Personal chef Beau St. Clair, recently divorced from his cheating husband, returns to the small Ohio River town where he grew up to lick his wounds. Jack Rogers lives with his mother, Maisie, in that same small town, angry at and frightened by the world. Jack has a gap in his memory that hides something he dares not face, and he’s probably suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Maisie, seeking relief from her housebound and often surly son, hires Beau to cook for Jack, hoping the change might help bring Jack, once a handsome and vibrant attorney, back to his former self. But can a new face and comfort food compensate for the terror lurking in Jack’s past? Slowly the two men begin a dance of revelation and healing. Food and compassion build a bridge between Beau and Jack, a bridge that might lead to love. But will Jack’s demons allow it? His history could just as easily tear them apart as bring them together.

Dinner at Jack's

But in the dream, he stood at the front of a courtroom, one he was sure he’d never been in. That was not to say, though, that it was a courtroom he hadn’t seen. He had—in a movie. It was the same courtroom in To Kill a Mockingbird. And now that Jack allowed himself to relax a bit into his damp pillow, he recalled that the dream itself, like the movie, had been in black-and-white. And if he didn’t know better, Jack saw himself in the dream dressed like Atticus Finch.


He had been pacing, looking down at the wooden floor and grasping for his next question.


Jack shivered when he realized what the question was.


Jack sat straight up when he saw, in his mind’s eye, the person on the witness stand. The person, a young man who appeared in full color despite the black-and-white rest of the dream, was dressed in a black Nirvana T-shirt and ripped jeans. Combat boots. He had rosy cheeks and a head of curly blond hair that made him appear angelic.


Chapter 49