One Big Happy Family Read online

  “About the chores? Sure. I’ll take any help I can get.”

  “You know that’s not what I mean.”

  He enfolded her in his arms and just held her for the longest moment. She laid her head against him, letting the wondrous night slide over her. An hour ago, she had been lonely and now—suddenly—all the world seemed to lie at her feet. She wanted to laugh and shout and dance. There was nothing to worry about here. She could let her heart have free rein.

  Kevin moved slowly away from her. “I guess if I’ve got a big test tomorrow, I’d better get home and get some rest.”

  “A wise man, indeed,” she teased.

  He leaned down and brushed her lips with his. It brought a touch of heaven to the darkened porch, and a brief glimpse of shooting stars and birds singing. Then it was over and he was gone.

  Sam just sighed and grabbed up the dishes. Their age difference didn’t matter at all to her. She hadn’t even given it a thought. But now that she was thinking about it, thirteen years wasn’t all that much. It was attitude that counted.

  And any man who could kiss like that, had a young attitude.

  Sam hurried down the inn’s front steps Saturday afternoon, her feet bare and her shoes in one hand. Kevin had just pulled the Jeep up to the house. He got out to meet her on the gravel drive.

  “We need to stop at Fiona’s house first,” she told him. “I have to feed her cats. Then we need to stop at the grocery store, the cleaners and the hardware store.”

  “I’m exhausted already,” he said, then stopped, frowning down at her feet.

  “It’s still summer, you know,” she reminded. “Fall doesn’t start for another two weeks. And even then, it won’t be all that cold.”

  “I wasn’t thinking about the cold,” he replied. “I just can’t believe you walk on gravel without any shoes.”

  “Us small-town girls are tough.”

  “Well, us big-city boys aren’t.”

  Suddenly he swooped her up in his arms. It felt so right. So natural. Before she knew it, her arms were around his neck.

  “You don’t have to do this,” she said. “It really doesn’t hurt a bit to walk on these stones.”

  He stared at her. It could have been her imagination but Sam thought that his grip on her had tightened. She did know that the look in his eyes had turned dark and dangerous—and that something deep in her soul wanted to respond.

  “It might not hurt you,” he finally replied, carrying her to his open-topped Jeep. “But it hurts me, watching you.”

  After he’d set her down in the front passenger seat, she missed the touch of his arms, and her weakness annoyed her.

  “Us kids always went barefoot in the summer,” she told him. “Our feet are tough.”

  “Humor me,” he said as he got into the driver’s seat.

  “Why should I?”

  “Because I’m your banker.”

  Sam suddenly found herself glaring at him, her emotions going from soft and cuddly to hard and edgy in the blink of an eye. He certainly was a bossy cuss.

  “Seat belt, please.”

  Sam jerked the belt into its grip at her side of the seat. She hated obeying, but common sense told her that refusing to fasten up would be worse than childish. She promised herself that she would fix him later.

  They drove mostly in silence to Fiona and Alex’s house. Except for Sam giving Kevin directions, neither said anything. She concentrated on the passing scene as she tried to figure out the sudden change in mood.

  Last night he was all laid-back and now he was all pushy. Or was she the cause of everything? Was she responding to him or he to her? Or were they both tuning in to some unknown karma floating about in the atmosphere? He pulled up in front of Fiona and Alex’s house.

  “I’m just going to put out some food, change their water, and clean their litter box,” Sam said as she slipped her feet into her shoes. “I’ll be right out.”

  “I’ll go in with you,” he said, following her up the front steps.

  “You might scare the cats.”

  “I’ll be very careful,” he replied, suddenly dropping his voice to a whisper and moving on tiptoe.

  Sam growled softly as she unlocked the door. “You’re the oldest child, aren’t you?”

  “How did you know?”

  She stepped inside, let Kevin enter and then closed the door behind them. “It’s obvious.”

  “I don’t think your attitude can be described as humoring your banker.”

  “If my banker isn’t careful, he’s liable to find himself humoring a good swift kick.” She stopped and poked him in the chest. “And I don’t need shoes to make it hurt.”

