A Handful of Heaven

“Sure.” She moved close to point the beam at the stubborn valve in the narrow corner. “I keep imagining that I’m going to need an ark to rescue the last of the customers I left in the dining room.”

He gave the wrench a little more muscle and the screech of old copper pipes told him he was making some difference. “If it comes to that, I’ll engineer you one.”

“Then I’ll be even more in your debt.” The gentle curve of her mouth eased into a ghost of a smile as she leaned closer to give the flashlight she held a better angle.

She smelled of cinnamon and roses. Cinnamon from the kitchen, he guessed. And roses from her lotion. The subtle aroma made him take notice. His chest throbbed. Heartburn, he thought, dismissing it as he felt the valve give a tiny bit. At his age, chest pain wasn’t a good sign. Being forty-two was a thrill a minute.

He was no longer young, but he wasn’t anywhere close to being old. Just in between. Which is pretty much where he’d been all his life anyway. Wasn’t that what Liz had always mourned? He wasn’t a stand-out kind of guy. Just average. Average looking, average earning…just average everything.

And that hadn’t bothered him much over the years until this moment.

The wrench froze in place, and as he moved into a better position, he bonked the top of his head hard on a thick wooden beam. Stars lit the dimness before his eyes a split second before pain reverberated through his skull.

Great going, Thornton.

“Are you all right?” Genuine emotion softened her lean face, and in the spare glow of the flashlight’s dim bulb, he saw concern fill her eyes.

“I’m fine. I’ve got a hard head.”

He couldn’t help noticing how lovely she was. Her heart-shaped face was classically cut with a delicate chin, a straight nose and wide, startlingly blue eyes. Dark feathery bangs spilled over her forehead, making him want to smooth those silky wisps away from her eyes. A band tightened around his chest like a vise.

That’s it, I’m cutting down on French fries.

He gave the wrench a little more torque, gritted his teeth and pushed for all he was worth. The stubborn wrench didn’t move a millimeter and then slowly, with a high-pitched squeal, it began to give. The pipes groaned. Evan groaned. His arms burned as he clenched his jaw and gave it everything he had.

The valve closed.

“Oh, Evan! You did it! Oh, I never could have done that by myself. You are incredible! Thank you so much!”

“It was nothing.” He removed the wrench and realized he was shivering.

“Nothing? You’ve only earned my eternal gratitude. It’s freezing down here. Come on up and we’ll get you something hot to drink.” She grabbed the wrench from him, and her warm, satin fingers brushed his.

Suddenly he totally forgot about being half frozen. He noticed the faint blanket of freckles across her nose. Her skin was flawless, her cheekbones high and chiseled, her mouth full and her chin delicate.

The vise around his chest clamped so tight he felt close to suffocating. He shouldn’t be noticing how beautiful Paige McKaslin was, because in the end it didn’t matter. He’d sworn off women, and that especially included noticing the beautiful ones.

He cleared his throat. “No, I’m fine. And as for your eternal gratitude, why don’t we call it even? You’ve served me plenty of good meals over the years.”

“Yes, and you’ve paid for them.”

“But I didn’t have to cook ’em for myself. See?”

“That’s not the same.” She headed up the stairs.

He did his best to behave like a gentleman and not notice how trim she looked in her worn jeans or the delicate cut of her ankle showing above her sneakers. He hit the light switch and climbed up after her in the dark. Something cold and icy pecked against his face.

“It’s snowing.” She towered over him, the toolbox in one hand and the flashlight in the other, aiming the shaft of light down the ladder, growing slippery with icy snow.

“Great. That will mix nicely with the dust and cobwebs.” The icy flakes slanted through the flashlight’s golden beam and pelted him as he landed with his feet on solid ground. “You’re going to need a plumber.”

“Very observant of you.” She knelt to grab the heavy trap door.

He beat her to it. “Go in where it’s warm and call Phil’s Plumbing. It’s in the phonebook. He’s my brother-in-law. You tell him I said to get over here pronto and give you a good price while he’s at it.”

“Thanks, Evan.” She marched away, blending with the dark until she was gone.

