He thought there had to be something wrong with him. The way that he watched her straight white teeth close over the crispy meat, the way that his focus was completely captured by how she chewed.

But everything about her was ethereal.

Even her bacon-eating.

And years in her presence hadn’t done a thing to acclimate him to that.

“Well, you seem to take a particular kind of joy in being unconventional.”

“What did convention get me? Look at my parents. Conventional as could be. High school sweethearts. You know, I don’t know... If he turned into a monster after they got married or if he always was one. If she... If she knew when she married him, or if he changed on her. I wish I did. I wish I did, because it definitely changes the way that I think about trusting people. Whether or not I think other people are less trustworthy, or that your own self is.”

“Either conclusion isn’t much good,” he said.

“But it’s important,” she said.

“You’re not your mother,” he said.

“I know,” she said. “I’ve pretty much gone out of my way not to be. Hence the lack of convention. I refuse to care one bit what somebody else thinks about what I should want or what I should do. My life is my own, Ryder. And I fought very hard for that.”

“I know you did,” he said.

That girl had carried more weight on those slim shoulders than anybody should have to. And she stood strong and brilliant in spite of everything that she had endured.

“So you’re going to help me find the guy. And...”

“Nothing.”

“Well, you want me to stay. What do you want me to do?”

He looked at her, and his breath caught. The words caught right along with it. “Nothing,” he said. “I just want you here.”

They didn’t speak after that. And Ryder found that suited him down to the ground.

He didn’t have anything else to say.

CHAPTER FOUR

SAMMY WAS FEELING much better about life in general by the time dinner rolled around and she was in the kitchen with Iris slathering butter onto French bread.

The house had often been chaotic over the years, and she couldn’t say that she was the best housekeeper. Iris was a lot better at the cleaning and organizing than Sammy was, but ultimately none of them were going to win awards.

But cooking... That was something that they had sunk into.

There was something about it that had felt like creating all the lost hugs that they were missing from parents who were gone. Or in Sammy’s case, parents who should have loved her more.

They had made holidays feel like something merry because they spent hours on cookies, cakes and pies. Roasting turkey, making stuffing.

Neither of them had learned it from their parents. But Iris had an old recipe card box that had belonged to her grandmother, and with that the two of them had made mealtime at Hope Springs one place where no one felt like they were missing out on anything.