Adding Up to Marriage. Karen Templeton

wary.

      Aaaand there went the protective mode again.

      Better than perv mode. Right? Maybe. Maybe not. “Of course not—”

      “Oh, that’s the one in the player now,” she said, nodding at the case. Still in his hand. Busted. He lifted it, coherent speech beyond him. She grinned, effectively disabling the protective mode. “It’s excellent, you should give it a looksee sometime. Eggs ready yet?”

      “No, sorry …” Silas dropped the case—setting off a clattering DVD avalanche which he had to stop and clean up—before following her back to the kitchen. “Didn’t want ‘em to get cold,” he said, turning the flame on underneath the cheapo skillet.

      “I can do that—”

      “No, it’s okay, you sit.” So I don’t have to look at you.

      She got her oatmeal out of the microwave, stirred in a generous pat of butter and like half a cup of syrup of some kind. Good Lord. “You sure—?”

      “Yes,” Silas said.

      So she sat, and he scrambled—the eggs, his brain, whatever—a minute later sliding the plate with eggs and toast in front of her at the chewed-up dining table. Her gaze met his for a nanosecond then skittered away, yanking her usual exuberance along with it. Huh.

      “Thanks,” she said, pushing her glasses up on her nose, and it occurred to him she didn’t see herself as sexy. Which was not his problem. No, his problem was him seeing her as sexy.

      “Can’t remember the last time anybody made me breakfast,” she said, not looking at him as she scraped the last bit of oatmeal from the bowl and dived into the toast and eggs.

      Silas poured himself a cup of coffee, leaning up against her counter to drink it while she ate. And ate, and ate. Where on earth she put it all, he couldn’t begin to guess.

      “Your mother okay?” he asked, more out of politeness than curiosity. Heaven knew he had enough issues with his own mother, he sure as heck didn’t want or need to hear about anyone else’s.

      After staring at him a moment too long, Jewel shoved her cheerfulness back out front, like a pushy mama making little Johnny sing for the folks. “Oh, she’ll be fine,” she said with a wave of her hand and a let’s-not-go-there smile. “She’s real good at landing on her feet. In more ways than one. So …” Her eggs polished off, she crammed the last bite of toast into her mouth and brushed off her hands. “What all do I need to know about the boys?”

      And would somebody explain to him, considering he was only being polite to begin with, why the brush-off stung? Not a lot, but enough to make him wonder.

      He pulled a list of instructions and emergency phone numbers from his back pocket and unfolded it, setting it in front of her. Still chewing, she quickly read it, then glanced up at him, her eyes glittering with amusement behind her glasses. Like snow in shadow, he thought, then mentally slapped himself.

      “Why don’t you just send ‘em to military school and be done with it?”

      Silas bristled. “I love my kids, Jewel. And I take my fathering responsibilities very seriously.”

      “Well, of course you do! I don’t mean …” After checking for a clean spot on her napkin, she yanked off her glasses to clean them. “Okay, I was only trying to make light of the moment, but …” The glasses shoved back on, she huffed out, “My mouth has this bad habit of spitting out random inappropriateness when I least expect it. I apologize.”

      This said eye-to-eye. Earnestly. Sincerely.

      “And anyway, this—” she lifted the list, thankfully oblivious to the sudden, random buzzing in Silas’s head “—isn’t near as bad as I expected. Considering the boys’, um, high energy level.”

      The buzzing faded. For which Silas was even more thankful. “The phrase ‘holy terrors’ has been bandied about a time or six.”

      Jewel’s eyes popped wide enough for him to see gold flecks in the dusky blue irises. “They are not terrors! By any stretch of the imagination! And whoever would say such a thing …” Her mouth pulled flat, she shook her head. “Honestly. Some people need their brains washed out. They’re just little boys, for crying out loud,” she said, her fervor pinking her cheeks and making her eyes bluer, and Damn, she’s beautiful smacked Silas right between the eyes. Hell.

      “Sounds like you’ve had experience with little boys,” he said, and her indignation melted into a chuckle.

      “You couldn’t tell?” Then she flicked her hand: Never mind. “Yeah, I do. When my mother married my stepfather—my second one, I mean—my stepbrother was a toddler. I was eleven, and ohmigosh, I thought Aaron was the cutest thing ever. I adored him, took him everywhere, played dress-up with him—you can wipe that look off your face, your boys are safe, I outgrew that phase years ago—even let him sleep in my bed with me. ‘Course,” she said with a crooked little grin, “the older he got the more I decided he was a pain in the posterior, but I still loved him. Still do,” she added softly. “God, I miss that kid.”