by Susan Gable
“Yeah.”
Complete silence from the other end of the phone made the hum of Molly’s hairdryer from the bathroom sound incredibly loud to James. “Well?”
Cord cleared his throat. “How do you feel about that?”
“Shove the counseling and just tell me what you think.”
“It doesn’t matter what I think. What you think is the important thing. However, since she’s lost a kid, maybe she’ll understand your obsessive-compulsive behavior when it comes to Molly.”
The hairdryer whined to a halt, and James lowered his voice. “I am not OC with Molly.”
“Are so. But that’s neither here nor there.”
“Dad?” Molly stuck her head through his bedroom doorway. “My hair’s dry now. You can do it.”
James held up one finger. “Be right there, tiger. I’m talking to Uncle Cord.”
“Cool. Tell him I said hi.” She withdrew from the doorway.
“Molly says hi. I gotta go. I need to take care of her.”
“You need to take care of James, too. For once, think about yourself a little. Molly’s doing great. It’s okay to think about your needs, too.”
“Thank you, Dr. Cordova.” James applied a heavy dose of sarcasm to the title. “Have you heard from my patient, Rose DeWitt?”
“All’s quiet on that front. Her ex has been behaving himself, so she’s managing to hold things together.”
“Good. You know how to reach me if you need me.”
“Yup. Have some fun, bud. Kick back and relax a little.” A sharp click ended the conversation.
James sighed. Relax? How was he supposed to relax when he was tied in knots over the woman next door?
RACHEL HESITATED ON THE blue cabin’s porch step. The cool morning breeze stirred the chimes, creating a metallic clinking.
Was having breakfast with James McClain a good idea after last night? Did she really want to put herself in that position? On the other hand, James and Molly could act as a buffer against all those other people she had to face this morning, the ones who’d seen her make a fool of herself yesterday afternoon.
Squaring her shoulders, she marched across the porch, drawing to a halt once again outside his door.
“I did not kiss her, not that it’s any of your business.” James’s voice carried through the open front windows onto the porch.
“But Cherish said—”
“I don’t care what Cherish said or what she thinks she saw last night.”
Last night? Rachel’s cheeks tingled.
James groaned. “Maybe we need to establish some ground rules. I, as the father here, will kiss whomever I want, whenever I want. You, as the daughter, will not kiss anyone until you’re a heck of a lot older, and then only father-approved boys who are kind, afraid of me and germ-free.”
“Eeww, I don’t want to kiss some icky boy.”
“Thank God” came James’s soft mutter.
Rachel covered her mouth with her hand and tried to swallow the laughter threatening to erupt.
“But I don’t mind if you want to kiss Miss Rachel. I like her.”
A small burst of warmth blossomed in the center of Rachel’s chest, but she wasn’t sure if it was because Molly had given her father permission to kiss her or because the child liked her. Maybe a combination of the two?
Another masculine groan reached her ears. “I am not having this conversation with my eight-year-old.”
Rachel leaned closer toward the window.
“I think it’s great, Dad. Does this mean you’re taking her on that date?”
“We are not going on a date.”
A surprising wave of disappointment washed over her, dissipating the pleasant warmth. Not that she intended to date him, but still, that stung. Obviously she’d been right. His wish for a kiss had been a fabrication, a psychologist handling a distraught woman in whatever way he thought would work.
“But what about the dinner you won? You can’t waste a whole dinner. And Miss Rachel would be disappointed. She probably worked real hard to keep up with you so you would win.”
A bittersweet smile curved the left corner of her lips upward. Molly McClain, champion of wounded women. The child was all spunk.
“Molly, hold still.”
“Ow! Dad, take it easy, that hurts!”
“It wouldn’t if you’d hold still. Come over here.”
“Ow! Stop!”
Through the window Rachel saw James, his hands tangled in his daughter’s hair as he pulled her toward the kitchen counter.
