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She blushed.
“Thank you, Oscar.” She extended her hand across the table. “I’m Mrs. Reyes. And I am so happy to meet you. I hope we’ll have fun together after school.”
Oscar gave her fingers a quick squeeze. Then laying his head on the table, he closed his eyes.
Ryan pulled out a chair across from Anna. He recognized the little girl, Maria Guzman. Overweight compared to her second-grade peers, she could speak and understand English according to her file, but her reading ability was below grade level.
Sixty-something Agnes Parks headed their way with the third student in tow, Zander Benoit. Mrs. Parks was the wife of Ryan’s pastor. Their daughter, Darcy, had once been Anna’s best girl friend in high school.
Throwing himself into one of the empty seats, third grader Zander held himself taut. But his black eyes never stopped moving, assessing the other children, the room and Ryan, too. He wasn’t sure why, but Zander reminded Ryan of his brother, Ethan, who’d just returned home from the army.
When the child’s gaze landed on the red Exit sign, Ryan understood the connection between his combat veteran brother and the third grader. Zander was formulating an exit strategy. Calculating the distance between the table and the door. The way Ryan was planning his own exit strategy after Christmas.
“What’s with the candy canes, man?”
Ryan’s attention snapped to Zander. A diversionary tactic? As if he sensed Ryan getting too close. Zander deserved a home visit, too.
Oscar’s eyes opened, and he lifted his head. Maria glanced around the media center walls, decorated with candy cane cutouts. The week after Thanksgiving, a few industrious colleagues had begun the holiday countdown to winter break.
Zander jutted his jaw. “Do we get candy after this boring school thing is done?” Behavioral issues had landed Zander in the program.
Ryan leaned back in his chair. “No candy. But—” he made sure he had everyone’s attention “—if each of you complete your weekly goals, we have a big reward planned for the group before winter break.”
Oscar’s face lit. “We get Chwistmas?”
“Don’t be stupid,” Zander responded before Ryan could. “Christmas isn’t real.”
Oscar’s face fell.
Maria stuck out her chin. “Estupido is a bad word. Isn’t it, Mrs. Reyes?”
Anna laid her palms on the tabletop. “We don’t say stupid, Zander.”
“Whatever.” Zander thrust out his chest. “But Christmas is for babies.”
Ryan shook his head. “That’s not true, Zander. Christmas is for everyone.”
He threw Anna an apologetic look. They hadn’t had time to confer. “Mrs. Parks and I were thinking about a field trip next week to the tree lighting in the Kiptohanock town square.”
Agnes Parks smiled. “With milkshakes and dinner beforehand. On us.”
“Milkshakes?” Zander’s dark eyes took on a gleam of interest.
Agnes nudged a math workbook toward him. “And the countdown to everyone reaching their goals begins right now.”
Ryan had his own private countdown. After Christmas, he was returning to the pharmaceutical position he’d abandoned to come home and help his family when his father died.
Yet surprisingly, Ryan had enjoyed the last three years as a fifth-grade teacher. A job far different from the technical work for which he’d trained. And even more of a surprise, he’d relished the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of at-risk kids like Maria, Oscar and Zander. Although with a tough kid like Zander, how much a difference he made remained to be seen.
Zander’s eyes slitted. “You mean them two—” his index finger jabbed the air “—got to meet their goals for me to get a chocolate milkshake?”
Mrs. Parks—whose team specialty included character building and cooperative learning—rested her slightly plump chin in her hand. “Exactly what we discussed earlier, Zander. We’re here to help each other succeed.”
Necessary in most endeavors, academic or otherwise. Crucial in life—as Ryan discovered when he and his siblings rallied to save the family business.
Mrs. Parks patted Zander’s hand. “Zander is fabulous on the computer. He has a lot he can teach us.”
Zander muttered under his breath. “How fun.”
Ignoring him, Anna laid the picture book on the table. “Let’s get started, shall we?”