  “Hey,” he said, smiling. “There’s the cat.”

  Sam put all thoughts of ravaging his body out of her mind. “That’s Elvis.” She walked over and patted the cat’s dark little head. “Where’s Prissy? Huh? Where’s your sister?”

  The cat just blinked, pushing his head against her hand, demanding more scratching.

  “She’s probably off sleeping somewhere,” Kevin said. “She’ll come out when she hears the can opener. That’s what my cats do.”

  “Except that Fiona uses a brand that doesn’t require a can opener,” Sam said, reaching into the cabinet for a tin of cat food. She tapped the dishes extra hard as she spooned food into them. “Prissy, honey. Din-din.”

  Elvis rushed over to devour the salmon but still no Prissy. That was unusual. Little Prissy was actually a bit of a pig, always pushing to be first where food was concerned. In fact, since Sam was a little late, Prissy should have been waiting with Elvis.

  “I’m going to look around for her,” she said. “I’ll be back.”

  “Elvis and I will guard the kitchen,” Kevin replied.

  Sam went off to find the little red cat. She looked in the bedrooms and the bath, the living and dining rooms and in the basement, before coming back to the kitchen.

  “I can’t find her,” she told Kevin.

  He went with her and they looked everywhere all over again. Upstairs, downstairs. In between stairs. Every single place that a cat could go in the house. No Prissy.

  Sam took one last look under Fiona and Alex’s bed, then sat back against the bed, fighting panic as she petted Elvis. “Where did she go, Elvis?”

  “Let’s think this out,” Kevin said. His voice was so calm and controlled that it made Sam feel slightly better. “We’re reasonably certain she couldn’t have gotten outside.”

  “I don’t know.” Despite her best efforts, Sam’s voice was wobbling. “I don’t know anymore.”

  “Well, Elvis is here, so for now, let’s assume that she’s inside the house, too.”

  “But we looked everyplace.”

  Kevin sat down on the edge of the bed, dropping a hand on her shoulder. “Cats are very creative, and you said Prissy’s a small cat. There have to be hiding places she knows about and we don’t.”

  Afraid to trust her voice, Sam could only shrug.

  “I think we should try the basement again,” he suggested. “That’s where my cats’ favorite hiding places are.”

  She nodded dumbly and let him pull her to her feet. They returned to the basement, with Elvis trailing along behind them. When they went into the laundry room to search, Elvis climbed from the washer to the sink to the water softener, then sat there staring at them.

  “We’ve turned the place over six or seven times,” Sam said. “There’s no way Prissy can be down here.”

  “Maybe we’ve done too much. Let’s just stand back and look around. Pretend we’re a little pussycat.”

  Sam could only nod. Kevin’s approach was very logical but it was no use. Tears were starting to form in her eyes. What was she going to tell Fiona? Her sister loved that little cat. And so did she. She blinked repeatedly as she imagined Prissy lying dead in some alley. What if she hadn’t been careful when she’d shut the door behind her? Maybe she should have come by more than three times a day to check up on th
em…

  “What’s this little door?” Kevin asked, pointing to a door about two feet square in the middle of the far wall. “Where does it go?”

  “Oh.” She shook her head. “That’s to the crawl space under the sunroom. But she can’t be in there. It’s latched and I never opened it.”

  He rubbed his chin. “We didn’t look there.”

  “It’s all sealed off,” Sam said, waving her hand in a half circle to indicate the rafters and supports above them. “She’d have no way to get in there.”

  Without replying, Kevin walked forward and opened the little door. Sam looked over his shoulder into the opening before turning away.

  “It’s all full of cobwebs and dust,” she said. “Prissy would never go in there. She’s much too fastidious.”

  “Well, hello, there,” Kevin said.

  Sam spun around in time to see a red feline face looking up at Kevin from inside the crawl space. Apparently satisfied he was a good guy, the little cat jumped through the opening and up onto his shoulders. Kevin brushed cobwebs off the cat’s back as she licked her paws.

  “Prissy!” Sam screamed.