He didn’t know if it was the icy storm or the dark that made him feel keenly alone. Well, he was used to being alone these days, he thought as he hefted the heavy door into place.

There used to be a time when he’d been so busy, making a living, running after the boys, looking after laundry and meals and bills that he ran on constant exhaustion. It was painful to remember, and yet it only felt like a few days ago when he’d dropped into bed well after eleven each night and bemoaned having not a second to call his own.

Funny, how he missed that now. How he’d give just about anything to go back in time. Those days had whipped by so fast, he’d forgotten to hold onto the good in them. And now…well, his sons were grown up and both doing well. Cal was in college and Blake in law school. Grown men, or at least grownup enough that they didn’t need him like they used to.

As he made his way around the building to the back door, satisfaction settled over him like the snow. It was good to do something useful. To make a difference. There was no way Paige could have handled that valve on her own, but she certainly hadn’t been squeamish about crawling into a narrow dank space.

There she was. He could see her through the window in the back door. She was talking on a cordless phone tucked between her chin and shoulder as she worked at the counter. She met his gaze through the glass. She flashed him a smile, a rare one of the sort he’d never seen from her.

His heart stopped between beats. The usually cool and collected Paige McKaslin shone like a morning star, like the gentle light that remained even when all others stars had gone out. She yanked open the door. “You’re a lifesaver, Evan.”

That troublesome tightness was back in his chest. He managed a shrug, but he didn’t manage to breathe. “I take it you got a hold of Phil.”

“He’s on his way.” She headed straight to the counter. He couldn’t help being struck by the long pleasant line her arms made as she hung up the phone. She had beautiful hands, slender and graceful.

And exactly why was he noticing this? Dumbstruck, he padded away through the other kitchen door, the swinging one that led to the far end of the dining room, so he could avoid the pool of water.

Once he was far enough away, his ability to breathe returned, but the emotion remained jammed in his throat. At the doorway, he glanced over his shoulder at her. She was working her way around the corner and didn’t seem to notice him looking.

He took one shaky step into the dining area and along the empty aisles. Only one other couple remained in the diner, finishing up their steak dinners. He fumbled onto the stool and leaned his elbows heavily on the counter. The impact of her smile remained, and his heart pounded crazily in his chest as if he needed a defibrillator.

Never had he reacted to a woman like that. Not even to Liz when he’d first fallen in love with her. What was happening? He didn’t know. But as he took his seat and grabbed the last of his fries, his taste buds paled. Everything seemed suddenly dim and distant. It was a strange reaction. Maybe he’d hit his head harder than he’d thought.

His pastor, his friends, his sons and even his brother-in-law, whom he’d kept in contact with after the divorce, all told him he ought to start dating again. That he should find some nice woman to share his golden years with.

I don’t want to admit to being anywhere close to having golden years.

“Evan?

The fork clamored to the plate. His fingers had somehow slipped. When he managed to meet Paige’s gaze, he made sure he didn’t notice that she was a beautiful, graceful woman with a tender heart. He forced himself to see the efficient businesswoman, who had taken his orders, served his meals and counted back his change over the years. That was the only Paige McKaslin he could allow himself to see.

“Department of Health rules. I can’t be open for business unless I have working restrooms.” She set a big paper bag on the counter between them and a take-out cup, capped, next to it. “Your extra order of fries, a slice of banana cream pie, I know how you like it, and a hot cup of that gourmet decaf you sometimes order.”

“Uh…thanks.” What he needed was to head straight home, empty house or not, and put some distance between his stirred-up emotions and Paige McKaslin. What he needed to do was to sit in the quiet of his home, the same house where his wife had cheated on him and finally left, and then he’d remember why being alone was the right choice.

“Here.” She reached beneath the counter and began dropping packets into the bag. “Let me make sure you’ve got napkins and a few things. Is there anything else I can do for you?”

“The pie would be fine. How much do I owe you?”

“Nothing, goodness. After your help tonight, this is on me. Please, you didn’t even get to finish eating.”

“No, forget it. I pay my way.” He pulled out his wallet and she held up her hand.

