Emily studied him and saw a good-looking older man with a day’s growth of light stubble on his face. And those eyes, as clear and bright as if they could see past the horizon. He swept off his hat when he saw her, displaying his unruly white-blond hair, long enough to brush his collar.
“Hey, Nate,” Joe Sweet said good-naturedly.
Emily just stared at him.
“Joe, I’d like you to meet Emily Murphy.” Nate hesitated, then without asking how she meant to proceed, added, “Her mom was Dorothy Riley.”
An immediate change came over Joe’s face, cheerfulness turning into wary interest. He studied her with an intensity that made her feel all charged up and strange inside. Oh, God, it’s all true.
“That’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time,” Joe finally said, nodding to her. “Emily, it’s nice to meet you, although I think I met you once when you were a little girl.”
“You did?” She swallowed and gestured to a chair. “Would you mind joining us?”
Joe kept looking at her, and she kept looking at him, and she didn’t know what she felt—was she supposed to experience a bang of revelation? An instant yearning? Instead, she simply felt anxious and intrigued all at the same time.
Nate signaled for the waiter, who filled all their coffee cups. “You want coffee?” he asked Emily in surprise.
She stared at her cup. “Oh, of course not.” She smiled distractedly at the waiter. “Could I have a glass of orange juice, please?”
When he’d gone, she watched Joe put cream but no sugar in his coffee. “So you . . . met me?” she began cautiously.
He smiled at her. “One of the rare times your mom came back to town. You were only a couple years old at the time. Cute as a button then, and you’ve grown into a pretty young woman.”
She smiled nervously at his compliment. He couldn’t possibly know he was her father, not by the way he was acting.
“Mr. Sweet—”
“Joe,” he said affably.
“Joe.” She was almost glad when her orange juice arrived, and she took a sip. Nate said nothing, letting her take the lead. Joe seemed to realize she needed a moment, for he remained silent, too. “Joe, I don’t know if you know this, but my mom died last year.”
His face clouded over. “I heard about the accident. You have my condolences, young lady. No one should die so young.”
She nodded. “Thank you. When I returned to Valentine to sell the building I inherited from her, I discovered that she’d lied to me my whole life. The man she married when she left here wasn’t really my dad.”
His sympathetic expression faded into confusion.
She rushed on. “I recently discovered she was pregnant when she left town at eighteen.”
Now Joe’s skin turned pale, mottled with red. “Son of a bitch,” he murmured. “Oh, sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Emily stared at him, not certain what he was thinking. Was he angry?
Whatever struggle was going on inside Joe’s head, he seemed to shake it off with a sigh. “How’d you get my name?” he asked. “It’s obvious you came to speak to me.”
“Doug Thalberg said you used to hang around my grandparents’ store. You weren’t the only one, of course, and I still have two men to talk to.”
“Forget about them,” he said flatly. “I was dating her.”
His gaze was sharp on her face, as if he needed to examine her every feature. She felt a little faint with nervousness.
“You were?” she whispered. “Did you . . .” And then she couldn’t go on.
“I didn’t know she was pregnant,” he said, running a hand down his face. “She broke it off, and she left town. When I saw her again—with you—she knew what I was thinking. She—she lied about your age, right to my face. Said she was happily married to your dad, and I believed her. Why would she do that?”
“I don’t know.” Emily barely saw Nate wave away the waiter, so focused on Joe was she. She gripped her orange juice, shaking so badly she almost spilled it, then sat back and fidgeted with the napkin in her lap. “In some ways, I never understood my mother. We didn’t exactly . . . get along. I didn’t like the way she ran her life, and she thought I was crazy for getting married young—just like her.” She added that last part with faint sarcasm.
And still they stared at each other.
“I think—” Joe broke off and cleared his throat. “I think she never liked