From Father to Son

Those soft-as-a-pansy brown eyes met his. “Do you intend to stay?”

He hesitated. “I’m not a hundred percent sure.” How did he say, It depends how noisy and intrusive your kids are? “Do you have a husband in the picture?” He hadn’t seen one, but could have missed him.

Her face tightened. “I’m a widow.”

He said the polite thing. “I’m sorry.”

She shrugged.

“Well,” he said. “I was depositing the rent directly into Enid’s account. Let me know how you want me to handle it now.”

“All right.”

The boy crawled back out from beneath the rhodies, followed by the dog. The boy had acquired a few scratches and quite a bit of dirt. The dog—well, his coarse, rusty coat probably never looked clean. Spotting Niall, the dog tore across the lawn, the boy following at a trot. Niall braced himself for possible impact.

“Sit!”

The dog sat.

“How do you do that?” Rowan asked, eyes wide with astonishment. “Super Sam and I went through an obedience course, and it didn’t do a speck of good.”

“I mean it, and he can tell.”

She glowered at the dog, who was obviously desperate to leap up. His tail was swinging furiously, his butt waggling with it, and his big brown eyes, a deeper brown than his mistress’s, were fixed on Niall’s face.

With resignation, Niall said, “Okay, boy,” and submitted to a fervent greeting. The boy hung back shyly, but looked as if he, too, would have liked to bound at Niall.

“I have a goldfish.”

He looked down to see the girl had abandoned her sandbox to come stand beside him. Her head was tilted back to allow her to stare up at him.

He cleared his throat. “Do you?”

“Uh-huh. You wanna see?”

No. Hell, no! He was going to be so sorry if he let these kids think he wanted to be buddies. He shot a helpless look at Rowan, who was smiling softly at her daughter, apparently oblivious to his discomfiture.

“Uh…I’ve seen goldfish.”

“My goldfish is named Goldie. ’Cuz he’s gold.”

“Goldfish are really orange,” Desmond said importantly. “You should have named him Orangie.” He cackled at his humor.

His sister ignored him. “I won Goldie.”

“At the school carnival,” the boy said. “She threw a quarter into a jar.” His tone suggested it had been an accident. “She picked Goldie, ’stead of one of the stuffed animals.” His gaze slid to Rowan. “Mom wasn’t very happy. She tried to talk Anna into trading Goldie in for a panda bear, but she wouldn’t.”

“Goldie’s alive,” Anna informed him.

Niall’s sense of humor was apparently alive and well, too, in defiance of his recent crappy mood. He was trying to hide his smile when he met Rowan’s, rueful but beautiful.

A small hand crept into his and tugged. Niall started.

“Come see Goldie.”

“Anna…” her mother began, but he shook his head.

“It’s okay.”

Desmond stuck close as they went in the house. Super Sam let out a pitiful whine when the screen door slammed shut in his face. As he allowed himself to be pulled through the house and upstairs, Niall heard Rowan talking to the dog.

The family was far from unpacked, but Anna’s bed was covered by a pink-and-purple comforter imprinted with unicorns and princesses and a castle. Her white-painted dresser had pink ceramic drawer pulls. Goldie lived in a glass bowl atop the dresser. A very small castle sat on the bottom of the bowl, and a couple of strands of fake seagrass waved in the water as he swam hopeless circles around the perimeter.

Niall learned that Goldie liked being talked to. Desmond fed the fish a few flakes; Mom wouldn’t let Anna feed the fish, he said, because she dumped in too much food, which wasn’t good for him.

“I get to feed Sam, too. He’s my dog.”

Anna’s lower lip shot out. “Is not!”

“Is, too.”

“Is not! He’s our dog. Mommy said so.”

“Well, I take care of him.”

She wanted to argue about that, but evidently couldn’t. She contented herself with a scowl, unnatural on her small, elfin face.

Niall took a look at Desmond’s room, too, where a spaceship was under construction with Lego bricks. Plastic as well as stuffed dinosaurs seemed to be the dominant theme. He resisted their invitation to look at Mommy’s bedroom, too. That was a picture he’d just as soon not have in his head.

Rowan studied him narrowly when the three of them came back outside.

“You’ve made some changes,” he observed.

“I plan to make more. Gran hadn’t painted or remodeled in forever.”

Probably never, was his guess.

