Dad’s hand was warm, his shake firm.
And something in Beckett crumbled. “I’m sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean to . . . I shouldn’t have even come to the wedding. Seth probably wants to kill me.”
Dad’s bow tie hung loose around his neck, and he must’ve left his tuxedo jacket in the car or back at the church. “Seth is so enamored with his bride you could’ve burned the church down around them and he wouldn’t have noticed.”
“I haven’t even met Ava.”
“She’s just as crazy about Seth as he is about her. And as even-keeled as they come. Trust me, they won’t be holding any grudges.” Dad’s focus cut down the hallway. “Unlike our police chief, unfortunately.”
“I broke up his wedding.” His voice flat-lined.
“Yes, I was there, if you’ll recall. Kit Danby looked so skittish walking down the aisle, there wasn’t a person there who didn’t think you were only doing what she wanted you to do.”
That’s what he’d told himself at the time, too. Didn’t change what he’d done. The hurt he’d caused. And now the shock of seeing Kit earlier this evening pulsed through him all over again. London—she was supposed to be in London.
Yeah, well, he was supposed to be talking his way out of a six-year-old arrest warrant right about now. Not standing inside a barely air-conditioned cell that smelled of bleach and stale coffee.
“Listen, I’ll stick around as long as I need to, bail you out, whatever. We’ll get this taken care of.” Dad pulled his bow tie free and stuffed it in his pocket. “Honestly, I’m surprised they even arrested you after all this time. Shouldn’t there be some kind of statute of limitations?”
“Doesn’t apply if you leave the state.” He’d checked on that years ago. Once he’d crossed state lines, any statute paused. Which meant he could still be arrested, charged, and prosecuted this many years later. If he’d just faced up to his actions at the time . . .
But there’d been law school to think about. His future. The promise he’d made after he’d been too late to say goodbye . . .
I’ll focus, Mom. I’ll make you proud.
Well, now he had a future to think about again. A new reason to focus. So maybe his homecoming hadn’t gone as planned. He could still rally, then get back to the life that was finally beginning to take shape.
“Dad, there’s a reason I came home now. It wasn’t just the wedding.” His fingers curled around the cell bars. “I’ve got some news—”
Dad held up one hand. “Let’s wait until we’re home.”
The strain in Dad’s voice was so subtle Beckett nearly missed it. It was the slight tick in his jaw that gave him away.
“Not bad news,” he added softly. But he couldn’t blame his father for assuming. The catalog of his past missteps turned its own well-worn pages in rapid succession: high school parties, lack of focus his first couple years of college. And even after he’d gotten his academic act together and settled on a career path, then there was the mess with Kit’s wedding, skipping town, the years of avoidance.
Smack in the middle, his biggest regret of all.
Mom . . .
“Well, then, seems both my sons came home with good news.”
Beckett blinked. “Logan?”
Dad nodded. “Refused to say what until after the wedding, but considering the Cheshire smile he had going on, I’d say we’re all in for a happy surprise. So let’s figure out how to get you out of here and—”
“Nothing to figure out.” Sam’s words echoed down the hallway ahead of his reappearance. He edged past Dad to open the cell. “You’re all processed in the system, Walker.”
In the system. Which meant he officially had a record.
As the cell door swung open, Sam thrust a slip of paper toward him. “Initial court appearance first thing Tuesday morning. Expect a couple counts—joyriding, damaging public property, the like.”
Aggravated misdemeanors.
Sam’s sneer accompanied his curt retreat, final words tossed over his shoulder. “See you in court, Walker.”
3
Sunrise still lingered in feathered curls of pink outside the window as Kit slid from underneath Grandma’s quilt on her childhood bed. Nigel must have found the thermostat last night, cranked the A/C. The hardwood floor chilled her bare feet.
Nigel . . . that must be him clanging around in the kitchen downstairs. Except . . .
