Chapter 1
KAREN WYCLIFF twisted the wand on the blinds just enough that she could see outside, but certainly not enough for anyone in her yard to see her looking through. That would not do. After all, she would be turning thirty-nine at her birthday party in three weeks, and this man outside her door must be close to a decade younger.
Then, with a gasp, she saw him turn her direction, and without a moment’s hesitation, her hand desperately flipped the wand she still held in her fingers. With the revealing blinds closed, and leaning her head against the wall, she drew in a deep breath and enjoyed the pounding of her heart. It made her feel alive again, and she needed to feel something good. Brad had been gone just three months, and his sudden departure from her life had devastated her. After all, they had started building this pool together, and then he had bailed out to go to Mexico with his secretary, leaving her with all the headaches of the life they’d built.
No, she didn’t need this man outside her window to know she was alive. She had far too much of life all around her every day. She just needed something besides a seventeen-year-old unwed mother living under her roof, a teen son with hormones raging like wildfire, and a parakeet that hadn’t seen the inside of its cage in days.
“Mom!” A boy’s cracking voice broke into her brittle assessment of her life. Life had returned in that one word, and she knew her son. Whatever he wanted wouldn’t be pleasant or easy. At fifteen, everything in her household followed in the wake of his emotional, hormone-driven, roller coaster days.
She looked to see him boil into the living room and sling himself into a chair. The backpack in his hands crashed to the floor at his side, and his face scowled at his knees and the holes in his brand new jeans.
“Dylan, what happened to your clothes?” They’d been to the mall just the weekend before. Her son had insisted on one certain brand, and they’d been very difficult to find. Expensive, too. Now they were destroyed.
When he looked up at her was when she saw the black eyes. Two of them, left and right.
“Oh, baby! What happened to you this time?” She was concerned about his injuries, but as importantly, she was relieved that this distraction had come along at just the right time to hide her own elevated interest in the man working outside.
When she stepped toward him, he let out a disgusted breath of air. “Same as always, Mom. Everybody’s bigger than I am.” He turned his head away, but not before moisture had begun to build in his eyes.
She immediately knew what this was about, and even though the black eyes always concerned her, they were routine by now. At least he wouldn’t face the same problem as his sister. Lissie had matured early, and that had attracted the attention of all the boys in her school. One in particular had been especially convincing, and now Karen had a grandchild. At least the baby had come in winter, and Lissie had only been homebound one semester. Karen had insisted she return to school for her senior year. Now all the girl had to do was graduate . . . and get a job, and married, and out on her own . . . and Karen could not think about Lissie’s problems just then.
That man was still outside her window.
“DYLAN, WE’RE never going to get this cleaned up if you don’t sit still.” She had made the fifteen-year-old strip off his pants as she filled a large bowl with cold water. Now he sat on the washing machine. His pants had been torn, but the shirt was bloodied. Looking at the pants wadded up to the side, she knew the most she could hope to salvage from them was to cut the legs off. A good hem and he could wear them for shorts all summer. The shirt, though, might still be saved. She worked it with a sponge, hoping for the best.
“Mom, just take it.” He yanked it over his head, thrusting it out to her. “I’m not bleeding anymore, anyway. I’m fine.”
She looked him in the face, and her eyes found the features that so reminded her of Brad, that fink who had abandoned her for the secretary he was with in that Mexican villa down in Baja. This face should make her angry, especially since the boy was so much like his father, even to chasing every girl he came in contact with. He was barely more than a child, though, and the girls didn’t seem as attracted to him as he was to them. She glanced up at the ceiling. Thank you, God, for that.
“Did she already have a boyfriend?” Placing her hand on the bare skin of his leg, she looked directly into her son’s blackened eyes. The sudden flush in his face told her the answer she needed. These torn knees and blacked eyes were from a girl, or at least from the boyfriend who hadn’t wanted Dylan to claim her.
“Mom!” He looked at her, and his eyes had already started to well up again. “Why do you always think they have boyfriends?”
“Is she pretty?” She smiled at him, her heart softened.
His face shifted with her question, and he began to grin. “She has two earrings, and she’s a cheerleader, too.”
Love for this fifteen-year-old made her laugh out loud. His response was so pure and open. He saw earrings and status. That was very different than what she had admired just outside her window a few minutes before. Even now she couldn’t get the memory of that strong, suntanned back and those rugged jeans out of her mind. She had closed the blinds too quickly to see his face clearly, but she’d certainly gotten an eyeful of his bare shoulders with that sweaty sheen, and she wouldn’t have known if he had been wearing earrings anyway. Her heart had been pounding too hard.