Men. Paige appreciated Evan’s pride and his ethics, but she had some of her own. “If you insist on paying for this meal, then I’m only going to give you the next one free. In fact, maybe I’ll do that anyway.” She turned toward the mature couple ambling down the aisle. “You, too, Mr. and Mrs. Redmond. I see that twenty you left on the table.”

“Well, dear, we’re not freeloaders, and we were nearly done anyhow,” Mr. Redmond kindly answered as he took a toothpick from the holder near the register. “You have a good night now. You still make the best steak in the state.”

“My mother’s secret spices.” Paige made a mental note to give the Redmonds their next meal free. She had the best customers anyone could wish for—they were so understanding! She grabbed the small white sack containing the baker’s box she’d filled in the kitchen and intercepted them at the front. “A little something for later.”

Mr. Redmond was not opposed to the gift of dessert and held the door carefully for his beloved wife. They disappeared together into the storm.

Sweet. What must it be like to have a bond like that? Paige couldn’t help the pang of regret or the pull of longing in her heart. She was thirty-eight years old, too old to believe in fairy tales, so why was she still wishing for one? The long painful years after her husband’s departure and the following divorce had taken their toll, as had the years of shouldering responsibilities for her family. Working sixteen-hour days seven days a week had worn her to the bone.

What she needed was a vacation.

No, what she needed, she corrected herself, as she waded to the hall closet, was a time machine so she could go back twenty years, grab that naive eighteen-year-old she’d been by the shoulders, and make that foolish, stars-in-her-eyes girl see the truth about life. A truth that the grown woman in her had come to accept as a cold, hard fact.

There was no such thing as true love and no real knights in shining armor. Anything that looked like a fairy tale was either an illusion or simply wishful thinking.

Okay, that sounded bitter, but it really wasn’t, she thought as she hauled out the mop. She sounded cold, but her heart wasn’t that, either. If anything, Paige felt foolish. Think of all the time and heartache she could have saved herself had she understood that truth earlier in her life. Her road would have been so much smoother had she seen the world—and the man she’d married—for what was real instead of what she’d wished them both to be.

If she had, she could have focused on what truly mattered—and only on that. She could have avoided wasting energy on dreams that only faded, on hopes that true love would walk into her life one day.

The hope that she’d find a good man to love had faded over time, bit by bit, shade by shade until it was nothing at all.

That was how she’d been living for a long, long time. She swiped the mop through the water, thinking that she’d been happier this way. Alone was good. She was strong, capable and independent. She was also safe from all the harm a man could bring to a woman. Sad, trying not to remember the long-ago love she’d been unable to save, she wrung the mop, listening to the water tap into the plastic bucket like rain.

As she worked, she listened to the sounds of Evan gathering up the bag and ambling down the aisle. His steps were deliberate and slow, as if he were in no hurry to leave. He drew to a stop in the breezeway between the eating area and the front counter. “Do you want me to hang around until Phil gets here?”

“That’s nice of you, but I’m used to being alone here after dark.” She swiped the mop through the cold water and wrung the sponge head well. “I do appreciate your help tonight. Not everyone would have gotten up to help me.”

“Glad I could make a difference. With my boys gone, I don’t get to do that much anymore.” He cleared his throat as if he had more to say, and could not.

What would it be like to come home to an empty house, she wondered? To open the door and know that her son would not be in his bedroom downstairs with his dog, listening to music or munching on potato chips or sacked-out fast asleep?

It had to be a long stretch of lonely, she thought as she went back to mopping. She didn’t know what to say as Evan walked past to snag his jacket from the coat tree, she couldn’t help noticing that he’d gotten pretty dirty crawling around under the diner. Dust streaked his slacks.

She bent to squeeze water from the mop head. “Uh, are those dry clean only?”

“No way. Don’t even worry about it.” He didn’t look at her as he slid into his black jacket, pulled a baseball cap over his head and leaned against the door.

“Drive safe out there, Evan. The roads have to be a mess.”

“You be safe, too.” He cleared his throat, slid a ten and a five on the counter and took the sack. There was a challenging glint in his dark eyes as he ambled past, as if he were daring her to give the money back.

