Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Holly always looked forward to Sunday mornings until now.
Sanctuary was closed, Main Street hadn’t fully woken, and the espresso machine sat dark and silent behind the counter.
Normally, she was able to breathe a little easier with the lights off and no one at the counter. She could catch up on paperwork, restock, and bake for the week while listening to her favorite playlist.
Today, however, the empty shop made the past two days feel like a boulder of guilt.
No customers. No music. No hiss of steam. No Maya calling out orders or Roni breezing in with Blue’s leash and opinions.
Just Holly, Reid, and the knowledge that a man had been found dead with one of her cups in his mouth.
She stood behind the counter while Reid waited near the pastry case, giving her room to move through a routine that had never felt less routine. Blue sat by the door, ears up, body quivering with the terrible burden of knowing the dog park existed somewhere in his near future.
Holly had already defrosted the lemon muffins, tucked three into a small white bakery box, and poured Judge Fleming’s coffee into a travel cup. Her hand trembled as she secured the lid, images of Hoyt with a cup jammed into his mouth flashing through her head.
She added two cranberry muffins because Linc always pretended he wanted only one thing and then looked offended when no one offered him a second.
Reid watched her place the cranberry muffins beside the lemon ones. “He asked for one muffin.”
“Your grandfather always asks for less than he wants.”
The corner of Reid’s mouth moved. “That’s accurate.”
“He loves my cranberry muffins. Lucky for him, I have some on hand.”
“He’s had strong muffin opinions for decades.”
“He’s had strong opinions about everything for decades.”
The words slipped out with a warmth Holly didn’t try to hide.
She’d known Lincoln Fleming most of her life, though not in the way Roni and Reid knew him.
Not as blood. Not as a man who’d raised her.
But he’d been part of the safest house she’d known as a teenager, the man who’d looked up from a newspaper and told her to sit down before dinner got cold, as if there had never been a question about whether she belonged at the table.
That old belonging made her chest ache before she even stepped outside.
Reid took the bakery box from her and reached for the coffee. “I can carry both.”
“I can carry the coffee.”
“Blue might try to herd us into traffic. You’ll need your hands free.”
At the sound of his name, Blue stood, tail cutting the air.
Holly narrowed her eyes at the dog. “You’re not helping his case.”
Blue sneezed.
They exited through the rear door. Holly followed Reid with the coffee in one hand and Blue’s leash in the other. The morning had warmed slightly. Sunlight spread across the brick fronts of the shops, soft and gold, and the mountains beyond Blackridge rose blue-gray against a clear sky.
It looked like a day for muffins and dog parks. It felt like a day borrowed from a life that kept getting interrupted.
They drove to Linc’s house in Reid’s truck.
Holly sat in the passenger seat with the coffee between her knees and Blue’s breath gusting over her shoulder from the back seat.
Reid drove with one hand on the wheel, the other resting near the console, quiet in that way he had when he was thinking too much.
Holly didn’t fill the silence. She had enough inside her without adding more.
The Fleming house sat beneath two old cottonwoods that had shaded the front yard for as long as Holly could remember.
White siding, dark green shutters, a wide porch with a swing that still hung from chains near the left rail.
The flower beds were bursting with tall bearded irises.
Coraline Fleming would’ve been proud to see their bright colors welcoming folks to the house.
The flagstone path had a few weeds in the cracks, but the house looked solid and familiar, as if it had held its ground out of pure stubbornness.
Holly’s throat tightened the instant Reid parked at the curb.
She’d spent so many evenings here that the place felt stitched into her bones.
Memories assaulted her of Roni dragging her through the back door after school, Coraline setting extra plates on the table without comment, and Linc asking if homework had been finished before dessert, then handing over dessert anyway.
Worse, she also remembered Reid passing through the kitchen in a baseball cap, T-shirt, or dress shirt, depending on whether he was heading out for a ballgame, a date, or his internship at the courthouse, older, unreachable, and impossible not to notice.
Every floorboard in that house knew a version of Holly she didn’t show many people anymore.
Reid cut the engine and glanced over. “You okay?”
She looked through the window at the porch, then back to him. “I haven’t been inside since your grandmother’s memorial. I kept meaning to come visit Linc, but something always got in the way.”
His hand tightened briefly on the steering wheel. “Granddad will be glad to see you.”
“It will be good to see him.”
Both things were true, and both hurt.
