eorgeanne hadn’t meant to agree to John’s vacation plans. She’d meant to remain firm in her opposition to Cannon beach. She would have, too, if it weren’t for Lexie and her interest in her fictional daddy, Anthony.

The day after they’d gone sailing near the San Juan Islands, Lexie’s questions started. Perhaps watching Charles with Amber had triggered her curiosity. Perhaps it was her age. Periodically Lexie had always asked about Anthony, but for the first time, Georgeanne tried to answer without prevarication. Then she’d called John and told him they’d meet him in Oregon. If Lexie was going to have a relationship with John, then she needed to spend time with him before she was told that he was her daddy. Now as Georgeanne drove toward the city of Cannon Beach, she hoped she wasn’t making a colossal mistake. John had promised her that he wouldn’t try to provoke her, but she didn’t really believe him.

“I’ll be on my best behavior,” he’d promised.

Yeah. Right. And elephants roosted in trees.

She looked over at her daughter belted in the seat next to her. While Lexie meticulously colored a picture of a Muppet Baby, her black smiley-face ball cap shaded her forehead and her kiddie blue sunglasses covered her eyes. It was Saturday, so her lips were painted a vivid red. And at last, those little red lips were stilled, and quiet filled the inside of the Hyundai.

The trip had started out pleasant enough, but then somewhere around Tacoma, Lexie had started to sing... and sing... and sing. She’d sung the only verse she knew of “Puff the Magic Dragon” and all verses of “Where Is Thumbkin?” She’d belted out the words to “Deep in the Heart of Texas” and had clapped as enthusiastically as any proud Texan. Unfortunately she sang it clear to Astoria.

Just when Georgeanne had finished calculating the number of years before she could ship Lexie safely off to college, the singing had stopped and Georgeanne had felt like a horrible mother for visually kicking Lexie from the nest.

But then the questions began. “Are we there yet?”

“How much longer?”

“Where are we?”

“Did you remember to pack blankie?” From Astoria to Seaside, she’d become worried about where she was going to sleep and the number of bathrooms in John’s house. She couldn’t remember if she’d packed her press-on fingernails, and she fretted over whether she’d brought enough Barbies to play with for five whole days. She did remember her beach toys, but what if it rained the whole time? And she wondered if there were kids in his neighborhood, how many and how old?

Now as Georgeanne drove through Cannon Beach, she was reminded of dozens of other artsy communities that dotted the coastal Northwest. Studios and cafes and gift shops lined the main street. The storefronts wore subdued shades of blues and grays and foamy greens, and whales and starfish were painted everywhere. The sidewalks were filled with tourists, and colorful flags fluttered in the always present breeze.

She glanced at the digital clock above the radio in the dash of her car. She had been raised on punctuality and usually arrived on schedule, but today she was early by about a half hour. Somewhere between Tacoma and Gearhart, her foot got real heavy on the accelerator. Somewhere between the first round of “Where Is Thumbkin?” and “Are we there yet?” she’d gassed the Hyundai up past eighty-five. The possibility of getting stopped by a cop and given a ticket hadn’t concerned her. In fact, she would have welcomed the adult conversation.

She looked at the map John had drawn for her and drove past weathered homes sandwiched between beachside resorts. She slowed to read his bold, scrawling handwriting, then she turned onto a heavily shaded street and drove straight ahead as instructed and easily found the house. She pulled her Hyundai next to John’s dark green Range Rover parked in the driveway of a white single-story house with a steep roof of wooden shingles. Gnarled pine and acacia shaded the wood porch, stained a light gray. She left the luggage in the car and, with Lexie’s hand in hers, walked to the front door. With each step Georgeanne’s heart picked up its pace. With each step her concern that she was making a big mistake grew.

She rang the bell and knocked several times. No one answered. Looking at the map, she read it carefully again. If she’d drawn it herself, she would have felt the familiar uncertainty that usually sat on her chest when she feared she’d transposed numbers again.

“Maybe he’s takin‘ a nap,” Lexie suggested. “Maybe we should go in and wake him up.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Georgeanne looked at the numbers on the house once more, then she moved to the mailbox nailed to the house and opened the top. She peered inside and hoped neither a neighbor nor a gun-toting postal employee was watching. She pulled out a business reply card addressed to John.

“Do you think he forgot?” Lexie asked.

“I hope not,” Georgeanne answered as she turned the handle and opened the door. What if he had forgotten? she asked herself. What if he was somewhere in the house asleep? Or taking a shower—with a woman? She knew she was a little early; what if he was in bed, his body entwined with some gullible woman?

“John?” she called out, and stepped into the entry-way. Her feet sank into plush carpeting the color of champagne, and with Lexie following close behind, Georgeanne walked into the living room. She immediately realized that the house was not a single story as it appeared from the front. To her left, steps led downward, while to her right a second set went up to an open loft above the dining room. The house was built into the hillside overlooking the beach and ocean, and the entire back wall was made of massive windows framed with bleached oak. Three matching skylights dominated the ceiling above the living room.

“Wow,” Lexie gasped as she spun around in a circle. “Is John rich?”

