Page 8 of Sweet Talking Man


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So Leif had regrets...lots of them. He'd escaped the wedding noose three times and regretted hurting the bystanders. But most of all, he hated that his fear of commitment had dragged three innocent women through the mire with him. Hadn't been fair to them, but he comforted himself with the thought he'd done the right thing.

Leif's feet couldn't be nailed down. He wasn't the kind of guy who stuck …and stayed. Even though he wanted to be someone who belonged somewhere. And to someone. Eventually.

Arriving in Magnolia Bend had been an accident of fate, but even if he hadn't gotten lucky with the position as art teacher at St. George's, he would have come to the town that held the answer to the biggest mystery in his life.

So the time to uncover his past had come. This place held the secrets about why his mother had run... and it held the secret of who Leif’s father was. Here he began, and here he would hopefully find the answer to the questions that had pricked at him for years. Then maybe he could stop avoiding the ties that bound and find a good spot to settle down.

The doorbell sounded and he grabbed a linen drying towel and hurriedly scrubbed the remaining moisture from his body. Sliding on thehatachigipants he'd abandoned on the bathroom floor, Leif hurried toward the foyer. The darkening sky had thrown his living area into gloom. Flicking the porch light switch, he opened the door to find Birdie standing on the stoop. Cool air swooshed in, so he grabbed the Patagonia pullover from the nearby hook and tugged it on.

"Birdie," he said, peering out to see Abigail standing once again at the mailbox. Obviously the two had given him some recovery time before resuming whatever mission they were on. Something about drawing. Maybe Abigail wanted her daughter to have private lessons.

"Hey," the girl said, shifting nervously in her Converse high-tops. "Mom made me come back to apologize."

"For...?"

"Uh, two things. First..." She glanced at her mother. Abigail gave her an encouraging nod. "I shouldn't have said that woman smushing cake in your face was awesome."

Leif couldn't stop his lips from twitching. Right after Birdie had declared the awesomeness of Marcie's actions, Abigail had hustled her daughter away with a quick farewell. She'd nearly dragged Birdie toward the adjacent access walk to the Laurel Woods Bed and Breakfast. "Well, it wasn't awesome for me, but I can understand from your vantage point."

"Yeah. She was pretty mad at you."

Leif lifted a shoulder. "Eh, I deserved it."

"You did?"

From her post Abigail cleared her throat. Loudly. Annoyance shadowed Birdie's eyes. "And the second thing that I'm sorry for is spying on you."

"Huh?"

Birdie turned and called to her mother. "There. I told him. Are you happy?"

Abigail gave her daughter the "watch it, missy" look mothers had been giving from the beginning of time.

Leif braced his hands on the door frame, drawing Birdie's attention. "You've been spying on me? Why?"

Birdie swallowed, shifting restlessly before tilting herself closer to him. "It was last month. I accidentally spied on you when I climbed a tree... for, uh, some sketching." She inclined her head toward her mother and dropped her voice to a whisper. "That's how I get away from her. She stresses me out, and she can’t climb trees.”

His mouth twitched again as he eyed the buttoned-up Abigail. Someone needed to release a pressure valve inside the woman. Glancing at her now in her navy sweater, her mouth pressed into a serious line, he figured it was tough to have a mom who carried a label maker and a thick accordion binder of forms, calendars, and sanitizing wipes. "Okay. Apology accepted."

The girl leaned even closer, so that he could smell the apple scent of her shampoo. Her gaze pleaded with him. "I didn't tell my mom you were naked. Please don't tell her."

Whoa.

Dear God.

He'd never considered that while swimming his daily laps, someone would see him clad in his birthday suit. His privacy fence topped out at eight feet and he usually did laps in the cloak of darkness. It had grown colder the past few weeks so he'd started swimming at the rec center, but last month he'd been in his pool. "Jeez, Birdie, that's, uh, not cool."

The girl rocked back on her heels, tears sheening her eyes. "I didn't mean to, okay? I didn't really see anything. Much."

"Okay, don't cry. The human body isn't some thing to be ashamed of so let's not make this some thing skeevy."

"You're not mad?"

"No, but you need to tell your mom at some point. Keeping a secret like this isn't a good idea." He nearly choked on the last thought. He'd kept a big secret from everyone in the town. He was the son of Calliope-a woman they thought murdered someone. He was also the son of some guy who still lived in Magnolia Bend. He just needed to find out who that guy was.

"She'll make it into something bad."

Leif looked at Abigail, who had given up the aggravation and now appeared concerned about the quiet conversation her daughter was having with him. "Curiosity about the opposite sex is natural, Birdie. Not bad. It's how we're made. But the deal is I'm a teacher at your school. Things like this can get complicated."

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