Love Finds a Home (14 page)

Jeremy considered the suggestion with the same thoughtful concentration he applied to other decisions. “I like hot dogs. Mom likes grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup.”

“I think we can handle that.”

“So do I.” Jeremy grinned.

They straightened up the barn before walking back to the house. Shadow attached himself to Jeremy’s side. Jake couldn’t help but notice how quickly the pair had taken to each other.

The soft smile he had seen on Emma’s face when she noticed the dog’s brand-new collar had lingered at the edge of Jake’s thoughts all morning.

Who was he kidding? Everything about Emma lingered in his thoughts, from the way her eyes darkened to an evening-sky blue when she was thinking hard about something to the gentle sway of her hips when she walked.

Grilled cheese sandwiches. Tomato soup.

Jake firmly rerouted his thoughts as they went inside.

“Mom usually does everything.” Jeremy stood in the middle of the kitchen and looked at him for direction.

“Which is why we’re going to give her a break today.” Even as he spoke, Jake hoped Emma wouldn’t show up until lunch was ready.

But she did.

She ventured into the kitchen less than ten minutes later. Jeremy was standing at the counter, buttering
slices of bread, while Jake kept a watchful eye on the tomato soup.

Her cheeks flushed a delicate shade of pink. “Why didn’t you come and get me?” she scolded them. “I would have made lunch.”

“We wanted to surprise you.” Jeremy inserted a piece of cheese between two slices of bread before carefully transferring it to the skillet.

“You did.” Emma sidled into the kitchen. “I’ll set the table.”

“Already done,” Jake said.

Emma glanced at the table and the uncertain expression tugged at his heart.

She took care of Jeremy, but when was the last time someone had taken care of her?

“There must be something I can do,” she persisted.

“There is.” Jake pointed to the table. “You can sit down. You’ve been working hard all morning.”

Emma didn’t listen. She wedged her way in between them and her gaze flickered to the wooden spoon in Jake’s hand.

He lifted it above his head. “Don’t even think about trying to disarm a police officer.” Jeremy giggled.

“I wasn’t.” Her blush deepened.

“Uh-huh.” Jake let his skepticism show.

“I can’t see the pan, Mom, ’cause you’re in the way.” Jeremy heaved a sigh.

“Sorry.” Emma stepped back. “I guess I’ll just…”

“Sit down.”
Jake and Jeremy said the words at the same time.

Emma laughed. “All right, all right. I’ll sit down.”

The unexpected sound rippled through the kitchen—and snatched the air from Jake’s lungs.

Breathe.

“The sandwiches are smoking.” Jeremy’s announcement jump-started Jake’s heart again. “Does that mean they’re done, Jake?”

“Affirmative. And they look great.” Jake ignored the crispy dark brown edges—
his fault
—as he flipped the sandwiches onto a plate. “I told you we could pull this off.”

“Jake made tomato soup for you, Mom.” Jeremy took the carton of milk out of the refrigerator and poured three glasses. “I told him you liked it.”

“Hot fudge sundaes and tomato soup.” Jake set a bowl down on the colorful woven place mat in front of Emma. “If you aren’t careful, pretty soon I’ll know all your secrets.”

“That means I’ll have to be careful then, won’t I?”

Jake had been teasing. One look at Emma’s guarded expression told him that she hadn’t.

“I’ll say the prayer today.” Jeremy slid into his chair at the table and bowed his head.

Jake listened as the boy thanked God for the soup and grilled cheese sandwiches. And Shadow. And that they had put the raft together in a record-breaking seven minutes and thirty-four seconds.

After Jeremy’s “amen,” Jake tacked on a silent prayer of his own.

Thank You for showing me there is still laughter inside of Emma. Keep working in her heart. Show her that You haven’t forgotten about her. That You love her.

Jake opened his eyes and found Emma staring at him. For a split second, all her defenses were down. He saw
bewilderment and confusion—and a longing that both terrified him and gave him hope, all at the same time.

Or was what he was seeing in Emma’s eyes simply a reflection of his own emotions?

