Chapter 18
Mark hadn’t expected Natalie to text him while he was in the maintenance shop at Shooting Star Canyon Ranch, cleaning up the last of the tools from an afternoon repair. When his phone buzzed on the workbench, the message was short, but he read it twice anyhow.
Coffee at Parker’s?
Was this wise? Parker’s Diner was one of the least private places in Shooting Star Canyon.
Mrs. Barlow frequented the diner all the time.
Far too many people did. He couldn’t risk forgetting that he and Natalie were supposed to be temporary, careful, sensible, and all the other words that had sounded useful before mistletoe and leftovers and the way she had looked at his family at his parents’ house.
Instead, he wiped his hands on a rag and texted back, I’ll meet you there. Does ten minutes work for you?
Yes.
Parker’s Diner sat on the corner of Main and Ash, its big front windows glowing warm against the December evening.
Betty Parker had owned the place longer than Mark had been alive, and she ran it with a sharp memory, a sharper eye, and a no-nonsense manner that could make grown men apologize before they realized what they had done wrong.
The diner drew the morning crowd, the church crowd, the ranch crowd, the after-school crowd, and anyone in town who needed coffee, pie, or information disguised as casual conversation.
By the time Mark arrived, Pastor John Abernathy was finishing coffee in a corner booth with Principal Grant Holloway, both of them leaning over what looked like a stack of school Christmas program notes.
Sheriff Colton Briggs sat at the counter with a slice of pecan pie.
Betty moved between tables with a coffee pot in one hand.
Her expression suggested she knew everyone’s business and had already decided which parts were worth correcting.
Natalie sat in a booth near the window, her hands wrapped around a mug, her coat folded beside her. She looked up when he came in, and the relief on her face hit him hard.
Mark crossed to her booth, suddenly glad he had not talked himself out of coming. “Hey.”
“Hey.” Natalie’s smile was small but real. “Thank you for meeting me.”
“Was I supposed to say no?”
She made a face. “You’re allowed to.”
“I know.” He took the seat across from her. “I didn’t want to.”
Color touched her cheeks, and she looked down at her mug as if the hot chocolate had suddenly become fascinating. “Aunt Eleanor arrived today.”
“That bad already?”
“No.” Natalie gave a quiet laugh and pushed a dessert menu toward him. “Well, not exactly.”
Mark understood more than he would have a week ago. Maybe even more than he wanted to. “She asked questions?”
“Pointed ones.” Natalie lifted her mug and took a careful sip. “Loving ones.”
He grunted. “Those are the most difficult kind to dodge. Believe me, I know.”
Betty appeared beside the booth with the coffee pot. She wore her silver hair pinned back and had a pencil tucked behind one ear.
“Mark Clemons,” Betty said. “You look like a man who needs coffee and something with sugar.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Don’t ‘yes-ma’am’ me unless you intend to order quickly.” Betty filled the mug she had already set near him then looked at Natalie. “You want the apple crumble or the chocolate cake?”
Natalie blinked. “I haven’t decided.”
“You came in looking like you needed chocolate cake, but now that he’s here, you might manage apple crumble.” Betty glanced between them, not smiling but not unkind. “Split both.”
Mark glanced at Natalie. “That sounds like an order.”
“It was.” Betty wrote it down. “Two forks each because I know better than to bring one and watch people pretend they don’t mind sharing.”
Natalie laughed, and Betty gave a satisfied nod before walking away.
Mark reached for his coffee. “She’s subtle.”
“Please. Betty Parker has never been subtle in her life.”
“She repeated gossip once when Gavin Mercer deserved correction for claiming her biscuits were dry,” Mark said, remembering the feed store owner’s offense had lasted less than a morning. “He apologized in person and bought six biscuits the next day.”
“Were they dry?”
“No.”
Natalie grinned above her mug. “Then he deserved correction.”
Mark smiled into his coffee, but his attention kept going back to Natalie.
She looked tired beneath the diner lights.
Not the worn-out kind from a long day at the shop.
He had a feeling it was the kind that came from holding too much inside.
Her aunt must have seen more than Natalie had wanted her to see.
That thought made him want to reach across the table, but he held back because Parker’s Diner was not private, and Natalie already looked as though too many people had touched tender places today.
“Did you tell her the truth?” he asked quietly.
Natalie’s fingers tightened around her mug. “Not exactly.”
He waited.
“I told her we weren’t pretending.” Natalie looked up then, and the shame in her eyes made his chest pull tight. “I know. I lied, and we said we wouldn’t lie if asked directly, but… the lie felt less like one than it should have.”
Mark slowly placed his mug on the table, watching her carefully.
Betty returned with two plates before he could answer.
The chocolate cake was smothered thick with frosting, and the apple crumble steamed beneath a scoop of vanilla ice cream that was already beginning to melt.
Betty placed the plates between them, set down four forks with deliberate precision, and looked at Natalie for a beat longer than necessary.
“Eat something sweet, honey,” Betty said. “Truth sits better when the stomach has help.”
Natalie gaped at her.
Betty patted the table once and moved away as if she had said nothing unusual.
Mark watched Natalie pick up a fork and press it into the edge of the apple crumble. “Betty hears everything,” he remarked.
“Apparently including thoughts.”
“She rarely repeats them.”
“I know, and that’s comforting, I suppose.”
“It should be.” Mark cleared his throat. “Grace?” he asked.
She nodded, and they bent their heads. Together, they murmured, “Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts, which we are about to receive from Thy bounty, through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Mark grinned at her before taking a bite of the chocolate cake. “Do you wish you had told your aunt the whole truth?”
Natalie looked toward the window. Their reflections stared back at them, softened by the warm diner lights. “I wish the whole truth were different.”
