.

stirred the mixture until it was smooth and poured the batter into the prepared pans and popped them into one of the ovens. After clearing away baking supplies and loading the utensils into the dishwasher, she turned her attention to dinner. Pot roast, she had decided earlier. A family favorite, and easy to make. She checked the temperature of the other oven and took out the roaster.

      If she kept herself busy, she didn’t have to think about Isaac getting hurt this morning or how she had blamed the fall on CJ or how she had behaved like a neurotic parent at the clinic. And maybe she could avoid thinking about that thing with Paul. She didn’t need a shoulder to lean on. His familiar embrace had suddenly felt unfamiliar and new. It had caught her off guard, that’s all. Thank goodness he hadn’t noticed. But then, why would he?

      She opened a bin, took out some potatoes. She had probably misinterpreted that moment with her husband’s best friend. She could call it relief that it was Paul who would examine Isaac, but that didn’t explain why she had invited him to drop by for coffee tomorrow morning. Nor did it explain why she had been secretly glad when he accepted.

      But it was just coffee. Just Paul. He had been one of Eric’s best friends. He cared about her and Isaac the way friends did. The same way Jack did. Having Paul drop by for coffee was not a big deal, and she wasn’t the type to make something out of nothing.

      So why was she overthinking this?

      She browned the roast in a large skillet on the stovetop, transferred it to the roaster and slid it into the lower oven. Then she took a vegetable peeler from a drawer and attacked the mound of potatoes she had dumped in the sink.

      She had loved Eric for as long as she could remember. Losing him in the spring had carved a huge hole in her life, one that left her aching and empty. Having Paul and Jack in Riverton would be good for her and Isaac. Especially Isaac.

      Jack was about to become her brother-in-law and Paul was...just Paul, she reminded herself.

      A movement at the veranda door caught her eye. Chester, the family’s aging retriever, sat patiently waiting to be let in. Annie dropped the last potato into a pot of cold water, then crossed the kitchen to let in the dog.

      “Hey there, golden boy.” She gave his head a rub, fed him a biscuit from the jar on the counter. Chester crunched and swallowed the treat, ambled over to his water bowl for a drink, then carefully lowered his arthritic hips to the big red-and-gold plaid cushion that was his bed. For more than a year now, Isaac had been begging for a puppy. Annie had deflected his cajoling with a reminder that they already had a dog. Much as she hated to admit it, the old retriever wouldn’t be with them forever. The Finnegan farmhouse had never been without a dog and Annie knew she would have to relent one of these days. Just not this one.

      With Chester snoring softly in his corner, she went back to work. She always welcomed an afternoon alone in the kitchen. After they’d come home from the clinic and had lunch, CJ had gone to work in the stable and their father had taken Isaac into town to pick up a few last-minute back-to-school supplies. They would be home anytime, though, and her solitude would come to an end. She loved her son’s boisterous boyishness, but she also cherished these moments of peace and quiet. There would be more of those moments once school started next week.

      She could hardly believe her little boy was already in second grade. He loved school, especially reading and science and gym class, and already had a large circle of friends. He was so much like his father in so many ways, it made her heart swell with love and ache a little at the same time.

      Eric would have been over-the-moon to have his two long-time friends in Riverton. With Jack about to marry Emily, he and Eric would have been brothers-in-law. He would have loved that. And now Paul was here, too. Still single and looking like a doctor on a Hollywood TV drama. What had they called that doctor on Grey’s Anatomy? McSomething. McDreamy? That was it. And that was Paul.

      The shock from the way she had reacted to his embrace that morning stung again. She felt guilty, too. His relationship with her husband made these feelings inappropriate and downright disrespectful. Eric deserved better.

      As she finished readying the vegetables for the pot roast, she could hear the front door swing open and Isaac barreled through the house, yelling a greeting. “Mom? Mo-om! Where are you?” He was heading straight for the kitchen because everyone knew this was the first place to look for her.

      “Guess what!” He burst into the room, blue eyes alight, blond curls bouncing, grinning from ear to ear. “You’ll never guess!”

      “Then you’ll have to tell me.” She pulled him close, carefully avoiding his bruised shoulder. “Using your inside voice.”

      “We went to the hardware store ’cause Auntie CJ needed us to pick up a bridle for the new horse she’s boarding. And you know the dog that’s always at the store? Izzie?”

      “I do,” Annie said, leery of the direction this conversation was headed.

      “She has puppies! Five of ’em.”

      Annie already knew this. She had gone into the hardware store earlier in the week to pick up paint for the chicken coop, and had immediately been drawn to the makeshift pen behind the sales counter, where Izzie had been sprawled on a blanket, nursing her impossibly adorable puppies. Having a soft spot for animals, especially an animal in need of a home, Annie had refused to let herself be drawn to those puppies. She already had all the strays she needed.

      Isaac had other ideas. “A dog would be a good thing to get.”

      “We have Chester.”

      “But he’s not my dog, and he’s old.”

      Both were true. Since Isaac was a toddler, Chester had tolerated him. Now he mostly ignored him. But a puppy? Puppies made messes on the floor and chewed the heels off shoes. Puppies needed to be housebroken and crate-trained.

      Puppies were also a boy’s best friend. They taught kids to be considerate and compassionate and responsible.

      “I need a puppy, Mom.”

      “I’ll think about it,” Annie said.

      “Yay!” Isaac raced back to the front door. “Gramps! We’re getting one of those puppies and we’re going to name him Beasley.”

      Annie sighed. “Use your inside voice, please,” she called after him, but she knew he hadn’t heard. When it came to her son, she was a pushover, but he was all she had left of Eric and there was nothing she wouldn’t do for him.

      Her father rolled into the kitchen. Isaac had climbed onboard and was sitting on his grandfather’s lap. He’d been doing this since he was a baby, but not for much longer.

      “The way you’re growing, you’ll soon be too big to ride with Gramps,” she said.

      Isaac flung his arms around his grandfather’s neck. “Then I’ll stop growing.”

      Annie exchanged smiles with her father. “So what’s this I hear about a puppy?” he asked. His attempt at innocence didn’t fool her for a second and she immediately knew what she was up against. It wasn’t just Isaac who wanted a puppy, it was Isaac and his grandfather.

      “I said I would think about it.”

      The co-conspirators in the wheelchair exchanged a wink.

      “So...” her father said. “Isaac tells me you saw Paul at the clinic this morning. Said the two of you have a date tomorrow.”

      “It’s not a date. He’s just dropping by for coffee.” Annie felt her nose turn red as she debated which conversation was more awkward—dogs or dates.

      * * *

      EARLY SATURDAY MORNING, Paul fixed his father’s breakfast and served it to him at the kitchen table. Two soft-boiled eggs that Geoff Woodward deemed to be too hard, dry toast that wasn’t dry enough, coffee that was too strong. Afterward, Paul settled the cantankerous old man in his favorite chair with a newspaper, the television remote and a thermos of tea.

      “I