Chapter 12 Hope
hope
Zoey was the spitting image of Sophie, but taller, thinner, and much more solemn. She regarded me skeptically as she sank down on her bed. “Are you really an artist?”
It was a question I sometimes asked myself. “Well, I have a college degree in painting and design.”
“I like to paint, too,” she said.
“Really? That’s great! You can help with the mural.”
Her face lit up with a gap-toothed smile. “Cool!”
“Me, too!” Sophie said.
Zoey shook her head. “You’re too small.”
I tried to play peacemaker. “I’m sure we can find parts for both of you to paint.”
Zoey looked doubtful. “She’s really messy. We want it to look good.”
“Oh, it will.” I sat down beside her. “So tell me what you want.”
Sophie climbed up on the bed with us. “A castle with a moat and a drawbridge and a tower!”
“That’s the outside,” Zoey said. “Our room will be inside.”
I was impressed with her understanding of perspective. “Maybe we can paint a big window, and it will look like we see the moat and drawbridge through it,” I suggested.
“Yeah!” Sophie said.
Zoey’s eyes brightened. “And a tower that’s on the other side of the castle.”
“Great idea. Do you have some paper so I can write this all down?”
Sophie brought me a pink piece of construction paper. I jotted down some notes. “What color should it be?”
“Pink!” they both exclaimed.
I grinned. “The inside or the outside?”
“Both,” Sophie said.
Zoey looked thoughtful. “Yeah, but castles are made of stone, and stone isn’t pink. It’s white or gray or brown.”
“I don’t want brown.” Sophie made an ick face.
“What if the outside is white, but a sunset is making it glow pink?” I suggested. “And what if a beautiful vine with pink flowers is growing up the side?”
“Yeah!” Sophie bounced on the bed.
Zoey nodded.
“Okay.” I made another note. “We have a plan. Do you have any pictures that might help me?”
“I’ve got some castles in my coloring books,” Sophie said.
“And we’ve got some real books with pictures, too.” The girls dragged out a half dozen or more books from their bookcase, along with a couple of DVD covers. We sprawled together on the floor, a girl on either side of me, and they took turns pointing out what they liked most.
Their enthusiasm was contagious. Ideas bubbled in my mind, and I rapidly scribbled them on the construction paper.
“How’s it going?” asked a masculine voice about thirty minutes later.
I looked up to see Matt standing in the doorway. To my relief, he’d lost his angry face.
Sophie jumped up. “Daddy, this is going to be so cool! She’s gonna paint a tower and a window and a moat and a drawbridge!”
“Sounds like a lot. We’d better let Hope tell us how much she can do in the limited time she has.”
I scrambled to my feet. “Don’t worry. I won’t start anything I can’t finish.”
“I didn’t mean to suggest you would.”
That was pretty much exactly what he was suggesting, but I decided to let it go. “I’ll sketch out a few ideas, and bring them over tomorrow. Then the girls can tell me what they like and what they want to change, and we’ll go from there.”
“Hey—want to see my princess dress?” Sophie asked.
“Sure.”
She ran across the hall to another bedroom and returned with a yellow Belle ball gown.
“I have one, too,” Zoey said. “Plus I have a princess gown dress my mom made, but I’m too big to wear it now.”
“I’d love to see it,” I said.
Matt cleared his throat. “Peggy has it. She’s getting it professionally preserved.”
“How nice.” And how sad, I thought. Were memories ever just one or the other?
“Here’s a picture of our mom.” Sophie pointed to one of the framed photos on the dresser.
“She’s very beautiful.” I sheepishly glanced up at Matt. “I was admiring photos of her before you got home.”
“We’re gonna look just like her when we grow up, because she looked just like us when she was our age,” Sophie said authoritatively.
“Yeah,” Zoey confirmed. “My gramma has a photo of Mommy that was taken when she was my age.”
“Actually, Hope’s grandmother took that photo,” Matt said.
I turned to him. “Really? I didn’t know Peggy and Griff had lived in Wedding Tree that long.”
“They had a home on the other side of town when Christine and Jillian were growing up, then they moved to Houston for Griff’s job. They moved to their current house when he retired a few years ago.”
