No way was she allowing him to do that

But before Katarina knew what was happening, Ben swiftly pushed up the loose leg of her jeans and exposed her knee. She saw him study the long railroad track of her scar, as well as the other jagged patches of scar tissue from where the bullet had ripped through the skin. Looking at it now in the firelight made even her a little queasy.

“It’s gross, I know,” she said.

But then he did the unexpected. He lifted her knee and he lowered his head. And with an aching sweetness, he kissed her leg. Not just her leg, every inch of her scars.

Katarina’s mouth dropped open in shock. “You—you don’t have to do that,” she said.

He lifted his head after planting one last feathery kiss.

“Yes, I do.”

Dear Reader,

I live in a small town. The other day I was walking my dog when I passed two neighbors deep in conversation. The man was a young German engineer whose company had transferred him to America three years ago, but who now was returning home. The other was a spry woman in her seventies, a former actress who taught drama. He was saying goodbye before leaving. “I hope you have something planned for the weekend,” he said sweetly. “Honey, I’m busy every day of my life,” she replied.

My first reaction was, only in a small town! Where else can people who’ve known each other forever or just a few years become so close? And where else can we gain snippets of wisdom while walking the dog?

I was delighted to bring the fictitious town of Grantham, New Jersey, to life in this story, as well as highlight a great community resource—adult education classes. I hope you will enjoy going back to school with me!

Tracy Kelleher

Falling for the Teacher
Tracy Kelleher

MILLS & BOON

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tracy sold her first story to a children’s magazine when she was ten years old. Writing was clearly in her blood, though fiction was put on hold while she received degrees from Yale and Cornell, traveled the world, worked in advertising, became a staff reporter and later a magazine editor. She also managed to raise a family. Is it any surprise she escapes to the world of fiction?

To Jan and John, for providing the perfect place to write, not to mention the inspiration of their dog Mickey.

A special thank-you to Katarina Sekacova, my expert in Slovak.

And in loving memory of my dad, my biggest fan.

CONTENTS

PREFACE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

PREFACE

Six weeks earlier…

FROM OUTSIDE THE HOUSE, Ben Brown could hear the insistent ring of the kitchen phone. But Ben had more urgent concerns to address. Chief among them, breathing.

He wiped the sweat off his brow with the back of his forearm, bent over at the waist and sucked in oxygen, ignoring the stitch in his side. He had told himself that turning thirty-eight the week before had been no biggie—just another nonexistent birthday candle on a nonexistent birthday cake.

But if it was so inconsequential, why the hell was it becoming next to impossible to clock seven-minute miles on his daily run along the towpath? Father Time was a cruel son of a bitch. Not to mention, almost as irritating as the phone that continued to drone on, demanding attention like an early morning alarm clock.

Ben straightened up—breathing was becoming tolerable—and considered the situation. Only three people had his unlisted number: one, his housekeeper; two, his one remaining friend from his former job—may everyone else burn in their greed and sense of entitlement; and three, his lawyer. Ben always thought in terms of numbers. According to his ex-wife, that was his strength but also his failing. What had been her name again?

He shrugged and cocked his head toward the open upstairs window, toward the sound of the vacuum cleaner going in his bedroom. That could only mean Amada, his housekeeper, had showed up when he was out running. So much for possibility number one. As for option number two, Ben knew that his friend and partner, Hunt, was in Davos, theoretically skiing, but more likely courting Swiss investors for their new venture capitalist firm. He looked at his sports watch. Four o’clock in the afternoon, which would be ten o’clock at night in Switzerland, too late for Hunt to be calling. So it had to be his attorney.

Never a happy option if recent history was any guide.

Ben considered letting the call go to voice mail when he heard the vacuum cleaner stop. God knows he didn’t want Amada to get mixed up in his business. Quickly he pushed open the door, the wood scraping along the slab of gray stone, an original element of the centuries old cottage.

I really do need to plane that, he reminded himself and picked up the phone.

“Brown,” he said.

“George B. Brown? Is this Mr. George Benjamin Brown?” The voice was female, unctuous and unfamiliar. Female he could take. Unctuous and unfamiliar held absolutely zero appeal.

He was about to hang up when the woman added, “My name is Trudy Colliver, and I’m calling from Steamboat Springs, Colorado.”

It was the “Steamboat Springs, Colorado,” that stopped him from slamming down the receiver. “Yes,” he said cautiously.

“Oh, good. I must say, you’re not an easy man to reach,” the woman at the other end of the line said. “I tried the Wall Street firm where you recently worked, and they suggested I contact your attorney in Manhattan. He, in turn, gave me your current number in—” Ben could hear a shuffling of papers “—in Grantham, New Jersey.”

“Did he now?” Ben was wondering if he should fire his lawyer today or wait for tomorrow. If he remembered correctly, it was the ambulance chaser’s birthday. Definitely today then.

“You see, I’m also an attorney, and I’m calling on behalf of a client. Charlise Worthington? I believe you were acquainted with Ms. Worthington?”

Charlise Worthington. Steamboat. Names out of his past, say, fifteen years ago, right after he’d gotten out of the Marines. Thumbing his way across the country with no particular focus, Ben had somehow landed in Steamboat Springs for one winter season, despite the fact that he’d never skied or snowboarded in his life and didn’t know a stem Christie from a telemark. No surprise there since foster homes didn’t exactly cater to expensive winter sports.

He had eked a meager wage playing piano at a bar where Charlie had been a waitress. She was a local, addicted to powder. The kind you skied on, that was. Charlie had had no time for drugs, any more than world politics, corporate greed or long-term leases. They’d shared laughs, more than a few beers and a brief affair.

The sad truth was—and Ben was beginning to be of the philosophy that truth was by and large sad—he had enjoyed her company and the sex immensely, but had headed for L.A. as soon as the snow had melted without an iota of hesitation and barely a glance backward. A typically insensitive guy. The only salvation was that Charlie had probably seen it coming, given her whole no-long-term lease on life thing.

Now, thinking back, though, he found he was smiling. “That’s right,” he said. “We did know each other, quite a few years back, but we lost touch.”

“That is what I was given to understand. Unfortunately it doesn’t make my news any easier.” There was a brief pause during which Ben could hear a long intake of breath. “Mr. Brown, I’m sorry to inform you that Ms. Worthington recently died.”

The sweat soaking his T-shirt turned ice-cold. Ben turned around and leaned against the kitchen counter. “That’s, ah, that’s…” What did you say in response to news about the death of someone who embodied life to its fullest? “That’s, ah, too bad.” He rubbed his forehead. “Was she in an accident? A skiing accident?”

“No, it was breast cancer. She was very courageous, and remained positive throughout the course of her treatments and relapses, but in the end the disease was just too strong.”

The tightness in his chest had nothing to do with the aftereffects of exercise. “I’m sorry. I’m…so sorry to hear that. Charlie was good, a good person. She didn’t deserve to die so young.”

“Does anyone?”

Ben didn’t respond. Unlike Charlie, he knew that he wasn’t a kind-spirited person. He could think of any number of people whom he wouldn’t shed a tear over if an errant bus happened to run over them. If there were any justice in the world, guys like him would be the ones to die young, while the Charlies of the world would live to a ripe old age, sitting around a roaring fireplace, sipping hot drinks and enjoying their grandchildren.

He rubbed his jaw with his palm. “Listen, if there’re some outstanding debts or things that need to be settled in her estate, I’d be happy to do so.” He turned on the cold water and bent his head to drink from the faucet.

“Actually, there is a small inheritance, but there are some bills that require payment, and your offer is very generous. But in all fairness, I called with reference to another matter in Ms. Worthington’s will.”

