Lydia bit back her immediate retort. She wanted results. Up until now, she hadn’t gotten them. “What are you proposing, Smythe?”
Again, a faint pause. “Is it your daughter-in-law you really want, Mrs. Moreland?”
She stopped to think. “No. I don’t particularly want to see her again. But she has my grandson.”
“Yes. But in fact it’s the child you’re interested in finding, isn’t it? Not the mother.”
“Not the mother,” she echoed.
“So if you could have the child without the mother, wouldn’t that make more sense, Mrs. Moreland?” The electronic voice hummed in her ear, rather like a finely tuned machine.
She ran her tongue across her lips. “Is that a possibility, Smythe?”
“Oh, it’s more than a possibility, Mrs. Moreland,” he murmured. “In fact, I’d say it’s the best solution to your problem, all around.”
“But…” She paused to gather her thoughts. “You’d bring the child to me directly? Unharmed?”
“If that’s what you want.” His voice was brisk. “Of course, it would require more compensation. My expenses would be greater.”
“Of course.” She took a deep breath, considering. “Keep it as a possibility. For now, just find the woman and my grandson. Once that’s done, we’ll proceed from there.”
“All right, Mrs. Moreland. I’ll be in touch.” The click of the disconnect sounded remarkably loud against her ear.
Lydia sat staring at the cell phone in her hand as if she could see “Smythe’s” face through the screen. She wondered idly how far she was prepared to go, but the thought really was idle. In fact, she knew precisely how far she’d take this.
And Smythe would get her there.
Lars arrived at Jessamyn Carroll’s front door promptly at five. He’d been tempted to come early, but he wanted to give her the full day so that she’d know exactly what she was up against. Mrs. Melendez had frequently looked like she’d spent the day chasing a herd of cats when he’d appeared on her doorstep.
Jessamyn Carroll didn’t look appreciably different from the way she’d looked at eight-thirty that morning. Her feathery golden hair framed her face, looking as if she’d run her fingers through it just before answering the door. Her eyes were the color of a stormy sea.
For just a moment, he wondered what she’d look like with makeup, in a dress. Then he ruthlessly pushed that thought into the farthest corner of his mind.
“Oh, hello.” She pushed the hair away from her eyes, bouncing her son on her hip. “Is it five already? I guess we lost track.”
“Daddy!” Daisy yelled, cannon-balling into his knees.
Lars gathered her up and gave her a hug. “Hi, Dais. Did you have a good time?”
Daisy wriggled out of his arms, grabbing his hand on the way down. “C’mon, Daddy, come see the bow-wow.”
“The bow-wow?” He turned back toward Ms. Carroll as Daisy towed him through the living room like a determined tugboat.
“Bower,” she explained, as if he should know exactly what that meant.
Daisy stopped in front of a deep window alcove full of pillows. It was covered in a velvet throw with an angel pattern, probably from Margaret Hastings’ angel shop downtown. “My bow-wow.” She pointed at a pile of pillows and picture books. “I sleep in there.”
“Daisy takes her nap in the bower.” Ms. Carroll shifted her son to her other hip as she gestured at a mesh baby gate. “We raise the drawbridge.”
The baby, Jack, looked up at him, grinning a guileless baby grin. Lars managed not to blink at his mother again. He figured it was best to just go with it. “I guess that keeps her in.”
Daisy gave him a look of pure outrage. “No, Daddy. It keeps everybody out. Just me inside.”
“Daisy decides when it comes down,” Ms. Carroll added. “And then she joins us.”
He nodded. Better than razor wire.
“And we read stories,” Daisy continued. “And I saw Mrs. Carroll’s booby!”
There was a beat of absolute silence in the room except for Jack’s coos. Ms. Carroll’s face turned a very attractive shade of pink, Lars noted. Much better than blusher.
“Okay. Well, time to go home, Dais,” he muttered. “Go get your coat.”
He watched Daisy bounce off down the hall, black curls flying. No wonder Jack had been entranced.
Behind him, Ms. Carroll cleared her throat. “I’m still nursing Jack. That’s what Daisy meant.”
Lars turned back toward her. Her cheeks were still faintly pink, but her forehead was creased. She looked worried. It took him a moment to understand what she was worried about, and then he felt incongruously like laughing. “Right. Look, don’t worry, Ms. Carroll, I figured it was something like that. Daisy is a genius at saying things I really wish she wouldn’t.”
She took a quick breath, then gave him a faint smile. “Maybe you should call me Jess.”
He thought of telling her no, telling her they should keep their interactions strictly business. But instead he found himself saying, “Call me Lars.”
“Okay, Lars.” Her smile widened slightly, just enough to delve those dimples in her cheeks.
