"Go with me today. Please. We can talk some more. Instead of burgers, let's stop off for dessert lunch. Remember when we used to do that when you were little? When we had mental health days?"

That got a smile out of him. When the boys had been younger there was the occasional school day that she would denote as mental health day. Instead of school and nutritious meals, the day was all about sleeping in, eating junk, and having whatever dessert their hearts desired for lunch. For Brian, it was usually a hot fudge Sunday. "Hot fudge... You know you want to." She wiggled her eyebrows at him.

But before Brian had a chance to answer, the doorbell rang. Kat made it to the door ahead of him, ready to go on attack, knowing that it was Perry. "Hey, Kit-Kat. The kid ready? We're cruising out to play some tennis, and..."

Kat stepped out front of the door and shut it behind her. "I know your plan, but I want to tell you something..."

Just as Kat started into her tirade, Brian opened the door. "Hey, Dad. I'm ready."

Perry slapped him on the shoulder. "Good deal, bud. I'm gonna squash you on the court."

"Right." Brian smiled and his face lit up. Kat failed to do that these days-light up her child.

Perry turned back to Kat and smiled. "You were saying."

She smiled back. "We need to talk."

He winked at her. "Anytime, Kit-Kat. Anytime. Let's go, man. Knock some balls around."

Brian turned back and waved weakly at his mom. "I'll be home by dinner, okay? Maybe we could do dessert lunch tomorrow. Love you."

"I love you, too." She swallowed back the hurt, sucking it deep down. As she went to shut the front door, another unannounced, unwelcome guest pulled into her driveway.

Emily.

Kat pulled herself together and watched in horror and amazement as the woman went around to the back of the car, took Amber by the hand, grabbed two pink Polly Pocket suitcases, and practically dragged the child to the front door. "Good, I'm glad you're home."

"Hi, Emily. Um, I thought you were coming by tonight."

Emily stood up straight, tucked her long brunette hair behind her ears, and straightened her khaki skirt. "Our schedule has changed. The movers came early and I really need to be there with them, without any disturbances." She glanced down at Amber, who looked like she'd been crying and was ready to start again. "Here are her things and I won't be able to get back this weekend, but next weekend we'll pick her up on Friday. I'll call Christian with the details." She bent down and pulled Amber into her. "You be a good girl for your daddy and Kat. Mommy loves you." With that, she turned on her loafers and headed back to her convertible.

Kat looked down at Amber, who was now sucking her thumb and watching (most likely in terror) her mother leave. Kat took her by the hand and opened the front door. They could get her suitcases later. The last thing this child needed to see was her mother pulling away as she abandoned her, which was exactly what the self-centered bitch was doing. "Hey, sweetie, have you ever had a dessert lunch?"

Amber shook her head.

"Well, today you're going to, and it'll be the best lunch of your life. I promise." Kat stooped down, picked Amber up and twirled her around. "Did you hear me? Do you hear what I am saying? Dessert lunch! It's crazy. It's wild and it's gonna be the best!"

Amber giggled and so did Kat.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

Jamie Nora arrived thirty minutes late, as usual, but Jamie had prepared for it this time. "Buenos Dias, Nora," Jamie said.

Nora didn't reply, but instead took out a small piece of paper from her purse and unfolded it. Jamie recognized it. It was the check she'd written her last week. "El cheque es no good. Bounce, bounce, bounce." Nora made a motion like she was bouncing a ball on to the ground.

"No. No. I don't think so. You sure?" Jeez. Jamie had hoped this wouldn't happen. She'd written the check on Sunday as always and crossed her fingers that Nora wouldn't go to the bank until Tuesday. Tuesday was the day her check from work went automatically into her checking account. "When did you go to el banco?"

Nora stared at her.

Great. The game. Here she was going to play the game with Jamie and they were talking money. For once could they not play the stupid game of, I don't understand what you are saying to me, even though I really do. "Okay. Donde. No. Que. No. Quein did tu visita to el banco?" She asked motioning with her fingers like they were walking and knowing that her Spanish was pretty much all wrong but she had to at least make the effort.

Nora raised her eyebrows. "Hoy."

"Today?"

Nora nodded. "Hoy. Si."

"What? No. That's wrong. It has to be wrong. You wait here."

What Nora was telling her couldn't be. She couldn't be overdrawn. She headed toward her office and nearly crashed into Dorothy, who came around the corner out of her room. "Hello, darling girl. I was wondering if you could get me an appointment at the hairdresser today? I have a big date tonight." She smiled and did a little curtsy. "Guess who with?"

"Not now, Mom. I have to take care of something with the bank."

"What do you have to take care of with the bank? Tell Nathan to do it. He's the man of the house. He can handle whatever it is. Come in my room and see what I'm going to wear tonight. It's so pretty and it's all for Dean. It's purple with organza. I want to wear a purple flower in my hair."

"Not now. I will in a minute."

Dorothy frowned. "Jamie, that's enough. Go and tell Nathan to do it. That's what men do. They take care of the finances and you are supposed to take care of the house. That means me and Maddie, too."

