nephew’s hair and laughed affectionately. “Your teacher doesn’t know you the way we do,” she assured the boy. “You’re more of a man than some guys three times your age.”
From the look on Ricky’s face, her nephew clearly saw no reason to contest that. He beamed at her as though she had just lifted a bad spell he’d been forced to endure for the sake of peace and quiet.
“You hungry, big guy?” Cris asked.
“Uh-huh,” he answered, once again bobbing his head.
“Okay, let’s see what we can find for you to eat,” Cris suggested.
As she slipped her arm around his shoulders, ready to usher him to the inn’s kitchen, Shane McCallister emerged from the section of the inn temporarily curtained off with sheets of plastic. They hung from the ceiling and went all the way to the floor to keep dust spreading to the rest of the inn at a minimum.
Behind the plastic sheets, the latest addition, as well as renovations to a previously constructed section, was taking place. Dust from his recent foray into carpentry had turned sections of Shane’s dark blond hair to a shade of off-white.
Ricky had taken to Shane astoundingly fast. Excited to see him now, the boy broke away from his mother and ran over to the contractor.
“Look at what I drewed, Shane!” he declared proudly, holding up the drawing.
Shane got down on one knee, the hammer that was hanging from his tool belt hitting the tiled floor with a thud. He gave the boy his complete attention.
One arm around the boy’s waist, Shane pulled Ricky to him as he held one edge of the drawing with the other. “You drew this?” he asked with the appropriate amount of wonder in his voice.
Pleased at the reaction he was receiving, Ricky grinned. “Yes, I did.”
“Cool. That’s a really fine family portrait,” Shane said. Releasing Ricky but still holding the drawing with one hand, he pointed with the other hand to what had previously been identified as a bird. “That angel your dad?”
Cris exchanged looks with Stevi, who watched from a distance. The latter shrugged in confusion, as clueless as Cris about how Shane could identify what still appeared to be an oversize bird. Cris couldn’t help wondering if perhaps Shane had somehow overheard the end of the conversation about the drawing. Shane’s startling interpretative ability seemed too much of a coincidence otherwise.
“Yes!” Ricky cried out, glancing over his shoulder at his mother. The glance all but shouted, See?
“You can tell it’s an angel?” Cris asked, gazing at the general contractor pointedly to see if he was pulling her leg.
“Sure,” Shane replied, the complete picture of innocence.
“Why didn’t you think it was a bird?” she asked suspiciously.
He regarded her as if the answer was obvious. “Because it’s a family portrait and Ricky doesn’t have a pet bird.”
Cris laughed as she shook her head. “You’re good,” she told him, impressed. “You make it sound so simple.”
The smile on his handsome, tanned face was utterly and frustratingly enigmatic. “Some things just are. Right, Rick?”
In response to hearing the adult version of his name, Ricky puffed up his small chest and beamed at this newest man in his life.
“Right,” he echoed with confidence. “Mama’s gonna make me lunch. You wanna have some, too?” Ricky asked, slipping his hand into Shane’s as if the man’s affirmative answer was already a foregone conclusion.
“Okay,” Shane readily agreed. He jerked a thumb toward where he’d parked his vehicle. “I was just going to take break and get my lunch out of the truck. Give me a few minutes and I’ll join you, Rick,” he said, pulling his hand out of the boy’s grip.
Cris stared at him. “You’re brown-bagging it?” she asked, incredulously.
Granted the addition and the renovations had been going on for more than a week now, but to be honest, she hadn’t been all that aware where Shane and the men he sometimes had working for him took their meals. She’d assumed he was out in the dining area.
“Yeah,” he answered. “It saves time if I don’t have to drive over to one of those fast-food places. This way, I get done faster and I can spend the rest of the time working on the addition.”
A lot had been going on at the inn of late, what with Alex and Wyatt’s wedding swiftly approaching and Ricky beginning kindergarten, not to mention a mini-convention of historical writers coming to the inn to hold this year’s annual meeting. Consequently, Cris had been exceedingly busy, aware only that Shane had been in and out of the inn several times to take measurements and render estimates after being apprised of what their father and Alex wanted done.
She realized now that he’d only really been on the job a few days.
She had to focus, Cris upbraided herself. Otherwise, she wouldn’t be able to get done all the things done she needed to.
No time like the present, she decided.
“Saves more time if you just tell me what you’d like to eat and I make it for you,” she said with an easy smile.
A smile he found more than captivating.
He always had.
Even so, or perhaps because it was so, he shook his head, brushing off her generous suggestion. “No, that’s okay. You’re busy.”
She raised a perfectly arched eyebrow. “And you’re not?”
He wasn’t clear on what one thing had to do with the other. After all, this wasn’t a competition where the loser would wait on the winner. “Well, yeah, I am, but—”
“No buts,” she informed him. “You’re coming with us to the kitchen.”
“Yeah!” Ricky added his minuscule weight to the argument.
Then, to ensure that Shane would indeed comply with his and his mother’s wishes, Ricky once again slipped his small hand into the contractor’s callused one. Holding on with all his might, Ricky gave Shane’s hand as hard a tug as he could manage.
“Wow.” Shane lunged just enough to make it seem he’d been thrown off balance by the boy. “You sure are strong.” He pretended to eye the boy suspiciously. “You work out?”
Ricky giggled and shook his head, obviously pleased with the evaluation. “No. I’m strong ’cause Mama feeds me good.”
“I bet she does,” Shane agreed, glancing in Cris’s direction, a trace of his admiration showing through. “But just so you get it right the next time, what you should say is Mama feeds me well,” Shane explained, gently correcting the little boy’s grammar.
Her momentary connection with Shane’s intense dark blue eyes instantly quickened Cris’s pulse at the same time that his thoughtful method of correcting her son’s grammar gladdened her heart. She was always partial to people