She stilled halfway across the bedroom that still looked the same as it always had—cream-colored walls, lavender chair in the corner that matched the hues of her quilt, white antique desk. Her ears perked to the muted rhythm sounding through the wall—Nigel’s snores.
So who was . . . ?
Lucas!
Kit threw a t-shirt on over her thin camisole, decided her striped pajama shorts were good enough, and bounded from the room. She padded past the guest room where Nigel still slept and then picked up her pace as she hurried down the stairs.
All that worry last night had been for naught. Her brother was here now, and even if he’d been brisk in his one email, even if their relationship had never entirely recovered from its fractures, surely they could mend things over the coffee she could already smell and maybe a walk out to the orchard and . . .
And it wasn’t Lucas standing at the kitchen sink.
“Willa?”
The woman spun, her sun-streaked braid whipping behind her, her grin as warm as it was surprised. “Katherine Louisa Danby. Honest to Pete, if I was wearing socks, you would’ve scared them right off.”
“But of course you’re not.” Because Willa Chambers would go sockless and wear sandals right through the dead of winter if it weren’t for the nuisance of snow and a pesky little thing like frostbite. “What are you doing here?”
The question was no sooner out than Willa skirted around the kitchen table and gathered Kit into a hug. And oh, if she didn’t smell exactly as Kit remembered. Like apples and summer and . . .
Home.
Willa stepped back. Her skin was as bronzed as ever, and extra wrinkles had etched a place at the corners of her eyes and around her still-smiling lips. She would’ve celebrated her fifty-fifth birthday this spring, right? Had Kit even remembered to send a card?
“It’s good to see you, my girl.”
Her girl. Automatic tears pooled as Kit gave in to a second, longer embrace. “I didn’t realize how . . . how much I . . .”
Willa’s palms rubbed her back, so much understanding in her soothing. “I know. I missed you, too.”
Willa had been Grandpa and Grandma’s only year-round orchard employee since well before Dad had carted Kit and Lucas to Iowa. But from day one of living with her grandparents and meeting Willa—who often spent more time at the orchard than her home in town—the woman had felt more like an aunt than a hired hand. The closest thing to a mother figure Kit had ever known.
Only when she’d blinked away the evidence of her emotion did Kit pull back. “But I still don’t know what you’re doing here.”
Willa’s alto laugh chimed as she returned to the counter. “This being Maple Valley and all, I heard you were back straight away. Came over on a whim, found the door unlocked.”
Because apparently old habits died hard. “I wouldn’t have dared leave my flat unlocked in London, but here it’s a different story.” And even if she had thought to lock up, she’d been too jet-lagged and weary to trudge back downstairs last night after making up the guest bedroom for Nigel.
Who’d barely said a word to her once she’d explained just who Beckett Walker was.
“He was my best friend.”
She’d tried to explain the rest—in hesitant starts and stops that stuck in her throat. Because she couldn’t get past that one word: was.
Willa pulled two coffee mugs from a cupboard and poured from the pot she must’ve brewed. She handed Kit one cup, and even as Kit’s fingers closed around the warmth, as the rousing scent wafted under her nose, she lifted her eyes to meet Willa’s. “If you hear
d I was home, then you probably also heard . . .”
Willa simply nodded. “Come, let’s go sit on the porch.”
She followed Willa through the house and then stepped outside into a morning already thick with warmth. Last night’s rain might’ve ushered in a temporary cool, but there was an edge to this morning’s air—a hazy heaviness. She settled beside Willa on the porch swing, its creaks and groans proof of its age and a match for the rest of the house’s neglected condition.
How could Lucas have let it get so rundown so quickly?
“I heard Beckett was arrested. Don’t suppose you know why.”
She blinked at Willa’s blunt prying and her thoughts swung back to Beckett.
It had been like this all through the restless night. Beckett. Lucas. Beckett. Lucas.
“I have an educated guess.” Kit sipped her coffee. “And I would’ve thought the whole town knew.”