  The cat gave Sam a look of disgust before going back to cleaning her paws.

  “Where were you?” She snatched Prissy off Kevin’s shoulders and hugged the little cat to herself. Prissy appeared unimpressed, biting at one of her hind feet. “We were looking all over for you.”

  Kevin poked his head deeper in the windowlike opening. “We need to find the hole and cap it.”

  “I grew up in this house,” Sam said. “We always had cats and we never had one go in there.”

  “Unless Scotty beamed her in, there’s got to be a hole.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re a ‘Star Trek’ fan, too,” Sam said. “John Wayne and ‘Star Trek.’ What a combination.”

  “A good combination, you mean.”

  Prissy jumped out of Sam’s arms and raced up the stairs. Elvis was following her.

  “I hope Elvis ate everything,” Sam called out, but Prissy was already disappearing around the edge of the door. Sam turned her attention back to Kevin. He was frowning into the cobweb-festooned crawl space.

  “We’d find the hole easiest from inside the crawl space,” he said. “The light from in here would spill through it, but I’m not sure I could fit through that opening.”

  “I guess I could go in.” Although the prospect didn’t thrill her.

  “Let’s check things out from here first.”

  She didn’t argue with that and watched as Kevin poked around at the supporting joists along the wall between the crawl space and the basement, proper. With the boiler and its pipes, plus the washer and dryer and their vents and pipes, checking wasn’t all that easy. Not to mention the water softener over there in the—

  Sam frowned. “Elvis was sitting on the water softener,” she said. “Maybe he knew where she’d gone and that was as high as he could climb.”

  “Worth a shot.” Kevin climbed up on a chair and felt around the top of the wall over the water softener. “Here it is.”

  “I don’t believe it,” she said.

  He jumped off the chair and made a cup with his hands. “I’ll give you a boost up and you can feel for yourself. It’s right above that big pipe.”

  Sam hesitated. Sticking her hand in some black hole didn’t exactly thrill her.

  “Don’t be such a scaredy-cat. If you lose your hand, I’ll buy you a new one.”

  Clenching her jaw, Sam put her foot in his hand and pulled herself up the wall. “Remind me to kick you in the head when I’m back down on the floor,” she muttered.

  Once she knew where to look, the hole was easy enough to find and Sam put her hand all the way through it.

  “You can feel the other side of this wall, right?”

  “Yeah.” She removed her hand and, with Kevin’s help, slid back down to the floor. “But it’s so small. Barely bigger than my hand.”

  “Big enough for a cat Prissy’s size to squeeze herself through,” Kevin said. “We need to seal it off.”

  “How can we do that?” Sam asked. “With wood somehow?”

  Kevin just shook his head. “Poster board nailed or stapled across the opening should do it for now. I don’t think she’d chew her way through.”

  Sam just smiled at him. “I’m sure Fiona must have some poster board someplace around here. You guard the hole while I go look.” She started toward the stairs.

  “Sam.” Kevin’s voice stopped her and she turned. “How am I doing on my test so far?” he asked.

  “Not bad,” she told him. “Not bad at all.”

  * * *

  “Here’s to new adventures,” Kevin said, raising his wine in a toast.

  Once they’d secured the hole to the crawl space and double-checked to make sure all closets were closed and the house was as safe as they could make it, they’d started in on Sam’s other chores. It had made for a full afternoon, so a nice quiet dinner at an out-of-the-way restaurant had seemed in order.

  “Uh-uh.” Sam shook her head but raised her glass anyway. “My heart can’t take more excitement.”

  “And I thought I was the one being tested for fuddyduddiness.”

  He couldn’t help smiling as she sipped her wine. Sam’s heart might have been bothered by the cat’s temporary disappearance but she sure didn’t look any worse for the wear. Her cheeks had a glow to them and her eyes were soft and sparkling, like distant stars.

  “I could have murdered her,” Sam said, running her fingers through her hair. “That little creep. I bet I’ll be all gray by morning.”

  “She looks like she’s part Abyssinian. They’re a curious breed.”

