Winter and Autumn groaned.
“What?” Cameron asked.
“The Magnolia Supper Club is our dear Spring’s little monthly soirée,” Summer said for his benefit.
“One to which none of us has ever been invited,” Winter groused.
“You have to cook to be invited,” Spring said, and apparently not for the first time because Autumn mimicked the words even as the eldest Darling sister spoke them.
Cameron grinned.
“And,” Spring said, “for your information, Miss Microwave Chef of the year, Summer has been invited.”
Winter rolled her eyes.
“I haven’t decided yet if I want to participate,” Summer said. “I like to experiment with baking, not all of the other things like entrées and appetizers.”
Lovie Darling chuckled. “Chief Jackson, don’t let this bickering fool you. Spring’s supper club is a recurring bone of contention among those two,” she said with a nod toward Spring and Winter. “The members of the Magnolia Supper Club have very discerning palates.”
“That’s Mother’s kind way of saying they are all hoity-toity foodies,” Winter said, “who would never let a frozen chicken nugget or a deep-fried Twinkie pass their lips. Only foie gras, truffles and arugula for that bunch. They all think they should be hosting their own programs on one of those cooking channels.”
“There was arugula in your salad and I didn’t hear any complaints as you scarfed it down a few minutes ago,” Spring said.
Summer made a face. “Deep-fried Twinkies?”
Autumn shook her head. “Here we go.” To Cameron she said, “Consider yourself initiated, Chief Cam. Every time it’s either Winter’s or Spring’s turn to cook for a Second Sunday we have this debate. It’s like listening to a scratched CD. Irritating.”
“Can we please change the subject?” Spring asked.
“I agree,” Lovie said, much in the manner of the head of a judicial body issuing a final decree.
“Have arrangements been made for Michael?” Lovie asked Cameron, steering the conversation in an entirely different direction.
“Yes. He had everything done ahead of time.”
Lovie nodded. “Michael was like that. Always prepared, always thinking ahead.”
She seemed lost in thought for a long moment. Summer and her siblings studied their mother, but no one said anything. Eventually Lovie expelled a breath that seemed to be equal parts wistfulness, regret and grief. She closed her eyes for a second, and then expressed her delight about the choir’s choice of selections for the morning service.
“It’s nice to see them add something new to the choral repertoire.”
The conversation then flowed as if the six of them regularly sat down to a shared Sunday meal. They talked about the weather, movies and a novel that they’d all read in the last six months.
“With the fire department keeping you so busy,” Lovie Darling said, “I’m surprised you have time to read fiction, Chief.”
The air seemed to be sucked out of the dining room as four pairs of blue eyes turned to Lovie and the sisters held their collective breaths.
Here we go, he thought.
Mickey notwithstanding, the pleasantries were over and she clearly wanted to know about the peasant dating her daughter. But Cameron had to chuckle to himself. He’d specifically asked the Lord to teach him to work through just this sort of situation. Mrs. Darling’s comment could have easily provoked him into believing it was intended as a slight to a working man. But today, Cameron had learned a lesson or two. The first lesson was that being slow to anger or take offense was a virtue he wanted to cultivate. And second, that there was usually more than one way to handle a potentially awkward situation.
He gave Mrs. Darling a self-deprecating smile. “That’s why it took me about three months to finish reading it,” he said. “I usually catch up on my reading when I go on vacation. With uninterrupted time to read and relax, I go through about half a dozen novels. Have you read the new mystery by Henrietta Wright Worthy?”
The mention of Cedar Springs’ celebrated mystery writer eased the tension and launched them all into a spirited debate over the author’s narrative arc in her novels.
Summer beamed at him, and Cameron smiled back.
The dinner was a success.
“Who’s going to help me with dessert?” Spring asked.
“I will,” Summer said.
“And I’ll get the coffee,” Autumn said. “Come help, Winter.”
“But...”
Autumn tugged on her sister’s blouse and Winter got up, mumbling about supper club rejects.
“They aren’t very subtle, are they, Chief Jackson?” Lovie said from her seat opposite his.
He smiled. “I was wondering if it was something I said.”
“When the girls were younger, if one of them brought a young man home for dinner, they made themselves scarce so their father could interrogate the poor boy.”
Cameron held his tongue. He knew from Summer and from her older sister that if any interrogating of young men had been done, it was Lovie Darling leading the inquisition.
“I want to thank you for two things, Chief Jackson.”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“First, for joining us for Sunday dinner. It’s nice to see a man in that chair again.”
Cameron’s guess had been right. He had been seated in Dr. John Darling’s place at the dining table.
“And most of all,” Lovie said, “I want to thank you for making my daughter happy.”
The compliment took him by surprise, but even more surprising was the moisture he thought he saw in Lovie Darling’s eyes. A moment later, it was confirmed when she delicately dabbed a corner of her linen napkin at the corner of an eye.
“Summer has had a difficult time,” she said. “I’m glad she’s found happiness again, and that joy has taken over the sadness in her eyes. You put that joy there, Chief Jackson. Thank you.”