Ben straightened up and wiped away some water that dribbled off his chin. “Whatever Charlie wanted to give me, I’d rather you donate it to charity. I really don’t want for anything and prefer to live simply.” He leaned over to drink some more.

“God knows that with two mortgages, one kid in college and another taking private figure skating lessons that cost more than most people’s yearly pay, I can understand your preference. However, in this particular instance, it’s not so simple to reject the offer. You see the bequest is a boy. A fifteen-year-old boy.”

The water ran into Ben’s nose. It splashed over his face. His hand. He coughed. And coughed some more.

“Mr. Brown? Mr. Brown, are you all right?”

Blindly, Ben managed to turn off the tap and, leaning heavily on the edge of the sink, sucked in mouthfuls of air. Just to make sure, he gulped another large dose of oxygen. “Charlie had a son?” he said.

“That’s correct.”

Charlie would have been a wonderful mother. Ben knew it. He could perfectly imagine what her kid must be like: blond, athletic, easygoing, one of those kids who was perpetually wind-and sunburned, maybe with a chipped tooth that he’d gotten from a skateboard accident.

But he never would have imagined what came next.

“And, Mr. Brown, she’s named you as the boy’s father.”

CHAPTER ONE

Dear Grantham Community Members,

Welcome to the twenty-fifth year of the Grantham Adult School! As in years past, we are delighted to offer a wide range of classes to meet the needs and interests of the community. Our instructors include noted scholars from Grantham University, as well as artists, artisans and business experts residing in the area. Above all, we at the Adult School believe that education does not end with a diploma. Hence, our motto:

Education: the Wellspring of Life.

Iris Phox, President

Grantham Adult School

“EDUCATION: THE WELLSPRING OF LIFE!” Ben tossed the thin booklet on the coffee table in his living room. It joined a stack of library books, fly-fishing paraphernalia and an empty bag of Doritos. “What the hell is a ‘wellspring’ anyway?”

“What was that? I wasn’t listening,” said Huntington Phox, co-founder with Ben of Garden State Global Venture Capital. He sat in a cracked leather armchair kitty-corner to Ben’s couch and was absorbed in reading a company prospectus. “Reading” perhaps was stretching it, given the way he kept bringing the report closer to his aquiline nose before moving it farther away and then closer again.

The nose, by the way, matched the rest of Hunt’s lithe patrician body, a body honed by generations of breeding for playing polo or sailing in the America’s Cup. Somehow Hunt seemed blithely unaware of this fact, whereas Ben never forgot it, especially in comparison to his own physique. That could best be described as bruising, the kind of hulking form fit for felling trees or working on the loading docks. It was blond Mayflower vs black Irish. Day vs night.

“Oh, for the love of Pete!” Ben slid aside a stack of magazines and uncovered the magnifying glass he used for tying flies. “Here. If you refuse to wear reading glasses, at least use this. Otherwise, it’s too painful to watch.” He tossed the magnifying glass onto Hunt’s lap.

Hunt lowered the report. “It’s not that I refuse to wear reading glasses, it’s more that I refuse to believe that at thirty-five I’m showing any signs of aging. I have to live up to my image after all, and something like reading glasses just doesn’t fit the look.” The tone of his voice was self-deprecating.

“Well, I hate to tell you. Not only are you going blind as a bat, you’re also more tired these days. So much for your theory of remaining an ageless golden boy,” Ben teased.

“You’ve noticed that, too?” asked Hunt. He set his jaw but after a pause, he settled his features into his usual devil-may-care expression. “You know, Ben, you’re the only person I know who gets nastier in retirement. It’s a good thing you’re my friend, not to mention a hell of an investor,” he said, effectively changing the topic of conversation.

“I wouldn’t exactly call you a slouch, ol’ buddy. Just because you didn’t grow up a street fighter, doesn’t mean you don’t know how to mix it up with the big boys.”

“Such praise. Please, it’ll go to my head, and it’s already filled to the brim with such trivia as how to tie a full Windsor knot and the proper use of a finger bowl.” Hunt waited while Ben chuckled, then said more seriously, “Let’s just agree that we both know how to spot a financial opportunity when we see one, and that Ribacoff & Riley rued the day it lost us.”

Ben shook his head. “R&R rued the day it lost you. It rejoiced up and down the Street when I left.” R&R was considered the most aggressive mutual-fund company on Wall Street.

“Says you,” Hunt said.

“Says everyone else on the Street.”

Hunt rested his hands on overstuffed arms of the chair. “Ben, you and I both know that you didn’t have to take the fall for the rogue traders in your group. And anyone who really knows you, knows you’re completely honorable.”

“Honorable, maybe, but not above fostering a climate of cutthroat competition that encouraged people to do whatever it took to make money.”

“That’s called capitalism. Now, can we get back to the business of making us richer, and forget about the whole rotten world out there?” Hunt grabbed for the magnifying glass and for the first time noticed the flier that Ben had been reading. “Is that what you were talking about before?” He picked up the pamphlet and held the round lens up to his eye, magnifying it to scary proportions.

Baby blues that perfect didn’t need to be any bigger, Ben thought. “Yes, that’s it. And if the introduction to the flier isn’t ridiculous enough, you should see the attached note.”

Hunt lowered the magnifying glass. “Let me take a wild guess. My mother?”

“Your mother.” Ben picked up the corner of the booklet with the tips of two fingers. “I should really get the barbecue tongs to avoid direct contact.”

“It can’t be that bad.”

Ben dipped his chin. “This is your mother we’re talking about.”

“Please, what an accusation. After all, you’re talking about a woman who is both president of the garden club and chairs the capital campaign for the new Grantham Hospital. A woman so exalted by the local community she has won the Rupert L. Phox Award, named after my grandfather by the way, for being the outstanding Granthamite three years in a row? Wait.” He held up an index finger. “On second thought, you’re right. This is my mother you’re talking about. Get the tongs. Better yet, get a face mask and bug spray.” Then he flopped back in the chair and chuckled heartily. “So what does my mother want now?”

Ben flipped open the pamphlet and peeled away a Post-it note stuck to the page. “It seems Iris thought it would be a…a—” he read from the message “—‘a nice gesture of community goodwill’ to speak at the first session of this class.”

Hunt smiled. “I like that. ‘Nice gesture.’ Very ladylike but also unmistakably insistent.”

Ben frowned. “Ladylike my you-know-what. Imperial command is more like it.”

“So what class did she have in mind?”

“Well, she’d hardly pick flower arranging. No, it was something to do with investing.”

Hunt bent forward again and placed the magnifying glass atop a pile of books on Etruscan art. He pursed his lips and strummed his fingers on the edge of the table.

“What?” Ben asked.

“Now don’t jump all over me. The sins of the mother should not be visited upon the son, but—”

“But?” Ben didn’t like the way this was going.

Hunt raised his hands on high, a definite save-me, save-me gesture.

Ben wasn’t buying it. “Speak quickly before I inflict extreme pain.”

“Hear me out,” Hunt said. “Did you ever consider that she might be trying to be helpful? Trying in her own warped way to keep you from living the life of a hermit?”

“No.”

Hunt sank back in the chair in exasperation. “My God, Ben, except from playing piano after hours at some neighborhood bar, you’ve just about cut yourself off from civilization. Do you have any normal contact with the outside world?”

Ben wet his lips. “I occasionally go grocery shopping when I forget to put something on the list for Amada.”

“C’mon. I’m serious. Look at you!”

Ben was dressed like a reject from an Army-Navy store—worn jeans, overly washed T-shirt and scuffed work boots held together by knotted shoelaces and duct tape.

Hunt swept his hand around the room. “And look at where you live. In a cabin in the woods! It’s…it’s practically Little House on the Prairie! This from a man who had a loft in Tribeca that graced the cover of Architectural Digest!”

“It’s not a cabin. It’s an eighteenth century stone cottage.”

