The House on Sugar Plum Lane by JUDY DUARTE Page A

Main, he noticed a man in blue coveralls sweeping the sidewalk in front of a café. He didn’t give it much thought until he caught sight of the guy’s profile. From the side, he looked familiar.
    Brandon tried to check him out, but he pushed his broom around the corner, disappearing from view.
    His dad?
    No, it couldn’t be. His old man had probably drunk himself to death by now. Besides, what would he be doing in Fairbrook? He didn’t have any family or friends here.
    â€œDaddy?”
    Brandon glanced in the rearview mirror at Callie, who sat in her car seat in back. “Yes, honey?”
    â€œHow come the light is green and you’re not going?”
    Oh, for Pete’s sake. Brandon glanced at the traffic light, saw that it wasn’t going to get any greener, and started across the street.
    â€œI can’t wait to go to Chuck E. Cheese’s,” Callie said. “It’s the funnest place in the world.”
    Ever since leaving Sugar Plum Lane, the little girl had been chattering up a storm. But it wasn’t the child he wanted to talk to right now; it was her mother, who was clearly up to something.
    The divorce had been an unexpected blow, but he’d gone along with it, thinking that a fight wasn’t in anyone’s best interest. Then Amy had insisted upon moving back to the townhome in Del Mar, which left him living alone in a sprawling four-bedroom executive house in La Jolla with a killer view, where he only returned at night to sleep.
    Of course, he’d been sleeping like crap ever since Amy and Callie moved out. What had gotten into the woman who’d once been so levelheaded and predictable? She’d morphed into a woman he no longer knew.
    â€œI’ll call and explain,” she’d told him.
    But when? Next week?
    He slipped on the Bluetooth, then called her cell instead. The phone rang several times before Amy finally answered.
    â€œHello?”
    â€œDid you lose your phone? You were supposed to call me.”
    â€œNo, I…”
    Brandon meant to be patient. He really did. But he couldn’t help pressing for an answer. “What’s going on, Amy?”
    She blew out a sigh, as though that simple explanation wasn’t so simple after all. “Remember how I told you that my mother had been searching for her biological family?”
    Vaguely, but he’d been pretty busy and hadn’t paid a lot of attention to things that hadn’t concerned him. He couldn’t admit that, though, so he said, “Yes, I remember.”
    â€œWell, I decided to pick up the search where she left off as a tribute to her.”
    Brandon furrowed his brow. “I still don’t get it, Amy. What are you doing? Looking for ghosts in a haunted house?”
    She laughed, the lilt of her voice more of a balm on his raw and ragged emotions than anything else had been since she’d moved out, which included having more than his share of stiff drinks, slamming a fist through the wall once, and burying himself in more work.
    â€œIn a way,” she admitted, “that’s exactly what I’m doing.”
    Okay, she’d really gone off the deep end. He again glanced in the rearview mirror, making eye contact with the little girl they’d created, a beautiful child with her mommy’s blond hair and expressive blue eyes.
    A daughter that still bound them together, whether Amy liked it or not.
    So he said, “I’m still waiting for that simple explanation you promised.”
    She inhaled, then let out a slow and steady breath. “I followed the trail to a woman named Barbara Rucker, who grew up in the house where you found me today.”
    â€œWhat’d you do? Break in?”
    â€œNo, I’m there legally.”
    That was a relief, although his wife was so honest that her mom used to say she wouldn’t take a shortcut home. But after all they’d been through the past few months? Who knew what she’d