“It looks that way, doesn’t it?” The furnishings were modern and made primarily of bleached wood and iron. An overstuffed sectional, upholstered in deep blue, was angled to take in the view of the ocean or the fireplace on the left wall. Above the mantel hung a large picture of John’s grandfather standing next to one of those big blue fish tourists catch off the coast of Florida. It had been a long time since Georgeanne had seen Ernie, but she easily recognized him.

“I wonder if John fell down somewhere.” Lexie moved toward one of three sliding glass doors off the living and dining rooms. “Maybe he broke his leg or got a cut.”

Together the two of them moved to the doors and looked out on a wraparound deck which went down to the beach. Beyond the deck, Haystack Rock jutted toward the clear blue sky. Seabirds circled and hovered above the green vegetation clinging to the top half of the enormous rock while their continuous squawks mingled with the crash of waves.

“John!” Lexie called out in a raised voice. “Where are you?”

Georgeanne opened the sliding door and let in a breeze heavy with the scents of salt water and seaweed and the sounds of the sea. She stepped out onto the deck, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. Maybe spending the week in such a beautiful house on such a wonderful piece of real estate wasn’t going to be such a hardship after all. If she didn’t let John charm her into moving him up further on her likable scale, and if he kept his lips to himself, then perhaps this trip wouldn’t turn into a big mistake.

Beneath her feet, Georgeanne felt a heavy thud, thud, thud through the soles of her espadrilles. She heard the steady thumping of footsteps pounding up the stairs, and her insides got a little mushy. Then John emerged one slice at a time. A pair of yellow headphones was strapped across his sweat-dampened hair, and the lower half of his face was covered with a dark shadow of a beard. Next came his wide shoulders and powerful chest. He wore a loose-fitting mesh tank top that looked like he’d hacked off the bottom with a pair of hedge trimmers. Georgeanne wondered why he’d even bothered to wear it. His stomach was flat and bare except for short, dark hair swirling around his navel, then disappearing like the shaft of an arrow into his navy running shorts. He had thighs thick with muscle, and his legs were long and tanned.

“You’re early,” she heard him say as he tried to catch his breath. She looked up as he pushed his headphones to circle his neck. He glanced at his sports watch turned backward on his wrist. “If I’d known, I would have been here.”

“Sorry,” she said, refusing to blush at the sight of him. She was an adult. She could handle a hot, sweaty, half-naked man. She could certainly handle John Kowalsky—no problem. She just had to think of him as one big bad hair day. Uncooperative, annoying, and real messy. “My foot got a little heavy on the gas petal,” she explained.

“How long have you been here?” He reached for a white towel hanging on the rail. He dried his face and hair as if he’d just gotten out of the shower, then his whole head disappeared beneath the thick cotton.

“Just a few minutes.”

“Umm, we thought you fell down and hurt yourself,” Lexie informed him, distracted by the sight of his stomach. Up to this point in her life, she’d never been close to a half-dressed man. She stared at all that skin and hair and took a step forward to get a better look. “I thought maybe you broke your leg or got a cut,” she said.

His head poked out from beneath the towel. He looked a Lexie and smiled. “Did you get a Band-Aid ready just in case?” he asked as he slid the towel around his neck, holding on to the ends with both hands.

She shook her head. “You gots a hairy tummy, John. Really hairy!” she said, then turned to the railing, her short attention drawn to the activity on the beach below.

He looked down and placed a big hand on his hard abdomen. “I don’t think I’m that bad,” he said as he rubbed his palm across his stomach. “I know guys who are a lot worse. At least I don’t have hair on my back.”

Georgeanne watched his hand slide lower on his abdomen, his long fingers slipping through short hair, and memories shimmering in her head like a mirage. She remembered a night a long time ago when she’d touched him, when she’d felt him warm and virile beneath her hands.

“What are you looking at, Georgeanne?”

She raised her gaze up his chest to his eyes. She’d been caught. She could act mortified and guilty or lie. “I was checking out your shoes.”

He chuckled silently. “You were checking out my package.”

Or she could admit it. “It was a long drive.” She shrugged. “I’ll go get our things out of the car.”

John stepped in front of her. “I’ll get your stuff.”

“Thank you.”

He slid the door open. “You’re welcome,” he said though an arrogant smile, and walked across the living room.

“Hey, John!” Lexie hollered, and ran past her mother, leaving Georgeanne to follow behind them both. “I brung my roller skates. And guess what.”

“What?”

“My mom bought me new Barbie knee pads.”

“Barbie?”

“Yeah.”

He opened the front door. “Cool.”

“And guess what else.”

“What?”

“I gots new sunglasses.” She took the blue frames from the bridge of her nose and held them up in the air. “See?”

John turned toward her. “Hey, those are real nice.” He stopped and stared into her face. “Are you going to wear all that purple stuff while you’re here?” he asked, referring to her liberal application of eye shadow.

She nodded. “I get to wear it on Saturdays and Sundays.”

He walked to the back of the Hyundai and said, “Maybe, since you’re on vacation, you could take a break from wearing all that makeup.”

“No way. I like it. It’s my most favorite thing.”

“I thought dogs and cats were your most favorite.”

“Well, makeup is my most favorite thing that I can have.”

His sigh was heavy with resignation as he took two suitcases and a duffel bag of toys from the backseat of the car. “Is this all?” he asked.