Mark’s hand tightened around his fork, but before he could find the right words, the bell above the diner door rang.
He glanced over automatically and froze.
Jenna Bogle stood just inside the door in a camel-colored coat, her dark hair falling in loose waves over one shoulder, one hand still on the handle as she looked around the diner with an uncertain smile.
Mark had not seen her in nearly two years. He had heard updates now and then because Shooting Star Canyon carried news through fence lines, grocery aisles, and church parking lots, but hearing a name was not the same as seeing the woman everyone once assumed he would marry.
Natalie saw his face change. He knew she did because her fork paused halfway to the plate.
Before he could figure out how to react, he realized Jenna had spotted him.
For one strange moment, Mark waited for the old pain to rise. He expected the punch of memory, the bitter taste of plans that had gone nowhere, the humiliation of being seen by half the town as the man she had left behind. He expected something heavy enough to knock the breath out of him.
Nothing came.
Not nothing exactly. Recognition, obviously. Surprise, of course. A distant tenderness for who they had been and a faint ache for how badly it had ended. But the wound he had guarded for so long didn’t open. It didn’t even throb.
Jenna crossed toward them slowly. “Mark.”
He stood because his mother had raised him right. “Jenna.”
Her gaze moved to Natalie then back to him. Something flickered there, curiosity or discomfort, he couldn’t tell. “I didn’t know if I’d run into anyone tonight.”
“This is Parker’s,” he said. “Running into people is half the menu.”
Jenna laughed softly.
Once that laugh would have pulled at him. Tonight, it sounded familiar without being dangerous.
Natalie had gone very still in the booth. Her chin lifted a little, and her shoulders squared in a way that made Mark understand she was bracing herself. Not because she didn’t trust him, maybe, but because women like Natalie knew too well what it felt like to be measured against a memory.
He hated that she felt it now.
He opened his mouth to introduce her, but Natalie beat him to the punch.
“Natalie Winters,” Natalie said, offering a polite smile. “Winter Wishes.”
“Jenna Bogle.” Jenna’s smile warmed. “I remember the shop. It always looked beautiful at Christmastime.”
“Thank you.”
There was no sharpness in Natalie’s answer, but Mark could hear the carefulness beneath it.
He made a split-second decision and moved around the end of the booth to slide in beside her. The movement was small but clear. He did not put his arm around her or make a show for Jenna or the diner or anyone else watching.
Natalie’s breath caught softly.
Jenna’s gaze dropped to the space between them. His knee nearly touched Natalie’s beneath the table. Then, Jenna looked back up at his face. “I heard you were seeing someone.”
Mark did not look away from her, and to his surprise, the answer came easily. “I am.”
The words should have felt like part of the charade.
They should have stuck in his throat or set off some warning bell about rules and temporary arrangements and all the careful lines he and Natalie had drawn.
Instead, saying them felt simple. Honestly, they felt true in the only way that mattered at that moment.
Jenna nodded slowly. “I’m glad.”
Mark believed her. That surprised him too.
“Are you back for Christmas?” he asked.
“For now.” Jenna tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “My parents needed some help with a few things, and I had some decisions to make. I’m still sorting out how long I’ll stay.”
Betty appeared at Jenna’s side with a menu. “Booth or counter, Jenna?”
Jenna looked almost relieved by the interruption. “Counter is fine.”
“Good. I have coffee that hasn’t been insulted yet tonight.” Betty pointed toward the counter then glanced at Mark and Natalie. Her expression warned all three of them not to turn her diner into a spectacle. “Eat your dessert before it gets cold.”
“Cake doesn’t get cold,” Mark said.
Betty narrowed her eyes. “It does if it’s neglected, and that ice cream is already in danger.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Jenna smiled once more. “It was good to see you, Mark. Nice to meet you, Natalie.”
“You too,” Natalie said.
Mark watched Jenna walk to the counter and take the stool beside Sheriff Briggs, who greeted her with a polite nod. The diner resumed around them, silverware clinking, coffee pouring, Pastor Abernathy laughing gently at something Principal Holloway said.
Mark sat there, waiting for regret, but it never came.
Natalie stared down at the apple crumble. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“Do what?”
“Sit beside me.” Her voice was quiet enough that no one else would hear. “Or say that.”
“Yes, I did.”
She looked at him.
Mark held her gaze, and the revelation moved through him so quietly that at first he almost missed it. He had spent two years thinking Jenna was the reason he could not move forward. He had made her the locked gate, the broken plan, the proof that wanting more was a dangerous thing.
But Jenna had walked into Parker’s Diner, smiled at him, and become only a woman he used to love.
Used to.
The past no longer held him.
Natalie’s hand rested near the edge of the table, close to his but not touching. Mark looked at it and realized the woman beside him was the one who could hurt him now.
Not Jenna.
Natalie.
The knowledge should have scared him enough to move away. Instead, he slid the apple crumble a little closer to her and picked up one of the extra forks Betty had brought.
“You should eat,” he said.
Natalie’s smile wavered. “Your father kept telling your mom that at dinner.”
“He’s right about some things.”
“Only some?”
“I’m not prepared to give him more than that.”
Her laugh was small and tender, and Mark felt it right in his chest.
Across the diner, Jenna stirred her coffee. Mark waited for the old ache to return, but all he felt was gratitude that what had ended had not destroyed him after all.
Then Natalie’s shoulder brushed his as she reached for the dessert, and his attention came back where it belonged.
He was over Jenna.
The realization should have felt like closing a door, but as he sat beside Natalie in Parker’s Diner with chocolate cake between them and the whole town pretending not to watch, it felt like one had opened.