  “I don’t care.” Sam took a healthy sip of her wine. Obviously her nerves had not yet returned to normal. “I’m still mad at her.”

  “It’s in her genes.” He took a drink from his own glass. “We are what we are. All of us.”

  Sam made a face and looked out at the quiet city street. Kevin sat quietly and watched her, then took her hand in both of his. “Prissy wasn’t trying to be mean. She was just being who she is.”

  “I know,” Sam replied.

  “Curiosity is just a part of who she is. She inherited it from her ancestors.”

  “I know.”

  “Like you inherited your acting ability from your biological parents.” Judging from the lines forming at the corners of Sam’s mouth, her agitation was growing, but Kevin went on, anyway. “Fiona doesn’t expect Elvis to be Prissy or Prissy to be Elvis. She lets each cat be themselves. Sort of like the story of the Ugly Duckling.”

  She frowned at him. Not a friendly frown, either.

  “You know, the story where the baby swan is in among the ducklings,” he explained.

  “I know what it is,” she snapped. “It was my favorite story when I was a kid.”

  “Then you must know that the swan was happiest when it was true to its nature.”

  “Maybe,” Sam said. “But what about the mother duck? Nobody ever worries about her and her feelings.”

  “How do you know the swan didn’t come back to visit sometimes?”

  “You’re as know-it-all as my brothers,” she grumped.

  “I just know that regret can be a bitter pill to swallow.”

  “Right now, I’m regretting letting you do chores with me.” Her face fell, then. “Though I never would have found Prissy without you.”

  Much as he wanted to take credit for the rescue, he couldn’t. “Prissy would have gotten out by herself,” Kevin said. “I doubt that that was the first time she’d gotten in there.”

  “I wouldn’t have wanted to take that chance.”

  “No, I agree.”

  “Sam?” a woman coming down the aisle toward them called out.

  Sam looked up, then sprang from her seat. “Angie!” Sam cried. The two women hugged briefly.

  A flicker of irritation rippled through Kevin’s gut as he watched a tall blonde, her escort,
and another couple advance on their table. Mid-twentysomething. Sam’s age. Thirteen years younger than him. He forced a pleasant expression onto his face.

  “You still at the library?” the woman was asking Sam.

  “Yeah. And I’m helping my father open up a bed-and-breakfast over on Clements Lake. You still selling cars?”

  “Sure am.”

  Sam turned to the others. “So what are you guys up to?”

  “Starving.”

  Sam’s eyes darted around the room, obviously seeing that all the tables were filled. Then her gaze returned to their large, mostly empty table. It was easy to see what she was thinking.

  “We have a lot of room,” Kevin offered. “If you don’t mind, we’d be happy to have you join us. Right, Sam?”

  “Oh, yeah.” She flashed him a quick smile before turning to her peers. “Okay with you guys?”

  “Are you kidding?” Angie said as, laughing, she and her group quickly occupied the empty chairs. “Hungry as I am, I’d sit on the floor.”

  “We ordered a cheese-and-sausage pizza,” Sam said, as Kevin signaled their server. “That should be here soon. Why don’t we all share that and then order more?”

  Introductions were made all around and then everyone settled into a moment of quiet as they waited for their drinks and the first pizza to arrive.

  “Say, weren’t you in the 10K stampede up in Cass County last month?” Angle’s date asked.

  Kevin nodded.

  “You were in the top five, right?”

  “Third,” Kevin murmured.

  “Are you running in the Blueberry Stomp in Plymouth at the end of the month?”

  Kevin nodded.

  “Rats,” the man exclaimed. “I need to get about three or four of you top guys to drop out before I make the top five.”

  Everyone laughed.

  “Do you run?” Angie asked Sam.

  “No way,” Sam replied.

  “I don’t, either,” the other woman said. “I like a purpose to my running. Like scoring a goal in soccer or basketball.”

  The discussion quickly turned to whether exercising was goal enough. Kevin leaned back and smiled. He didn’t feel out of place with Sam’s friends at all. As a matter of fact, he’d had these kinds of discussions many times. There really wasn’t much of a difference between his friends and Sam’s.