Natasha nodded. “When I woke up, it was so dark. And someone turned off the TV.”
“I turned it off when I went to bed,” Frisco told her.
She lifted her head and gazed up at him. The tip of her nose was pink and her face was streaked and still wet from her tears. “Mommy always sleeps with it on. So she won’t feel lonely.”
Mia was looking at him over the top of Tasha’s red curls. She was holding her tongue, but it was clear that she had something to say.
“Why don’t you make a quick trip to the head?” he said to Tasha.
She nodded and climbed off his lap. “The head is the bathroom on a boat,” she told Mia, wiping her runny nose on her hand. “Before bedtime, me and Frisco pretended we were on a pirate boat. He was the cap’n.”
Mia tried to hide her smile. So that was the cause of the odd sounds she’d heard from Frisco’s apartment at around eight o’clock.
“We also played Russian Princess,” the little girl added.
Frisco actually blushed—his rugged cheekbones were tinged with a delicate shade of pink. “It’s after 0200, Tash. Get moving. And wash your face and blow your nose while you’re in there.”
“Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum,” Mia said to him as the little girl disappeared down the hallway.
The pink tinge didn’t disappear, but Frisco met her gaze steadily. “I’m doomed, aren’t I?” he said, resignation in his voice. “You’re going to tease me about this until the end of time.”
Mia grinned. “I do feel as if I’ve been armed with a powerful weapon,” she admitted, adding, “Your Majesty. Oh, or did you let Natasha take a turn and be the princess?”
“Very funny.”
“What I would give to have been a fly on the wall….”
“She’s five years old,” he tried to explain, running his hand through his disheveled blond hair. “I don’t have a single toy in the house. Or any books besides the ones I’m reading—which are definitely inappropriate. I don’t even have paper and pencils to draw with—”
She’d gone too far with her teasing. “You don’t have to explain. Actually, I think it’s incredibly sweet. It’s just…surprising. You don’t really strike me as the make-believe type.”
Frisco leaned forward.
“Look, Tash is gonna come back out soon. If there’s something you want to tell me without her overhearing, you better say it now.”
Mia was surprised again. He hadn’t struck her as being extremely perceptive. In fact, he always seemed to be a touch self-absorbed and tightly wrapped up in his anger. But he was right. There was something that she wanted to ask him about the little girl.
“I was just wondering,” she said, “if you’ve talked to Natasha about exactly where her mother is right now.”
He shook his head.
“Maybe you should.”
He shifted his position, obviously uncomfortable. “How do you talk about things like addiction and alcoholism to a five-year-old?”
“She probably knows more about it than you’d believe,” Mia said quietly.
“Yeah, I guess she would,” he said.
“It might make her feel a little bit less as if she’s been deserted.”
He looked up at her, meeting her eyes. Even now, in this moment of quiet, serious conversation, when Mia’s eyes met his, there was a powerful burst of heat.
His gaze slipped down to the open neckline of her bathrobe, and she could see him looking at the tiny piece of her nightgown that was exposed. It was white, with a narrow white eyelet ruffle.
He wanted to see the rest of it—she knew that from the hunger in his eyes. Would he be disappointed if he knew that her nightgown was simple and functional? It was plain, not sexy, made from lightweight cotton.
He looked into her eyes again. No, he wouldn’t be disappointed, because if they ever were in a position in which he would see her in her nightgown, she would only be wearing it for all of three seconds before he removed it and it landed in a pile on the floor.
The bathroom door opened, and Frisco finally looked away as their pint-size chaperon came back into the living room.
“I’d better go.” Mia stood up. “I’ll just let myself out.”
“I’m hungry,” the little girl said.
Frisco pulled himself to his feet. “Well, let’s go into the kitchen and see what we can find to eat.” He turned to look back at Mia. “I’m sorry we woke you.”
“It’s all right.” Mia turned toward the door.
“Hey, Tash,” she heard Frisco say as she let herself out through the screen door, “did your mom talk to you at all about where she was going?”
Mia shut the door behind her and went back into her own apartment.
She took off her robe and got into bed, but sleep was elusive. She couldn’t stop thinking about Alan Francisco.
It was funny—the fact that Mia had found out he’d been kind enough to play silly make-believe games with his niece made him blush, yet he’d answered the door dressed only in his underwear with nary a smidgen of embarrassment.
Of course, with a body like his, what was there to be embarrassed about?
Still, the briefs he’d been wearing were brief indeed. The snug-fitting white cotton left very little to the imagination. And Mia had a very vivid imagination.
She opened her eyes, willing that same imagination not to get too carried away. Talk about make-believe games. She could make believe that she honestly wasn’t bothered by the fact that Alan had spent most of his adult life as a professional soldier, and Alan could make believe that he wasn’t weighed down by his physical challenge, that he was psychologically healthy, that he wasn’t battling depression and resorting to alcohol to numb his unhappiness.
Mia rolled over onto her stomach and switched on the lamp on her bedside table. She was wide-awake, so she would read. It was better than lying in the dark dreaming about things that would never happen.
FRISCO COVERED THE sleeping child with a light blanket. The television provided a flickering light and the soft murmur of voices. Tasha hadn’t fallen asleep until he’d turned it on, and he knew better now than to turn it off.
He went into the kitchen and poured himself a few fingers of whiskey and took a swallow, welcoming the burn and the sensation of numbness that followed. Man, he needed that. Talking to Natasha about Sharon’s required visit to the detox center had not been fun. But it had been necessary. Mia had been right.
Tash had had no clue where her mother had gone. She’d thought, in fact, that Sharon