Daisy galloped back into the room, trailing her coat behind her. Jack chuckled with delight. “Can we go to the bar with Uncle Pete and Uncle Cal?” Daisy pleaded.
He took a deep breath. “You can’t go into bars, Dais. I told you that.”
“But Uncle Pete and Uncle Cal can. And Auntie Docia and Aunt Janie. Why can’t I?”
He held the jacket for her, deftly inserting one of her arms in a sleeve. “Your uncles and aunts are all big people. When you’re big you can go to a bar.” He closed his eyes briefly. “Or not. That is, you might not want to. That is…”
He glanced up at Jess. Her lips were pressed tight, as if she was trying very hard not to grin. Jack waved his arms desperately at Daisy, whimpering.
“Time to go now, Dais,” Lars repeated, herding her gently toward the door.
“Okay. Bye, Jack. Bye, Mrs. Carroll. See you tomorrow.” Daisy sailed through the door, giving Lars just enough time to aim a distracted grin in Jess’s general direction as he trotted after her.
He grabbed Daisy’s hand before she got too far in front of him. “Slow down, Dais.”
She looked up at him with huge brown eyes, the color of blackstrap molasses. Toleffson eyes. His eyes. Lars felt another of those quick shots to the gut he’d felt ever since he’d picked Daisy up the first time, staring down at the smallish bundle in the receiving blanket the nurse had handed him.
“Daddy,” she murmured sweetly, “did Mama feed me with her boobies?”
Lars sighed. “Come on, Daisy, let’s head home.”
Chapter Four
By the end of the week, when Lars joined his family for their usual Friday night potluck supper, he had decided Jess Carroll was probably a witch. He figured nothing less than magic could explain her ability to manage Daisy, Jack and the Lone Oak Bed and Breakfast without losing her mind. Managing Daisy alone was making major inroads into his own sanity.
Now he sat in Cal’s oversize rocker and watched his brothers and sisters-in-law try to deal with Daisy, two dogs and a cat while they put food on the table. They didn’t seem overly harassed, but then they didn’t have to deal with all four on a daily basis.
Cal’s Chihuahua had established an uneasy alliance with Pete’s greyhound. Both of them were thoroughly cowed by Docia’s demonic black cat. So was Lars, truth be told. Daisy, of course, wasn’t cowed by anybody.
Friday dinners rotated from one Toleffson house to another. Cal and Docia lived in a terrific renovated barn he’d found and rented after moving to Konigsburg three years ago. Docia’s parents had given it to them as a wedding present. Pete and Janie lived in a former bed and breakfast they’d reconverted into a single-family home. It had a great yard, a strange mauve paint job, and serpentine halls that led to more bedrooms than any sane family could use.
Lars studied Cal’s living room, with its warm wooden walls and its vaulted ceiling high overhead, and wondered when he’d have time to find a real home for himself and his daughter. Right now they were renting a pleasantly bland house next door to Pete and Janie on a pleasantly bland residential street with lots of pleasantly bland elderly retirees. They all thought Daisy was adorable from a distance. He had a feeling she’d lose a lot of her appeal if she got much closer. He sighed. One more thing to put on the to-do list for when he had the time and the energy. To say nothing of the money.
Once upon a time he’d been as lively as his brothers. These days, he felt lucky if he could drag himself out of bed in time to fix Daisy a decent breakfast.
His brothers were both working in the kitchen, along with his sisters-in-law and Allie Maldonado. The barn consisted of one large room downstairs with a couple of bedrooms in the loft upstairs. The downstairs room had areas for cooking, eating and slacking off, as Lars was currently doing. He watched Cal toss a colossal amount of pasta with some kind of green sauce that Lars devoutly hoped was pesto rather than strained spinach. Since Cal was the only vegetarian in the family, he always made sure at least one entrée was meat-free and usually delicious.
Pete was taking care of the carnivores, slicing a large ham on the cutting board while his wife, Janie, tossed salad on the counter beside him. His greyhound occasionally cast a few hopeful looks his way, but Pete had so far ignored her.
Docia was in charge of dishing up the bread and the bowl of scalloped potatoes that Lars had brought, while Allie, praise be, took care of dessert. Beside him, Wonder took care of nothing much beyond his beer.
“We should help,” Lars ventured.
Wonder shook his head. “Don’t even try. You’d just become collateral damage. This dinner is a well-oiled machine, and you and I would constitute grit in the cogs.”
Allie raised her head, scowling at Wonder. “Not to mention you’re far more comfortable sitting on your ass.”
Lars blinked. Allie and Wonder usually had a playful banter thing going, but that last statement hadn’t sounded particularly playful. Beside him, Wonder’s mouth tightened slightly.
“Far more comfortable,” he agreed.
Allie turned abruptly and walked back toward the kitchen area. Wonder’s gaze after her was bleak.