It was hard to do anything in Maple Valley without an audience of well-meaning but unyielding busybodies. But something as public as tearing up the town square within hours of busting up a wedding? That was the stuff of local legend.
“You mean this is still about the night of your wedding?”
“I assume so.” Although that was six years ago. Beckett would’ve had plenty of time to get in more trouble since. Which, knowing him, wasn’t entirely outside the realm of possibilities. Yet, supposedly he was off in Boston building a successful law career. At least, that’s what she’d gathered from the few times she’d allowed herself a glance at his online profile, each time wondering, hoping . . .
Hoping for something that clearly wasn’t meant to be. Just like, apparently, her hopes for reconnecting with Lucas. She shifted on the swing. “You don’t by any chance know where Lucas is, do you?”
Willa took a long drink. “Can’t say as I’ve seen him all that much. Not since he let me go.”
Kit set her cup on the swing’s armrest so hard, coffee sloshed over the edge. “Let you go? As in, fired you?”
“Six weeks ago. I could tell he felt badly about it, but when I asked why, he didn’t have much to say for himself.”
Kit jerked to her feet, paced the length of the porch. How could you, Luke? And why? Even if he had good reason to close down the business side of the orchard, the trees still needed tending. Who’d been doing the pruning, the spraying, the everyday maintenance that kept their trees healthy and their crop robust?
“He didn’t give any indication of his plans? You don’t know where he would’ve gone?”
“Wish I did. All I know is he hasn’t been the same since—”
Her pacing halted as her gaze shot to Willa’s. Don’t say it.
“I don’t judge him. You know I don’t.” Willa leaned back against the porch swing. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t see what the war did to him.”
Willa was being generous—attributing Lucas’s changes to a two-word phrase: the war. It might’ve sounded noble if not for the other words lurking behind: desertion, court martial, federal prison.
She’d been sixteen when Lucas enlisted and went off to fight in Afghanistan after 9/11. Eighteen and fresh out of high school when they’d learned he’d gone missing. Nearly twenty-one when he was hauled back to the U.S. and had refused to deny the desertion charges.
Her heart ached for her older brother now even as it pumped with aggravation. Didn’t Lucas realize what disappearing—again—would do to the people who loved him?
“Didn’t he live in one of the Carolinas after he was released from prison?”
Kit brushed willful strands of hair behind her ear. “North. For a while.” Almost two years. But that was before Grandpa had passed away. His funeral was the only time in six years she’d come back to Maple Valley, and she’d almost thought she might end up staying. She’d always loved the orchard, always assumed one day she’d come home and help run the place.
But no. Dad had bestowed that responsibility on Lucas.
“I’m sure he’s okay.” Willa’s tone was gentle if not convincing. “Or if not exactly okay, at least safe. He’s a grown man who knows how to take care of himself. Maybe he just needed to get away for a while, clear his head.”
Kit settled onto the swing once more. “Just wish I knew where he was. And when he’s coming back. If he’s coming back. And as for the orchard . . .”
“Yes, about that.”
“You know something?”
“I think your father might be considering selling. Or at least closing the store, the touristy part of the business, and focusing solely on vending. I heard Lucas on the phone a few times.”
A feverish worry took hold. “But why?”
“Oh, I don’t think your dad’s ever had much interest in the place. Lucas never really seemed like a long-term fit, either.”
Maybe she shouldn’t take it so personally, shouldn’t feel such a charge of indignation and heartbreak. But how could they just toss aside what her grandparents had worked so hard to build? Maybe Dad didn’t feel a connection to the land—after all, Grandma and Grandpa were his in-laws, not his own parents. He hadn’t grown up here.
But Kit had. Lucas had. They were tied to this place.
Willa stretched her arm across Kit’s shoulders and let her pause linger before she spoke again. “Even if it’s not the best circumstances that brought you home, Katherine, I am glad to see you again.”
“You do know you’re the only person who still calls me Katherine, don’t you?”
