Free The Glass Kitchen by Linda Francis Lee

content with broken stuff.
    Portia felt an odd feeling of displacement at the thought, as if the work permits and new doorbell meant her old life was really gone. Which was ridiculous. Her husband divorcing her had put that particular pony to bed, not a stranger remodeling her great-aunt’s former home.
    “My great-aunt used to live here,” Portia said, distracted. “Back then, the doorbell was broken.”
    “Seriously? Someone you know used to live here?”
    “Yes, my great-aunt,” Portia repeated, walking farther into the town house.
    The structure was the same, but nothing else. The entire inside had been gutted and refurbished. The old Victorian wallpaper was gone, stripped, the walls redone with a bright white textured plaster. Portia shouldn’t have missed the water stains shaped like butterflies and dragons, but she did.
    The carpet had been pulled up, the wood underneath refinished and covered with Oriental rugs. Expensive art hung above expensive furniture. Everything was perfectly done, and in the back of Portia’s head she knew it was beautiful. But that was way back in her head, pushed aside by the fact that the work she had done in her own apartment suddenly felt inadequate compared to this. Glumly, she noted that one of the man’s rugs could no doubt have paid for an entire year’s worth of property taxes that Portia now had to figure out how to pay.
    “Where’s your aunt now?” Ariel asked.
    “She died. A few years back.” The words came out more abruptly than Portia intended. She thought for a second that Ariel flinched, but then the girl rolled her eyes.
    “Was she old?”
    “Yes, but very lively and dear. She left the building to my sisters and me. My sisters sold the upper floors to your dad.”
    “So that’s why you’re in the basement. I take it she didn’t like you as much as the others.”
    Portia laughed. “She left me the garden apartment, not a basement. She knew I love gardens.”
    “My mom’s dead,” Ariel said. “Like your aunt. But my mom wasn’t old.” She turned away as if she hadn’t said anything all that important.
    It took Portia a second to absorb the words. Was that why she felt a connection to Ariel when she barely knew her? Did girls who had lost mothers have a hidden bond?
    “That looks like a store-bought cake,” Ariel said, shifting gears before Portia could respond.
    “It is.”
    “You were supposed to bring one of those amazing cakes you make yourself.”
    Ariel gaped. “You did both the other night.”
    “Sorry. That was then. This is now.”
    Ariel’s shoulders slumped. But then she drew an exaggerated breath. She shrugged. “I can only do so much.”
    Portia followed the girl toward the back of the house. Unless there had been major structural changes, Portia knew they were coming to the sunroom, her favorite part of the house.
    But it wasn’t the room that she saw. It was Gabriel.
    “Damn it, Dan, that isn’t acceptable,” he said into a cell phone. “I’ve told you, I’m not going to relent. Make them pay.”
    He stood with his back to them, looking out the tall windows, phone pressed to his ear. Everything about him felt barely controlled, hardly contained. Without warning, he turned and saw her.
    The dark of his eyes grew intense as his gaze met hers before it slowly drifted over her.
    “You remember our neighbor, Daddy,” Ariel said, sweet as pie, emphasis on the word Daddy.
    Portia hadn’t seen him since the burger incident three days ago, and he seemed to take her in, assessing to determine if she was fine.
    She scowled at the memory of the incident, which made him raise a brow, his lips quirking.
    A voice squawked anxiously from the phone he was holding. “I’m here,” he said smoothly, seeming reluctant to turn away. But eventually he did, concentrating on the call.
    Ariel leaned close. “I use the whole Daddy thing to soften him up. For some reason, he likes it. Go figure.” She cocked her head. “Come on. Let’s put