More to Love

by Alison Bliss

  “Not well, but I met her once. She passed through here almost…my goodness, thirty years ago, I believe. Such a lovely woman with a bright, warm personality. Unfortunately, I didn’t meet her under the best of circumstances. Had things been different between us, I just know we would’ve been good friends though.”

  Jessa’s eyes widened. “So…you know?”

  Ms. Mathis nodded, and her eyes watered. “About the past? Yes, dear. I know.” Her gaze trailed over Jessa’s face, and she gave her another polite smile. “But I didn’t know about you. Not until this very moment.”

  Logan shook his head. “I don’t get it, Mom. What the heck’s going on?”

  Ms. Mathis smiled. “Would you like to tell him, Jessa?”

  Not knowing what she would even say, Jessa shook her head. She had a hard time believing it herself. She didn’t think she could say the words out loud and have them make any sense to him.

  “Okay, then I’ll be happy to do the honors.” Ms. Mathis walked over and took Jessa’s hand, bringing her closer to her son. “Logan, Jessa is your sister.”

  Eyes wide, Logan exchanged glances with Valerie, and then his gaze landed on his mother before shifting onto Jessa. “Is this some kind of joke? Because if so, it isn’t at all funny.”

  Jessa shook her head. “No, it’s true, Logan. I just found out myself, but I’m related to you. We’re half siblings.”

  “How is that even possible?”

  She faltered, unable to tell him the events of the past. “I…uh…”

  Ms. Mathis rushed to her rescue again. “Would you like me to explain it, dear? You seem a little shaky still.”

  “Please. I mean, if you don’t mind,” Jessa whispered. “It would probably be better coming from you anyway. I was dreading having to tell him that part.”

  Ms. Mathis nodded and took her son’s hand. “Logan, back when you were about three years old, your father didn’t come home one night. So I asked a neighbor to look after you and went looking for him at the local bar, where he would usually end up if he wasn’t at a casino. But he wasn’t there either. When I asked about him, I was told by one of the waitresses that he left with a slender redhead. I drove to every motel in Granite before I finally found his old beat-up truck parked in front of one of the rooms. I went inside and asked who the room was registered to. Back then, they weren’t as careful about giving out a room occupant’s information as they are nowadays,” she explained. “I found out the room was registered to a lady by the name of Mariah Gibson. She was the redhead your father left the bar with that night.”

  The look on Logan’s face was murderous, and Jessa’s eyes instantly filled with tears. “I know this is probably hard to hear. I’m so sorry.”

  Ms. Mathis was as calm as ever and shook her head. “Don’t be, dear. You have nothing to apologize for.”

  Logan nodded. “I agree. It’s not you, Jessa. It’s that godforsaken man. He spent the past thirty years hurting my mother, and she stayed with—”

  “Logan,” Valerie said, her eyes widening.

  Ms. Mathis touched his arm. “No, no, it’s okay. You can say it, son. I stayed with your father all of those years.” She patted him, trying to comfort him. “Just not in a true marital sense.”

  Logan ran his hand roughly through his hair. “What are you talking about, Mom? You only recently had your divorced finalized.”

  “Yes, but I never let that man put his hands on me ever again. I had always wanted you to have a brother or sister, but I couldn’t let him touch me. Never again. Not in that way.” She turned toward Jessa. “And I’m not saying anything negative toward Mariah. I just couldn’t trust that he wasn’t sleeping with other women too.”

  Jessa didn’t know what to say. To think that this woman had been married to a husband, one who had lied and cheated on her, even in name only, for over thirty years boggled her mind. Especially since she’d dumped Max because he’d lied only once. And it wasn’t even for anything near as bad as what this man had done.

  “Did you confront him?” Logan asked his mother, his voice still filled with anger.

  His mother sighed. “I’d planned to. But I had gone inside to ask who the room was registered to, and by the time I came out, he was already gone.”

  “Of course he was. That chickenshit bastard. He probably saw you pull up. I should kill that sonofabitch.”

