LITMIR.BIZ

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animal that, despite an obviously rough background, could remain optimistic. It occurred to him, not for the first time, that Bandit would’ve been a good dog for his and Zoe’s kids. Which sent his momentarily uplifted mood diving again.

      The decor, if it could be called that, was a hodgepodge of ’50s blue vinyl booths and red Formica-topped tables, a counter with the same blue vinyl on the swivel stools and a separate room in the back where tourists could buy souvenirs. What elevated the joint from your average doughnut shop was the enormous stainless steel espresso machine with as many switches and dials as a fighter jet. Because, after all, this was Washington State, where coffee was the nearest thing to a religion and Folgers in a carafe just wouldn’t cut it.

      “You look like you’re on the way to the chair,” Dave, a former homicide detective sporting a Tom Selleck broom brush mustache, greeted him. The uniform of the day was a cop-blue shirt with a badge that read Doughnut Patrol. The badge, natch, was available for sale in the gift shop alongside the T-shirts and travel mugs reading Don’t Dunk and Drive.

      “Just the job site,” Seth answered, handing over his oversize travel mug to Dave, who brewed him coffee just the way Seth liked it. Pitch-black and strong enough to stand a spoon up in.

      “Meaning the job you’re doing with your dad.” The machine began pouring out the coffee. “The morning after you had dinner with your mom’s new boyfriend.”

      “Well, that didn’t take long.” One of the good things about Seth’s hometown was that it was, in many ways, like small towns anywhere. The type of close-knit community where everyone would band together in a heartbeat to support and protect their own. The downside was that same closeness had everyone privy to everyone else’s business. “What, did someone put it on the damn Facebook page?”

      “Not yet. But Emma Mae Graham, who came in for a mocha latte and a chocolate glaze to take on the ferry for a day in the city told me she saw you with your mom and Mike Mannion at Leaf. Which makes it the first time they’ve gone public after the past two months, right?”

      “Yet you already knew.”

      “Hey, I was a street detective before I got into this business.” He tapped his temple. “And detecting in this town is a lot easier than back in the day. Hell, if I knew that everyone who comes in for a cup of joe feels the need to tell a story, I would’ve suggested we open up a Starbucks in the cop shop back in Seattle. It would’ve saved us a lot of interrogation time.”

      Fortunately, Seth’s dad was even more of a hermit than Seth, so there was a chance that it might take him longer to find out that his wife, who’d filed separation papers three months ago, had found herself a new man. He skimmed a glance over the doughnuts in the glass-fronted case. “I’ll take a box of six glazed crullers and six apple fritters to go.”

      “Breakfast of champions,” Dave agreed as he began putting them into a dark blue box with the Doughnut Patrol shield printed in gold on the top.

      “The fritters have apples in them,” Seth said. “Which is a government-recommended fruit part of the food pyramid, right?” That was his story and he was sticking to it.

      “Works for me,” the former detective agreed. “Like carrot cake is a vegetable.”

      “There you go.”

      After boxing up the fritters and crullers, along with three doughnut holes in a small waxed bag for Bandit, Dave handed the complimentary baker’s dozen thirteen deep-fried doughnuts to Seth, who bit into a cruller and enjoyed the rush of fat and sugar.

      He drove along the water, turning up the hill to a gut-job he’d been working on for a month. Great. His dad’s truck was already in front of the house. Seth didn’t know how the old man did it, but he’d often thought he could arrive at two in the morning and Ben Harper would already be there.

      He paused for a moment, studying the house, which was one of his favorites. Like the arts and crafts bungalows, Folk Victorians were one of the most often found styles of historical houses in the country, and what home buyers usually thought of when they went looking for “charm.”

      The homes had ruled the day from 1870 to 1910. Unlike the better-known high-style Queen Anne, a Folk Victorian was nothing more than a dressed up ordinary “folk house,” so named because it had been built to provide basic shelter for the masses with little regard for changing fashions.

      As growing railroads brought machinery into towns where workmen could produce inexpensive Victorian detail to be grafted onto existing homes, the decorated houses began to spread like wildfire.

      What set the Folk Victorians apart from the earlier ordinary houses was the decorative detailing on the porches and cornice line. Porch supports were usually turned spindles or square beams with beveled corners. Other porch details were lacy or unique jigsaw-cut balustrades. The possibilities were as endless as the craftsmen’s imaginations and reflected their own particular region. In this part of the country, silhouettes of trees, mountains, animals, whales and fish along with stylized Pacific Northwest Native American symbols predominated.

      Their uniqueness, combined with a simple floor plan, made Folk Victorians as desirable today as they were when that first trainload of architectural trim had arrived in the 1800s. This particular house had been bought by a local photographer, Kylee Campbell—an old friend of Zoe’s—and her photographer fiancée she’d met while traveling across Europe. While Kylee tended to focus more on portraits and the lucrative wedding business, Mai, her fiancée, was more into scenic shots she sold to magazines around the world. Some, taken in the national park and around town, were currently displayed in Mike Mannion’s gallery.

      While Bandit snuffled around the exterior, searching out any squirrels or raccoons that might have invaded during the night, Seth found his father inside what had once been a back kitchen and was in the process of becoming a darkroom. Although Kylee and Mai were both photographers, their methods were very different. Kylee preferred shooting digital so her clients could see the photo immediately, but Mai occasionally preferred working with black-and-white film, which she’d develop herself. While going over the plans for the darkroom, she’d jokingly told him part of the reason she preferred film over digital was that the Caffenol, which apparently had replaced the funky old developer, smelled so damn good. Especially early in the morning, when she claimed it was like breathing in hot coffee steam while meditating. He’d decided to take her word on that.

      While working on this house, he’d thought how often marriages were a study in contrasts. Along with being a born nurturer, which had made her such a beloved nurse, Zoe had definitely been the more outgoing and talkative of the two of them. Even as she could be briskly efficient, she also wore her heart along with her combat patch on her uniform sleeve. One of his few positive takeaways from her deployment was how she would have made a bad situation better for any soldier who’d ended up in her care.

      Similarly, in contrast to Mai’s serenity, Kylee was an extrovert, as bright as her red hair, perfect for keeping stressed-out brides and grooms from freaking out before the ceremony, while at the same time being empathetic enough to catch those special moments that showed, far better than any posed photos, expressions of love.

      Like the photos she’d taken for his and Zoe’s wedding, which included one of Zoe’s mother zipping up her wedding dress, another of his bride-to-be calling him one last time on her cell minutes before the ceremony to tell him how much she loved him. And one he hadn’t realized Kylee had caught, of him pinning the rose boutonniere on the lapel of his father’s seldom-worn, outdated suit. His father’s expression had revealed a warmth of emotion Seth couldn’t remember ever seeing before or since. Whenever he looked at that particular photo, Seth wondered if, just possibly, Ben Harper had been remembering his own wedding day to a woman as warm and open as he was distant.

      Zoe had always been the outgoing one of the two of them. Middle school was hard enough to figure out your way through, even when you’d known everyone in your class forever. Coming in as the new girl midyear couldn’t have been easy. But seemingly without any effort at all, she quickly began weaving herself into the fabric of the school, and by the time summer vacation

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