Shadows of Yesterday
Page 9

The table was set and the food ready to serve. Chad had brought Sarah’s swing into the kitchen so he could slice the canned ham for Leigh. The baby was consigned to the swing while they ate their meal.
“Do you work, Leigh?” Chad asked, biting into a buttered hunk of French bread.
“Yes, but it’s rather hard to explain,” she smiled. “I decorate shopping malls.”
He stared at her with utter bemusement and Leigh laughed. “Come again?” he said when he had swallowed the mouthful of bread.
“I decorate shopping malls. Haven’t you ever wondered who hung all those baskets of spring bouquets? Or who replaced the potted plants around the fountains? Or set up Santa’s North Pole house—which, incidentally, I’m doing now.”
Chad laid his fork on his plate and quirked an eyebrow at her. “I must be dense, but no, I’ve never given it a thought.”
“Few people do, but they’d certainly notice if they weren’t there.”
“You work for the mall?”
“Not exclusively. I work for them on a retainer basis. I do a few office buildings, too. They usually want only Christmas decorations. Sometimes Easter. I tell them what to buy within their budget, they buy it, and I set it up.”
“Fascinating.”
She laughed. “Hardly, but it’s a terrific job for a single parent. I work at my own pace, within deadlines, of course. I pay students to do all the heavy work for me, except at the mall. Their own engineers help me there. The decorations in the mall only have to be changed about five times a year. In between, I’m planning what I’m going to do next.”
“How does one go about finding a job like that?”
“Actually it found me. I had a friend who did this sort of thing for banks in El Paso. I was her unofficial assistant. She was offered this job by the developers of the mall here. She declined it, but sold them on me. Of course, they didn’t know I was pregnant when I first went to work, but no one said anything even when it became obvious.”
“Of course not. I’m sure they were pleased with your work, and who would fire a pregnant widow from a job in this enlightened day and age?”
She laughed. “You’re probably right. In any case, I’m glad they didn’t. I couldn’t beat the working conditions.”
They finished their meal and ate ice cream with fudge sauce for dessert.
“You wouldn’t happen to have any coffee to go with this, would you?” he asked.
Leigh dropped her spoon into her dish. “Oh, no, Chad, I’m sorry but I don’t. I don’t even have a coffeemaker. I don’t drink it and”
“You don’t drink coffee? Are you an American?”
She had been mortified that she couldn’t make him coffee, but she knew it was all right because he was teasing. “I’m sorry,” she said again.
“No need to apologize,” he said simply. “I’ll have another glass of tea.”
While Leigh cleared off the table, Chad fed surreptitious spoonfuls of melted ice cream to Sarah, who was again sitting on his lap. Leigh caught him red-handed.
“Chad, are you giving her ice cream?” she demanded, her fists planted firmly against her hips.
“Sure, she loves it,” he said with an innocent, boyish grin.
“I can barely carry her now, she’s so fat. The last thing she needs is ice cream.”
Chad lifted his head and studied Leigh for a moment, raking his eyes up and down her body. “I’d say both of you could use some extra flesh.”
She licked her lips nervously and tried to make a joke out of his remark. “I worked so hard trying to trim down and firm up after Sarah was born.” What was wrong with her voice?
“You did a good job.” His eyes dropped significantly to her breasts, and as though he had actually touched them, they tingled with response. Leigh was painfully aware of her nipples tautening and straining inside the sheer cups of her brassiere. She could have kissed Sarah for choosing that moment to start crying fussily.
“She’s sleepy,” Leigh said, lifting the infant out of Chad’s arms and holding the small body in front of her like a shield. “I think I’ll put her down for the night.”
“Can I help?” He had stood when she took Sarah. Now he was bending over them both, stroking the baby’s back but looking at Leigh as though he were touching her, not Sarah.
“N… no. Make yourself at home. I’ll be back in a minute. She usually goes right to sleep.”
Leigh virtually ran from the room. It took several restorative breaths for her to calm down once she had reached the bedroom she shared with Sarah. She wasn’t quite ready to move the baby out of that room and into the smaller second bedroom. There was something comforting in hearing another’s breathing, even the infant’s, beside her as she slept.
She tried not to transmit her nervousness as she prepared Sarah for bed. Her caution turned out to be unnecessary, for as she turned Sarah over onto her stomach, the baby assumed her bottom-in-the-air sleeping position and didn’t even require the usual several minutes of back-patting. She was instantly asleep.
Chad was pacing like a sentry when Leigh came back into the living room. “It was so quiet in there, I thought something was wrong.”
“No,” Leigh said. “She’s a very cooperative baby.”
“That means she’s happy. You’re a good mother; you’ve given her a sense of security.”
“I hope so,” she said earnestly. “I worry about her growing up without a” She broke off her sentence when she realized what she had been about to say and became intent on straightening an already straight picture on the wall.
“A daddy?”
Leigh turned around. “Yes.”
Chad stepped closer to her. She wanted to back away from the indefinable threat he posed, but her feet refused to move.
“Do I take that to mean that you aren’t currently involved with someone?” he asked softly.
The tenuous protection of Sarah’s small body between them had been removed. Chad’s presence filled the room with a masculine aura that had never been there before, engulfing Leigh. She could see it, feel it, smell it.
“Yes,” she answered his question after a considerable pause.
“Yes you are involved or yes you aren’t?”