The two men stood side by side in their small kitchen, blocking the doorway and making Liddie Hopewell Douglas uneasy, or rather, more uneasy than she already was. Her uncles were acting squirrelly, jumpy, and nervous, and that was never, ever a good thing.

“Liddie, there’s something you need to know before we go to the Hemlock Creek Tavern tonight.” Horace Hopewell’s apologetic tone didn’t soothe her misgivings one bit, nor did the fact that Thurgood Bunsen found his shoes very interesting.

“Mom! You’re up!” Tally Douglas threw her arms around her mother as if she hadn’t seen her in months, but the truth was it had been only a few weeks since the younger woman had ventured back to her mother’s hometown to help run the family’s salvage and vintage shop. Tally stepped back and examined her mother from head to toe. “You’ve lost some more weight, Mom. That’s not good.”

Liddie waved off her daughter’s concerns. “It’s not like I didn’t have some extra padding, sweetie. Besides, with Bunny’s cooking, there’s no way I’m going to keep it off.”

Bunny shook his head. “Not anymore, Liddie. We’re all about the low-fat, higher-protein, mostly plant-based diet these days.”

“Cancer can go fuck itself,” Ace groused. “I say, I’m dying anyway, so let me eat whatever the hell I want.”

“Uncle Ace!” Liddie gasped. “You don’t know that.”

“I do, too, Liddie. We’re all dying from the moment we take our first, squalling breath.” Ace sat heavily in a straight-backed wooden kitchen chair and pulled his oxygen tank closer to him. “But Bunny here seems intent on keeping me around a while longer, so I guess I’ll eat his damn rabbit food.”

Liddie snorted. “Is this what you had to tell me about tonight?”

Ace cut his eyes first to Tally, who was busy putting loose tea into various infusers and placing them in mugs of hot water, and then to his partner, who bugged his eyes at Ace.

“Oh, tonight is going to be so great, Mom. You should see what Cal and Kat have done to the Hemlock Creek Tavern. It barely looks like the same place.” Tally set a steaming mug in front of Ace and handed another to Bunny. Both men nodded their thanks and then focused their attention on the bottoms of their mugs. “Of course, it might look more like what you remember. Robbie Mac said it looked more like it used to.”

Liddie broke the can’s tab off. “Uh, Robbie Mac? You mean, Robert McFerrin?”

“Yeah? Owns the Owl Creek Vineyard? Makes all sorts of yummy jams and jelly, too? Whoa, Mom. Are you okay? You’re white as a sheet.”

Liddie drank half her soda and wished it was mixed with some bourbon. “Uh, yeah. I’m fine, honey. Can you run upstairs and grab me some Goody’s? I think I feel a headache coming on, and I want to nip it in the bud.”

Tally frowned at her mother but didn’t fuss. Liddie waited until she heard her daughter going up the stairs of the old house before turning to her uncles.

“Spill it,” she demanded.

“Well—” Ace started, but Bunny interrupted him.

“Toby Harper’s playing tonight.”

“Okay. Thanks for telling me, though I’m not sure why y’all are acting so crazy.” Liddie raised her glass to her lips, her shaky hand betraying her.

Ace reached over and took her free hand. “Liddie, sugar, you don’t have to—”

“Here you go, Mom.” Tally tore open the small packet and handed it to her mother, who threw back her head and swallowed the bitter powder down dry.

“Thank you, honey. I don’t know what happened. Probably just all the stress from the past few weeks getting to me.” Liddie gave her daughter what she hoped was a reassuring smile. “So what were you saying about Robbie Mac?”

Liddie half listened to her daughter talk about the quiet boy whom Liddie once knew from Sunday school at the Methodist church, the son of a local bootlegger, who seemed to have grown up and legitimized his father’s moonshine business. Then Tally began talking about the new owners of the Hemlock Creek Tavern, Cal and Kat, and Liddie started to pay attention.

“I don’t remember a Kat at all. I remember Kathy White, but she lives in Montana, and then there was Katie Raney, but she’s in Florida.”

Tally shook her head. “No, Kat’s not from here. You’ll have to have her tell you the story—it’s like something out of a movie. So romantic,” Tally said with a sigh. “She and Cal are kind of a funny couple, but they just . . . work, you know?”

Liddie closed her eyes for a moment. “Cal. Calhoun Harper, right?”

Tally nodded. “Yes! Did you know him? He’s really funny.”

“Um, he was a few years behind me, but I remember the name.” A vision of a dark-haired boy with pretty blue eyes and an impish smile popped up in her mind’s eye. She studiously ignored the specter that loomed behind him.

“Well, Cal and Kat have totally turned the tavern around, even in the short amount of time I’ve been here. Tonight’s the official grand opening, and Kat wants us to come. Oh, shoot. I have to go pick up the flyers and the postcards at the print shop in Gainesville before noon.” Tally put her mug in the kitchen sink. “I’d better scoot.” She gave her mother and both her great-uncles a kiss on the cheek. “I’ll be back in a bit,” she said before blowing out the door.

Ace shook his head. “That girl has more energy than anyone I’ve ever met. Whew,” he said with a chuckle that faded as he redirected his attention back to his niece. “Like I started to say, you do not need to go tonight. We’ll make up an excuse.”

Bunny sat down at the table and set his mug down with a thud. “Hell, Ace didn’t wanna have anything to do with the tavern when he found out that a Harper was the new owner.”

“I’m still not sure I wanna be involved with any Harpers after what—”

“Stop.” Liddie took a deep breath. “Calhoun is not his brother, and none of the Harper boys are their father, so . . . let’s just take a few steps back and get a damn grip on ourselves. Ace, you always say not to borrow trouble. Well, it’s been thirty years, and . . .” Liddie couldn’t think of how to end her statement without having a complete breakdown, so she clamped her mouth shut and shrugged.

“It’ll probably be fine.” Bunny didn’t look like he believed a word he’d uttered.

Liddie nodded. “Yeah, it’ll probably be fine.” She gulped the rest of the soda from the can and tossed it into the recycling bin after rinsing it out. “I’m gonna go lie down for a bit. I wasn’t kidding about the headache.”

“Okay, Liddie,” Ace said. “And just remember, you’ll always have an out while I’m still around, okay? You don’t have to face anything you don’t want to.”

Liddie nodded and headed up the stairs to her small bedroom, the one she slept in as a child. As she lay back against the pillows, she kept her eyes open, not trusting that the spirits from the past wouldn’t invade her sleep. It was rough enough last night, conversing with friendly ghosts at the cemetery; Lord knew what it was going to be like meeting the living specter of her past after thirty years.