ENCORE PERFORMANCE (THE MATCHMAKER TRILOGY) (24 page)

He’d seen it all in his chosen profession. The most
popular, the cheating husband. There were bosses who
suspected employees were skimming the till. And like the
angry wives’, the bosses’ suspicions were usually correct.
A missing relative or child was just as common, but this
case piqued his interest more than most.

Trevor Jacobs looked down at the manila folder on the
passenger seat of his car. He tugged at his collar. The
Missouri summer was warming the inside of his car to
temperatures that he was sure would kill a man. He picked
up the folder and flipped it open.

Finding Mandy Marlow had been a challenge because
she’d disappeared when she was seventeen. That had been
forty years ago.

The last time her mother had seen her, Mandy’d had a
newborn infant in her arms and had come back begging for
money. Ruth Marlow, Mandy’s mother, had given him the
case’s scant details over the phone. His notes clearly
reflected that Mandy hadn’t gone asking for a place to stay
or for help with the baby. She had wanted ten thousand
dollars and they had refused. She had told them she’d be
living with friends. Friends who would love her and her
baby, unlike her parents.

He’d finally tied Mandy to a David Kendal, a retired
airline pilot living in Kansas City, Missouri.
Mandy Marlow had lived in the Kansas City area
approximately seven years after she had left her parents’
house. Her DMV records showed she’d lived in a house
owned by David Kendal and exactly seventeen years after
she’d last been seen by her family she changed her name to
Mandy Kendal. He’d searched marriage records, but he
found no record that Mandy and David had actually been
married. She had assumed the name through proper
channels. However, their names did appear together on the
birth certificates of Carissa Marlow Kendal and one Hope
Katherine Kendal.
Hope Kendal had been born by cesarean moments after
they had pronounced Mandy Kendal dead. She had died of
heart failure and had papers that had strictly instructed that
she not be revived.
She hadn’t been.
David Kendal married a Sophia Burkhalter only three
weeks later. He flipped through the notes. “In a lovely back
yard ceremony of the home of the bride’s grandmother
Katherine Burkhalter,” the newspaper clipping had stated.
Adoption records showed that Sophia, now Kendal, had
adopted Carissa, then seventeen, and the newborn Hope
only three months after she’d been born.
What a tidy package, he thought. Ex-lover of the dead
woman shares custody of his children with his new wife.
What a twisted novel plot that would make. He laughed.
However, armed with the facts he had, he knew it had been
that simple.
A change of heart, or perhaps a shove in that direction,
had Mandy Marlow—Mandy
Kendal
—giving up her
children and refusing to fight for her own life.
Sweat beaded on his brow. Trevor reached for his
bottle of water. It had grown warm. He drank it down and
tossed it into the backseat with the other bottles he’d
discarded there. He knew he wasn’t the ideal patron for a
car rental company.
He flipped through his notes again and stared into the
face he’d become familiar with.
Hope Katherine Kendal.
She stood in a crowded room, but the camera had
zoomed in on her. She’d been intrigued by something, or
someone. Long blonde hair cascaded behind her shoulders
and crystal blue eyes watched him from the photo. She had
lips that were full and just a bit pouty. The face that
mesmerized from the photo had a cherubic look to her, but
a super model’s features.
He knew he’d been fascinated by it too long, too many
times. He’d seen it in his dreams. He’d found himself
driving down the road thinking about her face.
Trevor checked his watch. He’d been sitting in the
cemetery, in his parked car, for over two hours. He’d wait
another two hours and then he’d move on.
But he didn’t have to wait any longer.
A blue Miata pulled up between him and the headstone
that read Mandy Marlow Kendal. The beautiful blonde that
he’d familiarized himself with stood there in person. He felt
his heart race a little faster.
The pace of his heart was different from when he was
about to confront most of those whom he’d followed. That
was adrenaline. This was lust.
Hope stood just outside her car. She was dressed in
jeans that rode low on curvy hips. She wore her tie-dyed
shirt tucked in, giving her a look of being taller than she
was. Her hair fell well down her back in a long tail.
Large sunglasses shielded her eyes, but he knew how
blue they were.
She wasn’t moving. He was far enough from her he
knew she couldn’t see him, but he wondered what she was
thinking when she stood still on the narrow dirt road. She
reached through the open window of her car and pulled out
a bouquet of flowers.
Another car pulled up behind her. Trevor watched with
intrigue. Carissa Kendal Samuel—he’d familiarized
himself with her face as well—climbed out of her car and
approached Hope.
He watched them exchange a few words and then an
embrace. It was amazing how different sisters could be.
Hope was fair. Her blonde hair was strikingly different
from the dark hair of her sister. Carissa stood a few inches
taller than Hope and her figure was straighter where Hope’s
was voluptuous.
Arm in arm the sisters walked toward the grave of their
birth mother. A smile crossed Trevor’s lips. Right on time.

