Miracle Pie (15 page)

“If I’d known you were coming, I would’ve
made a Welcome Home Pie for you.”

“You didn’t know?” His left eyebrow rose.
“Your spidey-pie sense let you down?”

She smiled. It was good to see Matt again.
He’d matured during his time away at the famed culinary school in
New York. He looked handsomer, and he seemed more sure of himself,
a man who knew where he was going in life.

“I had a Welcome Home Pie, but I already
gave it away.”

“Trish and Gunner.”

“You heard?”

“I stopped off at Wegner’s for flowers for
Mom. I know all about their return and the quads and Gunner’s new
job with Earl.”

“Taxidermy and upholstery.” Tony sneered.
“Remember how Gunner acted when he got his journalism degree? He
couldn’t wait to get out of here.”

“They need the money.” Matt’s tone was
decisive, as if that said it all. “They’re lucky they can live with
Trish’s mom until they can afford to move.”

Katie sucked her lips in. No mention of Mrs.
Brauer’s cancer. Linda Wegner didn’t know everything.

Rosa hurried into the living room. “Katie!
Why are you all standing in the hall?” She lowered her eyebrows and
speared each son with her stare. “And why didn’t anyone call me?”
She switched her gaze to Katie and her pie. “I thought it was one
of Matt’s friends. What pie did you bring?”

“Blueberry.”

“Ah, your thinking pie. You need advice.”
She stepped forward and grabbed Katie’s elbow. “Come into the
kitchen. We’ll have pie, and we can brainstorm before I go to
work.”

Though she kept her tone light, her sons’
faces clenched with disapproval at the reminder of her job. Too
bad, Katie thought. They were sending disapproval to the wrong
parent. The injustice made her so mad, she wanted to tell them they
didn’t deserve pie and couldn’t have any.

But if she said that, the one she’d hurt the
most would be Rosa, so she turned her back on the two men and
followed Rosa through the living room to the rustic dining room
next to the open kitchen.

“You can still market the cooking show
pilot,” Matt said to his mother.

Rosa shrugged, her lips tight. Katie pressed
hers together, too. Clearly Rosa hadn’t told her sons that she’d
sent the pilot to every place she could think of. It was only a
little more than two weeks, and maybe months from now, someone
might finally look at it and say, “Yes, that’s just what I want!”
But in the meantime, Rosa wasn’t the type to sit at home and fume.
Katie doubted she could afford to lounge around the house,
either.

“Hey, Katie, your video is cool,” Tony said,
changing the subject, a middle child thing that made Katie think
there’d be hope for him to be a good guy someday despite his
father’s bad role modeling.

Ducking her head a little, Katie rounded the
dining room table. People had been coming up to her with smiles for
the last couple weeks, telling her how much they loved her video.
It felt odd to be praised for something other than her pies.

“I thought so, too,” Matt said. “I showed it
to my friends at school. Even a couple of the chefs. They all went
a little nuts over what you said about pies. One of the chefs said
he was going to show it to all his beginning classes. Tell them if
that’s not how they felt about cooking, they should pack up their
knives and not waste his time.”

“So that’s why I’ve been getting so many
views.” Katie’s face was warm. If she weren’t carrying the pie,
she’d have put her hands to her cheeks.

They reached the kitchen, and Katie put the
box on the counter. Tony beat his mother to the box, pulling out
the pie while Matt got plates and forks. Rosa, who had trained her
boys well, smiled wanly at Katie.

“Gabe was right after all,” Rosa said.
“People like your short video. It’s popular.”

Katie shrugged. “The last I checked, the
views were about three thousand. That seems a lot to me, but it’s
really not much.”

“I showed it to the woman next to me on the
plane,” Matt said. “It said your views were at 6900.”

“Really?” Katie heard the squeak in her
voice. She glanced down at her feet in the sensible sneakers that
wanted to do a little happy dance.

“I wonder that I haven’t heard from Gabe,
crowing about it.” Rosa frowned.

Matt narrowed his eyes at her. “That’s the
videographer, right? Was he bothering you?”

“Not me.” Rosa looked at Katie, her eyebrows
raised.

Katie gave Matt what she knew must be a weak
imitation of Rosa’s stare. “I have a father. If I have any
problems, I don’t need you to help me.”

“I hope Sam keeps his shotgun ready.”

Tony laughed.

