Julian assumed those things weren’t for Lilly or Lilly would’ve made that clear. “She liked to dress up and go out?”
She nodded. “I think that’s why she didn’t want to stay in Iowa.”
“Because there was nowhere to go?”
“It was a really small town. She used to tell Steve, ‘It doesn’t even have a movie theater.’ And we lived out on a farm with nothing but corn around us.”
“Did you hate it there, too?”
She took a bite of the croissant. “No,” she replied as she chewed. “Ilovedit.”
“What did you love about it?”
She thought for a moment. Then she said, “A lot of things. The tire swing Steve put up. The big porch on the old house where he’d sit in the rocking chair that used to belong to his parents and have a drink at night. The apple tree—apples have never tasted so good. But mostly Old Blue.”
“Who’s Old Blue?”
“My dog. Well, Steve’s dog. In a way. He didn’t buy him or anything. He said Old Blue just showed up one day and moved in, and Steve allowed him to stay. Blue was blind and lived in the barn. I tried to get him to move inside the house with me, but he liked to be by the horses.”
“You two became friends?”
“Bestfriends,” she confirmed.
“Is that the only pet you’ve ever had?”
“I had a cat once. But my mom made me give him away when we moved because he shed a lot and scratched up the furniture. And she said it was too expensive to take care of him, that it was hard enough just to take care of me.”
“How long ago was that?”
“I was in the fourth grade.”
She seemed to feel safe and unthreatened by the conversation, so he continued, “Have you had any contact with your grandparents over the years?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
She frowned. “They didn’t get along with my mom, didn’t like what she did.”
“All that shopping?” he asked with a grin.
A brief smile curved her lips, but then she looked down.“And all the men. Moving around. Leaving me home to go out. That sort of thing.”
“They made that clear?”
“I could hear them fighting. They fought a lot,” she added ruefully.
“Did they like the farmer?”
“Steve? They never met him. They were out of our lives by then.”
They hadn’t tried to stay in contact with their granddaughter? That was unfortunate. She’d obviously needed them, but maybe Sabrina had made it impossible.
“Where do they live? Are they still in California?”
She shrugged.
He wanted to ask more about Sabrina’s parents but didn’t want to make her feel bad, especially when she was just coming out of her shell a little bit. “What about aunts and uncles? Do you have any of those?”
