Page 9 of Sheltering Lily

“Actually, no. The Admiral and his brother—Chance’s dad—had a falling out years ago, when Chance was just a baby. Before I was even born. As far as we can tell, they never spoke again. Chance and his brothers grew up not even knowing that they had an uncle.”

Lily looked surprised. “Springwell’s a pretty small town,” she pointed out. “I would have thought everyone would know, even if the Admiral and Mr. McCallister never said anything about it.”

I shrugged. “I guess by the time Chance was old enough to be aware of what people were saying, it was already old news and no one thought to bring it up anymore.”

“So how did all of you find out?”

“Their dad died two and a half years ago. After the funeral, Chance was going through some old papers, and he found letters that the Admiral used to send his dad from his postings overseas. He started researching and asking around, and it wasn’t too long before he figured out the connection.”

“He couldn’t ask the Admiral?”

I shook my head. “He died five and a half years ago.”

“So they really never reconciled,” she mused. “That’s so sad. I can’t imagine living in the same town with your sibling and never talking to them—missing out on all the important milestones of their lives.”

“Are you close with all of your siblings?” I asked.

She smiled. “Yeah, I am. With the youngest ones, I’m kind of their second mom, since I did a lot of looking after them, which means it’s a different kind of closeness than what you have with Chance and your brothers, but we all stay in pretty constant contact. But wait, how did you get so close to Chance? I thought the two of you grew up together.”

“No, not really. I mean, we knew each other in passing, but I’m two years younger than Lee, the youngest McCallister brother, so it’s not like we had classes together. Chance was a senior in high school when I was still in eighth grade. But after Chance found those letters and started digging into the history between his dad and the Admiral, he reached out to me and my brothers to see what we knew—if the Admiral had told us anything.”

“Had he?”

“No, not directly.” He had talked to us a lot about how important family was, and how important it was for brothers to look after each other. Looking back now with new perspective, I had to wonder whether he’d been thinking about his own brother at those times…but I’d never really know for sure. “When Zach retired from the Navy and moved back to town, he went over to see Chance and his brothers and brought them some papers the Admiral had kept—letters from his brother and some other mementos. That was when the McCallisters basically told him they considered him to be part of the family now. They actually insisted that he move into their childhood home when he admitted that he didn’t have a place to stay yet. It was the house their dad had lived in, and they’d been considering selling it since none of them needed it—but it kind of became a family rest stop instead. Zach lived there for a stretch until he moved in with Carolyn, and Sofia and I lived there for a few months when I first came back to town.”

"Was it not white enough for you?” Lily teased with a grin. “Is that why you aren’t there anymore?”

Yes, actually—though that hadn’t been the whole reason, of course. “It was a little dated in a lot of ways,” I admitted. “Their dad did a good job of maintaining it so the building is still really solid, but the appliances were old and not in great shape, and the furniture wasn’t really kid-friendly. Plus, this location is better: closer to the park, lots of young families. These days, I only go back to the old house for our weekly poker games.”

“Oh, but this whole conversation started because I asked you about bridge!” she said, as if the reference to poker had reminded her. “Was it the Admiral who taught you to play bridge?”

“Yeah. He gauged our personalities and found a way to give each of us something special.” As a teen, I had pretended to my brothers that I didn’t like the game. In truth, I’d loved it. I liked the process of playing and winning, but I loved spending time with the Admiral and his old cronies.

“Bridge requires attention to detail and analytical skills,” she commented. “I can see why he chose that for you. I’m guessing those are his decks, then.”

“Some of them. Others I’ve picked up here and there in my travels. It’s kind of my way of honoring his memory.” I’d never expressed that to anyone before. My brothers were aware of it, but I hadn’t needed to explain to them my desire to maintain that connection with the Admiral.

“That’s really sweet. Thank you for sharing the story with me.” Her eyes were on me, and I expected to feel exposed, but I didn’t. I met her gaze, and a beat of heated silence passed.

How easy would it be to lean in and kiss her? As that thought crossed my mind, she slid off her stool and gathered up the remains of her dinner. Had she sensed what I had? I didn’t dare ask. If she had noticed the chemistry between us, then her choice to step away made it pretty clear that she didn’t think we should go there.

We shouldn’t go there. I was her boss, she was my employee; I was looking for a long-term commitment, and she didn’t want to be tied down. Besides, we were way too different. There were dozens of reasons why kissing would be a terrible idea.

But God, how I wanted to ignore them. I wanted to run my hands through that thick, beautiful hair, wanted to pull her close and feel her body pressed up against mine. Wanted to taste her tempting lips.

“Good night,” I said, as if to force myself to return to our business relationship. “I’ll be leaving early in the morning again, so you’ll have to get Sofia up.”

“Of course,” she said. “Good night.” She went out the back door, and a moment later I heard her enter her apartment. It took every ounce of determination I had to keep from following after her, knocking on her door, seeing if she’d let me in.

But instead, I cleaned up the kitchen and then headed upstairs to bed.

5

COLIN

“Your order will be up in five minutes, hon,” the waitress called to me where I stood at the counter of a little diner not far from my house.

“Thanks.” I took a seat on a stool and accepted the cup of coffee the waitress put in front of me. It had been another long day, but it had an unexpected silver lining: I’d share my dinner with Lily, as I had on other late nights since the one when I’d told her about the Admiral and how I’d gotten close to the McCallisters.

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