“We’re keeping most of her furniture for now, though. I didn’t keep most of ours when…” She didn’t have to finish.

He nodded.

“We lived with our grandparents,” Desmond said.

Niall turned his head to look at the boy. There had been something in his voice. Reserve. For a kid as outgoing as him, that was unusual. Rowan was watching her son, too, a few lines marring her forehead, but she didn’t say anything. It seemed there was a good reason for her hasty move to Enid’s house.

“Desmond having to change schools?” he asked casually.

Rowan shook her head. “My in-laws live only about a mile away. Walking distance, really.”

She didn’t sound altogether happy about that. Given his job, Niall was used to listening for undertones, and there were plenty here. But they weren’t his problem, he reminded himself. In no way, shape or form.

“I need to be going. Grocery shopping,” he decided, impromptu. He hesitated, his inner jerk doing battle with nice-guy Niall, who won the tussle. He said reluctantly, “If you need me to pick anything up for you…”

She beamed at him. “That’s really nice of you. But not today, thanks.”

Oh, this was going to come back to bite him in the ass. They all thought he wanted to be friends now. And he so didn’t.

He did like that smile, though. It had something in common with the bright, cheerful flowers she was planting. It was a happy smile.

The realization that she hadn’t looked happy the rest of the time gave him momentary pause. There were as many shadows in her eyes as he saw in his own every morning when he shaved in front of the mirror. He wondered when her husband had died and how. Why she’d moved in with the husband’s parents instead of staying in whatever home she’d already had. Why she’d fled the in-laws’ the instant the opportunity offered itself.

He was frowning when he let himself out the gate, rolled his motorcycle out of the detached garage and donned his helmet.

Not your business. You don’t want to know.

No. He’d have to raise avoiding them to an art form, for his own self-preservation. He didn’t get involved. Not with anybody, far less a sweet-faced young widow and her children.

It was a shame about the children, though, and the sweet face, given how sinfully sexy her petite body was. Shaking his head with regret, he kicked the Harley’s engine to throaty life and steered out of the driveway.

THREE DAYS LATER, Rowan suddenly realized how quiet the house was. She stuck her head out of the kitchen. “Desmond?”

No answer.

She followed the sound of the television to the living room, where a Disney movie played. Anna lay curled up on the sofa, sound asleep.

Rowan smiled down at her. Anna had decided recently that she was too big a girl to nap, but long habits could be hard to break. She looked comfortable enough, so Rowan decided to leave her where she was rather than carry her up to bed.

Had Desmond gotten bored with the movie and gone upstairs to play? She went up and found his bedroom deserted. Ditto Anna’s and her own.

Her heart sank. He must have gone outside without her noticing. She trusted him not to leave the yard, but she didn’t trust him not to have gone knocking on her tenant’s door.

Please don’t let Niall have been home.

Desmond had become infatuated with the brooding police detective. She couldn’t figure it out. Niall wasn’t anything like Drew, who she knew Desmond missed dreadfully. She had hoped his grandfather would fill some of the void, but… No, she didn’t want to think about that right now. She had to find her son.

The moment she opened the back door, she saw him. Niall had come out on his porch and was listening, head bent and arms crossed, as Desmond expostulated on some enthusiasm or other. He was bouncing on his toes in his excitement.

With a sigh, Rowan started across the yard. Niall saw her coming. His face was mostly expressionless, but she thought there might be a plea in his eyes.

“Desmond,” she said, “what have I told you about bothering Detective MacLachlan? You cannot come over here every time you get bored.”

“I’m not bothering him, Mom. Am I, Niall? He says I can call him Niall,” he said as an aside to his mother, to forestall her reproof. “’Cuz we’re friends, huh?”

Like ghosts, several emotions passed through her tenant’s gray eyes, “I did tell him to call me by my first name. ‘Detective’ is for work.”

“He never had a dog.” Desmond sounded astonished at the concept. “Not even when he was my age. He said his mom didn’t like dogs. I’m real glad you like dogs, Mom. ’Cuz then we wouldn’t have Sam.”

Thumping drew their attention. Sam might not be the brightest bulb, but he did know his name. She hadn’t noticed him lying on the porch, although she should have; his head was all but resting on Niall’s foot.

His bare foot.

