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(Present Day)
Marlene Thompkins smiled brightly,like the ray of sunshine she was, as Kennedy entered Well Brook Rehab & Assisted Living Home. Nana had been a resident there for six months now, and it was still taking some getting used to for Kennedy. She knew it was the best thing.
After her grandma’s heart attack, she’d had a stroke and had lost the use of one of her legs. She had several other complications from her health issues that made it necessary for her to have round the clock care. Well Brook was the best facility money could buy, but Kennedy still felt like she was failing her. Nana had taken her in when she’d needed someone to care for her, and now Kennedy couldn’t do the same when Nana needed someone.
“Well, hello, Miss Kennedy. How are you doing today?”
Kennedy forced herself to paste on a smile she wasn’t feeling. “Good.”
“And how is Laura? I saw her the other day, and she looked ready to pop.”
“She’s doing good. She has about six weeks left, so it’s getting close.” So far, Laura had breezed through her pregnancy with the twins. She’d waited so long to be a mom, and Kennedy couldn’t be happier for her friend. Knox, her baby daddy and fiancé, had been the most supportive partner anyone could ask for. He was just the cherry on top of Laura’s HEA sundae. The retired Navy SEAL worshipped the ground Laura walked on. He was everything her bestie deserved and more.
As happy as Kennedy was for her friend, she couldn’t help but feel a little bit of envy. She wanted her own happily ever after. She wanted to find her other half and start a family of her own.
Her dating life in the past six months had been basically nonexistent. In fairness, she had been distracted and had a lot on her plate dealing with Nana’s transition into full-time care and her health issues, but she hadn’t been totally unavailable. She’d gone on a handful of first dates with men who ticked nearly all of the boxes on her itemized list of one hundred qualities she was looking for in a partner. But the one box none of them ticked was chemistry.
Kennedy had entered her chemistry famine era. She was starving. She wanted to feel a spark. A tingle. A flutter. Something, anything that resembled attraction to the opposite sex. But it was as if her hormones had taken an extended sabbatical, and she was beginning to fear they weren’t coming back.
During her therapy sessions, Anne had been beating the attraction-can-grow drum, but Kennedy wasn’t so sure she agreed. Maybe it was the hopeless romantic in her, but she wanted that initial zing-zap-zoom. Sheneededthat instant spark to consider someone as a romantic partner. Every time she started to feel like maybe, just maybe, she was being too picky, all she had to do was look around town to find a dozen examples that she wasn’t.
Women in Whisper Lake had been meeting their soulmates left and right over the past five or so years. It seemed like since the filming of the reality dating showFairytale Love, the town had been sprinkled with true love fairy dust. Unfortunately, none had fallen on Kennedy.
Yet. Hope was what Kennedy was holding on to. Hope that her famine would turn into a feast. All it took was one man. Therightman.
“What about you, sunshine? How are things in your life? Mrs. Chen was in the other day visiting Sylvia, and she was braggin’ about how you’ve been killing it.”
“Things have been good.” Kennedy loved her job in real estate. She worked for Whisper Lake Realty, which was owned by Mrs. Chen and her husband.
“Working for her must be interesting.” Marlene’s eyes twinkled.
Kennedy knew exactly what Marlene was referring to. Mrs. Chen along with two of her friends, Mrs. Dobrinski and Mrs. Weathersby, were infamous for their matchmaking schemes. They ran a knitting club called the Needlepoint Mafia.
The trio of senior citizen cupids had aimed their arrows at ninety-nine point nine percent of the single over-thirty population in Whisper Lake. Since she’d turned the big 3-0, she’d definitely had her share of meet-cutes that she knew were set up by the three self-appointed matchmakers; unfortunately, none of them had turned into anything real.
But she refused to feel sorry for herself, especially around Marlene. Kennedy constantly reminded herself that other people had it much worse off than she did whenever she started to throw herself a pity party because of her single status. No one had ever died of loneliness. And if anyone deserved a woe-is-me pass, it was Marlene Thompkins.
Marlene’s only daughter had gotten ill and passed away from cancer a few years back. Marlene, who had been retired at the time, took all three of her grandkids in and went back to work to support them. And in all the years Kennedy had known her, even when Daisy, her daughter, was at the end of her life, Marlene always wore a wide smile and radiated positivity and kindness.
In Kennedy’s view, she was a superhero. “How are your grandbabies?”
“They’re great. Ornery as ever, but great.” She beamed as she slid the clipboard across the countertop before answering an incoming call. “Good morning, Well Brook Rehab and Assisted Living. How can I help you?”
Kennedy grabbed the pen attached to the clipboard with a tiny silver chain and looked down at the sign-in sheet. Her eyes scanned down the list of visitors and she exhaled a breath she’d been holding when she didn’t find her father’s name on it. If she could ban him from visiting her grandma, she would. Unfortunately, she didn’t have that power.
Marlene gave her a friendly wave as she buzzed Kennedy through the double doors that led to the residents and rehab wing. As she made her way down the halls to her grandma’s room, she found herself wondering what her dad’s end game was. He’d been in town a year, and she still didn’t know what he wanted. Nana didn’t have money, so Kennedy knew he wasn’t after that. She’d had a reverse mortgage on her house, so it wasn’t the house he was after.
There were no stories circulating around town that he’d tried to get anyone to invest in anything or had any get-rich-quick schemes he was trying to pass off as business opportunities. And this was Whisper Lake; if there was an award for Most Gossip in a Small Town, it would win hands down. If her father was up to something, she was sure it would have gotten back to her by now.
Which begged the question: Why was he there? He’d never stayed in Whisper Lake when she was growing up for more than a few months, even when she’d cried, pleaded, and tried to bargain with him not to go. He’d blow into town like an emotional hurricane, then blow out, leaving a path of destruction in his wake.
What was his angle? What was his con? What was his end game? Not knowing was driving her crazy. Mainly because she couldn’t protect Nana or herself from something she didn’t see coming. She needed to be on the offense, not the defense.
Every time Kennedy saw Michael around town or at Well Brook, he said hello, but for the most part, he’d respected her boundaries and hadn’t tried to push his way into her life. Kennedy knew she must be missing something; she just didn’t know what it was. But she would figure it out. And her plan was to keep her distance from him until she did.
When she got to Nana’s door, she lifted her hand and rapped her knuckles lightly against it as she walked inside. The room was dimly lit. The only light source was the mid-morning sun filtering through the tiny slits of the closed blinds. She glanced to the far wall, where she saw Nana napping peacefully, wrapped up in her throw blanket. A chill ran through Kennedy, and she rubbed her arms. The room was always kept at a crisp sixty-five degrees because Nana liked it cold.She headed over to the armchair in the corner next to the window and sank into it.
She pulled her Kindle out of her purse and started reading the newest Jeneva Rose release. Kennedy was taking a break from her usual romance novels and diving into a thriller. She wanted to read about sociopaths and killers, not true love and cinnamon roll alphas. Living in Whisper Lake, she saw those stories being played out in front of her, and she was tired of not being the female main character in one. She figured if she read about murder, it might take her mind off of what she was missing out on.
