daughter, listening to her heartbroken sobs, Axell experienced pure fear-filled panic.
He'd thought Constance's silence had been a natural reaction to grief, something she would have to get through as he did. What if she couldn't get over it by herself? What if it wasn't just grief? What if it was him?
* * *
The chanting monks greeted Axell as he entered the gift shop. Sunlight sparkled through newly washed windows, but the narrow, crowded interior looked no less musty than before. The wind chimes sang a merry tune in the breeze he let in, and he hastily shut the door while searching for some sign of the red-haired proprietor.
"Anyone home?" he called. He'd like to tell her this was no way to run a business, but he had a sneaking suspicion there wasn't much business to run and she really didn't care.
"Down here."
He leaned over the counter. To his shock, he discovered Maya lying flat on her back, eyes closed, hands covering her distended belly. "Are you all right?" he asked, hearing the panic in his voice. Twice in one day. They'd have him in an insane asylum within the week.
"That's a matter of relativity," she replied in a vague voice. Her eyes popped open, and Axell could see the mischief in them. "But if you're asking if it's time to call the ambulance or get out the forceps, the answer is no. You're safe for now."
Damn, but she'd scared him. He didn't like being scared. Stepping back, Axell stared politely at the black-and-white cat sleeping on the shelf while she righted herself. The cat was probably the only thing in here that wasn't a rainbow of color.
Sunset curls and a wicked smile suddenly blocked his view of the cat. "Well, Mr. Holm, has the domestic crisis been resolved?" she asked cheerily.
"I returned Constance to school," he answered, uncomfortable beneath her beaming gaze. A woman who lived in this slum had no business being so damned happy. "She wouldn't tell me how she got to the restaurant." He threw her a look of suspicion. "I don't suppose you know anything about that?"
"Sorry, much as I always wished for a fairy godmother, I've never had one and I've never been one. Someone else must have spirited the child there. Or she walked. It's less than a mile, you realize. And Constance is a very resourceful child." She lifted the steaming pot of water from the hot plate and poured it into the teapot she'd prepared.
The idea of his waiflike daughter traipsing a mile of highway through traffic and mud and all the modern-day horrors of civilization boggled his mind so thoroughly that Axell didn't have to be told to take the cups and sit down at the table. Setting the china down, he collapsed into the ugly little chair and propped his head against his hand.
She patted his shoulder as she leaned over to set the teapot on the table. He didn't even know this woman, but she was always touching him.
"Did you reassure her that you won't send her away?"
Axell heard the condemnation behind the question. It was none of her damned business. He resisted spilling his guts, but he had no one to confide in. This woman was a near stranger and she already knew more about him than he did himself.
"I can't do that," he announced heavily, leaning back in the chair while she poured the tea. If he came here any more often, he'd have to bring a coffeepot.
She lifted her arched cinnamon-brown eyebrows, and Axell could swear the turquoise of her eyes shot daggers. He winced.
"What kind of father lets an eight-year-old roam a highway?" he demanded. "I can't be there to watch over her all the time. I'm never there," he admitted. "She goes from school to your place to whatever baby-sitter I can find in the evenings."
Before she could shoot the first verbal bullet, he defended himself. "I pick her up at your place and take her out to dinner, but I own a bar. I have to be there in the evening and I can't take her with me."
"Did I say anything?" she asked innocently, sipping at her tea, staring at him with big eyes over the edge of her cup.
His gaze inadvertently dropped to her mouth as she sipped, but he jerked back to his senses at his first reaction to the moistness of her lower lip.
"I didn't notice that your mother-in-law kept Constance from roaming the highway," she continued, as if his