Collard Greens and Catfishing

by Kelsey Browning

  “How pretty.”

  “It’s called a stevedore knot. I was a Boy Scout. Eagle Scout actually,” he said with a note of pride. “I can tie just about any kind of knot. Believe me, those balloons won’t go anywhere until you want them to.”

  “Got it. Thanks.” Maggie inspected the knot—four twists and a pull-through. She tugged on it. Barnes was right. That thing was strong and a handy skill to have in her back pocket. “I was just heading to the attic to get down some Christmas lights to use for tonight.”

  “I’ll help.”

  She hadn’t been hinting for help, but another pair of hands couldn’t hurt. “Thank you. If you can untie a knot as good as you can tie one, you might come in handy with those strings of lights.”

  By the time Abby Ruth and Sera returned from their errands, Maggie and Deputy Barnes had the back yard strung with party lights, and the balloons flew above several chairs. Finally, something was going Maggie’s way.

  * * *

  When Summer Haven’s doorbell rang at five o’clock, Abby Ruth prayed she wouldn’t open it to another box of cheap steaks.

  When she answered the door, a cry of joy broke from her lips, and she did a little cotton-eyed Joe right in the foyer. Jenny stood on the front porch holding Grayson’s hand.

  “You came!” She threw her arms around her daughter in a hug that could wrestle a gator to the ground. Grayson looked as if he might turn tail and run. She must’ve scared the bejeebies out of him. “Sorry there, sport. I’m just happy to see you two.” And all it had taken was Maggie lying to Teague. If Abby Ruth had known it was that easy, she would’ve thrown her own damned birthday party long ago.

  “Hi, Mom.” As usual, Jenny was pulled together in some thick-looking slacks and high-heeled boots. Her hair was as dark as Abby Ruth’s had been at her age. But Jenny kept hers long while Abby Ruth had always chopped hers short. When Jenny was little, her hair had usually been as knotted as a wild squirrel’s nest. They’d had their share of battles—Abby Ruth screaming and Jenny crying—over that hair.

  But as an adult, Jenny kept it ironed straight and sleek.

  Damned pity that reckless little girl was gone.

  Her daughter had taken after both her parents and was just a few inches shy of six feet. But even to a less-than-maternal mother like her, the girl looked too damned skinny. She’d need to take her to the Atlanta Highway Diner for a big mess of biscuits and gravy.

  “What do you think of Georgia?” Abby Ruth bent down to catch her grandson’s eye. He had the same dark hair and slim build shared by the Cady side of the family. But his eyes, they were his daddy’s distinctively eerie green. Hopefully, that was all Grayson had inherited from that country-club weenie.

  All those years ago when Jenny had called to say she was marrying a Boston native, Abby Ruth had come damned close to being overwhelmed by a case of the old-fashioned vapors. Because she’d known Jenny belonged with Teague.

  Now, ten years later, her daughter could finally get back on the path she should’ve followed a decade ago.

  “It’s hotter than Boston,” Grayson informed Abby Ruth.

  After living in Houston for years, the fall temperatures in Georgia felt downright nippy to her at times. “It cools off at night.”

  “Do you have an Xbox?”

  “Anything like a batter’s box?” The look on the kid’s face told her all she needed to know. “Summer Haven sits on over fifty acres, Gray. You don’t need video games while you’re here. Wouldn’t even have time for them. There’s a creek out back, a cool old car in the garage, and lots of trouble to get into.”

  His head angled to one side, and he considered her with those hundred-year-old eyes. “What do you do with a creek?”

  “Well, you can fish or just muck around in it.” Abby Ruth shot a look at her daughter. Sure, Jenny’d grown up in the city, but their neighborhood in Houston had been an older one with acre lots that backed up to some woods. The kids around there had ridden their bikes all over the place, explored the outdoors and generally run wild.

  “Don’t fish stink?” he asked.

  “When you clean them,” she said, grabbing one of the suitcases and ushering them inside. “But when you fry ’em up in a mess of cornmeal, they smell like heaven.”

  Grayson looked skeptical, but his eyes widened when he took in the gleaming wooden floors and antiques around him. “This might be bigger than Dad’s new house.” He ran a hand over the stair rail. “I mean, it’s a lot older and everything, but this is kinda cool.”

