Loving Leah

“Maybe my dad could help us, too,” Gracie murmured wistfully. “Before my mom died he always used to make sure we had pretty flowers.”

“Maybe so,” Leah agreed, though she had no idea at all what John would or wouldn’t be willing to do in the weeks ahead.

“He’ll probably be too busy,” the child said with an audible sigh of resignation. “He’s always too busy to do things with me, or he’s too sad. He really misses my mom, you know. But you’re here now, Aunt Leah, and you’ll do lots of things with me, won’t you?”

“Oh, yes, Gracie. I’m here now, and we’ll do lots and lots of things together this summer. I promise,” Leah said, making yet another vow to someone she loved before she’d had a chance to consider what it might cost her.

“See all the weeds in our flower beds?” her niece said as they turned onto Cedar Street.

“Yes, I do,” Leah replied, trying to hide her dismay at how run-down and abandoned the lovely, two-story house appeared compared to the photographs Caro had so proudly sent her a couple of years ago.

With the streetlights illuminating the house, she gave it a closer look. Though not totally weed-infested, the gardens were overgrown, the lawn could have used a good mowing, and the front windows were all dark despite the onset of evening.

She had hoped her father and stepmother had been exaggerating about John’s mood and behavior. Surely he had begun to get over the worst of his grief and was now ready to move on with his life again. He had responsibilities that couldn’t be ignored, Gracie being the most important among them. And he had agreed to let her help him take care of his daughter for the summer, hadn’t he?

“Do you think my dad’s home?” Gracie asked as Leah turned into the driveway, the uncertainty in her voice adding to Leah’s own.

“That’s his SUV, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” the little girl replied, then added by way of explanation, “but that doesn’t mean he’s home. He goes for long walks at night. Really, really long walks, and it’s nighttime now.”

Leah could understand John’s avoidance if she’d been the only one showing up on his doorstep. But would he go for one of his long walks on an evening when he was supposedly expecting his daughter to come home, as well? The man she had known eight years ago wouldn’t have, but John had changed after Caro’s death in ways that Leah wouldn’t have believed possible had anyone except her father told her.

“If your father isn’t home, we can always go back to Grandpa’s house and wait there until he returns,” Leah said, hoping she sounded more decisive than she felt.

“Okay,” Gracie readily agreed, her fears obviously eased by Leah’s simple solution.

Deciding to leave her suitcase in the trunk of the car, Leah helped Gracie out of the back seat. The little girl had only a slight bit of trouble maneuvering her injured leg, encased in a metal brace, so that she could stand up, but she accepted Leah’s assistance graciously. And though she was more than capable of walking up the brick path that led from the driveway to the front door of the house on her own, she also tucked her hand into Leah’s. Leah held on gratefully, receiving her own measure of reassurance from the physical contact.

Pausing on the small covered porch, she took a deep breath, gave Gracie’s hand an encouraging squeeze and rang the doorbell. A cool breeze stirred the tree branches and lifted her straight, shoulder-length brown hair as she listened to the faint echo of the chimes. Shivering slightly, she wished she had put on her sweater before leaving the car. It might be June, but in Montana the night air still held a definite chill that her jeans and denim shirt couldn’t ward off.

“Oh, no…” Gracie murmured as seconds ticked into a minute, then two, without the door opening.

Reaching out, Leah pressed her finger against the doorbell a second time, holding it there several seconds longer than she had the first time. Another minute or two passed and then, to her relief, she heard the sound of the bolt lock being drawn.

“He’s here!” Gracie’s voice was filled with an odd mix of excitement and uncertainty that Leah determined to be a consequence of her father’s erratic behavior.

Choosing to ignore as best she could the quiver that stole along her own spine, Leah forced herself to smile. The simple words “Hi, stranger” formed in her mind, a perfectly acceptable greeting after eight years, especially if spoken in a cheerfully teasing tone.

The front door finally swung open, not smoothly but with a jerk that signaled impatience, even irritation, and in the semidarkness, the man looming on the threshold presented a frightening visage, at least to Leah’s eyes. Had she not expected him to be John, she would have never recognized the person now standing before her.

With his dark, shaggy hair unkempt, his face unshaven, his eyes bleary, his navy T-shirt and faded jeans hanging much too loosely on his tall, lanky frame, John Bennett looked no more familiar to her than a total stranger would have. And a hostile stranger at that, she thought, her smile fading and her jaunty greeting left unspoken.

“Hi, Daddy,” Gracie said.

The child’s high, sweet, hopeful voice filled the gaping silence as she let go of Leah’s hand and took a tentative step forward.

Immediately John’s expression changed, softening perceptibly as his gaze shifted to his daughter. His love for the little girl was so obvious and unencumbered that it seemed almost palpable to Leah. Here was the man she remembered, she thought, the good, kind man who would never intentionally hurt anyone, especially her. He wasn’t hostile at all, only ravaged by a grief so profound and desperately unrelenting that nothing, save the sight of his beloved daughter, could ease it.

“Hi, Gracie.” John bent down and scooped his daughter into his arms, gently cradling her injured leg in one large, competent hand. As he straightened up, he shared a warm and heartfelt hug with her. “Did you have a good time at Grandma and Grandpa’s house?”

“Oh, yes. They had a big surprise for me, too.” With a satisfied smile the little girl turned and waved a hand at Leah. “Look, Daddy, it’s Aunt Leah. You remember her, don’t you? I went to visit her in Chicago with Mommy a whole bunch of times. Now she’s finally come to visit us here in Missoula, and guess what? She’s going to stay right here with us all summer, and I’m so glad, Daddy. Aren’t you?”

