Chapter 8

CHAPTER EIGHT

Iris was in a mood, and the house was pure chaos. Jack had almost packed his little sister into the car and run to IHOP, which had been their Thanksgiving tradition whenever their mother had other plans, but two things had made him stay. One, he really did want to have Thanksgiving with his newly discovered half-sisters despite all the craziness that seemed to entail, and two, Adalia had mentioned that Maisie was coming.

He hadn’t heard from her, and although he’d thought about reaching out, she’d made her one rule pretty clear: just one night. She’d called him a rule follower, and he supposed that was true for the most part, but as far as he was concerned, she’d shown up on his home turf, which meant his rules.

Too bad he hadn’t figured out what they were.

Now would be a terrible time to try to start something with Maisie.

Iris’s move to Asheville hadn’t gone as smoothly as he’d hoped. When she wasn’t tearful and withdrawn, she was angry with Jack for moving to “this hippie town.” He had to acknowledge that moving to a new city less than halfway through her senior year had to be awful, but he couldn’t bring himself to go back to Chicago.

Did that make him a terrible person? He honestly wasn’t sure.

Iris had begged him to let her move in with Janie and her family, something they’d agreed to, but Genevieve had been calling and harassing Jack frequently enough that he didn’t dare risk it. Janie’s family didn’t deserve the hassle of dealing with his mother, and he wouldn’t put it past Genevieve to try to coerce Iris back home. Turned out that Iris’s father had caught wind that she wasn’t living with her mother anymore and had cut off his child support checks. (Did he have someone watching her? Jack knew they weren’t on speaking terms.) Jack noticed the asshole hadn’t sent the money his way instead. Not that he would have taken it. At least Prescott Buchanan had met with Jack a few times when he was a kid, before Genevieve got pregnant with Iris (probably his mother’s desperate attempts to rekindle something with his father). His sister had never once met her DNA contributor.

So Jack had told Iris that he was truly sorry, but their lives were in Asheville now, at least for the time being, and once she graduated from high school she could go to Northwestern University with Janie, just like they’d always planned.

If she got in, which was questionable since they had an eight percent acceptance rate, and she was blowing off a good portion of her homework.

Iris needed his full attention. He’d already dragged her away from her school and her friends. He couldn’t add a girlfriend to the mix. It wouldn’t be fair to Iris or Maisie.

All the more reason to blow off dinner and go to IHOP, and yet he hadn’t left. He’d told himself he was sticking around because Adalia would hog-tie him to a chair if he suggested leaving—which was probably true—but he wasn’t a total fool. He’d wanted to see Maisie again. To figure out if that spark was still there.

The answer had been obvious to him before he even walked into the kitchen. He’d glimpsed her through the back door, handing pieces of a broken dish to Adalia, and the surprisingly vulnerable look in her eyes had drawn him away from his post in the back yard.

He was supposed to be on Dottie duty. She was frying a turkey, and River and Georgie had decided she needed strict supervision. They’d all agreed to take turns babysitting her and the fryer; Georgie had even mocked up a schedule. But if he’d learned anything about Dottie Hendrickson, it was that she thought love trumped all other causes. If she’d known why he wanted to be in the kitchen, she would have pushed him inside with both hands.

He’d walked through the door, watching Maisie for several seconds before saying something. He hadn’t planned to mention poker. The words had just flown out of his mouth.

Her sassy answer was more than what he could have hoped for—had she really insinuated she was willing to pick things up where they’d left off?

Then Stella had walked in with Lurch, touching his arm, and they’d blown everything apart by announcing that the goose Jack had charmed three weeks prior was going to be part of their Thanksgiving dinner.

Maisie gasped in genuine horror, and Adalia gave her a confused look. “Who’s Diego?”

“The goose,” Maisie said softly, gesturing to the painting in Adalia’s hands.

“He’d outlived his usefulness,” Stella said matter-of-factly. “I have a new muse.” Then she gave Lurch an adoring gaze.

