The Secrets Between Them

Grasping her arm roughly, he’d halted her progress to the waiting limousine. In a voice pitched too low to be heard by anyone else, he had quite calmly, yet quite forcefully told her just how much he was willing to pay her to hand over her son to be raised by him in the luxury of his stately home in Asheville.

His proposal had been so insane that Hannah had laughed in his face. In a fit of rage, Randall had accused her of using Stewart all along to gain financially. He even went so far as to say she had probably allowed him to die just so she could collect on his life insurance policy. Then he had questioned her mental stability in such a sinister manner that a chill had crept up her spine—

“Mommy, Mommy, somebody’s coming up the drive.” Abandoning the tower of wooden blocks he’d been building in the middle of the brightly colored rag rug on the living room floor, Will joined her by the long, wide window that faced east down the gentle slope of the mountain. “Who is it, Mommy? Who is it?” he asked, his high young voice animated with excitement.

Hardly anyone had come to visit them in the past year. To be honest, hardly anyone had come to visit them since Will had been old enough to notice. His enthusiasm at the prospect of their having a guest—any guest, no matter the reason—spoke volumes to Hannah of his obvious need to socialize.

She had been able to justify keeping to herself in the weeks right after Stewart’s death, as well as through the long winter months when snow and ice often made travel difficult, even dangerous. But with the onset of spring, Hannah knew that she could, and should, start taking Will on walks to visit their neighbors and making the drive into Boone with him for more than gasoline and groceries.

“I imagine it’s the man who called about the ad I put in the paper for someone to help with the gardens,” she said as a late-model Jeep slowly rounded the last curve in the drive and came into view.

On the covered porch, sheltered from the drizzly rain, Nellie, the half-grown hound-dog puppy Hannah had adopted in September, scrambled to her feet, claws clicking on wood, and began to woof halfheartedly. Hannah had to admit that she wasn’t much of a watchdog. But Nellie had been very good company on a cold winter night, and she also trailed after Will like a mother hen, keeping a close eye on him during his daily ventures outdoors to play.

“I can help with the gardens, Mommy,” Will said as he slipped one small hand into hers.

“I know you can, sweetie, and you have, especially with the seedlings we started in the greenhouse. But there’s a lot more work to do than I expected, a lot more than we can do on our own. We’re not going to be able to get all the gardens planted as soon as we should without some extra help. You know I put an ad in the paper a couple of weeks ago.”

“Yes, I know.”

“And I told you that a man called about the ad a little while ago, didn’t I?”

“Yes, Mommy. But is he a nice man?”

Will’s grip on her hand tightened perceptibly as he looked up at her with wide, anxious eyes.

“He sounded nice on the phone,” Hannah answered, attempting to reassure not only her son, but herself, as well.

She knew she was taking a chance by allowing a stranger onto her property. She wasn’t being totally irresponsible, though. She had talked to the owner of the small motel outside Boone where the man had claimed to be staying, and had been reassured that he wasn’t a transient. In fact, he checked into the motel several days ago and he’d paid for his room with a classy credit card.

The Jeep pulled to a stop a few feet from the stone path leading to the porch steps and a moment later the driver’s side door swung open.

“Do you know his name?” Will asked.

“Evan Graham.”

“Like graham crackers,” Will stated with a smile. “I like graham crackers, Mommy.”

“I know. So do I.”

“He looks nice, doesn’t he?”

“Very nice,” Hannah acknowledged, an unfamiliar curl of sexual awareness tightening in her belly.

Evan Graham strode confidently around the hood of the Jeep and up the walkway to the porch steps, hurrying just a bit to avoid the rain. He was of medium height, maybe five-ten at the most, which still gave him several inches over her shorter stature. He was neatly dressed in a red plaid flannel shirt, sleeves rolled a couple of turns to reveal his muscular forearms, faded jeans that fit his slender build to perfection and brown leather work boots that appeared to be almost new. His thick, straight, golden blond hair was neatly trimmed and his angular jaw clean-shaven.

Hannah knew that appearances could be deceiving, but he didn’t seem the least bit threatening as he climbed the porch steps, head down, his tread amazingly light on the well-worn wood. Then he looked up at the house, his gaze shifting slowly left to right. Intelligence evident in the assessing slant of his bright blue eyes, he took obvious note of her and Will standing by the window, acknowledging their presence with a nod and a smile.

