by Mary McNear
“Yes. I know, it sounds strange, but—”
“Sank or capsized?” he clarified. An inexperienced canoer could capsize a canoe, but canoes did not, as a general rule, sink. Not on a day like today, under weather conditions like these. If he’d special ordered a summer day from a catalog, it could not have been more perfect than this one.
“I know the difference between capsizing and sinking,” she said, a frown line forming between her hazel eyes. “Believe it or not, I’m an experienced canoer.”
Walker didn’t believe it. And her tone, when she spoke again, told him she knew he didn’t believe it.
“Look,” she said, “I took out my grandfather’s wooden canoe. It’s at least fifty years old, maybe older. It was taking on a little water when I started out. But I thought I could handle it.” She indicated the plastic bailing jug she was holding. “It turned out to be more than a little leak, though. It turned out to be—”
“A big leak?” he interrupted, again. Somehow, the spell had been broken. She still looked irresistibly lovely standing there, her wet clothes clingingly appealingly to her slender body. But he was beginning, belatedly, to see the humor in the situation.
Her jaw tightened. “Yeah, okay. A big leak. Anyway, long story short, taking that canoe out was probably a mistake.”
“Probably?” Walker repeated, one corner of his mouth lifting a quarter of an inch.
“I’m glad you’re finding this so amusing,” she said, obviously exasperated. “But the only reason I’m even telling you this is because I need to cut across your property to the road. If it’s all right with you, I’ll be on my way now.”
“Be my guest,” Walker said, with a shrug. But then his curiosity got the best of him. “Where’d your canoe sink?” he asked.
“About a hundred yards to the right of your dock. In about five feet of water.”
“It was that close, huh?” he asked, the corner of his mouth lifting again.
She flushed, and he watched, fascinated, as a warm pinkness collided with the pale gold of her complexion.
“I wasn’t spying on you,” she said, “if that’s what you’re implying.”
“I’m not implying anything,” he said innocently.
“Anyway, if it’s okay with you, I’ll come back for it as soon as I’m able to. I don’t want it to be a hazard to other boaters.”
“I’ll take care of it,” he said. He loved a salvage project, big or small. “But in the meantime, why don’t I run you home? You can’t be comfortable in those wet clothes.” Even if you look amazing in them, he thought. But he immediately regretted thinking it. It seemed disrespectful, somehow, now that he knew more about her personal circumstances.
“Thanks for the offer,” she said. “But I’m going to walk back on the road.” He watched, fascinated, as a tiny rivulet of water ran down her neck and disappeared beneath her cotton T-shirt. She frowned, again, and crossed her arms self-consciously.
“Look, at least let me get you a towel,” he said, in as close to a business-like tone as he could muster.
“A towel would be nice,” she admitted. “And then I’ll get going.”
He slid the door open farther and gestured for her to come inside. “Why don’t you wait in here?”
She shook her head. “I don’t want to drip on the floor.”
“The floor is made from reclaimed wood from a barn,” he said, motioning her inside. “It’s already withstood a hundred years of exposure from the elements. I think it can handle a few drops of water.”
“It’s beautiful,” she said, examining the floor as she stepped inside.
“Thanks,” he said. “I put it in myself. I’ll be right back.” He brought her a towel, then looked discreetly away while she dried herself off. He thought about offering her some dry clothes, too, but decided that that might be going too far. Besides, he had nothing that would even come close to fitting her. Well, nothing that belonged to him. He pushed the image of his ex-wife’s nightgown out of his mind.
“Thanks. That’s much better,” she said, holding on to the damp towel. “Why don’t I bring this back to you after I’ve washed it.”
“That’s not necessary,” he said. “I can wash it myself.” He added, confidentially, “You know, they actually put the instructions on the inside lid of the washing machine.”
She didn’t smile. But she did hand the towel back to him. And when she did, he caught the faintest scent of coconut suntan lotion and clean lake water radiating off her skin. To him, it was the perfect distillation of summer. If he could have bottled it, he would have.
