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Simon’s sad tone tugged at Amos’s heartstrings. He scanned the yard for a distraction. “How good are you at climbing trees?”
“I’m real good.”
“Can you climb that one there?” Amos pointed to a mature dogwood tree with low branches.
“Watch me.”
As Simon scampered to the tree, Amos started to make one last appeal to Grace, but she was already striding toward her car. He chased after her while keeping a distracted eye on his son’s struggle to surmount the dogwood’s first branch.
“You’ll be back tomorrow?”
She was already at her car, one hand on the handle. “Listen.” She faced him suddenly. “I think it would be best if I work with Simon at your local library.”
The suggestion caught him off guard. “Why?”
“Well, for one thing, Simon is highly distracted by your expectations. He wants to please you, which causes him to be anxious. Anxious children don’t learn very quickly.”
Amos noted Grace’s stiff stance, the stilted way she spoke. She couldn’t be serious. He closed the space between them, noting how her eyes widened and dropped to his chest as if wary—or hopeful—of being hugged again.
“I think you’re the one who’s anxious,” he stated.
She said nothing to that, just swallowed hard.
“If you’re worried that I’ll touch you again, I promise I will not—unless you ask me to.”
“Hmph.” Her firming lips told him that was never going to happen.
“I think you’re tempted.” He winced.Why did I say that?
Her eyes glinted dangerously. “Why would I be tempted? I don’t even like you.”
As he reeled from her words, she wrenched her car door open, forcing him to step back, dropped into the driver’s seat, and tossed her bags onto the seat next to her. She didn’t so much as look at him as she backed up into the space meant for just that purpose. As she shot off up the driveway, his gaze fell on her license plate: 4 MATEO.
That was the name of the boy he’d kept her from bringing home.
With the acid in his stomach burning, Amos turned and headed back down the hill. He had to concede that Grace was a complicated woman, not that he’d known very many women to compare her with. Winning Grace over was going to require effort and ingenuity.
Simon captured his attention as he waved from high up in the tree. “Look at me!”
Amos was impressed. “Amazing. You’re a monkey. Come on down now, carefully. It’s time to eat.”
It would take them days to get through the quantity of food he had put together.
* * *
Emma stared at her stepmother’s home and knew beyond a doubt that Stacy didn’t live there anymore. The lawn was pristine, with diagonal lines left by a fastidious mower. The window boxes were full of summer flowers. Stacy had an artistic side, but as a single woman, she’d had more pressing things to do than mow her lawn.
“Y’all stay in the car. I’ll be right back.”
Conscious of Christopher’s worried expression, she pasted on a smile as she crossed from the curb to the front door—it now had a pretty glass insert—and rang the bell. A middle-aged woman peered through the glass at her and opened the door cautiously.
“Hi, sorry to bother you. I’m looking for Stacy Abrams, who used to live here. Any idea where she moved?”
Perceptive gray eyes took in the trio of heads in Emma’s car before refocusing on her. “Well, if I remember right, she moved to the assisted-living community right around the corner from here.”
“Oh.” Emma’s hopes for a place to stay drained away. “I see. Thank you.” At least they could visit Stacy, who might have ideas for her, or money to loan, not that Emma would ask for it.
“Good luck,” the woman called as Emma turned and walked away, her chin held high.
