Ned eventually wanted a couple of kids, but at twenty-seven, he wasn't in a hurry to lose sleep, change diapers, and worry about college tuition. He was more interested in finding the right woman, falling in love, and going on a honeymoonâa very long honeymoon.
As for his father wanting him to settle downâif he settled down any further, they would be holding his wake and burying him next to his great grandfather, Captain Horatio Porter. His life was on the same excitement scale as watching a snail crawl. Misty Harbor wasn't geared toward an exciting nightlife or even a day life.
The small, close-knit town only came to life during the tourist season. Then, the tourists mostly consisted of families and the occasional honeymoon couple. The Maine coast didn't make the top ten list for singles looking for action, love, or a tan. While bikini-clad women lined sandy island beaches drinking fruit-flavored drinks with tiny umbrellas stuck in them, Misty Harbor was serving up lobsters, clam chowder, and a cold mist spraying in your face as the waves crashed against the rocky shore.
If you didn't find the love of your life during your high school years, chances were you weren't going to find her in Misty Harbor. Most of the girls went away to college and stayed away. He couldn't blame the girls or the women they eventually became. A good portion of the men never returned home either after receiving their degrees. In some ways, Misty Harbor had been a slowly dying town.
Lately though, the town was experiencing a much needed population growth. Last year, he had attended more weddings than funerals, and in March, he'd had a blast buying little trucks for his boss's first child. Daniel and Gwen Creighton's son, Andrew, was born during a March blizzard that had made driving impossible. Thankfully, Gwen's sister, the town's doctor, had been a short snowmobile ride away, and she had arrived in plenty of time to deliver her nephew. Gwen had pulled through the at-home delivery like a champ. Daniel had barely survived the experience.
By the size of Doc Sydney, she was expecting her own bundle of joy any day now. Even Ethan Wycliffe's wife, Olivia, had either taken up smuggling watermelons, or she was about to make a contribution to Misty Harbor's growing population. The way things were going, in a couple of years, they would need to add on to the Misty Harbor Elementary School.
Everyone's taxes were about to go up.
“Ned,” said his mother, “could you please go get the baked beans. The casserole dish is sitting on the counter.” Peggy Porter placed the tray of condiments onto one of the picnic tables. “Be careful; it's hot.”
He tried not to roll his eyes as he headed into his parents' house. His mother's beans would not only be hot, but they would also be burnt and covered in a thick, black crust that turned to ash in your mouth. No one would ever confuse his mother with Julia Child or Martha Stewart. Over the years, he and his brothers had learned to hide their distaste of their mother's beans. Their current trick was to feed them to Flipper, who seemed quite partial to his mother's cooking. Of course, Flipper would be hurt and confused as to why he was being shut out of the bedroom tonight after eating nearly a quart of baked beans.
Ned stepped into his mother's kitchen and wondered which of his sisters-in-law had been cleaning up. Usually, his mom created mountains of dirty dishes, pots, and pans when she cooked, and every surface in the room was splattered with whatever she had been fixing.
He and his brothers had gotten so good at guessing what was for dinner by the splattered surface of the stove or by what was dripping down the front of cabinet or two that, to this day, Peggy Porter still hadn't figured out how her sons had known it would be meatloaf, tuna casserole, or one of the other three meals she knew how to make. She had chalked it up to big appetites and love. None of her boys or her husband had the heart to tell her the truthâshe cooked worse than she could garden.
Dinners might have tasted like charred roadkill and lay like lead bricks in your gut, but there had been plenty to go around . . . and around. Quantity was never the issue with his mother's cooking.
He picked up the two lobster-shaped potholders, reached for the baked beans, and froze. While the aged green casserole dish was the same one his mother had used to make her baked beans for his entire life, the contents weren't hers. There were no burnt or incinerated beans. No blackened ash coated the steaming and deliciously smelling beans. Even his sisters-in-law couldn't have performed such a miracle. That left one personâNorah's mother, Joanna.