Georgeanne smiled and unlocked the trunk.

“Jesus,” John swore as he stared at three more suitcases, two yellow rain slickers, one big umbrella, and a Barbie Beauty Parlor. “Did you pack your whole house?”

“This has been condensed several times since the original load,” she told him, and reached for the jackets and umbrella. “Please don’t swear in front of Lexie.”

“Did I swear?” John asked, looking innocent.

Georgeanne nodded.

Lexie giggled and grabbed her Barbie Beauty Parlor.

Georgeanne and Lexie followed him back into the house and downstairs. He showed them to a guest room decorated in shades of beige and green, then he left to retrieve their luggage. When he’d carried in all their things, he gave a quick tour of the lower floor. A room filled with free weights and exercise equipment separated the guest room from the master bedroom.

“I need to take a shower,” John told them as they headed into the hall after Lexie’s inspection of all three bathrooms. “When I get out, we can go look in tide pools if you want.”

“Why don’t you meet us down there,” Georgeanne suggested, wanting to take advantage of the sunbreak while it lasted, before the skies clouded and became overcast.

“Sounds good. Do you need beach towels?”

Georgeanne had never been a Girl Scout but was usually prepared for anything and everything. She’d brought her own. After John left them, Lexie and Georgeanne changed. Lexie slipped into her pink and purple plaid two-piece swimsuit, then pulled her Don’t Mess With Texas T-shirt over her head. Georgeanne changed into a pair of orange and yellow tie-dyed drawstring shorts, a matching halter that left her abdomen bare, and because she felt a bit too exposed, she slipped her arms into a light cotton blouse. The yellow fabric fell past her behind and she left it unbuttoned. Both she and Lexie shoved their feet into Teva sandals, grabbed beach towels and sunscreen, then headed outside.

By the time John joined them on the beach, Lexie had found a broken sand dollar, half a shell, and a little crab claw. She put them in her pink pail and crouched down beside Georgeanne to inspect a sea anemone stuck to one of many small rocks exposed by the low tide.

“Touch it,” Georgeanne told her. “It’s sticky.”

Lexie shook her head. “I know it’s sticky, but I don’t like to touch ‘em.”

“It won’t bite you,” John told her, casting a shadow over the two of them.

Georgeanne glanced up and slowly stood. John had shaved and changed into beige cargo shorts and an olive T-shirt. He looked clean and casual, but too rough and too sensuous to ever look completely respectable. “I think she’s afraid it will grab her finger and won’t let go.” Georgeanne said.

“No, I’m not,” Lexie objected, and shook her head again. She scrambled to her feet and pointed to Haystack Rock about a hundred feet away. “I want to go there.”

Together the three of them picked their way toward the huge formation. John helped Lexie jump from rock to rock, and when the terrain got a little rough for her short legs, he picked Lexie up and swung her up on his shoulders as effortlessly as if she weighed nothing.

Lexie grabbed the sides of John’s head, and her pail swung and hit him on his right cheek. “Mommy, I’m high!” she shrieked.

John and Georgeanne looked at each other and laughed. “Just what every mother longs to hear,” she said.

When their laughter died and was drowned out by the sound of waves, John’s smile remained. “I was beginning to think that you only wore dresses or skirts,” he said as he reached up to wrap his hands around Lexie’s ankles.

She wasn’t surprised he’d noticed. He was that kind of guy. “I don’t usually wear shorts or pants.”

“Why?”

Georgeanne didn’t really want to answer that question. Lexie, however, had no problem providing personal information. “Because she has a big bum.”

John looked up at Lexie, his eye squinted against the sun. “Really?”

Lexie nodded. “Yep. That’s what she says all the time.”

Georgeanne felt her face flush. “Let’s not discuss it.”

Reaching for the hem of her yellow shirt, John raised the back and tilted his head to the side for a better look. “It doesn’t look big,” he said as casually as if they were discussing the weather. “Looks pretty good to me.”

Georgeanne felt a little foolish for the ember of pleasure in the pit of her stomach. She batted his hand away and pulled the bottom of her shirt down. “Well, it is,” she said, then she stepped around John and walked ahead of him and Lexie. She remembered what had happened seven years ago when he’d turned her head with his smooth compliments. Every southern girl dreamed of being a beauty queen, and with very little effort, he’d made her feel like Miss Texas. She’d eagerly jumped in his bed. Now, as she walked around a medium-sized boulder, she reminded herself that while he could be charming, he could also get real nasty.

Once they reached the base of the rock, the three of them explored. John set Lexie back on her feet, and together they examined the usual variety of ocean life. The sky remained cloudless and the day beautiful.

Georgeanne watched John and Lexie together. She watched them discover orange and purple starfish, mussels, and more sticky anemone. She watched their dark heads bent over a tide pool and tried to bury her insecurities.

“It’s lost,” Lexie said as Georgeanne crouched down next to her beside the tide pool.

“What is?” she asked.

Lexie pointed to a little brown and black fish swimming beneath the surface of the clear, cold water. “It’s a baby and its mommy is gone.”

“I don’t think it’s a baby,” John told her. “I think it’s just a small fish.”

