Her Family Wish

“Of course.” He motioned to the hard plastic seat in front of his desk where many a student had pouted, cried, yelled, or all of the above, and waited until Hannah sat before doing the same. “Sorry that chair is so uncomfortable. Usually the people sitting in it are in trouble.”

“Then it’s the perfect way to start their punishment.” Hannah shifted in the seat and Jude couldn’t help but laugh.

“How can I help you today, Hannah?” He liked saying her name. Too much. Rein it in. No point in sending mixed messages, messages he couldn’t act on.

Even though too much of him already wanted to.

She opened the envelope she held with manicured fingers, and Jude’s relaxed smile faded to a slight frown. Miranda had been adamant about her weekly manicures and pedicures during their short marriage, a fact that had put their barely existent young family budget on a strain. But she argued that if she was going to have a baby and ruin her body, she should get to have pretty nails. He’d agreed with her at the time. But after she lost her baby weight and ended up a size smaller than she’d started out being, he knew he was in trouble—and that trouble had nothing to do with spending two hundred dollars a month on nail care.

Now he wished women would just go back to nail-biting.

Hannah pulled an eight-by-ten-size sheet from the envelope, and from the quick glimpse he got before she hid it from his view, he gathered it was a picture. “I know you said you weren’t interested in having a session done, but since Abby tagged along to her friend’s session this past weekend, they suggested the idea of friend photos. I thought you’d like to have this one.” She slowly turned the picture so he could see.

His breath caught at the sight of his daughter, a close-up of her beaming from the top of a slide, head tilted back and hair naturally highlighted in the sun. Jude reached across the desk and took the photo Hannah offered, his stomach a hard knot. Abby looked beautiful—of course. Like she had a choice with her mom’s portion of genes in her. He licked his lips, wishing the rock now lodged in his throat would settle back down in his stomach.

Nodding once, he cleared his throat. “Thank you. This is thoughtful.” Surely Hannah didn’t intend the knifelike wound twisting his insides. Despite that, he did like the picture. Because of his own memories and fears, he hadn’t taken nearly enough pictures of his daughter growing up. But if he did, and displayed them around the house, she would see how gorgeous she was and get the same idea Miranda had. He couldn’t lose his daughter the same way he lost his wife.

He refused to let her travel that path of destruction.

“I’m so glad you like it.” Hannah sat back in her chair, exhaling with a smile. She balanced the envelope on her lap. “I took a few more. But that one was my favorite.”

His eyes darted back to the print. It was a great shot. But…wait a minute. Abby’s hair was down and loose, which was unusual. And her clothes—he squinted, certain his eyes were playing tricks on him. What was she wearing? That shirt was not something he’d purchased. Neither was the makeup.

His fingers tightened on the photo and he quickly dropped it on his desk before he could crinkle the fragile paper. In fact, Abby hadn’t even told him she was going with her friend to a photo shoot at all. How many other lies lingered between them?

Hannah’s eyebrows knitted together, as if reading his mind. Or maybe he was just that obvious these days. “What’s wrong?”

“This is— She knows better than to—” Jude cut off his own sentence and pinched the bridge of his nose, uncertain how much to reveal to Hannah but unable to keep the frustration from bubbling up and over. “She’s wearing makeup. And clothes I don’t allow. She lied to me.”

Hannah’s face paled. “Lied? I knew she looked different than usual, more trendy, but I never thought—”

“She knows the rules.” Abby was his kid. And his kid and trendy didn’t mix. Not that Hannah could understand that.

Hannah held up both hands in defense. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to open a can of worms here. Mrs. McDuffy suggested the group photo and—” She reached for the picture on his desk as if to take it back, but Jude placed one hand on it and held it in place.

“Leave it.”

She leaned back, confusion splayed across her face. “I was hoping to surprise you in a good way, not get Abby in trouble.”

“You didn’t know. She did.” Jude sighed, reminding himself this wasn’t Hannah’s fault. It was Abby’s. Why couldn’t she accept no for an answer and trust him as her father? Whether his instincts were right or wrong, she’d disobeyed.

And now he had proof.

“I’ll keep this. I do appreciate the gesture. It’s just…complicated.”

Hannah stood, frowning, her fingers tapping the envelope pressed against her leg. She opened her mouth, then closed it before doing the same again twice.

Jude recognized the hesitation from his students, the desire to say what was on their mind but being afraid of getting in trouble if they did. He was tired of beating around the bush. He wanted honesty. Craved it, especially after the way his own daughter evaded him. “Go ahead. You won’t offend me.”

