“Well, itislate,” her daughter insisted as if Claire hadn’tthought of it.
Claire nodded. “Yes. It’s late.”
“And Mr. Riordan didn’t realize he’d be here so long.”
Johnny didn’t have nearly the patience Claire did with hislittle sister. “Spit it out, Jess.”
Jess started to squirm. “Well, he’s not really staying asclose as he thought. And I just figured, maybe we could offer him one of the spare rooms. We have two, ya know, andmaybe he could just stay over. Tonight, ya know?”
Claire couldn’t offer a better reaction than a blank stare.
Johnny, of course, wasn’t nearly so hesitant. “Don’t bestupid,” he snapped.
“I’m not sure Mr. Riordan really wants to camp over,”Claire demurred, venturing a look his way.
He could have at least looked uncomfortable. Even a little abashed. Instead, he was finishing up that beer, his gazeon her, his attitude easy.
“It’s just one night,” Jess argued. “Can’t he stay?”
Stay? Claire found suddenly she couldn’t pull her gazeaway from Tony’s. Calm, quiet green. Soothing, sensual,deceptively tranquil.
She felt the connection to her toes. She felt it down to thevery core of those old ghosts that never let her sleep.
He had brought the pain back to her house.
He’d defused it with nothing more than a soft voice andsincere eyes.
She couldn’t chance another episode.
She didn’t want to face the rest of the night alone. In thedark. In the silence. In a house where no one understoodjust what she heard in her head while they slept.
Jimmy would be there tonight in her nightmares, and shedidn’t want to see him.
Claire looked at her children, the one bright and anxiousand excited, the other almost belligerent in his opposition, and she thought suddenly that she wasn’t quite ready to handle them all alone.
She wasn’t ready to handle herself alone.
And so she surprised herself even more than both herchildren when she nodded her head in agreement. “What doyou say, Mr. Riordan? Would you like to stay the night?”
