A Dad for Billie Read Free

open.”
    “Uhh, Mom?” Billie stared at the ground and shuffled her feet. That didn’t signal good news.
    “What have you lost, forgotten or broken now?”
    “A window.”
    Jane thought about the small amount of money they had to last them the summer. She wouldn’t start teaching until September and her first paycheck wasn’t due until almost the end of that month. Please, God, let the window be a small one, she thought as she turned to face her house. Maybe they could board it up for a few months. If it was on the side that faced Adam’s yard, all the better.
    “Where?”
    “There.”
    But Billie wasn’t pointing in their yard. Instead her small tanned arm thrust up toward the front of Adam’s house.
    “No,” Jane said. “Not—”
    “Yup. I was playing ball and it got away from me.”
    She glanced at Adam. He was studying her with that damned inscrutable expression of his. “All those times I ignored my mother when she told me to act like a lady are being paid back in spades. Sorry.”
    “No harm done,” he said. “Except for the glass, of course.”
    “Of course.” Was he making a joke? The great Adam Barrington risking humor? That wasn’t fair, she reminded herself. He’d always been witty and charming. She’d been the one out of her element.
    “It’s over here.” Billie walked ahead of them, past the frontporch and stepped close to the bed of flowers in front of the freshly painted white mansion.
    “Don’t step on the…roses,” she called as her daughter planted a tennis shoe squarely on a peach-colored blossom.
    “Tell me those aren’t still Charlene’s favorites,” she murmured half to herself.
    “They are.” Adam kept pace with her, stopping at her side when they reached the scene of the crime.
    “See,” Billie said, almost proudly. “It would have been a perfect pitch.”
    “Yeah. All that’s missing is the batter, the catcher, a few other players and the umpire.” Jane glanced up at Adam. He looked down at her. If she hadn’t been so tired and out of sorts, she might have thought there was a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, that the straight line didn’t look quite as straight as it had a minute ago.
    “It’s just this one pane.” Billie jumped up and pointed. Her landing crushed the rest of the rosebush. “Ow. It scratched me.”
    “Self-defense on the part of the plant. Let me see.” Jane bent down and brushed the skin. “You’ll live.”
    “I’m bleeding,” Billie said with a whine in her voice.
    “One drop. You won’t miss it. Besides, you killed that rose.”
    Billie stepped onto the grass and stared at the squashed bush. “Oh. Sorry.” She grabbed a stem, careful to hold it between thorns, and tried to straighten the broken plant. The stalk drooped to the ground. Crushed petals littered the soil. “It’s a goner.”
    Jane rose and looked at Adam. “I mean this in the nicest possible way, but tell me that Charlene is dead. Because if she isn’t, I’m about to be.”
    This time he did smile. The slow curve revealed perfect white teeth. Her heart fluttered madly against her ribs. She’d forgotten about his smile and how it made her feel that swooning was a lost art form.
    “Charlene is alive and well,” he said, his eyes crinkling in the corners. “She’ll be out for blood when she finds out about this. You know how she feels about her roses.”
    “There’s already been blood.” Billie marched up to them and pointed at her leg. “You guys are adults. I’m a kid. You’re supposedto get worried when kids bleed. And what about infection? You’re always making me wash my hands.”
    A single drop rolled down and stained her sock.
    “All right, let’s deal with the medical emergency.” Adam crouched down and pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket. He moistened the corner and blotted the tiny puncture. “It’s stopped bleeding. You should be able to keep the leg.”
    “Good.” Billie held on to his shoulder for balance.