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with his son, time to get to know him. Time to introduce him to the people who’d become his family. “The Logans are having a barbecue on Saturday. And I’m not working. Would it be all right if I took Bobby?”
“Of course,” she said. “The Logans are nice people. And I know how much they mean to you.”
“Great. I’ll pick him up about noon, if that’s all right.”
She cleared her throat. “I’ll bring him to your house, if you don’t mind.”
Joe crossed his arms and leaned back in the red vinyl seat. So that’s where she was coming from. Obviously, she still didn’t want Joe at her house, still didn’t want to chance him running into her dad.
Had time with his son not been at stake, Joe would have told her just what he thought of that damn suggestion to meet him. As it was, he swallowed the bitter taste in his mouth and wrote the directions to his condominium complex on a napkin.
Her keeping things a secret wasn’t going to last for long. Joe wouldn’t let it. One of these days he’d force the issue and insist they tell their son the truth. Tell Bobby that Joe was his father. And that, from now on, his dad was going to be a big part of his life.
Then they’d tell Thomas Reynolds.
The blustery old goat might get red in the face and cuss a blue streak, but he didn’t scare Joe. Not anymore.
Joe didn’t want to see Thomas Reynolds suffer a heart attack but, quite frankly, the man should have learned to control his temper and his blood pressure years ago.
Bobby was a Davenport.
And as far as Joe was concerned, Kristin’s father could put that in his fancy pipe and smoke it.
Chapter Four
K ristin sat behind the wheel of her father’s white Town Car and glanced at the directions Joe had written on a crumpled napkin.
“How long will it take to get there?” Bobby asked from the back seat.
“Just a few more minutes, I think.” Kristin spotted the Playa del Sol condominiums up ahead and turned into the complex. She followed the roadway until it forked, then turned left, as Joe had instructed, and parked the car in one of the few visitor spaces she could find. “Well, this is it.”
She studied the white stucco building, the red, Spanish tile roofs.
“Which one is his?” Bobby asked.
“Number 126. Will you help me look for it?”
“Okay.” Bobby eagerly climbed from the car and began to scan the wrought-iron numbers on the front porches. “That one is 112. And there’s 113.”
They strode along the concrete walk that lined a freshly mowed carpet of grass. Kristin caught the salty scent of the ocean breeze, as she scanned the verdant grounds of the complex. Playa del Sol had been built in a Spanish style and landscaped with enough palms, tropical plants and flowers to give it a Mexican Riviera aura.
“There it is!” Bobby pointed to a unit with a red-flowered hibiscus growing near the door. “I’m going to ring the bell.”
A wave of anticipation washed over Kristin, in spite of her efforts to forget what Joe had once meant to her, and she wiped her hands upon the sides of the pale yellow linen dress she wore.
Joe opened the door, a broad grin aimed at her son. Or rather, their son. “Hey, Bobby.”
The boy beamed. “Hey, Joe.”
When the firefighter cast his gaze on her, something zapped between them. She wasn’t entirely sure what, but it shot a wave of excitement coursing through her veins, causing her heart to go topsy-turvy and her senses to reel. How could he still do that to her, after all these years?
After all the heartbreak, all the tears?
Kristin stood on the front porch, like an awkward adolescent on a first date. But this wasn’t a date. Not at all. And she hated the idea that it felt even remotely like one, for more reasons than one.
She was over Joe Davenport. And she was engaged to another man. An exceptional man who would make a wonderful husband and father.
Hoping her nervousness didn’t show, she mustered a smile. “Hi.”
“Good morning, Kristin.” His voice had grown deeper with age. Huskier. More able to strum upon her senses than it had in the past.
She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Are we too early?”
“Not at all.” He opened the door, allowing her and Bobby to enter. “Come on in.”
Her son zipped right inside, eager to be in the fireman’s home, while Kristin moved slowly. She noted the hardwood entry, the Berber carpet, the beige sectional against the east wall, the glass-top coffee table, where a TV remote and a Sports Illustrated rested.
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