“Trouble in paradise?” Lars asked. He waited for Wonder to reply something witty, sardonic, Wonderish.
Wonder sat staring after the woman Lars happened to know he loved to distraction. “Trouble in paradise.” He sighed, then swallowed a large gulp of his Spaten.
Lars took a swallow of his own Lone Star. “What did you do?”
“Why do you assume I did anything?” Wonder snapped. “Maybe she did something this time.”
Lars raised his eyebrows.
“Okay, okay,” Wonder muttered. “I asked her to marry me.”
“And she’s mad about that? What did you say?”
“I said, ‘I think maybe it’s time we should probably get married.’” Wonder slid further into his seat. “I think it was the
maybe
that set her off.”
Lars shook his head. “Couldn’t you have worked a
possibly
into that? Did she say no?”
“She said I was a moron. I’m not sure if that’s no or yes.”
Lars took another swallow of Lone Star. “I think you’d better come up with something pretty spectacular to apologize.”
“I’m working on it.” Wonder watched Allie as she sailed by again, paying him no attention whatsoever.
Dinner was the usual buffet of chaos. Lars sat at the table with his own plate and Daisy’s side by side, not that Daisy was sitting there herself. She bounced between her aunts and uncles, grazing from the various plates before finally settling into Docia’s lap with a piece of bread and butter.
Lars sighed. His daughter was turning into a feral child before his eyes. “Daisy, at least use a fork.”
Daisy mostly ignored him. “Aunt Docia,” she piped, “is my hair pretty?”
Docia glanced down at her absently. “Sure, Dais, your hair’s gorgeous.”
“Jack thinks so.” Daisy nodded in satisfaction. “He touches it. I’m gonna marry him.”
Docia’s look this time was pure shock. She raised wide eyes to Lars. “What? Who’s this?”
“Jack is nine months old,” Lars explained. “The marriage won’t be for a while yet. He’s Jess’s son.”
Docia’s gaze transformed from shock to something more like calculation. “Jess?”
Oops.
“Mrs. Carroll,” Lars amended. “Daisy’s sitter.”
“Jess Carroll,” Janie echoed. “I still haven’t met her. Why don’t you bring her to dinner?”
Lars heard alarm bells ringing in his brain. He hadn’t yet been able to convince his sisters-in-law that efforts at matchmaking were futile. He had no intention of getting hooked up with anyone until Daisy was twenty-one, and maybe not even then, given the catastrophe he’d stumbled into the last time he tried it. “Maybe sometime. What’s new at the bookstore?”
Janie’s look told him she wasn’t even slightly fooled by that diversionary tactic, but she apparently decided to let him get by with it. “Right now, it’s hell, but things will get better in January.”
“That long?” He turned toward Docia.
“We’ve got the Kris Kringle Market to plan for,” she explained.
“Kris Kringle Market?” His eyebrows stayed in questioning mode. “It’s only the first week in November. I thought that didn’t happen until after Thanksgiving.”
Docia sighed. “It doesn’t. The thing is, whatever we sell in the booth has to be approved by the Merchants Association, and it has to be something nobody else is doing.”
“So no funnel cakes. Richter’s Insurance Agency beat us to it. And no kettle corn because that’s what Hesselmeyer’s fruit stand always does. We’ve got to come up with something by the end of the week or we’re doomed.” Janie rolled a bit of pasta on her fork. “Did I mention this is really good, Cal?”
“Why not sell books?” Lars turned back to Docia. “I mean, that’s what you do, right?”
“Right.” Docia’s voice was dry. “I’m sure a booth selling books would be a big hit at an outdoor holiday festival.”
“Okay, if books don’t work, what does?” He helped himself to more pasta. Janie was right—it was really good.
“Food,” Docia intoned, counting off on her fingers. “That’s the biggest thing. After that, crafts—there’ll be tons of crafts people from all over the state.”
“Which means we can’t sell crafts since we can’t possibly compete with the pros. And we can’t sell books. So we’re back to food again.” Janie reached for another piece of bread.
“Candy canes,” Wonder suggested. “Gingerbread men.”
“
I’m
doing gingerbread men,” Allie snapped. “You’re supposed to be helping me.”
Wonder winced. Lars had a feeling gingerbread wasn’t the major problem between them at the moment.
“Dog biscuits,” Cal said flatly, pushing back from the table.
Everyone at the table stared at him, including both dogs.
Cal walked to the stove, where he heaped more pasta onto the platter. “People buy gifts for their pets at Christmas. Home-baked dog biscuits could be just what they’re looking for. Even if they’re just for stocking stuffers.”
“Dog biscuits.” Docia frowned, thoughtfully. “Where would we find recipes?”