“Mom, what’s funny?” Dylan grabbed a clean shirt from the basket on the dryer and pulled it on. “Did I say something I shouldn’t have?”
“No, baby. Stand up so I can give you a hug.” She did love this boy who was barely taller than she was, even if he happened to look so much like his father. As she wrapped her arms around him, he stood still for a moment, and then he tried to pull away.
“Enough, Mom. If you want to hug on someone, go out in the backyard. I bet that man would let you hug on him as much as you want.” He grinned.
She pushed him away, feeling warmth rising up her neck. “Dylan, that’s enough. I cannot believe you said that.” Turning, she knew her face must be growing red.
He laughed. “I was just teasing. I need clean jeans, too. I didn’t see any in the basket.”
She stepped away to look out the window. “Look in the dryer. I haven’t pulled them out yet.” As he knelt to dig inside for his jeans, she noticed something she’d never been aware of before. In the five years since she and Brad had built this house, she had never really paid attention to the fact that she could see directly into the backyard from the laundry room window. She was dimly aware of Dylan pulling on his jeans, and she only faintly heard the sounds as he zipped and buttoned the fly. All she could think of were the muscles she saw flashing in the sun and those well-worn jeans.
A streak of yellow outside the window did manage to shift her attention to a more immediate matter—and one of vital importance.
“Oh, my word, Dylan! Junie’s out again.”
A door slammed in another part of the house, and she realized she was alone in the room. “Dylan!” She called louder with no response.
This was to be up to her, and that bird was her grandson Chipper’s most treasured possession. It had to be recovered. The new pool and the man working on it were gone from her thoughts, and all she could imagine was the last time that yellow parakeet had gone out the door. It had flown from tree to tree, and only by luck had Dylan been able to whistle it to his finger. She didn’t even know how to whistle!
Grabbing a lightweight summer slip from the clothes basket to toss over the bird when she made her capture, she opened the back door and tried her best to purse her lips into a whistle. What came out was more of a sputter than a tweet, though. Groaning, she looked up and searched for the flash of yellow that would tell her where the bird was.
“Junie,” she called softly. “Junie, boy. Come here.”
Stepping past the birdbath Brad had insisted on for Texas’ hot summer climate, she splashed the water with her fingers. It was possible the bird might be thirsty. She guessed birds got thirsty in the daytime, and it was already heating up.
“Water, Junie. Cool water.”
She found him arrogantly perched high in a tall tree, and he just looked at her.
Glancing down, she stepped onto the dirt. The soil was cool against her bare feet, and that meant it was moist. It was also soft in places. There had been so much rain that the pool installation had been started and delayed over and over during the winter, and now that warm weather was here, they were scrambling just to make up lost time. She didn’t know if that was good or bad. With Brad gone, this hole in her backyard seemed either like a pre-divorce decision gone bad, that or a wonderful distraction to buoy her into a new life.
Right now it was an obstacle preventing her from chasing one irritating yellow parakeet. The bird had flown completely across the yard, directly to the other side of the dirt hole yawning in front of her.
“Bad bird,” she called. “Bad, bad bird. Come to Karen, sweetie.” She held up her hand and put one finger out, making a perch. She tried to whistle again, and it was no surprise when the sound came out as a dull honk.
A sudden, clear whistle from across the pool dig startled her, and she glanced around. To her horror she realized she had forgotten all about the man on whom she had been spying earlier. With embarrassment she looked away, needing to show she was not interested in him at all, that she was in fact out here simply to catch her wild little bird.
It was true, too.
Yes, she’d been peering through the blinds at him, and then she’d taken further opportunity from her vantage point at the laundry room window. However, to step directly outdoors to interact with this man was certainly outside the bounds of anything she would consider doing. Why, what would her church fellowship say if they knew she was fraternizing with a half-naked man in her own very private backyard? There’d be a prayer chain a mile wide just for praying her back to proper, upstanding Christian morality.
“You gonna catch that little-bitty bird with that negligee?”
Karen’s breath caught. This man’s voice, so familiar, as if she should know him. It was deep and melodious, and there was a hint of amusement there. Yet, he was just a construction worker, and this was not funny at all. A shadow of irritation made her press her lips firmly together, as she prepared a retort. She had never met this man, and she intended to tell him her bird was none of his business.