  Valerie put her hand on Logan’s shoulder. “Please calm down. I know this is all so tough to hear and probably comes as quite a shock, but I’m sure it’s very hard for your mother to tell this story to you too. Just let her finish.”

  Logan nodded, and his mother continued. “Your father was gone already, but the woman wasn’t. The light was on and someone was pacing in front of the curtain. So I knocked on the door, planning to give this stranger a piece of my mind about taking home a married man. But when she answered it and saw me standing there, she burst into tears. She knew exactly who I was and why I was there.”

  Jessa gasped. “Oh my God. My mother knew he was a married man and slept with him anyway?”

  “No, dear,” Ms. Mathis said. “Please don’t think that. Your mother had only found out he was married and had a child after they’d slept together. A picture of the three of us had fallen out of his wallet, and since he’d already gotten what he had wanted from her, he admitted to all of it. You mother had thrown him out of her motel room, which was why he was gone by the time I got back from the front desk.”

  Logan breathed out a heavy sigh. “You don’t know this about him, but he’s a real jerk, Jess. Trust me when I say that you don’t want anything to do with him.”

  His mother hushed him. “That’s not for you to decide, Logan. Jessa has to make that call all on her own.”

  Jessa shook her head. “Between my mother and the things I’ve heard just now, I can tell you now that I want nothing to do with this man. Any person who would treat a woman like that doesn’t deserve me in his life.”

  “It amazes me how much you sound just like your mother,” Ms. Mathis told her. “She was such a strong, proud woman and had so much life in her. She’d apologized profusely, though I told her over and over that it wasn’t necessary. She hadn’t known. That was all on him. But she’d hated that she couldn’t make it right. We ended up chatting over coffee until dawn about our lives, her travels, my son, and even the cheating man who had brought us together briefly. She was so genuine and honest. I really liked her a lot.”

  A tear fell on Jessa’s cheek. “I’m so sorry about what happened to you. But I’m glad you were able to see my mother as I see her. I was afraid…”

  “That we would think less of her? Not at all.” Ms. Mathis offered her a sincere smile. “I wish I could say we kept in touch, but we didn’t. I tried to look her up years ago, but she moved so much that I was never able to find her. And I’m not sure she would’ve wanted to hear from me anyway. I think maybe that would’ve been too awkward for her after what happened. But I would love to know how your mother is doing now, Jessa.”

  “Actually, she…passed away a few years ago from liver cancer.”

  Ms. Mathis immediately wrapped her arms around Jessa and hugged her close. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. May Mariah’s soul rest in peace.”

  “Thank you,” Jess said, sniffling a little.

  When the woman released her, she took a step back and paused. “Wait a minute. You said you just found out about all of this. So if you didn’t learn of any of it from your mother, then who told you?”

  “Well, my mother did. She always talked about how much she loved Granite and how wonderful the people were here. Now that I’ve met you, I can only assume she meant you in particular. But she’d also kept travel journals that she wrote in at every new location she went to. There was a lot of them, but right after her death, I’d boxed them up. It was too painful for me to read them at the time. But last night I, uh…well, I sort of needed to be close to her, so I opened them back up and started reading through t
he one she wrote where she passed through Granite.”

  “I’m curious. Did she tell you the whole story?”

  “Most of it. But not in quite so much detail. The thing that mattered most to me was that she mentioned that I had an older brother. As shocking as that bit of news was, you can imagine my surprise when I read the name Logan Mathis. I couldn’t stop shaking. Apparently she’d seen his name on the back of the photo or maybe you mentioned it to her and she remembered it. But the moment she found out she was pregnant with me, she added a note to her journal with his name.”

  Jessa realized how quiet Logan had gotten and glanced over at him. “I’m sorry if all of this has caught you off guard. But I want you to know that I don’t expect anything from you. Nothing has to change between us just because you found out you have a half sister. I’m not trying to cause any—”

  Without warning, Logan pulled her into his strong arms and squeezed hard. “You’re my sister, Jessa. There’s no such thing as a half in my world.”

