It was 5:50. Kara loitered at the stove, swirling stir-fry around the wok with mild annoyance as she noted the time. Of the two of them, Craig was the less likely to be late. But late he was, and the rarity made her all the more impatient.
The vegetables were ready and had been for several minutes, so she reached back to the stand-alone counter in the center of the kitchen and fetched up a bowl of ham she had sliced into cubed strips. She tipped the bowl, sliding half of the ham into the wok, mixing it in with the vegetables.
Content with the mixing, she pulled a few odd ends of ham out of the remaining half, carried them to the door that led to the side yard, opened it—and looked curiously down at the knob. She hadn't unlocked the door; it had been left unlocked. That was strange.
Paws, smelling dinner cooking inside, was already at the door, wagging his tail hopefully. She offered him the bits she had brought, and he licked them up as she rubbed his head. It was still raining lightly; the patio was wet and the wind had picked up a little, chilling the air just a bit after a warm day. She stepped back inside and shut the door behind her.
The rest of the ham she covered and stowed in the refrigerator. Through the kitchen wall she heard Craig's pickup pull into the garage. It's about time, she thought, glancing toward the table. All was ready, which was good since he would need to leave again shortly.
Craig hurried through the door to the garage and immediately noted her scowl. "I'm late, I know," he greeted her. He had been expecting the scowl—good for him. He had a hands-free cell phone, and he ought to have used it. "Traffic on I-5 was even worse than usual. Twice I sat in one spot for five minutes without moving an inch."
"And you didn't call?"
"The next exit was ours," he explained. "I thought I'd be home in ten minutes."
"And when you weren't?"
He sighed. "You're right, I should have called… Why are you grinning?"
She found that she was. She hadn't been able to hold the scowl for long, not with what she knew that he didn't know yet. "I'll show you in a minute."
"Show me? What is it?"
"You'll see." She brought the steaming wok to the table and set it on a hot pad between sliced cheese, a bowl of fruit, and a pitcher of iced tea. "Go wash up."
Eyebrows drawn in blended curiosity and suspicion, he ambled off to the bathroom. As soon as he was out of sight, Kara collected the day's mail, already opened, from the counter and stacked it beside his plate, careful to hide the last envelope beneath the others.
When Craig returned, hands and face freshly scrubbed so that the dirt patches they always carried after a day's work had vanished, they sat across from each other. "I know what the secret is," he offered. "Your mother called and said she won't be able to make it out to visit next month."
Kara took a bite of white cheese and spoke between chews. "She did call, actually, but just to confirm that we won't be too busy for her to stay with us."
"And you reminded her that summer's my busiest time, right? That I'll have to work at least eighty hours that week?"
She laughed and took another bite of cheese. "I told her you would be busy. I don't think she took me seriously, though. She just likes you, you know."
"That's because when I said 'I do,' she thought I was talking to her," Craig remarked. Kara grinned as he lifted more vegetables to his mouth.
He chewed for a moment. "Derek told me today that Shanice wants him to cut back on his hours this summer. I guess he was away from home too much last year, and she wants him to spend more time with her and the kids."
"I remember her complaining about how much he was gone."
"But do you know why he was working so much? He thought we still needed the money."
"So he was trying to bring in revenue…"
"…so we would have enough to get by," Craig finished. He poured himself a glass of the tea. "I told him we're doing a lot better than we were. I think he was relieved."
"Good. Oh, hey," she said, pointing through the kitchen, "you left the side door unlocked when you and Ben came by earlier."
He turned and looked thoughtfully at the door. "No, we didn't go out that way. We went straight to the guestroom and found the tools he needed, and then we left. We didn't go out to the shed."
Kara furrowed her brows. "I remember locking it this morning before I went to work…"
"Speaking of Ben, though," Craig said, "he brought it up again today…"
"Brought what up?"
"He wanted to know why we never adopted." He looked up from his plate.
Kara shook her head slowly. "He feels guilty because he has kids. What did you tell him?"
"That we're not jealous. And that we just couldn't do it at the time, emotionally or financially."
Kara considered. "Well, that's true. I couldn't even think about adopting then."
"Neither of us could."
"So did he want us to take one of the kids at the children's home?"
"He was hoping we'd be interested."
"Are we?" Kara asked.
Craig swallowed, though he'd had nothing in his mouth at that moment. He met her eyes, but still hesitated. He was thinking, calculating. "If you want to, we could look into it," he began. "But for myself…I'm all right as we are." Unconsciously, he scratched the tip of his nose with the end of his thumb. "It's not like we don't have nieces and a nephew we can go see when we want to." Still absently, he set down his fork and picked it up again. "What about you?"
Kara gave him a small smile, a little regretful, but still genuine. "I'm okay," she shrugged. His tone had been less sad than she might have expected; that was a good sign. "And there are advantages to 'us' being just the two of us."
"Like what?"
She grinned mischievously. "Like having you all to myself whenever I want." That happy thought reminded her—"Hey, take a look at the mail."
"What's in there?"
"You'll see."
He glanced through the envelopes. "Bill…bill…another advertisement for satellite TV. Do they never give up?… A postcard from the nursery. Is that what you're so happy about?" He flipped it over to scan the sale announcement on the back.
"No, Grover sent that ad out to the whole neighborhood. Keep going."
The last envelope caught his eye. "The Mariners?" he asked with predictable surprise. "Do they want us to buy season tickets or something?"
"Just look inside."
He pulled out the contents and dropped the envelope on the table, the logo—a baseball layered between a pair of offset compass roses—facing upward. He unfolded the letter and began to read.
"From the Director of Public Relations?" He lifted an eyebrow at Kara, then read aloud:
Dear Mr. Fleming:
The Seattle Mariners have recently learned of your several years of time, expense, and effort donated to improve local Little League baseball fields. In recognition of your hard work, and in conjunction with our salute to Little League baseball during the month of August, we would like to invite you, along with Mr. Derek Hopper, as co-owners of D & C Landscaping, to be our guests at our game on the evening of August 12. We also invite you both to throw out the honorary first pitches.
We will be contacting you and Mr. Hopper by phone in a few days to speak with you about this opportunity. We hope you and your families will be able to join us for that game.
M. Pecking, Director of Public Relations
"Is this a joke?" Craig looked with narrowed eyes at Kara over the letter. "Did my dad send this?"
She grinned back at him and shrugged.
He picked up the envelope again and touched the embossed logo gingerly. Then he held the envelope up to the light, assessing its authenticity. "Huh…"
"Why don't you give Derek a call?" Kara suggested.
Craig gazed at her with a vague, bemused expression. "Right, I should." Leaving his dinner and taking the letter with him, he drew out his phone and hesita
ted. "You talked with Shanice already, didn't you?"
Kara laughed. "She called a few minutes before you got home. That's why I opened it."
Craig dialed Derek's number. When Derek picked up on the other end, Craig wandered off into the hallway. From his tone, it sounded like Derek had found his matching letter, and the two men were as excited as fish discovering water for the first time.
Heart light, Kara turned back to her meal.
*****