She shook her head. “No, John. It’s a baby, all right.”

“Well, once the tide comes back in, its mommy can come and get it,” Georgeanne assured her daughter, attempting to stop Lexie before she got too agitated. When it came to orphans, Lexie was known to get very emotional.

“No.” She shook her head again and her chin quivered as she said, “Its mommy is lost, too.”

Because Lexie had only known the security of one parent, and she had no other family besides Mae, Georgeanne had to carefully screen Lexie’s movies and videos to make sure that every child and animal had a mother or a father. On her last birthday Georgeanne had let Lexie convince her that she was old enough to watch the movie Babe. Major mistake. Lexie had cried for a week afterward. “Its mommy isn’t lost. When the tide comes back in, it can go home.”

“No, mommies don’t leave their babies unless they’re lost. The little fish can’t ever go home now.” She rested her forehead on her knee. “It’s gonna die without its mommy.” She squeezed her eyes shut and a tear ran down her nose.

Georgeanne gazed across Lexie’s bent head toward John. He stared back with a desperate look in his deep blue eyes. He clearly expected her to do something. “I’m sure its daddy is out there swimming around looking for it.”

Lexie wasn’t buying. “Daddies don’t take care of babies.”

“Sure they do,” John said. “If I were a daddy fish, I’d be out there looking for my baby.”

Turning her head, Lexie looked at John for a few moments, weighing his words in her mind. “Would you look until you found it?”

“Absolutely.” He glanced at Georgeanne, then back at Lexie. “If I knew I had a baby, I’d look forever.”

Lexie sniffed and stared back into the clear water. “What if it dies before the tide comes back?”

“Hmm.” John reached for Lexie’s bucket, dumped out her shells, and scooped the tiny fish inside.

“What are you doing?” Lexie asked as the three of them stood.

“Taking your little fish to its daddy,” he said, and turned toward the tide. “Stay here with your mother.”

Georgeanne and Lexie stood on a flat rock and watched John wade out into the surf. Gentle waves swept up his thighs, and she heard his gasp as the cold water soaked the bottom of his shorts. He looked about him, and after a few moments, he carefully lowered the pail into the ocean.

“Do you think it found the daddy fish?” Lexie asked anxiously.

Georgeanne stared at the big man with the little pink pail and said, “Oh, I’m certain he did.”

He walked back toward them. A smile on his face. John “The Wall” Kowalsky, big bad hockey player, hero of small girls and guardian of tiny fish, had just sneaked past Bad Hair Day on her likable scale.

“Did you find him?” Lexie jumped off the rock and waded in up to her knees.

“Yep, and boy, was he happy to see his baby.”

“How did you know it was the daddy?”

John gave Lexie her pail, then took her little hand in his. “Because they look alike.”

“Oh, yeah.” She nodded. “What did he do when he saw his baby?”

He stopped in front of the rock where Georgeanne stood and looked up at her. “Well, he jumped up in the air, and then he swam around and around his little fish just to make sure it was all right.”

“I saw him do that.”

John laughed and little lines appeared at the corners of his eyes. “Really? From clear over here?”

“Yep. I’m gettin‘ my towel ’cause I’m freezin‘,” she announced, then took off up the beach.

Georgeanne looked into his face and matched his smile with her own. “How does it feel to be a hero?” she asked.

John grabbed Georgeanne’s waist and easily lifted her from the rock. Her hands grasped his shoulders as he lowered her feet into the frigid surf. Waves swirled about her calves and the breeze tousled her hair. “Am I your hero?” he asked, his voice gone all low and silky. Dangerous.

“No.” She dropped her hands from his hard shoulders and took a step backward. He was a big, powerful man, and yet he was very gentle and caring with Lexie. He was slicker than an oil spill, and if she wasn’t careful, he could make her forget the painful past. “I don’t like you, remember?”

“Uh-huh.” His smile told her he didn’t believe her for a minute. “Do you remember the time we were together on the beach in Copalis?”

She turned toward shore and spotted Lexie bundled up on the beach. “What about it?”

“You told me you hated me, and look what happened.” As they walked through the surf, he looked at her out of the corners of his eyes.

“Then it’s a good thing you find me completely resistible.”

He glanced at her chest, then turned his gaze toward the shore. “Yeah, good thing.”

When the three of them got back to the house, John insisted on making lunch. They sat at the dining room table and ate shrimp cocktail, slices of fresh fruit, and pita bread filled with crab salad. While Georgeanne and Lexie helped John put things away, she spied a deli sack stuck back in the corner by his answering machine.

By four o’clock the morning spent in the car with Lexie and the anxiety of the trip left Georgeanne exhausted. She found a soft chaise lounge on the deck and curled up with Lexie in her lap. John took the chair next to her, and the three of them stared out at the ocean, content with the world. She didn’t have anywhere to go or anything to do. She savored the calmness of it all. Although she couldn’t say that the man sitting next to her was relaxing company—John was too big a presence and there was too much painful history between them for that—this house on the coast went a long way toward making up for the strained moments when he did his best to provoke her.