“Oh, my God!” Adalia shrieked and jumped backward as though trying to get as far away from the platter as possible, not that Jack blamed her. He might not be a vegetarian or even a pescatarian like Adalia, but he figured there were farm animals and pets, and it was best not to mix the two. Besides, he’d been fond of the little guy.

“She cooked a goose?” Finn asked in confusion, looking from Adalia to Maisie. It was clear he didn’t understand the problem.

“Get that out of my house!” Adalia shouted, pointing her finger at the platter. She set the painting down, propping it against the cupboards, like she wasn’t so sure she wanted to touch it anymore.

River burst into the kitchen with Georgie right behind him. “What happened?”

“She cooked a goose,” Finn said, still not seeming to understand what all the fuss was about.

“Not just any goose,” Adalia seethed. “The goose from her paintings!” She gasped. “Do you eat your goats too?”

Stella shrugged. “I believe in the circle of life,” she said haughtily. “Diego would want us to have a delicious Thanksgiving dinner, looking at his portrait while we enjoy his bounty.”

“But you named him,” Maisie said, wrapping her arms across her chest. “You treated him like a pet. And now you want to eat him? Can you not see that this is massively screwed up?” She glanced up at Jack, her eyes glassy with unshed tears.

Was she thinking about Jack holding the goose in his arms? If not for Diego, he wasn’t sure he and Maisie would have ever had their night together.

“The goose that destroyed my old room?” River asked, and Georgie gasped.

River looked like he wasn’t sure how to react. Then again, Adalia had shown him the pictures. That goose had crapped on just about every surface in River’s old room.

“Get it out!” Adalia repeated, pointing to the back door. “Now!”

“What’s going on, dears?” Dottie asked as she walked through the back door into the now-crowded kitchen. “Oh, Stella. You made it.”

“These young folk are carryin’ on about me cooking Diego,” Stella said with a scowl. “But I think their ingratitude really stems from this one”—she gestured to Adalia—“worrying that I’m gonna try to steal her man.” She held up her hands in surrender. “I call a truce. Your man’s off-limits today.” She shot a dark look at Maisie. “I make no promises about yours.”

“Maisie’s?” River asked in surprise, then glanced at Maisie. “You have a boyfriend I don’t know about?”

“No,” Maisie barked, a little too quickly for Jack’s taste, then turned her attention to Stella. “I thought you’d claimed Lurch.”

“A woman can enjoy the company of more than one man,” Stella said with an upturned chin.

“So they are swingers,” he heard Maisie say in a whisper, nudging River.

Everyone remained silent for a moment.

“This town is so freaking weird,” Iris said in disgust from the doorway. “This never would have happened in Chicago.” Then she spun around and flounced off.

“I’ve heard Chicago is a very dry town,” Dottie said absently.

Jack had no idea what that meant, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

A cat shrieked out back, and Jack realized if Dottie was inside, then no one was attending the fryer. With Jezebel outside, having snuck out the front door earlier…

Oh shit. They didn’t need another dead pet at the party. Maisie would probably have a heart attack.

He raced out the back door just as Dottie said, “What’s the fuss? Diego played his role in the great circle of life.”

“That’s exactly what I said,” Stella agreed amidst a flurry of other comments.

But Jack had already left the kitchen, and he had much greater concerns than what was—or wasn’t—on the menu for dinner. Jezebel was perched on the wrought iron bench out back, hissing at the fryer, which had overturned and caught a three-foot by three-foot section of the lawn on fire. The grease was slowly spreading down the hill, moving toward the kitchen.

“I smell something burning,” he could hear Dottie say. “Is the stuffing still in the oven?”

“Addy!” Jack shouted. “I need a fire extinguisher! And possibly baking soda!”

He heard multiple gasps and cries inside, but his attention was focused on containing the fire before it reached the house or the fence. He’d seen an extinguisher when he’d helped clean out the shed to create a studio for Adalia a couple of months ago, and they’d put it in the detached garage. The door was locked, but it only took one good ramming with his shoulder to get it open. The extinguisher was on the shelf, thank God, so he grabbed it and ran back to the fire.

It had inched closer to the house, but his new concern was Lurch, who was holding the garden hose.