A memory from a long time ago surfaced. Rachel slammed the door into the far wall as she charged into the cabin. “Don’t do that. Let go of her hair!”
James paused, one arm outstretched in the direction of the counter, the other hand still clutching strands of Molly’s hair.
“I said let her go!”
“If I let go, I’ll lose what little progress I’ve made on this French braid.” Amusement sparkled in his brown eyes. “How about handing me that comb?”
“French braid?” Rachel’s knees went wobbly and she glanced down at Molly, whose eager face beamed a wide grin at her. “You’re braiding her hair?” She passed him the black comb from the counter. Add ability to French-braid a little girl’s hair to the list of amazing things about this man.
“What did you think I was doing?” James deftly retrieved a strand of hair, then clenched the comb between his teeth and began weaving.
“When I saw you pulling on her hair, it reminded me…” Rachel shook her head. “I— I…never mind.”
“You bust into my cabin and I don’t even get an explanation?” he muttered around the plastic.
Rachel glanced back at the wide-open door. “I’m sorry. I just thought…”
James plucked the comb from his mouth. “You thought I was hurting her, didn’t you?”
“She was yelling ouch.”
“You came to rescue me from my mean, hair-pulling father!” With a giggle, Molly squirmed free from her father’s grasp and flung her arms around Rachel’s waist.
James threw his hands into the air. “Molly! Okay, that’s it. Forget the French braid. Which, by the way, was your idea to start with,” he reminded his daughter as he deftly undid the beginnings of the complicated braid. “Now you can have a ponytail or pigtails. What’ll it be?”
The little girl backed away from Rachel and glanced up at her. “Ponytail, like Miss Rachel’s.”
Rachel smiled at the child, the pleasant warmth creeping back into her chest to replace the burning embarrassment she’d felt only moments before. “Definitely easier than a French braid.”
“I’ll say,” James murmured. In a flash, his daughter’s hair was styled. “There.” He glanced over Molly’s head. “Have you decided to join us for breakfast?”
Rachel nodded.
“Good.” James’s watch beeped, followed immediately by a chiming from the one on Molly’s wrist.
Rachel arched an eyebrow and inclined her head at him.
“Medicine time,” he explained, going to the kitchen cabinets. “Molly has to take her meds on time for them to work the best. So, we do 7:30 a.m., and 7:30 p.m.”
“Meds?”
“To keep my body from rejecting my new heart.” Molly snatched the small plastic cup with the pills and tipped her head back, dumping them into her mouth. She grabbed a water glass from him and washed them down.
“All right, ladies, let’s go.” James ushered them outside. They strolled leisurely along the dirt road, Molly skipping on ahead.
“You were quite a sight, busting into my cabin like that.”
Rachel flushed and ducked her head. “I’m sure I was. I can’t seem to do much right these days.”
“I think it was very brave of you to intervene.” James stopped walking. “But you should know that Molly is my life. I’d never do anything to hurt her.”
“I do know that. But…”
“But it looked bad, I’m sure. Who pulled your h
air?” He cast her a sideward glance and started walking again, small clouds of dust kicking up around his brown dock shoes in the wake of each step.
She easily matched her pace to his. “A teacher.”
“A teacher? What kind of schools did you go to?”
A half smile tugged at her lips. The urge to tell him warred with her normal urge of keeping everything close to herself. “DODD schools.”
“Okay, I’ll bite. What’s a DODD school? Is that like Montessori, only where the teachers pull hair?”
She shook her head. “Department of Defense Dependents. My father was a military man.”
“Oh. That explains a lot.”
Up ahead, Molly squatted down on the side of the road, obviously fascinated by something she’d discovered in the dirt.
“It does? Like what?”
“Like how you keep everything bottled up inside you. I’ll bet emotions weren’t shown much in your house, were they?”
“No. We all had to be good, stoic soldiers.”
“And how did you father feel about a teacher who pulled his kid’s hair?”
