LITMIR.BIZ

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glances. “Not Grandma, right?” Sophie made a face that inspired Rachel’s giggle.

      Grandma didn’t make Cam’s short list of options, either, but he wasn’t a fan of disrespect. “Your grandmother loves you. She’s just got her own way of doing things.”

      “Yeah. Mean.”

      “Rachel.”

      “Sor-ry.”

      She stretched out the word as if underscoring her sincerity, but Cam knew better. Rachel called things as she saw them, but he didn’t want to raise mouthy kids. “You guys have your books?”

      Sophie patted her backpack.

      Rachel looked guilty.

      Cam held up three books about an irascible kindergartner whose antics charmed kids of all ages and handed them over the seat. “Luckily, one of us was paying attention.”

      She grinned. “Thanks, Daddy.”

      “You’re welcome. And I’ve got snacks packed, but don’t mess up Miss Brennan’s house, okay? Or leave food crumbs around for the mice.”

      “Real mice?”

      “Or rats?” Sophie wondered, intrigued. “Will you pay us if we catch one?”

      Cam hesitated, then nodded, unsure how Meredith would handle that idea. Rodents were a fact of life in the country and he paid the girls fifty cents for every mouse they caught, inside and outside. He paid a dollar for rats, but they’d only bagged two of those over the past few years, thanks to Dora, their white-backed calico cat. Dora hunted regularly, as evidenced by the furry gifts she left on their side porch.

      She’d had three kittens a few weeks back, two of which were promised to friends.

      Kristy had loved kittens. Cats hadn’t been allowed in their apartment, but he’d promised they’d get one once they had their own place. She didn’t live long enough for that promise to become reality.

      His fault.

      Guilt festered, an angry wound in need of cleansing. But there was little to do for a wounded man who left his wife to die on the couch.

      Pneumonia, the doctor said.

      Five years later, Cam still felt a slap of disbelief that people died from pneumonia in this day and age, especially young women like his wife. But he should have known because he knew her lungs had been compromised as a child. He’d watched her use an atomizer for exercise-induced asthma. Problems in her first year had taken her to the hospital several times with infant pneumonia. What he hadn’t known was that the effects of those early problems could prove dangerous to the twenty-seven-year-old woman that shared his love, his life, his bed.

      “What’s wrong, Daddy?”

      He flicked a glance toward Rachel, erased his concerns and shrugged. “Nothing, honey. I’m just pondering how to do things at Miss Brennan’s.”

      “Oh.” Rachel nodded, accepting, then sighed. “I love her hair. Don’t you, Sophie?”

      Sophie darted a glance between Rachel and her father. Cam caught the tail end of the surreptitious look while paused at a stop light. “It’s all right,” she answered, purposely nonchalant.

      “It’s gorgeous.” Rachel laced her observation with full drawn-out emotion. “I want hair like that when I get bigger.”

      “I don’t.”

      Rachel eyed her sister and shrugged. “Well, you couldn’t have it anyway. You’ve got dark hair. And it’s straight. I’ve got curls like Meredith.”

      Cam cringed. The girls barely knew Meredith and already they were arguing about hair. What was next? Nails? Makeup? Boyfriends? “God made you different because you are different, Rach. That doesn’t make curls better than straight or vice versa.”

      “Vice-a-whatta?”

      “It doesn’t matter what your hair looks like,” he pressed.

      Sophie’s eye roll said otherwise.

      Rachel just laughed. “Of course it does. It’s hair. It’s supposed to look nice. Don’t you like the way Meredith’s hair looks, Daddy? All shiny and soft?”

      Do not go there.

      “How we act is more important,” Cam explained, feeling defensive and out of the loop, “than how we look outside.”

      Sophie stayed quiet, staring out the window, then leaned forward. “You get your hair cut all the time, Daddy.”

      “Yes.” He drew the word out, wondering. “I have to look decent to teach.”

      “What if we want to look nice, too?”

      Where Rachel finagled, Sophie calmly reasoned. Her words stabbed Cam. Could they possibly think they didn’t look nice? They were beautiful, lovely, adorable girls. They didn’t need artificial enhancements to make that more noticeable. He paused at a stop sign and met Sophie’s honest look.

      “You always look nice, honey.”

      She stayed silent, their gazes locked. Cam glimpsed a hint of the woman she was to become when she sat back and resumed gazing out the window, her face and posture quietly shutting him out.

      He’d blown it, big time, but he had no idea why. Or how. Or why hair mattered to a pair of little girls who should be more interested in crushing opponents on a soccer field than playing with dolls.

      As he turned into Meredith’s driveway, his mother’s warning resurfaced. He’d worked hard to raise grounded, gracious girls. Two days after meeting Meredith, he felt like Commander Queeg, murmurs of mutiny surfacing around him.

      He parked near the side door and started to unload his gear. For the next few months he’d be here in whatever spare time he could muster. But the girls…

      His precious girls.

      He’d worked hard to direct them to things of import. If being around Meredith elevated looks and fashion higher than they should be, he’d seek another option. Yes, he needed the money this job would bring. He’d called the orthodontist’s office and set up Sophie’s first appointment to get the ball rolling.

      But no amount of money could coerce him to risk his daughters’ emotional well-being. He’d recognized that early on, and refused to leave them with his mother more than occasionally for that very reason. Her negativity could quash their ingenuity, and he wouldn’t have that.

      But he wasn’t about to go the other way, either, and have them turn into prima donnas, more concerned with appearance than content.

      As the girls rushed the side door with their book bags in hand, Cam sent a look skyward. If only he’d been more on top of things five years ago, Kristy would be here, taking care of the girls, teaching them soccer drills and playing house with them. But she wasn’t, and there was only one person to blame for that, the husband who’d promised to love and cherish her, in sickness and in health.

      He’d blown that big time with his wife. He had no intention of risking a grievous mistake with his daughters.

      * * *

      The bang of the side door preceded the hurried sound of small, running feet. Meredith grinned in anticipation, rose, rolled her shoulders to loosen them, then put a choke hold on an emotional upsurge when Cam’s cautioning voice followed the rapid footsteps.

      “Girls. No running. This is a house, not a soccer field. Meredith?”

      “I’m here.” She descended the wide, turning staircase quickly, feeling his upturned gaze, pretty sure the inside temperature had risen indiscriminately with his arrival. Or maybe it was her personal internal temperature, in which case a nice, cold glass of tea should do the trick.

      One look into Cam’s sky-blue eyes said tea wouldn’t cut it.

      Meredith

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