Jane's Gift

by Abby Gaines

  “It’s not,” Kyle said.

  She whipped a small mirror from the folder and held it up to him.

  He glared. “Of course I’m frowning right now. You’re accusing me of something that’s not true.”

  “Let’s not use words like accusing,” she said. “Not when we’re off to such a good start. All I’m doing is identifying the need to display a more positive facial expression.”

  He scowled, and she flashed the mirror at him again.

  “Quit doing that,” he ordered. But he replaced the scowl with a neutral expression.

  “Better,” she said. “But not good enough. You need to put a smile on your face and in your voice when you talk to Daisy.”

  “If I frown, it’s not at her,” Kyle said. “I have a lot on my mind.”

  “Kids don’t think about what else you might have to worry about. If you’re scowling at her, she takes it personally. And before you accuse me of not knowing what I’m talking about, I have that direct from a counselor who works with kids.”

  “Let’s not use words like accuse,” he said.

  She snickered, and the moment lightened. “So, you think you can smile more?”

  “No problem,” he said. Straight-faced.

  “Any chance I could see an example?”

  “Now? You want me to smile at you?”

  He made it sound as if she’d asked him to cure cancer.

  “Humor me,” she said.

  For a long moment, he stared at her, as if he could think of a hundred reasons why humoring her shouldn’t be on the agenda. Then he stretched his lips in a caricature of a grin, baring teeth that were white against his tan.

  “Good.” She ignored that he looked more like a wolf wanting to devour Red Riding Hood than a loving dad. The smile would surely come more easily with his daughter than with Jane, the woman who’d exploded the myth of his wife and family. “The next step is to put the smile in your voice.”

  Kyle had already resumed his scowl.

  “Try this exercise,” she said. “Repeat after me, ‘It’s going to rain today.’”

  “It’s going to rain today,” he growled.

  Jane couldn’t help laughing.

  His eyebrows drew together. “What’s the point of this?”

  “Now smile—go on, fake it, the way you did before.” She waited while he curved his lips into that parody again. “Now say it again, while you’re smiling. ‘It’s going to rain today.’”

  “It’s going to rain—” He stopped.

  “You heard it, didn’t you?” Jane said smugly. “Putting a smile in your voice, even a fake one, lightens your tone and makes you sound friendlier.”

  “I’ll bet it looks stupid.” He grabbed the mirror and watched himself as he repeated the sentence. “Yep, I look like a half-wit. I’m more likely to spook Daisy than make her feel loved.”

  “I tried this technique with a client who was about to lose her job because she was too aggressive with customers. It made a big difference for her.”

  He set the mirror down. “It feels dishonest. Fake.”

  “You’re a politician,” Jane said. “Are you telling me you never once faked a smile at those events you attended on Saturday?”

  “I smiled out of courtesy once or twice,” he admitted. “But lately there hasn’t been a lot to laugh about.”

  Jane drank some of her coffee. “Beats me how you got elected in the first place. I always thought charm was supposed to be important in politics.”

  His lips twitched...but didn’t make it any further. “Last election, smiling was easy,” he said. “Four years ago, Lissa and I were still together, Daisy was a cute, smiling toddler and people had woken up to the fact that Wayne Tully might not have Pinyon Ridge’s interests at heart.”

  “Surely you don’t expect to lose to Tully. The guy’s a two-bit has-been. Not to mention an idiot.” She recalled him from when she’d lived here—he must be about ten years older than Kyle, and his claim to fame was a brief stint in the NFL, starting around Jane’s senior year, which he’d never let anyone forget.

  “I like the way you think.” Kyle’s lips twitched a bit further. “But Tully’s the football coach at Pinyon Ridge High now and the team’s currently number one in the district. He also has plenty of inherited wealth that he flashes about town.”

  “So what’ll make people vote for him?”

  “The promise of fast money in a town that’s been hit by the recession like everywhere else,” Kyle said. “I’ve been working on a plan for sustainable development that will allow Pinyon Ridge to grow without losing the best things about it.”

  “There are some best things?” she asked.

  “Absolutely.” Before she could point out that she had no interest, he’d launched into details of a development program that, she had to admit, was well thought out. He was so passionate, she almost got caught up in the picture he painted. Almost.

  “If you explain it like that to people, you should pick up a few votes,” she said in an offhand manner when he finished.

  “The money from my preferred development will come in a few years after Tully’s. Not to mention, Tully is married.”

  Jane snorted. “You think people will hold your divorce against you?”

  “I know they will,” Kyle said. “People don’t trust a divorced mayor.”

  “You just reinforced everything I ever thought about the small-minded folk around here.”

  He rolled his eyes. “There’s a reason why senators and presidential candidates aren’t usually divorced. Small-mindedness—or respect for family values, as some people would call it—is everywhere. People think if a guy can’t get run his family, how can he run a city, or a state or a country?”

  “Is that why you kissed Micki?” she blurted. At his stunned expression, she added, “It may be none of my business—”

  “It’s definitely none of your business.”

