had an entirely different sort of evening in mind. She didn’t seem to care that he had a bum leg, that he was as clumsy as a man could be and still stay on two feet. But he did it, just to get the third date out of the way, or so he told himself. The truth was he had a good time once he got the hang of holding her in his arms and swaying to the music, instead of trying to move around the dance floor. She didn’t seem to mind so much that she still didn’t know the two-step by the end of the evening.
When Val wasn’t dreaming up tortures for him, she was planning little outings for all three of them. There were more picnics, mostly with Annie along, which meant they weren’t considered part of their dating schedule. That could have been irksome, but it wasn’t once he got the hang of sneaking a kiss whenever Annie wasn’t looking. They went to diving meets with Annie and her friends. They took in several movies and ate enough pizza to qualify as honorary Italians.
One night as they finished their meal, several of Annie’s friends came into the restaurant. She ran off to talk to them. Slade watched her laughing and felt something deep inside him shift.
“She seems happy,” he said cautiously, not quite ready to believe his eyes.
Val regarded him with surprise. “Of course she’s happy. Why wouldn’t she be?”
“She wasn’t when she came to live with me.”
“She was scared, Slade. She’d felt abandoned. She didn’t believe you wanted her here with you. That’s all changed the past couple of months. You’re a good father.”
He dismissed the praise. “What kind of father abandons his kid in the first place?”
“The kind who’s going through a tough time. It’s not as if you left her with strangers. She was with her grandparents. They gave her plenty of love and attention.”
“But it wasn’t the same,” he insisted, echoing what Annie had told him on more than one occasion.
“Not the same, but the best you could do for her at the time. Someday she’ll understand that. She’s already forgiven you. Isn’t it time you forgave yourself?”
He was stunned by her words. “Is that what you think I’ve been doing? Blaming myself? Paying penance?”
Val nodded. “That’s certainly the way it looks from here. I even think that’s why you asked me to marry you, out of guilt over having failed Annie once before. You decided to give her the one thing you thought she really needed—a mom.”
He supposed there was more than a little truth in that. “No wonder you turned me down.”
“It was the gesture of a loving father, albeit a misguided one. All Annie really needed was to have her dad back in her life. Look how she’s blossomed.”
“You’re as responsible for that as I am,” he insisted.
She grinned. “Okay, we’ll share the credit.”
He reached for her hand. “You’re an incredible woman, Val Harding.”
Color flared in her cheeks at the compliment. “Thank you,” she whispered in a choked voice.
“Don’t you dare cry,” he commanded, alarmed by her reaction. “I’ll never be able to say anything nice again, if all it does is make you weepy.”
“Weepy’s not a bad thing.”
“Maybe from where you’re sitting,” he grumbled. “It makes me crazy. I keep thinking I’ve gone and ruined things again.”
“Hasn’t anyone ever explained the difference between happy tears and sad ones?”
“Doesn’t matter. They all make me crazy,” he repeated. “Suzanne used to turn on the waterworks at the drop of a hat, because she knew she’d get her way.”
“Manipulative tears are a whole other ball game,” Val said. “It’s not a technique I’m fond of.”
He studied her intently, then nodded. “No, I don’t imagine you’ve ever had to resort to tears to get what you wanted. You’re probably the most direct woman I’ve ever known.”
“Is that good or bad?”
He shrugged. “I haven’t decided yet. I always know where I stand, that’s for sure.”
“And you always will,” she assured him. “I can’t hide what I’m feeling, Slade. I won’t do it, even for you, even if it makes you uncomfortable. That’s why I didn’t even try to hide my interest in you from the day we met.”
Slade thought maybe just this once he could use that disconcerting directness of hers to his advantage, maybe get a reading on just what she was thinking about the two of them these days. He was running out of courting ideas. They’d long since skipped past