chance with Amy and you blew it. You need to move on with your life. Can we get back to work, please?”

Porter’s face reddened in anger, but Kendall held up his hand, then dropped into the chair and sighed. The truth was a bitter pill to swallow. “Marcus is right. I need to let go of this thing with Amy.” He looked up, grateful at that moment to have his brothers around. Then he straightened his shoulders. “We have a town to build. What’s next?”

“Next,” Marcus said without missing a beat, “is having our ducks in a row when the representative from the Department of Energy shows up to file a progress report. The guy’s name is Richardson.”

“Do we know when to expect him?” Kendall asked, trying to force his mind to the matter at hand. “You should expect him sometime over the next couple of weeks,” Marcus said.

Kendall blinked. “Since when did I get voted spokesman?”

Marcus looked at Porter, then raised his hand. “I vote for Kendall to be our spokesman to the D.O.E. rep.”

Porter raised his hand. “Ditto.”

Marcus turned back to Kendall. “You’re in.”

Kendall frowned, but knew when he was outnumbered. “I assume this will involve some sort of presentation?”

“And a tour,” Marcus said. “Plus lots of schmoozing to make sure we don’t lose our grant for being behind schedule.”

“We’re in good shape,” Porter insisted with a sense of casual confidence that Kendall envied. “Our downtown is growing every day. The clinic received Rural Health Clinic certification, the helipad is done, we have a school, a General Store and a post office.”

“The post office is inside the General Store,” Marcus added.

“For now,” Porter countered.

“The most important thing is we got our zip code,” Kendall said. Since the tiny post office had opened, he’d checked every day for a letter from Amy. So far—nothing.

“Right,” Porter said. “Demand for our recycled mulch is growing, the windmill farm is generating power for the town, the community garden is supplying seasonal produce for the dining hall.”

Marcus winced. “We’ll be in trouble if the representative eats at the dining hall.”

Porter nodded. Colonel Molly McIntyre ran a tight ship, but the cuisine wasn’t exactly cruise-worthy.

“Maybe we can distract Molly with the Lost and Found webpage, then ask someone else to step in for the day,” Kendall suggested.

Porter snapped his fingers. “The D.O.E. rep should see the town’s new website. All of our progress is recorded there, with photos.”

Kendall nodded, glad to have his mind diverted from…well, there he went again, thinking of Amy. He gave himself a mental shake. “Okay, I’ll prepare a presentation. Meanwhile, what’s next on our plate?”

“The residents are asking for a church,” Porter remarked. “A lot of couples are pairing up.”

“But we don’t even have a minister,” Marcus countered.

“Because we don’t have a church,” Porter said.

Marcus arched an eyebrow. “Are you planning to walk down the aisle soon?”

Porter blanched. “N-no. Nikki and I haven’t…gotten…that far.”

Kendall bit back a smile at his little brother’s sudden nervousness. He had no doubt Porter was head over heels for the doctor, but everyone—including Porter—had assumed he’d be a bachelor forever. He was still easing into the idea of being half of a couple.

“For now then,” Marcus said pointedly, “we can continue to hold services in the dining hall or in the great room of the boardinghouse. I think we need to shift our focus to rebuilding Evermore Bridge over Timber Creek.” Marcus walked over to an aerial map and pointed to a large green section of land.

“This land is within the city limits, but it’s cut off from everything else. I think we should relocate the recycling center we’re planning to build to this parcel, away from town because of potential noise levels. A new bridge will make this farmland accessible for other projects, too. I received a proposal this week from a scientist who’s looking into new uses for kudzu.”