and get it paid off in no time at all.”
“How much money are we talking about?”
“I need fifty thousand dollars to see me through the next two years.”
“You don’t intend to work for two years?” Claire asked, realizing she might have to give the woman bad news before they went any further in the process.
“With the cost of daycare, especially for infants, I’m afraid it wouldn’t do me any good. But as soon as Sara enters kindergarten, the expense should be easier to handle.”
When Erik had been a baby, Claire had wanted to stay home with him, but Ron had gotten caught in the credit card trap, and she’d been forced to return to work immediately after her maternity leave. It had torn her apart to leave her infant son in the care of others when he’d been so tiny. But at the time, even though she’d worked at an entry-level job and the cost of his sitter had taken nearly half her paycheck, there had been no options.
Claire looked at the Rodriguez children, a blue-eyed boy with a head of thick dark hair and a squirmy toddler. Her gaze naturally drifted to the woman’s belly. In a couple of months, maybe less, Maria would have another little one.
“What does your husband do?” Claire asked. Maybe there was a big enough income and it wouldn’t matter that she’d be out of work.
“He’s…we’re…” She cleared her throat. “Separated. Legally.”
“My daddy went to prison,” the boy added. “And for a very long time, but he can send me letters.”
The man was a convicted criminal?
Every day Claire met people wanting loans, couples hoping to refinance the house—to send a child to college, to remodel, or to pay off credit card bills. It was her job to calculate the risks of loaning them money, whether she sympathized with the applicant or not.
And in this particular case, Claire did sympathize. The poor woman had a rough row to hoe—and apparently no one to help. But the newly instituted loan regulations were sure to bind Claire’s hands.
She scanned the application again, looking for something on which to base a decision to preapprove the loan.
Education? Just high school.
Work experience? None to speak of.
A savings account? Just a couple of thousand dollars.
“Actually,” Maria explained, “I’m very frugal. So I’ve considered my living expenses plus the monthly payment in the loan amount I’m requesting. But maybe I can get by with less.”
“I believe you,” Claire said, “but I’m not able to approve your loan.”
“Why?”
“Because you have no income and no significant savings.”
“But I have a house. It’s worth a whole lot more than what I’m asking for. If I didn’t make the payments on time, you could take it from me.”
As tears clouded the woman’s eyes, an awkward sense of guilt settled over Claire. This wasn’t personal. She was only making a decision based upon the bank’s best interests. Didn’t Ms. Rodriguez understand that Claire wasn’t sitting in judgment here, granting loans on a whim? Playing God?
What about yesterday? a small voice quizzed. Isn’t that what you did at the park?
Again, she cleared her throat, hoping to shed the guilt that had settled over her as well as the sense of impotence. “I’m truly sorry, Ms. Rodriguez. We’re in the banking business, but we can’t loan money when the risk to do so is too high.”
“But I’m a hard worker. And honest. You can talk to the priest at my parish, he’ll tell you…”
Again Claire felt the uneasiness, the discomfort. The guilt. “Have you considered selling the house outright and living off the proceeds until after the baby comes and you can go back to work?”
“I don’t want to sell the house,” Maria said. “It’s all I have.”
It wasn’t all she had. She had her children.
Claire would have traded places with her in a snap, if it would have brought Erik back.
Maria slumped back in her chair. “So there’s nothing you can do?”
“I’m afraid not. Fairbrook Savings and Loan has a reputation for being conservative, so you may have better luck at another financial institution in town.” Claire stood, signaling the discussion was over, the judgment made. “Unfortunately, my hands are tied.”
The woman nodded, then touched the boy lightly on the shoulder. “Come along, mijo.”
“Are we done?” the boy asked.
“Yes.”
Maria guided her children out of Claire’s office, her shoulders hunched, yet she held her head high and led her little family to the door.
The boy slipped his hand in his mother’s. “Can we go to the playground now? Please?”
“Yes, mijo. For a little while.”
Claire would have given anything to turn back the clock, to have her son at her side again, asking to go to the park.
Yet that fact didn’t make her feel the least bit better about dashing another woman’s dreams.
Chapter 2
Walter Klinefelter parked his red Ford Ranger at Mulberry Park, then withdrew the worn leather game case and locked the door.
Two spaces down, the old woman and the blond-haired little girl climbed from their white Honda Prelude. They weren’t what he’d call regulars, since they’d just been coming to the park the past couple of weeks, but they showed up about midday. Like he did.
He’d approached them once, trying to make small talk, but the woman snubbed him like he was a dirty old man or something.
Heck, he was harmless. But he supposed they didn’t know that.
“Oh, yay,” the blond pixie said. “He’s here again today.”
“Who, dear?” the granny asked.
“Trevor.” The girl moved the tan-skinned dolly she carried from one arm to the other, then pointed to the child who’d been hanging out at the park a lot this summer, the kid who appeared as though he didn’t have a friend in the world.
In that sense, the boy and Walter had a lot in common.
“I told you before,” Granny said. “That boy is too old to be your friend.”
“He’s not exactly my friend,” the little blonde said. “He just helped me do something yesterday, and I might need him to do it again.”
“He’d
