Chapter 7
AHRI STRETCHED IN THE COMFORTABLE bed, testing her hamstrings.
After three days of gardening, the worst of the over-used muscle aches had decreased.
She’d always exercised back home but must not have used the same muscles.
When she’d tried to get out of bed the second day, she’d hardly been able to move.
Gardening, it seemed, was a great form of exercise.
She hadn’t understood how much work helping with the garden would be, things like hauling wheelbarrows full of compost, pushing a Rototiller, hoeing the rows, setting up drip lines.
She’d even gotten a little sunburned because she hadn’t been careful the first day.
The size of the garden had intimidated her, but she found she enjoyed the hard work.
When she finally had her own place again, she thought she’d like a garden, though much smaller than Francie’s.
The sound of the children rising drifted up to her room, with Nik squealing about something Lessa had done.
The Diederiks were laid back as parents.
Did that come because they were older? Francie had mastered a stern look that brought her children into line, while Alex had a way of teasing his children out of their temper tantrums.
For a second Ahri wondered what kind of parents she and Zed would have been.
She pushed the thought aside. It didn’t matter.
Now that she’d seen this style of parenting, she knew this was what she wanted to be like.
If she ever had a family of her own. Hopefully she wouldn’t end up like her mother, unable to let go and move on.
At dinner, Alex talked about the history classes he taught at the college.
This weekend he was hosting an end-of-term guillotine party for his Revolution in History class.
Ahri wished she’d had fun teachers like him when she’d been in college.
She might have stuck with her general studies and then finally chosen a major.
She went to the gable window that overlooked the property and surveyed the grounds, as she did every morning.
The weather here was definitely muggier than she’d been used to in Arizona.
Summer might be a bit much, but the B&B had air conditioning for hot days, so it shouldn’t be too bad.
She paused at the thought. Would she be there for the summer? Maybe.
Showered, her hair in a ponytail, and dressed for work in jeans and a T-shirt, Ahri skipped down the stairs. She picked up Nik, hugged him, and then chewed on his belly, making him squeal. His sister scurried over, her arms outstretched for her morning hug.
Zed hadn’t grown up in a demonstrative family, and he hadn’t liked much touching outside of the bedroom.
Ahri’s parents had been better about it, mostly her mother.
It’d probably been the one parenting thing she’d been really good at.
Until Ahri had experienced the Diederik family, she hadn’t realized how starved for touch she’d been.
“What can I do to help this morning?” she asked, entering the kitchen.
“If you would be a dear and get the oatmeal going for those two, I’d appreciate it.” Francie gave her the usual one-armed hug before going back to packing a sack lunch for her husband. She did that for him every day.
“Have you gotten the results for your online test?” Ahri asked as she took down a pot from a hook on the wall.
“I got an A.” Francie’s cheeks flushed, and she looked proud.
“When do you graduate?”
“At this rate I might be eighty when I finally walk.”
Ahri considered that as she waited for the water to boil. She knew that Francie had cut back from a full schedule because of the children.
“Do you resent only being able to take one class a semester?”
“Oh, heavens no.” Francie closed the lid on the lunch box.
“I have the best of both worlds now. I’ve always wanted to graduate from college, so I signed up once Rafe went to Harvard.
The local college accepted me for an employment program for women returning to the school.
I was assigned to the history department. ”
“History?” Ahri grinned. “So Alex was one of the professors in your department.”
“He was my professor. I worked for him.” Francie colored again. “Once we started dating, I went to work for one of the other professors in the department. The first time Alex came to the house, I was so surprised I fell off the roof.”
Ahri blinked, thinking of the pitch of the B&B’s roof. She couldn’t imagine climbing on it, much less falling from it. “Were you hurt very badly?”
“I only sprained my ankle because Alex broke my fall with his chest.” She burst out laughing. “He must have had the worst bruise from my boot, but he’d never admit it to me.”
“Guys,” Ahri said, stirring the now-bubbling oatmeal. “All their macho gets in the way of showing a flaw.” She wondered if that’d been part of the reason Zed had never confided in her about what he was up to.
