Single Dad
Jennifer Greene
www.millsandboon.co.uk
Contents
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
One
Well, of course youre shook up that this guy asked you to dinner, Jeanne. You spend all day with serial killers and werewolves. You havent been off that computer in so long that youve probably forgotten what a real, normal human male looks like....
The shop bell tinkled. Hugging the telephone receiver to her cheek, Ariel Lindstrom glanced through the doorway of the back room, but she didnt see any customers.
...An invitation to dinner doesnt mean you have to marry him, for Petes sake. Just go out and have fun. Whats so hard?...of course you dont have anything to wear. You havent been shopping since the turn of the decade. Come on over. Ill find you something in my closet...so my taste is a little wild. It wouldnt kill you to break out a little....
Ariel was on a rollgiving advice was so much funbut her gaze still searched the main room of the shop. Someone must have come in. The bell only rang when the door openedyet there wasnt a soul in sight. The afternoon had turned blistering, broiling, butter-burn hotunreasonably hot, even for a Connecticut July summer day. Everyone in Woodridge had holed up behind their air conditioners or fans. Her partner, Dot, had the day off and the shop had been as quiet as a tomb since lunch.
...So what if he gets the wrong idea? I hope he does. Whens the last time you were kissed? The Civil War? Its about that long since you pried yourself away from that book youve been working on....
Ariel rose on tiptoe and craned her neck, but nothing seemed to be stirring in the shop. When the phone first rang, shed been soldering the sterling clasp on a 1914 lavaliere. Old jewelry was the specialty of the gift store; the first two aisles of the shop were packed with nests of baubles displayed on velvet. The stock also ran to the gaudy, bright and whimsical. Crystal dragons and unicorns had a special niche in a sunlit corner. Stained glass doodads shot prisms of rainbow colors from another nook. Beyond the door, shed set up a magic corner for kids, with crystal balls and wands and magic tricks.
There. Ariels gaze narrowed. She couldnt see the body from this angle, but peeking out from the edge of the magic aisle was the tip of a tennis shoe. A laceless, orange fluorescent tennis shoedistinctly a child-size. She almost chuckled aloud. Im not through with you, Jeanne, so dont think youre off the hook. But Ill have to call you back. I have a customer.
Her friend sounded enormously relieved to escape the conversation. Ariel hung up the receiver and headed straight for the telltale shoe.
The entire world knew she was a sucker for kids, but this one was a true heart stealer. The child raised huge, stricken, guilty eyes the instant she spotted Ariel. The urchin was maybe five. A girl, dressed in a Red Sox T-shirt and stringy cutoffs, with two straggly brunette pigtails jammed under a backward baseball cap. Her nose had a smudge. Both knees had healing scrapes. Her face was downright plainexcept for those liquid chocolate eyesbut lack of cuteness certainly hadnt affected her self-confidence. Her whole belligerent posture spoke of smart-aleck bravado.
It wasnt hard for Ariel to relate. Shed never been short of attitude herself at that age. Ariel crouched down by the child. Hi there. Whats your name?
Killer.
Killer, huh? Well, if that isnt a great name, I dont know what is. Are you shopping for anything special today?
Those skinny shoulders pulled off a huge shrug. I just wanted to look at stuff. Like the magic tricks and things like that. I wasnt gonna take anything
Hey, I never thought you were. Its a great afternoon to mess with magic. Ill show you a couple of tricks if you want. Too hot to be playing outside, isnt it? Ariel tacked on casually, Wheres your mom, sweetie?
The question was never meant to be complicated. The neighborhood kids often made Treasures into a pit stop on a lazy afternoon. It was a middle-class suburb; lots of moms worked, and the hillside shop was within easy walking distance from the schools. Ariel only asked about the missing mom because she wanted to make sure the little one had permission to be here. She never expected the child to take the question so literally.
My mom split. She took off because she didnt want us kids anymore. We all made too many messes and drove her crazy.