Hunt looked around in disbelief. “So that’s what they call bastions of damp rot now?” He scratched his head.

Ben scowled and looked away.

“Okay, let’s leave aside the discussion of real estate and get back to what’s really bugging you,” Hunt said. “Tell me, what’s so bad about lecturing a bunch of retirees? It’s just one night, and they’re probably hard of hearing anyway.”

Ben snapped the course booklet shut. “I don’t care if half the audience comes with their seeing-eye dogs. My life, as you well know, has recently become complicated enough. It’s hard enough just trying to make it through one day at a time, and I don’t need the added hassle of lecturing a bunch of strangers on, on—” he flipped open the booklet to the page with the sticky note “—on the ‘Fundamentals of Personal Investing,’ this damn course your mother’s so hot on.”

From beneath a pile of books on classic racing cars and Civil War history arose the sound of a ringing cordless phone.

Ben stared at the ringing pile but didn’t make a move.

“Aren’t you going to get it?” Hunt asked.

“The phone hasn’t been exactly kind to me of late.” Ben narrowed his eyes and finally dug it out. “Yes?…Oh, Amada, what’s up?…What do you mean he wasn’t there when you went to pick him up? I thought you said he was going to his friend Vincent’s house to study?” Ben nodded as he listened. “Sorry, sorry. Okay his friend, Verjesh. So where is he? Does Verjesh know?”

He crooked his elbow to read his Breitling sports watch, one of the few vestiges of his former high-flying lifestyle. To his surprise, the time was already seven-thirty. “No, he doesn’t? Well, he couldn’t have gotten far.” He ran his hand through his hair. “What’s that? He’s got his bike? And Verjesh said his backpack looked full?” He paused. “You don’t think…All right, all right. I’ll handle it. You just go on home.”

Ben rang off. “Sorry, Hunt, but we’ll have to continue this discussion later. I’ve got to head off on a search party. What a day. First your mother. Now my son!”

CHAPTER TWO

“YOU KNOW, DEAR, IT’S only natural to be nervous,” Lena Zemanova said to her granddaughter standing nearby. She had to raise her voice to be heard above the torrential rain that lashed at her stalwart frame. It was a dark, February evening, making the downpour cold and menacing, a real Horatio Hornblower moment in land-locked Grantham, New Jersey.

Katarina Zemanova wrestled with locking her grandmother’s ten-year-old Corolla while simultaneously trying to open her own umbrella. Like clockwork, the over-the-shoulder strap of her Coach briefcase chose the exact same moment to slip down, thereby crushing her left wrist. She might never play the violin again, Katarina ruefully acknowledged, not that she ever did, mind you. Whatever. She pressed the small button on the remote again—and again—but when the car refused to lock, she gave up and bent forward to do it manually. That meant her umbrella tilted back, which, as fate would have it, allowed a sudden burst of wind to pop it inside out. Oh, yeah.

Katarina closed her eyes and bit back a sigh. To think that she had once been an accomplished multitasker. The only thing more awkward that could possibly happen would be if her headband slipped down over her eyes.

Her headband slipped down over her eyes.

Life was not meant for the faint of heart.

Katarina pushed it back on her already soaked head, and blinked in despair, the raindrops beading on her lashes. Once upon a time, she had had her two hundred dollar coiffure professionally washed and blown dry before work each morning. Once upon a time was a mere four months ago. How quickly times change. Merely thinking “whatever” was a little more difficult the second time around.

“Really, Babička, I’m not a delicate flower,” Katarina said to her grandmother.

As a young bride, Lena had left what was then Czechoslovakia to come to live in New Jersey. Despite a passage of fifty years, certain Old World connections, especially Slovak phrases and vocabulary, lived on, including the Slovak word for grandmother, Babička.

“Of course you’re not a delicate flower. None of the Zemanova women are delicate flowers,” Lena said. “Still, if you’d wear a proper hat instead of carrying one of those overpriced gizmos, you wouldn’t be soaked to the bone.” She tsked at Katarina’s Burberry umbrella. Unlike her granddaughter she wore a sensible, eye-popping yellow rain slicker along with a pair of high Wellington boots. With a few tweaks here or there, she could have modeled for the figure on the Morton’s salt container.

The wind blew Katarina’s hair, and a wet lock slapped her cheek. “I don’t like hats. They give me hat hair. Though I’m beginning to rethink that prejudice.” She held the umbrella into the wind and worked the catch a few more times to pop it right side out. “Good,” she said, and holding the umbrella overhead, offered an outstretched hand to guide her grandmother over the uneven pavement of the parking lot. Unfortunately, the high school lot was closed due to neverending construction, and they were forced to make the trek from a temporary lot down the block.

Her grandmother promptly ignored Katarina’s gesture, and together they bent forward into the stiff wind and made their way toward the sidewalk. In the darkness of the evening, Katarina had to concentrate on the tricky footing due to all the construction around the school. With her weakened leg she felt especially vulnerable. She tightly gripped the collar of her coat around her neck. The driving rain bit into her pants, causing the still tender muscles of her right leg to spasm. She pretended it wasn’t happening. Denial was a powerful weapon, one she’d been living with these last months. Her briefcase flopped against her hip with each limping stride.

“Okay, so I am nervous,” she said. “It’s not like I’m in any position to back out now anyway. The proverbial die has been cast, and, a die, I might add—” Katarina felt herself wearying of the metaphor before she’d finished using it, but seeing no where else to go “—that in no small part is due to a certain small person walking next to me.”

Lena didn’t bother to turn her head as she trudged forward. “Excuse me. I don’t know where you get the idea that I had anything to do with your teaching this class at the Adult School. I’ve been much too busy making sure I got into the Tai Chi class to meddle in your affairs. It happens to be very popular among people of a certain, more mature, age. That’s the problem with you young people today. You always think the world revolves around you. Haven’t you ever heard of Copernicus?”

“That’s Galileo, Babička, and, no, I hardly think the world revolves around me.” In fact, these past few months Katarina had felt more as if the world, at least the world as she knew it, had passed her by. “And besides, at thirty-three years old, I hardly qualify as young anymore.”

“In my book, anyone under the age of sixty is young. And for your information, I am not small!”

Katarina smiled. Her grandmother barely scraped the bar at five feet. Not that Katarina was any giant at five-four, but she could still claim to be the tallest woman in her family. Her mother, for all her outsize personality, stood a mere five foot two.

“All right, I take back the comment about you being small, but stop pretending you didn’t interfere, or, if you prefer, influence.” Katarina lifted her umbrella to talk face-to-face. “I know you, Babička. You wouldn’t have been able to stop yourself from calling Iris Phox and suggesting I teach a course on inves—”

Thwa-ack! A wall of water drenched Katarina. It got her face, splashed her coat. Soaked her shoes. Her designer umbrella? Gone with the wind. Having flown out of her hand, it tumbled down the street, ricocheting from one curb to the other, eventually chasing a speeding motorcycle like a Border collie dashing after a Frisbee.

Katarina wiped her wet bangs out of her eyes and fumbled for her headband, only to find it had disappeared somewhere in the torrent, too. “I don’t believe it! F—” She quickly remembered that her grandmother was standing next to her. “Sorry, Babička.” She looked sideways. Her grandmother wasn’t there. She looked down. She wasn’t there, either. Frantically, she looked behind her. “Oh, my god, Babička! Where did you go?”

Despite the glow of the streetlamps, the moonless night and pouring rain made it difficult to pick out more than diffuse shapes in the distance. She scanned the sidewalk up ahead, and at last spotted her grandmother standing next to a tree.

Katarina rushed to her side. The spurt of energy accentuated her limp. “Are you all right?”

