Chapter Six
He was as good as his word, Jane thought. He and the moving company.
The large van containing all of her worldly possessions had shown up promptly at ten Monday morning.
Adam had disappeared from her life a couple of hours earlier.
From the bay window in the guest room, she’d watched him walk out the front door and around the house toward the garage.
He hadn’t looked up at her or back at the house.
Either he hadn’t sensed her watching him or he hadn’t cared. Probably a little of both.
It was Friday, now. Jane brushed her bangs out of her eyes and stared at the stack of books in front of her. She was alphabetizing them as she placed them on the shelves. She sighed. Okay. She was alone; she could admit the truth to herself, if to no one else. She was lonely.
Returning to Orchard had sounded so noble when she’d lain awake in her bed in San Francisco.
She would unite father and daughter, be a wonderful teacher, provide her child with a warm, loving and stable environment.
When she’d imagined the scene, there had been a Joan of Arc sort of glow around her head in reward for all her good deeds.
Reality turned out to be very different.
She hadn’t seen Adam since Sunday, so she wasn’t making any progress on that front.
School wouldn’t start until early September.
She’d planned her lessons before she’d left San Francisco.
And as for Billie—She smiled. She’d love to take the credit for her daughter fitting in so well, but it was all Billie’s doing.
Adam had sent, via Charlene, information on the local softball league.
By Tuesday Billie had been enrolled in the park’s summer-camp program and assigned to a team.
She came home every day with new battle scars from her activities and tales of friends made and adventures experienced.
Jane rose to her feet and walked from the den to the kitchen. White tiles gleamed from her thorough scrubbing. Food filled the pantry. Everything had been unpacked and put away.
Maybe she shouldn’t have worked so quickly, she thought as she leaned against the counter and stared out the kitchen window into the backyard. But it had been hard not to. She wasn’t sleeping well. Only by staying busy could she keep Adam and the kiss they had shared from her mind.
Back in San Francisco, she’d had friends and activities to fill her time.
Here she knew people but—she shook her head—they would ask questions she couldn’t answer.
Not until Adam knew the truth. She could go see Charlene, but the older woman had her own life.
She was currently planning a trip to Greece.
A movie about an older woman finding if not love then certainly passion in the beautiful islands had inspired her to travel to the Mediterranean.
In addition, Billie had mentioned something about Charlene arranging for a few of her trucker friends to stop by before she left.
Jane grinned. She wouldn’t want to touch that one.
She remembered the time she had casually asked the other woman about her visiting male friends.
Charlene’s frank lecture of the joys of sex had left her blushing for days.
When she’d told Adam about the conversation, he’d laughed for several minutes, then had teased that it was her own fault for inquiring.
When she’d protested, he’d pulled her close and offered to illustrate some of Charlene’s more interesting points.
She’d turned away, embarrassed and scared and he’d—
She groaned. It always came back to Adam.
Stop thinking about him, she ordered herself.
She forced herself to mentally create a list of other chores she could do to fill her time.
There was always the mending. Billie destroyed her clothes on a regular basis.
And she could tackle the attic. Her mother had left several boxes up there.
She glanced at the clock. Almost twelve. She should do something about lunch. That would fill a few minutes.
The back door banged open and Billie stormed into the kitchen.
“Mom! I’m home!” she announced as she flew across the room and into her mother’s arms.
“So I see.” Jane hugged her close. “It’s early.”
“Friday’s only a half day at camp and I don’t have a game until tomorrow.” Billie looked up at her, her baseball hat pulled down so low, she had to crane her neck to see below it. “Can you make cupcakes for after the game?”
“Sure.”
Billie grinned. “Great. I told the guys you would.” She stepped back and dug out the ever-present softball from her dirty red shorts pocket. “Sometimes boys are dumb,” she said.
Jane chuckled. “Interesting observation. Why do you say that?”
“They tell me I can’t do stuff ‘cuz I’m a girl.”
“So?”
“So I threatened to beat them up.” She tossed the softball into the air.
If Jane hadn’t been present at Billie’s birth, she might have questioned whether or not this child was really hers. “Don’t throw that in the house,” she warned. “Why not just do what they say you can’t and show them up that way?”
“Maybe.” She walked to the refrigerator and pulled open the door. “I’m hungry.”
“I was just about to make lunch.”
Billie peered inside the fridge. “Something good, okay?”
“Are you insulting my cooking?”
“Mo-om. I just thought we could forget about vegetables until dinner. It’s Friday.”
“So?”
“So, I just thought. You know. For a treat. How come we don’t have that center thing in our kitchen like Adam does?”
Jane blinked at the quick change in subject. “Do you mean the island?”
“Yeah.” Billie shut the fridge and stared around the room. “It has stools to sit at, like a restaurant counter. I eat there at breakfast.”
“What?” Her heart lurched. “I thought you were visiting Charlene in the mornings before camp.”
“Nope.” Billie smiled, unconcerned. “I went over there Monday, but she said she wasn’t a morning person and that I should have breakfast with Adam.”
Jane felt faint. “You’ve been there every day this week?”
“Yup.”
She didn’t sound too panicky. Billie and Adam eating breakfast together?
Every day? It was inconceivable. On Monday Billie had bounced out of bed, her normal cheerful self, and had asked if she could visit Charlene before camp.
Jane had known the other woman would have shooed the girl away if she was being a pest—but never would she have imagined Charlene sending her to Adam.
Here she’d been worried about him having a chance to get to know Billie and it was already happening right under her nose.
“So, Mom, can we have a center island in our kitchen?”
“We don’t have room here, honey.”
Jane forced her thoughts away from father and daughter sharing a meal and studied the small room.
Counters lined two walls, with a built-in stove in the middle of one and the sink in the middle of the other.
Opposite the stove stood the refrigerator; opposite the sink, the old-fashioned Formica table with four matching vinyl chairs.
She remembered that set from her childhood.
The yellow, green-and-orange abstract shapes had reminded her of Crispy Critters breakfast cereal.
Her mother had hated the set, but her father had picked it out, so she’d lived with it.
Jane recalled that as she ate her solitary breakfast each morning, she used to make up stories about the imaginary animals running across the Formica tabletop.
“But I like the island.” Billie tossed her ball in the air and caught it. “Maybe we could make the kitchen bigger.”
Jane pulled off the cap and ruffled her daughter’s bangs. “One, don’t throw your ball inside. And two, we don’t have the money. Besides, it’s just the two of us. We don’t need more room. We already have three bedrooms.”
“I like Adam’s house better.”
So do I, Jane thought, thinking of the large graceful mansion built before the turn of the century.
The inside had been modernized, but each room maintained an elegance that couldn’t be manufactured today.
By comparison, her house was small and dark.
Still, it was home to her. The price was right and when she got a couple of paychecks in the bank, she’d be able to make some changes.
Her mother had often talked about remodeling.
She’d even made some sketches of the new room layouts and had pinned swatches of carpet and wallpaper to the sheets.
Jane’s father had vetoed the idea, telling his wife that her foolish plans were just a waste of time and money.
Her mother had turned away without a word and the sketches had disappeared, never to be mentioned again.
“It’s a nice house,” Jane said, pushing away her memories. “And ours will be, too. In time. Now you go play while I make lunch.”
“What are we going to do this afternoon?”
“What would you like?”
“The pool.” Brown eyes glowed with excitement. “And ice cream.”
“I think we can manage that.”
“All right!” Billie raised her arm and held her hand open. Jane hit it with her own, then paused for the high-five to be returned. “You’re the best.”
“Thank you. You’re somewhat of an exceptional child yourself.”
“I know.” Billie grinned, then ran from the room.