How was it she could be so coherent on some things, but could never remember that Nate was no longer alive? Jamie grabbed her gently by the shoulders. "Mom. I am the man now. I do all of it. Nathan is gone. We have had this conversation. I will come and see your dress in a minute, and I will see about getting you a hair appointment, but first I have to deal with an issue with the bank." Dorothy frowned. Jamie hugged her tightly seeing that she'd hurt her feelings, but what was she supposed to do? If Nora's check didn't clear that morning, then something was seriously wrong. Jamie knew that she'd scheduled all of her bills to go out that day through online banking, and she'd set up her mortgage to automatically pay on the first of the month.

Nora followed Jamie, flagging the check at her as they went down the hallway. "I needed dinero. I needed para mi familia. You needed a pagar mi ahora. I no coming no mas. You paga mi."

Jamie waved a hand at her. "I know. Uno momento. Please wait. Por favor." She shut her office door, sat down at her desk and sighed while her computer booted up. When she finally signed onto her banking site, she gasped. "What the...?" Oh no. Jamie saw that she was a thousand dollars overdrawn. Yes, things were tight but how could this have happened? Her first thought was that someone had stolen her identity or had somehow gotten access to her checking account. That had to be it. Going over the withdrawals everything looked normal. Until she got to the mortgage payment. "How stupid! How could I have been so stupid?" she said out loud.

She opened up her desk drawer, found the bill file, and located the mortgage company's statement. She dialed the number on the payment coupon, went through the five minutes of prompts and listening to her balance, her pay off, et al., and then after seven or eight minutes of listening to ridiculous elevator music and commercials about American Bank, Jamie was ready to come unglued. Finally a person came on the other end-a real live, freaking human being. Imagine!

"American Bank. Can I have your account number and name please?" the woman on the other end asked.

Jamie gave up all of her info again.

"How may I help you today, Ms. Evans?"

Jamie explained. "You see, well, actually it's kind of funny. I do online banking with my bills and I did them over the weekend, and I paid you guys twice, and I don't have the money in my account to pay you a double payment. I'm not sure how I did that. I guess I wasn't paying attention. Stupid, I know, but can you help me?"

"Hang on a moment, please." Jamie could hear the clacking of computer keys through the phone.

"It shows here that your payment went through fine with us."

"Yes, with you it did. But um, I have quite a few checks that came out after yours and the bank did not clear them. See the first five hundred overdrawn they cleared, but after that they didn't and they're charging me something like thirty-three dollars per bounced check."

"I'm sorry about that, ma'am."

"Thank you. So can you refund me that extra payment?"

"We can't do that."

"What do you mean you can't do that? You have to. That's my money."

"That's our policy, ma'am. We can't do that."

"You have to do that. That's my money! I didn't mean to pay you twice and now I'm being penalized by my bank and it's costing me three times as much with all of these bank charges."

"I'm sorry, ma'am, you'll have to take that up with your bank."

Jamie clinched her fists. "Can I please speak to a supervisor?"

She endured another three minutes of crappy music and then a man came on the line. Jamie explained the entire scenario again.

In a southern accent the man said, "Gosh, ma'am, I sure am sorry about that, but you see it is our policy to apply anything over and above the payment you make toward the principal on the home."

"Can't you just with a few keystrokes make a change to that policy? Can't you please refund that money?"

"No, ma'am. I can't do that."

Jamie sighed. "I'm kind of in a financial crisis at the moment. I'm sure there is something you can do for me."

"What I can do, ma'am is waive any late fees you may incur, say, next month. So say you happen to be after the grace period, I can make sure you won't be charged if that turns out to be the case. Will that help?"

"No, that won't help. I'm never late and I don't want to start being late. You have to put that money back into my account, and then I can pay you on time in August but I'm on a fixed budget right now and I need that money to get through the month."

"I really am so sorry, ma'am but there is nothing I can do to reverse that."

Jamie shut her eyes tight. Think. Think. Nate would have asked her to ask herself what was the outcome she wanted here. She wanted the damn money back into the account. That wasn't going to happen, so what was the next best case? Wait a minute. Something the manager said hit her. "Okay then, can you at least make that overpayment go toward my next month's payment? That should be doable, right?"

"No. I can't, ma'am."

"You're kidding me. Why not?" Jamie was starting to lose it.

"It's not our policy. You would have had to have written two checks for that to happen. One for this month and one for next month. But the good news is that you now have that extra money applied to your principal. That is always nice to know, isn't it? A little security in that."

"No there isn't! I don't care about the damn principal. Not right now! I care that I am overdrawn by a grand, that I'm being charged by my bank for every draft now, and that I won't have any money in the bank for another week. I need to get groceries and my mother-in-law needs her hair done." She knew she sounded frantic.

"I understand your predicament, ma'am. I really do, but there is nothing that I can do for you. That is our policy."

"Screw your policy and screw you!" Jamie slammed the phone down and read over her online statement again. How totally ridiculous. That was her money. Now she was running late.