Ryan’s pulse accelerated. And although he understood she was speaking to the children, her smile was for him.
* * *
Anna Pruitt Reyes inhaled the familiar and comforting scents of the elementary school media center. The musty smell of books. The faint leftover aroma of coffee from the teachers’ lounge.
It felt good to teach again. And after fourteen years, good to be home on the Eastern Shore, the narrow peninsula bordered by the Chesapeake Bay on the west and the Atlantic on the east.
Sweet, shy Maria headed off with Mrs. Parks to the computer lab. Zander feigned disinterest while Ryan attempted to show him how to subtract fractions.
Prodded awake, Oscar came over to Anna’s side of the table. And a tender spot grew in her heart for the little guy in clean but ill-fitting blue jeans. Zander’s ragged jacket was totally inadequate for the coming winter months. But though her clothes were from a discount store, Maria appeared cared for.
In her previous teaching post in Texas, Anna had enjoyed her after-school work with at-risk students. And now more than ever, she needed the salary supplement.
She worked with Oscar on sight words and phonetics. While he practiced writing the letters of the alphabet, she took the opportunity to get her first good look at Ryan.
He hadn’t changed much. The same light brown hair. The eyeglasses were new, though, since she’d last seen him. He’d switched to contact lenses their senior year. But apparently he’d gone back to wearing frames, which suited him.
A tie hung askew at the open collar of his blue Oxford dress shirt. In a pair of belted jeans and brown suede shoes, he looked very much like what he was—a schoolteacher. Except far too handsome compared to any schoolteacher she’d ever known.
Placing the textbook in Zander’s backpack, Ryan’s chest rippled with muscles beneath the brown blazer. No longer the endearing, if goofy, boy she remembered with such fondness.
She flushed when Ryan caught her staring. The awkward moment ended as another volunteer arrived to take the children to the transportation bus.
Ryan jumped to his feet. “Great work today, kids.” Lanky as ever, he high-fived Maria and Oscar. Zander moved out of reach.
She straightened the books. “Have a great weekend, everyone.”
Mrs. Parks gathered her handbag. “See you on Monday.” The media center slowly emptied until only Anna and Ryan remained.
“It’s good to see you, Anna. Welcome home.”
Renewing her friendship with Ryan had factored in her decision to finally return home. And because of their friendship, she couldn’t delay revealing the truth any longer. Scraping the chair across the carpet, she rose heavily to her feet.
His smile froze. Behind the brownish-black frames of his glasses, bewilderment dotted his eyes. Her heart skipped a beat. If her dearest friend in the world couldn’t understand, how would her parents react?
Almost without intending to, she placed her palm over her abdomen. And his eyes—the blue-green of so many in seaside Kiptohanock—flickered at the movement of her hand.
His features had become carved of stone, all chiseled bone and rugged angles. “I didn’t realize you’d remarried.”
She took a quick, indrawn breath. “I haven’t.” And with those simple words, it began.
His jaw tightened. “I see.” The stubble was new since high school. Giving him an attractive maturity. He looked away toward the window overlooking the playground.
She’d expected better from him. “What is it you think you see, Ryan?”
“I see a woman nine months preg—”
“Seven months.” Heat mounted above her collar. All too aware she resembled a beached whale.
A muscle ticked in that strong, square-cut jaw of his. “A woman seven months pregnant. A widow for the last two—”
“Mateo died nearly three years ago from cancer.”
“Who...?” Ryan cleared his throat. “Whose child is this?”
A child posthumously conceived from her late husband’s stored sperm before Mateo began chemotherapy. But Anna was tired of explaining herself.
“Mine.” She raised her chin. “The child is mine, Ryan.”
He scrubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know what to say to you, Anna.”
“Say that you’re my friend.” Her mouth trembled. “Say that you understand.”
“But I don’t understand, Anna. Why are you— What did your dad say when you got home?”
Her eyes dropped to the floor. But because of her protruding belly, she could no longer see her black flats. “Dad and Mom are still at the army base with Jaxon in Europe. They don’t know yet.”
