in his arms as she stared up at him with an expression he couldn’t decipher.
“I’m…uh…I’m so sorry,” she said, stepping back, giving him no choice but to let her go.
“Not your fault I came barreling in here and knocked you for a loop. I was in a hurry to pick up the girls. I thought we’d go for a hike before the light fails.”
“Oh. But I really need to talk to you.”
The disappointment in Justine’s face gave him a shot of pleasure. “So come with us.” The words had just popped out of his mouth. Too late, he noticed her outfit. She wasn’t really dressed for a hike. She had on a long top and slacks made of a velvety soft material that was pretty but casual.
“I…no, you don’t understand. I need to talk about Leslie.”
Confusion assailed him along with a sense of disappointment that she only wanted to talk to him about his daughter. “Leslie? Is she not settling in? She said this was working out okay.”
“As far as I know it is. She’s been getting on just fine. It isn’t that she’s any trouble.” Justine paused. “It’s something else. Have you noticed her losing weight lately? A lot of weight?”
Matt frowned. What was she getting at? “Les is getting taller, that’s all. Her clothes still fit, so she couldn’t have lost weight. You wouldn’t know this because you don’t have kids, but every once in a while they shoot up and look thinner. I guess they don’t grow everything at once. At her age, I grew six inches in one summer and didn’t gain an ounce. I could hardly keep my pants up.”
Justine didn’t crack a smile. He watched as she took a deep breath. “Matt, I’ve found her lunch in the trash four days in a row. Earlier today when I asked her why, she said she doesn’t like what you pack but doesn’t want to hurt your feelings.”
Leslie normally packed all of the lunches, but he wasn’t about to tell Justine that. She seemed to be implying he wasn’t taking good care of his kids. Or that they were afraid to speak their minds.
Brother. He was batting a thousand lately. First Mary and Seth, two people he’d thought of as parents since marrying their daughter, had begun doubting his ability to raise the girls without their mother and criticizing his every decision. And now the first person he’d been attracted to since Diane’s death was calling him an incompetent parent.
“Leslie can say anything to me she wants,” he growled. “And she knows it. If she’d said she wanted something else for lunch, I’d have seen she had it.”
“I have no doubt of that. I don’t think she wants something else for lunch. In fact, Gina told me it’s Leslie who makes the lunches.”
“I don’t appreciate your questioning my children, Reverend.”
Justine stiffened. It was as if he saw a barrier form around her.
“I didn’t question Gina, Chief Trent. She offered the information in one of her sweet, running advertisements for a mother. I came to you with a concern for your child. Not to inspire an attack on my motives. I’m terribly afraid Leslie may have an eating disorder.”
Matt shook his head. There was nothing wrong with his Leslie. She was losing her baby fat. And she’d gotten taller. Hadn’t he said that already?
Justine stepped forward and put her hand on his forearm. He could see her concern for Leslie in her eyes and hear it in her voice.
“I’m not criticizing. A blind man could see how much you love those girls. But you can’t afford to be blind to their faults and problems. Matt, please don’t discount what I’m saying. Watch her. Carefully. If I’m right, and I pray I’m not, this can be very dangerous. Anorexia is insidious and it’s a silent killer.”
“Leslie’s fine,” he insisted.
Before Justine could once again rebut his assertion, the clamor of little feet sounded down the hall from the classroom wing.
Minutes later he had both the little ones with him and watched Leslie strolling along the hall and down the steps. All at once she looked so alone to him. Maybe watching her closely wouldn’t be such a bad idea. After all, the girls were in this program because he’d been worried about Les.
As they started to put dinner together, Matt made it a point to notice if Leslie really did pick at what they were making for dinner. He felt guilty and almost sneaky. As if he were spying on her.
“Don’t you like dinner, Les?” he felt compelled to ask when he noticed how little of her meal she was actually eating. They all sat around the big maple table Diane had so lovingly restored. As far as Diane had been concerned, family meals were the center of the universe.
“Dinner’s fine, Daddy. But ham is a little fattening. I just don’t want to be fat. That’s all.”
That was the first he’d heard that she was worried about her weight. Maybe there was something here he needed to address. And maybe she had lost a little weight along with the inches she’d gained. On the walk, he had noticed Les just sort of floated along with a growing grace that made his heart ache and made him aware that his little girl was headed inexorably toward womanhood.
“Are you on a diet, princess?” he asked casually.
She shrugged. “Not really. I just like my clothes to fit loose. You know. Grandma’s no lightweight, either. When I get older, if I already eat right, I won’t have to worry that I’ll look like her. And I can look like the models in Pizzazz and Mystique.”
Matt sighed. America—a plastic surgeon’s paradise! Where men were supposed to be over-muscled and women were starting to look the same except for their out-of-proportion breasts.
“You know all those women don’t really look like that naturally, don’t you? Some have surgery and most of their photos are retouched.”
That got Leslie’s attention. Her head snapped up. “You think so?”
“Oh. Yeah. I saw it on a TV show about special effects. A graphic artist trims thighs, arms, hips, whatever the photographer wants slimmed down with the computer. It’s all smoke and mirrors. Your mother never dieted. She just ate healthy and let the good Lord take care of how she looked. And she looked wonderful. You will, too.”
Leslie tilted her head and frowned, clearly thinking about what he’d said. “You thought Mom was pretty?”
He could think of Diane now and remember her before the cancer. He smiled and knew it had a wistful quality. But that was okay. He’d never hidden his grief from the kids. They knew he missed their mom as much as they did. “She was perfect. Didn’t you think so?”
Her eyes shone and she nodded. “She was. Wasn’t she? Thanks, Daddy,” she told him with a sweet broad smile.
Matt gave a sigh of relief. Leslie was going to be fine. Justine had just panicked. Now all he had to do was apologize to the pretty minister for putting her in the crosshairs of his insecurities over single parenthood. He couldn’t believe how he’d spoken to her. And all because she cared about his daughter.
Chapter Four
Justine
