Samira led Baptiste past the petting zoo, where several llamas and goats received their youthful admirers, toward the dog park.

“What would you do if I held your hand right now?” he murmured, nodding at random people they passed along the way.

“Groin-strike you.”

He chuckled. “You probably would. Very shortsighted of you. We’re going to need my queue again quite soon. You’d be sad if you damaged it.”

“Maybe,” she said, studiously avoiding his gaze, “but is that a risk you’re willing to take?”

He shrugged, not bothering to stifle his grin as he looked at her. “The thing you fail to realize is that there is more to body language than touching. What about the way we look at each other?”

“Ignoring you,” she sang, her eyes firmly fixed on the grass ahead. “I just plan on ignoring you.”

He was still laughing when she opened the gate and led him into the fenced-in dog park area, where dogs of all shapes and sizes were barking and zooming around, chasing each other. One dog in particular, a Jack Russell terrier wearing a taco costume with a shell on each side and colorful toppings running down his back, seemed to be causing a commotion down at the far end by the pond, where he kept intercepting the tossed Frisbee meant for a beleaguered golden retriever.

“Hey, Mom and Dad,” Samira said, stopping when she got to a couple unleashing their pair of tan and white greyhounds.

Samira’s parents’ faces split into smiles of unmitigated delight.

“Sami!” cried the woman, clapping her hands before pulling Samira into a ferocious hug. “You made it!”

Short and stout, white-haired and brown-skinned, the couple wore long Bermuda shorts, sandals and glasses and seemed older than he’d expected. But of course, Samira had been adopted, so perhaps they’d been trying for children long before they had her. They had a sprightly and good-natured quality about them that reminded him of Father and Mrs. Christmas.

“I made it,” Samira said, laughing and extracting herself with great difficulty before turning to her father for a hug. “Hey, Dad.”

“Well, well, well,” said her father, who had a voice so deep and gravelly he might have been Louis Armstrong’s brother. “Look who the wind blew in.”

The dogs had started to run off, but doubled back when they realized that Samira was there.

“Hey, guys,” she said happily, bending to scratch ears and rub bellies. “Who’s a good boy, huh? Who’s a good boy?”

The dogs turned their attention to Baptiste, sniffing him thoroughly and then, when he evidently passed their inspection, leaning against him like a pair of overgrown cats, one in back and one in front. They were surprisingly heavy and strong. Sandwiched, Baptiste took the quick opportunity to scratch their velvety heads and ears and fondly remember his childhood dog, a sleek white Afghan hound named Blanca.

A sharp ache of nostalgia hit him.

Dog.

He wanted a dog. Another unfortunate symptom of his creeping insanity.

Samira’s mother, still beaming with her maternal glow, looked around at him. He stood a little taller, fighting a sudden and unprecedented case of nerves.

“And who is this handsome young fellow?” Samira’s mother said, fluffing her short hair and straightening the orange and black kerchief at her neck as she smiled at him.

Evidently, Baptiste wasn’t the only one with an attack of anxiety.

Samira straightened, smoothed her hair and flapped a hand at Baptiste in a gesture that was far too offhand for anyone who had even a remote acquaintance with her.

“Mom, Dad, this is my, ah, colleague from work, Jean-Baptiste Mercier. Baptiste, these are my parents, Joe and Rhoda Palmer.”

“Jean-Baptiste,” Rhoda said, her brow furrowed as she reached for Baptiste’s hand. “Is that French? It sounds French.”

“Of course it’s French,” said Joe, now taking Baptiste’s hand in a bone-snapping grip and pumping it several times. “Doesn’t sound Chinese, does it? Nice to meet you, Baptist. Whereabouts are you from?”

“A little town in Bordeaux in the southwest of France,” Baptiste said, utterly charmed by these two and their open enthusiasm. “And my English isn’t very good, clearly”—he shot a glance at Samira, who already looked a little green and seemed to have some idea where he was going, because she widened her eyes at him and gave her head a tiny but desperate shake— “but I’m not sure that colleague is the correct word, is it, Samira?”

“Colleague is the perfect word,” she said, her smile turning brittle around the edges.

“Oh?” said Rhoda, whose brows rose with keen interest. “What word were you looking for, Baptiste?”

Baptiste worked on looking politely puzzled and innocent. “Suitor? Beau?”

Samira’s eyes rolled closed in abject horror.