“Lurch!” Jack shouted. “Stop!”

Lurch waved as he turned on the faucet. “Not to worry! I’ve got this covered.”

Then he sprayed a stream of water directly at the flames.

As Jack had expected, the reaction was instant. Flames shot up into the trees, sending Jezebel leaping off the bench in protest. He heard a few screams, and he pulled the clip out of the extinguisher and started spraying the flames closest to the older man as he made his way to the faucet and turned it off. Lurch’s sleeve was smoldering, so Jack doused it with the extinguisher and then grabbed his free arm and dragged him to the porch, where everyone had gathered to watch the flames. “Get away from the house! Go out front, and someone call 911!”

But someone must have already called—likely one of the neighbors—because he heard distant sirens approaching them.

Stella and Dottie grabbed Lurch’s arms and pulled him inside while River ran out the door with another, smaller, extinguisher. Finn was trying to herd everyone out front, and considering the resistance he was getting, Jack wondered if he had the hardest job.

Jack and River sprayed the flames closest to the house, but the water had spread the fire.

“River! Let the firefighters take care of it!” Georgie called out, her voice shaking with fear.

Then, as though obeying Georgie, River’s extinguisher ran out. He took a few steps back toward the porch. “Jack, we can’t contain it. Come on!”

But Jack wasn’t ready to give up yet. His extinguisher was larger, and he was determined to save the house. It was his house, his and his sisters’ and even the half-brother who still hadn’t acknowledged him, and he wasn’t going to give up on it. He’d hang in as long as he could, or at least until the fire trucks pulled up. The smoke burned his nose and he started to cough.

“Jack!” someone called out in a panic.

He glanced over his shoulder to see Maisie on the back porch with Iris. They were both watching with horror in their eyes, but Iris was sobbing loudly.

“Maisie!” he shouted. “Get my sister out of here! And make sure to tell the firemen it’s a grease fire!”

“Stop, Jack!” Iris cried out. “Let it burn!”

Then his extinguisher ran out, and even though he was tempted to ask Maisie to get the industrial-sized bag of baking soda Adalia had gotten at Costco, he knew it wasn’t enough to contain the fire, or even keep it from reaching the house.

Maisie ran down the steps and grabbed his arm with both hands, tugging. “Don’t be a hero, Jack. Your sister needs you.”

He glanced down at her in surprise, and then she was pulling him up the steps, and he was following. Just like he’d followed her through the party weeks before. Almost like he couldn’t help himself. He wrapped his arm around Iris’s back the moment he reached the top of the steps, and it caught him by surprise when a coughing fit racked his chest. Maisie and Iris led him through the house and out to the front yard.

Maisie tried to get him to sit on the front step, but he was determined to make sure the firemen knew what they were dealing with.

“Where are you going, Jack?” Iris called out as he pulled free and walked toward the fire trucks that were now parked at the curb.

“I told you we’ve been here before,” one of the firefighters said to his buddy. “You owe me ten bucks.”

“I only agreed to pay up if the crystal statue of the naked old guy is here.”

“It’s not,” Jack said, pissed they weren’t taking this seriously. “And it’s a crystal dick, not a crystal statue. There’s a grease fire in the back yard. An overturned turkey fryer. That guy over there”—he motioned toward Lurch, who was sitting under a tree—“needs to be checked out. He tried to douse it with water and may have been burned by the shooting flames.” Then he started to cough.

“Sounds like you need to be checked out too,” the first guy said.

“Just go save my damn house,” he grunted.

“Jack, come on,” Adalia said, grabbing his arm and tugging him away.

He was disappointed it wasn’t Maisie, but she was sitting on the front curb with Dottie, who looked like she was about to burst into tears. Finn was trying to keep everyone gathered together in the front lawn, including Stella, who seemed far more interested in the firefighters than she was Lurch.

Maisie glanced up at him, her gaze letting him know that she wished she were tugging his arm too. She seemed to like tugging him around, not that he minded. He was tempted to go to her, to kiss her in front of everyone, but Iris was standing by herself, tears streaming down her face, and he knew what he had to do.