Then the final word of his question jumped into her mind. Negligee. All her bravado bled from her like warm butter in the Texas heat.
“Negligee?” She repeated his word with as much aplomb as she could muster, all the while keeping her gaze in the trees, attempting to track the bird as it hopped from branch to branch. At least she hoped her response came across with an appearance of self-confidence. Inside, her stomach fluttered with rising anxiety.
Negligee?
Then she reached to shade her eyes, and she remembered the summer slip. It was white and very sheer, and she supposed it could look like sleepwear. To a man it might, especially if he were single and unfamiliar with women’s intimate apparel. She tried to wad it under her arm, keeping the expression on her face as nonchalant as possible.
Even so, her heart pounded in her chest.
“I’m sorry. I was folding clothes, and then somehow my bird got out. I have to catch him for the baby. Little Chipper loves Junie and would be devastated if his little pet got away. Bye-bye, birdie, and all that. There’s no bye-bye birdie allowed in this house.” She knew she sounded corny, but she had no idea how to shut up. Her nerves had her all a jitter. She called out brightly, hoping to cover her bumbling, “This is just a slip I wear under my summer dresses.”
She cringed. That only made it worse. This man—she certainly couldn’t call him a boy—was just someone working in her yard, and he was probably tired and ready to go home. He was only here because he needed his paycheck. Wasn’t that the way it was with most people? Even if he did have broad, muscular shoulders and nicely scuffed jeans, that didn’t mean he would be interested in her. She was practically an older woman. Also, she had two children—plus a grandbaby, heaven forbid!
What would he ever see in her?
JOHN SPRINGFIELD chuckled. This woman hadn’t so much as looked at him since she’d stepped from the door. He had seen her peering at him earlier through the window, and he’d wondered if she’d needed to speak with him. However, when he’d turned to wave, she’d closed the blinds before he could even raise his arm. Now here she was outside with him, and it seemed as if she were afraid of him.
He remembered meeting Mrs. Wycliff several months before. Karen, he recalled from the paperwork. The day had been cold and business slow. He’d been looking at real estate brochures at his desk, determined to finally get out of his cramped apartment, and he had seen this gorgeous brunette step from a low-slung sports car. He wasn’t much of a low-slung car type, as four-wheel-drive vehicles were more his preference, but he was sure this one was expensive.
She exited the passenger side, so he knew she wasn’t alone. A leather coat and snug jeans topped hand-tooled boots. There was style in her clothing, and as she moved, he could see her style went even further. It was in her walk and the way she carried herself.
He had been entranced.
Then an older man had stepped from the driver’s side. He motioned to the woman, and immediately John smelled trouble in paradise. The man didn’t even wait for the beauty he was with to catch up to him, just strode heedlessly ahead.
In that moment he hoped they weren’t coming into his offices. He had felt an immediate attraction to this stylish, graceful woman, and she obviously had a man in her life. The man with her might appear brusque and uncaring to him, but that wasn’t his concern. He didn’t know these people, and if they just walked on by, he never would. This stunning woman would be a vision that could haunt his dreams that night, and if he enjoyed the dreams, perhaps a second night, also. Then she would be forgotten. However, if he heard her voice—
He had coughed, turning back to his brochures, pushing that thought aside. Then, to his horror—and heart-pounding anticipation—the door had chimed. He looked up as the older man stepped through and released the handle, leaving the woman to catch it and let herself in on her own. Before they’d left, they’d picked a pool design and written a deposit. Rather, John remembered, the man picked, and the woman went along with whatever was suggested, seeming totally distracted and less than really interested. She never once looked his way or spoke to him.
Mr. Wycliff—he’d introduced himself that way, even after John had given his first name—was content to have the site plans done up later, saying he would sign off on them when necessary.
The next day, when he was out to the house, there had been no one there. In the upscale Austin neighborhood where they lived, he knew the homeowner’s association would need to be consulted, and there would be special permits for the pool construction. However, the extreme slope of the lot would make for a challenging build, and he’d liked that. He might even want to get his own hands dirty on this job.
