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“Fesh fies!” Penny cried, pointing at the boys.
“But apple fries just aren’t the same,” Noah murmured. He caught Ella’s eye. “You should head back down the mountain before the storm hits. At Penny’s age, a case of the sniffles can turn serious overnight.” There. Spoken like a country doctor who only had a little girl’s best interests at heart.
Mitch gave Noah an approving nod, the kind of gesture that said, You’re one of us.
Noah clenched his teeth.
I have nothing in common with these people.
Worry flashed in Ella’s eyes. She’d no doubt weathered illnesses with her daughter before. Little kids picked up every germ.
“It’s just a cold.” Shane made light of Noah’s concern.
Ella’s gaze shuttered. She gave Noah a small smile. “Thanks, but it looks like we’re staying.”
“That’s too bad,” Noah murmured, staring at his gloved right hand and wishing Ella Monroe would leave town quickly.
A woman like Ella made a man remember he’d once had lofty dreams, made him think he could still be somebody important, made him try to regain ground when the odds were embarrassingly, impossibly stacked against him.
Well, what do you know. His inner cynic chuckled.
Turns out, Noah did have something in common with the other residents of Second Chance.
He wanted the Monroes gone.
CHAPTER TWO (#u620f0279-c426-5259-9dc8-308fc4fad755)
ELLA SHARED BOTH potato and apple fries with Penny at the counter of the Bent Nickel and tried not to stare the entire time at Noah and his gloves.
It was chilly inside the coffee shop and Ella hated being cold, but when she’d wiped baby snot off Noah’s pant leg his gaze had heated her right up.
All due to embarrassment, naturally.
She sneaked a glance at Noah, testing her embarrassment theory.
His black hair was long and pushed back from his face, brushing his collar in loose waves. He had a full, short, dark beard and broad shoulders. His brow had been furrowed since she’d walked in and his eyebrows were on permanent ground patrol over his blue eyes. He’d seemed different than the rest of the men in the coffee shop. Or maybe it was just that he held himself stiffly, as if he considered himself an outsider.
Ella could relate. She’d spent most of her middle and high-school years feeling like an outsider, a foster child with a few friends and a drawer of hand-me-down clothes. She’d since filled her closet, but after what had happened at the reading of Harlan’s will, she wasn’t sure of her future as a Monroe. If she couldn’t make a market assessment Bryce’s cousins approved of would they shut her out of the family, too?
Her attention drifted to Noah. His clothes were new. That wasn’t what kept him apart from the others. It was the black leather gloves, she decided. That, and the soulful look in his eyes.
Their gazes connected, and Ella lost track of her breath. The lack of oxygen combined with awkwardness heated her cheeks. The embarrassment theory was holding water.
Embarrassment and the fact that he’s gorgeous and looks at me as if I wasn’t the kind of woman to eat a package of Penny’s cheese and crackers for breakfast.
The Bent Nickel diner was a throwback to a simpler time. Green-and-white checked linoleum tiles. Chrome bar stools with mint-green vinyl seats. Forest green vinyl booths and worn white Formica tabletops. Framed photos crowded the walls, mostly black-and-white pictures of people in front of cabins and vintage cars.
There were elementary-age kids gathered around the L-shaped counter and a booth beside it. Schoolbooks, notebooks and laptops were stacked or open. Tall milkshake glasses and baskets of French fries were distributed among them. Between the chatter they spared amused glances toward Andrew and Alexander, Sophie’s twin boys, who were holding a spinning race on their bar stools.
“Me, too.” Penny patted Ella’s arm and then pointed to the twins. “Me, too.”
Penny didn’t have the arm strength to spin herself. Ella turned Penny’s bar stool in a slow circle.
“Whoa.” Penny’s eyes got huge. When her back was to the counter she had nothing to hold on to, particularly when she had an apple fry in one hand and a potato fry in the other. That didn’t stop her from saying, “Again,” when she’d completed one circuit.
Ella turned her stool a second time, aware of Noah’s gaze upon them.
“Woof.” Penny was halfway around on the stool. She pointed out the window and dropped the potato fry. “Uh-oh.”
Ella stopped spinning as she realized what Penny had seen—a yellow dog with an uneven gait. “Someone’s dog is outside.”