“It’s not necessary. Gabe’s in Chicago, and
I’m here.” Katie shrugged, as if it didn’t matter.

Matt’s expression softened, and Rosa put her
hand on Katie’s shoulder. Katie gazed down at her shoes again.
Apparently her shrug hadn’t fooled them. Who needed a lie detector
when you had friends?

“Enough chatter,” Rosa said. “Let’s eat the
thinking pie and brainstorm. I’ll get coffee.”

“I’ll help,” Tony said.

“Katie didn’t come here for your help, she
came for mine,” Rosa said.

Matt and Tony looked at Katie. She gestured
to include them. “I’m trying to think of a way to help Trish and
Gunner.” She pushed her hair behind her ear. Tony shoved a plate
across the counter at her, a piece of pie and fork on it. “I’m
thinking of auctioning off a pie a week. I thought maybe other
people in the village will join in to help Trish and Gunner,
too.”

“Does that pie a week include deliveries?”
Rosa asked. “I could do a meal a week, but if the highest bidder is
too far from Miracle, I might not be able to deliver.”

“Tell Nick to do it,” Tony said about Rosa’s
youngest son.

“Or you could,” Matt said.

Tony gave his older brother a look that
should’ve made him explode like a cartoon character. “I’m busier
than Nick.”

“Yeah, I know what you’re busy doing.”

“Boys!” Rosa’s voice rang out sharply. “This
is a thinking pie, not a fighting pie.”

“Fighting?” Tony waggled his eyebrows at
Rosa. “You see any fists?”

“If there were, I’d win,” Matt said.

“Ha! If I weren’t eating the pie, we’d see
who would win.” Tony turned to Rosa. “Not everyone in the village
has a talent like you, Mom. Or you, Katie.”

“Or me,” Matt said.

“You live in New York and won’t even be part
of this. And when are you going to get it through your inflated
head that not everything is about you?”

“This is where my mom lives, so it’s
definitely about me.” Matt gave his brother a male version of his
mother’s stare. “Just because I’m going to school in New York
doesn’t mean I don’t care about my friends in Miracle. I used to
hunt and fish with Gunner. I always liked Trish. I want to
help.”

“Enough squabbling.” Rosa gave both sons The
Stare, her lips a dark bluish pink from a bite of pie. “We should
sit down and talk about this seriously.”

“Some studies show we think better standing
than sitting,” Matt said.

Tony rolled his eyes.

“Then we’ll stand.” Rosa turned to Katie. “I
know a more efficient way to do this. You’re getting so many views,
and it’s just getting better.” She nodded at Matt. “I’m sure it’s
because you showed so many people.”

“Anything to help.”

“Hey, I showed my friends, too,” Tony
said.

“Thank you, too, Tony,” Katie said. Despite
the serious mission that brought her here, a small happiness hummed
through her. “Both of you are wonderful.”

They looked at her as if she were their
father’s special puttanesca sauce and they’d like to eat her, a
slow bite at a time. She thought of Gabe and snapped her attention
to Rosa, her face warm. She needed him out of her head so she could
think
.

“Before we go any further,” Matt said, “are
you sure they’ll accept the money? I don’t know about Gunner. He’s
proud.”

“Gunner’s going to be the father of six kids
real soon,” Tony said. “He can’t afford to be proud.”

“Tony’s right,” Katie said. “Trish is proud,
too. But neither of them is stupid. If they argue, we’ll just say
they can pay it back some day.” Lifting a forkful of pie to her
mouth, she looked at Rosa. “What do you mean by an efficient way to
do this?”

“What we need to do to raise money,” Rosa
said, “is get Gabe back to Miracle.”

Chapter Twenty-five

Katie choked on her pie. Matt pushed a
napkin at her, and Tony rushed to get a glass of water.

She managed to swallow and breathe fast, in
and out. Her face, neck and upper chest were hot. She was pretty
sure her complexion was a lovely strawberry shade.

Tony handed her a glass of water, his
eyebrows raised in a question.

Ignoring his expressive Italian face, she
gulped down half the glass then turned to Rosa. This wasn’t about
her. It wasn’t even about Gabe. It was about Trish.

“Why Gabe?”

“If we want a lot of money, it’s very
simple. We have to go global.”

“I think you mean viral,” Matt said.