Chapter Fifteen

O
ver the swish of the washing machine, Emma heard the muffled but steady tap of a hammer. Only this time, the noise wasn’t coming from the barn. It wasn’t coming from the porch, either, where Jake and Jeremy had fixed several loose boards the day before.

She would have thought Jake had projects of his own to attend to on a beautiful Saturday afternoon, but he seemed to be in no hurry to leave.

An image of him standing next to Jeremy in the kitchen, patiently supervising his efforts, surfaced in her memory again. Jake claimed to have no experience with children and yet he instinctively seemed to know exactly what would appeal to a boy like Jeremy, who wanted to learn new things.

Emma had shooed them out of the kitchen after lunch, assuming that Jake would take the hint. He and Jeremy had taken Shadow for a walk instead.

She stepped outside and followed the tapping to the back of the house.

Emma wasn’t sure what she’d expected to find, but the sight that greeted her momentarily stopped her in her tracks.

Jeremy sat cross-legged in the grass next to the back door, paintbrush in hand. The screen door had been removed. So had the screen, which someone had wadded up and stuffed into a garbage can.

Her gaze flew to Jake. He stood several feet away from Jeremy, hands propped on his lean hips as he stared up at the misshapen metal gutter that followed the roofline.

“I thought you two would be back in the barn, trying to shave a few more minutes off your time.” Emma couldn’t help the fact that her statement sounded like an accusation.

Both heads turned in her direction.

“We’re taking a break,” Jeremy explained.

“You’re taking a break to
work.
” Emma planted her hands on her hips. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of that.”

He waved the brush at her, inadvertently spattering the grass with droplets of white paint. “Jake bought a new screen for the door.”

“Did he?” Emma pinned a look on Jake that should have drawn another response other than the smile he flashed in return.

“I noticed the old one had a few holes in it,” he said.

Fixing the back door had slowly been working its way up the project list, but Emma wasn’t sure if she should be grateful or embarrassed that Jake had noticed its pitiful condition.

“He bought me my own set of tools, too.” Jeremy pointed to a toolbox gleaming in the afternoon sunlight, as shiny and red as a McIntosh apple.

“That was nice of him.” Too nice. Except that Emma didn’t want Jake to feel obligated to buy Jeremy gifts.
Or give up an entire Saturday to work on projects that weren’t his responsibility.

They
weren’t his responsibility.

“I made some lemonade.” Emma manufactured a smile for Jeremy’s sake. “Jeremy, why don’t you bring the pitcher and some glasses out to the picnic table and take a
real
break?”

“Okay.” Jeremy jumped to his feet and transferred the paintbrush into her hand before disappearing into the house.

Emma quickly maneuvered the dripping brush over the can.

“It’s primer.” Jake sauntered over, not looking the least bit guilty at having been caught in the act of an other home-repair project. “I wasn’t sure if you wanted to repaint the frame the same color, so I didn’t pick up the paint for that yet.” Yet.

“You’re Jeremy’s mentor, not my carpenter.”

Jake stuffed a rag in the back pocket of his jeans and shrugged. “A boy should know his way around a toolbox.”

So that’s what this was about. Another “teachable moment.”

The things she had sheltered Jeremy from, like hot skillets and hammers and raft-building contests, Jake considered learning opportunities. Emma couldn’t deny that she had liked it better when Jeremy had learned things from a book, but she couldn’t deny that her son’s confidence had been steadily growing.

“How much do I owe you for everything?”

“Nothing.” Jake’s jaw tightened.

“I can’t let you pay for the supplies.” Emma folded her arms across her chest and raised her chin. Jake would
discover she could be just as stubborn as he was. It was bad enough he had taken it upon himself to make repairs, she couldn’t let him absorb the cost.

“All right.” He gave in. “If you insist.”

“I do.”

“The cost of the supplies is dinner.”

“D-dinner?” Emma stammered.

“Jeremy mentioned that you make great homemade pizza. And since I don’t specialize in homemade anything, that would be reimbursement enough.”

“Pizza? That doesn’t seem like a fair trade.” And opening her purse would be easier on Emma’s peace of mind than opening her home to Jake again.

“It’s more than fair. Jeremy wants to help you. It gives him a sense of pride,” Jake said.

