had just asked the orderly to call her a cab when he poked his head around the door and then followed it with a pair of shoulders wide enough to scrape highways. Joe Dana, she decided, was a man who didn’t like to reveal too much of himself. Yesterday she’d seen his scars. Before that she’d noticed only that he was big, even bigger than she was. And dark. Black hair shot with gray. Dark eyes that reminded her of the tinted glass some people had in their cars. From the inside you could see out, but those on the outside didn’t stand a chance of seeing in.
Even as distracted as she’d been then, and as tired as he’d obviously been, she’d felt his intensity. It was almost audible. Like humming power lines.
“Good morning,” she greeted, a self-conscious smile trembling at the corners of her lips. “We never got around to finishing our conversation, did we?”
“You’re fixing to go somewhere?”
“Home. I’m already cleared for takeoff, as they say in all the airplane movies. I’ve never flown. One of these days I’m going to, though.”
She beamed at him. He looked baffled, as if he didn’t know what she was talking about, which was understandable. She always talked too much when she was nervous. “I just sent someone to call me a cab. The hospital’s lending me a car seat for the baby until I can get one of my own. Isn’t that nice of them?”
“No need to call a cab. my truck’s right outside.”
“Oh, but I can’t—”
“Sure you can. I’ve got a vested interest in little Miss Fatcheeks, remember? The least I can do is see her home.”
“Well, if you’re sure you don’t mind. And then you can ask me whatever it was you wanted to ask me.”
“Yeah, sure,” he said, and saying something about pulling his truck up to the front entrance, he left.
For one crazy moment Sophie started to call him back. Didn’t want him to leave her. She told herself it was only postpartum silliness, and that it would pass. She was already forgetting the birth pangs, just as the nurse said she would. In a few days she’d be back at her computer, juggling nursing, diaper changing and writing ad copy for the agency that currently helped pay the bills while she mailed out résumés and tried not to get her hopes too high.
All the same, she wondered just who he was, and why he was still hanging around.
Miss Fatcheeks, indeed! Her name was Iris Rebecca Bayard.
Three
“It was the yard that convinced me. That big old oak tree will be just perfect for a swing. And you saw my garden. In a year or so I’m fixing to fence in the other side to make a play yard. I might even get a few laying hens. Out here in the country, you can keep chickens, you know. It’ll be a wonderful place for Iris to grow up.” Sophie only hoped she sounded as confident as her words implied as they turned off the highway.
Joe had hardly spoken a word since they’d left the hospital, but then she’d already discovered that he wasn’t much of a talker. She’d chattered all the way home because it was what she did when she was nervous, but she was beginning to run out of things to talk about. The truth was, she was feeling less confident with every mile. What on earth had she been thinking of, moving way out here in the country? The closest neighbor was nearly a mile away, and not even particularly friendly. She’d made the mistake of paying a call soon after she’d moved in, and it had been plain from the first that she’d interrupted the grumpy old man in the middle of his morning nap, or something equally important. The first words out of his mouth were that if she was selling something, he wasn’t buying. If she was collecting, he wasn’t giving anything, either, because he was living on social security and there was dagnabbed little of it.
If her house were to catch on fire, she’d thought at the time, and he happened to see the smoke, he might stir himself to call the fire department. But what if she just needed someone to talk to? What if she needed advice? Looking after a house and a brand-new baby took a certain amount of experience, and she was beginning to think she might’ve bitten off more than she could chew. Not that she’d had much choice. Once the first domino had fallen, the rest had come tumbling down before she even realized what was happening.
When it came to soaking up guilt, however, Sophie had plenty of experience, dating back to a time when she’d been too young to understand what it meant and had overheard someone say that it was because of her that her father had run off. Since then, she’d collected guilt the way a magnet collects steel filings.
Flies in the house? Her fault. She must’ve left the window open.
The cake fell? Oops, she must’ve slammed a door.
Rained all over the Sunday school picnic?
Well. She wasn’t quite that powerful. All the same, if she’d prayed a little harder, it might not have rained.
Now Joe was frowning, and that was probably her fault, too. She’d allowed him to drive her home when she could easily have called a cab. It would have cost a fortune, but any day now she’d be hearing from the ad she’d put in the paper. Last time, she’d taken the whole set to an antique dealer to have it appraised, and he’d offered her five thousand dollars for the lot. Thank goodness she’d had sense enough not to be taken in. He’d ended up paying her twice that for one eensy-weensy piece that looked like something you could buy at Walmart. She’d been patting herself on the back ever since.
She’d also learned a lesson. The stuff might be tacky, but it was valuable. And it was hers. Rafe had given it to her, and dead or not, he owed her something for all the things he’d stolen. Not to mention child support.
She slanted a glance at the man beside her. He looked as if he had something on his mind.
Well, of course he did. He’d told her that yesterday, when he’d strolled into her garden and gotten trapped into playing Good Samaritan. He might be frowning now—he might try to act tough, but she knew better. Underneath it all he was a kind, decent man. The kind of man a woman trusted instinctively. The kind with a good heart.
And she was even getting used to his face. It was interesting, with all the sharp edges and angles. It was certainly masculine. And strong. And at the moment, scowling.
“You wanted to ask me something?” Heaven help her if it was about her taxes. She’d always done them herself and never had a smidge of trouble, but along about April 15 of this year she’d been in no frame of mind to concentrate on filling out forms.
At least not government forms. Her own had filled out so fast it had boggled the mind.
“It’ll keep,” he muttered.
“Are you headed back to Texas?”
“What makes you think I’d be going to Texas?”
“You have Texas plates. And you mentioned staying at a hotel, so I didn’t think you were from around here.”
“Right.”
Right, which? That he was from Texas, or that he’d be going back? She didn’t want him to go. And if that wasn’t scary, she didn’t know what was. Any woman who’d been stupid enough to believe that a handsome, charming scamp like Rafe Davis could take one look at her and fall head over heels