Jamie came out of the office with both Nora and Dorothy standing there obviously eavesdropping. "You paga mi."

"Yes. I will pay you today in cashola. Okay. Got it? Make her lunch and take care of her. I have a meeting." She was way too exasperated to even try and speak her broken Spanish. She grabbed her purse and headed out the door. How she was going to pay her- especially in cash-she had no clue, but she'd figure it out. Right now she had to drive into the city and have lunch with her brother-in-law David. Maybe it was time for David to step up and help out financially with his mom. One area she and Nate had not been smart in was financial planning, but who plans for their husband to die at thirty-five? She certainly hadn't.

But he had died. And now, as Jamie headed out onto the 101, tears blurred her vision and she had a long talk with Nathan, asking him over and over again the same question until she was shouting it. WHY?

Nate's brother, David, sat across from Jamie looking suave and self-satisfied. He did have the same blue eyes that her husband had had, but David was nowhere near as good-looking or as decent as Nate. He was rounder, balding and looking into the eyes of his, there was something in them that hadn't been reflected in Nate's-greed.

David had chosen a trendy fish and chips place near the wharf. "I'm not sure what you're asking me for, Jamie. You and Nate agreed to take Mom on as she aged. This is a discussion we had a long time ago. Susan and I never planned for my mother to stay with us. We both have careers, and on top of that Mom has always lived in Napa Valley."

Jamie pushed aside the fried food unable to stomach much of anything. "I have a career too, and a daughter that I'm raising on my own, and yes, we did have this discussion when Nate was alive, but that has changed. I'm not asking you to move Dorothy in with you, but I could use some financial help."

"What about the money from Nate's life insurance?"

Jamie shook her head in disbelief. "Wait a minute, this is your mother we're talking about. And as far as the life insurance or any monies left to me from Nate, that's a joke. We spent most of it trying to keep him alive."

"I told you both that was a waste of time and that you would have been better off spending that time together doing things with each other and Maddie."

"My husband, your brother, wanted to live and I wanted him to live and we were willing to do anything if we had even the remotest possibility of making that happen."

David leaned back in his chair, a cool breeze coming off the bay. "Here's what Susan and I are prepared to do. My wife is looking into a few facilities both here in the city and out in Napa. When we find a home that is suitable for all of us, then we can place her there."

Defeated Jamie didn't reply at first. "I'm not looking to put her in a nursing home. I am only looking for some financial help. I have someone who comes in daily and helps us out."

"I'm not paying for your housekeeper, Jamie."

"She is not just my housekeeper. She makes Dorothy's meals, helps her dress, watches over her, and she's been very good in tolerating Dorothy's rapidly declining mental state."

"Yeah well, her mental state." He shoved a French fry into his mouth, and while still chewing, continued, "All the more reason for her to be in a nursing home. Don't you think that would be best for you, anyway? You could get on with your life." David's cell phone rang and he answered.

Jamie looked out at the wharf, boats weaving side to side as a steady strong breeze filtered through. Men on fishing boats tugged in their nets and yelled back and forth to one another. The silver water cupped into small white caps with what looked like gold coins bouncing off them as the sun peeked through the myriad of clouds, reflecting it's rays off the water.

David bantered on with the person on the other end of the phone about some brief. She couldn't believe this guy was remotely related to the man to whom she'd been married. She had a gut feeling that David's wife was calling the shots in this situation. If he made waves and Susan took off for better things, then David would see his posh lifestyle go down the drain. He made decent money, but he didn't come from the kind of money his wife had.

He hung up the phone. "I have to run." He tossed down enough cash for his half of the lunch. "It's been hard times for everyone, Jamie. Money is tight for us too these days. We'll do what we can. I'll have Susan call you when she finds something, and also to set up some time when we can have Maddie for the weekend. Good to see you." He bent down and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Take care."

On her way home, she ran the conversation over and over again in her mind. She called David every name in the book and drove faster than she should've. She couldn't believe she'd taken the day off work to get nothing accomplished.

She picked Maddie up at the ranch where she'd signed her up for horse camp for the week and prayed that check wouldn't bounce too.

She parked and watched for a minute as Tyler had the group of kids seated on the grass while he and another instructor put on a puppet show. Jamie got out to watch. She sat down next to Maddie, who took her hand. Jamie squeezed it. Tyler caught her eye and she smiled at him. The story they told with the puppets had something to do with two cowboys, a sheriff and one very smart horse-smarter than the cowboys or the sheriff. Tyler did funny voices and all the kids laughed. Jamie laughed too. It was a nice diversion.

"All right, gang, see you all tomorrow at eight. Don't forget to take home your craft that you made with Gwen, and remember we're going to have a little quiz tomorrow on the anatomy of the horse, so look at the worksheet I gave you. You can go and get your things."

"My stuff is in the clubhouse, Mom," Maddie said.

"Okay babe. I'll wait."

Maddie sprinted off with another little girl. Tyler came over. "She's a great kid."

"Thanks. She looks like she's having fun."

"Definitely. How about you? Are you enjoying the lessons and the volunteer work?" he asked.