He had only seen her that one time. Frankie, his secretary, informed him several weeks later there was a situation of sorts, perhaps an impending divorce, and he needed to check on things before the backhoes tore into the yard. By then, the yard prep was well underway, and he had six other projects going at the same time. Before he could get out there, the wife, and he remembered Frankie’s word exactly, the wife had called to say the pool installation was still on, and did she need to sign a new contract?
He usually didn’t concern himself about family situations of people for whom he built his pools. His job was to build the best pool his family business could effectively install, and it was the clients’ job to work out their personal issues. However, when Frankie had told him about the call, he remembered feeling a sense of relief, almost as if he had some sort of personal interest in this woman’s life.
Now, here she was out in her yard chasing a little yellow bird, and she couldn’t even whistle. He smiled at that. She was prettier today than she had been that night at his office. He felt the connection building again, or at least he felt something.
Finally, he felt sorry for her. He’d grown up whistling to wild birds to get them to come to him, and he thought he could get this one to come to him, too.
“Here, I’m glad to help. Your bird didn’t come the first time, but I bet I can whistle a different tune and get him down. I know a pretty good parakeet song.”
She coughed, looking everywhere but at him. “I don’t think I could ask. Besides, you’re here to work, not to help me chase a bird. What would your boss say?” She lifted her finger into the air and called brightly, “Junie, baby. Come to Mommy.”
He was amused. He was the boss. Besides, if he could help, he wanted to. And he did want to.
He dropped his shovel and wiped his hands on his jeans. Not that it’d do much good. He’d been in and out of the muddy dig all morning, and he was pretty covered. He reached to remove his sunglasses, and his hand brushed against dried mud caked on his face. He chuckled, pulling the brim of his old Stetson lower over his eyes and leaving the glasses in place. He didn’t even have a shirt pocket for them. He’d used it to wipe them off earlier and then thrown it on the tailgate of his truck.
At least the bird wouldn’t care.
Ducking his head, he used his shoulder to brush some of the mud off one side of his face. Raising a hand, he whistled a second time. The sound was lilting, and then the high-pitched melody from his lips skipped and chittered.
With a flash of yellow, the bird was soon sitting on his finger, pretty as you please.
KAREN WAS amazed as she watched the capture. In a quick glance, she could see this man’s hat was askew, and his face was streaked almost black with soil. Dark glasses made his eyes invisible. Yet, in only a few notes, he had commanded this small terror of a bird to land on his finger.
“How did you do that?” she whispered.
He chuckled, almost as if sharing a very important secret with a novice. “I’ve had practice. Now, your underwear, if you please.” A grin creased one side of his mouth.
Her heart stopped, even as she bristled. Her underwear? This half-naked man wanted her underwear? They were in her backyard, and while it was relatively private, they weren’t completely invisible to the neighbors. Besides, she was a faithful attendee at Wayside Christian Fellowship. He could not have her underwear, even if Brad had left her and was vamping it up with that hussy in Mexico.
He repeated his request with a slight modification. “Your slip, the one in your hand. I’d like to wrap your bird in it so you can carry him safely inside.”
She felt her arrogance fade away, and in that moment she knew the affront she had felt had not been righteous indignation, although that’s what she would have claimed if he’d actually been serious. Her arrogance had been a moment of false hope, one driven by the loneliness brought on by a husband who had abandoned her. It had been a sudden desire for him to step to her, and, well, for other things she wouldn’t admit even to herself.
With her knees weak, she handed him her slip, and she watched him gently wrap the small bird inside. He placed the package in her hands, and as she thanked him, he tipped his hat and turned to walk away. She watched him for a minute as he went back to work.
As she stepped back into the house, she realized something.
She didn’t even know his name.
Chapter 2
“JUNIE! JUNIE! Hold Junie!”
The cry pierced the video segment running over and over in Karen’s thoughts, and she remembered the struggling animal she held wrapped in her slip. It was chirping away, and she hadn’t even heard it.
Walking in the door, she’d been in a shell-shocked daze. That man, that creature in her backyard, had stolen her breath away. He had been dirty and sweaty and half clothed, and he was just an employee of the company that was putting in this pool that she wasn’t sure she could afford anymore. He wasn’t someone she could be attracted to, for heaven’s sake. After all, she had simply opened the living room blinds, and there he had been.
Her heart pounded as she tried to transition from that man out there, but she knew what the problem was. The last three months had been very hard. Her emotions had been dragged through the coals, and inside her soul, she had been left burned and blackened. Even her social group at Wayside Christian hadn’t been able to alleviate the loneliness that had been her constant unwelcome companion. Getting back in church the past year and rededicating her life to Christ hadn’t been the solve-all she’d wanted it to be. Just ask Brad—oh, she couldn’t. He was in Mexico.
