before.
It was no wonder that when Meredith made her way to where he finally slept on the sofa, it was already almost eight o’clock.
“Daddy, SpongeBob is on and I usually eat breakfast during Rugrats.”
He opened his eyes and blinked. “Already?”
She nodded. “I’m very, very hungry.”
Charlie sat up and rubbed his scratchy jaw. “All right. Give me a minute.”
His daughter moved up to lean against his knee. “Did the angel sleep in your bed?”
A vision of his robe tossed to the foot of the bed flashed in his mind, and he forgot to argue the angel tag. “Uh-huh.”
“And you sleep-ded out here in your sweatpants?”
“Sort of.”
“Can we have panacakes?”
“Sure.” He got up and made a trip to the bathroom, looked out the front windows at the falling snow still piling up, then started preparations for breakfast.
Coffee was brewing and he had mixed pancake batter from a box when Starla came out of the bedroom and approached the bar dividing the rooms. Meredith turned from where she sat perched on a stool and smiled at their visitor.
Starla had dressed in her jeans and his sweatshirt—he’d have to get rid of it after she was gone, or he’d forever picture her slim shoulders and the fullness of her breasts beneath the worn cotton. Her feet were bare and her hair was pulled into a loose knot with Meredith’s band. “Good morning.”
“’Morning,” Charlie and Meredith chorused.
Her aquamarine gaze dropped to his chest.
He hadn’t pulled on his T-shirt. “Did you sleep okay?” he asked.
She averted her attention and took the stool beside Meredith. “I did, but I woke with a headache.”
Immediately, he shook out a couple of capsules and placed them on the counter in front of her, then went to grab a T-shirt and pull it on.
Meredith had the refrigerator door open when he returned. She withdrew a colorful pouch and proceeded to strip away the slim straw and pierce the juice box with it. She set the drink before Starla. “You can have one of my Mickey Mouse coolers. It’s juice and it tastes like strawberry.”
“Why, thank you.” Starla picked up the capsules and swallowed them down with a sip through the straw. After tasting the offering, her gaze caught Charlie’s. The drinks were incredibly sweet and appealed to kids. He discreetly set a glass of orange juice within her reach.
The area around the stitched cut on her forehead was bruised, and even the skin beneath her eye looked tinged with purple.
At his perusal, she raised fingers to her temple self-consciously. “I look a fright, don’t I?”
In his opinion, she could still win the Miss Universe Pageant hands down. He poured batter on the hot griddle. “Does it hurt?”
“It’s tender.”
Charlie tended his pancakes and flipped them at the appropriate time. He stuck several slices of frozen bacon into the microwave and set plates on the counter. “Garreth—the doc—said it was a clean cut and he made tiny stitches. You shouldn’t have a scar.”
“Have you heard the weather report?”
For someone who looked the way she did, she seemed unconcerned about the possibility of scarring. Her attention stayed focused on getting her truck on the road. “I just got up a few minutes before you did.”
Starla watched him efficiently prepare the meal. He’d only been up a short while. That explained the bare chest she’d admired upon entering the kitchen. She smiled at his time-saving methods and no-frills breakfast. But thinking bare reminded her of last night’s bathing process and how he’d assisted her to the bathroom and even out of her jeans and later out of the tub.
So far she knew several things about Charlie McGraw: he loved his daughter desperately; he made a good living—this spacious log home was evidence of that—he was adequate in the kitchen; and he was a gentleman.
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