Rosa flapped her hand at him. “Viral,
global, whatever. Gabe can film us talking about Trish and Gunner
needing help. I’ll set up a bank account for the money. People can
send us checks, and we’ll put it in the bank for them.”

“Yeah, right,” Tony said, irony heavy in his
voice. “We ask for money and people will give it to us. I’m sure
that will work as well as when I asked Dad for my last raise.”

“Not just
us
.” Rosa shot her middle
son another scorching look. “The whole village. Maybe we can just
tell them how much it matters and even a little about Miracle.”

Both men grimaced, and Katie squeezed Rosa’s
arm. “It could work. But instead of just putting out a plea for
money, maybe we should ask Gabe—or even someone else, because I
don’t know why he’d do this—”

“He’ll do it,” Rosa said, in the tone of
voice that said
He’ll do it after I talk to him
.

“We should ask him to do interviews with
other people in the village. Something similar to what he did with
me. They can share their story. Then at the end, after they make
people care about them, they can say why it’s important to do
this.”

“That’s when they ask for money,” Matt said.
“I like it.”

“It could work,” Rosa said. “We’ll have to
make a list of people who have a story.” She pushed her empty plate
away.

“It’s going to be a short list,” Tony
said.

Katie shook her head. “Everyone has a
story.”

“Yeah, but we know their stories, and
they’re boring.”

“They’re boring to us,” Katie said, “but
they’re not boring to the people who lived it.”

“How do you know they’re boring?” Matt held
out his hands, reinforcing his question. “Who would’ve thought
Katie’s story would be interesting? Sorry, Katie.”

Tony nodded. “It’s true. Sorry, Katie, but
you live in your dead grandma’s cottage. You hardly date. It’s kind
of weird to find out you’re interesting.”

“No offense taken. I’m amazed, too. It’s not
as if I do anything as interesting as either of you.”

They both stared at her for a second, then
Rosa laughed.

Matt grinned first. “You’re making fun of
us, aren’t you?”

“You must be the smart male in your
family.”

“Hey!” Tony said.

Matt snickered then gestured at Katie.
“There’s a lot of truth in what she said. Maybe everyone’s
interesting once you find out more about them.”

“We think we know our neighbors.” Rosa’s
eyes narrowed and darkened. “Or people close to us. But many times
we see what they want us to see.”

The grin dropped from Matt’s face, and
Tony’s eyebrows lowered, a brooding, angry look that made Katie
wonder how long he would continue to work for his dad. Unlike Matt,
she couldn’t see him going on to culinary college. Or any
college.

“So you agree?” she asked. One crisis at a
time. And if Matt and Tony were thinking about helping Trish and
Gunner, it would make their own problems seem smaller.

“If you can get this Gabe guy,” Matt said,
“it’s worth a shot. He’s got the touch.”

Katie’s arms prickled. Gabe certainly did
have the touch. He didn’t just seduce her into telling stories. He
seduced her right into bed.

Or did she seduce him? At the time it seemed
awfully, wonderfully mutual.

“Sounds good to me,” Tony said. “And at the
end of the stories, we’ll put the information for the website.”

“A website?” Rosa frowned. “I wonder if
there’s a way to do it for free? I could ask Derek Muench. He did
the website for our...your father’s restaurant.”

“I was in the same grade with Derek,” Katie
said. “I could ask him.”

“I was a paying customer.” Rosa gave her a
determined look. “It’s harder to say no to me. I’ll ask him.”

“Derek will do anything to get away from his
mom,” Tony said.

“Except move out of her house,” Matt
replied.

“And they say women are catty,” Rosa said.
“Elaine has MS. How could he leave her?”

“Hey, we’re just sayin’ it the way it is.”
Tony helped himself to another piece of pie. “It’s not like she
can’t get around. When I’m twenty-eight, I don’t plan on living
with you.”

“I can’t tell you how grateful that makes
me.”

Katie felt like she was watching a movie.
They even said cutting things to each other with love and
humor.

“We’ll have to see how we can set this up as
a charity.” Rosa frowned. “I’ll ask my accountant if he can help.
This is getting complicated.”

“I can ask my dad,” Katie said. “He knows
people.”

“Would you?” Rosa’s smile held relief. “I
could do it, but Sam would do it better.”

“It’s better to involve as many people in
the village as possible,” Matt said. “Make it a community project.
Not just yours and Katie’s.”