The peaceful sounds and the soft breeze lulled Georgeanne to sleep, and when she awoke, she was alone. A handcrafted blanket with shells on it covered her legs. She pushed it aside, stood, and stretched the kinks from her bones. Voices from the beach rose on the breeze, and she moved to the rail and leaned over the edge. John and Lexie weren’t on the beach. She pulled her hand back and a sharp sliver stabbed the soft pad of her middle finger. Her finger throbbed, but she had a more pressing concern.

Georgeanne really didn’t think John would take Lexie anywhere without talking to her about it first. But he wasn’t the sort of man who would think he needed her permission. If he’d left with her daughter, then Georgeanne figured she had a right to kill him and consider it justifiable homicide. But in the end, she didn’t have to kill him. She found both Lexie and John downstairs in the weight room.

John sat on a fancy exercise bike in the corner, pedaling at a steady pace. His gaze was lowered to Lexie, who lay on the floor, her hands behind her head and one dirty little foot resting on her bent knee.

“How come you gotta ride that so fast?” Lexie asked him.

“It helps my stamina,” he answered above the soft whirring of the front wheel. He still wore the olive T-shirt he’d worn earlier, and for one short second, Georgeanne let her gaze travel to his strong thighs and calves, and she took in the pleasure of watching him.

“What’s stamina?”

“It’s endurance. The stuff a guy needs so that he doesn’t run out of steam and let the young guys kick his ass all over the ice.”

Lexie gasped. “You did it again.”

“What?”

“You swore.”

“I did?”

“Yep.”

“Sorry. I’ll work on it.”

“That’s what you said last time,” Lexie complained from her position on the floor.

He smiled. “I’ll do better, Coach.”

Lexie was quiet for a moment before she said, “Guess what.”

“What?”

“My mom gots a bike like that.” She pointed in John’s direction. “ ‘Cept I don’t think she rides it.”

Georgeanne’s exercise bicycle wasn’t like John’s. It wasn’t as expensive, and Lexie was right, she didn’t ride it anymore. In fact, she never really had ridden it. “Hey,” she said as she stepped into the room, “I use that bike all the time. It has a very important job as a shirt hanger.”

Lexie turned her head and smiled. “We’re working out. I rode first and now it’s John’s turn.”

John looked over at her. The bicycle pedals stopped, but the wheel kept spinning. “Yes. I can see that,” she said, wishing she’d brushed her hair before she’d found them. She was sure she looked scary.

John didn’t agree. She looked tousled and flushed from sleep. Her voice a bit lower than normal. “How was your nap?”

“I hadn’t even known I was that tired.” She combed her fingers through her hair and shook her head.

“Well, keeping up with the twists and turns of a certain little mind is exhausting,” he said, and wondered if she was doing that hair-shaking stuff on purpose.

“Very.” Georgeanne walked over to Lexie and held out a hand to help her to her feet. “Let’s go find something to do and let John finish.”

“I am finished,” he said as he stood, keeping his eyes above chest level and trying not to stare like a schoolboy at her cleavage. He really didn’t want her to catch him ogling her body and think he was some kind of perverted bastard. She was the mother of his child, and although she never really said anything specific, he knew she didn’t have a very high opinion of him as it was. Maybe he deserved her low opinion. Maybe not. “Actually, I wasn’t going to do this today, but Lexie and I got a little bored waiting for you. It was either ride the exercise bike or play Barbie Beauty Parlor.”

“I can’t see you playing Barbies.”

“That makes two of us.” But there was just one problem with his good intentions; the halter top she wore was sapping his willpower. Kind of like Superman and kryptonite. “Lexie and I have been talking about finding some oysters for dinner.”

“Oysters?” Georgeanne turned her attention to Lexie. “You won’t like oysters.”

“Yeah-huh. John said I would.”

Georgeanne didn’t argue, but an hour later as they sat in a seafood restaurant, Lexie took one look at the picture of oysters on the menu and wrinkled her nose. “That’s yucky,” she said. When their waitress approached the table, Lexie ordered a toasted cheese sandwich on “fresh” bread, fries on a separate plate, and Heinz ketchup.

The waitress turned her attention to Georgeanne, and John sat back and observed the power of her southern charm and megawatt smile.

“I know you’re very busy, and I know from experience that your job is thankless and extremely hectic, but you look like a sweetheart, and I was so hoping I might make just a few little changes,” she began, her voice oozing compassion for the woman and her “thankless” job. By the time she was finished, she’d ordered salmon with a “lemon-chive brown-butter sauce” that wasn’t even on the menu. She substituted new potatoes for the rice, with “no butter, just a dash of salt, and a pinch of chives.” She ordered her cantaloupe served on a separate plate because “cantaloupe should never be served warm.” John half expected the woman to tell Georgeanne to go to hell, but she didn’t. The waitress seemed only too happy to change the menu for Georgeanne.

Compared to his two female companions, John’s order was extremely easy. Oysters on the half shell. Nothing extra. Nothing on the side. As soon as the waitress left, he looked across the table at the two females with him. Both wore light summer dresses. Georgeanne’s matched the green of her eyes. Lexie’s matched the blue of her eye shadow. He tried not to frown, but he hated to see all that makeup on his little girl. It was embarrassing and made him grateful for the darkness of the booth.

“Are you gonna eat those?” Lexie asked once their food arrived. She leaned forward, fascinated yet repulsed by his dinner.