  “High praise,” Jenny said in a low voice.

  There was more to the Daniel Northcutt story, and Abby Ruth would get it soon enough.

  Maggie rushed into the foyer. “Hi, Jenny. Y’all made it! It’s so good to meet you. I’ve got you all set up in the Azalea Room.”

  Abby Ruth put her hands on her hips. “You knew she was coming, and you didn’t tell me.”

  “Oops. Did I keep a secret from you?” Maggie just grinned. “Grayson, you’ll be staying in the Cherokee Rose Room.”

  “Cherokee? Like the Indians?” Grayson’s eyes lit up.

  “Just like that.” Abby Ruth rustled his hair. Poor kid had no idea he would be surrounded by flowers. She pointed down the hallway. “Grayson, there are peanut butter cookies in the kitchen if you want to go on back.”

  Jenny gaped at her. “You baked cookies?”

  “Those Boston winters are getting to you, girl.” Abby Ruth elbowed her. “Sera made them. I had to beg her to use good old American peanut butter rather than cannabutter.”

  “Well, that’s a relief,” Jenny said, her tone as dry as a triple olive martini. “I’m trying to keep Grayson off marijuana until he’s at least twelve.”

  “C’mon upstairs,” she said to Jenny.

  Jenny looked uncertain. “Mom, we could always go to a hotel. I don’t want to be any trouble. I mean, this isn’t even really your house.”

  That was like a double-tipped arrow to Abby Ruth’s chest. Was it too much for her daughter to want to stay under the same roof with her? Because even if she didn’t own Summer Haven, it had quickly become her home.

  And wasn’t that a kick in the ass? She’d left Texas, sold almost everything she had so she could travel. And yet here she was, settling down in a Georgia town the size of Angelina Broussard’s skinny butt.

  “Summer Haven has plenty of room for everyone.” Maybe this wasn’t the best time to mention they didn’t exactly have bathroom facilities for everyone, though. Rather than risk Jenny making a break for it, Abby Ruth grabbed both bags and muscled them up the stairs. “Besides, you’d hurt Maggie’s feelings something awful if you didn’t stay.”

  “Mom, give me one of those damned things.”

  “I might be retired, but I’m sure as hell not an invalid.”

  “You’re right.” Jenny sighed. “You could single-handedly carry the weight of the world on your back.”

  Abby Ruth made it to the landing and let the bags thump to the wooden floor. Jenny was right on her heels, like a spotter for a gymnast. “If you didn’t want to come down here for my birthday, no one forced you.”

  Jenny slumped against the landing’s floral wallpaper. “It’s not that. I’m just a little out of sorts. All of Grayson’s chatter about Daniel’s new house and new wife. It’s making me crazy.”

  “You’re not sorry you divorced that schmuck, are you?”

  “Absolutely not.” Jenny knocked the back of her head against the wall. “Sometimes it just sucks being a single parent. I make a good living, but rather than the Back Bay house where Grayson grew up, I now have him stuffed into a two-bedroom apartment. He has to stay in after-school care because I rarely leave the office before six o’clock. But when he goes to Daniel’s house, he gets to swim in their new Olympic-sized pool. And the good wife doesn’t work so there’s no rushing here and there.”

  Abby Ruth’s heart lurched. “You were a good wife, Jenny. A great wife.”

  “I k
now. I did as well as I could. She’s just so…so perfect. And they buy him stuff. Too much stuff.”

  “Like the Xbox?”

  “I told Daniel not to do it. But if he didn’t listen to me when we were married, he sure doesn’t listen to me now.”

  Abby Ruth, always awkward when it came to soothing hugs, wrapped her arms around her daughter. But she understood what Jenny was going through and tried to provide comfort. “Sometimes, being a single parent does suck.”

  “That’s for sure.” Jenny laughed, but it sounded too watery for Abby Ruth’s liking. But when her daughter drew back, her eyes were dry. “Why did you do it, Mom?”

  Abby Ruth knew her daughter’s question wasn’t as simple as it sounded. She was asking so many things. Why Abby Ruth had chosen to be an unmarried mother at a time when it hadn’t been as acceptable as it was today. Why she’d been a career woman instead of a cookie-baking mom. Why she’d never told Jenny who her daddy was. “Because I wanted you. And because I loved you. Still love you more than I love another soul on this earth.”