His ex-girlfriend was right. Until Iris left for college, anyone else would be in second place. And as much as it killed him to admit it, Maisie deserved more than he could give her.

He went to his baby sister and pulled her into his arms, comforting her. Then he felt something brush his legs, and he smiled when he realized it was Jezebel. Tyrion was trotting behind her, wagging his tail as if nothing had happened.

Adalia cried out, “Tyrion!” then dropped to her knees and buried her face in his fur. “I was so worried about you! They wouldn’t let me go upstairs to look for you.”

“That evil cat found the dog?” Iris asked in disbelief.

“Looks like it.” Jack pulled away from Iris and sat down on the lawn to thoroughly examine the cat. When he declared her healthy, she nuzzled him under his chin.

“I swear you’re a warlock,” Adalia said in wonder. Finn was sitting down at the curb with Dottie and Maisie, but he kept glancing back at her.

“Animals have always liked him,” Iris said in a snotty tone. “A real sister would know that.”

Adalia’s eyes widened slightly, but then she said in a sweet voice Jack knew it must have taken some effort to summon, “I’m Jack’s real sister too. Same as you. And while we don’t have as much history with Jack as you do, Georgie and I are trying to make up for lost time. But like I told you before,” she said, “Jack’s family is our family. We want to get to know you too.”

Iris rolled her eyes. “Whatever.”

Then she walked over to Jack’s car and rested her butt against the side.

“I’m sorry, Addy,” Jack said, horrified. It was like he’d left his sister in Chicago and some evil pod person had replaced her. What had happened to the sweet, funny kid he’d helped raise? But if he were honest with himself, she’d been changing over the last year as their mother had begun sinking into another depressive spiral. “I had no idea she’d be this surly when I asked if it would be okay for her to move in. We can move out if you want.”

Adalia released a snort-laugh. “ Please. You should have seen me when I was her age. I had a chip on my shoulder too. She’ll come around. Give her time.”

“I only have nine months before she leaves,” he said, surprised to hear his voice hitch a little. Truth be told, part of him looked forward to his sister’s graduation in the same way a prisoner looked forward to being released. Once she was an adult, on her own, he wouldn’t have to worry about her so much. Of course, he knew it wouldn’t matter in some ways—he’d feel responsible for her no matter where she lived. It had become part of who he was.

“Trust me, Jack,” Adalia said. “Just love her and she’ll come around. In the meantime, I feel like I’m looking at my teenage self in an alternate dimension, and I’m fascinated. Besides, I spend half my time at Finn’s. Don’t you think about going anywhere.”

The firemen made quick work of putting out the fire, which had blackened the side of the house but not actually burned it. They gave Dottie a lecture about turkey fryers, but Stella kept interrupting to feel all of the firemen’s arms. Lurch actually took photos of her posing with them, which Jack couldn’t begin to understand. Then again, he’d never been the sharing type when it came to women. If he liked someone, he was all in.

The paramedics wanted to take Jack to the hospital to get checked out for smoke inhalation, but he refused since his oxygen saturation rate was fine. But they did end up taking Lurch, who had singed off his eyebrows and had burns on his arm. Thankfully, Stella went with him. One of the firefighters tried to get cozy with Georgie, asking her if she’d set the fire to summon him back, and River surprised Jack by getting between them, telling the firefighter she was very much taken. He had never seemed the jealous type.

The ambulance pulled away, followed by the fire trucks, leaving the Buchanans and their guests standing in the front yard, with a growing crowd of whispering neighbors watching them like they were a zoo exhibit.

“Show’s over, folks!” Adalia shouted while giving them a salute. “Go enjoy your turkey and tofu dinners, just like we’re about to go eat ours.” Then she walked to the front porch and turned around to face her family and friends. “I spent all morning making this dinner, so don’t you even think about leaving.”

Then she disappeared into the house.

“You heard the woman,” Finn said. “Trust me, you do not want her to go after you.” But he grinned, like maybe he wanted her to go after him .

Iris rolled her eyes. “Old people are so gross.”