Janie shrugged. “The Web? I’ll bet there are lots out there. And Cal could check them to make sure they were okay.”
“Sure.” Cal slid the pasta-laden platter back on the table. “Dog biscuit recipes should be easy enough.”
“Maybe cats too,” Janie chimed in. “Cat biscuits.”
Pete stared at her. “There’s no such thing.”
“Well, there should be.” Janie nodded at Docia’s cat, who sat on the bookcase examining the two dogs for possible weaknesses. “Nico would eat them, wouldn’t he, Docia.”
“Probably. He eats everything else that comes his way.” Docia gave Cal a stunning grin. “Thanks, Doc, I think you’ve got it.”
“Anytime, ma’am.” Cal bent down to kiss her ear, ruffling Daisy’s hair as he did.
Lars told himself he didn’t feel old and grumpy and unloved. Still, he wished Daisy would give him a hug.
“You know, we could do books, too,” Docia mused. “Stuff about pets. Kids books. That kind of thing. Buy your dog a biscuit and your kid a copy of
Old Yeller.
”
Wonder gave her a surprisingly wistful look. “I read that when I was a kid. Begged for a golden lab until my folks found out I was allergic to dogs.”
Allie narrowed her eyes. “You’re not sneezing now.”
Wonder shrugged. “Neither of these dogs have any hair to speak of.”
“It’s not the hair, it’s the dander,” Cal explained.
Docia glanced down at Cal’s dog. “Do Chihuahuas have dander?”
“Everything has dander.” Cal reached to scratch the greyhound’s ears. “It’s just dry skin flakes.”
Janie grimaced. “Okay, officially
euww
. I don’t want to talk about this during dinner.”
Docia nodded. “I’m with you.” She glanced down at Daisy again, then back at Lars, her eyes sparkling with mischief. “Tell us about Mrs. Carroll and Jack, Dais.”
Daisy glanced up at her, chewing on a carrot stick. “I’m gonna marry Jack.”
“Right. What does Mrs. Carroll say about that?” Docia cocked an eyebrow.
“She says okay. But he’s not old enough. I’ll marry him when I’m five.” Daisy checked the table for new snacks.
“Is Mrs. Carroll nice, Dais?” Janie sounded deceptively innocent.
“Yes, ma’am.” Daisy nodded, reaching for another piece of bread. Docia redirected her hand to another carrot stick.
“Is she pretty?” Docia’s eyes were glittering again.
“I guess. Can I have a cookie?” Daisy stared up at Lars.
“Did you have any normal food?”
“Yes, Daddy,” Daisy said patiently.
“Okay, then.”
Lars watched Daisy grab a chocolate chip cookie the size of a saucer.
Please, please, please let the subject of Jessamyn Carroll be closed.
Fat chance. “What do you do at Mrs. Carroll’s house all day?” Janie lifted Daisy and her cookie into her lap.
“Play with Jack and color and play games on the computer. And clean the cabin sometimes.”
“The cabin?” Janie glanced at Lars.
“The guest house. She manages the B and B.”
“Oh.” Janie shrugged. “Well, maybe you can pick up some housekeeping skills. Not that you’ll need them since you’ll be the CEO who hires people to come in and clean her house.”
“What’s a CEO?” Daisy asked, pushing the rest of the cookie into her mouth.
“Somebody who runs a company,” Pete explained. “The big cheese.”
Daisy frowned at him. “We don’t eat cheese. We have soup. And Mrs. Carroll feeds Jack with her…”
“Daisy!” Lars sat up abruptly.
Daisy stared back at him wide-eyed.
“We talked about this,” he said flatly. “You remember what I told you.”
“But she…”
“No, Daisy!” Lars felt his ears getting hot. Everybody at the table was staring at him.
Daisy’s eyes began to pool. “It’s just her boobies!” she blurted. “You said there was nothing wrong with boobies.”
The silence in the room was so complete Lars could hear the sound of the Chihuahua’s toenails clicking across the living room. He took a deep breath, very carefully not looking at anyone in the room. “Mrs. Carroll is nursing her baby. Daisy and I discussed it. I thought the subject was closed.”
He chanced a quick glance around the table. Wonder blinked at him. Allie was biting her lip. Pete’s face had turned magenta and Cal had a hand clapped over his mouth.
Docia swallowed hard, her lips trembling with the effort not to laugh. “He’s right, Daisy. There’s nothing wrong with boobies.” Her voice shook a little on the last word. “It’s just that we don’t usually talk about them at dinner.” She closed her eyes, pressing her lips together hard.
“Well,” Janie muttered, “maybe on special occasions.”
The general hysterics took about ten minutes to settle back into the occasional snicker. Lars let his chin sink onto his fists on the table. Gee, parenthood was fun.