Page 7 of This Time Around (The Can’t Have Hearts Club #3)

“Oh dear.” Skye frowned and set down the cat. The feline scampered across the carpet and out into the foyer, its baseball-mitt paws skidding across the travertine. “Vicky didn’t tell you?”

“Tell me what?” Allie struggled to remember someone—anyone—daring to call her grandmother Vicky . She’d always been Victoria or Grandma, but Vicky?

“She hasn’t run this place as a B&B for years,” Skye said. “Said she didn’t have the time or the energy anymore. She turned it into a cat sanctuary about a year ago.”

“A cat sanctuary? Like—for cats?” Allie grimaced, knowing she sounded like an exceptionally dense child, but this wasn’t adding up. “I mean she was always into animal advocacy, but I didn’t realize—I mean, she never said?—”

“I did sort of wonder why no one from the family came by to see it.” Skye gave a sympathetic head tilt, and Allie knew what was coming next. “She told me about your parents—about the whole prison thing? I guess I figured you all had your hands full.”

Allie swallowed hard, trying to understand. “She never wanted me to visit her here after I got older. And then when she moved into assisted living, I used to take her out to lunch all the time. I always offered to bring her here to see the old place, but?—”

She trailed off, hating where that thought was taking her.

She didn’t want me to know. She thought I’d tell Mom and Dad, and she knew they wouldn’t approve, but she went and did it anyway and made sure we wouldn’t know until she was gone.

There was something utterly heartbreaking about that. About her grandmother feeling a need to hide her own act of charity or impulsiveness or whatever this whole cat thing was.

Skye had gone quiet, seeming to sense Allie’s need to process.

When she finally spoke, her voice was soft.

“It started with only a few cats, but she took in a few more,” she said.

“Then it turned out a couple of the originals weren’t spayed or neutered.

It’s mostly under control now, and I have a vet come in every few months to make sure they’re all healthy.

We do still end up with the odd litter of kittens, so I guess we haven’t quite managed to fix everyone. ”

Allie nodded, still numb. “I mean, I guess I can kind of see why she’d do it. My grandmother loved cats, and she always had one or two, but?—”

“Not fourteen?”

Allie blinked. “Is that how many there are?”

Skye nodded. “Vicky left enough in her will to keep them fed and cared for at least for a little while, but obviously I’ll be leaving as soon as I graduate.”

“What?” Allie blinked. “You’re leaving?”

Skye smiled. “Well, I wasn’t planning to live here forever. This is your place now.”

“My place,” Allie repeated, too dumbfounded to form words of her own.

“I know it meant a lot to your grandma for you to have it,” Skye said. “She wanted you here.”

Allie surveyed the room and wondered how long it had been since the sofa was cleaned, since the walls were repainted, since the floors were scrubbed or resealed.

And wondering how she’d gone from being Allison Ross, budding lawyer, potential wife and mother, to Allie Ross, instant crazy cat lady.

Jack took a step toward the door, then hesitated and turned back to his mother. “You’re sure you’re okay with this?”

His mom smiled at him from the mostly empty living room of the three-bedroom house Jack had rented for the next couple months. “Sweetheart, of course I am! I’m just happy to see you two again. It feels like it’s been ages!”

“It’s been three days,” Jack pointed out. “But I really appreciate you watching her on your first day here.”

“Nonsense,” she said. “You’re going through all the trouble and expense of moving me out here and setting me up in that nice new place. The least I can do is watch my granddaughter every now and then.”

The granddaughter in question had run down the hall to put Louise’s suitcase in the guest room, which is where she’d be staying until all her furniture arrived and her new place was ready.

Jack had hoped she’d wait until he had her all set up in the posh apartment he’d rented for her at a nearby retirement village, but his mom had insisted on coming early.

She’d missed them too much since they’d left California, and the loneliness had gotten the best of her after only a few days.

The thought of his mother alone sent small spurts of rage through him. It felt like that anytime he thought of his father walking out thirty years ago, but he tamped it down. Now wasn’t the time for old grievances.

“Grandma!” Paige came bounding down the hall like an excited puppy, her long, dark braid bouncing behind her like a tail. “Want to see the dance routine I’ve been working on?”

“Absolutely! Where would you like to do it?”

“Upstairs. Come on, you can sit on my bed and play music on my phone.”

The idea of his mother serving as a DJ to a ten-year-old made Jack smile, or maybe that was the sight of his mom and his little girl looking so happy to see each other.

Paige didn’t have a close relationship with Caroline’s parents, who lived in Florida and visited once a year at best. The girl saw her aunt Missy—Caroline’s sister—a couple times a year, but the visits had become less frequent as more time passed since Caroline’s death.

