He nodded, opened his book and dug right in. Clunky and uneven, he banged out the simple notes, but Desi could tell he’d put a lot of effort into his playing. Even to the point of grunting and muttering “uh-oh” or “dang it, I keep messing up.”
She loved looking down at his silky white-blond hair and thought for a boy he smelled pretty good, too. Gerda had been right—Steven showed potential, but he just needed to be nudged. She patiently worked with him, curving his fingers just so, straightening his wrists and gently prodding his spine so he’d sit straighter. When he repeated his slouched posture over and over again, Desi realized he must have liked the way it felt when she walked her fingertips up his spine to get him to sit straight.
“That tickles,” he said after the third reminder, smiling up at her, and her strict teacher persona melted around the edges.
When she explained some of the tricky parts of the song and showed him how to play it, she noticed his head had come to rest on her upper arm. The sweetie liked this attention. Maybe she could use that to make a piano player out of him.
“Would you like to learn a different kind of song?”
“Yeah, this one seems kinda dorky.”
She played a simple basic blues song that used the bottom notes to make it sound snazzy. Steven sat right up, immediately interested in the piece. She found the page in the book so he could see the notes and showed him how to play the first few bars. He obviously liked the rhythm and soon his shoulders moved to the beat. She’d found it—his kind of song.
“I tell you what,” she said. “You live next door, right?”
He nodded, making a serious face, exaggerating his already-deep dimples.
“If you want to come over here after school a couple days during the week, I’ll let you practice on this piano, okay?”
“Will you be here?”
“Sure. I’ll even help you practice if you want.”
“Okay!”
The moment she’d finished carefully writing out his homework, the doorbell rang, and she jumped up to open it. The Norseman stood on the other side, overbearing in stature, first drilling a glance through her then peering inside the house. She’d forgotten how big Kent was. In daylight, his finely carved features and cutting blue eyes almost took her breath away. Too bad he chose to look so serious all the time. He wore a navy blue polo shirt, but the sleeves barely fit around his arms. The standard jeans fit very, very well, indeed.
She smiled a simple superficial greeting, while odd tingles threaded along her skin. “Come in,” she said. “We just finished.”
“Hi, Dad!”
“Hey, son.”
Steven gathered his piano books and rushed toward his father. “Ms. Desi is a really cool teacher!” They hugged, and Desi could see the honest-to-goodness love they shared. It was the same kind of you and me against the world love that she and her mom used to have, and the display touched her deep inside. Maybe she’d cut the big guy some slack.
“That’s great,” he said to his son, then looked at Desi with near alarm in his glance. “Are you taking over for Mrs. Rask?”
“Just today. Her arthritis is flaring up.”
“Won’t you be my teacher next week?” Disappointment poured out of Steven’s voice.
“We’ll see how Gerda feels, okay?” She walked back to the piano and picked up the wrapped candy, then came back to Steven and handed it to him. “I promised to help you practice, remember?”
He took the treat as if he’d gotten the biggest present in the world. “Gee, thanks!” Throwing his arms around her hips, he hugged her and squeezed, his cheek flat against her stomach. Such a sweet boy. She couldn’t say he was attention starved, not by the way his dad watched over him, but Steven sure liked being around her. It made her wonder where his mother was.
Midhug, she glanced up at Kent, her grin quickly shifting to a more serious expression. Though he tried to hide it, caution and warning flashed in his azure eyes, and the hair on the back of her neck alerted her to let go of Steven and back off.
She’d reacted instinctively to the boy and must have crossed over a deeply engraved line. She didn’t have a clue why she’d tripped the alarm, but she’d respect Kent’s nonverbal message. He watched steadily as she stepped away, and when they’d said their necessary goodbyes, all she could do was wonder what she’d done wrong.
Copyright © 2014 by Janet Maarschalk
ISBN-13: 9781460334881
A BRIDE BY SUMMER
Copyright © 2014 by Sandra E. Steffen
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and ™ are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office and in other countries.
www.Harlequin.com
A Bride by Summer Page 20