The bell overhead jangled as he strode into the night. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Uh, yeah, that would be great. I’ll be waitressing.”

“Then I’ll be ordering.”

He stared at her for a beat, as the night began to engulf him. In the moment before the shadows claimed him completely, she saw the essence of him, not the physical, not the expected, but the steady strength of a good man.

The door swung shut, and she was alone. Snow pinged against the windows, driven by a cruel wind, and she swore she felt the echo of it deep in her heart, in a place that had been empty to romantic love since before her son was born.

And how foolish was that, that she was wishing for the impossible now? No, not exactly wishing, but thinking that it was possible again.

I’m more tired than I thought, she told herself with a chuckle as she turned the dead bolt and went back to her mopping.

Chapter Three

The house was dark. He’d forgotten to leave a light on again. Evan fumbled along the kitchen entryway. Cal had gone off to school what? seven, eight months ago, and he still couldn’t get used to him being gone. It hasn’t been so bad when Blake had left, for he and Cal had made the adjustment together. But this…having them both gone, it felt like he’d walked into someone else’s life.

But this was his life now. He was a free man, unencumbered and carefree. Shouldn’t it feel better than this? Evan tossed the keys and his battered gym bag, and slid the sack from the diner onto the counter, pushed the door to the garage shut with his foot and listened to his footsteps thump through the lonely kitchen.

Let there be light. He hit the switch and a flood of brightness shocked his eyes. He’d been outside so long, his eyes had gotten used to the darkness. The drive home had been slow and long and pitch-black. The headlights had been nearly useless in the rapid snowfall. And now, this place seemed too bright and too glaringly empty to feel like a home.

Well, he was just feeling lonely. It was Friday night, after all. Maybe one of the boys had had time to call in. That thought put some bounce in his stride as he left his briefcase on the kitchen table and leaned to check the message light on the phone recorder. Nothing.

Okay, young men had more fun things to do on Friday nights than to give their old dad a call. He was glad for them both. He wanted them to be out there, living their lives and doing well. It’s just that he hadn’t figured on how his own life would stand still when they were gone.

The flier one of his clients had sent him was sitting on the edge of the counter. He’d meant to toss it with the rest of yesterday’s mail, but he hadn’t gotten around to it yet. The apple-green paper seemed to glow neon in the half light and he pulled it out so he could look at it properly.

A Bible study for the rest of us. A bold carton caption stretched above a cartoon-like pen-and-ink drawing of a middle-aged man in his recliner. “The youth have their own lives, and the singles and the seniors have their activities. What about the rest of us? Come join us for Bible study, dessert and fellowship at Field of Beans.”

That was the coffee shop in town—and Evan knew Paige’s relatives owned it. That was a bonus, he suddenly realized. Plus, it was an evening meeting, something he could do after work. Something besides cleaning out the horse barn, that is.

He folded up the flyer and slid it in with the stack of bills needing to be paid. That was something he’d been meaning to do—study his Bible more. Now that he had the time. Maybe this was a solution to one of his lonely evenings. Maybe he would take everyone’s advice—not to date but to get out and do the things he’d been putting off when he’d been so busy raising his sons.

The phone rang while he was on his way through the family room. One of the boys? Hope jolted through him. He snatched up the cordless receiver on the second ring. “Hello?”

“Is this Evan Thornton?”

“Uh…” In his excitement, he’d forgotten to check the caller ID screen. “Yeah. Who is this?”

“This is Michael from First National Bank, how are you this evening? I want to tell you about our new identity theft program—”

At least it wasn’t bad news. “Not interested. Goodbye.”

He hung up the phone, glanced around the room at the TV remote that was on the coffee table where it belonged and not flung and lost somewhere in the room, at the chairs pushed in at the table instead of all shoved around askew. There were no stacks of books or heaps of sports equipment and coats lying around, all needing to be put away.

Would he ever get used to the quiet, to the orderliness, to the emptiness? Standing alone in the family room, which had been put into tidy order by the cleaning lady, he felt at a loss. This didn’t feel like home anymore.