Blue barked once from the back seat, eager to go in. Holly unbuckled him and gave him a firm look before opening the door. “You’re visiting The Judge. Conduct yourself accordingly.”
Blue leaped out and immediately tried to mark a shrub. Holly stopped him, and the dog gave a snort.
Reid came around the truck with the bakery box, and together they went up the path. Holly carried the coffee, Blue pranced at her side, and the porch boards creaked under their feet with the exact sound they’d always made.
Reid knocked once, then opened the door. “Granddad?”
“In the kitchen,” a gruff voice called, “where breakfast belongs.”
Reid looked at Holly as if apologizing in advance. She grinned and stepped inside.
The house smelled like old wood, coffee, and lemon cleaner. The entry table still held a ceramic dish for keys, though fewer keys sat in it now. Family photographs lined the hallway, some old enough that Roni had braces and Reid looked lean and serious in a high school graduation robe.
Blue tugged toward the kitchen, and Holly let him lead.
Lincoln Fleming sat at the small kitchen table near the window, a cane propped against the chair beside him and a folded newspaper spread open in front of him.
He was thinner than the last time Holly had seen him, his shoulders not as broad beneath his flannel shirt, his white hair cut short and a little uneven around the ears.
But his eyes were the same—sharp blue under heavy brows, and when he saw her, the stern lines of his face softened into something that made the years between visits fall away too quickly.
“Holly,” he said. “He told you lemon, right? You didn’t bring any of those nasty blueberry muffins, did you?”
She set the coffee in front of him and leaned down to kiss his cheek. His skin was cool, his jaw rough with a morning shave that had missed a spot. “Good morning to you, too, Judge.”
“Linc,” he said. “I’ve told you that since you were sixteen.”
“And I’ve ignored you since I was sixteen.”
He grunted, pleased despite himself, then looked past her at Reid. “Took you long enough.”
“It’s been twenty minutes,” Reid said.
“Long enough.”
Holly set the bakery box on the table and opened it. “Lemon muffins, plus cranberry.”
Linc peered into the box. “No blueberry?”
“You always say blueberry was a muffin lying about being dessert.”
“It is.” He took a lemon. “That’s my official verdict and I’m sticking to it.”
Reid moved to the counter and pulled down plates.
He placed one in front of Linc, then one near Holly, and she caught the quick way he assessed the pill organizer on the counter, the half-full glass of water near the sink, the stack of mail by the toaster.
He worried in silence, just like he’d always done.
Blue sat beside Linc’s chair, vibrating with hope. Linc looked down at him. “You’re larger than the last time I saw you.”
Blue wagged.
“And probably no wiser.”
“Boy, is that the truth,” Holly said.
Linc broke a tiny piece from the edge of his muffin and held it between two fingers. Reid opened his mouth, likely to protest, but Holly put a hand up.
“I’ve got a substitute.” She pulled a biscuit specifically made for dogs who came to the shop patio from her pocket and handed it to the judge. “Lemons aren’t good for dogs, but he can have this.”
Blue accepted the biscuit with reverence.
Linc gave Reid a dry look. “The dog and I understand each other.”
“You both like to eat things that aren’t good for you,” Reid said.
“It was a treat, not a felony.”
Holly sat across from Linc. The kitchen looked almost the same and not the same at all.
The curtains had been replaced. A calendar with church suppers and medical appointments hung where Coraline’s recipe cards used to be pinned.
The table had new scratches. The chair where Roni used to sit and kick Holly under the table now had a cushion.
Time had been here, moving Linc’s life by inches.
He ate half the lemon muffin before speaking again. “Roni says you’ve put my grandson to work.”
Holly glanced at Reid, who stood near the counter with his coffee. “Temporarily.”
Linc’s eyes narrowed slightly, not with disapproval, but with the old courtroom habit of listening to what had not been said. “Didn’t realize coffee shops required Navy lawyers to clean tables.”
“They require people who can refill napkins and follow instructions,” Holly said. “He’s adequate at both.”
“High praise from you.”
“She keeps me away from the espresso machine,” Reid said.
“She’s always been sensible.”
Holly took a sip of coffee to hide the warmth that rose at the familiarity in his voice. Linc had always treated her as if she belonged to the house when she was inside it. She hadn’t realized how much she’d missed being spoken to that way.
His attention moved between them again, lingering when it came back to her. “Everything all right at the shop?”