Debra Salonen - His Daddy's Eyes

“I can give you the name of a man, but he’s not cheap,” her neighbor said, turning to leave. “I just hope you get something done before the next association meeting.”

Sara waited until the woman was gone, then sighed heavily. The homeowners’ association took its job seriously—too seriously for Sara’s taste. But she didn’t think it was right that she had to pay for Hulger’s mistakes. And in her opinion, the entire house was a mistake.

Hulger had had the house built as a wedding present for Julia. Then he’d devoted the five years before his death to imposing his taste on every decorating detail, inside and out. Sara still could never understand how a woman as strong-willed and self-sufficient as Julia had tolerated such an autocratic husband. Another mystery of life, she figured.

In many ways, Julia was an enigma. Sara blamed their mother for that. When Audra was incapacitated by drink and couldn’t run a can opener let alone a household, Julia had become a surrogate mother to Sara, making sisterly confidences impossible.

Julia’s stormy relationship with her husband had never been open for discussion. Danish-born Hulger once told Sara his role in life was to make money and visit his parents once a year; Julia’s duties, according to Hulger, included looking beautiful for his friends, entertaining in lavish style and accompanying him to Denmark.

Julia had tried to do justice to her role, working out at the gym to stay fit and taking exotic cooking courses, but she’d missed her nursing career. Sara had been privy to enough arguments between the couple to know this was a huge issue in their marriage.

Sara had hoped things would turn around once Julia found out she was pregnant, but Brady’s birth seemed to add a new kind of tension to the marriage.

Sara sighed. She missed her sister every single day. Living in Julia’s house was a mixed blessing—reminders of Julia abounded, but so much of her taste was overwhelmed by Hulger’s bizarre, unwieldy legacy.

An hour or so later, Sara strapped Brady into his stroller and started down the street. Although she’d invited Amy to join them, the teen said she intended to use her baby-sitting money to take her mother to the movie as a Mother’s Day treat. Sara had completely forgotten about the holiday.

“Well, Brady, love, what should we do to celebrate?” she asked, giving the stroller a jiggle. “Shall we buy an ice-cream cone?”

“Iceee,” he cried enthusiastically.

She pushed fast to avoid looking at Hulger’s unfinished landscaping. In her opinion, the empty concrete fishpond resembled a giant diaphragm, which complemented the stunted marble shaft that was supposed to support an ornate fountain. Sara had petitioned the estate lawyer—a close, personal friend of Hulger’s who treated Sara like some greedy interloper—for the funds to complete the work, but he’d spouted something about long-term capital investments overriding short-term needs. Feeling utterly intimidated, she hadn’t even bothered asking for help with the gutters.

Sara pressed down on the handlebar of the stroller, leaning Brady far enough back to look up at her. “Whee,” she said, pushing him over the speed bump. His high-pitched chortle made her heart swell. She loved the sound of his laugh. Her favorite time of the day was his bath. Invariably she’d wind up soaked, but it didn’t matter because they’d laugh from start to finish.

“Fas,” Brady demanded. “Mommygofas.”

She took two quick steps. “This fast?”

He shook his head, his curls dancing. “Mo’fas.”

She sped up. “This fast?”

He leaned forward, pushing his little body back and forth as if his movement could increase the speed. “Mo’fast.”

His reward for saying the word right was an all-out run, which lasted until Sara became winded. Brushing her bangs out of her eyes, she hauled in a deep gulp of air. “No mo’fast. Mommy tired.”

With a slower pace, she walked to the market, singing a silly song for Brady. “When you’re happy and you know it, shake your feet…”

Brady’s fourteen-dollar sneakers bounced just above the pavement. “Another ‘short-term’ need, I suppose,” she muttered under her breath. I wonder whether that lawyer would manage if he had my income instead of his.

BO SQUEEZED OFF THE LAST of his exposures. Even through a telescopic lens, he could tell Sara looked tired, but the shots of her laughing as she pushed the kid in his stroller ought to get Ren’s attention. With her hair pulled back in a ponytail, she looked like a teenager. Not exactly sex-goddess stuff, but he’d included a few shots of her nicely shaped legs displayed by snug denim shorts, for good measure.

After a stop at the one-hour processing lab, he could wash his hands of this job. It was one thing to tail a stranger, but for some reason he didn’t think of Sara that way. Bo blamed that on her open, friendly manner. He had a feeling Ren would like Sara, too, but Bo doubted the feeling would be mutual once Sara found out about Ren and her sister.

Bo shook his head sadly. He wasn’t the kind of guy who believed in happy endings, but this one looked worse than most.

THE FOLLOWING WEDNESDAY EVENING, Bo parked the Mazda a block-and-a-half from the bookstore, then hunkered down to wait. The Unturned Gentlemen’s reading group was due to begin in fifteen minutes. His stomach rumbled—a two-front nervous rumble.

First, the more time he spent in Sara Carsten’s company, the more Bo admired her. The duplicity of befriending her while running a background check seemed shoddy, but the longer Bo was around Brady, the more convinced he was that the little boy was part-Bishop.

Granted, Bo knew squat about kids, but Brady had an imperious manner that shouted, “I’m important!” Pure Babe, some Ren.

