Temporary Father. Anna Adams

soak up instructions for raisin-specked, honey-drizzled bread pudding when she was called to the treatment room.

      She recognized one of Brent’s colleagues in the room across from hers. And she recognized the man who said, “Come on” with a force Eli could hardly have matched. “Two more weeks? You gotta be kidding me.”

      The receptionist pulled Aidan Nikolas’s door closed. “Dr. Vining always forgets to close the door after he looks over results, and heart patients rarely want to hear they have to take it easy a couple more weeks.”

      Too busy silently swearing to speak, Beth only nodded. She followed the other woman inside and nodded again at instructions to take off her clothing and put on a paper gown.

      She couldn’t ask a sick man to work on her behalf.

      She donned the gown, and for the first time in her life, was too preoccupied to be nervous.

      THE LAST PERSON Aidan wanted to see was standing outside a sporting goods shop beside the pharmacy where he had to refill his prescription for beta blockers. He stuffed the medication, bag and all, into his jeans pocket.

      “Beth,” he said, involuntarily.

      She turned, her face flushed, her eyes focusing anywhere but on him. She knew—somehow.

      Small towns. Gossip through osmosis.

      He moved to stand beside her. “Skateboarding?” he asked, as he studied the colorful boards. “I never realized they didn’t come all in one piece.” Sets of wheels gleamed as they never would after their first use.

      “Me, either, until my son started skating.” Beth lifted her hand to the height of a black board, printed with a bulky, dark green cartoon character in midleap. “This part is the deck.”

      “Are you buying it? You know you work too much when you don’t recognize cartoons.”

      “I can’t affor—” She stopped on a deep breath. “Eli had one something like that before the fire.” She looked him up and down and stepped back. “I need to go home.”

      “Let me take you to lunch.” What had she seen? Weakness? Women normally wanted to spend time with him. For once, he’d make time to linger.

      “It’s barely after eight,” she said.

      “Oh.” His rage at the continued restrictions returned. She followed his hand as he shoved the medicine deeper into his pocket.

      “And Eli’s on spring break. I scheduled my—an appointment I had—early so I could spend the day with him.”

      “Okay.”

      “Come up later, though. Join us for hot dogs or something. Mrs. Carleton—she’s Van’s housekeeper—she’s off today so we’re fending for ourselves.”

      There was a dare in her tone. “I might do that.” She couldn’t scare him with hot dogs and family fun. He loved the simple stuff.

      The frown between her eyebrows told him he’d read her right. “You probably aren’t supposed to eat junk food,” she said.

      He took his hand out of his pocket. “Van told you?”

      “About the heart attack.” She pushed her finger around the loose collar of her shirt. “He mentioned you’d had a minor problem.” She made a huge production of looking at her own watch. “I need to get home. Nice to see you again. Come on up if you get the time. I always make a salad for myself when Van and Eli pig out on the bad stuff.”

      A MAN—a decent man, no less—had asked her to lunch. By herself. Not because he wanted something from Van, or he taught her rowdy son Social Studies and they needed to brainstorm “solutions” to Eli’s behavior.

      She’d had to say no. With her heart beating near the back of her throat, she glanced back down the sidewalk. Aidan had already gone. Good.

      Thinking he might be attracted was one thing. Feeling attracted to him was exciting because she hadn’t cared for any man in—who knew how long?

      She’d forgotten the thrill of a caught breath, the tingle of flushing skin, the excitement of a maybe.

      But Aidan Nikolas was used to women with no ties except to their clothing bills. She’d already made enough mistakes in her life.

      Falling for a handsome, successful man in town only until he felt healthy again would be par for the course for a woman who’d lost her heart and too many years to the captain of the high school football team.

      Eli was her responsibility, Eli with his moods and needs and their lack of a home to call their own. So why had she invited Aidan to join them in a hot-dog fest?

      She wiped her palm across her forehead. Had the temperature grown warmer today, or had she backed herself into a hot corner? Lunch would be safe, with Eli and Van to keep an eye on her. Aidan, way out of her league, would see she had other priorities.

      She took her phone out of her purse and dialed Van’s home number. In a second, her son answered, but she could tell his mind was elsewhere. He must be slaying aliens.

      “Hey, buddy,” she said.

      “Can’t talk, Mom.”

      Alien massacres for sure. “I asked Uncle Van’s friend over for lunch, and I wanted to warn you guys. Will you let your uncle know?”

      “I’m not sure where he is.” His movement made Van’s leather sofa grumble. “I think I hear him in his office. He might be on the phone, too. I’ll tell him if he comes out.”

      “Good enough. See you in a little while.”

      “Okay.” He started to hang up. The phone hit the receiver, but then he was talking again. “Mom, did you go by Gross’s Sporting Goods?”

      Her heart broke. She lied to her son because she couldn’t stand telling him no again. “I forgot you wanted me to, son. Maybe we can look together sometime this week.”

      “It doesn’t matter. We can’t afford what I want anyway.”

      She was failing her son, and all avenues of escape seemed to be disappearing. “I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

      “Okay. Mom?”

      “Hmmm?”

      “Don’t worry about it.”

      She gritted her teeth. “It’s normal to be upset you can’t have what you want.”

      “I understand why, though.”

      Something was wrong. All the more reason not to play sighs-and-smiles with her temporary neighbor.

      AIDAN SKIPPED the hot-dog fest. Not that he didn’t want hot dogs or another few minutes with the first woman who’d made him feel alive in eighteen months.

      At around dinnertime, he’d stood on the weathered gray deck of the cottage, scenting the delicious aroma of a grill at work—wanting to go—but Beth obviously hadn’t wanted him to show up.

      In the end, he’d lost himself in the business channels on the satellite, pretending that catching up on the news he’d missed was just as much fun. Which probably explained why he’d fallen into a deep sleep on the fat, blue-and-white plaid sofa.

      Something thudded into the door a little after six in the morning. Aidan’s eyes opened and he gasped a deep breath. He rolled his head on a sofa cushion, not recognizing the tick of the clock, the rough scratch of the upholstery or the deep, thick silence of no-one-else-at-home.

      He’d hardly slept since the heart attack. Not that he was avoiding Madeline’s accusing face in his dreams. He did try to sleep.

      He pulled on sweats and padded to the front door. Outside, The Honesty Sentinel lay on the rug. He picked it up, sliding it out of its plastic sleeve.

      His father was the one who’d persuaded