Lena stood there undaunted in her foul weather gear, a rubberized Rock of Gibraltar. She harrumphed. “I thought we just finished establishing that Zemanova women are not delicate flowers.” Lena patted the back of her hand against Katarina’s arm. “Move. You’re in the way. I can’t see.” She peered down the street.

Katarina followed her grandmother’s gaze. The motorcycle that she had glimpsed earlier? It had come circling back, slowly, coming to a stop within arm’s distance. The rider’s feet, clad in a pair of mangy-looking hiking boots, touched the pavement on either side of the bike. He softened the throttle and lifted off the seat. The rain spattered against the black visor of his helmet. In a quick, fluid motion, he reached behind.

For Katarina, memories instantly came flooding back. The routine stop at an ATM machine late at night…The thief from out of nowhere…The gun…The threats…The pain…

The biker brought his arm forward.

Katarina didn’t stop to think. She went ahead and pushed her grandmother behind her. Then when she saw the biker hold up something long and cylindrical, her heart gave an extra jolt, and her eyes widened.

Four months ago, she had stared down the barrel of a gun, a horrific sight she’d never forget. Once more it looked as if fate had chosen to mark her as a victim of violent crime. She staggered, but refused to waver. If nothing else, she would make sure Babička wouldn’t have to go through what she had already experienced once.

“ Babička, here, take these.” She fished the car keys out of her coat pocket and thrust them out. “Run back to the car. Get in and drive away.”

Lena tried to step forward, but Katarina blocked her. “What are you talking about?”

“The gun.”

“What gun?”

Katarina wiped away the rain that clung to her eyelashes and blurred her vision. She blinked. What gun indeed?

What he was holding was her umbrella. And by the look of it, right side out, closed and neatly snapped shut.

The surge of adrenaline gradually dissipated. Okay, her heart was pounding like a pile driver to be sure, but at least it was functioning.

“Did one of you ladies lose an umbrella?” the stranger asked.

Lena stepped from behind the speechless Katarina. “My granddaughter. She dropped it when you got her all wet when you went driving by like some crazy maniac. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

The biker flipped up his visor. The glow from a streetlamp cast his features in shadowy angles and planes. But despite the rain and other obscuring elements, his firm jawline cut the air like a piece of granite.

“I’m very sorry,” he said.

Did slabs of granite move? Katarina wondered.

“It’s just that I’m…uh…kind of preoccupied at the moment—” he rubbed his chin “—and I didn’t see you in the dark with the rain. I know it’s no excuse, but I hope you’re okay. No permanent damage or anything?”

Katarina shook her head. It was impossible to make out the color of his eyes but his teeth shone white as he spoke in low, rushed tones, and she could sense the anxiousness in his voice, a sexy, mellifluous baritone of a voice.

Katarina told herself not to take any notice, that whatever she was sensing was more probably an aftershock from envisioning what might have been. “Wet but otherwise fine,” she said in answer to his question. At least the wet part was accurate.

“Well, if you’re sure…?” He fidgeted with the handlebars. “Listen, I don’t mean to, to…ah…splash and run, but if you’re really okay, I have a small family crisis I need to deal with. It’s really urgent.” He worked his lower lip.

Katarina couldn’t help noticing how full it was. Aftershock, aftershock, she told herself and swallowed. “Not, not to worry,” she said.

“I can give you my phone number to let me know about dry cleaning expenses or something?”

“No, really, I’m fine. And everything will be fine once it dries out.”

He reached for his visor.

Katarina held out her hand. “Just one thing. My umbrella?”

“Oh, right. Sorry about that.” He seemed to hesitate, then thrust it at her. “If you’ll excuse me then.” He nodded goodbye, flipped down his visor and thundered off into the night. The heavy strumming of the rain muffled the sound of the engine until it vanished into oblivion.

“‘Splash and run.’ I like that,” Lena said. “But careless, much too careless.” She turned and inspected her granddaughter. “Katarina? What do you think?”

“Yes, Babička?” Katarina pulled her gaze away from the disappearing figure, half hearing what her grandmother said and having less than half an interest in responding. She sucked in the insides of her cheeks and forced herself to concentrate on the essential here and now. “Listen, I think we need to hurry if we’re not going to be late to class.”

Lena stood unmoving with her eyes focused on the receding figure. “Don’t pretend you didn’t hear what I said.”

“I didn’t,” Katarina said.

Lena held up her hand to thwart any protests. “Waddayaknow! Look!” She pointed down the road. “He’s stopping at the high school! All I can say is, if he turns out to be the defensive driving instructor, I’m going to have to call Iris again and let her know. We can’t have that.”

Katarina pointed her umbrella triumphantly in the air. “Ah, hah!” she said. “See, I was right! You did call Iris Phox about me teaching! Now you can’t deny it.”

Lena turned back to her granddaughter. “So sue me. As your grandmother, I only had your best interests at heart.” Then she nodded and smiled what could only be described as a very ungrandmotherly-like smile. “He was something, wasn’t he?”

“Babička!”

Lena shrugged. “I may be no spring chicken, but I still know a rooster when I see one.” She sniffed loudly. “Unlike some people, I might add.”

“I’m not immune to the opposite sex, you know,” Katarina protested.

“What I know would fill a book, a very large book. Come, I hate being late. And, you, brush your hair and wipe your face when you get inside. You never know what might happen.”

CHAPTER THREE

KATARINA GAZED AT THE brass knob, its surface marred by the sweaty palms of generations of eager young minds, and realized that the whole problem was she could imagine what might happen. Not with the mysterious biker. That was out of the realm of imagination. But with the class.

They’d hate her. She would bore them. They’d ask her questions she couldn’t answer. She’d run out of things to say. People would get up and leave early. And on and on.

And the really frustrating part about it all? She had absolutely no experience when it came to dealing with these kinds of anxieties. Up until the shooting, she had been fearless, some coworkers at Curtis Worldwide Home Products Inc., would have said even reckless, especially those she had passed by in her rapid rise to senior vice president for finance. But then, she had never had a reason to doubt herself.

From an early age, Katarina’s single mother had taught her to be independent. This was the same single mother whose own independent streak now took her to Antarctica to carry out geological research. And why should Katarina have doubted her word? After all, Katarina had been blessed with the two best qualities a single child could have: the ability to amuse herself with long hours of reading, and the self-confidence to believe she could do anything if she set her mind to it. She had succeeded in school, college and business school, graduating at the top of her class and sailing into a dream job out on the West Coast. If someone needed a report by midnight, she could produce it. A partner to climb Kilimanjaro? No problem.

But ever since a bullet had ripped though her right knee, that kind of fortitude, some might even say bravado, seemed to have vanished.

Still, the mantra “Zemanova women are tough” had been needlepointed into every pillow in the house in a figurative sense, and Katarina hadn’t dared tell her mother and grandmother about her anxieties. Instead, she had assured them that there was no need for either to fly out during her long convalescence. And it went without saying that she’d thrown herself into her postoperative physical therapy with the same overachieving ardor that had propelled her to accomplish so much already.

Despite the tedium and the pain, she had been all smiles for her doctors and therapists. Over the phone to her family, she had conveyed nothing but upbeat sentiments. When her company said, “Take as much time as you need before you come back,” she had said that she was sure she wouldn’t be long. Yet, deep down she knew it was a lie.

She was already drifting, unable to make decisions, even the simplest like whether to wear brown pants or black, to have coffee or tea, to do the crossword puzzle in pen or in pencil, or not to do it at all.

So after four months of physical recovery, she had gravitated back to the one place that had always felt safe no matter where life had taken her—Babička’s house in Grantham. Lena had never challenged her, didn’t ask her about her short or long-term plans, and didn’t question her feelings. Until this matter of the Adult School, that is.