“Mind if I cut through your house to the driveway?” she asked now, glancing around.
“Of course not. But why don’t you just let me run you home in my truck? It’ll take five minutes. Less, probably.”
“No, you’ve done enough. I don’t want to disrupt your day any more than I already have.”
He smiled. “I was reading a fishing magazine,” he said. And thinking about you, he added silently. “The title of the article was ‘Best New Lures for Summer.’ Pretty important stuff, obviously. But I can probably tear myself away from it.”
She bit her lower lip, weighing his offer. “Okay,” she said finally. “If you don’t mind, a ride home would be great. I don’t want Jax to try to reach me and have me not be home. I was only planning on being gone for a little while.”
“Let’s go then,” he said. He led her through the cabin and out the front door. She murmured appreciatively at the rest of the interior, and he was tempted to remind her she’d used the word ostentatious to describe it when he’d met her at the coffee shop. But he didn’t say anything. Not about that, anyway. He was thinking about something else he wanted to say to her. Needed to say to her.
They climbed into his pickup truck and drove in silence to her cabin. She looked studiously out the window, as if she was trying to memorize each variety of tree they passed. And he tried to look at the road, instead of at her knees. He had a thing about women’s knees. Usually, though, they were too bony and sharp. Or too dimpled and ill-defined. Her knees, he saw with a sidelong glance, were absolutely perfect.
Too soon, he turned into her driveway and stopped in front of her cabin.
“Hey, you’ve gotten a lot of work done on this place,” Walker said, approvingly. It doesn’t look like it’s going to fall down anymore, he thought, but didn’t say.
But Allie only shrugged and started to get out of the truck.
“Hey, before you go,” he said, quickly. “I wanted to apologize.”
“For what?” she asked, turning to face him.
“For asking you about your husband when we met at Pearl’s. That was rude. It was none of my business.”
She looked away from him, out the passenger-side window, but otherwise said nothing. He got the sense that she was trying, somehow, to compose herself. A breeze blew outside, stirring the trees and changing the dappled shadings of the sun that played over both of them in the truck.
Finally, he heard her exhale. “It’s not your fault,” she said. “You couldn’t have known.” And then, turning to him with a rueful little sigh, she said, “I knew I was right about how quickly gossip traveled in Butternut.”
“It wasn’t like that,” Walker said, frowning. “Caroline told me about it because she thought you and Wyatt might need help.”
“What kind of help?” she asked him, warily, not taking her eyes off him. And her eyes were beautiful, he thought. Like mosaics, with little chips of light brown and green intermingled in them.
“I think what Caroline meant,” he said, carefully, “is that the two of you might need a neighbor some time. A real neighbor. Why she thought I could be that person, I don’t know. I don’t have any practice at it.” Unless, of course, you counted the fling he’d had with the flight attendant who lived next door to him in his condominium complex in Minneapolis. And he didn’t count it.
“I appreciate Caroline’s concern,” she said now. “I really do. But
I didn’t move here for the whole ‘small town experience.’ I moved here for the privacy.”
“I can understand that,” he said. Nobody valued privacy more than he did. But she and her son’s circumstances were different from his own.
“But what about your son, Wyatt?” he asked, gently. “Does he need privacy, too?”
She flushed. And there was an edge of anger in her voice when she spoke again. “Wyatt is doing just fine, thank you. And I think I’m probably the best judge of what he does or doesn’t need.” She paused, then asked, coolly, “Do you have any children?”
“No,” he said, feeling a twist of pain in his gut. Its sharpness surprised him. “No, I’m not a father,” he heard himself say.
“Then you probably don’t know a lot about raising children.”
That was harsh, he thought. Harsh, but fair.
“You’re right. I don’t know anything about kids,” he said, abruptly. Then he leaned over her and opened the passenger-side door. He knew it was a rude thing to do, but he didn’t really care.
Allie didn’t move, though. And when she spoke again, her tone was gentler. “Look, I know you mean well. Everybody means well. But nobody really understands. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m not the first person to lose a husband to a war. And I won’t be the last. There are plenty of military widows out there. But they’re not usually the people giving me advice. Or claiming to understand how I feel. Or trying to be ‘helpful.’ ”
“You say helpful like it’s a dirty word,” he observed.