She knelt and motioned to the toddler making his way her direction. As she reached one hand to her face, she realized she was perspiring profusely. The house was certainly cool, and she’d been outside for only minutes. The child must have left a door open somewhere. It couldn’t be her pulse, she knew, her racing pulse making her overly warm despite the air conditioner she could hear running. She would not let it be that man outside that was doing this to her, not with her daughter and grandson home.
And certainly not with her Bible study group later that evening. Dear lands, how could she face those women feeling like this?
“Junie?” the baby called. “Eat Junie?”
“Hey, sweetheart. Junie’s right here. And no, you cannot eat Junie.” She forced a smile at his excited little face, and she didn’t think he would be able to tell her enthusiastic greeting was less than real. He wasn’t even two years old, and he was only interested in holding his bird. However, she didn’t want the animal out in the house for an additional three days, so she unfolded the slip slowly, reaching her hand inside to wrap careful fingers around the delicate, feathered creature. It struggled for a moment and then relaxed in her grasp.
Chipper grabbed for the bird’s yellow feathers, and Karen laughed gently as she moved the animal away. The baby wasn’t always easy, and she wanted the fragile creature to live to see another day.
“Easy, Chipper. One finger. Junie likes you, but you must be easy.” She saw Chipper’s mother Lissie walk through the doorway on the far side of the room, and she winked at her daughter, glad to feel an additional distraction from that man outside, and even gladder to feel her pulse slowing to something nearing normal.
“Mom! You caught Junie. How did you do that? You can’t even whistle.” Lissie giggled in disbelief, making an astonished face. “You, climbing on top of the dining room table to retrieve him from inside the chandelier. How funny!”
That had become the animal’s roosting spot over the past few days, and it wasn’t a problem, except at meal times. Then falling feathers and occasional discarded seed pieces had to be picked from the family’s lasagna, scrambled eggs, or hamburgers. It was good entertainment for the baby, though, and they enjoyed the parakeet’s chirrupy songs.
As Karen stood, Chipper jumped for the bird in her hand. She held it carefully aloft and quieted a twinge of guilt. She hadn’t caught the parakeet at all. Someone else had brought this bird down out of a tree, and just the memory of standing close to him and having him hold her underwear, her slip, and then handing it back to her, made her heart pound all over again.
“Mom, I simply can’t see you climbing on the table. You’d be afraid you’d fall down. Did Junie get trapped in the window again?” Lissie made her way towards the wall of windows stretching across the back of the living room. “I caught him there once. I think he wanted outside. I bet he made a mess on the sill again.”
Karen panicked. All she could think was how she felt when she looked out the blinds not so very many minutes before, and then she had run into the yard to chase the bird, and there her construction worker was, with those brown, muscular shoulders and that deep, melodious voice. The sheen of the sun on his sweat-covered skin was as crisp in her memory as her grandson jumping at her feet.
“Lissie, no!” She jumped forward to get her daughter’s attention, only to feel the baby holding onto her leg. Looking down, she brushed at his small fingers with her free hand while holding onto the yellow parakeet with the other. “Lissie, wait!”
“Junie! Junie!” Chipper jumped up and down, toppling to the floor and wailing, “Eat Junie!”
Lissie glared at her mother with a frown. “Mom! Chipper needs you! Aren’t you paying attention? The babysitter said he’s been needy all day. He’s your grandson. You have to pay attention to him, you know. You can start by telling him he can’t eat Junie.” She took the wand beside the window. “Junie was in this one? What do you know about that? You think the light’d hurt his eyes or something.”
Karen was beside herself at this point. As long as that man remained hidden, then he wasn’t real. She was the only one who had seen him, and if her heart had tried to beat its way out of her chest, what of it? No one else knew, and no one else would, either. That man and his strong arms and melodious voice would disappear forever. She would teach her Sunday school class this weekend, and she wouldn’t dream of that man rescuing her from the morass of a life that had dragged her down the past three months. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t, no matter how the thought of him made her heart pound.
She had to stop her daughter from opening that blind.