That left Jack’s mom serving dual roles as primary grandma and the lone, consistent female presence in Paige’s life. Considering she’d raised Jack alone, he knew she was up to the task.

Paige and her grandma had made it halfway up the stairs, Jack completely forgotten.

It was just as well, since he needed to head back to the temp office he’d rented so he could nail down the final details of Clearwater’s move to Portland.

He had contracts to review, moving trucks to coordinate, job postings to consider, transfers to?—

“Hey, Daddy?”

Jack looked up at the top of the stairs where his little girl stood biting her lip. “I think I left my sweater at Allison’s house last night.”

— and sweaters to retrieve , he added to the growing to-do list.

“What have we talked about, Paige Anne?” he scolded. “About being more responsible for our belongings?”

God, he sounded like a parent. Or like Allie used to when he’d lost his damn keys for the hundredth time.

The thought of Allie reminded him of one key fact: Paige’s forgotten sweater gave him an excuse to see her again. He felt equal parts pissed off and giddy, or maybe just pissed at himself for even thinking the word giddy . Was he sixteen?

“I’ll go get your sweater,” he said. “But you’re going to have to do an extra chore from the chore list to earn it back.”

“All right,” she said. “I’ll do it before you get back. Then me and grandma will make that chocolate mousse you like.”

“Grandma and I,” he corrected without thinking.

“Nope, just us. Ladies only!” She giggled and ran up the stairs before he could say anything else. Instead of feeling dismissed, he just felt grateful. Paige needed more girl time in her life, more female influence than he’d managed to give her in his years as a single dad.

He headed for the door and out to the silver Toyota he’d rented until the moving company brought his Audi with the rest of their things.

He didn’t go for ostentatious sports cars, but he did like nice automobiles.

Not that there was anything wrong with the Toyota.

He’d owned one in college, though that had been covered in rust spots and sporting an odometer that had keeled over somewhere around three hundred and fifty thousand.

He spent several hours at the office going over contracts, then hit Fred Meyer for a few groceries and toiletries they needed at home.

The route back from there took him right past Allie’s place, which was a good excuse to grab the sweater.

Halfway there, it occurred to him he should probably call first, but he was on the interstate and didn’t have the hands-free option linked to the rental car.

Hopefully she was home, and wasn’t writhing beneath Wade in the throes of ecstasy.

The thought made him a little queasy, so he pushed it out of his mind as he turned off the ramp and onto the little side road that led to her place.

As he pulled up the driveway, he noticed a blue BMW that looked like the one she’d driven in college. That seemed odd. It had been a nice car then, brand new when her parents gave it to her as a high school graduation gift with a personalized plate that read anus tart .

At least that’s how Jack had read it until Allie’s mom sniffed and pointed out that a nu start was a celebration of their baby’s departure for college.

Jack hadn’t said so at the time, but he guessed it also underscored their hope Allie would set off for her new life and leave her deadbeat boyfriend behind.

Jack got the last laugh there. For a little while, anyway.

As he parked beside it now, he knew it was definitely the same car. The license plates had changed, and it showed a bit of age. Eighteen years was a long time to keep a car, especially for someone with the sort of taste Allie had.

He got out and surveyed the fading paint, the body style that harkened back nearly two decades, and wondered why he hadn’t noticed the car the night before.

Peering through the back window, he felt an unexpected rush of nostalgia.

He knew that backseat well. He recalled fumbling and groping and having sweaty, passionate sex too many times to count that summer before they started college.

Back when they were young and dumb and full of hope and hormones.

Jack clicked the alarm on the rental car and turned to Allie’s place, taking the steps more quickly than he had the night before.

He’d started to think showing up unannounced was a dumb idea, and if he hurried, maybe he wouldn’t change his mind.

It was a habit he’d started after Allie dumped him and he dropped out of college.

In a rare moment of nostalgia, he’d tracked down his father’s number and called him for the first time in years.

He’d been hoping for a meaningful father-son talk, maybe even a few words of wisdom.

Get your shit together, son! his dad had barked over the phone. The road is paved with flattened squirrels who couldn’t make up their minds.

It was one of the last times he’d spoken to his father.

Jack shook off the memory and steeled himself to knock on Allie’s door. He waited, hearing footsteps on the other side.

The door flew open faster than it had the night before, almost as though she’d been standing right next to it with her hand on the knob.

But as Jack took in her appearance, he decided that was unlikely.

She wore baggy sweatpants with a pink stain on the thigh. Her hair was in a sloppy topknot, and her entire face was covered with something that looked like split pea soup. The television over her shoulder blared something that sounded like Real Housewives of New York City .

Allie gaped at him. “Holy shit.”

Then she slammed the door in his face.