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“Hate to see you get the shaft twice, bro What about Summer Arnold? She always had eyes for you, you know”
Tom chuckled “Su and pink hair”
“Just hate to see you get your hopes up” Rick brushed crust crumbs off his jeans, and Tom noticed the aard ot the crap kicked out of you by love,” Rick said “It’s not worth it”
Tom was surprised at the bitterness in Rick’s voice, but he couldn’t deny the truth in the words Abby had nevera te If he were a smart man, there’d be no more kisses in the foyer or any other part of that house
The ht about it, the more he real
ized thatthe entertainment unit was a dumb move Abby certainly wouldn’t care less, and after the renos were done, Toain
As Rick got up and said good-bye, Tom knew that the picnic at Sarah’s was the perfect tis as friends … no, as business associates That was all there could ever be between the himself to think otherwise
Abby had felt a pressing need to findthe letters, so she spent one sunnythe boxes and chests she’d already been through to one side of the less roo … most would remain packed away for now until she could decide what to do with them Some, sadly, were destined for the du shut up in the airless space Those she put closer to the door, working up a bit of a sweat as the te things around heated her up But there were other boxes that she knew she’d co to be examined for holes, different knickknacks, shoe boxes of black-and-white photos Some were family treasures she knew she should keep She understood nohy there’d been pressure to e, there were so many antiques and period items from the past that it made sense
A museum would certainly fill the house with people, but that wasn’t what Abby had in mind
What this place needed was laughter Friends Family It needed someone who could take it and make it a home And that someone wasn’t her
Marian had felt the sah, and while Abby wasn’t any closer to solving the o of a lot of her resent e woh Abby did wonder why Marian had chosen that particular cause Abby sed, re how alone she’d felt in the weeks and months after her father’s death when she was nine She’d felt so lost; torn away from her home to live with a mother she barely kneithout her dad and without Graether, but her ht At the tis locked inside
Abby had longed to have a place where she elcomed, accepted, understood Her aunt Marian had provided such a place for girls in trouble, young woment It had been personal for Marian somehow Abby could feel it even if she couldn’t prove it
The next stack of boxes were shoved into a far corner of the room and she pulled one down and plopped it on the floor in front of a three-legged stool she’d unearthed She pulled off the cover and stared at a stack of journals and photographs This was e in black-and-white Abby flipped through the pictures first, exa upper-class woarden behind thearden party—the Fosters were really top-draeren’t they?
Another showed a cluster ofin front of a ship down at the docks—one of Elijah’s shipping fleet, perhaps? There was one of Marian, holding Edith’s hand on one side and clutching a bouquet of daisies in her other hand as she stared up at the camera, her dark eyes full of impishness There were several ers drawn to one in particular Even in the sepia tones, Edith’s face seeently rounded with pregnancy That had been Iris, Abby thought, pausing over the picture for a moment Then she put it aside and picked up another