“Yep.” He reached for a half shell and raised it to his lips. “Mmm,” he said, then sucked the oyster into his mouth and down his throat.

Lexie squealed, and Georgeanne looked a little squeamish and turned her attention to her salmon with lemon-chive brown-butter sauce.

The rest of the meal progressed fairly well. They chatted with a bit less tension than usual, but the ease of the evening ended when the waitress set the check next to him. Georgeanne reached for it, but he stopped her with his hand. Her eyes met his across the table, and she looked like a woman who wanted to drop the gloves and fight for the check.

“I’ll get it,” she said.

“Don’t make me get rough with you,” he warned, and squeezed her hand. He wasn’t opposed to the match, just the arena.

Rather than argue, she let him win, but the look she gave him said she clearly meant to discuss it again later when they were alone.

On the way home from the restaurant, Lexie fell asleep in the backseat of John’s Range Rover. He carried her into the house, feeling her warm breath on the side of his neck. He would have liked to hold her longer, but he didn’t. He would have liked to stay while Georgeanne got her ready for bed, but he felt a little funny about it and left.

Georgeanne watched John leave and reached for Lexie’s shoes. She dressed Lexie in her pajamas and put her to bed. Then she went in search of John. She wanted to ask him about tweezers for the sliver in her finger, and she needed to talk to him about the money he was spending on her and Lexie. She wanted him to stop. She could pay for herself. And she could pay for Lexie, too.

She found John standing at the bank of windows, staring out at the ocean. His hands were shoved in the front pockets of his jeans. The sleeves of his denim shirt were rolled up his forearms, and the setting sun cast him in a fiery glow, making him appear bigger than life. When she entered the room, he turned to face her.

“I need to talk to you about something,” she said as she walked toward him, bracing herself for an argument.

“I know what you’re going to say, and if it will keep that scowl off your pretty forehead, then you can pick up the check next time.”

“Oh.” She stopped in front of him. She’d won before she’d begun, and felt somewhat deflated. “How did you know that’s what I wanted to talk about?”

“You’ve been frowning at me since the waitress placed the check by my plate. For a few seconds I thought you really were going to leap across the table and wrestle me for it.”

For a few seconds she had thought of it, too. “I would never wrestle in public.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” In the gray wash of approaching night, she saw a corner of his mouth lift slightly. “‘Cause I could take you.”

“Maybe,” she said, unwilling to concede. “Do you have a pair of tweezers?”

“What are you going to do, pluck my eyebrows?”

“No. I have a sliver.”

John walked into the dining room and flipped on the light above the pedestal table. “Let me see it.”

Georgeanne didn’t follow. “It’s no big deal.”

“Let me see it,” he repeated.

With a sigh, she gave up and walked into the dining room. She held out her hand and showed him her middle finger.

“That’s not too bad,” he announced.

She leaned closer for a better look, and their foreheads almost touched. “It’s huge.”

A frown lowered his brows. “I’ll be right back,” he said, and left the room, only to return with a pair of tweezers. “Have a seat.”

“I can do it myself.”

“I know you can.” He turned a chair backward and straddled it. “But I can get it out easier because I can use both hands.” He placed his forearms on the top rung and motioned to another chair. “I promise I won’t hurt you.”

Warily she took a seat and shoved her hand toward him, purposely keeping an arm’s length between them. John closed the short distance by scooting his chair until her knees touched the back of the wooden seat, so close that she had to press her legs together so they wouldn’t brush the insides of his thighs. She leaned back as far as she could, He took her hand in his palm and squeezed the pad of her middle finger.

“Ouch.” She tried to pull free, but he tightened his grasp.

He glanced up at her. “That didn’t hurt, Georgie.”

“Yes, it did!”

He didn’t argue, but he didn’t let go either. He lowered his gaze and poked at her skin with the tweezers.

“Ouch.”

Once again he lifted his gaze and looked at her over their joined hands. “Baby.”

“Jerk.”

He laughed and shook his head. “If you weren’t such a girly girl, this wouldn’t be so bad.”

“Girly girl? What’s a girly girl?”

“Look in the mirror.”

That didn’t tell her much. She tried to pull her hand back again.

“Just relax,” he said as he continued to work at the sliver. “You look like you’re about to jump out of your chair. What do you think I’m going to do, stab you with a pair of tweezers?”

“No.”

“Than relax, it’s almost out.”

Relax? He was so close he took up all the space. There was only John with his callused palm cupping her hand and his dark head bent over the tips of her fingers. He was so close she could feel the warmth of his thighs through his jeans and the thin cotton of her kiwi-colored dress. John had such a strong presence that relaxing with him so close was impossible. She raised her gaze from the side part in his hair and looked across the living room. Ernie and his big blue fish stared back at her. Her memories of John’s grandfather were of a nice older gentleman. She wondered about him now, and she wondered what he thought of Lexie. She decided to ask.

He didn’t look up, just shrugged and said, “I haven’t told my grandfather or my mother yet.”

Georgeanne was surprised. Seven years ago she’d thought John and Ernie were close. “Why?”

