"Well, I'm not and what should that matter anyway?" I got the distinct feeling that I wasn't going to like this man. He was far too brusque to suit me, but then again Peggy had warned me.

"Your age will tell me how far down to put you on the list."

I grew more agitated by the moment. "I don't think my age is any of your business."

"Okay, fine, don't tell me."

"I have no intention of doing so."

I heard him mutter under his breath, "Would you like me to guess?"

"No, what I'd like is an estimate for a new sign for the B and B I recently purchased from the Frelingers."

"When do you need it?"

"The estimate or the sign?"

"Both."

"As soon as possible." I wasn't sure I was going to be able to work with this man. "Have you done work for the Frelingers before?"

"Plenty."

"When can I expect to see you?"

"I'll put you on the list. I heard the Frelingers had found a buyer," he said.

I noticed that he didn't offer his welcome. What an unpleasant man.

"You're not from these parts, I heard," he said.

"From what I heard, neither are you," I returned. I could give as good as I got.

He ignored that. "I can probably stop by sometime later today."

"Okay, but call first. I have errands to run and I might not be here." Nor did I have any intention of waiting around for him all afternoon.

He chuckled as if I'd said something amusing. "Call first? Do I sound like the kind of man who enjoys making phone calls?"

I had to admit he didn't. "Take your chances then."

"I will."

I was tempted to make a sarcastic comment like "nice talking to you" but resisted. I did have to admit, though, that I was curious about Mark Taylor.

Chapter 8.

Josh stared at Mich.e.l.le and wondered what she'd meant. She'd been a friend to Richard because of how she felt about Josh? That made no sense. They had no relationship. Oh sure, he'd been sympathetic when they were teenagers. He'd helped her dad paint the garage one summer and she'd brought him a gla.s.s of iced tea and they'd chatted a bit, but Josh had never thought of her as anything more than a friend-in part because he had always a.s.sumed she'd set her sights on Dylan. He looked at her with fresh eyes, somewhat astonished that he'd been so blind.

For now, Josh decided to ignore the comment. It was better that way. Less complicated. Less troubling. He couldn't focus on anything other than dealing with Richard; anything else would be distracting.

Interrupting his thoughts, Mich.e.l.le asked, "You ready to slay the dragon?" She seemed anxious to let the comment slide as well.

Josh had never thought of himself as a dragon slayer, but he liked the a.n.a.logy. "Ready as I'll ever be."

Grabbing his jacket he walked with Mich.e.l.le across the yard toward Richard's home. Josh noticed that the house was showing a lot of disrepair. The gutters needed to be cleared and it looked like it was well past time to have the roof checked for leaks. The siding could use a paint job as well.

Richard had always been a stickler about keeping the house and yard neat-he'd taken great pride in it.

It seemed his stepfather had given up on just about everything after Dylan's death. The neglect also said that Richard had been unwell for a long while.

Mich.e.l.le didn't bother to do more than politely knock before she opened the door and let herself into the house.

"Richard, it's me," she called out as she led the way inside.

"He's not with you, is he?" Richard called.

By he, Richard must mean Josh.

"I'm here," Josh shouted back, trying to keep it light.

They found Richard in the family room, sitting in his recliner, his feet up and his legs covered by a knitted afghan. It was the dark blue one his mother had knit the year before she died. Josh remembered how she'd struggled with getting the cables all to face the same direction. Funny how little things like that stuck in his mind like a protruding nail in a floorboard, catching on things. For an instant Josh experienced a sense of overwhelming loss. He was a man of well over thirty, but he missed his mother. He shook it off before either Richard or Mich.e.l.le could see his sadness.

"What do you want now?" Richard demanded. His voice was gruff and weak, as if he'd wanted to shout but didn't have the strength or the breath to manage it.

"Just a couple of things that belonged to my mother," Josh said, keeping his voice level and calm.

"Like what?"

"Her cameo." His mother had worn it nearly every day. She'd loved the small broach that had been pa.s.sed down to her from her mother.

Richard frowned and shook his head as if to say he didn't remember any cameo. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Josh was convinced his stepfather had gotten rid of it just to spite him. "This cameo," he clarified and grabbed a photo of Richard and his mother off the bookcase and handed it to Richard. "See, there on her blouse. It belonged to her before she married you and I'd like to have it to remember her by."

Richard stared at the framed photograph for a long time before he answered. "I buried your mother with the pin ... I didn't think."

Josh frowned. He tried to remember seeing his mother inside the casket and couldn't recall what she'd been wearing or the jewelry she'd had on at the time.

"The funeral director would have given it back to you," he insisted. "Right along with her wedding ring."

Richard stared back at him and slowly shook his head. "I ... I don't know where it is, and even if I did ..."

Josh didn't stay to hear anything more. Not even five minutes inside the door and his temper was ready to explode. The two of them couldn't be in close proximity without an angry outburst.

"Where are you going now?" Richard called after him.

Josh ignored the question and headed up the stairs to what had been his bedroom at one time. He heard footsteps behind him and he knew Mich.e.l.le was trailing after him. Being in Cedar Cove again was proving to be so much more difficult than he'd ever antic.i.p.ated.

"Josh?" Mich.e.l.le reached him just before he entered his old room.

He heaved in a deep breath in order to center himself. His emotions had gone from grief to anger so quickly that even he was shocked. This entire trip had him on an emotional roller coaster. Josh wasn't accustomed to dealing with these sharp ups and equally rapid downs. His heart pounded hard against his ribs while he struggled within himself.

"I apologize, Mich.e.l.le," he said, turning to face her and planting his hands on her shoulders. "I don't know what it is about Richard that makes me so angry. I didn't mean to blow up like that."

"It's a volatile situation," she said. "I understand."

Josh stuffed his hands in his pockets. She was right; it was that all right, and more.