  Tears pricked her eyes, and she hugged him back fiercely. “Thank you. I feel the same way. I actually always wanted an older brother.”

  Valerie stood off to the side with moisture in her own eyes, but she giggled. “You’re so going to regret saying that. I know this from experience.”

  They all laughed, but Jessa gazed at Logan and shook her head. “Never.”

  Ms. Mathis touched her shoulder. “Jessa, I hope you will also consider me as part of your family too. I know you had a wonderful mother, and I would never try to take her place. But I would be honored if you would let me get to know you better and come to me if you ever need anything. Sort of like an honorary godmother.”

  Jessa gave her a watery smile. She was no longer alone in this world. She had family. People who cared enough to want her in their lives. “Thank you, Ms. Mathis. I’d love to have you as my honorary godmother. You were very kind to my mom, given the circumstances, and I’ll never forget that. I know she didn’t either.”

  Valerie waited for her turn and then reached out to hug Jessa as well. “Guess this means we’ll be sisters soon.”

  Jessa squeezed her tight. “I always wanted one of those too. Thank you all for welcoming me with open arms. It’s nice to know that I’m not alone anymore.”

  Logan put his arm around her and pulled her into his side. “Jessa, I know this is probably going to sound crazy, but since the day you arrived, you weren’t alone. I swear I could feel this strong connection with you. I don’t know how, but it was there from the first time I saw you standing in that grocery store. I thought I was crazy for thinking it.”

  “It’s true,” Valerie agreed. “We talked about it several times. He said it was like he felt responsible for you or something.” Then she grinned. “Your brother’s really lucky I trust him and that I’m not an insecure person, or he’d have been missing some of his favorite parts of his anatomy by now.”

  They all laughed again, and the sound was pure joy to Jessa’s ears. And Jessa had her own funny story to share. “I had something similar happen to me. I’d casually mentioned that I thought it was fate that I met Logan, and Max didn’t—”

  “That sonofabitch!” Logan yelled, startling all three of them as he headed straight for the door.

  “Logan, what in the world? Where are you going?” Valerie asked, uncertainty in her voice.

  “To find Max,” he ground out. “Before, I stayed out of it because I didn’t have any right to interfere in Jessa’s life. But now that we know we’re related, I’m going to kill that bastard for messing around with my little sister.”

  “Oh crap,” Jessa said, running after him.

  Her and her big mouth.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Max stared out the front windows of the Empty Plate Café to the empty lot across the street. Windsor Park had been deserted for the past two days. No people. No food truck. And no Jessa.

  He’d been sitting in the same place every day, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. But the woman had completely vanished…and it was all his fault.

  God, what had he done?

  He’d blown it, damn it. That’s what.

  And now he’d lost her forever.

  Not only was the food truck gone, but Pops’ customers hadn’t come back either. Max was alone in the vacant restaurant, except for Pops who had just come out of the kitchen with a sign in his hands. “It’s time,” Pops said, his low voice wrought with emotion. “I’ve put it off for as long as I could.”

  Max eyed the For Sale sign. “Jesus, Pops. Can’t you hang on a little longer?”

  “That’s what I was doing in hopes that a miracle would come along. But I can’t keep lying to myself. I can’t afford to update the restaurant, much less compete with the innovative menu items that your young woman was offering to my customers. Times have changed, and unfortunately I’m not able to change with them anymore. I’m too old to even want to change with them.”

  Max had come clean to Pops about his relationship with Jessa, and the old man had gotten a good laugh out of it. It wasn’t exactly the reaction that Max thought he’d get, but he was glad that the old man hadn’t started hating him too. “God, I’m sorry, Pops. I was really hoping something would work out for you.”

  “I know, son.” The old man squeezed Max’s shoulder as he passed by him. “But don’t you worry about it. You’ll find another place to eat your lunch every day.”

  “Jesus. That’s what you think I’m worried about? After losing Jessa and watching your business go down the drain, I don’t have the stomach to eat ever again. I’m just worried about what you’re going to do now.” And where the hell she is.

