He stared at her, this attractive, accomplished young woman who seemed so very sure of herself. When she’d made a similar speech in his office, he’d thought she was talking only about Jaye. But now he was certain there was more to what she was saying. She had layers, and one of them had peeled away as she made a case for Jaye.
“Is that what music did for you?” he whispered. “Gave you a refuge from your troubles?”
A shutter closed over her face. “We’re not talking about me. We’re talking about Jaye.” She nodded toward his niece. “Punish her some other way,” she said in an urgent tone, “but don’t take the violin away from her.”
He glanced at Jaye. The girl’s small chin was still raised stubbornly, but she was blinking rapidly, as though fighting tears.
“If we don’t hurry, we’ll miss the start of the performance.” Abby leveled him with another of her challenging looks. “Are you and Jaye coming?”
She expected him to say no. He could see the resignation in her eyes, as though she believed he couldn’t possibly understand that nurturing Jaye’s love of music could benefit her.
“Yeah, we’re coming,” he said, enjoying her look of surprise. In a louder voice, he called to Jaye, “C’mon, Jaye. We don’t want to miss the beginning of the concert.”
The child’s defiant expression lifted, replaced by hope. “Do you mean I can go?”
“As long as you understand this is the last place you’ll be going all week. You’re grounded, young lady. You also have to sit next to me and promise to behave yourself.”
She seemed about to protest, but then nodded. Walking past Connor, Jaye told her teacher, “Thanks, Miss Reed.”
Abby smiled, transforming her face from merely attractive to beautiful. Connor wondered if she’d ever smile at him that way.
“You’re welcome,” she said and took the girl’s hand. “But now we have to dash if we’re going to make it on time.”
Connor followed them into the Kennedy Center as they hurried down the red carpet of the Hall of Nations past the walls draped with the colorful flags of foreign countries en route to the Concert Hall.
Before Abby had pleaded for Jaye outside the Kennedy Center, he’d thought of the teacher mainly as a nuisance to bear. But something had changed in that instant when she’d pleaded his niece’s case and he’d gotten an inadvertent glimpse into her soul.
This was a complicated woman, with hidden depths that made her the most interesting person he’d met in a very long time. The passion she could interject into a simple sentence got his juices flowing the way no woman had for as long as he could remember.
Somewhere along the line, the annoyance she’d inspired had turned to attraction. Abby Reed was somebody he’d very much like to know better. A hell of a lot better.
“THAT WAS TOTALLY AWESOME. Wasn’t that totally awesome, Miss Reed?”
Jaye Smith didn’t try to contain her excitement as the bus barreled away from the Kennedy Center north on New Hampshire Avenue toward Silver Spring.
“Totally awesome,” Abby agreed. The only thing that had prevented Abby from completely sharing in her enthusiasm had been the feel of Connor Smith’s eyes on her throughout the performance.
She’d ensured he didn’t sit next to her by positioning him at the flank of the group of students. But every time she’d turned her head, she’d caught him looking at her.
She wasn’t sure why she noticed. He was exactly the kind of man who didn’t interest her. Even though she gravitated toward the world of music, she wasn’t drawn to the sophisticated, moneyed sort of male who inhabited that world. The men she’d dated in the past had been simpler, the sort who took her to a pizza place for dinner and ordered beer.
Despite his earlier attempt on the bus to portray himself to Mr. Greeley as the common man, Connor Smith seemed like he’d order champagne. Probably at a five-star restaurant. He’d given in and allowed Jaye to come to the concert, but she had a dozen other reasons to dislike him. The way he put his work before his daughter, for one. He’d left the performance at one point to take a call. The phone hadn’t rung, but she’d seen him remove the slim device from the pocket of his suit jacket and check a number.
She turned her head. Connor was sitting two rows behind the seat she shared with Jaye on the opposite side of the aisle. Their eyes locked, and she quickly broke the contact.
“I’ll never be able to play like that.”
She transferred her full attention to the girl, dismayed at how quickly the excitement had leeched from her voice. “Why would you say that, Jaye?”
“Didn’t you hear them? They were totally awesome.”
“If you want it bad enough, you could be awesome, too.”
The eyes that raised to hers looked hopeful. “You really think so?”
“I really think so. But you’d have to put your mind to it and practice hard.”
The hope disappeared from Jaye’s face in another lightning-quick change of moods. “I’m not allowed to practice.”
“Oh, I can’t believe that,” Abby said. “I’ve never heard of a parent who didn’t encourage their child to practice.”
“Mine doesn’t.” Jaye’s mouth set in an obstinate line. “And he was really mad about me singing on the bus. He says he’s going to punish me. He’ll probably take away my violin.”
“He won’t do that, Jaye.”
“How do you know?”
Abby hesitated. “I’ve talked to him. He seems like a reasonable man.”
“He locks me in my room without supper,” she announced. “And he makes me go to sleep at seven o’clock.”
Jaye’s pronouncements reeked of exaggeration, however tempted Abby was to believe the worst of Connor Smith. By the same token, Abby could tell that father and daughter were not as close as they should be. That was evident in the rebellious slant of Jaye’s mouth.
She tried to put herself in Jaye’s position. After all, she’d grown up without a parent, too. But in Abby’s case, that parent had been her father and he’d been absent by choice. It was far worse to be forced to deal with the death of a mother. Especially at Jaye’s young age.
She was no guidance counselor, but she longed to help the girl. She couldn’t do that without more information. All Jaye had told her so far was that her mother had succumbed to cancer. “How long has your mother been gone?”
Jaye sniffed. “About a month.”
Abby bit her lip. She’d known the loss had been recent but hadn’t realized how recent. “How long had it been before then that you’d seen your father?”
“A long time,” Jaye said. “Years.”
“One or two years?” Abby pressed.
“More.” Jaye turned her face away and stared out the bus window. They were passing through a particularly lovely section of northwest D.C. Rock Creek Park was immediately to the west, and large colonial and Tudor-style houses lined the street, their lawns losing the dullness of winter and starting to turn a richer shade of green. Abby doubted Jaye saw any of it. “Mom and I lived in Tennessee.”
Physical distance, in Abby’s opinion, was no reason to keep emotionally distant from a child. Especially when it was your own. But she was jumping to conclusions without all the facts. She didn’t know for certain that Connor Smith hadn’t kept