  “—but Micki deserves a guy who’s serious about her.”

  “You think I would date someone just to impress the voters?” he asked, incredulous.

  She drained her coffee cup. “Let’s get back to your ability to smile. Which, by the way, is not in evidence at the moment.”

  “You accused me of dating Micki to fool the voters.”

  “Let’s not use words like accuse. It was a query, a preposterous one.”

  “A damn fool one.”

  Unexpectedly, she laughed. His bemused gaze seemed to get hung up on her mouth. Probably because they were talking about smiling.

  “It doesn’t have to be exaggerated,” she said.

  “Huh?”

  “A small smile is enough.”

  “Right.” He contorted his mouth again.

  “Less Big Bad Wolf,” she advised, “and more Happy the Dwarf.”

  He recoiled. “I am not trying to look like a happy dwarf.”

  “I didn’t say—” She sighed. “Never mind. I’ll let you figure it out.”

  There was a pause.

  “What’s next?” he asked.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I believe we’ve only covered the first point on that list of yours.” He nodded at the sheet of paper she’d long since forgotten.

  Jane ran a finger down the page. Don’t get distracted by worries unrelated to Daisy. Don’t overcomplicate simple decisions. Don’t read cell phone messages while talking to Daisy. And so on and so on. Thirteen points in all. An exhaustin
g prospect. The clock on the microwave showed only nine o’clock, but after the drive out from the city, she was ready for bed.

  “Let’s not push our luck,” she said. “I’m still not convinced of your ability to smile.”

  He gave her that forced grin again.

  “Exactly.” She put a hand over her mouth to cover a yawn.

  “Smiling might come more naturally,” he mused, “if I did something fun with Daisy.”

  “That’s a great idea.”

  He looked at her expectantly.

  “What?” she asked.

  “So what should I do with her?”

  Jane tsked. “Anything you like. Anything she likes.” She’d never had to entertain a kid—she didn’t know where to start.

  He raked a hand through his hair. “I just need something that sounds like fun.” Again, that expectant look.

  “I have no idea,” Jane said. “In my family, fun was getting through an evening without Dad hitting anyone.” Yikes, did she really just say that? “Kidding,” she added quickly.

  His carefully bland expression said he didn’t believe her.

  “Surely you have plenty of happy memories to draw on,” she said.

  “We had lots of fun when I was a kid,” he agreed. “But it’s been a while. I guess life got in the way, and now I don’t know where to start.”

  He drummed his fingers on the table as they eyed each other.

  “Loser,” Jane said.

  One side of his mouth quirked. “Right back at ya.”

  She grimaced. “Poor Daisy, having you and me in charge of her fun.”

  “Totally sucks.”

  And then it happened.

  He smiled. Not Big Bad Wolf, not Happy the Dwarf. A warm, unmistakably real smile that turned him from handsome to devastating, hit her in the chest and spread, like one of those bullets that expand on impact.

  It left her reeling.

  No way, I do not reel when Kyle Everson smiles.

  “It’s late,” she muttered. “I’d better go to...” The bed dropped off, suddenly seeming an unsuitable word. Too suggestive. This is nuts—what am I, fifteen?

  She reached for her coffee cup, just as Kyle did the same, presumably planning to clear it away. Instead, his fingers wrapped over hers.

  The unexpected touch startled her. She tried to pull away, but her thumb was through the cup handle, and instead, she got tangled up with Kyle.

  Jane didn’t touch people often, not beyond a handshake. She felt hot, flustered, panicky.

  “Sorry,” she said, breathless, still trying to wrestle the mug out of his grasp.

  “Hang on,” Kyle said. He moved his hand to hold the cup at the top. “Okay, I’ve got it.”

  Jane freed her thumb, then rubbed her tingling fingers down her skirt.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  “Fine.” I have tingles up my arm from a casual touch, but that’s not a problem. “I think I’ll turn in.” Why couldn’t she have thought of turn in a minute ago?

  Calm down, she told herself, as she pushed her chair back from the table, then picked up her folder. So you felt a second’s fleeting attraction to Kyle. Big deal.

  She needed to lift her game. She’d started tonight determined to act like a professional, and ended it blabbing about the misery of her childhood and overreacting to a meaningless touch.

  Tomorrow, she would act like a professional.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “SO WHAT’S THE REAL DEAL about you staying on in Pinyon Ridge? Neither you nor Kyle looked too happy about it Friday night.” Micki set Jane’s coffee in front of her and sat down. She gave a little groan of pleasure at taking the weight off her feet. Only eight-thirty, only Monday, and already she was tired.

  “I realized I wasn’t done yet,” Jane said vaguely.

  Micki rolled her eyes; Jane was queen of the mind-your-own-business evasion. There was no such thing as minding your own business in Pinyon Ridge, which was both a blessing and a curse. “You mean, not done with Daisy? Or not done with Kyle?”

  She’d said it to be provocative, but Jane’s spoon rattled against her cup as she stirred in her sugar. “With Daisy, of course.” She clattered the spoon into the saucer.

