Miss Liz's Passion. Sherryl Woods

shook with fury and anguish, she said, “Don’t patronize me, Mr. Lewis. I know exactly how hard it is to be a parent.”

      The words lingered in a moment of stunned silence before he said slowly, “You have a child?”

      He sounded as if the very thought of it were mind-boggling. If she hadn’t been hurting so at the flood of memories, she might have smiled at his startled expression. Instead, she simply shook her head.

      “But Kevin said—”

      “I had a child. She died when she was three. My husband died in the same accident. So don’t tell me about loss, Mr. Lewis. Or guilt. Or worrying. Or loving. I could write the textbook on every one of those emotions myself.”

      Chapter 4

      If Liz’s quietly spoken words stunned Todd, the stricken expression on her face was almost his undoing. She reminded him of a wounded doe. Her eyes turned bleak as her anger faded. As he watched, shadows of fear and dismay dimmed the sparkling amber to a dull, lifeless brown. He felt her loss as sharply as he’d once felt his own, recalling in vivid detail the emptiness of those painful weeks and months after Sarah had walked out of his life, the awful sense of betrayal, the hurt of rejection.

      But he’d had Kevin and, oblivious to his father’s grief and anger, four-year-old Kevin had filled the house with laughter and tears and impatient demands. For the last four years Kevin alone had kept the memory of love alive in Todd’s aching, embittered heart. Kevin had been the one thing left worth fighting for. That much had never changed. He would still fight tenaciously for his son.

      Liz had lost both husband and child. Todd couldn’t imagine anything to compare with that.

      “I’m sorry,” he said softly, wishing he knew more comforting words. For the first time in many years he cursed the inadequacies that had kept his vocabulary unpolished, his manner rough. He knew all the right words to keep a crew of a hundred or more men in line and on schedule. He knew just what to say to difficult suppliers or demanding tenants. He even knew the glib and easy words necessary for a casual seduction. But in the presence of this kind and wounded lady, he knew a fierce longing to be a truly gentle man with a gift for mending.