While he was gone, Shannon hung her parka in the hall closet and took the breakfast dishes out of the dishwasher.
When he and Finley returned to the kitchen a few minutes later, Finley was carrying a little laptop. Rory joined Shannon at the counter where she was forming the hamburgers. “She can play a game or two while we cook.” He pointed at the hamburgers. “How many of these should we make?”
“How many do you want?”
“I’ll eat two. Finley will eat one.”
“And I’ll eat one.” She glanced down at the plate. “We already have four. So it looks like we’re done.”
He nudged her aside. “I’ll take it from here. Usually I grill hamburgers, but I can use a frying pan, too.”
Shannon retrieved plates and utensils and stacked them on the table. She grabbed a handful of paper napkins and set them beside the plates.
Finley glanced up. “Can I help?”
Surprised, but not about to turn down help, Shannon said, “You can arrange the plates and silver while I start the French fries.”
Finley nodded. Shannon walked back to the refrigerator, removed the frozen fries and put them into the fryer.
Dinner conversation was very different from the quiet lunch. Finley chattered about how much fun she’d had sledding and how silly her dad looked on a sled. Rory reminded her that she didn’t think him silly the times he rode down the big hill with her and she giggled.
Shannon basked in the ordinariness of it. A happy little girl and her father who clearly adored her. They bantered back and forth as Rory cut her burger in half and poured ketchup for her fries.
Shannon took a bite of her own hamburger. Rory was a nice guy, with a big heart, trying to raise a daughter abandoned by her mother. She supposed that was why he’d pulled away rather than kiss her that afternoon. He was too busy to be looking for a romance. But as quickly as she thought that she reminded herself of her decision not to even ponder a romance with him anyway. She’d seen the expression on his face when he talked about having more kids. A son. No matter what he said or how busy he was, someday he’d want to remarry. He’d want that family. Those kids.
And she couldn’t have any.
The aching pain filled her as it always did when confronted by her barrenness. The loss. The unfairness.
For the first time in months she wanted to flirt. Wanted to be pretty to somebody—and she had to pull back.
For both of their sakes.
“WELL, SHE’S ASLEEP.” Rory plopped down on the sofa beside Shannon, who was pulling strands of tinsel through her fingers to untangle them. Supper had gone well. But after the dishes had been cleared, Finley had begun to nod off, so Rory had taken her for a bath. “She went out like a light the second her head hit the pillow.” Rolling his head across the sofa back, he smiled at her. “You’re great with her.”
Shannon laughed. “Not really. In case you didn’t notice my strategy, I simply kept her busy until she dropped from exhaustion.”
He laughed.
“I’m serious. She’s obviously a smart little girl. She bores easily. The trick to preventing tantrums might be simply keeping her busy.”
“I can’t always do that. I have a company to run. So it’s her nanny, Mrs. Perkins, who gets the brunt of her moods. Though she spends a lot of time entertaining Finley, there are days when Finley only wants me. If she breaks down and calls me and I come home, we feel like we’re rewarding Finley for bad behavior.”
“You are.” She turned her attention to her tangled tinsel again. She didn’t like to pry, but he needed help and now that she’d spent a little time with Finley, she realized she’d learned a great deal watching her friends and their children in South Carolina. “There are lots of things you can do to discipline her. The first is to get her accustomed to hearing the word no. But you have to be smart about it. If she’s tired or hungry, she won’t take well to it. If you don’t watch her mood, and discipline her when she’s not open, it’ll make things worse.”
He tweaked her hair. “How’d you get so smart?”
She shrugged. “I pay attention?”
He laughed. “Right.” He paused, obviously waiting for her to say more, and when she didn’t he said, “I’m serious. I’ve asked you this before, but you always blew me off. And I’m curious. Did you read a book or something? Because if you did, I’d like to get that book.”
“No book.” She ran some more tinsel through her fingers, once again debating how much to tell him. After a few seconds, she said, “When I lived in South Carolina with my ex, all of our friends had children. We’d be invited to picnics and outings and I’d see how they handled their kids. My husband really wanted children and I wanted to be a good mom. So I’d watch.” She laughed slightly at how stupid she probably sounded. “Technically, I spent my entire marriage watching other people raise kids.”
The room grew silent. Every pop and snap of the logs in the fireplace echoed in the quiet room.
Rory finally broke the silence. “So what happened?”
She peeked at him. “Happened?”
“To your marriage.”
Once again, she thought before answering. There was no way she’d tell him the truth. It was humiliating to be deserted by the man you loved on the day you needed him the most. Humiliating that a man who’d truly loved her couldn’t stay. Humiliating that she’d been abandoned for a physical defect.
Plus, Rory was in Green Hill to buy her store. They might be spending some personal time together because of the storm, but at the end of the weekend they would be business associates.
Still, they were stranded together and he’d told her some personal things. So she couldn’t totally ignore the question.
She ran the last of the first strand of tinsel through her fingers and began spooling it around her hand so it would be ready to hang the next day when Rory and Finley left.
“I suspect my ex was a little like your ex.”
He laughed. “Really?”
“He had very definite ideas of how he wanted his life.” She continued spooling so she didn’t have to look at him. “He wanted things to be a certain way. When we hit a point where I couldn’t make those things happen, he dumped me.”
He sat forward, dropped his clasped hands between his knees, then straightened again and caught her gaze. “I’m sorry your ex was a jerk.”
“I’m sorry your marriage didn’t work out.”
Once again silence reigned and unspoken thoughts rippled through her brain. He was a nice guy and, at her core, Finley was a sweet little girl. She’d give anything to have had a good husband and a beautiful child. Anything.
Rory leaned toward her and her heart expanded in her chest. They were only a foot apart. A shift forward by him, a shift forward by her and their lips could touch.
But uncertainty leaped in the dark depths of his deep brown eyes. Though he didn’t say a word, she knew the litany undoubtedly rattling through his head right now. They were both wounded. He had a child. And as soon as they got out of his storm, they’d be doing business. They shouldn’t get involved.
He pulled back, away from her, confirming her suspicions, and disappointment shuddered through her.
He rose. “I guess I’d better head off to bed myself. I’ll see you in the morning.”
She