“Admirer? Boyfriend? Probably one of those.”

“Really?” Rhoda all but clapped her hands with glee. “Wait till I tell my friends at church. They were all carrying on about Samira being left at the altar—”

“Ah…” Baptiste interjected quickly just as Samira’s eyes snapped back open. “It’s very new, with me and Samira, so we’d prefer to keep it quiet for now, especially as we have to work together.”

“Oh, okay,” Rhoda said, she and Joe nodding eagerly. “We understand. Our lips are sealed.”

“But since you’re Samira’s parents, we wanted you to know what’s happening,” Baptiste concluded.

“Thank you, Baptiste.” Rhoda threw open her arms to pull him in for a hug. He gave her a kiss on each cheek. “What a gentleman. Isn’t he a gentleman, Joe?”

Behind her mother’s back, Samira glared at Baptiste and made vomiting motions.

Baptiste stifled his laugh.

“Well, now, Baptist, if you’re going to be hanging around, you need to meet the rest of the family,” said Joe, gesturing for the dogs.

“Ah, Dad, it’s Baptiste. Not Baptist,” Samira said.

Joe looked around blankly, eyes twinkling. “That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

“Nope,” Samira said tightly. “Not even close.”

“Well, I can’t be bothered trying to learn a whole new name at this late stage of my life.” Joe flapped a hand. “I’m seventy-four. Barely remember my own name half the time. Mind if I call you J.B.?”

“Dad!” Samira looked like she’d swallowed her tongue. “It’s not that hard to say his—”

“J.B. is perfectly fine.” Baptiste couldn’t remember when anyone other than his friend Daniel had bothered to give him a nickname. Certainly none of the adult figures in his life had ever done so. He discovered he quite liked it. It made him feel like he fit in somewhere. “What were you saying about the dogs?”

“This here’s Vinnie Barbarino,” Joe said, pointing to the one with the blue collar, “and this here’s his brother, Juan Epstein, in the red collar.”

Other than the different collars, the dogs were absolutely identical.

“Hello, guys,” said Baptiste, scratching their heads again. “Your names are quite impressive.”

“Dad always names his dogs after TV characters,” Samira said apologetically.

“It’s because our names are Joe and Rhoda, which are the main characters’ names from one of my favorite shows from the nineteen seventies,” Rhoda explained.

“Ah,” said Baptiste.

“This rule would be fine if Dad stuck to classic shows and names like Lucy and Ethel or Archie and Edith or something,” Samira said.

Joe scowled. “I think we can all agree that Welcome Back, Kotter was one of the best TV shows ever. These dogs are honored to be named after Sweat Hogs.”

“Whatever you say, Dad,” Samira said with a condescending pat to his shoulder.

“So where did you kids meet? Online?” Rhoda asked brightly.

“Would you like me to…” Baptiste asked Samira, raising his brows and trying to look innocent.

“No. You are done talking for the day,” Samira said with a quelling look. Baptiste grinned. “We met at a Halloween party. We’ve been, ah, getting to know each other a little bit.”

“Yes, and Samira told me about your delicious ribs and soul food,” Baptiste said to Joe. “I want to hear all about it.”

“Oh! We’ve got a ribs fan here?” Joe rubbed his hands together with undisguised glee before setting an arm on Baptiste’s shoulder and steering him over to the fence so they could lean against the rails. “You’re okay in my book, J.B. Step into my office so we can talk.”

“Oh, Lord,” Samira muttered, trying to take Baptiste’s arm and tug him away. “Baptiste, I can’t even do this to you. If this man gets you alone and starts talking about his cooking, you’ll run screaming out of here and hop the next flight back to Paris.”

“I am offended,” Joe cried, outraged, letting Baptiste go.

“Go away,” Baptiste told Samira, laughing. “I’m having an important talk with your parents. We don’t need your commentary.”

Samira looked surprised. “You want to talk to these two alone? I don’t think you understand that you need my buffering presence to protect you from—”

“Skaddle,” Baptiste said with a shooing gesture.

“Skaddle?” the other three said.

“What’s the word? To get away?”

“Skedaddle?” Samira asked, one brow raised high.

“Yes! Skedaddle!” Baptiste told her. “I’ll catch up with you later.”

Samira hesitated. “But…”

“Get out of here and let us talk about you for a minute,” Rhoda said loudly. “Don’t make us tell you again. Hang on—before you go, have you heard anything from your birth mother?”

