is one of the most meaningful things I’ve ever received. I’ll keep it with me all the time.”
He slipped it into his pocket, but the stick protruded awkwardly. He pulled it out and contemplated it for a moment.
Reaching in his shirt, he pulled out the dog tags ever-present around his neck. “These are my dog tags from when I was an active-duty marine. I don’t ever take them off, either.” He grasped the back of his T-shirt, pulling it over his head, and pointed to the dog tags tattooed over his heart. “These are the dog tags of my best friend, Lt. Duncan Ballard. He died in Afghanistan.”
He scanned the wide eyes of the group. “Would it be okay with y’all if I wore the star on the chain with my dog tags instead of keeping it on the stick? Maybe some of the magic will absorb into my pretty heart...that’s where Dunk continues to live, so maybe he’ll feel it.”
All the heads nodded vigorously, including Summer’s.
Amanda stepped up to give him a hug, but she paused and pointed to the words tattooed under the dog tags. “What’s that say, Mr. Rick?”
“Semper fi. That’s short for Semper fidelis.” He found Summer’s eyes, and locked his gaze with hers. “It means ‘always faithful.’”
He watched a shadow pass over Summer’s face. Was she doubting whether or not he could be faithful? Obviously, there was still more about him she needed to get to know.
All the girls fell into line and gave him a hug one by one.
Summer was last. “Thank you. That was beautiful.”
As she turned away to follow the girls to the bunkhouse, he looked back down at the polished granite star. He imagined Summer’s look of admiration reflecting back at him.
What a treasure!
It wasn’t just a magic wand. He’d been given the key to Summer’s heart.
* * *
“WE WERE BEGINNING TO THINK you gals had fallen asleep,” Neil said when Summer and Tara finally showed up at the staff meeting.
“You can thank Tara,” Summer answered. “If it wasn’t for her resourcefulness, and her magical CD, we’d still be trying to quiet them down.”
After the presentation of the wand, the girls had been pretty keyed up. Tara had come up with the brilliant idea of putting a relaxation CD in the player and turning it up loud enough to be heard all over the room. The gentle sound of rain with Native American flute music in the background had calmed the girls to sleep.
Summer took the seat next to Rick, who shuffled the papers in front of him. He glanced up to give her a smile before turning his attention back to the activity sheets. Even the quick look spiked her temperature.
Tara slid onto the opposite bench. “This job makes good use of my teacher training. Next time the kids get too rowdy in class, I’ll put that same CD on and give them nap time.”
“I’m ready for nap time.” Neil didn’t try to cover his noisy yawn.
“Okay, let’s make this fast before Neil falls asleep.” Rick used his authoritative tone. “Any concerns?”
“Yeah.” Summer gave Neil an apologetic shrug. “I’m worried about Howie. He’s a bit of a smart mouth with Tara and me. We’ve both noticed it.”
Tara nodded. “Yesterday morning, I heard him refer to me as ‘that Tara chick’ to Jimbo. But he did apologize when I called him on it.”
“And today, he was very disrespectful to me,” Summer continued.
Rick’s eyebrow quirked. “I’ll talk to him,” he answered.
“I don’t want you to talk to him,” Summer shot back. This was the telling moment. Rick’s reaction to the wand had her hopes soaring, but this would give her a definite answer. “I want to be more proactive than that. His dad’s obviously got issues with women, and boys with dads like his are the ones who grow up to be abusive toward women.”
Neil perked up enough to comment. “No argument there. What do you propose we do about it?”
“I’m hoping we can break the cycle for him. Convince him girls are his equals.”
Rick’s eyebrows drew together. “How do we do that in three weeks’ time?”
“We start mixing the groups with both sexes.” Summer used her most confident tone. “Like this morning, instead of the girls cooking and the boys doing tae kwon do, we could’ve mixed the groups with five of each. That would make them think of themselves as one group instead of two.” She paused for a reaction. Neither of the guys seemed too off-put by her suggestion,