“Pass the ketchup, please.”
Jake handed it over, and Brady squirted a dollop over his eggs. Jake eyeballed his brother, wrinkling his nose. To each their own, but as he watched his perfectly fluffy, Cordon Bleu–perfected recipe utterly ruined, he held back the urge to gag.
Liz elbowed him and mouthed the wordsnobat him, and then very deliberately squirted some ketchup on hers as well when Brady passed her the bottle.
Jake raised his hands in defeat good-naturedly, seeing how ridiculous it was for him to fuss, and feigned absolute shock. “Me? A snob? If you want to ruin perfect eggs, far be it for me to—”
Tanner burst into a full-out belly laugh, and everyone joined in, including Jake. The old him would have said something and been offended. The new him? What did it matter? His family was enjoying food he had made for them, and that was enough.
“Get off your high horse, City Boy. Out here, we don’t care about highfalutin recipes. We just want to eat good food,” Tanner said as he picked up his fork. “This ain’t steak and eggs from the Brightside Diner, but it comes close.”
Peony, who was carefully buttering a piece of toast, shook her head at both of them. “You boys,” she happily muttered under her breath.
Everyone was in a good mood this morning. Despite the somber letters and the heavy emotions they’d dragged up to the surface, it felt as if everyone had experienced some form of closure after what had been a month of drama, grief, and uncertainty.
Conversation eventually reverted to the day to come, and Jake got up and took his empty plate to the sink. He looked out the window, watching the flowers waving in the early morning breeze, the sky a light, hazy blue with puffy clouds in the distance. It would be warm and sunny today, but the breeze would make it less miserable. That would be good for the crew.
How interesting that he was now thinking of the weather as an important thing to keep track of. The idea of running a restaurant was so far gone, that life descending into a fog behind him.
He returned to lean on the door frame into the dining room, his family sitting around the big oak table, talking, teasing, laughing with one another. Waiting to tell everyone how he felt, and what he’d decided seemed ridiculous. Liz looked up at him and he nodded, and her eyes brightened.
“You gonna tell ’em?” she asked, and everyone turned to look at him.
“I should probably get this out in the open,” he announced, raising his voice. Peony lifted her eyebrows and then smiled as she picked up her coffee cup. He caught her eyes, and she winked back at him, her smile spreading as he shook his head in mock chagrin. That woman could read him like a book.
“Okay, New York. Spill,” Brady said, and tilted his chair back. “What’s the plan? What’d you find in that study last night?”
“I have documents nullifying the will, pending signatures. We can have that done when I call Frank today, and the title goes back to you and Tanner by default. There’s a lot of other paperwork for life insurance policies and then we’ll have to revert the banking, but the solution is all in there.”
“And if we don’t want to change how it is right now?” Tanner replied. “Like I said last night—”
“I know what you said,” Jake replied quickly, and paused, feeling the weight of his decision. “If that is what you want, Tanner, we can—”
“Are you staying to run this ranch with your brothers like your father wanted or not?” Peony asked point blank, interrupting him. She cocked her head to one side as he turned and raised his eyebrows at her. “Because, Lord above, if you don’t—”
“I would like to do that, if you’ll all have me.”
Silence echoed through the room except for a garbled gasp from Liz, who scraped back her chair and beelined to him. She buried her head into his chest, her arms around his waist, squeezing. He dropped his arms around her.
“I don’t think that’s the only reason you’re staying,” Tanner said, and stood, walking his plate over to the sink and setting it in, before coming back to put a hand on Jake’s shoulder. “You’re meant to be here and run this place. With her.”
Nods from Brady, and tears in Peony’s eyes that she dabbed at with her napkin were all he needed to let the breath out he was holding.There. Decision done. It felt simple, easily made, even though it wasn’t. It was a huge, fundamental change in his life, who he was, what he did for a living, but the click in his mind last night sitting in his dad’s chair had been almost audible in the quiet. The admission to Liz after they had made love had acknowledged his heart and his head were both on the same page.
“I’ll come see you later, after you’ve called Frank,” Liz said, pecking Jake on his cheek as her phone buzzed and she fished it out of her jeans pocket, making a face at her screen. “I’m late out to the stable now.”
Peony sat back, her coffee cradled into her chest, and watched it all, still silent. Brady was wolfing down a second helping of breakfast and finished the last bites as he too headed for the sink.
“S’good. Thanks, Jake,” he mumbled as he finished chewing.
“Let’s get goin’. Animals don’t feed themselves,” Tanner broke in, and Liz and Brady moved out to the back mudroom. The flurry of activity left the kitchen and suddenly Jake was alone with Peony.
He sat down beside her, and she leveled one of her Peony-looks that he now knew so well. He leaned on the table, fist against his cheek, propping himself up, and they appraised each other.
“Did she tell you she snuck into my room and read my letter last night?”
Jake chuckled. “Didn’t tell me what was in it, but she did, yeah. How’d you know?”
“I heard her, sniffling and stomping. That girl cannot sneak anywhere, Lord love her. I put two and two together in the morning when the letter was stuffed sideways into my sweater pocket, and was slightly damp.”
