Chapter Nine
Jake thought Brightside looked exactly like a small town should as they parked by the post office.
The entire street sundrenched, chrome on the cars beside them blindingly bright, canopies at the front of the stores faded.
Jake had never seen a street wider than any avenue in New York with angled parking and old-time coin-fed meters painted a dull gray.
If he suspended reality, he could be on a classic movie set, complete with a red and chrome facade on a diner, a department store with the side of the brick painted white over the old sign, and a grocer over on the corner, the front bristling with flowers and overflowing vegetable stands.
A side street looked to have a salon, a bar, and a few smaller stores.
He pictured classic convertibles and the cast of Grease sitting up on the back seats.
The only downside was that, as he scanned, there wasn’t one coffee shop to be seen.
The drive in had been calming, full of small talk with Liz doling out trivia about Brightside.
He wasn’t paying close attention, stealing glances at her as she drove instead.
When she smiled, her entire face lit up, and if something he said was funny, she’d glance at him before she laughed.
He liked the confident way she relaxed behind the wheel, one hand draped on the top, the other on the gearshift.
He’d felt the sway of the trailer behind them when a gust had slapped at them on the road into town, but she didn’t even blink.
She had expertly backed the entire thing between two vehicles as well, while Jake nervously eyeballed the mirror on the truck beside them, mere inches between them.
Chatting about the town helped alleviate the familiar ache from his childhood, the wood plaque that Brady had painted for their father on his dad’s desk stuck in his mind as they left the ranch.
It was moments like that that he felt as if he had missed out.
That hurt of not having a dad when it mattered most. Tanner and Brady, they’d grown up with that influence, benefited from his guidance, chafed under his discipline, but ultimately, had been given the chance to know their father, and it had shaped them.
He would’ve given anything to have that. It wasn’t as if his father had been dead. He had been here, just outside this apple-pie town, raising other sons.
Jake had been the one he didn’t want.
“Earth to Jake?” Liz said as she rounded the front of the truck, flipping her keys in her hands, jingling them.
He looked back at her and his breath caught. She was smiling, one eyebrow lifted because he must have been staring off into space.
Hair escaping from her braid whipped around her face in the wind blowing down the street, and the freckles dusted across her cheeks like tiny stars were stark in the sunlight.
He wondered if all of her was freckled. He cleared his throat as their eyes met, that thought much too forward to even contemplate, but it was there all the same.
When he’d asked her if she wanted to go to town with him, it was impulsive and not what he’d planned. When she’d agreed, it had given him a charge of energy.
He’d observed her laughing at something Brady had said at dinner the night before, completely unguarded, and he’d felt that interesting tightening in his stomach, signaling in no uncertain terms that he was attracted to her, and he couldn’t deny it if he tried.
She wasn’t snobby, but she guarded herself.
Sassy comebacks and teasing woven around deeper conversation showed the spirit she had but held in.
He liked talking to her; she was intelligent, took a joke, and was tough as nails when it came to keeping up with the men on the ranch.
Just yesterday from the front deck of the house he’d caught her riding in the sand ring and had stopped for a moment to watch.
Ramrod straight in the saddle, expertly riding a horse in a small circle, the dust from the sand swirling dramatically against the backdrop of sky, trees, and weathered board fencing.
Then she slid the gray horse to a stop, pivoted, and rode the circle back the other way.
Another rider and horse in the ring did the same pattern when she finished, but were not nearly as exacting.
She was good at what she did, and when he asked her about it later, her eyes had lit up and she had enthusiastically explained with big hand gestures what “reining” was.
Despite everything being so new and getting to know people he was now in effect living with, he could relax around her, be himself.
He’d always buttoned himself up around new people.
Mind you, most people he’d met in the past couple of years were in the restaurant business and he was normally talking business, even at social gatherings.
With her, he could just be Jake. Not Jake the successful chef or Jake the business owner.
“Is it always this windy in town?” he asked. He impulsively tucked a strand of her hair back behind her ear. She blushed the moment he did, lifting a shoulder in a half shrug, looking away from him.