He seemed often to go barefoot, she’d noticed in the slightly less than a week they had lived here. He had quite sexy feet, an observation which had taken her by surprise. Rowan did her very best not to notice men as sexual beings. And feet weren’t supposed to be sexy anyway, were they? She didn’t even know why the word had crossed her mind. His feet were long and bony, with a few copper-colored hairs curling on his toes. Even so, at the sight of them close up, she felt a funny, warm, melting sensation low in her belly.

Of course, if she concentrated on his hands, long-fingered but strong, she had something of the same sensation. And he was very well built, she could see that; broad-shouldered, lean, powerful in a streamlined way. His hair was a beautiful color, a deep, rich auburn that in sunlight revealed itself to be composed of strands of a dozen colors. She wouldn’t have thought of him as a redhead at all, except that his jaw stubble was copper colored like the hairs on his forearms and toes. It made her wonder if he had much chest hair and whether it, too, was as bright....

Sternly, she slapped down any such speculation. She didn’t actually want to see his chest, or to touch it. Definitely not to touch it.

In her marriage, Rowan had learned to dread the sexual act. She had no reason to think it would be different with any other man. No, she wasn’t going there again, however much Desmond wanted a father. And she had to figure out how to keep him from bugging Niall, or she suspected she was going to lose her tenant. She hated the idea of having to find someone new. Niall might not be the friendliest man on earth, but he was safe. Plus, according to Gran he didn’t hold parties—in fact, almost never had a visitor at all—was neat, occasionally helpful and quiet. Although how Gran knew about the quiet part was a mystery. Niall could have howled at the moon without Gran hearing.

Keeping a renter in the cottage was a financial necessity for Rowan, and she hated to imagine the possibilities if Niall left.

“Are you going back to work soon?” she asked, trying to keep the hopeful note from her voice. His ironic look told her she hadn’t succeeded.

“Probably next week. You should know I don’t always work regular shifts. Don’t worry if you hear me coming and going at strange hours.” When she nodded, he asked, “Do you work?”

“I’m a para-ed at the elementary school. A teacher’s aide,” she translated. “It lets me work the same hours as Des is in school. Before, her grandparents took care of Anna, but this year she’s going to a preschool instead.”

“Grandma is mad about that,” Desmond said.

Rowan laid a hand on his head. “Disappointed, not mad.”

“She sounded mad.”

“Okay, upset.”

Niall, she couldn’t help noticing, was listening to the conversation closely. In their few interactions, she’d become aware of how much he took in while not, if he could help it, participating. She wondered what he thought about them.

Then she almost laughed. He thought they were a huge nuisance, that’s what he thought.

“Please,” she said, “let me know if any of us are bugging you. I mean it.”

Eyes widening, Desmond looked up at her, then at Niall.

“I’ll do that,” he said with what she thought was a sigh, although she sensed more than heard it.

“But I haven’t bugged him yet, have I, Detec— I mean, Niall? I’ve been real polite, haven’t I?”

Niall was apparently not immune to the plea in her son’s eyes.“You have been polite. Which—” his gaze fell to Sam, whose tail thumped “—I can’t say for your dog.”

Desmond cackled. “Dogs aren’t polite. ’Cuz they don’t know they’re supposed to be!”

“Is that so?”

“What has Sam done?” Rowan asked, apprehensive.

“Given half a chance, he shoots in the door and gallops through my place as if it’s a rodeo arena. I’ve fallen over him twice when I stepped out on the porch. He’s been gnawing on my Adirondack chair.” He nodded toward the bright blue chair, where the dog’s teeth marks whittled into the wood. “He stares in the window.”

The smudges along the lower panes of the front window were, evidently, nose prints. Rowan winced.

“He seems to be trying to dig a tunnel under the cottage. Take a look around the corner,” he suggested. “He has something else in common with convict escapees. The middle of the night is his favorite time to work on his project.” He paused. “The tunnel happens to be right underneath my bedroom window. Oh, and I ate out here one night and was stupid enough to set my sandwich down while I reached for my beer.”

He didn’t have to finish.

“I’m so sorry! I…” Her shoulders sagged. “Well, I don’t know what to do about Sam. Maybe I could tie him up some of the time. And…and keep him in at night. Only, if I do that, he…”

He lifted one eyebrow in a masterpiece of sardonic inquiry.