So Katarina mustered the same family backbone that had gotten her grandmother through early widowhood as a recently arrived immigrant. It had also gotten her mother through college and graduate school raising a young child alone. Alone because she had insisted from the moment she’d discovered she was pregnant that the father was out of the picture, and refused to reveal his name. Likewise Katarina now took a deep breath and reached out, adding her own sweaty palm to those that had come before her. What was Franklin Roosevelt’s adage: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself?”

She pushed the heavy wooden door with so much conviction that it swung wildly and banged into the inside wall. Well, that got everyone’s attention, she thought before saying out loud in a forthright manner, “Good evening, everyone.”

She crossed the floor to the desk at the front of the classroom, listening to the distinctive squishing sound made by the crepe soles of her shoes. She unpeeled her raincoat, dropped it over the back of the chair and wiped aside her wet hair. Finally looking up—she could delay the inevitable no longer—she offered a tight-lipped smile to the students in her night school class. Why wasn’t she surprised at what she saw?

Clearly, Babička’s maneuverings had gone beyond securing her this part-time post. Among the eager faces looking to her for guidance and inspiration were several of her grandmother’s friends and aquaintances.

Katarina nodded hello, first to Carl Bedecker who sat front and center. Carl’s wine-colored V-neck sweater had a Kiawa Island logo stitched on the upper left, above his prominent bulging stomach that stretched the knit fabric below. He greeted her with a beaming smile showing somewhat yellowed teeth. The twinkle in his rheumy eyes brought to mind a kindhearted Norman Rockwell figure on a Saturday Evening Post cover until…

Until he winked at her with what was definitely not a Norman Rockwell kind of smile. Katarina sighed internally but tried to tell herself to be charitable. According to Lena, who had felt the need to catch her up on the local gossip in the first hour of her arrival, Carl’s wife, Trudy, had passed away two years ago. Since then he had let his two sons take over the family nursery, and with too much time on his hands, he was at something of a loss.

Carl is probably just lonely, Katarina told herself, possibly a little rusty when it comes to social interaction.

Carl winked again.

Forget rusty. Katarina pretended she didn’t see the gesture and shifted her attention to a woman on Carl’s left. She was well into her seventies, but talk about denial. Multiple hoop earrings dangled from her earlobes and her short, spiky hair had phosphorescent purple highlights. This could only be Wanda Garrity, no question about it.

Wanda was a member of her grandmother’s Thursday tennis doubles group. Babička had told her that Wanda always brought her Boston terrier, Tiger, to the tennis courts even though dogs were strictly forbidden. In fact, recreation department authorities had even posted a sign to that effect, expressly with Tiger in mind. Wanda had taken absolutely no notice, obviously considering herself a higher authority.

The rec department hadn’t dared to argue.

Katarina couldn’t help noticing the enormous tote taking up most of Wanda’s desk. Katarina didn’t need X-ray vision to hazard a guess as to what was inside. That the bag jiggled at random intervals confirmed her suspicions.

The door closed softly behind her and Katarina turned.

“Sorry I’m late,” came a gravelly voice. “I don’t move as swiftly as I used to.”

Katarina immediately recognized Rufus Treadway, moving slowly with the aid of a walker. As one of the vocal leaders of the black community, Rufus was an institution in Grantham. He also owned the Nighttime Bar whose decidedly downscale, painted cinder block exterior defied the gentrification of Grantham with a confident sense of reverse snobbery. The Nighttime Bar had been serving Rolling Rock on tap for more than sixty years, ever since Rufus’s late father decided to change his gas station into a watering hole. The dark wood stools with cracked faux leather seat covers had supported the weight of countless patrons. Everyone from governors residing in the local mansion, to garbage men sharing rooms in boardinghouses. They all came, drawn by the beer, camaraderie and quality of the live jazz.

Katarina smiled and held her hand out to an empty chair in the front. “The hip replacement still acting up? Lena told me you had had an operation not too long ago,” she said. She rested against the front of the teacher’s desk to take the weight off her own sore leg.

Rufus nodded. “Don’t you know it? The doctors tell you it only takes three months to recover, but they don’t tell you that those three months will be hell.”

“If you knew ahead of time, you’d never go through with it,” Katarina said. She knew only too well from personal experience. “Still, I know that my grandmother is expecting you to be out there for the summer seniors’ basketball league, so you’ve got to keep up with your rehab.” She reached around for her briefcase and pulled out the class list.

“For those of you who don’t know me—or my grandmother—” Carl chuckled a little too loudly “—my name’s Katarina Zemanova, and I’m your instructor for ‘Fundamentals of Personal Investing’. By way of an introduction, I recently moved back to Grantham from California where I was the financial officer for a major household products company. So, not only can I teach investing, but I also know more than most people about bleach.”

She saw Wanda rummage around in her enormous bag and lift what looked to be a white tennis skirt. Katarina cleared her throat. Wanda let it slide back in.

“Anyhow, why don’t I take the roll so I can put some names to faces for those of you I don’t already know?” As she worked through the list of about fifteen students, Katarina made small talk, putting people at ease. Finally she reached the last name on the list. “Worthington. Matthew Worthington.” She looked up. “Matthew Worthington?”

A pale hand rose from a back corner of the room. “Just Matt,” came the reed-thin voice.

Katarina slanted a few degrees to get a better view. She slanted a few more. “Just Matt” was maybe all of sixteen. The spray of pimples across his forehead confirmed that his adolescent hormones were making their presence felt. Unfortunately pimples weren’t the problem. His age was, at least as far as the rules were concerned.

Katarina worried her bottom lip before saying something to that effect.

“I know that…ah…this class is supposed to be for adults,” he said as if sensing her ambivalence. His voice cracked as painfully as chalk on the blackboard, and he halted in midstream, visibly gulping for air. “I thought that, though…you know…that maybe you might make an exception since what I want to do is…ah…maybe find out about saving for college? You know?”

“I do know,” Katarina said. “I went to college on a scholarship and worked jobs the whole time.” Zemanova women did not shrink from responsibilities or “Cry in their mlieko” as Babička was want to say.

“So, far be it from me to discourage your desire. Still, given the structure of the Adult School and the fact that you probably already have homework from earlier today, wouldn’t it be better if your mother or father attends the class instead?”

“That might be kind of hard. My mom’s dead.”

Katarina felt a little piece of her heart crack off. She rested her palm on the desk and gripped the corner hard with her fingers. “I’m so sorry,” she said, feeling inadequate with her clichéd response, even if the sentiment was genuine. “Not only for your loss but the fact that you’ll shouldering more responsibility than most young people your age.” She paused, groping for a solution.

“What about your father? Would that be possible?” she asked.

The boy cleared his throat, his Adam’s apple bobbing painfully. “It’s not like we talk all that much.”

The door opened behind her, but Katarina didn’t turn around. She was trying to stay focused on the teenager. “I know how parents can be busy, especially single parents. Still…” She waited, trying to coax a reply.

Matt tucked his chin into his concave chest. The writing on his T-Shirt, Pirates Are Way Cooler Than Ninjas, cupped his jawbone like a cotton nest. She saw his lips move, but couldn’t hear his words. “What’s that? I didn’t quite get what you said.”

“What he said was that he doesn’t like to bother me, which may explain why he failed to let me know where he went this evening.” The voice, a deep baritone, came from behind.

Katarina watched as all the students shifted their eyes, and collectively held their breath. And for a fraction of a second, given the mean age of her students, she had this crazy hope that the Adult School kept a defibrillator on the premises. She glanced down at her watch. Not even fifteen minutes into her first class and already she was facing a crisis.

