An Accidental Mom. Loree Lough

stage again, even if it had to be from the grave! She made good and sure Max would spend the rest of his life blaming himself for her death. And so far, she’s succeeded.”

      “What do you mean, she succeeded?”

      “First, he hasn’t been out on a date since before he met her. And second, he won’t go anywhere or do anything that might even hint at having fun. As if that’s not bad enough, he’s totally given up on God.”

      Well, that explained the ever-so-serious expression on his handsome face. Explained his stern attitude toward Nate, too. “Sad,” Lily said. “He used to be so goofy, such fun, the life of every party.”

      “Which is exactly why I think you had a doggone good idea, if you’ll pardon the pun.”

      Lily forced herself to grin. “You really think Max will go for it?”

      “You ’n’ me will see that he does!”

      “Just so he doesn’t see it as interfering…”

      “How could he see you matching his son up with a great dog like Missy as interference?” Georgia laughed. “You add my leg to your prayer list, I’ll add Max’s answer to mine.”

      “Deal!” Lily said, shaking the woman’s hand.

      Neither of them noticed the three-foot tall shadow standing near the bottom of the stairs….

      Nate’s dad had scolded him enough times for thundering down the steps. This time, he was determined to get to the first floor as quietly as possible. So he pretended to be an Indian brave, stalking a deer in the forest. “Heap big bunch of meat,” he whispered, remembering the Daniel Boone movie he’d seen earlier. “Take home to squaw.” He raised the plastic shovel-turned-tomahawk just as he reached the bottom step…just in time to hear Lily and his grandmother talking about getting a dog!

      He snuck back up to the second floor and slipped into his room. A dog! he thought as his sneakered foot hit the top step. A dog named Missy. Nate didn’t give a thought to the color of her fur, her age, the loudness of her bark. His only thought was a dog that he would soon have of his very own!

      Flopping onto his back on the twin bed that was his here in Amarillo, he kicked both feet into the air and punched the mattress. “Yippee!” he whispered.

      “Gramma, how old does a person have to be to use the telephone?”

      “Old enough to talk, I guess,” she said distractedly.

      Nate watched as she filed her fingernails. “What if a person wants to talk to somebody, but he doesn’t know their number?”

      “He could look the number up in the phone book….”

      Slapping a hand to his forehead, Nate did his best not to appear impatient. “But what if the person can’t read?”

      “Then, I guess he’d have to call Information.”

      “Information?”

      His grandmother nodded. “He’d have to dial four-one-one and tell the nice lady what city and state the person he wants to call lives in.”

      “We’re in Amarillo, Texas, right?”

      “Right.”

      Now he watched as Georgia shook a tiny bottle of fingernail polish. “You gonna paint your nails, Gramma?”

      “Mmm-hmm.”

      “Why? ’Cause that nice man is coming over again tonight?” Nate thought she looked right pretty, not at all like a grandmother, when she smiled like that.

      He was about to tell her so, when she said, “He’s going to load me into his car and take me out to eat. And then we’re going to the movies.”

      “Cool. Whatcha gonna see?”

      “Who knows? Something funny, I expect. Robert loves comedies.”

      Nate nodded, mirroring Georgia’s frown as she concentrated on layering each fingernail with a coat of pearly white polish. “So Gramma…”

      “Hmm?”

      “After this person tells the nice lady what city and state, then what?”

      “Then he tells her the name of the person who lives in that city and state, and she recites the phone number. Unless it’s unlisted.”

      “‘Recites’?”

      “Tells,” Georgia clarified. “She tells him the person’s phone number.”

      Nate could read better than most four-year-olds, but not nearly well enough, he knew, to look someone up in the telephone directory. He could write his numbers, though, because his dad had started teaching him as soon as he could hold on to a colored marker.

      He was thankful that his grandmother’s focus was still on her hand. And his dad was down the street, buying washers to repair the leaking kitchen faucet. If God had been listening when he’d asked for assistance, Nate could make the call before either of them could say their favorite word: Whippersnapper.

      “What’s for supper, Gramma?” he asked, heading for the stairs.

      “I think your dad said something about fixing chicken fingers for the two of you.” Suddenly, she tucked her tongue between her top and bottom lip. “What do you expect,” she muttered to herself, “when you’ve only used nail polish twice in your entire life!”

      “I love chicken fingers. ’Specially with honey-and-mustard dippin’ sauce.”

      “Mmm-hmm…”

      “God?” Nate whispered as he climbed the stairs. “Help me remember everything Gramma just said, okay?”

      Closing the apartment door quietly behind him, the boy sat on the end of the couch nearest the telephone. Holding the handset to his head, he pressed four-one-one.

      “And, God?” he continued, waiting for the numbers to connect him to the nice lady. “Let Dad say yes about Missy the dog!”

      Lily rather liked the way Missy followed her around. The dog sat quietly as Lily fed milk to a baby squirrel. And while she cleaned the eagle’s cage, Missy lay quietly, head resting on her forepaws, cinnamon-brown eyes watching every move. It was as though the retriever understood that the barn was both shelter and hospital for birds with broken wings, for orphaned bunnies…for dogs who’d been separated from their families.

      “You’re a pretty cool mutt,” she said, ruffling the golden fur. “Even Obnoxious thinks so!” Missy got along well with her dad’s dog. Surprising in itself, because while Obnoxious had never been vicious, he’d never before befriended one of Lily’s visiting canines.

      Missy sat on her haunches and sent Lily a happy-doggy grin. She was about to admit that if Max said Nate couldn’t have a dog, she’d keep Missy for herself—but the phone rang, forestalling her speech.

      “Miss Lily?”

      Nate? But why would he be phoning her? “Yes.”

      “It’s me, Nathan Maxwell Sheridan. We met at my gramma’s diner?”

      Lily grinned. “Yes, I remember.” How could she forget, when he’d plied her with compliments and practically asked her to be his mother! “How nice to hear from you, Nate.”

      “I just called to say thanks for saving that dog today. You’re not just pretty, you’re brave, too.”

      He was his father’s son, all right, adept at flirting, even at the tender age of four. Max had made an art form of it in high school. Surely he’d only improved since—

      Lily remembered what Georgia had said—that Max hadn’t dated, had practically refused to do anything that involved a good time since his wife’s death.

      “I heard you, a little while