Second Time's the Charm

People equaled danger.

“Abraham, Daddy can’t help you if you don’t speak to me.”

Maybe this was a normal temper tantrum. He was in his terrible twos, after all. “Use your words, son,” he said, touching his nose to Abraham’s.

The boy stopped crying and gave Jon a wet-eyed stare. “Use your words.” Jon took the opportunity to remind Abe before the child started to scream again. “Daddy can’t help you if he doesn’t know what’s wrong.”

“Daddeee.” Abe’s voice wavered, as though he was about to cry again. “Daddee, go.”

“You want to go?”

Abe nodded.

“Tell me.”

“Go.” The word shot out.

“Okay, we can go, but Daddy has to reach under that shelf and get our box of cereal first, okay?” he said, praying that they wouldn’t be putting on another show for the citizens of Shelter Valley. “Okay?”

Abe nodded, his chin still quivering. Those big brown eyes watched him as he bent down—he knew because he kept eye contact as long as he could. And his heart broke a little bit as a leftover tear dropped off one of those baby-long lashes.

His son was not a bad or spoiled kid. He just had some things to learn.

And so did his dad.

CHAPTER TWELVE

“CAN WE GO somewhere we can talk?” Kirk had walked with her to her car. Lillie wanted him to leave. Jon and Abe were due at her house soon, and though she’d lent Jon a key to her place, she still wanted to be there when they arrived.

She wanted to see them.

Just to make certain that Abe had fully recovered from his upset that morning.

Or so she told herself.

“We have nothing to talk about.”

“How about we go to that little pub on campus? Remember all the nights we hung out there? In that little booth in the back? I stole my first kiss from you there on our second date.”

She tried not to think about such things, thinking instead about having dinner with Jon in that very same booth.

Jon. A client. Because her life was about work.

“I’m tired, Kirk. I just want to go home, get out of these clothes and relax.”

She recognized her mistake the second she saw the slow sexy grin begin to cross his face. “Sounds good to me.”

“Fine, we’ll go to the pub.” She had to eat. And it wasn’t as if she was apt to see anyone she knew there. The class she’d graduated with had all moved on to the rest of their lives.

But Lillie gave the room a once-over, anyway, before she took a seat at a table around the corner from the booths when she arrived there a minute or two ahead of Kirk. She’d told him she had an errand to run and that she’d meet him at the pub. And then she’d swung by her house, just in case Jon and Abe were early, but Jon’s truck wasn’t in her driveway. Or parked out front, either.

“What, our booth wasn’t empty?” Kirk asked as he slid into the seat across from her, bumping his knees with hers under the table.

“Can it, Kirk, or I’m leaving.”

“Sorry.”

Lillie glanced up from the menu she’d once known by heart. “What did you say?”