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“Did you hear from him?” Norma Jean asked anxiously, thinking that she should have asked that to begin with.
“Yeah. Sorry.” Miles rubbed the back of his neck. “I forgot to tell you. He’s got a broken leg and a concussion, and they think his ribs are bruised, but they’re not broken.”
“Thank God. So... What does that mean?”
“I think they’re going to be sending him home. They’re putting his leg in a splint and perhaps casting it. He wasn’t sure when I talked to him.”
“So he might even be home today?” Norma Jean asked, remembering that she was supposed to be putting all her effort into being loyal to Peter. After all, she owed him. But Miles was such a huge distraction. She...felt a pull toward him that she had never felt before.
“He thought so. He wasn’t going to know for sure until the orthopedic surgeon came in and talked to him.”
“Surgeon?”
“He was pretty sure that the orthopedic surgeon was going to say he didn’t need surgery, but until he heard it from the horse’s mouth, so to speak, he wasn’t going to say for sure.”
“I see.” She didn’t know how any of that stuff worked, but an orthopedic surgeon sounded a little scary. Hopefully it was nothing.
“All right. I’m off.” He put his hand on the doorknob, then turned around. “I’ll give you my phone number in case you need me?”
It should have been a statement, but it ended up being a question as he looked at Norma Jean, then nodded his head at Holly who had wandered over to the coffee maker and stood with her hands behind her back. She bent over, looking at the different coffees that Norma Jean had arranged.
“Oh. Yeah. That would be a good idea,” Norma Jean said, pulling her phone from where it sat on the desk and lifting it up while Miles told her his number.
She punched it and then sent him a text with a smiley face.
He didn’t even wiggle an eyelash when he saw what she said.
She was going to have to up her game if she was going to get Miles to smile. And then she castigated herself. If she was interested in Peter, she couldn’t be worried about whether or not Miles smiled at her.
“Thanks,” he said, turning toward the door and then calling to his daughter, “Be good.”
“See you later, Dad,” Holly said as she ran toward him, throwing her arms around his neck and squeezing him tight as he bent down.
Norma Jean’s heart felt happy as she watched the taciturn man put his arms around his daughter and hug her tightly. It was obvious he loved her and adored her and that she adored him.
Norma Jean didn’t have any idea what happened between Miles and his wife. As far as she knew, Miles was from Raspberry Ridge, which was a little town farther north along the lake.
She busied herself at her desk so they didn’t catch her staring, and he walked out without saying anything more.
Holly stood in front of the door, watching her dad walk away. “At home, when we feed, Daddy lets me help him.”
“Wow. He must really love having such a great helper.”
“Yeah. I’m his biggest helper,” Holly said, turning around and giving Norma Jean a big smile.
“We don’t have as many cows as what Mr. Peter does though. And Daddy has to come down here to work so he has enough money to feed me. I eat a lot,” she said, and Norma Jean had to work to hide a big smile over Holly obviously repeating what she’d heard her dad say.
“I’m glad that he’s able to help Mr. Peter, because Mr. Peter is going to need a lot of help if he’s got a broken leg.”
“Yeah. Dad said that if he could have gotten there a little bit earlier, Chester could have kept it all from happening, but Mr. Peter was in a big rush because he didn’t want his cows to get into the neighbor’s field.”
“I see,” Norma Jean said. She didn’t believe in pumping little kids for information and definitely not because a person was interested in their father. However, for the child’s own good and welfare, she said, “Does your mommy help on the farm?”
The little girl’s face dropped. “No. Mommy moved to Chicago. She has a boyfriend there.”
“Oh.” Now Norma Jean had opened the can of worms, and she didn’t know what to say. Obviously the idea of her mother having a boyfriend in Chicago and not living with them anymore made Holly sad.
“Mommy says I can come visit her sometime, but she hasn’t let me come yet. She is supposed to come and play with me on Thursdays, but she didn’t come today.”
