Jeb joined them, she was swinging Kevin, and the child was smiling. Jeb stood watching and she was grateful for his patience and caution around Kevin. She knew Kevin was shy, and he became even more withdrawn if someone forced attention on him.
Time seemed to stretch into aeons until they went inside. She bathed Kevin and tucked him into bed. When she kissed him good-night, she held him close. He hugged her and then lay on his pillow. “Mama, who is Mr. Stuart?”
“He’s a friend, Kevin,” she answered slowly, wondering how to tell Kevin the truth. He’s your father and he’s come to take you from me ran through her mind while she looked into a pair of dark eyes so much like those of Jeb Stuart.
“I like it better when you don’t have a friend here.”
“You like it when Megan or Peg come over.”
He thought this over and nodded. “I like Megan better than Mr. Stuart.”
Amanda merely nodded and hugged Kevin again and fought tears because she didn’t want to cry in front of him. As though he sensed something amiss, he clung to her. She kissed him again and tucked him in.
“One more story, please.”
She relented and told him another story until his eyes closed and his breathing became deep. Reluctantly, she squared her shoulders, then tiptoed out of Kevin’s room and closed the door behind her.
In the small family room, Jeb Stuart stood with his back to her, staring out a darkened window at the night. She knew he was lost in his thoughts because there was nothing to see outside.
“He’s asleep.”
Jeb turned around and studied her, flicking a swift glance over her that she felt as much as if he had brushed her body with his fingertips.
“Is he always so shy?”
She shrugged and crossed the room to sit down on the sofa, folding her legs beneath her. “He’s shy, but he’s even more shy with you because he’s seldom been around men. He sees me and his nanny, his Sunday school teachers, my friends and, on rare occasions, my aunt, and they’re all women.”
She received another assessing gaze. “You’re pretty,” Jeb said.
“Thank you,” she answered perfunctorily, because she suspected he was going somewhere with his remark, and her wariness increased. Even as her defenses rose, on another level, she was pleased by his assessment.
“You’re too attractive to be single unless there’s a good reason. I know this is a blunt question, but you and I are going to have to do some serious talking. Why haven’t you married and had your own children?”
She raised her chin. It had been a long time now since she had thought about marriage, and having Kevin had taken most of the sting out of the question, because Kevin had helped her lose a lot of her feelings of inadequacy.
“Why haven’t you remarried and had more children?” she shot back at him.
“I had one unhappy marriage, and I’m not ready to marry again. So back to my question—why haven’t you married and had kids of your own?”
Like a lot of other people, she had secrets she didn’t care to share. Jeb Stuart’s question was personal, and she knew she could refuse to answer him or give him one of the two or three casual replies she had given on dates, but she saw no reason now to be anything except totally honest.
“I can’t have children of my own,” she replied, looking him squarely in the eye, feeling an old familiar pain.
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