Her Single Dad Hero. Arlene James

for a mother. The boy didn’t realize that most husbands and wives spent relatively little time together and that almost no fathers were blessed with the almost constant companionship of their children.

      Dean mentally sorted through a number of possible replies, everything from correcting Donovan’s grammar to playing dumb. In the end he chose casual honesty.

      “She’s pretty.”

      “And you like red hair, don’cha?”

      “I do. But you realize that she doesn’t actually live here, right?”

      “Huh?”

      “She’s just visiting, son. Before long she’ll go on back to where she came from and stay there.”

      “Huh. Is it a long ways off?”

      “Yep. Afraid so.”

      Only a few hours away by car. Worlds away by every other measure.

      But then that had always been the way with him and Ann Billings.

      Donovan couldn’t know that, of course.

      Dean hoped that he never would.