  Jenny glanced away as though embarrassed by the conviction in Abby Ruth’s voice. Is this what she’d created over the years—a daughter who didn’t know how her own mom felt about her and when hit with the truth of those feelings, shied away from it?

  Shame swarmed over Abby Ruth. This was her fault. Her doing.

  To regain her equilibrium, Abby Ruth wheeled Grayson’s bag into the room where he would stay for the next few days. None of the bedrooms at Summer Haven were particularly masculine, but Maggie had put Grayson in the one with dark, heavy furniture and a vivid green motif—as green as the leaves of the Cherokee rose, fitting since it was the Georgia state flower. Grayson would no doubt be disappointed when he realized there wasn’t a single tomahawk or arrowhead in the space, though.

  When Abby Ruth returned to the landing, Jenny had herself under control. She hustled into the Azalea Room. “Is this where I’m bunking?”

  “For as long as you want.”

  “We’re only here for the weekend, Mom.”

  This time. Abby Ruth could only hope. She sat on the edge of the bed. “Have you ever thought about leaving Boston? Wouldn’t be such a bad thing to put some miles between you and the good wife.”

  “It’s where my job is.” Jenny placed her bag on the luggage stand, but she made no move to unpack. “Even if Daniel would agree to let me move Grayson, Boston’s the only home Grayson has ever known. Isn’t it bad enough I’ve made him a child of divorce? It wouldn’t be fair to uproot him from his friends too.”

  Abby Ruth noticed Jenny didn’t claim her own life was there. “He’s young and adaptable. And that kid has the ability to bloom where he’s planted.”

  “I can’t take him away from Daniel. A boy needs his dad.”

  Abby Ruth knew a man who would make Grayson a much better daddy, but she kept her mouth closed on that one. “He could see him on school holidays. If Daniel’s still the man I knew, there’s no way he’s taking Grayson on every one of his visitation weekends.”

  Jenny sighed. “He picks him up every time, but it wasn’t long after he remarried that Grayson started coming home talking about spending a good part of the weekend at Rogers Stadium.”

  “Wait a minute,” Abby Ruth said. “That’s where that new minor league baseball team plays.”

  “Exactly. The Miracles. Apparently, the good wife’s dad is Rogers. He owns the team and the field.”

  “Son of a bitch.” How in the world could Jenny—or Abby Ruth, for that matter—compete with owning a baseball team?

  “They’re actually nice people.” Jenny rubbed her forehead as though fighting her own thoughts. “They don’t have other grandkids, so they dote on Grayson.”

  “Far be it for me to point out that Grayson is not their grandson.” This was ridiculous. Abby Ruth had to beg, borrow and steal to get Jenny to bring Grayson to visit. Damned if she wanted to play second fiddle to Daniel Northcutt’s in-laws for Grayson’s affection.

  The boy needed to be introduced to the benefits of small-town living. Between Teague and her, they should be able to win Grayson over to the Mimi Abby Ruth team. “Teague will be at my birthday party tonight.”

  “Mom, don’t start.”

  “Start what?” She projected all the innocence she could.

  “That ship not only sailed a long time ago,” Jenny said. “It sank to the bottom of the ocean.”

  “He’s still looking good. Actually, if you ask me, he’s better looking than ever.”

  Jenny groaned and dropped to sit on the edge of the bed. “That’s what I was afraid of.”

  “Don’t you think it’s time to get past his old mistakes?”

  When Jenny’s head came up, her dark eyes were blazing. “I loved him.”

  “Of course you did.”

  “And he hauled off and married another woman.”

  “Have you ever asked him to explain?”

  “I shouldn’t have to ask him to explain.” She made a chopping gesture with her hand. If Teague had been standing in front of her, he’d now be split from the sternum down. “If he wanted my forgiveness, he should’ve crawled on his hands and knees. By the time he got to my door, his skin should’ve been raw and bleeding.”

  Abby Ruth tried to suppress her smile, but she loved it when Jenny’s Cady side came out. “You’re absolutely right.”