The childs tone was matter-of-fact, no bid for sympathy, yet Ariel felt an instant, violent tug of kinship. Divorces were so every-day common that another broken-home story was hardly headline news, but growing up, shed had ample experience being shrapnel in the divorce wars. At twenty-nine, she had no faith in the institution of marriage and even less belief in forevers. Still she hated to see a mite-size urchin stuck learning those painful lessons so young.
And could the mite talk. Eek. Once the urchin began chattering, she barely stopped for breath.
Her real name was Patrice, but no one called her anything but Killer. Her last name was Penoyer. Her great-grandfather was Hungarian, but hed been dead for just about forever. She was six. Her dad couldnt braid hair worth squat. Her two older brothers couldnt play any girl games. She was supposed to start first grade in the fall, but her brothers had filled her in about the boring school business. She wasnt interested and she wasnt going. Ever. Her best friend was Boober. Boober was nine feet tall and liked magic, which was a secret she was keeping from her dad. Because my dad doesnt believe in magic. At all.
He doesnt, hmm? By then, Ariel had shown her the disappearing scarf trick and miraculously made a fifty-cent piece appear from behind the childs left ear. She didnt mind ignoring work and entertaining the little one. Give or take the unknown gender of the imaginary friend Boober, there didnt seem to be any females in the childs life, and she was clearly lonesome for some company. Only the clock over the antique cash register kept ticking, and the child showed no signs of winding down or leaving.
Honey, are you sure its okay that youre still here? No ones expecting you at home, are they?
Those liquid chocolate eyes turned stricken again. Uh-oh. Can you read me the time?
Its just after four oclock, Ariel told her.
Oh, cripes. Oh, double cripes. I gotta go!
That was it. The child galloped for the door; the bell tinkled, and then she was gone, rounding the corner of the building down the alley and out of sight.
Ariel rubbed the back of her neck, amused and bemused by the whole encounter. It wasnt hard to understand why she felt such a fast, fierce emotional bond with the gregarious little smart aleck. The child reminded her of herself at that age, but it would be silly to take the bond too seriously. Who knew if shed ever see the urchin again?
And playtime was over. Shed brilliantly managed to avoid doing a lick of work all afternoonno guilt there; shed never been plagued by either ambition or practicalitybut bills refused to disappear by osmosis. She pivoted on her heel and started walking toward the back room...when she suddenly noticed the missing unicorn.
The crystal unicorns had become a favorite with collectors. Because each tiny figure was unique, Ariel had decided to display each piece on its own tiny mirror. The mirror with nothing on it stood out like a beacon.
No one had been in the shop but Killer, and the price tag for the missing unicorn was forty-five bucks. A little late, Ariel recalled finding the child at the corner between the magic aisle and the crystal displayand the stricken, guilty look in those chocolate eyes.
Damn.
For a short five seconds, Ariel debated tracking down her miniature thief. The little delinquent had mentioned her last name. Penoyer? Wasnt that it? Nothing so common that scouting a telephone number should be too challengingif she wanted her unicorn or her forty-five bucks back.
The mental debate didnt last long. The money was no big deal; the principle mattered more, but the red-line truth was that shed rather chew rats than get the child in trouble. The image of that dad who didnt believe in magicat all prowled through her mind.
Killers dad sounded like a hard-core realist. Stern. Unbending. An unyielding rule lover. Basing her judgment on the few comments the child had made about him was hardly fair, but it didnt really matter if she was right or wrong. Shed never know him. One lost unicorn simply wasnt worth the risk of getting the child in trouble, and that was that.
* * *
Ariel!
Hmm. Ariel heard her partner calling, but she didnt look up from the workbench. The chances of Dot actually needing her for anything were about five million to one. It was nearly sevenclosing timewhich Dot could handle blindfolded in her sleep.
Spread in front of Ariel was a tray of seed pearls. She adjusted the gooseneck lamp for the third time. The coral cameo brooch was a real find. A little cracked, but not too bad. The brooch was circled with seed pearls, a style common around 1910, but two pearls had been missing when the piece came in. Fixing it was no challenge, but finding two seed pearls of the right color and size was a real blinger.
Ariel! Theres someone out here to see you!