The second source of anxiety stemmed from the slim paperback resting on the seat beside him. He couldn’t decide if he was more amazed by the fact that he’d actually read the thing or that he’d enjoyed it.

A rap on his passenger window startled Bo, until he saw the smiling face of Sara Carsten, who was bending down to look at him. Busted, he groaned silently. He picked up his volume of Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage, then opened the door and hauled himself to his feet.

“Hi, Bo. I’m so glad you could make it. Did you like the book?” Sara asked. At her side, a far less cordial Claudie watched him warily.

“Yeah,” he admitted. “I liked it. Half the time I couldn’t believe it was true, but no writer would be that cruel to his hero, right?”

Sara sobered. “True. Real life’s often bleaker than fiction.”

Claudie snorted. “The guy was a jerk. He deserved what he got. Why the f—heck would anybody go to Antarctica in the first place?”

“Challenge. Adventure. Accomplishment,” Bo returned.

“Men things,” she muttered. “Only men would be stupid enough to think those things mattered.”

Before Bo could reply, Sara laughed and said, “Now, now, children, if you can’t play nice, you don’t get any cookies.”

“Cookie?” a voice chirped from the navy-blue stroller.

Bo walked around the front of the car and squatted, eye-level with Brady. “Hey, kiddo, out for a ride?”

Brady kicked his feet and twisted to one side, shyly hiding his face in the soft fabric. “We had a picnic supper in Capitol Park. Brady walked all the way there, but petered out on the way home,” Sara said.

“It was them squirrels that wore him out,” Claudie added.

Sara poked at a crumpled bread wrapper stuffed in the top pocket of the stroller and explained, “He likes to chase the squirrels. Brady loves animals—but what little boy doesn’t?”

“I bet he didn’t,” Claudie muttered.

Bo decided it was time to confront her. Rising, he faced her squarely. She barely came to the top of his shoulder, but she lifted her chin defiantly and met him eye-to-eye.

She wouldn’t be bad looking, if she weren’t so damn prickly, he thought, taking in her blousy shirt cinched at her very narrow waist by a black leather belt. Although her purple stretch pants showed every curve of her shapely legs and derriere, her running shoes were more Stairmaster than streetwalker.

“Night off?” he asked, and immediately wished he hadn’t.

Her eyes narrowed viciously, and her red lips clamped together as if she’d tasted something bitter. “This ain’t the safest area at night, so Keneesha and I take turns hanging out with Sara on book club nights. You got a problem with that?”

Not at all. In fact, he found it admirable. But he couldn’t tell her that.

Sara relieved him of the problem. “I’m so lucky to have such great friends. Look what Claudie did to my hair. Isn’t it fun?” She fluffed out her shortened locks. The style made her hair seem fuller, and it bounced in a girlish manner near her jawline.

“I like it,” Bo said honestly.

“Who cares?” Claudie rejoined waspishly.

“I do,” Sara said. “I’m vain enough to be pleased when a handsome man tells me I look nice.” A blush brought up the color in her cheeks. “Well, my hair looks nice.”

Handsome? Bo nearly stumbled backward into the gutter, but he managed to get past the odd compliment in time to add, “You definitely look better than nice. I’d go so far as to say beautiful.”

Claudie frowned at him and gave Sara a push. “You better open up. Your gentlemen don’t like to be kept waiting.”

Sara, who was dressed in a simple sleeveless, teal-green sheath that cupped her bosom, then fell straight as a plumb bob to the tops of her canvas deck shoes, looked at the utilitarian watch on her wrist and gave a little yelp. “Good point. Come along, Bo. You don’t want to be late for your first meeting.”

“He’ll be there in a second, Sara J. I gotta discuss something with your new gentleman.”

Sara tossed a concerned glance over her shoulder. “Don’t hurt him, Claudie. He’s a paying customer.”

Bo swallowed. He didn’t like the way Claudie was looking at him. Like he was a wad of gum on the bottom of her shoe. “Okay, say your piece.”

Claudie waited until Sara was inside, then asked, “Are you a cop?”

Bo blinked, astounded by her perceptiveness. “No.”

“You move like a cop. You’re always asking questions like a cop. If you’re not a cop, then what are you?”

A PI looking into ruining your friend’s life. The thought made his stomach heave, nearly recycling his hastily eaten burrito.

He moved past her, noticing for the first time how fragile she seemed. How’d you end up on the streets? he wanted to ask. Instead, he said, “Just a guy killing time ’til I get a job, but jobs ain’t easy to come by when you got a record.” He was good at improvising.

“What kind of record?”

D.U.I. in college. “None of your business,” he said shortly, walking away. She dogged his heels, step for step, but stopped half a block from the bookstore. Reluctantly, Bo slowed, then turned around.

“I don’t know if I believe you, but I don’t really give a flying you-know-what. Keneesha and me look out for our friends, and Sara is off-limits to all losers,” she said, her tone ominous. “She wouldn’t be interested in you anyways.”

Bo had no intention of making a play for Sara—no matter how cute she looked with her new haircut—but he didn’t like being told what to do. He’d had enough of that growing up. “Oh, really? And why is that?”

Claudie waited until the man ahead of them was through the door of the bookstore before she said in a low voice, “Because she’s…gay.”