“Of course I remember your aunt. In fact, I remember her quite well,” John replied in a noncommittal tone, his gaze settling on Leah. “Welcome back to Missoula, Leah.”

She started to smile again, started to greet him as she’d planned, but the expression on his face belied his softly spoken words. Though not openly hostile, the glance he cast her was, at the very least, unfriendly. So unfriendly, in fact, that it caught her completely by surprise. And his failure to agree with Gracie that he was glad she would be staying with them spoke volumes about his feelings in that regard, as well.

She had thought that John was not only aware of the arrangements her father and stepmother had made on Gracie’s behalf, but that he also approved of them. He had to have known that she was the one Cameron and Georgette had chosen to serve as the little girl’s nanny for the summer. Surely they’d discussed their plan with him and gotten his approval before approaching her, hadn’t they?

But if John had given his approval, why was he treating her with such hostility?

Leah realized that she’d never asked either Cameron or Georgette how John felt about the matter, and apparently, in their wisdom, they had chosen not to mention it themselves. They had told her only that John had changed quite a bit since Caro’s death, and to Leah that had been understandable, considering the extent of his loss. Had she known he would be irritated by her arrival and dislike the idea of her living in his house, she would never have agreed to return to Missoula.

What had possessed her to assume so much, so mistakenly?

Her love for Gracie, Leah realized. Cameron had insisted that John was still too preoccupied with his own loss to give the little girl the attention she needed, and Gracie’s comments in the car had verified that. And then, of course, there had been that unavoidable flare of hope, coupled with the sudden reawakening of long-dormant dreams, that had stirred deep in her soul at the thought of seeing her dearest friend again after eight long, very lonely years.

She hadn’t expected John to share her feelings. Barely a year had passed since Caro’s death, and he would never love anyone as much as he’d loved her. But neither had Leah anticipated such a total lack of warmth, not to mention welcome.

“The nanny’s room is on the far side of the den past the kitchen,” he directed, interrupting her reverie in a no-nonsense, matter-of-fact tone of voice. As if she was a lowly stranger hired for the summer against his better judgment, instead of someone with whom he’d once shared his hopes and dreams, Leah thought, staring at him in undisguised bewilderment.

“Make yourself at home,” he added, his cool, distant expression devoid of any hint of invitation. Then to Gracie in a much softer, gentler tone he said as he turned away, “I bet you had dinner at Grandma’s house, didn’t you?”

“Oh, yes, my favorite—hamburgers and French fries.”

“Well, then, let’s get you upstairs and into your pajamas. It’s almost past your bedtime, young lady.”

Putting her arms around her father’s neck, Gracie giggled with uninhibited delight.

Standing alone on the porch, watching John walk slowly up the staircase just inside the entryway of the house with Gracie held close in his arms, Leah’s first impulse was to yell, “Hey, wait a minute. Where do you think you’re going?” She couldn’t do it, though. Not with Gracie looking on. The little girl deserved a peaceful night’s sleep, and she definitely wouldn’t have one if she first had to witness an angry scene between her father and her aunt.

But Leah had a right to know what was going on with John. She’d had what now seemed to be the glossy version from her father and stepmother. Apparently they had given her just enough information—distinctly shaded to the positive—to lure her back to Missoula. And with her guard down, she had been totally unprepared for the problems they must have known she would surely encounter.

Of course, she couldn’t claim to be totally innocent. She had gone along with the plan easily enough, she acknowledged, fumbling along the wall inside the doorway for the switches that turned on the porch and entryway lights. She’d believed what they’d wanted her to believe because she’d wanted to believe it, too.

Her father and stepmother had needed her help—help she’d been easily able to afford to give during her summer vacation. They’d been sure that if anyone could deal with John’s moodiness while also providing a stable home for Gracie, it was she. And with her experience working as a teacher at a private girls’ school in Chicago, Leah had known she could also help Gracie catch up on the schoolwork she’d missed due to her injuries.

Ruefully, she now considered all the questions she hadn’t asked Cameron and Georgette, and remembered, much too late, all the words they had used to describe John Bennett—bitter, angry, not himself—which she had originally chosen to ignore. There had even been a comment about John running off two nannies in the past nine months—a comment she should have questioned more closely, but of course hadn’t.

Obviously they hadn’t left because he’d been nice to them, Leah acknowledged as she walked back to the car to retrieve her suitcase. And he certainly hadn’t been nice to her, either. But she wasn’t just any young woman hired through a professional agency to look after his daughter. She was Leah—his once and always friend. Or so she’d believed until he’d dismissed her without so much as a backward glance.

She could leave of course. She could just get into her car and drive back to Chicago. No one would blame her, not even her father and stepmother. But who would look after Gracie then? Who would care for the little girl as willingly and lovingly as she would? Not Cameron and Georgette—they were leaving for her father’s summer lecture series in Europe early tomorrow morning. There wasn’t anyone else Leah could think of.

So she would have to stay—or live with more guilt than her conscience could bear. But she wasn’t going to tolerate open animosity from John Bennett, she vowed as she opened the trunk of her car. She shouldn’t have to. He had been her friend once—her very best friend—and she was there for a very good reason.

As she had every intention of reminding him once she’d had a chance to gather her courage and stand up to him.

Chapter Two