“What do we do now?”
“I’ll get new tires for Dad’s truck, but it ain’t worth spending the money on Spammy. At this point, just about the only thing holdingher together is duct tape and prayers. Guess I’ll have her hauled off to sell for scrap. In the meantime, Claudia just called. She’s watching the Weather Channel, says the roads are iced over bad. No way we can leave today, even if the tires were okay. You can’t be towing a trailer in these kinds of weather conditions.”
Kerry didn’t know whether to cheer or cry.
Murphy must have read her mind. “Looks like you get your wish. We stay another day. Claudia wants to fix us breakfast at her place. You in?”
Kerry’s stomach rumbled on cue. “All the way in.”
As they scurried across the street Kerry shot a sidelong glance at her brother. “How was last night?” And then she couldn’t resist. “And this morning?”
His answer was a typical grunt. “Good.”
“What did Claudia say about all your manscaping? And the new wardrobe? Did she approve?”
He shrugged. “She didn’t have any complaints.”
And that, she knew, was about as much as she would get from her uncommunicative big brother.
Claudia’s apartment was in the same building as the restaurant, two floors up.
Her nest was small but undeniably feminine with pale Tiffany-blue walls, a rose velvet sofa, and floral chintz curtains at the windows overlooking the park. Bookshelves stuffed with romance novels, historical fiction, and cookbooks flanked the windows, and silver-framed family photos covered every flat surface. Murphy’s head almost brushed the low ceiling, and he looked distinctly out of place as he ushered Queenie inside.
“Sorry, but we couldn’t leave her in the trailer,” he said, gesturing at the setter.
“It’s okay. I locked the cat in my bedroom,” Claudia said, wavingthem into the tiny kitchen, where they were greeted with the scent of bacon and frying onions. She was dressed in a blue velour tracksuit, and as always, her hair and makeup were freshly done. She’d set plates at a table in an alcove with bay windows. She glanced over at Kerry. “Wanna invite Patrick to join us? There’s more than enough.”
Kerry hesitated. “I guess I could ask.”
She retreated to the living room and stared at her phone for a moment. She wanted to see him again, desperately, but hated the way she’d run out on him the night before. She was a loser, a chicken-shit, a coward, and worse. It would serve her right if he ghosted her the way she’d ghosted him.
He answered on the first ring. “Kerry? Where are you? I’m looking down at the tree stand from my window, but it doesn’t look like anybody’s around.”
Kerry told him about the slashed tires and the bad roads and the resulting change of plans. “Claudia wants to know if you’d like to join us for breakfast at her place. And Austin too, of course.”
There was a long pause at the other end of the line. “Is that what you want? After last night, I got the impression that you’d just as soon make a clean break and blow town.”
She winced. “Guess I deserve that. Yes, I’d love it if you and Austin could come over for breakfast, and no, I don’t want a clean break. I can’t tell you what I do want. Because I’m that screwed up.”
The five of them sat elbow-to-elbow around the breakfast table, passing platters of omelets, home fries, bacon, and slices of thick-sliced grilled country bread. The grown-ups had Bloody Marys, and Austin had coffee with milk.
“Miss Claudia,” Austin said, heaping strawberry jam onto his toast, “can I come to your house for breakfast every day?”
Claudia winked at the child. “Well, honey, I mostly just have coffeein the morning, but the next time I do cook breakfast, I’ll be sure and invite you over.”
“Cool.” Austin took a gulp of milk, then turned to Patrick. “Since it’s morning now, can we start putting up posters and knocking on doors? We gotta find Mr. Heinz.”
Murphy raised an eyebrow. “Posters?”
“Austin wants to have posters made of the sketch Kerry made of Heinz,” Patrick explained. “Since we don’t know where he lives, he’d also like us to do a door-to-door canvass. I’ve tried to explain why that’s not practical…”
The boy pulled a sheet of folded paper from his pocket and smoothed it out on the tabletop. Kerry stared, as she hadn’t realized he had the sketch.
“Can I borrow a pen?” he asked their hostess.
“Yes, of course.” Claudia turned to a small hutch behind her, opened a drawer, and brought out a pen.
Austin gave her a nod of thanks, then looked at Kerry. “How do you spell Heinz?”
