The Second Chance Café (Hope Springs, #1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

the craftsmanship of the items on display. The cards of old buttons amused her, as did those of antique braid trim.
    “Oh, I meant to tell you,” Dolly said, speaking to the woman working on the place mat as Luna picked up a vintage roll of glass-head straight pins. “One of the foster children who used to live with May and Winton Wise? She bought that old Victorian of theirs from the Colemans.”
    “You’re kidding.”
    “And this is the best part. She’s going to open a café. Jessa called me yesterday and told me to go by and talk to her because she’s looking for a cook.”
    “Which girl is it?”
    “She’s Kaylie Flynn now, Jessa says, but she used to be Kaylie Bridges.”
    Luna’s head came up, her nape tingling, her stomach tumbling to her feet. She squeezed the paper roll, the pinheads gouging her palm, the cardboard buckling from the same pressure crushing the air from her chest.
    “Kaylie Bridges. The one who used to bake all those brownies?”
    Dolly nodded and leaned closer, but still spoke loudly enough to be heard outside the booth. “And whose mother went to prison for child endangerment and distribution of illegal narcotics.”
    Luna knew the story better than most, knew details these women as outsiders couldn’t. She’d been told them all in confidence, told them by a family friend. Told them by a man who’d come home from his Gulf War deployment to tales of violence and drug abuse and a child at risk.
    A man who’d been looking for his daughter ever since.

CHAPTER FIVE
     
    S aturday morning, Ten was just out of the shower when the phone on his nightstand rang. Dripping water on the hardwood floor, he crossed the room to pick up the handset—though when he saw the caller’s name on the display, he winced.
    It was a reaction he’d yet to tame even after all these years, expecting bad news that never came. “Manny. How goes it?”
    Manuel Balleza responded with a weighty sigh. “Same as always. Wondering when the good guys will catch a break. Hoping there’s still time to make a difference with all that’s wrong in the world when they do.”
    Always the optimist, that Manny. “What have I told you about taking the latest crime stats personally?”
    The other man bit off several choice words. “You can’t be surprised why I’m calling.”
    Manny had been Ten’s older brother’s parole officer, and since Ten had set up shop in Hope Springs, he’d put several of Manny’s parolees on the payroll. Most had worked out just fine. Hardly a surprise, since none were career criminals, just men who’d made a life-altering bad choice, like Dakota.
    So, no. Ten wasn’t surprised at all. “What’s his name and when’s he getting out?”
    “Will Bowman. He’s being released first thing Monday. Wired a little tight, but overall a good kid.”
    Weren’t they all? Good kids, tightly wired? “I’ve got a job to look at this afternoon, so Monday evening would work.”
    “Sounds good. He’s done construction. Tucked away two years of an engineering degree before screwing things up.”
    And how many others had been there, done the same stupid stuff? “As long as he’s not afraid of heights. This job comes through, I’ll have shutters on a three-story Victorian at the top of the work order.”
    “Doesn’t seem to be afraid of much of anything, which is pretty much the problem with most of these yahoos.”
    Ten laughed. “Watch who you’re calling a yahoo. Dakota’s a productive member of society these days. Or he was last I heard.”
    And that had been, what? Six years ago? Seven? Ten had no idea where his brother had gone once cut free from Manny and the state. Then again, he didn’t know much of what was up in his sister’s life, aside from what he heard secondhand. And he was completely out of the loop with his parents. As much as he liked the peace and quiet of the status quo, he wasn’t exactly proud of it, a conundrum he supposed he’d have to work on one of these days.