How could she avoid it? How could she let him think she was all right with this plan, or not leave the door open forhimto say he wasn’t all right with it?Harden up,she told herself.It’s one conversation.
You can cry when you get home.How many times had she told herself that?She was so tired of this. Tired of trying to cope. Tired of trying to pretend.
She just had to do it for ten minutes more. Ten minutes, and she’d go home.
“Yes,” she managed to say, with only a bit of tremble in her voice. “I still want to talk to him. Can you ask him to come down, please?”
Her granddad didn’t even answer. He thought she was unfair. He’d probably been resenting her for years. How had she not known?
She put her hands between her knees and breathed.
Ten more minutes.
Zane did not have a good feeling about this.
About what, exactly? He couldn’t even have said. Well, that Skylar was so clearly unhappy about the situation, for one thing.
He ran down the steps and found her standing in the sitting room, her arms wrapped around her middle. He said, “I’m here. Go on and have your say. Sit down first, though, would you?”
She didn’t sit down. She wandered over to the folding glass doors that made up the wall and said, in a distracted tone, “That’s a pretty flash pool. Granddad and Maureen could do their water aerobics in there.” She smiled at what he was sure was the startled expression on his face, but the smile didn’t match her body language. “Too much geriatric bliss in skimpy togs? Imagining Granddad in a budgie smuggler? No worries, his togs are perfectly normal. His legsareskinny, though. And white.”
“You’re worried,” he said. “You wanted to talk this over. Stop trying to lighten it up and say what you need to say.”
“And you’renotworried? Zane …”
He liked how she said his name. He couldn’t help it. “Well, I do think it’s a bit ironic that I’ve been so careful to keep any extracurricular activity well away from my kids, and here’s my grandmother talking about having her fella here for the night, as bold as brass.”
“Yes,” she said seriously. “I said that, too. That it’s not a good example for the kids.”
He had to smile at that. “Well, if Nan were entertaining a string of boyfriends, maybe. I don’t imagine it’ll be all that exciting, or that the kids will care much. Sorry to be blunt, but I don’t think they’ll be having the kind of athletic sex that would get noisy, not at their ages. Anyway, the kids’ bedrooms are nowhere close.Mybedroom is, but I’ll put a pillow over my head.”
She said, “You’re trying to make this funny, but I can’t believe you feel that way. I’d tell you to let Granddad know if you don’t want him, but you’re clearly able to do that.”
“Clearly,” he agreed. “I’m not famous for my tact. So … what?”
“Uh … kids? In your house? Fighting withyourkids? Youcan’twant that.”
“I won’t be here,” he pointed out. “What difference will it make to me? And I doubt it’ll scar them for life. Things change, and you change with them. No choice.”
“Oh.” She did sit down, then, so he could sit down, too. At right angles to her. Her hands were clasped between her legs, and then they went up and shoved into her hair in that way she did. In that way he wanted to do.
“Scarlett hasn’t been on her best behavior, eh,” he said. “Is that what you’re afraid to say?”
“I’d say that Finlay’s given her a run for her money,” Skylar said. “They’re feeling territorial, I think. How much more territorial if my kids areon your turf? I don’t want to make my kids unhappy, but I especially don’t want to makeyourkids unhappy.”
He shrugged. “Don’t remember my Mum and Dad tying themselves into knots when we had a cousin living with us, or whatever it was. Nobody gets everything they want, and they may as well get used to that. When we boys fought too much, they generally just turfed us outside.”
“To play rugby.”
“If we were done with our chores. Farm kids. You were right about that, by the way. They’ve been getting away with too much. Scarlett and Duncan are more than old enough to be of use.”
“So you really don’t mind this.”
“I’m not that subtle. No need to look at me so searchingly. I’m willing to give it a go. If it doesn’t work out, I’ll tell you.You’re losing more than I am. Sounds like your granddad’s leaving you high and dry.”
“No. No, he’s— Well, he probably hasn’t done quite as much as your Nan has around the house—it’s not like I’m ever gone overnight—and I expect he’ll still be willing to let the plumber in and so forth, and fix the toilet when it runs. It won’t be that bad. I’m grateful he’s done as much as he has. Of course I am. I just?—”
“How did your husband die?” he asked.
