Adding Up to Marriage

“It’s okay,” Silas said, almost irritably. “I’ll check around in the morning. So … what all went on in here while I was gone?”

Jewel laughed. “What didn’t go on, is more like it. And I apologize for keeping them up so late, but they were having so much fun—well, me, too, but that’s something else again—I didn’t have the heart to play mean old babysitter and make them go to bed. Especially since I doubted they would’ve gone to sleep on time, anyway. They missed you,” she said with a little smile. “And they were so worried about their grandma. And no way was I gonna let them sit in front of the TV all night, no, sir.”

Dinner dishes scraped and rinsed, she pushed down the dishwasher door and pulled out the bottom rack. “So we made cookies—they’re on that dish over there if you want some—” she nodded toward a foil-covered plate at the end of the bar “—and read a bunch of books—I made Ollie read a couple to me, he sounds like he could use the practice—and then we played about a million games of Snakes and Ladders, and then we played Secret City.”

“Which called for wholesale destruction of my living room.”

She straightened, shoving a piece of hair off her forehead with her wrist. Even with her glasses, he could see the knot between her brows. “Kids learn by playing, Silas. By using their imaginations. Okay, so maybe we sorta went overboard—I’m sorry about your living room. But I put it all back together, didn’t I? And the boys had fun. Isn’t that kinda the whole point of being a kid?”

Life’s not all about having fun, he wanted to say, except even he knew how stuffy and ridiculous it would have sounded. And of course he wanted the kids to have fun, but …

But, what? Yeah, that’s right—no answer, huh?

His dinner finished, Silas reached for the foil-covered plate. Catching a whiff of the peanut butter cookies lurking underneath, he smiled. Despite himself.

“You might want to put peanut butter on your list,” Jewel said, her back to him as she continued cleaning. “I got carried away with that, too.”

Silas bit into one, sighing at the taste of childhood, of innocence against his tongue, and felt like a heel. “Where’d you get the flour?”

“One of your neighbors. Which reminds me, you owe Mrs. Maple two cups of flour. And an egg.”

Silas hesitated, hoping she’d turn around. She didn’t. “These are delicious, too.”

She shrugged. Silas sighed.

“Jewel, it’s been a long day and I’m ready to drop, but that’s still no excuse for me acting like I did when I came home. Especially considering you basically saved my butt. You not only survived my kids for—” he squinted at the microwave clock “—nearly six hours, you obviously took excellent care of them. Not to mention going above and beyond with dinner and the cookies. So I apologize for acting like a bozo.”

Finally she looked at him. “You didn’t—”

“I did.”

A smile teased her mouth. “Okay, maybe a little.”

Silas smiled, then ground the heel of his hand into his slightly aching temple. “This single fatherhood business,” he said, dropping his hand, “it’s not for sissies. I remember what my brothers and I were like when we were kids and it gives me the willies, to think those two carry my genes.”

“You mean you weren’t always this … this …”

“Uptight?”

She lifted her hands. Whatever.

“No,” he said on a soft laugh. “But I’ve gotten so used to who I am now, I guess I’ve forgotten what it’s like to drape cloths over the dining room table and pretend it’s a fort. Used to make my mother batty. Especially the time we used her best lace tablecloth.”

“I bet,” Jewel said, giving the now-bare kitchen table one final swipe. “Speaking of mothers … do the boys ever see theirs?”

The unexpected question made his breath hitch in his chest. “She died in a car crash when the boys were very little,” he said quietly. “Not long after our divorce.”

“Ohmigosh …” Spinning around, Jewel pressed her hand to her mouth, then lowered it. “How awful,” she whispered. “Do they even remember her?”

“Ollie does, a little. At least he thinks he does. But Tad was still a baby.”

“Oh. That accounts for …”

Silas tensed. “For what?”

“Why you’re so protective of them,” she said gently. “And no, that’s not a criticism, anybody in your position would be.” She leaned across the counter and touched his wrist, only to remove it almost before it registered. “You’re obviously a really good dad, Silas. But man—” her eyes twinkled “—you’d be a pain in the butt to live with. There,” she said, surveying the much cleaner kitchen, a big smile on her face. “All fixed. Although I have to say my own place—well, Eli’s, I suppose—never looks half this good. Suzy Homemaker, I’m not.”