“That’s a Labrasnoodle.” Roy moved toward the window. “Does it belong to one of you Monroes? It’s one of them designer dogs. A Labrapoo or Doodledoo or something.”
“We brought kids,” Shane said loftily. “Not dogs.”
“The dog’s limping.” Roy peered to the side. “Come on, Doc. Looks like someone dumped a dog out here again.” Roy glanced back at Noah.
Ella and Sophie exchanged raised-eyebrow glances, as if thinking the same thing: What was a young veterinarian doing in an old town like this?
Noah didn’t get up. “I’m a surgeon, not a vet.” His fingers flexed.
Ella and Sophie continued to be perplexed: What was a young surgeon doing in an old town like this?
A yellow, curly-haired Labradoodle placed two large paws on the diner’s window, peeked inside, barked once and then dropped back to all fours.
“Woof,” Penny barked again.
Her antics made the twins giggle and a preteen girl with braces say, “Ahhh, how cute.”
Roy opened the door and the dog burst in, along with a surge of cold air. His feet scrambled for purchase and he slipped and slid around the room, managing to gobble up Penny’s fry on the floor before he crashed into Noah almost the same way Penny had done.
The dog put his big paws on Noah’s sturdy thighs, then he exhibited a panting grin that passed over every human in the room before settling on Noah. Immediately, he was surrounded by eight schoolchildren eager to pet the dog and take a photo with their tablets.
“Isn’t this against some kind of health code?” Shane asked from one of the dark green booths. He was nursing a cup of black coffee and reading a thin local pamphlet on real estate for sale in the area.
Ella made a mental note to get a copy for herself.
“In winter, the health codes are more like guidelines.” Roy thrust his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels. “And in winter the Bent Nickel is more like Ivy’s family room.”
“Talk like that will get me shut down quicker than the wind whips down this stretch of road during a blizzard,” Ivy snapped. And then her tone softened. “I’d prefer to report that Doc’s therapy dog came in the diner today. Just keep him out of the kitchen.”
“I’ll get you a bag of dog food, Doc.” A tall woman grabbed her coat and hurried out the door.
“He’s not mine.” Noah sounded put out.
Roy put his hands on his knees and bent to peer at the canine. “He’s not putting any weight on that back foot. Why do you think that is, Doc?”
Noah shook his head. “Again, not a vet.”
Mitch cut his way through the crowd and ran his hands around the dog’s neck. “I saw this guy outside earlier. He wouldn’t come to me and he doesn’t have a collar.”
Most of the kids drifted back to the counter and their food.
Laurel had recovered enough from being carsick to get up and go over to pet the dog. “He might be microchipped.”
“Not likely if he don’t have a collar.” Roy sat down by the fire and whistled for the dog. “We’ve had folks dump pets out here before. Sad way to treat a member of the family.”
Ella’s compassion for the dog increased.
“Woof.” Penny’s eyes were huge. She’d never seen such a large dog before.
The dog heard Penny and wagged his big tail, but he didn’t move from his position in Noah’s lap.
“Come on, boy.” Roy whistled again, slapping his thin thighs. “Dogs love me.”
The dog wasn’t budging from Noah.
“Maybe he’s deaf,” Roy said brightly. He had the kind of attitude that nothing could bring down, not even a blizzard.
The dog turned his head to smile at Roy.
“He’s made up his mind.” Roy stood. “Dogs have a way of choosing people and he seems to have chosen you, Doc.”
Noah sighed and stared into the dog’s big brown eyes. “Are we really going to do this?”
The dog bumped his big nose against Noah’s chin, making all the children laugh.
Noah ran his gloved hands over the dog’s torso and down each of his front legs. And then he ran his hand down the leg the dog held off the ground.
The poor boy yelped and somehow—big as he was—managed to climb completely into Noah’s lap.
“Best take him to your clinic,” Roy said. “He might need surgery.”
Noah blanched.
“While you take care of the dog, Noah, I’ll check in our guests.” Mitch gestured that they should follow him, which was easier said than done. Everyone had to bundle up first.
Shane drove the SUV two businesses down from the diner and parked, while Laurel, Sophie and Ella ushered the kids along the shoveled walk.
