The Wrong Man

“Oh.” She nodded her head in understanding.

“You want to play, not work.”

Play? Was that what this was? An immature need to recapture his adolescence?

“What if my work felt like play?”

She giggled. “That’s silly, Daddy.”

“What if I could be—” he hesitated, his mouth dry “—happier?”

Lifting one small hand to his cheek, she studied him. “We’re sad, aren’t we? We miss Mommy, right?”

“But Mommy would want us to be happy again, to laugh and play.”

“Okay,” she said, as if the matter was settled.

Okay? If only it could be that simple. He had gone back and forth about the best way to break the news to Kylie, but now that the time had come, the words stuck in his throat. He licked his lips, cuddled her closer, and then, with a deep breath, began, “I have something important to tell you, and I want you to listen carefully.”

“It’s about Mommy, isn’t it?”

“Not exactly.”

She rubbed her nose. “I know. About your carmpentry.”

“Yes. Yesterday I told Grandpa that I won’t be working for him anymore.” Much as he’d dreaded telling Gus his plans, Trent had been relieved when, despite his obvious disappointment, his father-in-law had claimed to understand. Now he said to Kylie, “I’ve accepted a job in a place called Whitefish that will make me much happier. I think you’ll really love it there.”

“We’re moving?”

Swallowing hard, he nodded.

She jumped from his lap and stood glaring at him, her fingers working the lace trim of her sweatshirt. “No!”

“But, honey—”

“I’m not going.” Her protruding lower lip sent a powerful message.

“Just now you said it would be okay for us to learn to laugh and play again.”

She stamped her foot. “But right here.”

Tension knotted Trent’s gut. “You’ll like Whitefish. It’s where I went to school.”

“I don’t like fish!”

“There are lakes and mountains. You can learn to ski and snowshoe and—”

“No.” She shook her head back and forth, her straight blond hair fanning the air. “We can’t leave.”

Trent tried desperately to see the situation from his daughter’s point of view. She’d had too many changes lately. Did he have any right to inflict one more on her, even one that would free him in ways that made him light-headed with relief? “Why not?”

Kylie stood stock-still, looking at him as if he had just asked the world’s most ridiculous question. “Because Mommy’s here.”

His chest ached. “Sweetie, we’ve been over this so many times. Mommy is dead. Even though she is never coming back, she is always with us in spirit, but she isn’t in Billings.”

He watched, thunderstruck, as Kylie’s face screwed up into a red ball before she screamed at him, “She is too! She’s at that place with the stone. The c-cemcementery!”

“Oh, honey.” Although Kylie struggled against him, he gathered her back into his arms, where she remained stiff and unmoving. “The decision has been made.”

She stared at the far wall. “I’m not going.”

This was harder than he’d imagined. “Where else would you live except with me?”

“With Grandma Georgia and Grandpa Gus.”

Trent bit his lower lip, knowing full well his in-laws would welcome that plan. “Wouldn’t you miss me?”

She shrugged, unwilling to meet his eyes. “You could visit me.”

It was time for a dose of reality. “I wouldn’t be able to visit very often. I’ll be working.”

She didn’t move.

“I’d really like you to come with me. In Whitefish there’s a big lake and a ski slope. You could go to the same school where I went as a little boy.”

Her lips quivered and she wrung the hem of her shirt.

“Looks like we have a problem, doesn’t it? I’m not happy being a carpenter. You don’t want to leave Billings. What do you think we should do about this?”

“What would you do there—in that place?” she mumbled.

Patiently he explained about the adventure-outfitting business. About his love of the out-of-doors, which he wanted to share with her. About how lonely he would be without her.

“Where would we live?”

“To start with, in Weezer McCann’s guest cabin.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Weezer? Who’s that?”

“I’ve told you about her. Remember, she’s the lady who helped Grandma Lila and me when I was a little boy. She was like my second mother. You’ll love her. She tells the most wonderful stories.”

Kylie twined her fingers around his wrist. “What about?”

Good Lord, had he actually succeeded in capturing her interest? “Native American legends about birds and fish and animals. Why they’re named what they are. Why they do what they do.”

“Like beavers and bears and stuff?”

“Exactly.”