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“That…is an excellent point. I’ll keep that in mind.”
He glanced over at where Mercy was working and then turned back to Nora. “Shall we take her for a walk?” he asked, smiling down at Daisy.
Nora addressed her as well. “That would be lovely,” she said, grinning as Daisy babbled up at her.
They took her over to a small grove of apple trees and spread out a blanket that Adam had grabbed from the porch rocking chair, plopping her on it. Then they took turns handing her little bits of things to play with.
After a few minutes, their fingers started to overlap as they handed her things. Until they finally stopped the pretense altogether and just sat twining their fingers together over and over.
Adam gave her a slow smile and leaned forward, letting his lips trail up the column of Nora’s neck. She shivered delightfully, but she pressed a hand to his chest, gently pushing him away.
“While I’d love to see where those lips of yours planned to go, perhaps we should wait until later.”
“I hate waiting. Patience is absolutely not a virtue—I don’t care what anyone says.”
“At least not one you possess.” She laughed and nodded at the little girl. “We have an audience.”
He looked down and laughed. “Ah, yes. I’d almost forgotten she was there.”
Well, not truly. But Nora was right that they should behave for the moment. He certainly hadn’t been paying as much attention as he should have.
“Is it all right that she have that?” he asked, nodding at the apple the child held.
Nora shrugged a shoulder. “I would think so. She certainly can’t fit the whole thing in her mouth, and she doesn’t have enough teeth to get off a big enough piece to choke on. As long as we watch her carefully, she should be fine for a minute.”
He nodded, frowning a bit. It had never occurred to him that children could be so troublesome. Which brought to mind another thought.
“Do you want one?” he asked.
…
Nora’s eyes flew open. “A baby?” She frowned a little. “I hadn’t really thought of it.”
That wasn’t completely true. She had thought of it. How could she not when that was what women her age typically did? Got married, had kids. But she’d never given it any real consideration because she’d never thought she would ever get married. She liked children and had always thought it would be nice to have them. But it wasn’t an opportunity she’d thought she could have.
And she was all right with that. For the most part. So she answered him as truthfully as she could.
“I enjoy playing with my friends’ children, and truth be told, it is sometimes nice to play with the children and then go home and let their parents deal with the hard part of raising them.”
He chuckled, nodding his agreement.
“I think,” she said, “I think, yes. If I had a choice and a willing partner, I’d like children someday. You?” she asked.
“I’ve never really thought about it, either. The life of a gunslinger isn’t really conducive to child-rearing.”
She laughed. “I suppose not.” Her eyes searched his, trying to read how he really felt about all this. “But…now that you’re retired…?”
He thought about it for a moment. “If I could find a place, a goodsafeplace, where I knew I could raise my children in peace and not have to worry about always looking over my shoulder, I think it might be nice to have kids. But the last thing I’d want to do is give my enemies any leverage over me. It’s one of the reasons I haven’t been back to visit my family since I came out west and…well, took up the profession I did.”
“You have family somewhere?”
He nodded. “My mother, and a brother and sister. My sister married a banker, lives in New York City the last I heard. My brother is a law clerk. He lives near my mother, takes care of her. I do miss them. But I worry also.”
“You don’t want to bring your past home to them?”
“It just always seemed safer to keep my distance,” he said with a sad smile. “Maybe someday, if that changes, I can think about things like visiting my family. Or starting a new one,” he said, bringing their entwined hands up to his lips so he could press a kiss to hers.
She smiled, staring at him for a moment before taking a deep breath and returning her attention to Daisy.