She smiled another one of her almost smiles. “No, ‘helpful’ is all right,” she said. “Assuming that you want to be helped.”
“Instead of just being left alone?” he supplied.
She looked thoughtful. “Sometimes, yes.”
He thought about what she’d said. He didn’t know why, but it bothered him. Which was strange, when you considered how much he’d wanted to be left alone over the last couple of years.
“Look,” he said, “I can’t speak for everyone in Butternut. But I can speak for myself. And I’ll try to leave you alone. Usually, it’s something I’m very good at doing. Leaving people alone, I mean. You might even say it’s a specialty of mine.”
She bit her lower lip. “I didn’t mean I want people to ignore us,” she clarified. “I just meant I don’t want people to try to help us. Not when I can take care of both of us.”
Walker was silent. He didn’t think now was the time to mention that she’d taken care of herself so well today that her canoe was sitting on the bottom of the lake.
“Thanks for the ride,” she said, favoring him with one of her rare smiles. And then she gathered her gear together and slid out of the truck, slamming the door behind her. He didn’t wait for her to walk all the way up to her cabin. When she was a safe distance away, he gunned the engine, turned the truck around, and sped, too fast, up her driveway.
You’ve met your match, Walker, he thought, turning onto the road and making a conscious effort to slow down. You’ve finally found someone who’s even more obsessed with her independence, and her privacy, than you are. You two should be perfect neighbors. But if that were the case, he wondered, why was he suddenly in such a lousy mood?
CHAPTER 11
Jade, please hold still,” Jax said, with uncharacteristic impatience.
“I’m sorry, Mommy, but you’re pulling too tight,” Jade said. “I don’t see why you have to braid my hair, anyway,” she added, in an injured tone.
“Sweetie, you know the rule,” Jax said, trying, but failing, to hide her exasperation. “If you want to grow your hair long, you have to wear it braided. Not all the time. But most of the time. And definitely at day camp, all right? Otherwise, it gets all tangled. And Mommy doesn’t have the energy right now to get the tangles out every night before bedtime. So try to hold still and I’ll get it over with as quickly as possible. I promise.”
But a moment later, Jade objected again. “Ouch! Mommy, that hurts.” She squirmed on the high stool she was sitting on, her back to Jax. They were on the screened-in porch off the back of their house, where Jax’s daughters liked to sleep on warm summer nights.
“I’m sorry, baby,” Jax said, letting go of one of Jade’s braids. She knew she’d pulled too hard. Under ordinary circumstances, she was an excellent braider. But this morning, she was having difficulty making her hands do what she wanted them to do. It was nerves, plain and simple. Her hands had been shaking, for instance, when she’d ironed Jeremy’s shirt that morning. And her stomach had churned uneasily when she’d swallowed her prenatal vitamin.
“What’s wrong, Mommy?” Jade asked, swiveling around on her stool.
“Nothing’s wrong, honey. I’m just pregnant. And tired. And hot,” she said, reaching over to turn up a nearby fan that felt as if it was barely stirring the already humid morning air.
“But, Mommy,” Jade reminded her, “you said you like being pregnant. You said it’s easy for you, ’cause you don’t feel sick or throw up or anything.”
“I did say that, didn’t I?” Jax smiled at Jade’s upturned face, all wide blue eyes and riotous freckles. “Thank you for reminding me about that, Jade. And do you know what I’ve decided about today?”
“What?”
“I’ve decided that today should be a ponytail day for you. What do you say to that idea, sweet pea?”
Jade nodded, relieved.
So Jax started over, brushing out Jade’s hair, being careful not to pull too hard on it, and being careful, too, not to complain when Jade started squirming again. It wasn’t Jade’s fault, after all, that she had trouble sitting still. She was six years old. And for her, today was an ordinary day, like any other day, except better, of course, because it was a summer day. But for Jax, today was a day she’d been dreading for weeks. It wasn’t marked on the family calendar that hung in the kitchen. But if it had been, it would have been marked with a big, black X. It was the day Bobby said he’d be calling her from prison.