“What about macho men?” Alex pulled Francie into his arms and kissed her.
She shot Ahri a quick glance, and both women laughed.
He turned to face Ahri, one arm still around his wife’s shoulders. “Why do I have the feeling that you two were talking about me?”
“We were.” Francie handed him his lunch. “About your first visit here.”
“When she screamed and came sliding off the roof . . .” He kissed her temple. “I thought I’d killed her.”
“You saved me.” Francie gave her husband such a look of love that Ahri had to glance away, her eyes prickling.
She focused her attention on the food. Had she ever looked at Zed like that? He’d certainly never looked at her that way. Her heart ached a little. What had she and Zed had then, besides attraction? Looking back on it now, she wondered what they could have been thinking to get married.
Some of the cryptic remarks about Francie’s first husband came to mind and the horrible home life he’d created. The man couldn’t have been anything like Alex. Poor, tenderhearted Francie to have been tied to such an unkind man. Why had she stayed with him?
Ahri paused, a little surprised at how far her view on the subject had changed.
Her father’s desertion had left her little-girl mind with a rigid belief that couples should always stay together to work out their problems. She’d amended that to exclude physical abuse.
When she’d first considered leaving Zed, guilt had eaten at her.
She’d thought she must be no better than her father if she were willing to destroy her family. How wrong she’d been.
After she turned off the burner and moved the pot to the back of the stove, she went into the living room where the children were playing with their toys in the corner.
“Your breakfast is almost done. Do you have everything ready for school, Lessa?”
The girl jumped up and ran to grab her little backpack.
She thrust it at Ahri before returning to the toys on the floor.
She enjoyed the two little ones and their precocious personalities, but they did test her patience sometimes.
Ahri hadn’t had a lot of experience with children in recent years.
She’d stopped babysitting when she’d turned sixteen and could get a better-paying job.
They’d needed the extra money to pay the bills.
Alex strode into the room carrying his briefcase. He set it down and swung both of his children. They squealed at his kisses.
If they’d had any children, Ahri couldn’t imagine Zed behaving like this. This was what she wanted in her future, a man who wasn’t afraid to touch and tease, to show his love and regard.
“Thank you so much for the help you’ve been this week,” Alex said.
Ahri pulled herself from her thoughts to find he’d set down the children and picked up his briefcase again.
“It’s been fun.” Cathartic, though she didn’t say it aloud.
“Well, it’s helped Francie a lot and taken a load off my mind. She keeps insisting on enlarging the garden.” He sent a fond glance toward the kitchen before saying to his children, “You two clean this up and then eat your breakfast.”
“Bye, daddy.”
Under his watchful eye, they started picking up the toys. He winked at Ahri and strode out to his car.
Ahri evaluated what she’d need for the drip system on the section she’d prepped.
She wiped the sweat from her brow. Her appetite had been good with all the work she’d been doing.
Her stomach growled. She was already looking forward to dinner.
It would be at least another hour before Francie got back from taking Lessa to her piano lesson, and Ahri would need to clean up so she could help prepare for dinner.
The sound of tires on the gravel driveway drifted to the back of the house. The mail had already been delivered, and Francie’s guests had mentioned being gone until early evening. Who could it be?
“Hey, Ma,” Rafe’s familiar voice yelled.
“She’s not here,” Ahri called, heading toward the house, surprised and pleased that he’d come in the middle of a workday.
Rafe came around the corner, dressed casually in jeans and a T-shirt rather than the business attire she’d have expected for this time of day. She wondered what he was there for.
“Well, dang. I’m sorry I missed her.” Rafe came to stand by Ahri and glanced around. There ought to be a law against handsome men who smelled that good. He said, “I came to help with the garden.”
“I won’t complain.” Ahri turned back to her row, biting back a grin.
“What have you got going there?” He followed her and scanned her work. “Nice job. You know, I think Ma must have doubled the size of this thing since I was in high school. Is she reckoning to sell at the farmer’s market?”
“No. She said she’s planning to expand the catering part of her business.” Ahri fumbled with one of the connections for her line. “She said anything she doesn’t use will go to the local food pantry.”