Carissa laced her arm through her sister’s. “So, in
twenty-three years this is the first time I caught you here?”
“You knew I came every year on the day that she
died.” On the anniversary of her own birth.
“I did.” Carissa rested her head against her sister’s. “I
just wasn’t sure why you did.”
“She’s a piece of me. She’s a piece I don’t know. A
piece I’m afraid to ask about.”
“We’ve always been open about her.”
“I know. But I’m old enough to really understand. I
think I want to understand now.” Hope bent and laid the
flowers on Mandy’s grave then stood erect next to her sister
again. “Do you really think she was always the person you
knew?”
Carissa snorted out a laugh. “I hadn’t thought about it.
My memories of her aren’t the happiest ones. I guess I
never gave any consideration to who she was aside from
that.”
Hope gave her sister a nod. Since she’d been ten years
old she’d been curious. She’d remembered asking her
father on the day they had buried her great-grandmother,
Katie, if he’d take her to see her birth mother’s grave.
She’d whispered it in his ear, not wanting to hurt her
mother’s feelings. He’d agreed. They hadn’t gone that day,
but he’d taken her.
They had stood where she now stood with her sister on
her arm. They’d looked down at the grave without a word.
She hadn’t asked questions and he hadn’t offered anything
either. They just stood together in awkward silence.
The woman in the grave was not her mother. She
understood that. Yes, Mandy had given birth to her, but that
wasn’t motherhood. Sophia was her mother and would
remain in her heart as just that. She’d raised her, molded
her, and above all else loved her unconditionally. However,
Mandy Marlow Kendal’s blood ran through her veins, and
unlike her sister, whose biological father raised them both,
Hope knew nothing of the two people who’d given her life.
Carissa gave her a nudge.
“I have to get back to the school. Thomas is planning
dinner for you tonight. You are coming, aren’t you?”
“Me miss a birthday dinner that Thomas made? Not on
your life.” She kissed her sister’s cheek. “Tell him I’ll be
there and I’ll bring treats for the kids.”
“No candy,” Carissa pleaded. “Aiden has had enough
sweets since he’s been staying with Mom while we work.
Bryce’s teeth are going to rot out from under his braces,
and Julie and Becky, well they just don’t need it.”
“Okay. I get it. I won’t let you know.” Hope grinned
up at her sister, who only shook her head.
“You’re as bad as Mom.”
“We’re entitled.”
“Wait till you have kids. You will curse her and her
giving ways.”
“I’ll take your word for it.”
They fell silent again.
“Are you going to stay?” Carissa asked.
“Yeah. I think I need a few more minutes.”
“I’ll see you tonight, then.” Hope nodded without
looking up. “Happy birthday,” Carissa added.
Hope tilted her head up toward her sister and smiled.
“Thanks.”
Carissa walked back to her car, leaving her sister to
gather her thoughts over the grave of Mandy Kendal.

He watched Carissa’s car drive away. Finally, he
thought. He couldn’t take the heat inside the car any longer.
Trevor slipped his business card into his pocket,
climbed from the car, and put on his sunglasses. He walked
across the grounds, slowly, as though he were searching for
a stone.
She looked up at him as he neared and gave him a
smile. Not an affectionate one, but that of someone who
knew if you were in a cemetery, someone there mattered to
you.
He wiped a hand over his brow.
“Hot day.”
“Sure is.” Her voice rang in his ears, penetrating every
part of him. He’d studied the face, memorized the eyes, but
had never heard the angelic ring of her voice.
A smile slid over his lips. “Visiting? Is this your
grandmother?” He nodded to the grave where she stood.
“My birth mother.”
Trevor nodded again. She was specific, he thought.
Hope scanned a look over him, and though her eyes
were still shielded by the sunglasses, a knot twisted in his
stomach because she was looking right at him. Those eyes
he’d studied in the picture and dreamed of at night focused
on him.
“Are you searching for someone?”
“Yeah. My aunt is here somewhere.” At least he
wasn’t lying. It was his great-great-aunt. Her grave marker
read the year 1877, but he didn’t need to give the details. “I
always forget where she’s buried.”
Hope nodded. “Good luck finding her.”
She turned to walk back toward her car.
This was the point in his findings, in a case like this,
where he would introduce himself and tell her why he’d
been sent to find her. He wasn’t ready for that. He wasn’t
ready to hand her his card and say, “Your birth father is
looking for you.” He wasn’t ready to put away the feeling
he had when her eyes looked in his direction.
“I’m Trevor,” he called out to her and she stopped.
“Trevor Jacobs.”
Hope turned back to him. “It’s nice to meet you.” She
smiled warmly and continued back to her car.
“And you are?” He followed, then slowed, realizing he
appeared too anxious.
“Are you following me?” She tilted down her
sunglasses. The piercing blue eyes he knew so well looked
right into him, and his heart slammed in his chest. He could
barely breathe.
“I’m just new to the area. You know, trying to meet
anyone I can.” He looked around. “Anywhere I can.” He
laughed and she pushed up her glasses and studied him.
“Hope Kendal.” She extended her hand to him.
He took it and the shock that zapped between them had
them both pulling their hands away.
“Wow,” he whispered as he looked down at his hand
then back up to her.
“Shocking,” she joked. “Well, Mr. Jacobs, it was nice
to meet you. I hope you find your aunt.”
He couldn’t move.
Hope walked to her car and he watched as she drove
away. He looked back at his hand. It still tingled.
“It was a sign, Hope Kendal.” He turned back toward
his car with a wide smile. “And I believe in signs.”
He swung open the car door and crawled in behind the
wheel.

Hope watched him climb into his car from her
rearview mirror. He headed out of the cemetery in the
opposite direction. When she was sure he was out of sight,
she stopped the car with a jolt and took a deep breath.

She rubbed her hand on her pant leg, trying to ease the
tingling in it. She shook her head. She could hear her greatgrandmother telling her she would meet a man someday
that would take her breath away. They were walking
through a meadow, she recalled.

Hope moved her head from side to side, trying to ease
the tension in her neck. She was losing her mind. She’d
never walked in the meadow with her great-grandmother.
She’d only been ten when Katie died and she’d been too
frail to walk anywhere.