Samira had reached out to her birth mother for the first time ever several weeks ago.

“No, Mom,” Samira said, exasperated. “I’ll let you know if and when I hear anything. I keep telling you that.”

“Well, I just want to make sure you didn’t forget to mention it.”

“Is that likely?” Samira asked.

“All right, if you say so,” Rhoda said, sighing. “Go on, now.”

“Please don’t do anything to embarrass me, Mom and Dad.” Lobbing a final glare in Baptiste’s direction—he kept his expression as neutral in his triumph as he could—Samira trudged off, back toward the gazebo. “Pretend you’re normal parents. Don’t act like the Clampetts or anything.”

“The Clampetts?” Baptiste asked.

“We are not the Beverly Hillbillies!” Rhoda shouted after her, joining the men at the fence.

Samira walked off, raising her hand in a farewell wave.

“Now, the thing you’ve got to remember about ribs, J.B.,” Joe said, putting that hand on Baptiste’s shoulder again and leaning in close, “is that you need to do a rub and a glaze. Lotta people think you can do one or the other—”

“Joe,” Rhoda snapped, resting her elbows on the fence. “This boy doesn’t want to hear about your ribs.”

“Actually, I do,” Baptiste said. “And if you know anything about macaroni and cheese—”

“Well, we’ll talk about that later,” Rhoda said. “You and Samira seem like you get along pretty well so far?”

“We do,” Baptiste said, willing his face not to turn red.

“You like her?” Rhoda asked with an encouraging smile.

“Very much.” Baptiste held her gaze for as long as he could, but then his ears overheated. Again. He had to look away, clearing his throat. “I like your daughter very much.”

“What kind of hobbies are you into, J.B.? Nothing says more about a man than his hobbies,” Joe said, turning Baptiste loose.

A standard question, but Baptiste drew a blank.

What the hell was he supposed to say to that?

The truth, which was that in recent years he’d been so consumed with making his winery successful that he rarely took a day off, much less indulged a hobby? Or would it be better to mention that his old hobbies, back in his reckless twenties, had been partying and womanizing?

Perhaps meeting Samira’s parents hadn’t been such a brilliant idea after all. At the end of this conversation with him, they might well whisper in Samira’s ear that Baptiste was exactly the kind of bad boy to be avoided at all costs, and where would he be then?

“I, ah, love biking,” he said on a sudden inspiration. “You have some beautiful trails here in Journey’s End.”

“I don’t ride.” Joe rubbed the small of his back. “Too much arthritis from crouching under people’s sinks and over their toilets all those years. What about fishing? Do you fish?”

“No, but I’ve always wanted to learn.”

“Well, we’ve got a couple types of bass in the river, then we’ve got trout in Lake Emerald. Happy to take you out sometime before we move if you’re interested. But you can’t go talking the whole time. Fish like the quiet. So if you’re going to yack the whole time, then we’d better not.”

“You can’t invite the man to fish with you, then forbid him from talking, Joe,” Rhoda said, frowning over at her husband.

“Just want to make sure he knows the etiquette,” Joe said. “You interested, J.B.?”

“I’d love to,” Baptiste said, thrilled.

“What other hobbies you got?” Joe asked. “You watch any sports? Where do you stand on the Pats versus the Bills?”

“I’m not sure I stand anywhere,” Baptiste admitted.

“Well, you’d better pick a side right quick,” Joe said. “This is fall in New York. Not having a football team is a hanging offense around here. Me? I like the Jets.”

“Noted,” Baptiste said, laughing.

“And what kind of books do you like to read?” Joe asked. “You can tell everything about a man by the—”

“Joe!” Rhoda said, now looking fed up. “Let the man catch his breath, why don’t you? Save some of your nosiness for later.”

“It’s okay…” Baptiste began, still laughing.

“I am allowed to have a conversation, Rhoda,” Joe said with growing outrage. “Didn’t your daughter take off so we could get to know J.B.? Well, I’m getting to know him.”

“Well, we don’t want to drive him off in the first five minutes,” Rhoda muttered.