“The bird, Lissie! If you open the blind, he’ll try to fly through the window. He can’t get outside again!” She was babbling now, and she didn’t care. All she knew was that no one could be allowed to see that man who had pulled such strong emotions from deep inside her soul and forced her to feel sensations that no married woman should feel about a strange, sweaty man working in her backyard.
Then she remembered. She wasn’t married anymore. Divorced, that’s who she was, poor divorced Karen with a new pool going into her backyard. Hope surged through her chest. She could be attracted to any man she wanted.
Then her heart sank, and she wilted with despair. Grandmother Karen. Sure. She could be attracted to him all she wanted. He just wouldn’t be attracted to her. Suddenly drained, she stopped and relaxed her hands. In that moment, the parakeet took advantage of the opportunity for continued freedom, and it flung itself across the room.
Startled into action, Karen grabbed for the bird, and as she did, Chipper stepped right into her path, bringing her down in a shambles onto the floor.
“Mom!” Lissie barked a laugh, tapping the blinds with the tips of her fingers. “Seriously? Junie was outside? I bet that stupid brother of mine left his window open again. You know that’s how he sneaks out to see his girlfriend. You should lock that window with a padlock. That’s the only way to keep him inside.”
Then she twisted the wand, and the view outside came tumbling into the room. The trees were green, the sky was blue, and the hillside rose up to enclose the space that was becoming the family pool. On the other side, halfway up the terraced yard, were the knees of a man. That’s all that could be seen beneath the paper blueprints hiding the upper part of his body.
“Yuck.” Lissie turned away. “People. I want our yard back again.” Then she laughed with inspiration. “Mom, you need to get a life. I’ll go ask that guy out there for you, if you want. You know, for a date. He probably scrubs up pretty good.” Glancing towards her mother, she laughed and put her hands on her hips. “Chipper, did you get in Mimi’s way and cause her to fall?”
A flash of yellow streaked through the room, and Chipper yelled, “Junie! Want birdie! Mommy, Junie!”
Karen scrambled to her feet, appalled at the mess that was unfolding around her. Life? She had all the life she could handle. That man sitting out there was the wrong kind of life, and she wanted the blinds closed.
“Lissie, please close the blinds.” Karen forced herself under control, her heart and her emotions. Even so, she could feel the room becoming hot again, and she knew the opened blinds must be letting in the summer heat once more. Seeing that man across the yard with his brown arms holding those papers and his muscular legs tight in his jeans wasn’t affecting her. No, it was those blinds Lissie had just opened. They were letting the glare from the concrete porch in. That’s why she suddenly felt so hot. “Please, Lissie. The blinds.”
“Mom, what’s the deal? It’s just the yard.” She called to the baby, “Chipper, come let Mimi alone for a minute. I think you overwhelmed her.”
“Lissie. The blinds, please? I can handle the baby. I really want the window closed.” She heard it in her voice, the way her words edged on ragged, nearing to desperation. That man was still out there, and surely Lissie could tell what he did to her. She had to control this situation now.
“Mom!” Lissie turned back to the window and glared at the man sitting there.
Karen could just see him. He had dropped the paper to his knees, and the perspiration on his browned, bare shoulders glistened in the midday sun. His sunglasses were shadowed under the brim of his western hat, and he seemed to be looking over the damage that had been done to the yard all around him.
“Close the blinds. Now, Lissie!” A stronger note of desperation crept into her voice.
“Mom! You’re so funny today. Is that man out there the problem?” She grabbed the wand and laughed. “He’s just a construction worker. He probably smells, too. Look, he’s all sweaty.” With a swift motion, she flipped the blinds shut and turned around, winking. “It’s not like he’s going to come in here and ask you for a date or anything, although with a nice suit and a tie, he might even be okay.” An inspired look came over her. “Would you like me to see if he’d like something to eat?”
Karen’s face turned white. “You better not dare!” Breathing hard, hoping she could carry off anger instead of embarrassment, she turned to stomp from the room, only to find Chipper still holding tightly to her leg.
“Chipper!” Her word was short, but she managed to keep her tone soft. He wasn’t even two. She knelt to put her arms around him, giving him a hug, unable to speak another word out loud. She would cry if she did.
A hand squeezed her shoulder, and her daughter’s voice was surprisingly tender. “Mom, it’s just a worker with the pool company. Dad’s gone, and although you wanted to believe in him, he was gone from us a long time before he walked out. I love him, Mom, but Dad left us. We didn’t leave him. We have to move on.”