“Mr. Worthington, I presume?” she said, giving a pretty good imitation of an offended schoolteacher. She slowly turned around while heartily congratulating herself on being a better actress than she would have imag—

Holy mother of…

The darkness of night hadn’t done justice to the way his shoulders filled out the jacket. Nor had it allowed an onlooker to see how the angles of his face came together in a combination that wasn’t so much handsome as arresting. And now, without the helmet, Katarina could see how his inky-black hair tumbled over his brow and curled around the collar of his leather jacket. Lines fanned out from his dark green eyes, lines that didn’t seem to go with anything remotely resembling smiling. The grim line of his full lips and the determined set of his jaw confirmed that judgment.

Forget offended. Before her stood a smoldering Brontë hero. Heathcliff or Mr. Rochester. No, definitely Heathcliff.

“Actually it’s Mr. Brown,” he said, but he didn’t bother to shift his gaze from the back of the room.

Katarina pushed away from the desk, wincing with the sudden pressure on her bad leg. “Sorry. Mr. Brown. I just assumed that you and Matt had the same last name. My mistake.” She held out her hand. “I’m Katarina Zemanova, the teacher for this class, and even though these may not be the best of circumstances, I am delighted to welcome you here.” She might not feel brave inside, but Katarina could at least make a good show of it on the surface.

The man glanced down at her hand as if not quite sure what to make of her gesture. There certainly was no immediate reply, and just when she thought she would have to rescind her invitation, he abruptly thrust out a hand.

The brief contact should have passed without fanfare, except for the annoying little voice in her head that kept pointing out how big his hand was, and how the pads of his fingers were rough with calluses. How his skin was cold to the touch but somehow warm, very warm within. Maybe, just maybe, that little voice had read too many of her grandmother’s romances?

Katarina ended the handshake after one firm up-and-down motion; then she reflexively tried to wipe away a lingering tingling sensation. “Won’t you have a seat then?” she offered.

He stood still and silent.

It was like pulling teeth. “I know how anxious you must have been, but now that you’ve found your son, you can relax.”

“There’s no relaxing when you have a teenager,” Rufus said from his seat in the front. That raised a nervous twitter from several students.

Katarina looked around the classroom. All eyes were on her to do something. Except two green ones that stayed focused on Matt. The cords in his neck strained like the stretched lines on a skiff heeling hard against the wind. His nostrils narrowed as he breathed in deeply.

Katarina rubbed the side of her nose. She could do this. What was dealing with a little father/son strife when she’d faced down a bullet? She could do this, right? Right?

“Perhaps I could be of service?” Carl said, starting to rise. “I’m the father of two grown sons.”

Katarina cleared her throat.

“Thank you, but that won’t be necessary, Carl,” she said, smiling, buying a few moments as she figured out what she was going to do. “You see, ah…I was thinking that rather than hold up the class any further, perhaps it would be better if I…ah…if I chatted with Mr. Brown and Matt at the break? Yes, the break. That way, we could get on with the lesson and not hold everyone up.” She glanced around the classroom, looking for a response.

There arose an audible sigh of agreement, as well as the buzz from someone’s hearing aid. Marginally more confident, she turned back to the new arrival. “So, Mr. Brown, if you’d just take a seat…” She pointed to a chair next to his son in the back. And was greeted by an even larger frown…

THE TEACHER COULD HAVE been indicating the path of Halley’s comet for all Ben was aware because the plain truth was that he wasn’t listening. All his attention, all the mounting stress that had constricted his airway and frazzled his nerves to the point he couldn’t even feel the tips of his fingers, had been focused on finding Matt—his son.

His son. He still couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact that he had a son. If someone had ever suggested that he’d be one of those men who nervously patrolled the sidelines of their child’s soccer game or attended piano recitals, listening proudly to halting renditions of “Für Elise,” he would have scoffed, poured two fingers of the finest single malt scotch and gone on about his business of making money for him and a bunch of people who already had too much money for their own good.

Well, scoff away. He had become one. A father. An instant father to be exact. And no matter what critical words had been said about George Benjamin Brown—and there were maybe too many—he had never been accused of shirking his responsibilities. Even when it came to something as uncomfortable as fatherhood.

Ben narrowed his eyes and reassured himself that the skinny kid slumped over in a chair in the back of the classroom was indeed his son, Matt, and not some imposter. Then he let go a giant breath of air he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. Was it always going to be like this? The anxiety? It was one thing to mentor up-and-coming young bucks in the workplace. If they performed well, he recommended them for a fat bonus. If they fell flat on their faces, he had had no qualms about giving them the heave-ho. Either way, it wasn’t personal.

But with parenting, everything was personal. He couldn’t fire his kid because he skipped out at night without asking permission or leaving a note, nor could he promote him if he made his bed two days in a row. As someone who had never known his own father, the underlying assumption that there existed an unwavering bond of love between a father and a son was an alien concept to him. Would he ever feel it? Even more scary, given his own emotional development, would he mess up his son forever? It was this fear that kept him up at night and kept him from reaching out to get closer. So why he had panicked when Matt had failed to show up?

As an afterthought, Ben glanced over at the teacher who was moving her lips and pointing her finger, giving every sign of talking to him. For the first time, he looked at her, really looked at her. It allowed him to notice the way her mouth formed a small circle while her cupid’s-bow upper lip puckered as she was waiting. Waiting for him to say something.

And that’s when it dawned on him that she was the one. Not the one, but the same woman he had met earlier. The one with the flyaway umbrella and pint-size grandmother and that unexpectedly mesmerizing combination of vulnerability and determination. Though the elements had assaulted her, she had stood resolute.

Tearing his gaze away from her delectable mouth and dove-gray eyes, he tried to focus on her outstretched arm. The gesture to “Sit down” was clear as daylight, and it was one he had seen all too often from his own frustrated teachers.

Ben hesitated. All he wanted to do was collect Matt, find a quiet corner and lay into the kid for scaring him half to death.

“So, Mr. Brown, if you’d just take a seat,” he heard her say.

Ben cleared his throat. “Listen, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt your class. I was just looking for Matt.”

“Well, now that you’ve found him, why don’t you sit next to him? As you can see, we certainly have room for one more.”

He backpedaled. “Taking a class wasn’t really what I had in mind when I headed out tonight.”

“Yes, but you’ll never know if it’s a good idea unless you try, correct? Anyway, just think of the motto printed in the front of the course booklet, something along the lines of education doesn’t end with graduation.” She scanned the class as if looking for confirmation.

“‘Education: the Wellspring of Life,’” Carl said. He opened his copy and showed the class how he’d highlighted that declaration in Day-Glo yellow. He turned back at Katarina and beamed. “And that goes double when the teacher’s a pretty gal like you.”

“You’re not supposed to say things like that anymore,” Wanda chastised. “Though I suppose in this postfeminist era of Camille Paglia, chauvinistic statements are now considered meta-statements of female sexuality.”

That had everyone stumped.

Spare me, Ben growled inwardly. Now he was prepared to say, “Thanks for the offer, but tonight is really not the night,” when he noticed the way the teacher’s auburn hair framed her face like a maelstrom of fiery locks….

Maybe the confrontation with Matt could wait, at least until the first break in the class? Then, after offering his apologies, they’d be outta there, at which point he’d attach a chain so strong to the kid, nothing short of heavy-duty bolt cutters could set him free.

That settled, he made his way to the back of the room. Not without considerable difficulty, he scrunched his oversize body into the desk next to Matt.

“Hey, what do you mean taking off without a word to anyone?” he whispered to Matt. “I was worried sick.”

Matt chewed on his lips. The top one was already worked raw. He stuck out his pointy chin, making more conspicuous the few wispy whiskers that protruded at haphazard angles. “How was I to know you’d be worried?” he said. “Anyway, it’s not like I haven’t been looking after myself for a long time already.”