Cameron found himself a bit choked up, too.
He didn’t quite know what to say. Lovie Darling wasn’t the dread force of nature he had been expecting to encounter. She was a woman who clearly loved her daughters and wanted to see them happy. And she was a woman who had made a difficult decision decades ago. She chose to follow her heart. In doing so, she’d broken the heart of his friend.
But Cameron was glad that Mickey and Lovie Darling had been able to have a few moments together before Mickey’s death. He’d been stunned, but pleasantly surprised when the nurses told him about Mickey’s visitor who was clearly not someone from the fire service.
“Mrs. Darling,” he said.
She lifted an eyebrow in answer, a gesture that he recognized from Summer. “Yes, Chief Jackson?”
“Please,” he said. “Call me Cameron.”
Chapter Seventeen
The funeral service for Mickey Flynn was truly a firefighters’ send-off. Hundreds of people, neighbors, church members, friends, city officials and a seemingly never-ending line of firefighters all in uniform, showed up to say farewell.
“I have some duties to perform,” Cameron told Summer, “so we won’t be able to sit together.”
“I know,” Summer told him as she slipped her hand in his. Cameron, in the formal dress blue uniform and spit-shined shoes that he’d worn when he showed up at her front door, was somber, but not stoic. His grieving was, Summer suspected, a private affair. “My mother is here,” she said. “We’ll sit together.”
An honor guard, also in formal dress blues, had the colors posted at the church. Mickey’s family consisted of his fire department brethren and Cameron.
The service was both in honor of and respect for a man who was responsible for nurturing the careers of so many men and women. Just about every one of
them spoke highly of him, including more than a dozen former students who, like Cameron, were now fire chiefs in their own right. There were proclamations from elected officials, and then there was a tribute to his faith in song.
As former student after former student spoke about him, Summer realized just how much he’d meant to not only Cameron, but all of the men and women he’d mentored through the years. At one point, Lovie reached for Summer’s hand and squeezed it tight.
When Cameron rose to go to the podium he walked straight and tall. He was 100 percent male and for the first time in her life Summer realized the appeal a man in uniform had to many women.
She’d dated a Marine from Camp Lejeune while in college. That short-lived relationship had been based on sheer curiosity on both of their parts. But there were plenty of girls she’d attended high school and college with who looked no further than Fort Bragg and the Marine Corps base to find their life partners.
A uniform didn’t make the man, Summer thought as Cameron pulled a few index cards from a pocket. But it sure made the man look good.
She hadn’t known that he’d prepared remarks.
“I put together a few things to say about Mickey,” he began holding up the cards to the gathered mourners. “But a lot of what I have written here has been said today already. So I would like to spend a few moments telling you about the Mickey Flynn I knew.”
Cameron cleared his throat and Summer’s heart gave a little flip. Sitting in the church at Mickey Flynn’s funeral she realized she had fallen in love with this man. Despite her best efforts, she’d done the one thing she thought she would never do again—fall head over heels, heart and soul in love with someone.
With a tissue in hand, she listened to him bare his soul about his friend.
He touched his hand to his brow for a moment and gave a half smile. “Just recently, I had the occasion to explain to someone dear to me why I do what I do.”
Cameron’s gaze found Summer’s in the crowd. She could not keep the astonishment from her face. A wry smile tugged at Cameron’s mouth, and Summer felt heat flame her cheeks at the personal reference. She managed—just barely—to squelch the involuntary sound of surprise in the hushed sanctuary.
“That desire to work in fire service comes from a place deep down,” Cameron said, tapping his chest for emphasis. “It is an opportunity to serve others, to save lives, to learn and to live discipline, teamwork and to be a part of something bigger than a single person. For Mickey, it was even more than that.
“Mickey loved firefighting and he loved God,” Cameron said. “For some people, finding the connection between faith and fire service might seem something of a stretch. But Mickey gave all of us the model and the example of why and how to experience joy, pure joy, in helping other people and in showing compassion for others. With a servant’s heart he was able to do his job as a sacrifice to God.”
Summer dabbed at her eyes and saw that her mother was doing the same thing.
Listening to Cameron talk about his friend, she understood even more about him. Cameron was a man who displayed faith in his actions, and so, apparently, had been Mickey Flynn.
“I was honored to claim Michael Sean Flynn as a mentor and friend,” Cameron said. “I was proud to serve with him as a fellow firefighter, and today, though we mourn the passing of the man, I am filled with joy because I know that Mickey is in glory, sitting on the right hand of the Father and looking down at all of us left here to carry on his work.”
When Cameron took his seat again in front with the other fire chiefs, Summer swallowed the lump in her throat.
She understood.
She understood his initial reaction when she tried to express her own sadness at his loss. Cookies did not make it better. But she was glad that Cameron had had those days at the end to spend time with Mickey. And a glance at her mother revealed another truth: Lovie was crying, but she looked content. Her mother had made the right choice all those years ago.