The image of her father, dressed in dirt-and-grass-covered cammies, M12 slung over his shoulder as he stormed into her nearly empty first-grade classroom, came back to her clear as day. “He was not pleased. I was scared to death he was going to be furious with me. My mother had called him in the field after the school had called her. All my crying in the background really upset her. Dad made it to the school before Mom. What a sight. He was on maneuvers, and when he came through that classroom door with his gun over his shoulder, I’m not sure which of us was more nervous, the teacher or me.
“Dad believes in discipline, but he also believes in fair play. Luckily I happened to be on the right side in that little misunderstanding. But Dad reminded me that soldiers didn’t cry, that I’d worried my mother with my crying.” And Rachel would give anything for the chance to worry her mother again with her tears. Her mom had died two years before Daniel’s birth. Rachel often wondered what advice her mother would have given her about Roman.
“Bet that teacher didn’t pull your hair again.”
“Definitely not.”
“Dad!” Molly came running back down the dirt road in their direction, hands cupped together, arms extended out in front of her. “Look what I found.”
“What this time, Unsinkable?”
She skidded to a halt, tilted her head to the side and scowled at her father. “Da-a-ad.” Her sneakered foot stomped into the ground, creating a large dust cloud, and she jerked her head in Rachel’s direction. “Not in front of other people, remember?”
Rachel pressed her lips together tightly. How could she have ever thought this man, who could do French braids, would hurt his charming daughter? She’d just chalk it up to lack of sleep and too much going on in her life.
“Sorry. Whatcha got?” James leaned over for a better look.
Molly opened her cupped hands and a toad jumped out, landed on the powdery road, then quickly hopped back into the underbrush. “Oh, no!”
James shook his head as he straightened up. “We’re on our way to eat. Toads and other critters—”
“Carry germs.” Molly sighed and extended her now-empty hands toward her father. “I know, but he was so cute, I just wanted you to see him.”
“Not before we eat, okay?” He reached into the pocket of his faded denim shirt and retrieved a small plastic bottle, then squeezed hand sanitizer onto Molly’s outstretched palms.
“Sorry,” Molly mumbled, rubbing her hands together vigorously.
“It’s all right. Just remember to go into the bathroom and wash them when we get to the dining hall, okay?” The recapped bottle disappeared back into his shirt pocket.
“Okay, Dad.” Molly skipped off again in the direction of the camp’s main building, leaving the adults to amble along behind her.
“Toads aren’t high on my list of favorite animals, either,” Rachel told him.
“They’re not?”
“No, they always pee on you. I’d rather have a snake.”
James stopped, causing her to do the same. His eyes widened as he stared at her, then he broke into a devastating grin that eventually grew into a throaty chuckle. “You are just full of surprises, aren’t you?”
Rachel lifted her left shoulder, then let it drop. “Life is full of surprises. Some of them are good, some not.”
He reached out and tucked a loose strand of her hair behind her ear. “I’d say you qualify as one of the good surprises. You’re not what I expected to find at summer camp.”
Heat rose in her cheeks, and she fumbled to interpret the glow in his eyes. “What? You mean a donor’s mom?”
“No. I mean—”
“Dad!” Molly yelled from the doorway of the main building. “Hurry up! Cherish is already here!”
A wry smile appeared on his face. “That’s my daughter, always impatient.”
Rachel stifled a sigh, wondering what he really had wanted to say. “I can understand that. We old folks are far too slow for them. Daniel had two speeds—supersonic and warp.”
“That’s Molly these days.”
They entered the main building and turned down the long corridor that led to the dining hall. Molly scurried into the bathroom at the far end, darting back out just as they reached the doorway. She held her hands up and grinned at her father. “Ok, Dad? I’m gonna go say hi to Cherish.”
James nodded his approval and began to follow his daughter.
Rachel paused in the entryway. The scents of bacon and eggs made her mouth water, but she hesitated when several people glanced over at her.
She backed up a step but stopped when a large, warm hand slipped over hers.
