I only stopped moving when I felt Genevieve’s hand cover mine. “Humor me. Quit trying to fill
every minute of your day with something to do and sit with me.”
When I opened my mouth to tell her I wanted to finish this bed, she glared at me. Sometimes, it
still caught me off guard to see the woman she’d become. It was easier to imagine she was still the
timid teenager she’d been when I left home. I should probably apologize to her for all the times I
worried she wouldn’t be able to make it on her own but, knowing her, she’d kick my ass.
“Fine.” I leaned the shovel against the railing and followed her into the house. The scent of
cinnamon and coffee told me I wasn’t the only one who’d been up early this morning. “Did Jayden
stay here last night?”
“No, why?” I wasn’t the only one in the family who buried their worries in menial tasks rather
than talking about them. Genevieve worried her bottom lip as she pulled a pan of fresh-baked rolls
out of the oven. Since Jayden moved into campus housing, I’d noticed signs of stress I’d chalked up to
her baby boy leaving the nest. This year, he was living in a suite with some of his buddies, and Vivvie
was trying to pretend she didn’t know what was rumored to go on there. But Jayden was a good kid; I
highly doubted he was wasting his college years partying. And if he was, who cared, just as long as
his grades stayed up.
“You don’t usually bake when it’s just the two of us,” I pointed out. She picked up a rag and
started wiping the counter. Avoidance. That didn’t ratchet up my concern. Nope. Not at all. “What’s
going on, Vivvie?”
Her shoulders slumped forward, and I could hear her muttering to herself. When she spun around
to face me, there was a fire in her eyes that gave me pause. “You do realize I’m almost forty years
old, right?”
“Um, yes?” What in the fuck was I supposed to say to that? Maybe I should have pulled the sheet
over my head and wrestled sleep a bit longer because something was going on and I wasn’t sure I
was ready to face it.
“Then quit calling me Vivvie. When you do that, I feel like you still see me as a helpless kid.” She
balled her hands into fists and squared her shoulders. “I’m not helpless, William. I’m perfectly
capable of fixing things when they break. When I bought this house, one of the things I wanted to do
most was work on the landscaping this spring. I wasn’t thinking, gee, this would be a great project for
my brother. It was for me.”
