“I’ll walk you out.” His fingers wrapped around her elbow determinedly.
Clarissa marched out the back door, down the steps and across the newly mown yard. Jared was now working at the side of the house.
“He must have fixed it,” Wade muttered, staring at the shorn lawn. He shook his head and focused on her. “I don’t know how many times I have to say this, Miss Cartwright.”
“Don’t bother! I already know what you’re going to say. You’ve told me enough times.”
She kept on walking. Or she would have if he’d let go of her arm.
“Then why—”
“Why do I keep coming back here?” She rounded on him angrily. “Because they asked me to, that’s why. And I can’t say no.” She gulped down her frustration. “I know you don’t want me here, but the children need my help. And so do you.”
“No, I don’t.” He enunciated each word with frustrated precision.
“Well, you need something. Rita is the head honcho around here, and Judge Prendergast will do whatever she recommends. If you don’t get her on your side, you’re going to lose those kids to the state welfare agency. Is that what you want?”
“No, of course not!” Wade raked a hand through his hair, his face weary. “But I can’t be here all the time. I can’t do everything.”
“I know,” Clarissa told him calmly. “That’s why it makes sense for them to come to me. I’d love to help and I don’t mind in the least. I like them. I think they’re smart kids.”
“But I don’t want them to become dependent on you. They shouldn’t have to lose someone again. That’s not fair to them.”
Clarissa shrugged. “Is it fair that you lock a friend out of their lives, won’t even let me help a little by providing a meal now and again? Is it fair that Lacey and Pierce and Jared and Tildy all come to me for help and I have to send them away because you’re too stubborn to accept a little assistance once in a while?” She said the words that had begged release for days now.
“Is it fair that I can’t mother them a little?”
“Probably not,” he agreed grimly. “I don’t think it’s fair that their mother died, either. Or that I—” He stopped, clenched his jaw, then shrugged. “It’s just the way life has to be.”
Clarissa saw red. The hidden words poured out of her mouth with no regard for the consternation spreading across his glowering face.
“No, it doesn’t! Can’t you see that I only want to help these kids? I’m not asking you to be involved,” she added scornfully. “And I’m not after your money or your house or anything like that.”
“No, you’re after my kids.” His eyes glinted belligerently.
“All right! Yes, I am. I’m asking you to consider them and what it must be like to grow up like this. They can’t have friends over because there’s no one here to supervise.”
“I hired someone.” His chin jutted out as if to say “so there.”
“I know.” Clarissa nodded. “Mrs. Anders. She couldn’t come this afternoon so she asked me to stop in once they were home from school. But it’s not the same.” She continued. “They haven’t any spare time to go out with chums because there are so many chores.” She waved a hand at the house behind them.
“You talk about my house being run-down, but at least it has more than one bathroom and lots of bedrooms. This place is too small!”
As she searched his face for a hint of acquiescence, Clarissa let her heart’s desire pour out. “Why would it be so wrong to let me coddle them a little bit? I promise I’m not after you. I know I’m not wife material—I’m not beautiful or desirable or any of those things men want in a wife, but that doesn’t matter, does it? I can still be a friend to them, and a darn good one! I can love these kids and be there for them. Why won’t you let me? They’ll still love you, Wade. I would never do anything to change that.”
Wade stared at her, his mouth hanging open. He reached out and lifted a strand of her hair and tucked it back behind her ear, his fingers brushing against her cheek. When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet, sober. Clarissa steeled herself for the rebuff she knew would come.
“There’s nothing wrong with your looks, Miss Cartwright. You have a soft-spoken kind of beauty that any man in his right mind would find attractive. But I’m not that man. I have nothing to give. It’s all I can do to provide for four children. I don’t need a wife to look after, too.”
“Actually, I was in no way suggesting that. But those children are exactly why you do need a wife,” she countered, then stopped as the grim line returned to his mouth. “I’m not proposing, Wade. Really, I’m not! But will you at least let me help out once in a while? Will you come over for a meal now and then? Will you let me help Pierce with his birds and Lacey with her biology? Just until you’ve got things more settled?”
Wade studied her for a long time, but when he spoke there was a hint of amusement in his low tones. “Frankly, I’d be ecstatic if you’d take over Lacey’s biology. It’s a subject I detest, especially the dissecting. And you know very well that Pierce has never stopped questioning you about his collection, in spite of my protests.”
It was an admission, but Clarissa wanted more.
“And you’ll come for dinner? Tomorrow? No, Friday. You’ll let me help Tildy with her school cooking stuff?” She waited, her breath held till it hurt her chest.
“We’ll come for dinner on Saturday,” he finally agreed. “And I suppose it won’t hurt for Tildy to get some help, once in a while. But that’s all. Nothing more. You won’t drop over and clean the house or mend clothes or do the laundry.” His eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Do you promise you won’t pretend there’s something more going on when the busybodies start talking?”
“Of course not!” Clarissa was scandalized by the very idea. “I’m just a friend, and I’d like to help you out.”
“Fine. Then I’ll help out, too.” He sniffed. “Whatever’s cooking in that oven didn’t come from Tildy’s hands. In repayment for your assistance, I’ll fix your roof.”
“Oh, but it’s just a chicken pie!” She frowned, trying to imagine how much fixing her roof would cost him. “I didn’t expect you to—”
“Take it or leave it,” he warned, but there was a glint in his eye that warmed her heart. “If you help us, we help you. Friends.”
Her decision was unfairly influenced by the drop of rain on her nose. “I’ll take it. I’ve got to get going.”
“To put pails out, no doubt. You should have had it fixed months ago.” Wade shook his head as he surveyed the sorry condition of her weathered gables and red-rimmed turrets. “I’ll come over tomorrow and take a look.”
“You don’t have to—”
His look silenced her.
“All right. Thank you very much. I’ll be at the library till eight. We stay open late on Thursday.”
“I know. Believe me, I think I’ve been told everything about you.” He didn’t make it sound like a compliment.
“Really?” Clarissa frowned. “Like what?”
“You have this,” one finger trailed across her jaw where it curved up to meet her ear, touching the hairline scar, “because, at age six, you helped get Johnny McCabe out of a tumble-down barn. You broke this arm when Petey Somebody dared you to jump off a granary, and Sarah Kingsley stopped being your best friend when she stole