“You haven’t told them?” He gestured at her stomach. “Not exactly something you can hide.”
“I’m not hiding.” She bit her lip. Not anymore.
His broad shoulders slumped. “I was sorry to hear about Jax’s wife.”
“Exactly why I haven’t told my parents. They’ll be home after New Year’s.”
Who could’ve foreseen that she and her older brother, Jaxon, would both be widowed? This first Christmas without his wife, Jax needed their parents’ support. Their undivided attention.
She wasn’t eager to face the disappointment in her beloved father’s eyes. A disappointment not unlike the look on Ryan’s face.
“How did Charlie take the news?”
Charlie was Anna’s youngest brother, a deputy sheriff in town.
She pursed her lips. “I haven’t told him yet. I drove straight across the Bay Bridge Tunnel to school this morning from Virginia Beach.”
“Did you stay overnight with Will?” Ryan’s brow creased. “What did he say?”
A year younger than Anna, her firefighter brother lived on the other side of the bay.
“I made him promise to let me tell the rest of the family in my own time.”
Ryan shook his head. “So you drove all the way from Texas? You must be exhausted, Anna.”
In more ways than he could possibly know. Yet she was compelled by an inexplicable need to come home and mend fences with her family.
She took a breath. “I called Charlie this morning to let him know I was driving straight to work.”
Ryan frowned. “As I recall, your ex–deputy sheriff father doesn’t like surprises. Are you sure springing the baby on them is the best way to handle the situation?”
She tucked a tendril of hair behind her ear. “I wish you’d trust I’ve made the best decision for me and my baby.”
His eyes locked onto hers. “I wish...”
Something fluttered inside her chest. What did he wish?
He pinched his lips together. “Never mind.” Pivoting, he exited the media center as suddenly as he’d reappeared in her life.
She blinked away tears. “Merry Christmas to you, too.”
Why had she believed it would be different here? Brushing aside every obstacle, she’d left everything behind to be home for Christmas. She’d so needed a new start.
If this was any indication of the reception she’d get from her hometown... Her gut wrenched. She’d hoped the people who knew her best and loved her the most would also love this child.
Had she made a mistake in coming home?
Chapter Two (#u60d18151-6d40-54d5-aed1-487c7fafd7e6)
Out in the school parking lot, Ryan regretted his abrupt departure. He wrenched open his car door. There were so many questions he should’ve asked Anna. But he’d been stunned by her pregnancy.
Where was the baby’s father? Why had he left Anna to face her family alone with the news? What kind of man—?
His gut tightened. What sort of friend was he to let her face her family alone? She’d only asked one thing of him. To be her friend. To trust her.
But the pregnancy made no sense. This wasn’t like Anna. Not the Anna Pruitt he remembered. After her husband’s death, had she succumbed to grief or loneliness? Had she changed so much from those long-ago childhood days?
Getting into his car, he drove toward town. He followed Highway 13, which bisected the Delmarva Peninsula of Delaware, Maryland and Virginia into bayside and seaside. The tiny fishing village of Kiptohanock—their hometown—hugged the Atlantic shoreline.
Entering the small hamlet, he looped around the village square. The Waterman’s Association had been busy. Christmas wreaths hung from the gas-powered lanterns on each corner of the green.
Anna’s sister-in-law, Evy, worked in the library on the west side. On the south end of the square stood the white brick volunteer fire department. Ryan parked in the empty parking lot of the Sandpiper Cafe, closed for the evening.
This time of year, he found himself missing his father more than usual. His dad had loved participating in community events.
On the nearby waterfront, commercial and recreational boats bobbed in the marina. The steeple of the white clapboard church pierced the winter sky above the harbor. At the Coast Guard station, flags fluttered in the stiff wind.
The wind off the water would be cold this time of year. Yet his oceanside home rarely saw snow nor, hopefully, none of the more usual ice storms.