Hmm. Using tweezers and a magnifying glass, she held up another seed pearl to the light. Dot had been handling customers for several hours, the same amount of time shed buried herself in the back with repair projects. She was determined to finish this last one before calling it quits.
The two-day heat spell hadnt broken, and the airconditioning just refused to reach back here. Shed jettisoned her shoes hours ago, piled and pinned her long blond hair off her neck, hiked up her skirt and unbuttoned her blouse. She was still hot. And beginning to suffer from starvation.
She studied another seed pearl in the lamplight, but her mind was indulging in a lustful, dawdling daydream about bathtubs and butter-brickle ice cream. The daydream wasnt as good as a nice, wicked fantasy about sexbut almost. Her apartment was over the shop. If she ever finished this blasted brooch, she just might climb the stairs, lock the door, strip and immerse herself in a cool scented bath, a spoon and a pint of ice cream in hand. So it was a little decadent. Whod know? Whod care?
And she could already taste that to-die-for-delicious butter brickle.
Ariel, for heavens sakes, didnt you hear me calling you?
Hmm? Oh. Sorry, Dot, my mind was in another universe.... She spun around, expecting to see her partner in the doorwaywhich she did. But Dorothy, with her short-cropped Afro and bifocals and tastefully tailored clothes, had always been the stable member of their pair. Why she was standing there, winking and rolling her eyes, was beyond Ariel. Whats wrong?
Nothing. Dot shot her another meaningful wink. I just wanted to tell you that Im leaving. The registers locked and the Closed sign is up, so you wont be disturbed. Ill be in tomorrow at nine.
Fine, see you tomorrow. Ariel still hadnt fathomed what all the winking was about, until her six-foot friend shifted past the doorway.
There were two people just behind Dot. A man and a child. Ariel recognized the miniature female delinquent in the orange fluorescent tennies in a hearts blinkshed thought about Killer more than once over the past two days. But it was Killers dad who riveted her attention.
She didnt have to guess about the family connectionthe physical resemblance was unmistakable. Mr. Penoyer had the same shock of thick unruly hair, midnight black, and the same liquid dark eyes as his daughter. But the squirt must have inherited her homely bones from some other source, because her daddy was one hell of a looker.
Ariels complete distrust in the institution of marriage never meant she was antimen. It had been a while, though, since she met a lightning bolt who inspired her feminine hormones to a 911 red-alert status. He wasnt huge, maybe five feet ten, but the package was all lean, wired muscle. Apparently hed come straight here after a day of working in the heat, because he carried a hard hat in one hand, and he was dressed in jeans, a worn navy T-shirt and scuffed work boots.
Judging from the character lines etched around his eyes, he was in his mid-thirties. Judging from the scowl cut deep as a well on his forehead, he was smoking with tension and temper. It wasnt hard to figure out that he didnt want to be here. The phrase volatile powder keg shot through her mind, followed by the disgracefully wayward thought that hed be an incredible handful in beddangerous and exciting and unpredictable.
Not that his skills as a lover were relevant to anything. She wasnt prospecting. It was just an objective observation.
In those same few seconds, he seemed to make some instantaneous objective observations about her, too. Those dark eyes laddered up her bare feet to her hiked-up skirt to her open-collared shirt to her wildly disarrayed blond hair. Modesty hadnt been her concern in the privacy of the back room. Actually, modesty was rarely a front-line priority with her anywaygood grief, a body was a body. But hers suddenly felt different, alive and aware and definitely exposed. Heaven knew what hed expected, but his gaze reflected the same kind of wariness hed show an open vial of nitro.
Youre the owner of this place? Ariel Lindstrom?
He sounded so doubtful that she was tempted to offer him ID. Yes.
Well, Im Josh Penoyer. Patrices father. With two firm hands on her shoulders, Killer was ousted from the safe hiding place behind his legs. My daughter has something to say to you. Killer clearly wasnt fond of this plan, because she burrowed straight back for her daddys arms. Patrice. There was no meanness to his tone, but it wasnt hard to identify the immobility of rock. Dad wasnt gonna budge. The little one lifted dread-filled eyes. Sotto voce, he prompted her, Were sorry....