“What kind of books did you say, J.B.?” Joe asked, shooting a final glare in his wife’s direction. “I like to read science books. History of the universe, the search for black holes. That sort of thing. People think that since I was a plumber, I don’t like to read or think deep thoughts. They like to write me off as a big dummy. So I like to whip out a little knowledge on ’em. Ask ’em where they stand on string theory. Maybe talk a little climate change and see if they think water vapor or carbon dioxide causes it.” Joe tapped his temple. “People look at you with a whole new respect when you whip out the science on them.”

“I’m looking at you with a whole new respect right now,” Baptiste said, impressed.

“See?” Joe boomed. “It works!”

They all laughed.

“Now that you mention it, I haven’t taken the time to read in a while,” Baptiste said when the laughter trailed off. An image flashed into his mind, much like the one of the brown-haired toddler he’d had the other night, of him and Samira curled up on a sofa in front of a fire with cashmere throws and books on their laps. “I miss reading my adventure novels. I should make it a priority again.”

“Life is short, J.B.,” Joe said. “You can’t go around wasting it.”

“Can I get a word in edgewise now?” Rhoda asked her husband.

Joe made a sweeping gesture. “The floor is yours.”

“Have you been in the U.S. for a while, Baptiste?” Rhoda asked.

“Not that long this time,” Baptiste said. “But I lived here for several years awhile back, when I was learning about the winemaking business and living in Napa.”

“Oh,” Rhoda said, her face falling. “I was thinking maybe you were born in France, but you were a U.S. citizen now, or something like that. But you still live in France?”

Baptiste hesitated, but there was no way around it.

“I still live in France.”

“Oh,” she said, exchanging a worried sidelong glance with Joe.

“But…” Baptiste thought of his buddy Daniel’s advice, earlier that afternoon, to dial his feelings for Samira back from eleven and not come on so strongly, but those warnings seemed to mean less and less with each passing moment. When it came to Samira, he didn’t seem capable of reining any of himself in. “I don’t have any immediate plans to go back there. I want to get to know Samira better.”

“You’re not gay, are you?” Joe asked.

Rhoda leaned across Baptiste to squawk at her husband and smack his arm. “Joe!”

“It’s a fair question after what happened with the wedding,” Joe said.

“I’m not gay,” Baptiste said. “Never married. No children. No siblings. My parents are both gone now.”

“How’s your money situation?” Joe asked.

“Joe!”

“Not bad,” Baptiste said, stifling his smile. “If you don’t mind…I was wondering if you folks could answer a question or two for me.”

“Of course,” said Rhoda kindly.

“Forgive me. I believe in being very open and honest about things,” Baptiste said.

“That’s the best policy,” Joe said.

“Not everyone is comfortable with interracial dating. I hope you’re okay with Samira spending time with me?”

“I’m more concerned about your lack of an NFL team than I am your color,” Joe said darkly.

Rhoda smacked his arm again, ignoring his yelp. “What he means to say, Baptiste, is that we don’t care what color you are. As long as you treat Samira like a queen—”

A tiny shiver raced up Baptiste’s spine at her use of the word.

“—then you’re okay with us. Isn’t that right, Joe?”

“I’d be more okay with him if he wore Jets green come Sunday,” Joe said.

“I will make it a priority to select a team,” Baptiste assured him. “Meanwhile, Samira said you’ve been together for around forty years? What’s the secret to your success?”

“You’ve got to have your own bathroom,” Joe said firmly. “None of this standing around and waiting while she puts on her—”

“Joe!”

“Why can’t I ever speak?” Joe complained. “He’s looking right at me, Rhoda. That means he wants to hear my opinion.”

“He probably wants to hear you give a worthwhile opinion,” Rhoda said.

“Well, J.B., I’ll tell you,” Joe said thoughtfully. “Other than the bathroom thing, you’ve got to be a team.”

“A team?” Baptiste asked, leaning closer because this sounded like useful information. The only thing that had ever united his parents had been their mutual and abiding hatred of each other.

“A team. If you make up your minds that you’re together, then you’re together. You don’t talk about splitting up. You don’t let the kids divide and conquer you. You don’t complain to your friends about how she won’t let you stay out past midnight with them,” Joe said.

“Ah,” Baptiste said, storing all of this in his memory banks.

“If she’s got a problem, then you’ve got a problem,” Joe continued. “If she’s unhappy, then the team’s down at fifty percent. And a team at fifty percent is not a winning team. You feel me? So that’s your problem, too. The team wins or loses together. If you fight, you fight fair. And you keep it in the locker room. The rest of the world don’t need to know. And that’s it. Nothing tricky to it.”