  “But has he ever come crawling? No, he hasn’t. And if he thinks I’m going to make the first move, he’s out of his ever-loving mind.” Her hands were in tight balls. So tight that they’d taken on a white hue.

  Abby Ruth leaned against the door jamb to keep from doing a celebratory electric slide. Regardless of Jenny’s protests, she still had feelings—strong feelings—for Teague. “Has it escaped your memory that you married someone else too?”

  The look of hurt and betrayal on Jenny’s face killed Abby Ruth’s desire to line dance. “Only after he did.”

  “What are you saying?” Abby Ruth studied Jenny closely. “Did you marry Daniel to get back at Teague?”

  “Of course not. I just…there was no reason for me to mope around. Teague was taken, and it was time to move on with my life. Besides, I wouldn’t trade Grayson. He’s everything to me. And no matter what a pain in my ass Daniel has been, I wouldn’t have Grayson without him.”

  “Times have changed. You and Teague are both single now.”

  Jenny flopped back on the bed, arms and legs wide, like she used to when she was a moody teenager. “What does it matter? I live in Boston. And he lives here.”

  “That’s just geography.” Abby Ruth had a feeling Jenny wasn’t as worried about the physical distance as much as the emotional one.

  “About eleven hundred miles of geography in between,” Jenny said, her tone flat. “Besides, I’ve never lived in a small town in my life. What do people even do here besides run around chasing small-time bad guys?”

  “It’s not as godawful boring as you think.” Small-town living had some redeeming qualities. Otherwise, why would she still be here? “Did I mention that Maggie, Sera and I registered for an online dating site?”

  That brought Jenny back to a ramrod sitting position. “You did what?”

  “Yep. And Maggie’s already had one very nice date.” Didn’t bear mentioning that the date was weird as all get-out and that Abby Ruth had already been kicked out of the game once. But she was back in the saddle now.

  “Is this a…senior dating site?”

  “No. Maggie’s pretty sure her beau is younger.”

  “Pretty sure? If she had a date with him, shouldn’t she know?”

  Damn, that was a stupid slip. “Well, you know how it is with men. If they take care of themselves, it’s hard to tell. The bastards. But no…this isn’t called OvertheHillDates.com. It’s ThePerfectFit.com. In fact, Teague is registered on it too.”

  Jenny’s mouth tightened. “What? Why would he do that? He doesn’t need some online dating site to get a woma
n.”

  “Mmm-hmm. I ran across this profile called LetsPlayBall, and there was his picture, big as Dallas. So, young lady, if you think the hunky Teague Castro is down here in Georgia burning a candle for you, you’d better think again.”

  “I don’t. That would be silly. We haven’t seen each other in years, and I barely think of him.”

  “I may have raised you to be a lot of not-so-nice things, Jensen Cady, but I did not raise you to be a liar.” Abby Ruth shook a finger at her daughter. “So you may have been lying to yourself for a long time now, but that won’t cut it with me. Here’s the truth…if you want a second chance with Teague, you’d best get your fanny in gear.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  By the time Teague made it to Summer Haven for Abby Ruth’s birthday party, the circle drive was already crammed with cars. Truth be told, he’d been dressed thirty minutes early. But he’d been so nervous, he’d spilled half a pale ale on his pants. He couldn’t see Jenny for the first time in ten years smelling like the inside of a beer can, so he’d pawed through his closet like a teenage girl. Most of the clothes he owned were now sprawled across his bed and his floor.

  Good thing he had no intention of trying to lure Jenny back to his place. Not that he wouldn’t love to, but tonight was a recon mission. He needed to feel her out, find out where they were with one another. Plus, her son was with her. Grayson created an entirely new layer of complication in rekindling his relationship with Jenny, but one Teague was willing and ready to focus on.

  Standing at the front door with three packages in his arms, he looked as though he was playing Santa Claus when Maggie walked up and intercepted him just as he was about to knock on the front door.

  “Teague,” she said, “there you are. Abby Ruth’s been foaming at the mouth wondering where you were.”

  “With all these people here, I’m surprised she even missed me.”

  “Abby Ruth doesn’t miss a trick.” Maggie reached for his load. “Want me to put these on the gift table?”

  He passed her the box wrapped in bandana print paper. “This one is for the birthday girl, but the others…”