him for a moment, trying to see past the almost unsettling planes and angles of his tanned face and the deep-green eyes to the man beneath. “So, where is it that you’re from?”
Dark brows drew together as he regarded her warily. “Here and there. Why?”
“No reason.” She lifted a shoulder, letting it drop carelessly. “I just thought I detected a New York accent, that’s all.” Nothing thick or blatant, just a hint of one when he said certain words.
Tyler slipped his hands into his pockets, looking back to the girls. “No, never been to New York.”
Was it her imagination or had he lowered his voice just then? There were only his daughters and him in the store. Who was he lowering his voice for?
God, just listen to yourself, Brooke. You never used to be this suspicious. When was she ever going to be rid of that annoying touch of paranoia that seemed to almost constantly hound her thoughts?
“Have you? Been to New York?” Tyler added when she looked at him quizzically.
Boy, have I ever. But she made no effort to explain the wry expression she knew had twisted her lips. “Once. For a while.” Just long enough to have my heart broken.
He debated saying anything. He, above all, had come to respect privacy and minding his own business. But there was something in her eyes that prompted him to comment, “I take it that it wasn’t a pleasurable experience.”
Now there was an understatement, she thought. But she kept that to herself. Instead, she said only, “It started out that way, but no, not really.”
He wanted to say, “Me, too,” but that would be admitting he had been in New York, contradicting what he’d just said. He had to keep track of the lies or they would wind up tripping him up.
Lies were like shoots of ivy, their tendrils reaching out, hooking onto things that came in their path. Spreading until you weren’t sure just where they had begun or where they were going.
Turning his back to Brooke, he clapped his hands loudly, gaining his daughters’ attention. “Well, have you girls made a decision yet?”
None of them wanted to leave. “Just a little longer, Daddy,” Bethany pleaded.
“I want these, Daddy.” Coming over to him, Stephany produced a pile she had carefully garnered from the shelves.
Eyes as large as saucers, Tiffany quickly grabbed a handful of books without looking at their titles. Trying to lug her bounty over, Tiffany wound up dropping them on the floor several feet short of her goal. But her spirit wasn’t daunted. “If she gets that many, can I have the same, Daddy?”
Coming over to pick up the scattered spoils, Brooke laughed as she made eye contact with Tiffany. “Ah, eager customers. My favorite.”
She was surprised to have Tyler join her, quickly gathering the remainder of the fallen collection. He was attempting to look at least a little stern. “Girls, we talked about this.”
Closest to his right, Bethany frowned. “We talked about a lot of things, Daddy.”
Brooke knew a brewing storm when she smelled it and hurried to quell the waters.
“You know the best thing about my store, girls?” Rising, she deposited Tiffany’s fallen goods on the small reading table closest to her. She could put the books back in their places later. “It’s not going anywhere.” She looked at the three upturned faces in turn. “Which means that if you each just pick one book, you can come back with your daddy some other time and pick another one. And another after that.” She smiled warmly at them. “That means you have something to look forward to. And I get to look forward to seeing you all again. How about it? Sound like a deal?”
She already recognized Bethany as the serious one. Standing beside her father, Bethany nodded. “Sounds like a deal,” she agreed. “Okay.”
Eager not to be left out, Stephany echoed, “Yeah, okay.”
“Okay.” Tiffany sighed, glancing over her shoulder at the surrendered cache that had momentarily been hers. She began rifling through the pile. “I want this one now and this one later and this one…”
Tyler was tempted to physically separate Tiffany from the books, knowing that of the three of them, she was the one who had a penchant for prolonging things. There was somewhere he had to be within the hour, and he had already lost some time.
But instead of giving in to his feelings, he stepped back. “Make your choices, girls,” he instructed. “Put the rest back and meet me at the register.” Tyler turned from his trio and looked at Brooke. “Very nicely done.”
This time the lowered voice was perfectly plausible. Absorbing the amused praise, she smiled. “I’ve had lots of practice.”
He glanced at her hand. No ring. Still, that didn’t mean as much these days as it used to. Neither did wearing one. He still had his because he felt incomplete without it. As incomplete as he felt without Gina.
“Refereeing your own kids?” he guessed.
Brooke shook her head. It was her greatest regret. Marc had always told her that children would be something they would discuss seriously “later.” For them, later never came.
“No, I don’t have any. But I get lots of customers.” Her gaze swept over the girls, who were still solemnly making their choices. “And I’ve always loved kids. I worked at a preschool when I lived in New York.”
Tyler envisioned an arena of screaming children, all vying for attention at once. That had been his one and only experience with preschool. After that, Gina had taught the girls at home, inviting neighborhood children over to make sure that the girls learned how to interact with kids their own age.
“Was that part of the bad experience?” He realized that had to sound as if he was prying. “Sorry, none of my business.”
The man was far too polite for a New Yorker. That had to be a different accent she detected in his voice.
“No, it’s okay.” She waved away his apology. “I don’t mind answering. To be honest, that was the only part of the experience that was good. All the way through.” She thought of several children who had won her heart and wondered if they still remembered her. “I hated leaving them.”
He heard the qualification in her voice and waited. Finally he asked, “But?”
She deliberately pushed thoughts of Marc and his infidelities out of her mind. Why was she suddenly seized with a desire to unburden herself to a perfect stranger? The man had come looking for storybooks, not true confessions.
Brooke tossed her hair, forcing herself to sound cheerful. “But this is home and I needed to come home. You know how it is.”
“Yes, I do.”
There went her imagination again, reading things into his tone of voice.
But he did sound sad, she thought. Had returning home for him been a bad experience or was it the opposite? Did he long to return home only to know that for one reason or another, he couldn’t?
Not