The diner, the general store, with its two gas pumps and a single-bay garage, and the inn had all been built along the river and had enough space between the two-lane highway and the buildings for a vehicle to pull in and park perpendicular to the road. There was a narrow sidewalk from one building to another covered by a slanted roof to offer some protection against the elements, although not the cold.
There were small log-cabin houses up and down the highway, many of which looked forlorn and deserted. There were many buildings on the other side of the road, both new and old. A huge log cabin sat on the corner and butted against another small highway, across from which was a small church and a building with a cupola and bell.
Ella didn’t relish doing a market assessment with so many buildings spread out and heavy snow in the forecast. Would she have to shovel her way to every door?
The icy wind blew strong enough to chafe Ella’s cheeks and sweep Penny’s feet out from under her.
Ella kept her daughter upright but shrugged deeper into her stadium jacket. “I hate cold.”
“You should come live near me in Southern California.” Laurel wrapped her thin leather jacket tighter around her chest. “Since you have to move.”
“Don’t take her away from me,” Sophie countered. “I’m determined to get a job at the museum in downtown Philadelphia.” Sophie had been the Monroes’ art-collection curator.
Yes, the collection was so large it needed a manager.
“Cold, Mom.” Penny raised her arms to be lifted into Ella’s.
They hurried past the garage and then climbed the stairs onto the wood porch, which spanned the length of the inn, and went inside.
The Lodgepole Inn was a long, two-story log cabin wedged between the highway and a bend in the river. The logs used to build the cabin hadn’t been planed. Their curving girth took an extra foot off the interior on every exterior wall, making the large space seem cozier somehow.
“How big is this place?” Ella asked while Mitch checked her in.
“The Lodgepole Inn has ten rooms upstairs and two suites downstairs.” Mitch had thick black hair and a cautious smile, one that you didn’t usually find in politicians or innkeepers. He swiped Ella’s credit card and returned it to her. “My daughter and I run the place.”
Penny and her cousins ran around the great room, which had a comfy couch covered in a blue-and-brown quilt, several high-backed chairs, a large TV on the wall and a big rock fireplace, the kind pioneers used to cook in but with hearth seats built into either side. The kids squealed and released pent-up energy from hours spent on a plane and in a vehicle.
“How charming,” Sophie said, giving herself a tour of the main room.
“Our inn used to be a brothel for the miners.” A preteen girl with pale strawberry blond hair, braces and her father’s cautious smile handed Ella a metal key attached to a thin strip of wood that had the words Blue Bonnet carved in it.
“Gabby,” Mitch gently chastised. “That’s not the way we market the Lodgepole Inn.”
The preteen shrugged. “I did a paper on the history of the town.”
“We don’t know for sure it was a brothel,” Mitch said apologetically, as if it might matter to the Monroes. “Some people say it was a barracks for the cavalry. I can tell from the architecture it was originally two large, two-story cabins with a stable in between. You’ll see several different types of cabins in town—round-log, square-log and brick.”
“Our round-log inn was a brothel.” Gabby frowned at her father. “I even footnoted it in my report.”
“I’d like to read it.” Ella’s interest was sincere. History added value to property. The information the lawyer had given her included when structures were built and what their exterior dimensions were, but not much else.
Mitch’s smile hardened at her request. “Ella, if you need anything let us know.” He waved a hand toward the stairs, which were made of pine and had a rustic lodgepole-pine railing.
“What we’d like to know,” Shane said, handing over his credit card, “is why my grandfather purchased this town.”
“Gabby, go get Shane the key to Sawtooth.” Mitch waited until his daughter disappeared into the back room. “He didn’t tell you?”
Shane shook his head.
“I don’t know,” Mitch said, not entirely believably.
“Really?” Shane rubbed his jaw and considered the innkeeper. “He bought this place from you a decade ago. You signed a lease for one dollar a year. You’re telling me that somewhere along the line you didn’t ask my grandfather why he was interested in your property?”
“You’re facing a dead end.” Gabby returned, placing the key and wooden key ring on the counter. “That’s about as much as I’ve gotten out of him.”
Mitch frowned. “Gabby, what have I told you about adult conversations?”
“I’m just trying to take on more responsibility in the family business, like you asked.” The preteen held up her hands. “I guess you don’t need help with check-in.”