As he headed upstairs to change out of his work clothes and into his barn clothes, he realized this was what it meant to be unencumbered and carefree, a free man again. There was no phone ringing off the hook, no kids traipsing through the house.

Just the telemarketers and him.

He’d always known his boys were a great blessing. He’d given thanks to the Lord every night as he’d lain down to sleep, but he’d never stopped to see the treasured gift that each day really was, and that, for all of those eighteen years, they were surprisingly fleeting.

“Well, that should just about do it.” Phil the plumber tried to stomp the snow off his work boots. But considering the mud he’d picked up from the crawl space, it was a hopeless cause anyway. “I’ve double-checked the length of the pipes and couldn’t find a drop anywhere. I think we’ve got the problem licked.”

“Music to my ears. Thank you.” Paige dropped the scrub brush into the soapy bucket, where she’d been cleaning the water line against the bathroom wall. “I appreciate this so much. I know it was a long drive out here, and it’s going to be worse going back.”

“Before you get all misty on me…” He gave a friendly—but not too friendly—wink. “I’ve got bad news. You’re gonna have to replace some of this pipe. It’s gonna be expensive, and if you want, I can work up an estimate. I can either do it for all new water lines, or I can do it in phases and we can just do the worst stuff first. You just let me know.”

Bad news? Did he say bad news? No, he had that wrong; this was devastating news. The small allotment she put faithfully into the savings account every month for repairs would never be enough. She didn’t have to go grab the latest bank statement to know that she couldn’t afford to replumb the entire diner.

She also knew how lucky she’d been tonight. The damage could have been worse, and as it was, she could open for business as usual in the morning. She’d only lost three hours of business tonight. Not bad, considering. Heaven was gracious, as always, and she was thankful. “Why don’t you work up the bit-by-bit estimate?”

“Fine by me. I’ll send it with my bill.”

Already dreading the amount due, she handed him a sack with the last of the cinnamon rolls. “A little something for your breakfast tomorrow. You drive safely out there now.”

“I’ve got four-wheel drive.” Phil hefted his big toolbox to the door and stopped to retrieve his parka. “I’ll get the stuff in the mail on Monday. Thanks, ma’am.”

When had she become a “ma’am”?

Probably about the same time her son had learned to drive. Thank God for hair color that covered the gray and intensive eye cream. Worry could do that to a girl. Stress was her middle name these days, and that combined with her age didn’t help. She wasn’t quite sure where all the time had gone—wait, erase that. She did. She’d spent probably seventy-five percent of the last twenty-two years right here in this diner.

After seeing Phil out and locking the door behind him, she glanced at the clock. The movie ought to be getting out about now. Great, she could get back to worrying about Alex being out there on these roads. Maybe what she needed to do was to expend some of that nervous energy and clean.

So she kept her eye on the clock as she scrubbed down the grill and wiped the counters, tables and chairs. Then she tackled the rest of the floor that hadn’t been flooded, mopping until the tile squeaked beneath the mop head and her cell phone was ringing in her back pocket.

A quick glance at the caller ID window revealed her home number. Good. That meant Alex was home safe and sound—and even five minutes before his curfew. How great was that? “Hey there. How was the movie?”

“Good. You can stop worrying now. Notice the time? I’m calling you before eleven. What do you think about that?”

“It’s unprecedented, and it makes me suspicious. Worry and suspicion are a mother’s job.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. So, are you gonna be home soon?”

That question made her suspicious, too. “You didn’t happen to notice a leak in the bathroom before you bugged out of here, did you?”

“Nope. I’d have told ya, even though Beth was waiting for me. Why? What’d I do?”

“Nothing. I had a leak in a pipe, that’s all. Are you getting ready for bed, or are you going to get lost in your new video game?

“Uh, nope, I wasn’t playing my X-Box, but thanks for reminding me, Ma.” He sounded pleased with himself. “Just kidding. You want me to go out and feed the horse for you?”

He was volunteering to do barn work? There had to be something wrong. That wasn’t normal teenage behavior. “Okay, what did you do?” Expecting the worst, Paige hefted the bucket toward the kitchen. “Don’t tell me you dinged the truck.”

“No way.”