The doorbell rang then, interrupting her thoughts.
“That’s Allie and Wyatt,” she said, gathering Jade’s hair into a ponytail and twisting elastic around it.
“They’re here now?” Jade asked, excitedly.
“Yep,” Jax said, reaching under Jade’s arms and lifting her down from the stool. “Why don’t you let them in?”
Jade raced excitedly to the front door, and Jax smiled, pleased that Jade liked Wyatt so much. He’d been very quiet the day he’d come blueberry picking with them. But far from being disappointed, Jade had simply adjusted her conversational strategy and talked enough for both of them.
By the time Jax got to the front door, Jade had already flung it open and was talking a blue streak to Wyatt.
Jax laughed. “Jade, honey, can you at least say hello to Allie and Wyatt first?”
“Oh, hello,” Jade said, a little breathlessly. And, without missing a beat, “Now do you want to come upstairs to my room and see my rock collection? I have like a gazillion rocks. More than anyone else I know. And I’m not even done collecting them.”
Wyatt hesitated, but he let Jade take him by the hand and drag him away.
“Make it quick, Jade, okay?” Jax called after her, closing the front door. “Your dad’s going to be here soon to take you and your sisters to day camp.”
Allie smiled, gratefully, at Jax. “She is exactly what Wyatt needs right now,” she said.
“A bossy six-year-old girl telling him what to do all the time?”
Allie shook her head. “No. A friend,” she said simply. And Jax smiled, even though something caught in her throat at the thought of what Wyatt and Allie had been through.
“How about a cup of coffee?” she asked Allie, leading her to the kitchen. “Or on second thought, how about an iced tea? It’s way too hot for coffee this morning.”
“An iced tea would be nice,” Allie said, sitting down at the kitchen table.
Jax busied herself, taking a pitcher of ice
d tea out of the refrigerator and two glasses out of the cupboard. “By the way,” she said, “did you get a lot done at the cabin on Saturday? I forgot to ask you when we brought Wyatt home.”
“Oh,” Allie said, looking a little vague, “I didn’t get as much done as I thought I would. But thanks for taking Wyatt, anyway. It was so good for him. He doesn’t spend as much time with other children as he should.”
“Have you thought about sending him to day camp?” Jax asked, carefully, setting the glasses of iced tea on the table. She sensed this would be a sensitive subject for Allie. Wyatt, she knew, wasn’t the only one having difficulty separating.
“The one your daughters go to?”
“Uh-huh. It’s at the little nature museum, right outside of town. They call the campers there ‘junior naturalists.’ And there’s a different theme there every week. The girls love it,” she added.
“That sounds like fun,” Allie said, a little wistfully. “I’ll ask Wyatt about it.”
Just then, they heard a car’s engine backfire down the street, and Jax’s hand jerked, spilling iced tea on the table.
“Jax,” Allie said, gently. “Do you think maybe you should cut down on the caffeine? You seem a little . . . tightly wound this morning.”
“Oh, this is decaffeinated,” Jax assured her, wiping up the spill with a dish towel. “Really, I’m fine. I just couldn’t sleep last night. And this morning I feel a little tense.” A little? She felt like the proverbial live wire, her body practically humming with anxiety.
“Anyway,” she said, changing the subject, “in case you’re wondering why I asked you to stop by this morning, it’s because I wanted to invite you to a party.”
“A party?” Allie echoed. She looked horrified, like Jax had said electric chair or plane crash instead of party.
“Yes, party,” Jax said. “Parties are supposed to be fun, remember?”
“Not really,” Allie confessed. “It’s been a while since I’ve been to one. I’ve tried to avoid them, I guess, over the last couple of years.”
Jax hesitated. She couldn’t blame Allie, really, for not feeling as if she had any reason to celebrate. Still, Jax thought, she couldn’t avoid parties forever, could she?