“Interesting,” Baptiste said. “What about you, Rhoda?”

“Laughter and great sex, dear.” Rhoda patted Baptiste’s arm. “That’s all you need to know.”

Baptiste all but choked on a startled laugh and tried to get his shocked eyes back into his head. “And I thought I was frank. You two have—”

The rest of his sentence was lost when something soft crashed into the backs of his knees with surprising force.

“Hey!” he cried, turning quickly to catch the offender.

It was the taco-costume-wearing Jack Russell terrier, who had apparently executed a spectacular leap and caught the Frisbee over the head of that same disgruntled golden retriever, who came racing up to bark at him. The Jack Russell terrier ignored his critic and sat back to stare at Baptiste, the Frisbee clamped in his jaws.

“Sorry!” A Star Wars storm trooper ran up as best he could in his gleaming white plastic costume, whipped off his helmet to reveal a forty-something man with a headful of equally gleaming white hair, tucked the helmet under his arm, clipped a leash on the Jack Russell and yanked the Frisbee out of the dog’s mouth. “I’m so sorry. My dog has been out of control today. It’s all the hot dog bites I’ve given him. His furry little brain is running on overdrive—here’s your Frisbee. Sorry!”

The golden retriever’s glowering owner, a man in a flowing brown Jedi robe, marched up, snatched the Frisbee out of the Stormtrooper’s hand and marched off again, his dog following in his wake.

“You’re a bad boy, Bobsy,” the storm trooper said, pointing a finger in the Jack Russell’s face. “Bad boy!”

The dog grinned at him, tongue flapping.

“If you think you’re getting that caramel apple you had your eye on after this, you are sadly mistaken, sir,” the storm trooper told Bobsy, who seemed indifferent to this information. The storm trooper turned to Baptiste and stuck out his free hand. “Raymond Martin. Real estate agent. Nice to meet you. Please don’t judge me by my dog.”

“Jean-Baptiste Mercier. Winemaker. Pleasure.”

“Oh!” Raymond’s eyes lit up. “Your winery is merging with Harper Rose, I hear.”

“That’s me.”

“And how are you, Rhoda?” Raymond kissed Rhoda, then shook Joe’s hand. “I heard you folks are in charge of the ribs this year. Can’t wait!”

“Oh, no!” Rhoda checked her watch, looking vaguely panicked. “We need to get the trays set up, Joe. It’s time to eat.”

“Well, let’s get the dogs,” Joe said, whistling for them.

“Raymond, can you make sure Baptiste makes it back up to the gazebo?” Rhoda asked. “He’s our guest here. Don’t want him to get lost.”

“Oh, sure.” Raymond flapped a hand. “I’ll take good care of him.”

Baptiste put a hand on Rhoda’s arm to stop her from hurrying away so quickly, feeling a bit sad he hadn’t had more time to spend alone with her and Joe. He’d hoped to ask them about Samira’s childhood—he was dying to know what kind of little girl she’d been—but he supposed there’d be time enough for that later.

“It’s a great pleasure to meet you,” he said, bending down to kiss her cheeks. “I look forward to seeing you later. And I hope to spend more time with you before you move out west.”

“Oh, my,” Rhoda cooed, pressing her hands to her plump cheeks and giggling like a schoolgirl. “You’re such a handsome devil, aren’t you?”

“What about me?” cried Joe.

“You’re a handsome devil, too,” Rhoda told him.

“I’m not talking to you!” Joe said to his wife. “Is it only a marginal pleasure to meet me, J.B.? Is that where this is going?”

Baptiste laughed. Ever since he’d set foot in Journey’s End the other day, and especially since he met Samira, it seemed as though he couldn’t laugh hard enough, often enough. It felt like he had to make up for the time lost to his unhappy childhood and all the lonely years of his adulthood.

“It was an equally great pleasure to meet you, Joe,” Baptiste told him.

“But I don’t get all the kissing,” Joe grumbled.

Baptiste reached for him, making a show of puckering his lips. “I’m more than happy to—”

“Oh, no, you don’t,” Joe said, shooing him away. “Get out of here.”

Baptiste watched them go for a minute, feeling a faint and irrational pang of loss. And he wondered, as he rubbed his aching chest, how differently his life might have turned out if his parents had ever shown him a tenth of the warmth he’d just experienced with Samira’s lovely parents.