“Because both of them have been bothering me to get married again and start a family. When they find out about Lexie, they’ll shoot to Seattle faster than a smoker from the sweet spot. I want time to get to know Lexie first, before I’m blitzed by my family. Besides, we agreed to wait to tell her, remember? And with my mother and Ernie hanging around, staring, it might make Lexie uncomfortable.”

Married again? Georgeanne hadn’t heard anything he’d said after he’d uttered those two words. “You were married?”

“Yeah.”

“When?”

He let go of her hand and placed the tweezers on the table. “Before I met you.”

Georgeanne looked at her finger, and the sliver was gone. She wondered which meeting he was referring to. “The first time?”

“Both times.” He grasped the top rung of the chair, leaned back, and frowned a little.

Georgeanne was confused. “Both times?”

“Yep. But I don’t think the second marriage really counts.”

She couldn’t help it. She felt her brows raise and her jaw drop. “You were married twice?” She held up two fingers. “Two times?”

His brows lowered and he drew his mouth into a straight line. “Two isn’t that many.”

To Georgeanne, who’d never been married, two sounded like a lot.

“Like I said, the second time didn’t count anyway. I was only married as long as it took to get a divorce.”

“Wow, I didn’t know you were ever married at all.”

She began to wonder about these two women who’d married John, the father of her child. The man who’d broken her heart. And because she couldn’t stand not knowing, she asked, “Where are these women now?”

“My first wife, Linda, died.”

“I’m sorry,” Georgeanne uttered lamely. “How did she die?”

He stared at her for several prolonged moments. “She just did,” he said, subject closed. “And I don’t know where DeeDee Delight is. I was real drunk when I married her. When I divorced her, too, for that matter.”

DeeDee Delight? She stared at him, at a compete loss. DeeDee Delight? Cryin‘ all night in a bucket? She had to ask. She simply couldn’t help it. “Was DeeDee a... a... an entertainer?”

“She was a stripper,” he said blandly.

Even though Georgeanne had guessed as much, it was a shock to hear John actually confess to marrying a stripper. It was so shocking. “Really! What did she look like?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Oh,” she said, her curiosity unsatisfied. “I’ve never been married, but I think I’d remember. You must have been real drunk.”

“I said I was.” He made an exasperated sound. “But you don’t have to worry about Lexie around me. I don’t drink anymore.”

“Are you an alcoholic?” she asked, the question slipping out before she thought better of it. “I’m sorry. You don’t have to answer such a personal question.”

“It’s okay. I probably am,” he answered more candid than she would have suspected. “I never checked into Betty Ford, but I was drinking pretty heavily and turning my brain to shit. I was pretty much out of control.”

“Was it hard to quit?”

He shrugged. “It wasn’t easy, but for my physical and mental well-being, I’ve had to give up a few things.”

“Like what?”

He grinned. “Alcohol, loose women, and the Macarena.” He moved forward and hung his wrists over the top rung of the chair. “Now that you know the skeletons in my closet, answer something for me.”

“What?”

“Seven years ago, when I bought you a ticket home, I was under the impression you were broke. How did you live, let alone start a business?”

“I was very lucky.” She paused a moment before adding, “I answered a help wanted ad for Heron’s.” Then because he’d been so truthful with her—and because nothing she’d ever done could equal marrying a stripper—she added a little fact about her life that no one knew but Mae. “And I was wearing a diamond that I sold for ten thousand dollars.”

He didn’t bat an eye. “Virgil’s?”

“Virgil gave it to me. It was mine.”

A slow smile, which could have meant anything, worked the corners of his mouth. “He didn’t want it back?”

Georgeanne folded her arms beneath her breasts and tilted her head to one side. “Sure he did, and I’d planned to give the ring back, too, but he’d taken my clothes and donated them to the Salvation Army.”

“That’s right. He had your clothes, didn’t he?”

“Yep. When I left the wedding, I left everything but my makeup. All I had was that stupid pink dress.”

“Yes. I remember that little dress.”

“When I called him to ask about my things, he wouldn’t even talk to me. He had his housekeeper tell me to drop the ring off at his offices and leave it with his secretary. The housekeeper wasn’t very nice about it either, but she did tell me what he’d done with my stuff.” Georgeanne wasn’t especially proud of selling the ring, but Virgil was partly to blame. “I had to buy all my clothes back at four and five dollars a pop, and I didn’t have any money.”

“So you sold the ring.”

“To a jeweler who was happy to get it for half of what it was worth. When I first met Mae, her catering business wasn’t doing real well. I gave her a lot of that ring money to pay off some of her creditors. That money might have given me a little help, but I’ve worked my tail off to get where I am today.”

“I’m not judging you, Georgie.”

She hadn’t realized that she sounded so defensive. “Some people might, if they knew the truth.”

Amusement appeared in the corners of his eyes. “Who am I to judge you? Jesus, I married DeeDee Delight.”

“True,” Georgeanne laughed, feeling a little like Scarlett O’Hara unburdening her dishonorable deeds to Rhett Butler. “Does Virgil know about Lexie yet?”

“No. Not yet.”

“What do you think he’ll do when he finds out?”

