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“I took a couple of days off work. We baked all weekend. Made as many as we could. Then Monday, I sold them at the construction site. They were gone in minutes. Tuesday, I brought in even more and took them to another construction site. The same thing happened. By the time she was ready to go back home, word had spread about the hand pies, and guys were showing up at the two construction sites, buying me out in less than an hour. I had my home business.”

“How did you make it work with Harrison?” she asked, trying to absorb everything he told her.

“It was hard at first, going to construction sites with Harrison in his car seat. I started making pies as soon as I got back from selling them at lunch. I worked until about midnight, then grabbed a few hours of sleep before getting up and working more. That was all I did—I was either taking care of him or making pies. Once my bills were paid, I used the extra money to buy a couple more ovens and a second refrigerator.” He smiled. “I’m sure I violated a lot of health codes, but I never got caught.”

“Ah, the heart of a bad boy never changes.”

“In some respects. It took me six months to save up enough to buy a food truck, and that helped a lot. I set up different locations where I would be every week and started developing a following.”

“One truck became three and so on?” she asked.

“Pretty much. Within two years I had a fleet of food trucks in the Austin metro area. Five years later, I’d expanded to the big cities in Texas and was moving into California. I’d also opened a couple of stores, and they were successful. Today I have two hundred trucks and ten stores, and we’re in fifteen cities.”

Jeez, that was impressive. She’d known he was successful, but hearing it from him was different.

“Including Wishing Tree,” she said with a smile.

“It’s my favorite store. It means I get to be around whenever Harrison needs me.”

She glanced at the wall of pictures. “You should have its picture up there.” She frowned, then leaned forward to study the photographs. “Is that bottom one of the old hardware store?”

“Yes.”

She looked from it to him. “I’m surprised. You always had a complicated relationship with the store.”

He’d been twelve when he’d first started working there, trying to help out when his dad was too drunk to care about things like opening or stocking inventory. As Toby had gotten older, he’d taken on more responsibility. Once they’d started dating, they’d spent hours together in the store. She’d learned all about tools and how to repair things like a faucet or a light fixture.

“It wasn’t the store,” he said. “It was my dad.” He exhaled. “Judy had that picture framed for me when I was putting up photographs. I didn’t want to tell her I’d rather not stare at it every time I came in here.”

Involuntarily, she reached out and touched his arm. “I’m sorry. That’s hard for you.”

“It’s a picture. I can handle it.”

She dropped her hand back to her lap. “Your dad sold the store right about the time you left, didn’t he?”

Toby looked at her. “He didn’t sell it, Reggie. He lost it. He didn’t pay the lease or for his inventory, and they took it from him. He got mad and blamed me for not doing enough.” He looked away. “He came after me with a baseball bat the day he lost the store. I knew then if I stayed, he would kill me. So I took off.”

“What?”

The word burst out before she could stop it. One corner of Toby’s mouth turned up.

“You thought I left because of you?”

There was no way to change the truth, she thought, fighting embarrassment. “It crossed my mind. We’d just broken up, and it was all your fault. I thought you were handling it badly.”

“I did. I was crushed, but I didn’t take off because of you.”

“I’m chagrined.”

“Don’t be. It’s a logical thing to assume. And speaking of mistakes, I didn’t blab about that night.”

She stared at her wine, not sure what to say.

The night of prom, after dating for more than a year and knowing she would love Toby forever, she’d finally been ready to give herself to him. They’d gotten close dozens of times, but she’d always held back on going all the way. But that night, knowing how much he meant to her, she’d given him her virginity. Tuesday morning at school, Paisley had warned her everyone was talking about the fact that Toby had told the football team she was the best sex of his life.

She’d been devastated by the betrayal and humiliated beyond words. She’d called her mom to ask if she could come home. When her dad found out, he’d threatened to take Toby out back. She’d told him she would take care of Toby herself and had broken up with him. Three days later, he’d been gone.

“It wasn’t me,” he repeated. “Reggie, you know me well enough to know I wouldn’t do that.”