Ben didn’t know anything about fatherhood, but he knew enough from his own rough growing up that bravado was a handy mechanism for hiding fear. Matt had already had to live with more fear than most adults ever encountered in their lifetimes. With no close relatives to turn to, Ben had learned from the lawyer in Colorado that Matt had been left alone to witness his mother’s painful decline.

“Well, now there’s someone around to look after you,” he told him as matter-of-factly as he could.

Matt scowled at him as if he were the spawn of Satan. Clearly, the gesture hadn’t had the desired effect. “You don’t need to. Anyway, you should be relieved. All I wanted to do was take an adult school class. It’s not like I was doing drugs or going to some sex orgy.”

“What do you know about sex orgies?” The boy was being sarcastic, wasn’t he? “I mean, what do you know about sex orgies?”

Matt rolled his eyes. “Do you really want to know?”

Ben held up his hand. “Okay, not really, at least not right now. We’ll leave that discussion for another night. But for now, you’ve got to understand, I was sick with worry. If I hadn’t gotten hold of your friend…what’s his name, Victor…Vincent…whatever…I never would have known you’d enrolled in some night school class.”

“It’s Verjesh, not Victor. Can’t even get my one friend’s name straight?”

“I’m not good with names. So sue me.” Ben scanned the class. “What is this course anyway? By the look of the average age, I’d say it was something to do with the virtues of bran and regular exercise.”

“Do you always have to be so sarcastic? You know, there are some people who try to find out what’s going on before they pass judgment.”

“Are you saying I’m judg—”

The teacher’s voice floated above the clanking of the heating pipes. “Iris Phox, the director of the Adult School, had located a guest lecturer for us tonight.”

Ben tried to count to ten to rein in his temper. He made it as far as six. “—that I’m judgmental? Okay, maybe I am, but you’ve got to admit—”

“If anyone can sniff out a speaker, it’s Iris.” Wanda’s strident voice came out loud and clear.

The class chuckled.

“—that if you’d just stop to eval—” Ben stopped midrant.

“Yes, well…he’s a former leading light in the investment community, but now something of a recluse here in…”

Ben quickly glanced over at Matt. “Wait a minute. What is this class?”

“Shush, Ben, would you?” Matt said with a frown. “I’m trying to listen.”

“Unfortunately I never heard back from the speaker, and it doesn’t look as if he’s going to show…” The teacher’s voice dropped off.

Ben leaned across the aisle. “Just tell me. What’s the subject?” He raised an apologetic hand when another student swiveled around to stare at him.

Matt kept his eyes focused on the front of the room. “Finance. Personal finance.”

“Holy—” Ben bit back the expletive. This time he got two annoyed stare downs.

“You were the one who was supposed to come talk, weren’t you?” Matt did the eye-roll thing again, big-time. Then he shook his head in disgust.

CHAPTER FOUR

“YOU FORGOT, DIDN’T YOU?” Matt accused. “Why am I not surprised?” He turned his head away. “Some dad you turned out to be. You forgot about my mom. You forgot about m—” He bit back the final word.

The boy turned back, his scowl evident. “So what are you going to do about it?”

Ben stared. “Did you just refer to me as your dad?”

Matt straightened and faced forward. “Don’t take it personally. It’s just a figure of speech. And don’t change the subject.”

Matt had resolutely insisted on calling Ben by his first name since they’d met a month and a half ago, and Ben hadn’t tried to dissuade the boy otherwise. He figured Matt would come around and accept the relationship. Ben was still waiting.

The teacher’s voice rose higher. “Could everyone pass these around?”

Ben glimpsed up to see papers making their way back. He ignored them and bent toward Matt. “Listen, like I told you before, for whatever reasons, your mother didn’t tell me about you.”

“Maybe because you never stuck around to find out.” Matt took the assignment from the student in front of him. “Here. Have some homework.” He thrust the extras at Ben who got an additional stack from some crazy-looking woman with punk hair.

Flummoxed, Ben dropped the handouts in a rough pile on the desk. A few drifted to the floor. “Listen, we really need to talk and—”

“Mr. Brown, is there some problem?” the teacher called out from the front of the classroom.

Matt hung his head in his hands and groaned.

Ben he looked up. The teacher was frowning. “No problem,” he lied. Everybody’s a critic, he mumbled under his breath.

He angled his shoulder under the desk and stretched his arm awkwardly, managing to snag the last paper. Then he went to straighten up. And promptly clipped his head on the corner of the desk. “Holy—”

Only visions of Matt dissolving with shame kept him from finishing his thought. He gingerly straightened up, clutching the back of his head with one hand and holding the papers in the other. He looked around.

Everyone’s attention was again locked on him.

“No damage done,” he assured them, ignoring the lump forming on the back of his head.

“If you’re sure?” the teacher said. She turned sideways, and Ben saw her cover her mouth to hide her laughter.

He lowered his head and died a thousand deaths. This must be what Matt’s every waking hour is like, he thought.

The teacher spent the next thirty minutes or so talking, and Ben, who was still pondering the unfairness of fate, vaguely heard terms like pension, 401K and IRA defined and discussed. And somewhere in the mix she seemed to have mentioned something about homework until finally, miraculously, a buzzer sounded. There was a remote chance he’d survive this moment after all.

Ben looked across the aisle and found the kid’s seat empty. He checked the room. Matt had found refuge in a corner and was furiously texting, moving his fingers across the keypad with lightning speed.

Ben sighed and unfolded his legs from under the desk. “Get me out of here,” he said to no one in particular.

Rufus swiveled around from his front row seat. “Don’t worry. In four or five years he’ll actually become human again.”

The woman with the spiked hair thrust a small flat packet in his direction. Her large hoop earrings looked like they had razor-sharp points at critical junctures. “Here, crack this. It’ll help,” she said.

Ben stared at the thin plastic-covered square. “Microwave popcorn?” he asked, confused.

“God, you’re helpless. It’s a cold pack that activates when you crack it. Put it on your head where you hit it. Otherwise I can guarantee you’re going to have a nasty bump. I always carry one in my bag on account of tennis. You never know.” She tapped the oversize canvas tote.

Ben could have sworn it moved, but maybe he’d been hit on the head one too many times tonight. “Thank you, but I’m fine, really,” he said.

She patted his hand, something he couldn’t remember happening in quite some time, if ever. “No, you’re not.” One more pat, then she marched back up the aisle.

Ben closed his eyes and shook his head. He heard more footsteps coming his way. What now? he wondered. More unsolicited advice from the soft food crowd?

Reluctantly he opened his eyes. And saw the teacher. She appeared all radiant and dewy, though perhaps a more accurate appraisal was semidried out.

She stopped a few paces in front of him. “Mr. Brown.”

“Ms…ah…I’m afraid I didn’t catch the name.”

“Zemanova.”

“Zemanova.” Saying her name produced a vibration on his tongue that was mildly exhilarating. Maybe he did need that ice pack after all?

She tucked a lock of her wild red hair behind her ear. The lobe was pearly pink, the rounded edge as delicate as fine china.

Ben told himself to breathe.

“Mr. Brown,” she repeated, “I wanted to talk to you. Maybe we could have a seat?”

Ben groaned inwardly.

She motioned to the empty desks.

“I’m…ah…” He caved. “After you,” he said, wondering as he lowered himself sideways if Hunt knew the name of a good chiropractor. “Actually I wanted to talk to you, too. I think there’s been a misunderstanding.” He sat facing her, at right angles to the desk. He let his legs hang out in the aisle.

She scooted back in her seat. “At the risk of possibly offending you, which, believe me, is totally not my purpose, I think the misunderstanding may actually be between you and your son.” She pursed her lips.

“Listen, I’m sorry if we were disturbing the class, but you might say our relationship—” Ben nodded toward Matt who had yet to lift his head from his phone “—is a work in progress.”

