Page 2 of Her Hometown Man
“Why didn’t she ask me?”
Case shrugged. “I don’t know. But she knows what the stakes are for you, so maybe she’s feeling some pressure to keep up an appearance everything’s good. I’ve been helping out around the property since David died, so maybe it’s easier for her to ask me for help.”
“Just keep me in the loop, please.”
“You know I will.”
When an ancient Jeep Wrangler pulled into the Sutton driveway and parked half on the grass next to one of the SUVs, Case leaned forward in his rocker. Unlike her oldest sister, Evie Sutton wasted no time getting out and, after opening the back door, she started piling totes and a few boxes on the ground.
The youngest sister also had blond hair—all three of them did, like their mother—but hers was shorter than Gwen’s, and a lighter shade. Mallory’s color was in-between, and her hair was shoulder-length and wavier than Gwen’s. Despite the differences, there was never any doubt the three women were sisters.
“She’s got a lot of stuff, too,” Case said, not that he needed to. His cousin’s gaze was locked onto his ex-wife. “Maybe we should go over there and offer to help carry stuff in.”
As Gwen walked over to Evie and the two sisters exchanged what could only be described as a perfunctory hug, Lane chuckled. “Nope. I want no part of whatever’s going on over there tonight.”
Case sat back in his rocking chair and took a sip of his beer. “Things are definitely about to get interesting.”
Gwen would have happily sat in her car for a while more—hours, even—rather than go inside, but Evie had texted them all to say she’d stopped at the market and would be home in a few minutes.
Home.
Back in her small, suffocating hometown in the middle of New Hampshire. She hadn’t expected to be back until December. She’d begged off last Christmas—claiming deadlines as she always did—doing a FaceTime chat with the family instead. She’d had to come home anyway, in the middle of January for her dad’s funeral. Missing out on sharing his love for the holidays and getting one last hug would haunt her forever.
Without being told, she’d known she’d have to be home for the family’s first Christmas without Dad. But here she was, at the halfway point of the year, with the bare minimum of things she’d need for the summer. She was hoping not to be in Stonefield for that long, but Mal had been sketchy on the details when she called.
Gwen had been munching on a carrot stick—which absolutely wasnota satisfying replacement for her beloved Doritos, regardless of crunch and color—and staring at a whiteboard covered in plot points scrawled on sticky notes when the phone rang. She’d answered it and heard Mal’s voice.
“You need to come home.”
“The hell I do,” Gwen had responded.
“Gwen.” Her sister had managed to inject an entire paragraph’s worth of exasperation into that one word.
“Mallory.”
When the answering silence had stretched on, Gwen had resigned herself to making another trip home. As much as the good people of Stonefield got on her last nerve and no matter how behind she was on her book, if her family really needed her, she wouldn’t say no.
So now here she was, back in the house she’d grown up in with her mom and her sisters. It would feel like she’d stepped through a time warp, if not for the constant awareness that her father was no longer with them.
Though the house had a huge formal dining room thanks to its pre-Suttons life as an inn, they were seated around the small kitchen table, as always. The kitchen was the heart of Ellen’s home and they’d always taken their meals there. For as long as Gwen could remember, the massive cherry dining room table was for doing jigsaw puzzles, eating Thanksgiving dinner and wrapping Christmas presents.
Mallory’s two boys—ten-year-old Jack and Eli, who was eight—had been granted video game time in the family room after greeting their aunts, and as her mom made them all tea because she believed tea was always a cure for what ailed a person, Gwen listened to the sounds of engines racing and juvenile trash talk.
And she stared at the empty chair at the head of the table—her dad’s chair. Her mom’s favorite summer cardigan was slung over the back, and Gwen wasn’t sure if it was simply where Ellen had mindlessly tossed it, or if she’d put it there to keep people from sitting in the spot her husband had occupied for over thirty years.
“It’s so good to have all my girls home again,” her mom said, as she pulled out the chair to the right of the empty one—where she’d not only been next to her husband, but closest to the stove—with a tea of her own. Her smile was warm but quivering slightly. “I’m sorry to be such a bother, though.”
It was Mal, of course, who reached over and covered their mother’s hand with her own. Mal was the peacemaker—the one who interceded and arbitrated and soothed. Maybe it was because she was the middle child, though she didn’t really bridge the gap between the eldest and youngest. At thirty-five, Mal was only a year younger than Gwen. But there had been seven years between Mal and a surprise Evie and even at twenty-eight, their youngest sister seemed irresponsible and immature to Gwen. Evie thought Gwen was uptight and controlling. Mal had always had her work cut out for her when it came to keeping the peace between them.
“You know we’re always here when you need us, Mom,” Gwen said. And then she turned her gaze to Mallory. “You said you’d explain everything when we got here. Well...we’re here.”
What followed was Mallory recapping the last six months of handling their father’s estate, while Ellen wrapped her hands around her warm mug and held it so tightly, Gwen was afraid it might crack. The bottom line was that David Sutton had put everything they had into turning the carriage house into a brewery and if it wasn’t a success, their mom could end up with nothing.
Gwen swallowed the questions that popped into her head first—how could her father have been so irresponsible and how could her mother have let him—and focused on the immediate issue. “What, exactly, is it you expect us to do about the brewery?”
“Help. I expect you to help.”
“I hate to break it to you, Mal, but I don’t know a damn thing about brewing beer.”
