Free A Different Light by Mariah Stewart

Quentin said softly. “Anytime.”
    “Yeah, I guess.”
    Quentin silently cursed his ex-wife. For monthsafter she left, he’d kept their home in St. Louis, thinking that maybe his son would be better off in familiar surroundings. Tim went to the same school he’d always gone to, played for the same sports teams, hung out with the same kids. But as time went on, it became apparent that there was no point in trying to pretend that nothing had changed in Tim’s life except for the fact that his mother was gone. Nothing was the same, and Quentin had some hard decisions to make. In the end, he’d decided to move east, to the New Jersey town where his mother now made her life with her new husband. If nothing else, Tim would have extended family members. He’d have time to spend with Quentin’s mother, and he’d get to know his stepgrandfather and his stepaunt.
    Tim had seemed so happy there when they visited over Christmas vacation that Quentin hadn’t hesitated to accept when his stepfather offered him their gatehouse as temporary living quarters. They returned to St. Louis only long enough for Quentin to list the house with a Realtor and pack their belongings. The Forbes guys were back in New Jersey by March, and neither of them had looked back. St. Louis held few good memories. Quentin had hoped that the change would be good for Tim, and in some ways it had been. The boy loved his grandmother and his new grandfather, both of whom doted on him. There were stables with horses to ride and meadows to ride through, streams to follow into the woods, and new challenges on the playing fields to be met.
    But Quentin had noticed that Tim kept to himself much of the time and didn’t seem to have made any friends. At first he told himself that it was because they’d moved in the middle of the school year. Now, he wasn’t so sure.
    “So what’s it going to be, sport?” Quentin came to a stop at a red light. “Burgers? Or no burgers?”
    “I don’t care.”
    “How about burgers on the way to the beach?”
    Tim’s head spun halfway around to face his father.
    “The beach is cool. I’d be up for that.”
    “In that case, it’s back to the house to pick up our stuff.” Quentin turned left when the light turned green.
    “It’s nice of Grandma to let us use her beach house.” Tim smiled for the first time since he got into the car. “It’s such a cool place. I love the ocean.”
    “Me too.”
    “If we’d stayed in St. Louis, I’d probably never get to see the ocean.”
    “We’d have come for visits,” Quentin reminded him.
    “It wouldn’t be the same as being able to go any time we want.”
    “No, it wouldn’t be.”
    Ten minutes later, they were driving through the gates of Quentin’s mother’s home.
    “Dad, it’s okay if Callie Moran doesn’t like me,” Tim told him before he got out of the car. “You can still like her mom even if Callie doesn’t like me.”
    “What makes you think I like her mom?”
    “’Cause you dug up all that stuff for her and carried it down to her car.” Timmy grinned, his parting shot before jumping out of the car. “Besides, her mom’s hot.”
    Out of the mouths of babes, Quentin thought as he followed his son into the house. Callie Moran’s mom was, indeed, hot.

 6 
    It was an obviously depressed Dan Rossi who stepped off the elevator on a sultry Monday morning in late August.
    “Can I get something for you, Dan?” a concerned Athen asked. “Some coffee? Maybe something cold? Or some aspirin?”
    “Aspirin and cold drinks won’t help, Athen, but thank you.”
    “Is there anything I can do? Anything I can help you with?”
    “I appreciate that. But this is something I have to deal with myself.” He made a gallant effort to smile.
    She tiptoed out of the office, wondering at the cause of his troubles. She all but knocked over Edie, who’d obviously been lurking outside the door.
    “Find out what’s ailing him?” Edie nodded in the direction of the