For the Children

“If he’s on the team, it’ll be with the proviso that I monitor his lunch every day,” Kirk told her. “Obviously, keeping a list of what he’s eating wasn’t enough.”

Valerie’s smile was shaky. “Thank you.”

He shrugged off her gratitude. Told her it was nothing.

But it wasn’t.

AN HOUR LATER, he was walking her to her car, basking in the admiration shining in her eyes as she laughed up at him. He didn’t bask long. If Valerie Simms learned anything about the man Kirk Chandler had been all his life, her admiration would quickly fade. She was a judge. A woman who heard the facts and passed judgment every day of her working life. He wouldn’t have a hope in hell.

Not that he cared. His life plan no longer included self-gratification. He’d already had more than his share of that. And he’d taken far too much from too many people.

“So,” she said, climbing into her car, “we never decided for sure. Are we friends?”

Could the woman read his mind?

“Sure,” he told her. Because he would be a good friend to her, watch over her sons.

She nodded. And then her eyes grew shadowed. “But just friends, and the boys can’t know.”

“I agree.”

“And not just because you’re their coach.”

“Because you don’t want them thinking their mother’s friends with a mere crossing guard?” he asked, intending the question to sound light and teasing.

He was surprised it didn’t come out that way.

Valerie glanced through the front glass, shielding her expression. “They’ve already lost one father, Kirk. And obviously they have a lot of unresolved issues with that. They’re my first priority and I can’t risk letting them think they might have another father, because I don’t know how it would affect them if it didn’t work out. So I just can’t get involved right now.”

“Hey.” He reached in the open door, laid a palm on her shoulder, ignoring her softness. “It’s okay,” he told her. “I understand.”

She looked up at him, her eyes clouded with an uncertainty he wasn’t used to seeing.

“Honestly,” he added. “I don’t want to make any of the other boys feel any less special, and if it got around that I was friends with the Smith boys’ beautiful mother…”

She smiled, as he’d hoped she would.

Good. That was settled.

They’d be friends. On a joint mission to save the children of the world.

Friends.

And nothing more.

CHAPTER TEN

THE WEEK AFTER Thanksgiving, the Menlo Ranch Rangers won all three of the games they played, landing them a chance to make the play-offs. With Abraham Billings’s skill, Blake Smith’s footwork and Brian Smith’s heart, the team appeared unstoppable.

Abraham, Blake and Brian had become quite a team off court, as well. Valerie didn’t know this just because Kirk had told her so on the two occasions they’d met that week, but because if her boys weren’t talking about basketball, they were talking about their new friend, Abraham.

“They invited him over to spend the night,” Valerie told Kirk late Friday night. He’d called to talk her into a late-night walk, but she’d already been in bed—reading. They’d been on the phone for the past hour, instead.

“He’s there?” Kirk sounded surprised.

“No.” Valerie frowned. “He said he was busy to night.”

Just as he’d been busy the other three times the boys had invited him during the past week. Just as he’d be busy the next hundred times they asked—if they asked. Valerie was fairly certain Abraham Billings would rather die than be a visitor in the home of his judge.