LITMIR.BIZ

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placed on the counter by the cooktop.

      When she’d finished, she looked at Violet. “She didn’t mean anything by mentioning black leather.”

      “I know. It’s fine.” Violet knew she was different from Jenna. From all of them. It wasn’t good or bad—it just was. She turned to her boss. “You must really take after your dad. You don’t look anything like your mom.”

      Jenna smiled. “Not surprising. I’m adopted. Mom says I come from a tribe of redheaded Amazon women and she’s jealous.”

      Adopted. Violet turned the idea over in her mind. There would be advantages of not knowing where you came from, she thought. “You two are really close.”

      “We always have been. My mom’s my best friend.” Jenna wrinkled her nose. “That sounds so fake, but it’s true. She’s always been there for me.”

      “Nice,” Violet said. “What about your biological parents? What are they like?”

      “I don’t know. I’ve never met them.”

      “Did you ever think about finding them?”

      Jenna shrugged. “I never saw the point. I have a family. I’m not looking for another one.”

      Because the one she had was so good, Violet thought, more bemused than jealous. It was like watching a zoo animal. They were cute and all, but nothing she could relate to.

      She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be close to her mother. Hers had beaten her, same as look at her, and Violet had taken off when she’d been fifteen.

      She’d lived on the streets for five long years before realizing that if she stayed there, she would end up dead before she was twenty-five. Change hadn’t come easy, but she’d managed.

      And now she was here, she thought, looking around at the store, seeing it as it would be, rather than as it was.

      Maybe Jenna didn’t know what she was doing, but she had Violet. Together they would make Grate Expectations a success. Jenna had class and money and something to prove, while Violet knew how to make it, no matter the odds. An unlikely match, she thought, but a good one.

      Jenna added spices, one after the other. She quickly stirred the strips of flank steak, searing them with the spices, over the high heat. The late news played in the background and she was already on her second glass of wine.

      Telling herself it didn’t matter, that no one would know, she picked up the bowl containing the sauce she’d created on a whim and dumped it in the pan.

      The liquid snapped and boiled, reducing to almost nothing immediately. She rotated the pan, then used a spatula to flip the strips over one last time before dumping the contents onto the warm flour tortilla.

      After setting the hot pan on another burner, she turned off the heat and took a fortifying sip of wine.

      There it was. A taco of sorts. She’d been mentally playing with the idea of combining Mexican and Indian cuisine. Many of the spices were rooted in the same plants.

      Jenna grinned. Rooted in the same plants. That was funny. Then her smile faded as she turned her attention back to the food she’d made.

      She was nervous about tasting it. Experimenting used to be so easy, so joyful. Now it terrified her. Worse, it made her feel sick inside, as if something that had once been a part of her was now lost. She ached to be who she’d been before and didn’t want to admit that woman was probably gone forever.

      After squaring her shoulders, she picked up the taco and took a bite. The unusual blending of spices didn’t sit well on her tongue. She found herself unable to chew, let alone swallow. She spit the meat into the sink and flushed it down with water. After running the garbage disposal, she threw out the rest of the taco.

      When the tears came, she ignored them.

      “I’m worried,” Beth said as she stacked rinsed dishes on the counter. “Jenna doesn’t know anything about making a store work. She doesn’t even like shopping, unless it’s for knives. Then she could spend hours. But this is different. This is working with the public.”

      “She’s a smart girl,” Marshall said as he loaded the dishwasher. “Give her a chance. She’ll figure it out.”

      “She doesn’t have much time to make it work. All her money is tied up in that place. Her savings and her half of what she and Aaron got for that sad little house they owned. If the city hadn’t wanted to buy it and tear it down for that road, she would have had even less. You should have seen the inventory in her store. Thousands of dollars’ worth of kitchen equipment.”

      Her husband glanced at her. “Did you want her to start a business without something to sell?”

      “Don’t be logical. You know how I hate that.” Beth sighed, wishing she could learn how to let go. But when it came to anyone she cared about, she couldn’t help worrying. Obsessing, Marshall would say.

      “She knows what she’s doing,” Marshall told her.

      “I’m not so sure. She’s a chef. She should be cooking. She understands that world. I wish I knew what really happened with Aaron.”

      “Do you think there’s more than she’s telling us? Isn’t Aaron cheating on her enough?”

      “It is,” she admitted, although her mother’s instinct told her there was more to the story than Jenna had admitted. Something was different with her daughter. Not just the expected sadness and hurt from the breakup of a marriage. It was bigger than that.

      “Jenna will figure out her store. Didn’t she hire someone?”

      “Violet. She’s wonderful. Pretty. Black hair and dark eyeliner. I’m sure she has tattoos.” Beth thought of the other woman’s stacked bracelets and her three silver hoops in each ear and wished she had the courage to be unconventional.

      “Does Violet have retail experience?”

      “Yes. Several years of it.”

      “Then she’ll help Jenna.”

      The statement drew Beth back to the subject at hand. Her chest tightened a little. “What if it’s not enough? I understand that Jenna needs to regroup. She has to think and come up with a plan for the rest of her life, but opening a store? I don’t think that was smart.”

      She finished rinsing the last two pots. Marshall fitted them into the dishwasher. She handed over the soap. He filled the cup, then closed the dishwasher and started it.

      The end-of-dinner ritual had been the same for years. When Jenna had still been in the house, the three of them had cleaned the kitchen together. It had been a time of conversation and laughter.

      “If she fails at this, too, she’ll be crushed,” Beth whispered, aching for her only child.

      “You need to let it go, Beth. You can’t protect her from everything. Jenna’s a smart girl.”

      “Worry’s my thing.”

      He moved toward her and slid his arms around her waist. “I’ll admit you’ve turned it into an art form. Now you need to practice letting go.”

      She rested her hands on his shoulders and stared into his dark eyes. Even after all these years, being close to him made her breath catch.

      “I can’t help it. I love her.”

      “If you love something, set it free,” he began.

      She laughed. “Don’t you start with me.”

      “Why not? I plan to finish with you.”

      He bent his head and kissed her.

      Jenna stood in the center of her store and listened to the sound of silence.

      Upbeat background music—something perky and Italian—played through speakers, but there

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