Another flutter of apprehension had Hannah’s stomach turning somersaults all over again. She wasn’t sure exactly what kind of man she’d expected Evan Graham to be.

She had known he wasn’t a fool when she’d talked to him on the phone. She wouldn’t have invited him out to the house for an interview if he was. Mostly she’d thought he’d be older—closer to fifty rather than forty—and maybe just a little softer and a little wearier around the edges.

But the man now pausing on the porch to rub Nellie’s long, silky ears as the dog wriggled up against him encouragingly seemed not only much too vibrant, but also much too accomplished to be truly interested in the type of work she had to offer him.

“Nellie likes him,” Will said.

“Nellie likes just about everybody,” Hannah reminded her son, smiling at him as she gave his hand a squeeze.

“Are you going to ask him to come inside the house?”

“That would be a good idea, wouldn’t it?”

Prompted by her son’s reminder of good manners, Hannah moved away from the window at last. Having seen her standing there, the man already knew that she was aware of his arrival. There seemed to be no need for her to wait until he knocked on the door.

She smoothed a hand over the wisps of hair that had come loose from her braid as she reached for the knob, and wished for the first time in months that cosmetics were a part of her daily routine.

In the next instant, however, Hannah chided herself for being silly. She was a thirty-two-year-old widow with a five-year-old son looking to hire a gardener-slash-handyman to help out on her property, not hoping to snag a boyfriend. But she couldn’t deny that the sight of Evan Graham had awakened something in her—something that made it all the more disappointing that he would likely turn down the job. Once he had an idea of exactly what it would involve—hard work—and what it wouldn’t—a decent wage—she knew he’d be long gone.

“Mr. Graham?” she asked as she opened the door wide, her tone cool but polite.

“Evan…Evan Graham.” He gave Nellie one last pat on her head, then straightened so that his eyes met hers, again with a shrewdness that gave her pause. Extending his hand, he added with equal formality, “And you’re Mrs. James?”

“Hannah James,” she replied, pleased by the firmness of his handshake, but also relieved that he kept it brief, and eminently impersonal.

“I’m Will,” her son announced, squeezing next to her in the doorway, his dark-eyed gaze eager and inquisitive. “And that’s Nellie, the dog.”

“Well, hello, Will. It’s very nice to meet you.” As Will giggled with delight, Evan Graham turned in Nellie’s direction and made a formal bow. “And hello to you, too, Nellie, the dog.”

“She forgot that she’s not supposed to chew on the corner of the living room rug again, so she’s having a time-out on the porch.”

“Yes, she most certainly is,” Hannah agreed with another smile for her son. Then she glanced at Evan Graham again and noted a similar softening of his expression as he, too, eyed Will with kindly interest. Reassured in a way she couldn’t quite explain, she stepped back and gestured invitingly. “Why don’t you come inside the house, Mr. Graham. It’s much warmer in the kitchen than it is on the porch, and I’ve just made a fresh pot of coffee.”

“Sounds good to me,” he replied with an appreciative smile genuine enough to chase some of the iciness from his eyes.

“Can Nellie come inside the house, too? Please, can she?” Will pleaded. “I’ll play with her in the living room while you talk to Mr. Graham and I promise, promise, promise not to let her chew on the rug again.”

Nellie gazed at Hannah contritely with her soulful brown eyes, as if aware that her fate hung in the balance.

“All right,” Hannah agreed, sure that she was giving in much too easily when Nellie scrambled past her without a backward glance, ears flapping and nails clicking on the wood floor, Will galloping after her, futilely calling her name.

“Sometimes I wonder who’s really in charge around here,” Hannah admitted in a rueful tone.

“You seem to have things pretty well under control,” Evan said, stepping past her into the house, then pausing to survey his surroundings as she closed the door.

Hannah couldn’t be sure, but she thought she detected the faintest hint of surprise in his voice. She wondered what he had expected to find there as she, too, eyed the neat and tidy interior of her home.

The door to the porch opened directly into the L-shaped living room, dining room and kitchen area. The rooms were all simply furnished with a mixture of recently dusted and polished antique rosewood and mahogany furniture and a more contemporary, comfortably upholstered grouping of sofa, loveseat, chair and ottoman.

Some of Will’s toys were scattered about on the rag rug, and some of her books and gardening magazines were handily stacked on an end table. But there was no real mess in evidence—never had been.