She didn’t know but guessed that Luke Gates lived a more austere existence. She imagined he’d be as content to sleep under the stars with a buffalo robe for warmth and a saddle for a pillow as he would in a feather-soft bed with eider-down pillows and thick blankets.

Josh had inherited his mother’s need for keepsakes. Posters covered the walls of his room, and model planes hung from the ceiling. His desk was littered with baseball cards, trophies, books and CDs and his floor space was crowded with toys he’d just about outgrown. “You okay?” she asked, seeing that her son was channel surfing, flipping from a docudrama about the police to the baseball game.

“Fine, Mom. Don’t worry.”

“I’m your mother. It’s my job.”

“Oh, right.” Josh rolled his eyes.

While Blue lifted his head in the hopes of snatching a dropped morsel, Katie handed Josh the plate. “Better than Papa Luigi’s,” she said. “You’ve got my personal guarantee.”

“Sure.”

“Ask anyone in town.” She tucked the ice bag around his ankle.

He sucked in his breath and stiffened, tipping his plate and nearly losing a sandwich to the floor and the ever-watchful Blue. “Jeez, Mom, that’s cold.”

“It’s supposed to be.”

“I know, but, Mom, it’s freezing cold.”

“That’s the general idea,” she deadpanned. “It’s ice.”

“I don’t want it.”

“You have to. Wait a second.” She went to the linen closet in the hall, found a thin washcloth, then wedged it between the bag and Josh’s bare ankle. “Better?”

“Lots.” He nodded, bit into his sandwich and turned his attention to the little black-and-white TV where a batter was sizing up the next pitch.

“Good.” She patted him on the head and resisted the urge to overmother him and kiss his cheek.

By the time she’d returned to the kitchen Luke had settled himself into one of the chairs that surrounded the small table she’d bought at a garage sale three years earlier. His long, jeans-clad legs stretched out at an angle to the middle of the kitchen floor and he was sliding his finger down the open Yellow Pages of the phone book. “Tow company,” he said to the question she hadn’t yet voiced.