“I suppose. Brightside is on a bit of a flat spot,” she replied. “Never noticed before.”
“Okay, well, I’ll go see about my stuff. Where’s the bank?” he blurted, wanting to distract himself from his invasion of her personal bubble. Shit. What was he thinking?
Liz pointed down the street. “It’s just up there on the left, the sign with the funny lion on it. That’s the bank.”
“I’ll head over there. Come find me when you’re done at the— Wait, do you need me to give you money for the things you have to get?”
“The Co-op. No, I have some cash I pulled last week to use. It’ll do until you get the accounts squared away.
I’ll come back and find you either here or there,” she replied, pointing behind him.
She walked around back, and within a few moments the trailer was off the hitch and propped up.
She hopped back into her truck and rumbled around the corner with a wave out the window.
Jake shoved his hands in his pockets and watched her drive off. It caught him then how much more rugged she was than him. He wasn’t used to not feeling like the capable one in charge. “Get a grip, West,” he muttered under his breath, and stepped into the post office.
The amply built, beehive-haired woman behind the counter looked up as the doorbell tinkled, and he watched as her eyes went wide when she saw him.
He supposed he was going to get that reaction from people who knew his father.
Peony did say he looked very much like Brett.
It was frustrating to hear on some level, but it also made him strangely proud.
Like a part of his identity had been missing up until now.
“Can I help you?” the woman asked, putting her glasses on, the beaded chains wiggling as she settled them on the bridge of her nose and squinted.
“Yes. I’m Jake West. Apparently, you have a large number of boxes for me.”
The woman put her hand on her chest and made that tsking noise all older women made when they were taking stock of you. He wasn’t sure if it was a good or a bad noise, so he waited for her to finish. She went from that to pulling out a book and grabbing a pen.
“My word, you look like your daddy. But you’ve got your momma’s cheekbones. I can see ’em,” she clucked as she pointed to the line on the page where he had to sign. “I’ll get Herb to pull your stuff. Liz left her rig out front, I see.”
The post office lady was a hawkeye it seemed, and knew his mother.
Did everyone? It bugged him suddenly, that there was a side to his mother he had never experienced, and that he couldn’t even begin to know what she might have been like.
Swallowing the lump in his throat, he nodded. “Thank you, ma’am. Much appreciated.”
The clerk tsked some more, took a long look at him and shook her head. “You sound like Brett, too, Lord above. No woman in town is safe from you with those eyes and that smile either. Not one.”
She prattled on as she opened the door behind the counter and stuck her head through. “HERB! The lost West boy’s here for his stuff,” she screamed, and Jake hung his head. Right. Small towns. Gossip. Everyone likely knew exactly who he was and what was happening.
She turned back and smiled sweetly at him. “He’ll bring it ’round front if you want to open up the trailer.”
“Thank you,” he said, backing away from the noise as she screamed for Herb again.
He stepped into the sunshine and went to the rear of the trailer. He looked for a handle of some sort to open it, but found none. He looked at the side, then poked at the hinge pin. How in hell did you open this thing? He stood back, arms crossed, feeling like a complete idiot.
A throat cleared behind him and he turned to see an older skinny, bald man—Herb—behind him, a cart stacked with Jake’s suitcases and several taped boxes.
“Ya never opened one of these things before?” he asked in a quiet, raspy voice.
“Nope.” Jake shrugged and gestured at the back of the trailer, the feeling of inadequacy bubbling near the surface again.
Herb muscled past him and levered up a small handle Jake hadn’t seen in the middle. With a squeal the hinges on both sides popped and the doors swung wide. Herb dusted his hands and put them on his hips, looking over at Jake.
“All good. I’ve got to go get the next load. Furniture too. Think you can manage this part?” Herb said, a hint of humor in his voice.
Jake grinned sheepishly and sighed. “Thank you. Yes.”
It took several trolley loads and a few trips in and out carrying his oak table, chairs, recliner, bed, side tables, and some light fixtures, but the lot of it was loaded. Herb was surprisingly strong for his thin stature.