Miss Liz's Passion. Sherryl Woods

He just needed a little firm discipline every now and then.

      Suddenly the nagging memory of his ex-wife’s endless complaints about Kevin’s manageability returned with untimely clarity. He’d dismissed her rantings at the time as yet another excuse for walking out on them. Sarah had wanted to leave long before the night she’d finally packed her bags and departed. She’d been too young, too immature to accept the responsibility of marriage, much less a troublesome son. He had blamed the inability to cope on her, not Kevin.

      The comparison gave him a moment’s pause, but he dismissed the significance almost at once. No doubt this terribly proper and probably ancient Miss Gentry was equally inept with children. If she couldn’t handle an eight-year-old boy, perhaps she’d chosen the wrong profession. Perhaps she should be teaching piano and embroidery to sedate young ladies in frilly dresses and dainty white gloves, instead of third-grade boys who got dirt on their clothes even before the school bus picked them up in the morning.

      He glanced across the room at his sturdy, blond son. Kevin was quietly racing small cars through an intricately designed village he’d built from the set of Lego blocks he’d begged for and received for his birthday. Todd figured the subdued behavior would last no more than another ten minutes, long enough for his son to feel secure that this note from his teacher would not result in some sort of punishment.

      “Kevin.” He kept his tone determinedly neutral. Still, wary blue eyes glanced up from the toy Porsche that was about to skitter around the village’s sharpest turn. A tiny jaw jutted up, mimicking all too accurately Todd’s own frequently belligerent expression. That look warned him that there just might be something behind Miss Gentry’s complaints.

      “What’s this all about, son?”

      “Same old stuff.” Kevin directed his attention back to the car. It whizzed around the turn and up a hill.

      “What stuff?” Todd persisted. “I gather this is not the first time your teacher has written.”

      A guilty blush spread across Kevin’s round, freckled cheeks and he continued to look down. Todd nodded with sudden understanding. No wonder the teacher had been indignant. She thought he’d seen all of her earlier notes and had intentionally ignored them.

      “I see,” he said wearily. “What did you do with the other letters?”

      There was the tiniest hesitation before Kevin said in a whisper, “I lost ’em.”

      “Really? How convenient,” he said, barely controlling his temper. “Suppose you tell me what they were about.”

      Kevin studied the miniature red Porsche he was pushing back and forth and mumbled, “She said she told you in this one.”

      “I want to hear it from you.”

      Kevin remained stubbornly silent. Todd knew from experience that getting him to talk now was going to require tact and patience. He was shorter than usual on both tonight.

      “Son, she says this is the fifth note in the last three weeks. Are you sure there’s not something happening in school that you should tell me about?”

      Kevin’s expression turned increasingly defiant. “I told you, Dad. She don’t like me. That’s all it is.”

      “School just started a month ago. Why would you think your teacher doesn’t like you?”

      “Everybody knows it, Dad. She’s always telling me how to do stuff.”

      Despite himself, Todd grinned. “She’s a teacher. That’s what teachers do.”

      “Yeah, but Dad, she only tells me. Even when I tell her I can’t do it, she makes me. The other kids get it, but I can’t. I try, Dad. Really.”

      The tears that welled up despite the tough facade convinced Todd that his son was telling the truth, at least as he saw it. A swift surge of compassion swept through him, blotting out for a moment his need to get to the bottom of the teacher’s complaints. His overwhelming desire to protect Kevin at any cost refueled his anger at the stiff, unyielding Miss Gentry and gave substance to all of his long-standing suspicions about the school system’s ineptitude. It had done a lousy enough job with him. He’d obviously been foolish to hope that things had improved.

      What kind of teacher would single out a child day after day like that? He’d tried his darnedest not to interfere, to let the school do what it was supposed to do—educate his son, but he wouldn’t have the boy made out to be some sort of freak because he was a little slower than the other kids. Kevin was smart as a whip. Anyone who took the time to talk to him could see that.

      “Are you going to talk to her, Dad?” Kevin’s voice was hesitant, the tone a heartbreaking mix of hopefulness and fear. Todd wasn’t sure what response his son really wanted.

      “Don’t you want me to?” he asked, though he knew there was no longer any real choice in the matter.

      Kevin shrugged, but his little shoulders were slumped so dejectedly it made Todd feel like pounding his fist through a wall. “She’s made me stay after school almost every day this week,” Kevin finally admitted. “A couple of times I almost missed the bus. I think she’s real mad at both of us now.”

      Todd sighed. Kevin tried so hard not to let anyone fight his battles for him. If only he’d told Todd sooner, perhaps this wouldn’t have gotten so far out of hand. The prospect of confronting Miss Gentry’s self-righteous antagonism held about as much appeal as putting in another grueling, mishap-ridden twelve-hour day at the site of his latest shopping center.

      “Then maybe it’s time I have a talk with her,” he said, anyway. “Don’t worry about it, son. I’ll get it straightened out. Tell her I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon.” He recalled the string of problems he’d left behind at the construction site and the imperious tone of that note, then amended, “Or the next day, at the latest.”

      But despite the reassurance, fear still flickered in Kevin’s eyes. That frightened expression aroused all of Todd’s fierce protective instincts. He remembered every single humiliating moment of his own school experience and swore to himself that Miss Elizabeth Gentry would not put his son through the same sort of torment.

      Liz stared longingly out the classroom window at the swaying palm trees and deep blue sky. It was a perfect Florida day. The humidity had vanished on the breeze. She had only five more spelling papers to grade before she could leave the confining classroom and enjoy what was left of the early October afternoon. The prospect of a long swim raised her spirits considerably.

      She had had an absolutely hellish day again. The school had instituted yet another form that had to be filled out, though no one knew quite why. Two of her students had been sent home with the flu, after generously sharing their germs, no doubt. She’d had cafeteria duty, which almost always left her with a headache. Today’s was still throbbing at the base of her skull. And Kevin had gotten into another fight. This time he’d sent Cindy Jamison to the school nurse with a bloody lip. She herself had gotten a lump on her shin and a run in her hose trying to break up the brawl.

      Now Kevin was sitting at his desk, his head bent over another assignment as they waited for his father, who was already forty minutes late. The man probably had no intention of showing up this time, either, though Kevin had vowed that he would be here.

      She heard a soft, snuffling sound and looked back just in time to catch sight of a tear spilling onto Kevin’s paper. Her heart constricted. Blast that stubborn, indifferent father of his.

      “Kevin, bring me your paper.”

      He looked up, his expression so woebegone that once again she felt like taking his father apart piece by piece.

      When Kevin didn’t move, she said, “Aren’t you finished?”

      He shook his head.

      “That’s okay. Show me what you have and we’ll do the rest together.”

      “It’s not very good.”

      “No