“Virgil is a smart businessman, and I’m his franchise player. I don’t think he’ll do anything. It’s been seven years, and it’s water under the bridge, anyway. Now, I’m not saying he’ll be real happy when I tell him about Lexie, but he and I work together fairly well. Besides, he’s married now and seems happy.”

Of course, she’d known he’d married. Local papers had reported on his marriage to Caroline Foster-Duffy, director of the Seattle Art Museum. Georgeanne hoped John was right and that Virgil was happy. She harbored him no ill will.

“Answer me something else?”

“No. I answered your question, it’s my turn to ask you.”

John shook his head. “I told you about DeeDee and my drinking. That’s two skeletons. So you owe me one more.”

“Fine. What?”

“The day you brought the pictures of Lexie to my houseboat, you mentioned being relieved that she didn’t struggle in school. What did you mean?”

She didn’t really want to talk about her dyslexia with John Kowalsky.

“Is it because you think I’m a dumb jock?” He gripped the top rung of the chair and leaned back.

His question surprised her. He looked calm and cool as if her answer didn’t matter one way or the other. She had a feeling it mattered more than he wanted her to know. “I’m sorry I called you dumb. I know what it’s like to be judged for what you do or how you look.” A lot of people suffered from dyslexia, she reminded herself, but knowing that famous people like Cher, Tom Cruise, and Einstein endured it also didn’t make it any easier to reveal herself to a man like John. “My concern for Lexie had nothing to do with you. When I was a child, I struggled in school. The three Rs gave me bit of trouble.”

Except for a slight crease between his brows, he remained expressionless. He said nothing.

“But you should have seen me in ballet and charm school,” she continued, forcing levity into her voice and attempting to coax a smile from him. “While I may have been the worst ballerina to have ever leaped across a stage, I do believe I excelled at charm. In fact, I graduated at the head of my class.”

He shook his head and the crease disappeared from his forehead. “I don’t doubt it for a second.”

Georgeanne laughed and let down her guard a bit. “While other children memorized their multiplication tables, I studied table settings. I know the correct positions for everything, from shrimp forks to finger bowls. I read silver patterns while some girls read Nancy Drew. I had no problem distinguishing between luncheon silver and dinner silver, but words like how and who, and was and saw, gave me fits.”

His eyes narrowed a little. “You’re dyslexic?”

Georgeanne sat up straighten “Yes.” She knew she shouldn’t feel ashamed. Still, she added, “but I’ve learned to cope. People assume that someone who suffers from dyslexia can’t read. That’s not true. We just learn a little differently. I read and write like most people, but math will never be my forte. Being dyslexic doesn’t really bother me now.”

He stared at her for a moment, then said, “But it did as a child.”

“Sure.”

“Were you tested?”

“Yes. In the fourth grade I was tested by some sort of doctor. I don’t really remember.” She scooted back her chair and stood, feeling resentment build inside of her. Resentment toward John for forcing her problem into the open as if it were his business. And she felt the old bitterness toward the doctor who’d turned her young life upside down. “He told my grandmother I had a brain dysfunction, which isn’t altogether a misstatement, but it is a rather harsh term and a blanket diagnosis. In the seventies, everything from dyslexia to mental retardation was considered a brain dysfunction.” She shrugged her shoulders as if none of it really mattered and forced a little laugh. “The doctor said I’d never be real bright. So I grew up feeling a little retarded and a bit lost.”

Slowly John stood and moved his chair out of the way. His eyes got real narrow. “No one ever told that doctor to go fuck himself?”

“Well, I—I—” Georgeanne stuttered, taken back by his anger. “I can’t imagine my grandmother ever using the F word. She was Baptist.”

“Didn’t she take you to another doctor? Have you tested somewhere else? Find a tutor? Any damn thing?”

“No.” She enrolled me in charm school, she thought.

“Why not?”

“She didn’t think there was anything else that could be done. It was the mid-seventies and there wasn’t as much information as there is today. But even today, in the nineties, children are still misdiagnosed sometimes.”

“Well, it shouldn’t happen.” His gaze roamed her face, then returned to her eyes.

He still looked angry, but she couldn’t think of one reason why he should care. This was a side of John she’d never seen. A side filled with what felt like compassion. This man standing in front of her, the man who looked like John, confused her. “I should go to bed now,” she uttered.

He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again. “Sweet dreams,” he said, and took a step back.

But Georgeanne didn’t have sweet dreams. She didn’t dream at all for a very long time. She lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling and listening to Lexie’s even breathing beside her. She lay awake, thinking of John’s angry reaction, and her confusion grew.

She thought of his wives, but mostly she thought of Linda. After so many years, he still couldn’t bring himself to talk about her death. Georgeanne wondered what sort of woman inspired such love in a man like John. And she wondered if there was a woman somewhere who could fill Linda’s place in John’s heart.

The more she thought about it, the more she came to realize that she hoped not. Her feelings weren’t very nice, but they were real. She didn’t want John to find happiness with some skinny woman. She wanted him to regret the day he’d dumped her at Sea-Tac. She wanted him to walk around kicking his own behind for the rest of his life. Not that she’d ever get together with him again, because, of course, she wouldn’t even consider it. She just wanted him to suffer. Then maybe when he’d suffered a long time, she’d forgive him for being an insensitive jerk and breaking her heart.

Maybe.