Because she’d been Kit from the day she’d met Beckett Walker. Dad had only just moved them to Maple Valley, to Grandma and Grandpa’s, and she’d met Beckett playing in the ravine that divided the land between their houses. He was eleven, she was ten, and as soon as she’d introduced herself, he’d promptly declared she couldn’t go by Katherine because that was his older sister’s name.
“Not Kate or Katie, either. That’d be too weird if we’re going to be friends.”
“We’re going to be friends?”
“How about Kit?”
The memory faded as Willa patted her knee. “You should go out to the orchard. See your trees. Then come on back and I’ll have breakfast ready for you and whoever it is snoring upstairs.”
“Oh, he might sleep all morning. Jetlag and all.”
Willa lifted one eyebrow. “He? This anything I should know about?”
“Don’t worry, he’s British, which means he’s endlessly proper. But yes, he is my . . .” Boyfriend? The word still felt awkward. But that’s what this was, wasn’t it? That was what Nigel had wanted months back when he’d declared he was tired of, in his words, a relationship that lacked definition. “My boyfriend.”
There went the other eyebrow. “So it’s a new thing?”
“Not really.”
“Huh. Well, you might want to practice saying it a few times before introducing him to anyone around here.”
She rolled her eyes and leaned in for another hug before heading into the house. Upstairs, she changed into a pale yellow top over light blue shorts. She toed on a pair of flip-flops she found in her closet, and within minutes, she was back outside, walking the gravel lane that led to the orchard. Her grandparents used to drive their old truck out to the main orchard grounds each day, but it was a short enough distance to walk when unhurried.
The sun had climbed higher in the eastern sky and it rambled over the fields across the road—green and golden and then ebbing to an end as the orchard entrance came into view. She passed under the welcome sign and drank in the sight of her childhood playground.
Most prominent was the long rectangular dairy barn that had been renovated into the orchard’s store, its yellow paint weatherworn and pale, a stretching wood porch and quaint shuttered façade tracing the length of its front. Set slightly back and to the east of the main building, a metal machine shed glinted in the sun. Then a large grassy lot with a play area for kids. Grandpa used to talk about adding a petting zoo there.
Finally, at th
e far edge of the clearing, a concrete foundation and a hollow frame for what would’ve been the property’s largest building. Grandpa had begun building it when she was still in college with the plan of turning it into a special events space he could rent out for additional income—weddings, family reunions, community gatherings. He’d finally laid the foundation the year she’d graduated. “It’ll be red, of course. Classic barn shape with gable dormers at the top and an extended overhang on one side overlooking the knoll. Rustic charm on the outside; elegant, multipurpose space on the inside.”
But that’d been the year before the hailstorm that’d claimed nearly an entire season’s crop. After that, he’d either been too short on funds or energy—perhaps both—to finish his plan. So now only the bones of the barn stood testament to his intentions.
Ground still soft from last night’s rain slicked under her sandals as she passed between the shed and the barn. Gravel turned to grass in the open expanse behind the buildings and then . . .
Then the trees. They stood together as if waiting for her, patient and beckoning, Grandpa’s whisper on the breeze. “We plant them in rows for better air circulation. Our property is perfect for the trees because it’s on high ground, which means well-draining soil and direct sun exposure. There’s always at least eight feet between each tree.”
Out here she could almost forget Lucas’s disappearance. Beckett’s presence in town, his arrest. Nigel’s look of disappointment last night when he’d realized there was an entire piece of her past she’d never shared with him.
Leaves rustled, and dappled sunlight danced through branches. Dew-tipped grass swished over her toes as she tipped her head . . .
And then halted. Wait . . .
Her focus paused on a drooping shoot, its shape like a shepherd’s crook, black and telling. No. Her gaze dragged from tree to tree, taking in too many gray-black fruit blossoms, bending leaves and stems.
Humid air clung to her skin as the reality of what she was seeing sent her hopes plummeting. Fire blight—a bacterial tree disease. Destructive. Contagious. It could take out the whole orchard.
Maybe already had.