“Rachel.” James squeezed her fingers lightly. “You promised me breakfast this morning. You’re not reneging on that, are you?”
“I said maybe.”
“Consider me a kid. I think maybe means yes.” He pulled gently on her hand. “Come on, you have to eat.” His eyes once again conveyed his understanding of her reluctance and he offered his strength through his warm fingers now entwined with hers. “And you have to face them all at some point. Might as well be now.”
“Spoken as a counselor?”
“No. Spoken as a friend.”
Several slow seconds ticked by while she stared into his eyes, then she squeezed his fingers back. “Thank you.”
“My pleasure.” A spark glinted in the caramel depths. “Shall we?” He released her and gestured toward the breakfast line.
She nodded and took one step into the room.
The clapping began. First one woman at the closest table, then it spread to those near her. Then the woman rose to her feet.
Rachel froze in place. Surely they weren’t applauding her? The scene she’d made yesterday wasn’t enough—they were looking for an encore?
More people rose to their feet. She could see their hands moving together, but a roar in her ears blocked out the sounds. Her chest tightened. Trudy’s words from her office upon her arrival came back: They’ll consider you a hero.
Her throat closed and she struggled to breathe. A woman left one of the tables over by the windows and hurried to her, head and eyes lowered as she closed the gap between them. Rachel recognized her as the sharp-tongued woman who’d asked for her credentials and started the whole messy spiral.
“Rachel?” She didn’t wait for a response. “Honey, I just wanted to say how sorry I am about yesterday. I had no idea—”
Rachel clenched her hand into a fist, trying to resist the overwhelming urge to pinch the bridge of her nose or better yet, to remove herself from the room as quickly as possible. James gently pressed his hand into the small of her back. Gratitude for his support washed over her. “Thank you.” She focused on the woman as she said it, but the words were meant for him.
The woman removed a green ribbon pin from her shirt. Her fingers trembled as she quickly placed it on Rachel’s. “I want yo
u to have this. It’s for organ donation awareness.”
Rachel glanced down. The green stood out starkly against her white blouse. The pin weighed down her heart like a heavy stack of textbooks. “Oh, no, I couldn’t—”
“Please. I want you to wear it in honor of your little boy.” She grabbed Rachel’s hands. “For Daniel.”
Unable to speak, Rachel nodded and shook the woman’s hand, then whirled and buried her face in James’s chest, drawing comfort from his closeness.
He wrapped his arms around her and held her tight. “Easy,” he whispered. “It’s okay. They’re just trying to show you how much they appreciate what you did.”
Rachel trembled. She’d done nothing. She was no hero, no selfless person who’d tried to save other people’s lives when her son died. She was a complete fraud.
She hadn’t wanted to donate Daniel’s organs in the first place.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“YOUR FATHER’S LOVE LIFE is none of your business. You’re a little too young to be playing match-maker.” Cherish’s mom wagged a finger at Molly, then turned to include her own daughter. “I don’t know what you two are up to, but knock it off.”
Molly glanced over her shoulder, watching her dad steer a pale and slow-moving Miss Rachel along the breakfast buffet. “But he was holding her. I saw it with my own eyes.”
“She was upset, Molly. Doesn’t your father hold you when you’re upset?” Cherish’s mom patted Tyler on the back as he squirmed against her shoulder.
Molly slumped lower on the bench. “Yeah. But don’t you think he likes her, even a little?”
Nolan chuckled warmly. “Oh, yeah, he likes her all right.” His wife’s elbow caught him firmly in the side. “Oof. Hey!”
“See, I told you.” Cherish smiled at Molly, winked and stabbed another piece of French toast. Golden maple syrup dripped onto the plate as she lifted it toward her lips.
Molly’s mouth watered. She darted another quick glance over her shoulder to check on her dad, then returned her attention to Cherish’s breakfast. “Give me a bite.” She opened wide and leaned in closer. Her friend popped a square of the sweet, gooey stuff into her mouth.