Somehow, he wasn’t surprised. “I never could understand how people could live in clutter. Noah and Eli shared a room when we were teenagers—I think my mother was ready to call the HazMat team at one point.”

“Sounds like Noah and me would get along great, then,” she said, and he glared at her, which got another shrug. “Driving myself nuts trying to keep a place clean when it’ll only get messy again simply isn’t a big priority. And it’s not like I’ve got the kind of wardrobe that needs padded hangers. Or any hangers, for that matter. I’m not dirty,” she said to his appalled expression, “but I’m the only one living there. Nobody comes to visit much, so if the mess doesn’t bother me, who cares?”

Silas’s eyes narrowed slightly. Did she even hear the loneliness weighing down her words? A loneliness he might not have even noticed if his own hadn’t been all up in his face that night, whispering insane ideas in his ear, like … like maybe they could use their respective loneliness to their mutual advantage—

The idea caught him so short he actually had to grab the edge of the counter. Fortunately, Jewel had bopped back into the living room to continue straightening, so she missed it. Whew.

Silas swiveled unsteadily on the stool to watch her righting pictures, putting lamps back, as it struck him how little he actually knew about her. Except for whatever floated in Tierra Rosa’s ether, like a free-for-all wireless signal. “You have any family nearby?”

“My mother’s in Albuquerque, but we don’t see each other much. Haven’t seen my dad in years. Or my stepdads, for that matter.”

“Stepdads?”

“Dos,” she said holding up two fingers. “One’s in Denver, the other’s in Montana. Or Wyoming. I forget which. Both remarried. No, wait, the one in Denver is divorced again. I think. Can’t keep track, don’t really care.”

Although she still periodically flashed smiles in his direction as she talked, her “chipper” was definitely fading fast. So when she bent over to gather the boys’ cars—affording Silas a nice, long look at a rather appealing backside, actually—he said, “Forget it, if the boys dragged all that stuff out here, they can clean it up tomorrow before school. Besides, you’re obviously exhausted.”

She straightened, stretching out the muscles in her back. “And it won’t drive you insane in the meantime?”

“Yes. But that’s my problem, not yours.”

Laughing, Jewel dumped the cars she’d already picked up, a moment before headlight beams streaked through the frosted glass insets alongside the front door. She went to gather her jacket and purse—both somewhat long in the tooth, Silas noticed—and it occurred to him she probably wasn’t exactly raking it in, doing what she did. Not that he was, either, but the ends tended to overlap more than not. He pulled his wallet from his back pocket, digging out several bills.

“Here,” he said, laying the cash on the counter. “This is for you.”

She turned, frowning at the money as if it was foreign currency, before aiming the frown at Silas. “Excuse me?”

“For watching the kids. Cooking my dinner.” When she stood there, gawking at him, he added, “If nothing else, consider it hazard pay.”

Her face went bright red. “Ohmigosh! I was just helping out! Being a good neighbor! I c-can’t.”

She said, eying the money like it was a candy bar and she’d given up chocolate for Lent.

“And I’m sure you don’t want to make me feel bad, like I took advantage of you. Please, Jewel. Take the money.”

Her gaze flicked from the money to him, then back to the money. “You sure? I mean … maybe we could come to some sort of other arrangement.” When his brows lifted, she said, “Like you helping me with my taxes or something.”

Which, since he doubted she had pension plans and investments and the like to sort through, would probably take him ten minutes. Tops. He got up, scooped the bills off the counter and walked over to her, pressing the money into her palm, and her hand was warm and soft and strong all at once and he liked the feel of it in his way too much. Sad. “Doing your taxes is a given. Now get out of here before Patrice wakes the entire town with her horn honking.”

For a long moment, their gazes tangled. Damned if he didn’t like that way too much, too. Which was even sadder. “You’re nuts, you know that?” she said with a little smile, stuffing the cash in her pocket. Then she yanked open his front door and fled.