Maybe the entire Stevens family was enchanted. Norah had caused the sickly rosebush to bloom, and Joanna had taught his mother the secret of pulling food out of the oven before it turned to ash.
He had no idea if there were culinary fairies, but he wasn't about to argue the point. He picked up the fragrant side dish and headed out back to enjoy the bounty.
Norah laughed at the joke Matthew had just told for her mother's benefit about a man who walked into a bar with a parrot on his head, a duck under his arm, and an alligator on a leash. Her mom, who had joined them a minute ago, seemed to appreciate the humor too. Matthew was handsome and extremely attentive, and if she had to guess, she would say he was flirting with her. She should have been flattered by all the attention; instead, her gaze and thoughts kept wandering to Ned. Something had put a smile onto Ned's face, and she couldn't figure out what.
Ned had entered the house; while he had not really been scowling, the look on his face had been close. No one was in the house, yet he came back out wearing matching lobster oven mitts on his hands, carrying a hot casserole dish, and looking like he was holding the winning lottery ticket. She was dying to know what had put that sexy, crooked smile on his face.
Curiosity was the curse of all journalists. As far as curses went, she had it bad.
“Here we go,” said Ned's father, “hot off the grill.” John Porter set a plate piled with grilled hamburgers in the center of the table.
“Kids,” called Jill, “time to eat.”
Three noisy kids and Flipper came running. The two dads came at a more leisurely pace but appeared just as excited by the prospect of food.
Kay rolled her eyes at the dirty group. “All of you kids go inside and wash up.”
Jill looked at her husband, Paul, and sighed. “That order includes you two
older
boys. You should know better than to roll around in the dirt right before dinner.”
“They started it.” John Jr. tried to defend himself by pointing at the kids with one hand, while brushing off the dirt clinging to his jeans.
“Yeah, they double-dog dared us,” added Paul while hastily swiping at his T-shirt.
The three kids snickered, and tried to look innocent at the same time. Tyler actually whistled, stared up at the sky, and toed a clump of dead grass. Morgan batted her eyelashes, while Hunter just stood there and grinned.
Norah almost lost it when Matthew started to choke, and her own mother was biting her lower lip while pretending to fuss with Zsa Zsa's bow. The kids were adorable. The men were charming, and the women were gracious. The Porter family was warm, friendly, and loving. They were everything a family should be and more. If she could learn to ignore the sheer size of them, she really would enjoy herself. But how did one ignore a backyard full of giants?
Her mother didn't seem to be bothered by their size. Why should it bother her so? Her mother had more cause to fear physically large men than she did. So why wasn't her mother jumping every time someone accidentally bumped into her? Why wasn't she anxious to get out of the shadows of the giants and head back home where it was safe? By the expression on her mother's face, one would think she had been the one to hit the lottery.
Joanna had been so excited to get invited to this little get-together, that she had changed her outfit three times. In a way, she couldn't blame her mother. While she was at work all day, her mother was home alone working in the gardens, cleaning, or painting some rooms. The Porter family was the first neighbors they were really getting to know.
The neighbors on their other side, the Harpers, were a young family. Karen Harper had stopped over the day after they had moved in with a plate of welcome brownies. With a part-time job and three school-age children, there had been just enough time for a quick exchange of names and hellos before Karen had to rush back home.
Tonight, her mother was enjoying herself immensely, and there was no way she would the ruin the evening for her by suggesting that they head back home as soon as they were done eating. They would be there to the end. Her mother deserved to have friends and neighbors who wouldn't look at her with that knowing look in their eyes. For years, everyone had known about the turbulent relationship between her parents. Everyone that is, but her. Over the years, her mother had become very skilled at hiding the fact that her father, when drunk, became abusive both verbally and physically.
For years, she had had the impression that her mother was a bit on the clumsy side, which explained the occasional black eye, black and blue marks, and even a broken wrist once.
She had been blind to the abuse that had been going on right under her nose for years. Her mother might have been a good actress, but it didn't excuse the fact that she hadn't noticed. Now, the guilt she was feeling was enough to consume an elephant.
