Okay, okay… At first she was going to find him and kill him. But after she’d spent time helping Leigh cope with the divorce, her job change, moving and multiple pregnancy, she began to understand that it had probably been the other way around. Leigh was such a bungler when it came to romance that she’d probably broken the poor fool’s heart. Jess had thought about demanding the name of the responsible man, but then she decided that what Leigh really needed was a specialist who could help her catch up socially with the rest of her age group. Otherwise, Jess’s demands for the culprit’s name would not have done much good. She might have gotten John as a son-in-law, but it would undoubtedly have been far too temporary.

While Leigh was carrying and birthing the twins—and seeing the therapist—she was also dropping hints about her Durango fling. “He’s just a simple, semi-hardworking guy who hates the whole concept of me having a Ph.D. You wouldn’t want to have me marry just any old ski bum, now would you?” she’d asked. “Oh, sure, he has a job, but until they form a ski patrol in L.A., he wouldn’t budge from Durango. Besides, since this little accident occurred, he’s gotten himself married…and he doesn’t even know about the babies.”

After she had moved back to Durango, Jess called John out to do fix-it jobs at the house and watched him like a hawk. He never asked about her daughter, but she could see him scanning the place for pictures. She kept one old picture in a frame and moved it around the house to satisfy herself that John indeed seemed to look for it and relax around the eyes and mouth when he finally spotted it. She purposely did not mention her grandsons… She was saving that for a time when she needed his reaction. Now she believed she had him cold.

Recently Leigh had herself paved the way for what would eventually become Jess’s plan to get her daughter married to the father of her children. It was when Leigh said, “I was always so smart, but so dumb about love. You know, Mom, I might not have picked the right guy, but I sure did love him a lot. And he’s not a bad guy. In fact, he’s a really down-deep good guy. He just couldn’t accept me. I was too much.”

“Maybe he just didn’t have a chance,” Jess had said.

“And now it’s too late.”