A poem about firefighting was recited. Then the final tolling of the fire bell brought her and everyone else gathered to tears. During the drive to the cemetery in a processional that began with the No. 1 truck from Mickey’s station and his flag-draped coffin on a caisson and lasted for blocks of cars and fire trucks, Cameron held Summer’s hand as they drove, mostly in silence.
After the funeral and graveside services, there was a repast at the fire station closest to Mickey’s home. By six o’clock that evening, Cameron and Summer were headed back to Cedar Springs from Raleigh.
“There had to have been a thousand people there,” Summer said later.
Cameron nodded. “That’s why the service was at that church instead of St. Paul’s, which is Mickey’s church, but has a small sanctuary.”
“Thank you for letting me share this day with you,” she told Cameron.
Cameron squeezed her hand then returned both to the wheel. “I’m glad you were there.”
“That poem,” she said, reaching for her handbag where she had tucked the funeral program. “It echoed what you’ve been telling me.”
Cameron nodded. “It’s recited at most firefighters’ funerals. It began as an actual prayer of a Wichita fireman after a call-out to an apartment fire where kids were trapped. What’s printed in the program there is the way it’s been altered over the years. There are other versions,” he said with a glance at Summer, “including one called ‘A Fireman’s Wife’s Prayer.’”
“Really?”
He nodded again. “But all across the country, ‘The Fireman’s Prayer’ is inscribed on monuments to firefighters killed in the line of duty. Mickey’s funeral was a little different in that regard.”
“What do you mean?”
“He died of cancer, but was honored with the funeral rites of a line-of-duty death.”
Summer nodded. “Well, I’m glad I got to know more about Mickey through you and all of his protégés today. A lot of people lost...” she paused and reached for Cameron’s hand. “You lost a good friend and mentor. I’m sorry.”
He was quiet for so long that Summer grew concerned. “Cam?”
“Mickey was assured in his faith,” he said. “But you know what I’m most grateful for, in addition to his friendship?”
She smiled. “What’s that?”
“That he and your mom had a chance to reconnect before he died.”
Chapter Eighteen
Several days later, Summer knocked on the door of the small office that Ilsa Keller used on the days when she came to Manna. Her stomach had been in knots from the moment she’d awakened. She found herself equal parts relieved and dismayed that the day had finally arrived for the two of them to talk.
For the briefest of moments, before Ilsa put on one of her fake smiles, Summer glimpsed raw animosity on her face.
Summer took a step back.
“Come in, Summer. You’re right on time.”
Summer was ten minutes early, but she didn’t correct her.
“Have a seat,” Ilsa invited, indicating one of two uncomfortable-looking chairs in front of the desk.
The space was tight, the room barely large enough for a desk, the two chairs and a four-drawer file cabinet. An older-model desktop computer took up most of the space on the desk.
Both Cameron and Spring thought quitting her volunteer work at Manna was a bad idea. As of six o’clock this morning, Summer had remained conflicted.
Ilsa, dressed in blue slacks and a cream blouse, settled behind the desk and clasped her hands together on the blotter.
“You wanted to meet with me?”
Summer nodded, pulling her thoughts together.
“When I moved to Cedar Springs,” she began, “I wanted to get immersed in the community. I heard about Manna at Common Ground in church one Sunday and thought it might be the pe
rfect vehicle for merging my interests and skills.”
She took a deep breath. So far, so good, but she couldn’t sugarcoat what came next. “I’ve enjoyed the work here tremendously. Manna offers a tremendous service to people in need.”
“But you’re quitting,” Ilsa said.
Summer was startled by both the resignation in Ilsa’s voice and the fact that she’d surmised the reason for the meeting request.
“I...”
Ilsa held up a hand to halt her next words.
“It’s my fault,” Ilsa said. “Manna has been losing volunteers left and right for the last six months. Long before you got here. I didn’t like you on sight.”
Summer jerked. She couldn’t have been more surprised by the verbal attack.
“What? Why?”
A rueful smile flashed across Ilsa’s mouth and was gone as quickly as it had come. “I thought you were my replacement.”
“Your replacement? But I’d just moved back here. I don’t have any experience running a soup kitchen. I just wanted something to do a few days of the week.”
Ilsa snorted. “So you say.”
“Ilsa, I asked to meet with you because I wanted to make some suggestions about how to more effectively schedule volunteers. Manna needs a volunteer coordinator so all of the work can be done without burdening any one or two people.”
“Everything was running smoothly,” Ilsa said.
“Then why were volunteers quitting left and right?”
The question was out of Summer’s mouth before she could squelch it.
Ilsa smiled, but it held no humor or warmth. “Well,” she said, pushing her chair back from the desk and bending down. “That’s not my problem anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
The soup kitchen director hefted a small box up from the floor. A handbag was on top of it.
“I’ve been relieved of my duties here,” she said. “The Common Ground board so very graciously offered to keep me for another month while they searched for a new director. I told them I’d be leaving immediately.”
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