Karen knew that. She had wanted to make her marriage work. While she might admit she had been too optimistic, she had known the marriage was failing for a long time before Brad served her the divorce papers. But, a dirty construction worker? Why did she have to be attracted to a tanned, muscular man covered in sweat? Why did he have to hide behind those mysterious sunglasses and that cowboy hat? Why did he have to whistle so perfectly and help her catch that stupid yellow parakeet?
She knew one other thing. Her daughter hadn’t been looking, but Karen had seen him lower that blueprint, and bless her soul if that bare-chested man hadn’t looked straight at the house, nodded his head, and grinned just as if he could see right there inside where she had tumbled to the floor.
Would she like Lissie to go out there and ask him if he’d like a bite to eat? Her thoughts were in a jumble. Dear God in heaven, no, and dear God in heaven, yes. Yes, Lissie, yes, and don’t you dare, daughter. I might just take him up on it, and that wouldn’t do at all.
KAREN CRANKED Dylan’s window shut. That’s how the bird had gotten out. It had to have been.
She let her eyes rove the backyard. All day she’d refused to open the downstairs blinds again, knowing what she would see out there, and she wasn’t entirely sure she would be able to resist offering him some water, or perhaps a glass of lemonade. Then, of course, it would have been inconsiderate to come directly back inside. The gracious thing would have been to stay outside to visit with him for a few moments, perhaps to discuss the taste of the water or the sweetness of the lemonade. Then, if he were interested, and he would be, they would talk of the progress on the pool and of the benefits of tweaking this minor part of the design, or just what the view might be if they walked to the far corner of the yard that was totally hidden from the houses around them. She might even slip in the soft dirt where the plumbing lines had been run, and if she grabbed at his bare, muscled arm, she would have no choice but to hold on tightly as he helped her to her feet.
No one would see any harm in that, would they? Not even God would disapprove of this man helping her out of a predicament. After all, she wasn’t asking him to remove his shirt. She hadn’t seen him with his shirt on and then waited until he pulled it off before stepping outside. No, it had been off when she first looked through the blinds. No one could fault her there.
Her gut tightened with the butterflies she felt inside. He was gone from her yard. In the final fingers of the early evening sun, she could see that. She could certainly look, however, to make sure, even if she knew he wasn’t there. In fact, she should, for security purposes. Everyone should check their yard through their windows to ensure there were no strange men lurking about. Hadn’t Lissie said she needed to check this window, that Dylan had been sneaking out? That’s all she was doing, what her daughter had suggested. She wasn’t looking for that man, that horrible man who had taken his shirt off in her backyard right where she could see him and admire that strong back and his muscled chest. If she were to happen to see him, it certainly wouldn’t be because she wanted to see him again, and certainly not because she had found him attractive or her pulse had throbbed in her temples at the sight of his bare skin.
No, she knew, this man was the type who probably went to Town Lake and intentionally roamed the shore wearing only swim trunks and flip flops, just to be admired by all the women who happened to pass him by. She was certain he had an apartment somewhere, a loft, perhaps, and there were neon lights underneath his bed. Every weekend he had a party, probably two, and his glass-walled loft was filled with twenty-somethings who partied hard and needed the next day to recover. That was not the kind of man a thirty-eight-year-old grandmother needed at all.
However, she could see her backyard was as empty as the hole in her heart. No cowboy-hatted man was waiting on her to bring him lemonade, and her parakeet was not outside. She knew, because the bird was roaming her house again.
With a suddenly quickened pulse, she realized she could have asked that man in for that. Rescuing the bird again would have been an acceptable excuse. Even Lissie would have understood. Karen could tell her daughter how he had charmed the bird with his whistle, and Lissie would see that her mother was not interested in that sweaty construction worker. Her interest lay solely in the rescue of this bird that was once again living in the dining room chandelier.
However, it would not be polite to ask this man-with-no-name to come inside to whistle for her bird without offering him a soda or some of that oversweet lemonade. Then, when she asked him if it was too sweet, he would laugh and tell her it was fine. In that moment she would offer to fix another batch. When he made to drink it anyway, she would have to place her hand on his arm to stop him. She would laugh and tell him he was just being nice, and then he would smile and tell her he was always nice. They would laugh and look into each other eyes. At least, he would look into her eyes, and then she would reach to him and slowly remove his sunglasses. In that moment, she would see his brown pupils, and they would be the creamy color of German chocolate frosting.