  Hmm, interesting.

  “It’s just...Kyle was looking at you oddly all evening.” Micki knew Kyle pretty well, but his face had been unreadable when he looked at Jane. Which he did a lot.

  Jane looked flustered. “We’d argued earlier about whether I should stay. He doesn’t think Daisy needs more help. But I talked him into it.”

  “So there’s nothing going on between you?” Jane deserved to find a nice guy, but maybe Kyle wasn’t the one. Micki glanced at the door. Charles would arrive any moment.

  “It would be strange if there was, given the clinch I caught you two in.” Jane had recovered her usual poise.

  Micki deflected that with a backhanded wave. “That was for old times’ sake.”

  “Right,” Jane said. “It had nothing to do with the fact that you like one of the Everson men. Which I presume is Kyle, given you were kissing him.”

  “Actually, he kissed me,” Micki said.

  “You moaned,” Jane said.

  Micki grinned. “Did it sound convincing?” The kiss had done nothing for her—it had taken all the acting skills that had landed her the part of lead angel in the church Christmas pageant last year, and then some.

  Jane pinched the bridge of her nose, which also happened to be a habit of Kyle’s. Again, interesting.

  “It convinced your audience you’re crazy about Kyle, if that’s what you mean.”

  “I didn’t want to look crazy about him!” Micki checked the door again. “I wanted to look like I’m incredibly hot.”

  Ugh, had she just said that? There was something about Jane that made her easy to confide in. Micki sensed she’d had enough trouble in her own life not to be fazed by other people’s insecurities.

  “Are you saying Kyle isn’t the one you like?”

  Micki made a lip-zipping motion. One more word and she might give herself away completely.

  Jane drummed her fingers on the table. “So you kissed Kyle, hoping Gabe would catch you in the act. How did you guess Gabe would come in at that moment—or were you planning to hang in there all night?”

  Micki laughed. “I think that minute or so stretched Kyle’s patience to the limit. All night was never an option.”

  “Which means you knew Gabe would come inside right then...” Jane frowned. “Kyle was giving me the evil eye over our argument about Daisy—” in Micki’s judgment, it hadn’t exactly been the evil eye “—then Gabe came to talk to him.”

  “No need to rehash,” Micki said quickly, her face heating. “I was right there.”

  “Then Kyle announced he was going inside for more beer,” Jane continued. “And Gabe said...” She paused. “No, Charles said, I’m about to bring these steaks in, can you get the garlic butter.”

  “Do you remember every conversation word for word?” Micki demanded.

  “It’s my job to observe people.” Jane’s forehead wrinkled in puzzlement. “How did you know Gabe would—” She stopped.

  Micki’s cheeks were so hot, she could be standing over a pan of frying bacon during the morning rush.

  Jane gasped. “No way.”

  Uh-oh.

  “You don’t like Gabe, you like Charles.”

  “Are yo
u nuts?” Micki attempted a laugh; it sounded shrill.

  “You have a crush on Charles Everson?” Jane obviously realized she’d spoken too loudly, despite the buzz of breakfast conversation around them, and lowered her voice. “You...and Charles?”

  “Shut up!” Micki hissed, leaning forward. “What are you, some psychic freak of nature?” A horrible thought occurred to her. “Please tell me the entire Everson family didn’t come to the same conclusion on Friday night.”

  “I only just reached it myself,” Jane said. “I don’t imagine that scenario would occur to those guys, not even Gabe, who has some intuition—it’s too far-fetched.”

  “Hey!” Micki said.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean...” Jane stirred her coffee again. “Charles?”

  “Why not? He’s a great guy.” Micki tried to sound casual, but like all her thoughts about Charles, it came out intense. “I love talking to him. He’s honest and caring. I have huge respect for him.”

  “And also the hots,” Jane suggested, looking appalled.

  “Well, yeah,” Micki said helplessly. “He reminds me of Sean Connery. Twenty years ago.”

  “I guess there is a resemblance,” Jane conceded. “A faint one.”

  “He has a sexy voice,” Micki said. “Different from Sean Connery’s, but just as sexy. And he’s kept in shape—he never did that fat cop thing.”

  “He’s lean,” Jane agreed. “But...how old is he?”

  “Fifty-nine,” Micki admitted. “And I’m thirty-seven. Twenty-two years,” she added, before Jane could complete the math. “It’s not unheard of. In fact, it’s more common than you think. I read an article in Cosmo.”

  “Bound to be true,” Jane deadpanned. “So, judging by your bizarre decision to kiss Kyle on Friday—”

  “He kissed me,” Micki inserted automatically.

  “—Charles doesn’t know you’re interested?”

  Micki propped her chin on her hands. “I’ve talked to him over breakfast every weekday morning for four years—he started coming in for more than just a coffee about a year after Patti died. For the past year, it’s been Saturdays, too. We laugh, we debate, we connect in an unbelievable way...but no, I don’t think he’s ever thought of me as more than a friend.” She sighed. “Which is a step up from my being Kyle’s friend, which is how he used to think of me.”