Hopefully. Not offending Jude seemed to be getting harder to accomplish lately. Was that why Abby had been at odds with him so much the past several months? He thought he’d gotten a handle on his temper in the counseling sessions he attended after Miranda’s desertion years ago, then again after receiving news of her death. Maybe it was the stress of the budget wearing on him. That alone was enough to drive a man crazy, much less this drama with his almost-teenager.

At Hannah’s hesitation, he pressed on. “Please, say what’s on your mind.”

Her words rushed out, tumbling over each other like a waterfall off a cliff. “I know I’m not a parent, but I’m curious why you have these rules for Abby. She’s a good kid. I know you know that. But honestly, she looked cute at the park. Not inappropriate by any means.”

Jude stood, his irritation now welling despite his good intentions to tamp it down. He’d heard enough about his parenting ability from both his parents and his in-laws. He didn’t need it from a stranger, too—even one as sweet and attractive as Hannah. She didn’t know what she was talking about, didn’t know him or his family. He pressed his lips into a thin line. “You’re right. You’re not a parent. So you can’t understand this.”

Her eyes widened and she flinched as if he’d dealt a physical blow. Her jaw clenched, and she nodded once, her voice soft. “Then I’m sorry to interfere.” She glanced at the envelope in her hands, and with a flick of her wrist, tossed the entire package on top of his desk.

Guilt rocked Jude’s senses as several different-size photos of the same image slipped free of the envelope. Once again, he was taking his frustration out on the wrong person. Jude held out his hand. “Hannah, wait. I shouldn’t have—”

Without looking back, Hannah slipped out of the room.

Chapter Four

With a temper like that, the man should’ve been a pro wrestler, not an assistant principal.

Hannah fumed the entire time it took her to stalk from Jude’s office to Sophia’s classroom, which wasn’t long considering her strides were peppered with indignation. What happened? How could one picture, hinting of loose hair and a tube of lip gloss, set off a polished professional like Jude? It didn’t make sense. He’d originally seemed fine with the photograph—pleased, even.

Until the switch flipped and it was out with Dr. Jekyll, in with Mr. Hyde.

Hannah didn’t have to be a math teacher to know something didn’t add up. Jude’s vibe toward Abby went beyond mere overprotective. He had a secret.

She knew because she had her own.

She paced outside Sophia’s classroom, not ready to go inside until her blood pressure lowered. The dirt-streaked floor passed in a blur as she walked and turned, walked and turned. Jude had every right to raise his daughter the way he chose to, but this was ridiculous. The photo shoot had been done in complete innocence.

Hannah kept pacing, the bulletin board outside Sophia’s classroom a kaleidoscope of blue and yellow construction paper in her peripheral vision. Maybe she should have stayed out of it, but how could she have turned Mrs. McDuffy down over something so trivial? And why would someone refuse a photo of their kid? A gorgeous photo, at that—not a boast of Hannah’s talent, but of Abby’s natural beauty. Hannah had barely even opened the picture in Photoshop. In fact, the only thing she’d done was enhance the lighting of the background. She hadn’t touched Abby’s direct image.

How could that make a father upset instead of proud?

Even now Jude’s words echoed harshly in her mind. You’re right—you’re not a parent. He didn’t know—couldn’t know—how badly that hurt. The words themselves were an agreement, truthful. The average woman wouldn’t have even flinched.

Yet here Hannah was stuck trying to remove a hundred stinging barbs from her heart.

“Hannah, what are you doing in the hallway?” Sophia poked her head outside her class, bracing one arm on the door frame. Her dozen colored bangles clanged together on her wrist, jerking Hannah from her ponderings.

She turned to face her friend. “Trying to figure out why men do what they do.”

Sophia’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, honey, you better come on in. That one will take you until the end of the semester. Maybe longer.” She tugged Hannah inside. “What happened?”

Hannah nibbled her lower lip as they both leaned against the side of Sophia’s cluttered desk. “I think I made a mistake.” Logic began a slow descent, replacing the initial burst of frustration. “You remember last week Jude said he didn’t want me to take pictures of Abby for my portfolio?”

Sophia crossed her arms, bracelets jingling. “Yeah…” Her voice trailed off into a wary question.

“I did anyway, though it wasn’t my initial idea.” Hannah let out a long breath as she filled Sophia in on the photo shoot from Saturday and her conversation with Jude. “I honestly thought he just didn’t want to accept anything free, so I believed having it on Mrs. McDuffy’s account would skirt the issue. It wasn’t a free session I did as a favor that way, you know? But now I think he has other reasons.”

“Jude’s always been very careful with Abby,” Sophia agreed, moving to the chalkboard to erase her previous class’s bulletin points. “But this seems like overkill, even for him. Maybe he’s upset that she disobeyed his rules. He could have been projecting that anger onto you.”