had stopped at the end of the island, his expectant glance darting from one adult to the other. He’d pulled on pants and a green thermal shirt and held a red flannel shirt in his fist.
“I have to go now,” Erik told the grinning little boy. “But I heard your mom say she’d help you.”
His smile fell. “You have to go?”
“Yeah, bud. I do.” Unprepared for how the child’s disappointment affected him, not sure what to make of the strange hollow in his chest, he tousled his sandy hair one last time, gave him a smile and let himself out through the store.
“Erik! I was just going to call you!”
Erik turned from where he was locking the front door of Merrick & Sullivan’s client office. Phil had just emerged from the silver Mercedes parked behind the construction Dumpster in front of the building next door. The tails of her white scarf flew in the breeze as she hurried around to the sidewalk. “Do you have a minute?”
He didn’t feel particularly sociable. What he did feel was defensive, edgy and impatient to be on his way. Still, he made himself smile. “Sure,” he called back, pocketing his keys. Hunching his shoulders against the chill, he headed to where she’d stopped by Cornelia’s building’s front door. “What’s up?”
“Let’s get out of the cold. I’ll make us some coffee.”
“A minute is really all I have, Phil. I’m leaving to see my folks in a couple of hours.”
“Oh. Well, then.” Hitching her bag higher on her shoulder, she crossed her arms over her furry white coat. Beneath her matching hat, her eyes smiled through the lenses of her bookish, horn-rimmed glasses. “Rory said you were there when I called the other day. The power being out everywhere had us concerned about her and her son,” she explained, “but some neighbors were visiting so I knew we didn’t have to worry. We didn’t have a chance to really talk, though. Is everything all right with the property?”
Realizing she was checking up on Cornelia’s investment threatened to turn his mood even more restive. “There are a few downed trees and a loose gutter, but no structural damage,” he told her, thinking that was about all she’d be interested in. “I heard the power was restored a while ago.”
He’d learned that from Ed, who’d done as Erik had asked him to do and called when the area had gone back on the grid. Since he’d told his old friend about Rory’s unfamiliarity with the generator when he’d borrowed his saw, Ed hadn’t questioned his concern about wanting to make sure there were no other glitches.
Erik hadn’t let himself question his concern, either. He’d tried hard to keep thoughts of her and Tyler to a minimum.
“That’s good to know. Just one other thing, then, and I’ll let you go.” She flashed him a smile as she crossed her arms tighter, anxious to get out of the wind. “I take it the two of you were working when the storm hit,” she said quickly, making it apparent that Rory hadn’t mentioned his insistence about helping with their Christmas tree. “So, how do you think she’ll do? Or is it too soon to tell?”
He wanted to say she’d do just fine. She certainly didn’t lack for aptitude or the determination to succeed. She even had the incentive of keeping a roof over her son’s head pushing her. It would be a challenge doing it on her own, but she’d make a living there. With the connections she was establishing, she’d probably even make a life.
He brushed past the thought that she’d be making that life without him. He had a life of his own right where he was. He had work he loved, a great business, good friends. He had money and the freedom to come and go pretty much as he pleased. His obligation to the woman messing with his carefully constructed status quo ended once they had the business established. Once it was, he could walk away and never go back there again.
“Is there a problem, Erik?”
“No. No,” he repeated, waiting for the quick shutdown of feeling that normally reinforced his last thought. “I’ll make it work.”
I will. Not we.
Phil apparently heard the distinction.
“Isn’t she cooperating?”
Not when she was giving him grief about helping her, he thought.
“She just needs a break right now,” he decided to say. “With her little boy and the holidays, it just seemed like a good thing to do.”
“Was that your idea?”
Initially, it had been. For the business part, anyway.
“The decision was mutual.”
“So when do you meet again?”
“Whenever we’re scheduled to be here.”
“That will be the fifth.”
“That soon?”
“At two,” she added, and cocked her head. “Do we need to meet before then? We certainly can, if there’s ever a problem,” she hurried on, having caught his lack of enthusiasm for the meeting. “Part of what we do for our ladies and their mentors is help them work through challenges. Differences of opinion can arise over anything from creative priorities to scheduling—”
“It’s nothing like that.”
“May I ask what it is?”
It was clearly too late to deny a problem even existed. But all he would admit was, “It’s complicated.”
“I see.” Adjusting the frame of her glasses, she peered at him with interest. “Do you have a solution to the problem?”
He wasn’t sure there was one. Not for the two of them. “Not yet.”
“Can you work together?”
“Yeah. Sure. There’s always email and the telephone.” He’d given his word. He’d hold up his end of the deal. For his grandparents. For her. “She wants the business to work. That’s what I want, too.”
She considered him for a moment, her head tipped thoughtfully, the fine fibers of her white hat fluttering. “You know, Erik, when I gave Rory the address of your grandparents’ property, I suggested she look for the possibilities. We knew what she would see when she got there, and that it would be nothing she could have imagined she would want.
“What she’d been looking for was a small home for herself and her son,” she confided, “but her needs changed when she lost her job. To see the potential in that property, she had to let go of a mind-set that focused on what she had been looking for and what she now needed. To find the solution to your problem, maybe you should look at the possibilities, too.”
She smiled then, gave a little wave of her white-gloved hand. Crystals shimmered on its cuff. “I’ve kept you long enough,” she said. “You have a plane to catch. And I need to get inside before I freeze. Have a safe trip. And merry Christmas.”
He thanked her. Added