“He chews things up,” she admitted. “Mostly the kids’ toys. It’s hard to get them to put everything away.”

“And if he couldn’t find a toy, he’d start in on the furniture.” He leveled a significant glance at his porch chair.

“Possibly. Still.”

His sudden grin took her breath away. “Don’t worry about it. I can afford to replace the chair if he gets all the way through the leg. And it’s better to have him digging by the foundation than under the fence.”

“Yes, but sooner or later he’ll happen to dig beside the fence,” she muttered.

If anything, his grin widened. “Happen? Implying your dog is stupid, by any chance?”

“He’s not!” Desmond declared, indignant.

Rowan finally had to laugh. “I can’t blame it on overbreeding.”

“No, you definitely can’t do that. He must have a dozen breeds in him. His legs sure as—” his gaze briefly settled on her son “—heck don’t come from the same ancestor as his body does, and then there’s the head, and the ears, and…”

“Mommy, you said he was cute. Why are you laughing?”

“He is cute. In a, well, sort of ugly way.” She bent to hug her six-year-old. “Looks don’t matter anyway. It’s his heart that really counts.”

So why, she asked herself, was she so drawn to this man’s looks? She had no idea what his heart held. Except he had been kind to the kids, after that first meeting. He did avoid them, but when either of them cornered him, he was nice. And that said something about his character, his heart, didn’t it?

Probably, but it really didn’t matter. This was as friendly as they were going to get.

“Excuse us,” she said to Niall. “I don’t want Anna to wake from her nap and find us missing.” She firmly quelled Desmond’s protest and marched him back to the house, feeling Niall MacLachlan’s thoughtful gaze all the way.

“I HAVE TO REEXAMINE my whole life,” Rowan’s mother told her. “Did your father ever love me? I think back to conversations and get this jolt. Maybe he wasn’t thinking and feeling anything like I believed he was. That vacation we’d planned where he suddenly had to stay behind and work. Remember? We went to Ocean Shores? Was it a woman? Were there other women all along? He completely refuses to talk to me. ‘Think whatever you want,’ he says, as if that’s any answer!”

Rowan knew she was supposed to offer sympathy and understanding. Sitting on her back porch with the phone to her ear instead of mowing the lawn the way she’d intended, she was feeling low on sympathy and even lower on understanding. If only Mom didn’t call every day or two, reiterating the same miseries.

Mom and Dad’s separation had come as a huge shock to Rowan. Even worse was the way they both used her to bad-mouth the other one.

Dad had started to date from practically the moment Mom moved out, and that was the part that was infuriating her. Hurting her, too, probably, Rowan realized, but the whole subject had become an obsession.

Her best tactic would be to start dating, too. Dad might not want to be married to her anymore, but his pride would be stung by the sight of her seemingly enjoying herself with a succession of men. Rowan would have suggested it—her mother was an attractive woman who’d kept her figure at fifty-two—except Rowan could totally understand Mom never wanting anything to do with a man again. A desire she frequently proclaimed, and one Rowan shared.

“Mom, I really have to go,” she said.

As if she hadn’t spoken, her mother went on and on. Her father was making himself look ridiculous, dating women half his age—which Rowan thought was a slight exaggeration. Dad’s latest was maybe mid-thirties, bad enough. “Why don’t you talk to him?” Mom suggested. “He might listen to you.”

A car was pulling into the driveway, and Rowan’s heart sank when she recognized it. Glenn and Donna Staley, her parents-in-law, had come calling.

“I don’t care who Dad dates,” she told her mother, perhaps more brutally than she should have. “I don’t want to meet them, I don’t want to hear about them and, honestly, Mom, what difference does it make who he dates? You’re getting a divorce.”

“You blame me for feeling hurt by his foolishness?”

Rowan sighed. “No. Of course not, Mom. But I’d love to see you focus on yourself now. On finding what makes you happy.” As long as it was something besides calling her daughter to bitch about Dad. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I have to go. Glenn and Donna are here.”

“Oh? You didn’t mention that you were expecting them.”

“That’s because I wasn’t,” she said, possibly a little tersely. Not that she necessarily would have told her mother they were coming, but she wasn’t thrilled to see them.

She ended the call to her mother as the couple reached the bottom of the porch steps.

“I don’t see the children,” Donna said, her disappointment obvious.