Pride? What about her pride?

Emma was embarrassed by her inability to keep up with simple outside home repairs—and mortified that Jake had noticed.

Her gaze strayed from Jake to the siding that was practically begging for a fresh coat of paint.

“I’ve thought about selling the house.” Emma couldn’t believe she had said the words out loud.

Jake was silent for a moment, as if he’d been surprised by the admission, too. And then, “Did you and Brian live here while you were married?”

Emma nodded, surprised that the mention of Brian’s name didn’t flood her with painful memories. “It belonged to his grandparents. After Grandma Barlow died, Brian’s grandfather closed up the house and moved to Arizona to live with Brian’s parents. When Brian took the job with the Mirror Lake police department, his grandfather was thrilled. He called the house a wedding gift.”

“A difficult one to return,” Jake commented.

Emma couldn’t argue with that.

“It was supposed to be temporary.” Regret stirred the ashes of Emma’s grief. “We planned to build a place on the lake eventually, but Jeremy was born premature and couldn’t leave the hospital for two weeks. The bills piled up and it seemed wiser to stay put until we got back on our feet.”

Their five-year plan.

She and Brian had had such a short amount of time together, Emma sometimes felt as if she had never really gotten to know her husband at all.

“Brian didn’t have any other family close by?”

“An older sister, Melissa, but she had already graduated from college and moved to the east coast by the time we got married.” Emma, who had always dreamed of having a sister, had been disappointed that Brian’s only sibling had moved so far away. “She writes at Christmas and sends Jeremy a birthday card every year, though.”

The shadow in Emma’s eyes ignited a slow burn that worked its way through Jake as the truth became clear.

The very people who should have been there to lift her up had, in fact, let her down.

“Don’t Brian’s parents, or his sister, ever come back to visit?” he asked carefully.

Emma shook her head. “There isn’t anything here for them anymore.”

There’s you,
Jake wanted to say.
And Jeremy.

From the way Emma described her situation, it sounded as if she and Jeremy had been…abandoned.

“I don’t blame them,” Emma said quickly, as if she’d
read his mind. “The memories… It would be hard for them to come back here.”

“You stayed.”

“I didn’t have much of a choice.” Emma shrugged. “The house might have come with some flaws but at least it didn’t have a mortgage. When Jeremy turned two, I started working a few hours a week at the library, just to supplement Brian’s income a little, but after…” Some of the strength in Emma’s voice ebbed away. “When Mrs. Morrison retired, she suggested that the library board offer me the full-time position because I had experience, even though I hadn’t finished my degree.”

“What about your family?” Jake felt compelled to ask.

The silence that fell between them lasted so long that Jake didn’t think Emma was going to answer the question at all.

“My mom died in a car accident when I was six years old,” she finally said. “Dad was in the military, so we never stayed in one place very long. After I graduated from high school, I decided to take some classes at a local technical college. The next time Dad moved, I was an adult, so he moved without me.”

“Where is your father now?”

“He retired a few years ago but accepted a part-time job as a consultant with a civilian company overseas. He only makes one trip back to the States a year.”

Which answered the next question that had begun to form in Jake’s mind.

Something in his expression must have shown, be cause Emma stepped back. The guarded look re turned.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go on and on.”

And she didn’t want him to feel sorry for her, either.
But Jake didn’t. He felt sorry for all the people in Emma’s life who had never taken the time to get to know her.

“Don’t be sorry. It will help me get to know Jeremy better if I know some of his background.” Jake spoke the truth but the brief glimpse into Emma’s past had told him a lot about her, too.

But it was clear she was already regretting it.

“I read the guidelines for the mentor program that Pastor Wilde sent to me,” Emma said slowly. “They state that mentors agree to spend four hours a week with the boy they’ve been assigned to.
Four hours.
You’ve put in your time and then some. I know you’re busy. Please don’t let Jeremy pressure you into spending more time with him than necessary.”

“In the first place, I don’t think of Jeremy as someone I’ve been
assigned
to,” he said. “And I don’t spend time with him because I feel pressured. I enjoy spending time with him.”

And with you.

“It’s nice of you to say that.”