She took a deep breath. It made her chest rise.

Ben tried to pretend he didn’t notice. He focused on her slender neck instead. There was a hollow indentation at the base between her collarbone. It looked like a shallow porcelain bowl.

“I wouldn’t call a steady stream of barely contained bickering progress,” she said.

He stopped looking at that mesmerizing depression. He was suddenly tired. He had been on an emotional roller coaster, and why was it that strangers felt compelled to point out how incompetent he was when he was perfectly capable of making that same judgment himself? “Ms. uh, Ms. Zemenitch,”

“Zemanova.”

“Ms. Zemanova. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but has anyone ever told you that you’ve got some nerve?”

“Actually, I don’t have any nerve. Not anymore at least. But then that’s my problem, not yours.”

It wasn’t the response Ben had expected, but, frankly, he was more focused on his own problems than trying to dissect someone else’s. “And before you launch into a lecture on proper parenting, I want you to know that I’m kind of new to this whole father thing,” he explained. “Not that I’m making excuses, mind you, but the truth of the matter is, Matt just came to live with me less than a month ago, and before that, I didn’t even know he existed.”

She frowned at the news. “I see,” she said, sounding schoolmarmish. “Well, far be it from me to lecture anyone on parenting skills, seeing as I don’t have any kids myself.” After glancing down at her watch, she looked up, the strain visible in her eyes. “It must be very difficult for both you and him. I can only imagine how hurt and abandoned he must feel, but he’s lucky he has you to turn to now.”

Ben breathed in deeply and swallowed. “I’m not sure he’d agree with that statement.”

“No teenager agrees with what an adult says.”

“I thought you said you weren’t the expert?”

“I’m not, but I remember shouting horrible things to my mother when she wouldn’t let me dye my hair blue.”

“You wanted to dye your hair blue?”

“Well, blue was the school color, and I wanted to show my rah-rah spirit. Anyway Mother said she could understand someone wanting to dye their hair, however she thought the whole blue rah-rah thing was and I quote, ‘an Orwellian sign of mindless conformity to flaunt institutional colors.’”

Ben stared at her. There were mothers in this world who said things like that? Perhaps foster care hadn’t been such a bad option after all. He cleared his throat, contemplating just how different their worlds had been…

OH, MY GOD, HE’S sitting there looking at me like I’m some kind of lunatic! Katarina thought. The seconds ticked by. It took all her willpower not to check the time again.

Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all, her bid to assert herself and do a good deed. But there had been something about the sullen unhappiness of the boy that had struck a personal chord. She silently studied the man seated opposite her. His eyes were deep set, and with his high cheekbones his appearance was mysterious, foreign and unbelievably sexy.

She gulped. “Listen, I know that you must think I’m a complete idiot.” She splayed her hand over her collarbone and felt the rapid pulsing of a vein.

He lifted his gaze from her hand to her face. “Actually, I was trying to imagine what it would be like to have a mother who used words like Orwellian.”

Katarina detected a smile. At least one corner of his mouth was turned up, which in common parlance seemed to indicate the act of smiling. And his voice had a certain lilt that had been absent before, a sign that seemed to elicit a small flutter from the base of her sternum.

“It was different, I can tell you,” she said, waving her hand to dismiss further discussion on that subject. “Anyway, my mother and I are besides the point.”

He raised his chin and stared down at her through sooty black lashes.

No man deserved to have those.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Well, I suppose it’s always about our mothers on some level, but let’s not go there. Let’s get to fathers, and not in the abstract.” She gripped the edge of the desk and chose her words carefully. “As a teacher, what matters to me most right now is the proper functioning of this class, and that proper functioning seems to have gotten tied up with the relationship between you and your son. Listen, I know Matt is worried about funding his college education, and that’s why I’m encouraging you to take this class along with him. I mean, technically, he’s too young to be in the class, but with you involved, I think we can bend the rules a bit. Besides, working together on this project—” she tapped her index finger up and down on the sheaf of papers she held “—might be a great opportunity to bond, not to mention solve the college tuition problem.”

She looked over at Ben’s desk and saw that except for the motorcycle helmet, he didn’t have anything else at the ready. “Perhaps you didn’t get one for yourself?” She peeled off the top sheet and handed it over.

He skimmed the assignment. “An investment simulation game?”

She nodded, clasping her hands atop the pile in front of her. “That’s right. You see, everyone in the class will set up a mini portfolio, and together we’ll all chart our progress. Naturally, I’ll explain strategies for picking stocks and other investments, as well as the elements of buying and selling.”

She saw him consider the document carefully. Perhaps the assignment seemed all a bit too overwhelming for him? “Don’t be worried. It’s not as complicated as it seems.”

“That’s what you think,” he replied.

Katarina opened her hands and begged, or at least beseeched. “I’m not saying you have to perform like our no-show guest lecturer. Besides, the idea is to work in groups, so you won’t be in this alone. You’ll have a partner. Naturally, I was thinking you and Matt could work together, and that way you could bounce ideas off each other, spend time working things out.”

“That’s if we don’t kill each other first.”

“Well, there is that possibility, I grant you.”

He smiled at her words.

Katarina felt her face go red. It was the curse of being a redhead. She looked sideways and fanned herself with the top few papers. “Hot in here, don’t you think?”

“There’s just one thing,” he said.

She returned his gaze in all earnestness. “I know, I know. You’re worried that you’re not signed up for the course. I can take care of that.”

“No, it’s not that. It’s more about…about…who I am.”

She dismissed his objection with a shake of her head. “I know, I mean, think I understand. It’s all new to you, this investing thing, and no doubt you’re concerned that you won’t look good in Matt’s eyes.”

At his startled expression, the answer suddenly became clear to her. “Wait, no, hear me out. How about I work with the two of you. After class even, if it’s all right with you?” She narrowed her eyes in a demonstration of earnest commitment. She even pumped her fist. “I really want to make this work, for the class, but mostly for Matt and you.”

And for me, a little voice inside her head added. I need to make something work for me. To be able to move forward and accomplish something instead of merely marking time.

He looked completely befuddled. “That’s very kind of you. But what I really wanted to talk about was the guest lecturer you mentioned. The one who didn’t show?”

“Please, can we forget about him? It wasn’t my idea anyway, something Iris dreamed up. Can you believe it?”

“Somehow I can.” He rubbed his forehead.

“Only Iris would ask some megamogul to speak at a night school class.” She watched his thick black curls tumble over his long fingers. Nice.

“About the speaker…I really think you should know—”

“The case is closed on the speaker.” She held up her hand to make a stop sign before glancing down at her watch. “Look, break’s almost over, Mr. Brown. So, what do you say? Will you do it?”

He hesitated, sizing her up and down twice.

Katarina felt as if he was measuring her mettle. She sat up straighter.

“You’re determined to help us out, even after class?” He looked at her askance, one eyebrow raised.

She nodded encouragingly. She would not go down without a fight. “It’ll be good for me, too. Promise.”

The buzzer sounded, signaling the end of break. She stood, wincing as she put weight on her leg. “Do we have a deal then, Mr. Brown?”

He carefully levered himself from the tight desk to an upright position.

Once more Katarina was struck by his size and strength.

“All right, Ms. Zemanova. I’ll do it. But only if you call me Ben.” He tilted his head and waited for a reply.

She breathed in slowly. You can do this, girl. No sweat. And then she held out her hand to secure the deal, all business, just like she used to do in her old life. “All right, Ben. And you must call me Katarina.”

He clasped his hand in hers. Firm, warm and masculine. “Katarina.” This time there was no mistake. “But one thing?”

“Yes?”

“You have to promise to protect me from my son.”

Katarina ended the handshake and clutched the papers to her chest. The real question, she realized, was who was going to protect her from the father?

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