“Junie!” The toddler’s voice intruded into Karen’s thoughts, and Karen turned to see a yellow flash burst through the door and to the window. When the bird discovered it was closed, it immediately shot back out the door and was gone. Chipper’s laughter followed the feathered missile down the hall.
She sighed and closed the blinds. At least the tanned cowboy with the glasses was gone from her yard, even if that bird was still loose in her house. It would have been nice to have that man whistle Junie back to its cage, even if she never got to offer him her lemonade. She chuckled sourly. She didn’t even have any lemonade mix in the house. A lot of good it would have done to offer him a glass.
She headed down the stairs, shutting the safety gate before moving to the landing. “Lissie? Are you still upstairs?” She could hear music from the upstairs hall, but the baby couldn’t be left alone if his mother wasn’t upstairs with him.
The music quieted, and Lissie’s voice called out, “Mom? You need something?”
“I’m headed downstairs, Lissie. Chipper’s with you upstairs.”
“Sure, Mom. I’ll keep an eye out.” The music increased in volume once again.
Karen sighed. Seventeen was far too young to have a child, and she had raised her two. Now it seemed she was raising another. At least that man was gone from her yard. That boy was gone from her yard. He was a boy, too. He might be twenty-five or thirty, but compared to her, he was a boy. She was a grandmother and soon to be almost forty. No matter that Brad had left her, divorced her, leaving her free to chase any eligible man she wanted, she was far too old for this boy who had magically whistled her bird onto his finger today.
Anyway, the weekend started tomorrow, and next week her vacation would be over. Even if that sweaty man returned to her yard, she would be at work, and her respectability would be safe. So would his, as far as his involvement with her was concerned. If he wanted to waste it on his wild parties with his twenty-something girlfriends, then that was none of her business. She didn’t even know where his glassed-in loft was, anyway, and there was no way she intended to try to find out.
Reaching the darkening living room, she touched the switch to turn on soft, ambient lighting around the edges of the walls. A movie might be nice tonight. A romance about a woman who falls for a construction worker.
Sure, she thought. Like I’ve got a dozen of those.
At least she’d insisted Brad install the home theater in here and not in the den upstairs. She liked being able to watch in the main part of the house where life was centered, not up in some remote hideaway where no one could find her. Now that the house was hers, she appreciated having it the way she wanted it.
Picking up an oversized remote, she pressed a button, and a screen dropped from the ceiling.
Then she remembered. Garbage pickup was in the morning, and the pool crew always left paper cups and such around. She tried to make the rounds of the yard twice a week just to keep things under control. She would need to hurry to take care of that before dark, too. The light was fading fast.
She grabbed a flashlight, certain she had almost waited too long. Perhaps the white of the cups would catch in the light, and she could get this done quickly.
Stepping outside, she flicked her fingers in the birdbath, remembering how strong her response to that man had been earlier. The sound of a helicopter overhead caught her attention, and she looked up to see its running lights overhead. However, it was far away, and she dismissed it from her thoughts. Looking at the dark pit of her pool, she was reminded of how her stomach had turned over at the sight of that unknown construction worker, and she chuckled. Sure, his presence had done a number on her, but now, somehow, it was almost funny. At least it wouldn’t happen again.
She stepped to the edge of what sidewalk still remained, and looking to where her sweaty construction worker had been sitting earlier, she sighed. Her weekend was perhaps not so safe after all. Just across the open space where the pool would eventually be were the blueprints and a pair of sunglasses. Now she would have to be sure to keep the blinds closed all day tomorrow, either that or make a point to be gone for the day. Her unknown man would miss his things in the morning, and surely he would stop by for them. She did not want to be here when he did, either.
Stepping to the edge of the pool excavation, she paused when the automatic lights in the trees flickered on. Then she squinted in the gathering shadows at a glint next to the sunglasses. Did she see a set of truck keys there, also? Surely he was not still around. In a sudden panic, she pivoted her foot in the dirt to return to the house, and with an unplanned loss of balance, the damp earth gave way underneath her.
She sat down roughly, scrambling to keep from going inside the hole. Then, her feet lost their grip, and with a gasp of desperation, she felt the edge of the pool become a dirt slide. However, instead of landing on the floor of the excavation, she had an unexpected surprise. When she reached the bottom, someone was there to catch her, and it was the very man she had so desperately hoped to avoid.