Four Reasons for Fatherhood by Muriel Jensen

Author:Muriel Jensen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2013-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eight

John and Paul looked so frightened as Susan and Aaron waited with them in the principal’s office of Stony Elementary that Susan would have happily taken them home with her for one more day and brought them back tomorrow. Rain fell in torrents beyond the office’s big windows and contributed, she was sure, to the boys’ gloomy expressions.

But they would still look like this tomorrow, she told herself firmly. Just as she might stand beside Aaron today and pretend that he didn’t know she was in love with him, and that she didn’t know he was in love with her. But there was no escaping that truth.

John’s anguish turned to a smile when the boy sent by the third-grade teacher to take him to class was Stewie Marshall, one of the kids who made up their backyard baseball team.

A contingent of three children, two of them girls, came from the first-grade class to take Paul in. He looked the girls over, then turned worriedly to Aaron.

Aaron patted his shoulder. “You’ll be fine. I’ll pick you up after school.”

“Okay.” He did not sound at all convinced.

Susan and Aaron hurried back to the car, with him holding the wing of his raincoat over her. He took her to the passenger side rather than the driver’s and snatched the keys from her hand.

“Hey!” she protested halfheartedly.

“What’s your favourite color?” Aaron asked without preamble as he unlocked her door and helped her inside.

“Why?” she asked worriedly when he climbed in behind the wheel.

“Because I’m going to buy you something.” He turned the key in the ignition, then headed for the exit to the street.

“Beebee’s alone with George and Ringo,” she reminded him.

“And up to the job.” He pulled out into traffic and turned in the opposite direction from home. “I told her we’d be out until after lunch, and she said she was happy to be rid of us.”

“Us?”

“Okay, me. Color?”

She resigned herself to some mysterious shopping expedition. In truth she loved the thought of a little time spent alone with him. Now into her second week in his company, she was able to admit, at least to herself, that she was falling in love. And grew more and more conscious that in no time at all, he’d be gone.

“All right.” She relaxed in her seat, enjoying the intimacy of their confinement in the car while rain pounded on the roof and the windows and made the windshield wipers work hard. “Ruby and emerald have always been my favourite colors,” she teased, “and if there’s a diamond or two between them, so much the better.”

“All right. Ruby and emerald.”

She closed her eyes, enjoying the blissful if temporary freedom from children. “Wake me when we get to Tiffany’s.”

“No time for napping,” he said. “We’re here.”

She felt the car make an abrupt turn and opened her eyes to see that they were not shopping for jewelry. He’d pulled into an automobile dealership.

She was speechless while he drove slowly down the long lineup of rain-spattered new cars until he reached the vans, then he barely crept along as he peered out the window.

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