"If you want I'll ask Richard if I can look through his bedroom for your mother's cameo."

Josh shook his head. "It would probably be better to just wait."

"You mean ..."

She didn't say the words out loud. She didn't need to complete the thought for Josh to know what she was asking.

"Yeah," he confirmed. Josh wanted to wait until Richard was dead to find the cameo, if it was to be found. No sense unsettling the old man any more than he already had.

"So which room was yours?" Mich.e.l.le asked as they stood in the middle of the narrow upstairs hallway. Dylan's bedroom was on the right and Josh's on the left. The bathroom they'd shared was at the end of the hallway. The master bedroom was downstairs. Josh wondered if Richard had taken that into account when he purchased the house years ago, antic.i.p.ating that he wouldn't have the strength to climb the stairs in his old age. He couldn't now; otherwise he would have followed Josh up the staircase.

Instead of answering Mich.e.l.le's question, Josh opened his bedroom door. The room looked exactly as it had when he'd been in high school. The bedspread was the same one that had been there when he'd left-correction-when he'd been kicked out.

The dresser and mirror were also exactly as he remembered them. He walked over and opened the dresser drawer and frowned. Instead of his T-shirts being in the top drawer where he always kept them no matter where he lived, he discovered his socks and underwear. They were stuffed haphazardly inside, which was just the way he'd left them-in a different drawer. The second one down held the T-shirts.

"Do you want to pack up any of these clothes?" Mich.e.l.le asked. "They look almost brand-new."

Josh shook his head. "I'd prefer to give them all to charity ... except," he paused and smiled at Mich.e.l.le. "I want my letterman's jacket." He'd earned that letter his senior year in track. Dylan had been the athlete who all the girls had pined for, but Josh had made his mark on the track field. He wasn't a great runner, but he'd been good enough to make the team.

"Where'd you keep it?" Mich.e.l.le asked, sounding excited herself.

She'd made a point of attending all the school's sporting events, including the track meets. Josh remembered how she used to cheer the team on from the sidelines, and was grateful. A couple of times he'd gotten a ride home with her. His mother had been too sick to attend the meets and Richard, well, he couldn't be bothered. Even driving to pick Josh up after an event had seemed to be a huge burden for him, and he'd always complained. So much for parental support.

Josh slid open the closet door. A couple of shirts remained and a good pair of slacks, the very ones he'd worn to his mother's funeral. Then he saw his letterman's jacket.

"Oh, Josh." Mich.e.l.le's hand flew to her mouth.

Someone had taken a razor blade to the sleeves, ripping them open, slashing away at the leather.

Someone?

Josh was able to narrow that someone down to a single individual in less than a second.

Richard.

It could only have been Richard. For an instant he saw red. Josh wasn't about to stand by and ignore this. He didn't care that Richard was sick, this was destructive and immature for a grown man. Josh started out of the room when Mich.e.l.le placed a restraining hand on his arm.

"Why?" Josh demanded. "What did I ever do to Richard that would give him reason to destroy the one thing I was most proud of accomplishing in high school?"

"Oh Josh, I hardly know what to say ..."

"Why?" he demanded again. "What could I have possibly done for him to hate me this much?"

Josh sank onto the end of the bed. Mich.e.l.le sat with him and reached for his hand, gripping it with both of her own.

"I think he did it the day he learned Dylan was dead," she said.

"How would you know?"

"I don't for sure. It's an educated guess. He was in such pain that he lashed out."

"At me? But why? Explain it to me if you can, because frankly it looks pretty sick."

"Because you were alive and his son was dead," she explained. "You were only here on the day of the funeral, but I was around afterward and it was bad for Richard. So bad that my parents called me and asked me to talk to him. Richard was inconsolable, in such terrible grief that no one seemed to be able to reach him. My family thought I might be able to help. You have to understand that he didn't come out of the house for days. He didn't eat, didn't bathe."

"I was alive and his son was dead."

"I realize that makes no sense." Mich.e.l.le squeezed his arm in consolation.

Josh wanted to lash out at his stepfather, make him sorry for what he'd done; instead he forced himself to calm down.

"In other words, punishing me for being alive made sense to Richard," Josh said.

She leaned against him. "Letting your anger get the best of you now wouldn't do either of you any good."

Josh knew she was right. As difficult as it was, he'd need to simply let it all go. "Actually, in some way it doesn't come as that much of a shock. Richard never liked me. I was little more than an enc.u.mbrance that he had to tolerate while my mother was alive."

"Your mother loved him, though, despite his flaws," Mich.e.l.le said.

"She did." Josh sighed and realized Mich.e.l.le was right. His mother had been happily married to Richard. Josh's father had abandoned the family when he was barely five and Teresa had struggled as a single mother, doing the best she could. She viewed Richard as an honorable man. And to her, he had been all that and more.

Unfortunately, Josh's stepfather had never taken a liking to him. Josh tended to think that Richard had never tried. He'd married Teresa and found in her a wife and a mother for the son he loved. As it happened, Teresa had come with a bit of baggage in the form of a son, whom Richard did his best to ignore.

It hadn't taken very long for Josh to figure out the lay of the land. Dylan was the apple of his father's eye. It was always Dylan, and nothing Josh accomplished would ever measure up in Richard's eyes. Josh had been a fatherless boy, longing for a male figure in his life, which only made it worse. While Dylan didn't excel academically, he was a star in both football and basketball. Josh helped him get a pa.s.sing grade in geometry, earning his stepbrother's respect. The two got along just fine.

Not so with Richard and Josh. They locked heads often, and although Josh was almost always on the losing end, it didn't stop him from challenging his stepfather.

"He was good to my mother," he said, deep in thought.

"I see this same scenario in my work again and again. Richard loved your mother, but wasn't at all loving with you."