“You should learn to say what’s on your mind.” With a half laugh, Spence took the coat from her. “One more thing.”
“Only one?”
“Yeah.” He swung her back into his arms for one long, hard, mind-numbing kiss. He had the satisfaction of seeing her sink weakly onto the arm of the sofa when he released her.
“Good night,” he said, then stepping outside, gulped in a deep breath of cold air.
It was the first time Freddie had been asked out to a grown-up dinner, and she waited impatiently while her father shaved. Usually she enjoyed watching him slide the razor through the white foam on his face. There were even times when she secretly wished she were a boy, so that she could look forward to the ritual. But tonight she thought her father was awfully slow.
“Can we go now?”
Standing in his bathrobe, Spence rinsed off the traces of lather. “It might be a better idea if I put some pants on.”
Freddie only rolled her eyes. “When are you going to?”
Spence scooped her up to bite gently at her neck. “As soon as you beat it.”
Taking him at his word, she raced downstairs to prowl the foyer and count to sixty. Around the fifth round, she sat on the bottom step to play with the buckle of her left shoe.
Freddie had it all figured out. Her father was going to marry either Tash or Mrs. Patterson, because they were both pretty and had nice smiles. Afterward, the one he married would come and live in their new house. Soon she would have a new baby sister. A baby brother would do in a pinch, but it was definitely a second choice. Everybody would be happy, because everybody would like each other a lot. And her daddy would play his music late at night again.
When she heard Spence start down, Freddie jumped up and whirled around to face him. “Daddy, I counted to sixty a jillion times.”
“I bet you left out the thirties again.” He took her coat from the hall closet and helped bundle her into it.
“No, I didn’t.” At least she didn’t think she had. “You took forever.” With a sigh, she pulled him to the door.
“We’re still going to be early.”
“She won’t mind.”
At that moment, Natasha was pulling a sweater over her head and wondering why she had invited anyone to dinner, particularly a man every instinct told her to avoid. She’d been distracted all day, worrying if the food would be right, if she’d chosen the most complimentary wine. And now she was changing for the third time.
Totally out of character, she told herself as she frowned at her reflection in the mirror. The casual blue sweater and leggings calmed her. If she looked at ease, Natasha decided she would be at ease. She fastened long silver columns at her ears, gave her hair a quick toss, then hurried back to the kitchen. She had hardly checked her sauce when she heard the knock.
They were early, she thought, allowing herself one mild oath before going to the door.
They looked wonderful. Agitation vanished in a smile. The sight of the little girl with her hand caught firmly in her father’s went straight to her heart. Because it came naturally, she bent to kiss Freddie on both cheeks. “Hello.”
“Thank you for asking me to dinner.” Freddie recited the sentence, then looked at her father for approval.
“You’re welcome.”
“Aren’t you going to kiss Daddy, too?”
Natasha hesitated, then caught Spence’s quick, challenging grin. “Of course.” She brushed her lips formally against his cheeks. “That is a traditional Ukrainian greeting.”
“I’m very grateful for glasnost.” Still smiling, he took her hand and brought it to his lips.
“Are we going to have borscht?” Freddie wanted to know.
“Borscht?” Natasha lifted a brow as she helped Freddie out of her coat.
“When I told Mrs. Patterson that me and Daddy were going to have dinner at your house, she said that borscht was Russian for beet soup.” Freddie managed not to say she thought it sounded gross, but Natasha got the idea.
“I’m sorry I didn’t make any,” she said, straight faced. “I made another traditional dish instead. Spaghetti and meatballs.”
It was easy, surprisingly so. They ate at the old gateleg table by the window, and their talk ranged from Freddie’s struggles with arithmetic to Neapolitan opera. It took only a little prodding for Natasha to talk of her family. Freddie wanted to know everything there was about being a big sister.
“We didn’t fight very much,” Natasha reflected as she drank after-dinner coffee and balanced Freddie on her knee. “But when we did, I won, because I was the oldest. And the meanest.”
“You’re not mean.”
“Sometimes when I’m angry I am.” She looked at Spence, remembering—and regretting—telling him he didn’t deserve Freddie. “Then I’m sorry.”
“When people fight, it doesn’t always mean they don’t like each other,” Spence murmured. He was doing his best not to think how perfect, how perfectly right his daughter looked cuddled on Natasha’s lap. Too far, too fast, he warned himself. For everyone involved.
Freddie wasn’t sure she understood, but she was only five. Then she remembered happily that she would soon be six. “I’m going to have a birthday.”
“Are you?” Natasha looked appropriately impressed. “When?”
“In two weeks. Will you come to my party?”
“I’d love to.” Natasha looked at Spence as Freddie recited all the wonderful treats that were in store.
It wasn’t wise to get so involved with the little girl, she warned herself. Not when the little girl was attached so securely to a man who made Natasha long for things she had put behind her. Spence smiled at her. No, it wasn’t wise, she thought again. But it was irresistible.
“Chicken pox.” Spence said the two words again. He stood in the doorway and watched his little girl sleep. “It’s a hell of a birthday present, sweetie.”
In two days his daughter would be six, and by then, according to the doctor, she’d be covered with the itchy rash that was now confined to her belly and chest.
It was going around, the pediatrician had said. It would run its course. Easy for him to say, Spence thought. It wasn’t his daughter whose eyes were teary. It wasn’t his baby with a hundred-and-one-degree temperature.
She’d never been sick before, Spence realized as he rubbed his tired eyes. Oh, the sniffles now and again, but nothing a little TLC and baby aspirin hadn’t put right. He dragged a hand through his hair; Freddie moaned in her sleep and tried to find a cool spot on her pillow.
The call from Nina hadn’t helped. He’d had to come down hard to prevent her from catching the shuttle and arriving on his doorstep. That hadn’t stopped her telling him that Freddie had undoubtedly caught chicken pox because she was attending public school. That was nonsense, of course, but when he looked at his little girl, tossing in her bed, her face flushed with fever, the guilt was almost unbearable.
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