  “Well, I thought it over plenty the last few weeks, and I kind of liked having all this extra time on my hands. So I think I’m going to use the money I get from the sale of the restaurant to retire on. I’ve put in my years, and it’s about time I slowed down anyway. I’ve got some more fishing to do.”

  “But what about cooking? Aren’t you going to miss it?”

  “Sure I will. But I’m betting I know a young man who would be willing to stop by my house for lunch on occasion,” he said with a chuckle.

  Max grinned. “Anytime you want company, you let me know and I’ll be there. I’d never pass up one of your meals.”

  Pops nodded. “That’s pretty much what I thought.”

  The door chimed, and Sam waltzed in. “Hey, fellas.”

  Pops greeted him with a wave. “You here for lunch, Sam?”

  “Sure. Why not? I’ll have the special.”

  “All out,” the old man replied.

  Sam sighed. “Figures.”

  Max smiled. Damn, he was going to miss that. He loved it when Pops rattled Sam’s chains. “Give him a cheeseburger and fries, Pops.”

  “Coming right up,” he said, heading to the kitchen.

  Sam pulled out a chair and took a seat across from Max. “Ya know, I’ve been calling you for the past two days.”

  “I know, but I didn’t feel like talking. I told you that already on the voice mail I left for you the other night. I said I wasn’t coming in for a few days. I had some personal things to attend to.”

  “Any of those personal things happen to involve Jessa?”

  Max leaned back in his chair. “Like I said, I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “She found out that you lied to her before you had a chance to tell her, didn’t she?”

  Anger swirled through him. “Do you not understand the meaning of ‘don’t want to talk about it’?”

  Sam grinned. “Yeah, I understand it. But since you didn’t listen to me when I said the same thing to you about Leah, then that’s just too damn bad.”

  God, had I really been so annoying about it at the time? “Look, it’s over. She’s gone, and she’s never coming back. There’s nothing left to say.”

  “That’s what you think,” Sam said vaguely.

  Don’t do it, Max. Don’t take a bite out of that bait. “O
kay, so you obviously know something. What do you mean?”

  Sam chuckled. “Thought you didn’t want to talk about it?”

  “You asshole. You better start talking, or Leah’s going to wonder where you got that black eye from.”

  “What black eye?”

  “The one I’m about to give you. Now spill it.”

  Sam laughed but held his hands up in surrender. The dickhead was enjoying this way too much. “Okay, okay. So from what I hear, the reason Jessa left the park and hasn’t come back is because she can’t come back.”

  “What do you mean she can’t come back? Why the hell not? Who’s stopping her?”

  “The city health inspector. Ya know, the real one.” He grinned again. “Apparently, there’s a city ordinance that won’t allow a food truck to park within a certain distance from a free-standing restaurant. Though she didn’t know it at the time, Jessa had been violating a code—a real one—the whole damn time.”

  “Christ. Did she get a fine?”

  “Nope. The new inspector seems to be a pretty fair guy. He actually let her off with a warning and asked her not to park across the street from the Empty Plate Café anymore.”

  “How in the hell do you know all of this? Have you been talking to the inspector or something? Who told you that?”

  “Jessa did.”

  Max sat in stunned silence for a moment before rolling his eyes. “You’re full of it, buddy. She left town. I went by her place this morning and looked through the windows. Her things have been cleared out. The house is completely empty.”

  “Yep, it is. Logan and I helped her load all of her stuff. It’s now sitting at the bakery. Well, above it, technically. Since Valerie moved in with Logan, Leah offered the apartment to Jessa. She moved in yesterday.”

  What? He’d expected her to get as far away from him as humanly possible. “Sam, if you’re bullshitting me…”

  “I’m not, I swear. If you don’t believe me, you can go by the bakery and see for yourself. The other night, after the two of you had it out, Valerie found her in the bar’s kitchen, washing dishes while she was crying her eyes out. She was talking about leaving town, but Leah and Valerie rallied around her and wouldn’t allow it.”