“Anna is napping, and Desmond is playing with a neighbor boy at his house.” Rowan had been pleased to find another boy exactly Desmond’s age who lived less than a block away, and delighted when the boy’s mother suggested they plan a few playdates.

Glenn frowned. “Do you know these people?”

“You left Anna alone in the house?” exclaimed Donna. “Dear, is that a good idea?”

Rowan dug deep for patience. Donna loved the kids, but worry also made her judgmental. “The back door is open. I’ll hear her the minute she wakes up. And since she can’t reach the lock on the front door, she can’t get out even if she’d do something like that, which she wouldn’t. And yes, I went with Des the first time to Zeke’s house and had coffee with his mother. She’s very nice, a stay-at-home mom.”

“You know we’d have happily taken him today if you wanted to have time on your own,” her mother-in-law said.

Did she sound disapproving? She often did, but Rowan wasn’t sure this time. She knew they weren’t happy. Of course they were sorry to miss seeing Desmond. They hadn’t wanted Rowan and their grandchildren to move out of their home, and even though she had needed to escape, Rowan understood how they felt. They’d grieved terribly after Drew’s death, and having Anna and Des close had been a huge consolation for them.

Rowan was proud of her smile. “I wasn’t looking for time on my own. Desmond needs friends his age. A new one is welcome.” She picked up the phone and stood. “Would you like a glass of lemonade? Why don’t we sit out here so we don’t wake Anna.”

“I thought you told me she’d given up her naps,” Donna said. “Are you sure you want her to sleep? Won’t she fight bedtime tonight?”

“Some days she doesn’t nap, but she’s still in transition. I figure if she falls asleep on her own, she needs the rest.” Rowan kept the smile fixed on her face. “Lemonade?”

“I suppose.” Glenn snorted. He was eyeing the broken run-off pipe for the roof gutters. “Your grandmother didn’t keep this place up, did she?”

Couldn’t he pretend to be a little excited for her? Rowan didn’t let herself sigh. No; Glenn took pride in being blunt. He’d made no secret of his opinion of her moving out on her own with two young children when she had the option of being taken care of.

They’d both become more critical since Drew died. Rowan had been reasonably sure they never quite approved of her. The first thing Donna had ever said to her was, “What kind of name is Rowan?”

Drew had insisted that Rowan was being too sensitive when she told him she didn’t think his parents liked her. “That’s just Mom and Dad,” he said, sounding resigned.

Rowan had clung to the fact that they did adore their grandchildren. And they had been generous in taking her and the kids in after Rowan realized she would have to sell the house to cover the debts Drew had left. They’d refused her offer to pay rent and rarely even let her buy groceries, which had allowed her to put some money away. How could she not be grateful, even if some days they’d made it hard? If only they’d respected her right to parent her own children the way she thought best, she wouldn’t have felt so desperate to get away from them. Even so, Rowan had been ashamed of the fervor with which she’d seized the chance to move out.

Perhaps, she thought now, if she’d involved Donna in the redecorating plans that would have appeased her.

But rebellion immediately sparked in her. Was it so bad to want to make the house totally hers and Anna’s and Desmond’s?

Was it so bad to wish she could she could restrict their contact with the kids to an occasional outing and too many packages under the tree on Christmas morning?

Rowan didn’t know whether to hope that Anna would sleep for a long time and they would give up and go away, or that she’d wake up and give them a grandchild fix. She had a gift for softening them both. Rowan worried more about Des, who they seemed determined to correct and mold, chide and stifle. More than Anna, he was slated as the replacement for their son. In the last year, he’d gone from being happy to see Grandma and Grandpa to shutting down and getting quiet in their presence. It infuriated her that her confident, bright, happy kid had to feel that way. Even if she’d loved living with Donna and Glenn, she’d have moved out at the first opportunity for Desmond’s sake.

“Why don’t I come in and help pour that lemonade?” Donna said. “And I can take a peek to see what you’ve done to the house. I’ll be quiet, but you know dear Anna wouldn’t want to miss our visit!”

How could she say no, even though her mother-in-law didn’t know how to keep her voice low? Even though it meant hearing again that Donna didn’t understand how Rowan could possibly want to live in a place that was so dark and dingy. Why, it wasn’t fair to the children, when they’d had such a nice room at Grandma and Grandpa’s.