Logic told her that she hadn't been responsible for her father's actions or the pain her mother had suffered at his hand. But logic didn't rule the heart, and her heart broke anew every time she thought of what her mother had endured. Tonight she would smile and be neighborly for her mother's sake. No matter how uncomfortable she became.
“What can I get you, Norah?” Paul stood next to her holding an empty plate.
Matthew quickly picked up another plate and looked at her mother. “Joanna, what would you like to start withâa hamburger or a hot dog?”
Jill and Kay both gave the men a funny look before turning back to help the kids with their plates.
“A hamburger would be great, but I can wait on myself, Paul.” She took the plate and smiled. “Thanks, but why don't you go help your wife? She looks like she's got her hands full.”
Paul took one look at his wife and rushed to her side to help.
Jill was trying to balance two paper plates, while Hunter was not helping the situation by trying to scoop potato salad onto one of the plates. The plate was bending at a dangerous angle when Paul rescued the sliding food and saved Hunter's dinner. “Hey, watch out there, son. You're putting too much on the plate.”
“I'm hungry, Dad.” Hunter straightened his hot dog.
“Well, that's good, but you've got to take it easy on the plates.” Paul ruffled his son's dark hair. “You can always come back for seconds.”
Norah smiled as Hunter scooted up onto a bench next to his grandfather. The boy looked so tiny next to the large, burly man. Yet Hunter beamed with delight as his grandpop carefully squeezed ketchup onto his hot dog for him. “Thanks, Grandpop.”
“You're more than welcome, Hunter.”
John Porter gave his grandson such a tender, loving smile that Norah could feel the love from where she was sitting. John Porter was a gentle giant, and she and her mother had nothing to fear from him.
She turned to the dish of baked beans at the exact same instant as Matthew. Their arms bumped, and she reacted instinctively. She jumped back, putting a safe distance between them. Matthew handed her the serving spoon, saying, “Here you go.” Matthew didn't seem to notice her sudden jolt.
“Thanks.” She took the spoon as her gaze met Ned's across the width of the table. Matthew might not have seen her jump, but Ned had. She could see the questions in his eyes. Questions she didn't want asked because there was no way she would be answering them.
She quickly averted her gaze and looked at Peggy Porter. “This looks delicious, Peggy; did you make it?” She scooped up a big spoonful of beans.
“Sure did.” Peggy looked so proud of herself. “It's an old family recipe. But I must say that I've never seen them turn out so fine looking. They sure can make one's mouth water.”
Jill and Kay stared at the casserole dish in wonderment. Norah had to wonder how much influence her mother had had in doctoring up the beans. It was quite obvious by everyone's reaction that the beans she had just piled on her plate weren't Peggy's normal dish.
“Gee, Peg, when are you going to give me that recipe?” Kay watched as her husband, John Jr., wolfed down another forkful of his mother's beans.
“I already gave it to you, Kay.” Peggy looked confused and just a little bit offended that her daughter-in-law hadn't remembered.
“You did? When?”
Jill looked like she wanted to ask for the recipe too, but wasn't about to risk it.
“About six years ago when you married my son.” Peggy looked over at her oldest son, who was still eating the baked beans. “I figured you were now part of the family, so I gave you all the recipes that my mother-in-law had given me. The way my mother cooked, you wouldn't have wanted any of her recipes.”
“That was for the other baked beans you usually make. I want the recipe for these.” Kay swiped another forkful of the beans off Tyler's plate. “These are delicious.”
“That's the same recipe, Kay.”
Now it was Kay's turn to look confused. Norah gave a quick glance in her mother's direction and knew what had happened. Joanna had doctored up Peggy's recipe without the other woman knowing it. Her mother was looking guilty. A change of subject was definitely in order before Peggy's feelings got hurt. “Hey, what's the best cell phone company to go with up here? My boss wants me to get one since I'll be out of the office while working on some of my articles.”