Dad by Default

“What’s orjinns?” queried Bethany from the Regency-style chair where Yvonne had deposited her.

Beau’s craggy face softened. “It’s fruit I sell at the store. Orjinns and applins. If you like ’em, I got some.”

He had a sense of humor? This was news to Yvonne.

“Okay!” Bethany cried.

“She’ll need someone to cut up the fruit.” Yvonne hesitated. A carload of salvaged possessions waited to be hauled upstairs, but her great-uncle couldn’t prepare food with his damaged wrists. “You don’t happen to have a banana, do you? She could eat that on her own.”

“Sure do,” Beau replied. “Then this li’l darlin’ can help me pull the plastic off the playroom toys.”

Li’l darlin’? The evidence of goodwill toward the child he’d publicly rejected amazed Yvonne. Perhaps his fall really had shaken some sense into him. “I can’t hang around the playroom right now. Would you be willing to watch her?”

“Don’t see why not,” he said. “Ain’t got nothing else to do.”

With him keeping an eye on Bethany, Yvonne could finish a lot faster. “Call me if she needs anything. And don’t leave her alone for a minute. That plastic could suffocate her.”

He sniffed. “I ain’t no amateur, Vonnie. I babysat your dad.”

More news. “Thanks, then.”

He held out one hand to the toddler. “Let’s go get that banana. Don’t squeeze hard. I hurt my durn wrists, you see.”

“Okay.” Bethany gripped one of the large, bony fingers and toddled away beside him.

Nostalgically, Yvonne watched them go. She’d spent many happy weekends with her gentle, artistic grandma and doting grandpa. Was it possible Beau might play a similar role for her daughter?

Tenderness must skip generations in the Johnson clan. Perhaps Beau could spare a warmth for Bethany that he’d never felt for Yvonne.

In a similar manner, her grandfather had been harshly critical of her father. Grandpa had resented the fact that, after inheriting the antique store he’d spent years building up, her father had gradually lost customers to a local company that made antique replicas. Dad hadn’t had the temperament or the energy to come up with marketing ploys, or the cleverness to expand the store’s wares. Plus, he’d been simply a victim of a disadvantageous situation.

Yet the old man had spent hours playing with Yvonne when she was little. She’d sometimes wondered if her father’s harsh attitude toward her didn’t contain a bit of envy.

When she was twelve, Grandma had died of pneumonia. Two years later Manley Johnson had suffered a fatal heart attack. Grief-stricken at the loss of her grandfather, Yvonne had hoped Beau might fill the gap. However, he’d showed only impatience for a gangly, emotionally needy teenager.

Then Dad had found a job in Mill Valley and relocated the family, forcing Yvonne to switch high schools for her senior year. Her mom’s as-yet-undiagnosed Alzheimer’s disease had further complicated the picture.

That was ancient history. Annoyed at herself for dwelling on what couldn’t be changed, Yvonne went out to the car.

An hour later, she had finished reassembling the crib in the smallest of the three bedrooms. In an adjacent chamber, she heard Beau and Bethany laughing as they played with the electric train.

Yvonne hoped their bond would last. Bethany needed a father figure.

From overhead, a thump resounded. She waited, listening for further sounds, but there was no repeat. All the same, she couldn’t imagine what would make such a noise in the empty studio.

She entered the playroom. “Do you have raccoons in the attic?”

“A big one,” Beau answered gleefully. “He’s real tame, though.” He sat on a low stool, watching Bethany pull dolls from a trunk.

“See raccoon!” Bethany’s pout signaled oncoming crankiness.

Beau gave a negative shake. “No can do.”

“Yes! Now!”

“No! Not now!” the old man grumped.

To Yvonne’s eye, both her charges appeared tired. “Nap-time.”

The toddler clutched one of the dolls. “No, Mommy!”

“For you and Grandpa both.” Quickly, she added, “May she call you that?” Addressing him as Beau would be too familiar, and the child couldn’t handle a moniker like great-great uncle.

“Fine,” he answered hoarsely. “I ain’t tired, though.”

“If I say you’re tired, you’re tired,” Yvonne informed him. “Must I tuck you into bed or can you go alone?”

He assumed a sly expression. “I’ll be a good boy, Nurse Johnson, if you’ll promise to poke your nose upstairs and make sure that raccoon stays out of trouble.”

“We’d better call a trapping service,” she answered irritably. It didn’t take a genius, however, to guess that a raccoon hadn’t caused the thump. What mischief was the old coot up to? For Bethany’s sake, she’d better investigate. “Okay, I’ll check. First, however…” She swooped up the toddler and the doll.

“Stay here!” Bethany struggled.

“She don’t look tired to me,” Beau protested.

Rather than argue, Yvonne tried distraction. “You could read her a book.”

He rose in a hurry. “You bet.”

“Book!” Bethany cheered.

Once the two were settled in the nursery, Beau chose a picture book about trains. As he read in a dry voice, Yvonne watched the pair from the doorway.

The tableau formed by the gruff old man and the tiny girl in the crib brought unaccustomed tears to her eyes. Beau seemed to have been waiting for a subject on whom to lavish his affections.

Satisfied, Yvonne went to inspect the attic.

She remembered these stairs right down to the worn places in the handrail. Although she’d believed no one went up here, the doorknob at the top rotated as if newly oiled.

When she stepped inside, Yvonne inhaled the scent of lemon cleanser mingled with an unidentified chemical smell. Despite a hint of warmth, the air lacked the stifling heat she’d expected.

Puzzled, she advanced into the open.

Easels stood at angles, perhaps to catch the light throughout the day. They held paintings done in a vivid, realistic style so familiar that she must have seen the artist’s work before. Against one wall leaned several blank canvases, one of which had toppled. That probably accounted for the thump.

Near the room’s center, his back to her, a man radiated intensity as he focused on his work. Paint-daubed jeans and a blue shirt clung to a muscular body that also struck her as familiar.

From this angle he bore a disconcerting resemblance to Connor Hardison. Who on earth was this man and why was he working in Beau’s attic?