Tea and Destiny

“Don’t apologize. It was wonderful to come home to that. Just what I needed.”

“Bad day?”

“No worse than most others. I just seemed to have less patience with it.” Probably because she’d been up half the night for the second night in a row trying to make sense of the astonishing effect this man had on her. Her entire body—and her common sense—had melted in his arms. She hadn’t been able to come up with a single, logical explanation for it and she was a woman addicted to logic. Logic made sense of life, brought order out of chaos. And it was tidier by far than being prey to erratic emotions. Even though she knew all that, she looked into his eyes and felt the irrational tug of desire starting all over again.

“Have you eaten?” he said.

She shook her head.

“Then come sit on the porch and let me bring you something. Tracy made vegetable soup. With this chill in the air, it seemed like a good night for it.”

Beethoven? Homemade soup? What was going on here? “Who’s idea was all this?”

“All what?”

“The music and the soup.”

“Tracy had the recipe book out and the soup on when I came in from work. She said something about experimenting. It sounded dangerous to me, but it turned out to be edible. Paul and David actually finished every bite. Melissa picked out all the carrots and Tommy threw them across the room, but I think we found the last of them. It’s safe to come in now.”

She regarded him oddly. He actually sounded as though he’d enjoyed the evening. He was adapting far more readily than she’d anticipated. It sounded as though the children were, too. That pleased her, even as it made her uneasy. How long would it last? How long before he vanished from their lives?

“After all that,” he was saying, “I felt like listening to some music. I hope you don’t mind that I went through your iPod.”

“Not at all. I must admit I’m a little surprised by your choice.”

He turned a knowing grin on her. “I’m sure you expected a preference for twanging guitars over violin concertos.”

“Something like that,” she conceded.

“Loretta Lynn and Tammy Wynette have their places. So do Beethoven and Mozart. I’ll have you know I can even manage a little Chopin on the piano.”

“You?”

“Three years of piano lessons,” he boasted.

“Your mother must have been very strong-willed to manage that.”

“My mother had nothing to do with it,” he said with an unmistakable edge in his voice. “I took the lessons a few years ago.”

Intrigued by his tone, she was more astounded by his announcement. She stared at him in wonder. “You took piano lessons when you were—”

“Thirty-four,” he supplied, chuckling as he held up hands that looked far too large, far too strong, to be used in such a gentle pursuit. Those hands playing Chopin? Those hands caressing…