“And Jillian?”
He shifted his stance, as if the question made him uncomfortable. I wondered what the situation was between them. “She got a job at the local middle school when they moved here. She has her own place about a mile away.”
“I can understand why they’d all want to move here. I spent every summer in Wedding Tree when I was a kid, and it’s a great town.”
“Did you know the people who used to lived in this house?” Sophie asked.
“When I was your age, it was an elderly lady.”
“Did she give you cookies like Mizz McCauley?”
“No, but Gran and I used to take cookies to her. The house was much different back then. It’s far lighter and brighter and more beautiful now. I always wondered what the upstairs looked like.”
“I’ll show you the rest of it!” Sophie pointed down the hall. “Daddy’s room is that way, an’ next to it is a sittin’ room.”
“I, uh, saw those when I came upstairs.” I was keenly aware of Matt watching the proceedings from the hallway. “Let’s not intrude on his private space.”
“Okay.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me into a Jack-and-Jill bathroom. “This is our bathroom. The first sink is mine.” She opened a door and led me into another pink room. “This is supposed to be my room, but Zoey and I decided to share.”
“We’ve shared a room ever since Mommy died,” Zoey said. “I didn’t want to be alone, and Daddy said I couldn’t share his bed.”
Matt ran a hand across his jaw, looking uneasy.
Sophie pulled me across the hall into a room with a sofa, a desk with a computer, and toys scattered on the thick rug. Zoey followed. “This is our playroom. And next to that is another bathroom, and then there’s Jillian’s room,” Zoey announced.
Matt cleared his throat again. “It’s actually the guest room.”
“Yeah, but Jillian’s the only guest.”
“That’s only happened a couple of times when I had to be away overnight and your grandparents were busy,” Matt said.
Was he trying to clarify the nature of Jillian’s sleepovers for the girls’ sake, or for mine? What was the real nature of their relationship? I’d picked up a territorial vibe from Jillian earlier. “It’s got to be convenient, having family so close by.”
He nodded. “That’s why we moved here.” He suddenly looked ill at ease, as if he’d said too much. He thumped on the doorframe. “Well, I’d better go check the burgers.”
“Do you want to stay for dinner?” Sophie asked.
“She’s not invited,” Zoey said flatly.
Matt raised his eyebrows and opened his mouth, but Zoey continued before he could get a word in edgewise. “You wouldn’t let Jillian stay. You said you wanted a night with just the three of us. So she can’t stay, either.”
I quickly lifted both of my hands. “Actually, I’ve already eaten.
Gran’s on the senior dining plan, which means dinner is served at five o’clock sharp.
And speaking of time . . .” I made a show of looking at my watch.
I wasn’t wearing one, so I had to pull my phone out of the pocket of my running shorts to look at the time.
“I’d better get going so I can get started on the sketches. ”
I said good-bye to the girls and headed down the stairs.
Matt followed me into the foyer. I was about to open the door, but Matt reached around and opened it for me.
He wasn’t touching me, but I could feel the heat of his body as I turned toward him.
Or maybe not; maybe the heat was coming from me.
All I knew was that the air between us suddenly felt a whole lot warmer.
I paused. “Look—I’m really sorry about earlier. I had no business looking at your pictures.”
He raised his shoulders. “No harm, no foul. I overreacted.”
Up close, he was more attractive than ever—and I was close enough to see the lighter blue facets around his pupils. He smelled of starch and soap and testosterone. My stomach fluttered. I gave a nervous grin. “Well, from now on, I promise to stay out of your bedroom.”
The minute the words left my mouth, I realized how they sounded. My cheeks flamed.
The corners of his eyes tensed. For a long, hot moment, I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t think, I couldn’t move. I just looked at him, trapped in a bubble of thought-erasing heat.
His gaze shifted to my mouth, then back to my eyes. He smiled. “I’ve got about a dozen clever rejoinders swirling around in my head, but I’d better not say any of them.”
I couldn’t think of a single response to save my life. My face on fire, I muttered a fast “good night” and ducked out the door.