Chapter 1

May all the angels and saints protect me.

Martha Ryan uttered the silent prayer, knowing she'd need every bit help she could get. Patience, please give me patience.

She needed lots of patience to deal with all the distractions she would have this afternoon. Not the least of which was the incoming storm the meteorologists had been warning about all day.

A snap of lightning and quick rumble of thunder encouraged her index finger to push the doorbell of the sprawling former bed-and-breakfast her ex-husband and his children called home.

Only a canine chorus greeted the chimes. She sighed in frustration and tightened her fingers around the handle of the cart that held her laptop and the briefcase that bulged with Phil's financial records. Too bad Phil's dogs couldn't open the door and let her in out of the rain. She wrapped her fingers more firmly around her cane she'd learned to use over the past year. Once again, she released the cart and rang the bell. Her index finger turned white on the chimes. She barely heard the ringing over the accompaniment of thunder, howls, and barks.

The door opened, unfortunately too late to keep Martha from being soaked by the rain. Not the gentle soft sprinkling of a summer shower, but buckets hurled by clouds born on the African coast and developed to raging maturity by the warm waters of the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico.

Phil's nine-year old, Shannon, opened the door. Two dogs pushed their way by her before she was able to stop them. A Pekinese, frantic with joy, bumped itself against Martha's ankles to get her attention. Before she could bend to pet it, or move inside, the Cocker Spaniel jumped up on Martha's knees determined to claim the first pat.

Twenty-five pounds of Cocker Spaniel and a wet, slick concrete walkway was too much for her damaged leg. Martha lost her balance and fell backward into the empty flower bed. Her cart landed with a thud on the pavement. Too late she remembered the warning: Never pray for patience, for then God will send things to teach you patience.

"Oh, geez." Phil's nine-year old Shannon grabbed the Cocker's collar. Lightning snapped, thunder crashed. The mutt that followed Shannon out of the house did its best to climb into her arms. The Cocker took advantage of the mutt fear to break loose from Shannon's grip and jump on Martha.

How Shannon managed to keep her footing with a mutt trying to find shelter from the storm in her arms Martha didn't know and didn't care. Mud squished under her back and she needed to fend off the Cocker standing on top of her joining the rain in washing her face.

"Pop! Hey, Pop! Come help!"

Please, the mother in Martha mentally added the admonition even though Shannon wasn't her daughter. She pushed away the Cocker and sat up.

"No, Joe," she told the lunging Cocker. "Sit." At Martha's command, the cocker sat, his feathery tail swept the dirty sidewalk. The soaked Pekinese yipped her welcome, too.

Through the open door, taking all the time in the world because it obviously revolved around his needs, strolled Phil Russell, his four year-old son tucked under one arm like a football. Barefooted, he squished into the flower bed to stand next to her. He shifted his son to balance him on his hip. The toddler wrapped himself around his daddy.

Phil lifted his own face to the rain. "Watch, Jerry, I can catch the rain in my mouth. Want to drink rainwater?"

Want to watch me smack you upside the head? Martha thought from her seat in the mud, not that she'd do something like that in front of Phil's children. Smartest thing she ever did was divorce this immature grown-up. Stupidest thing she ever did was trust another man after Phil demonstrated most men weren't worthy of trust in the first place. The smartest thing her thieving, double-crossing, abusive second husband ever did was die before she could kill him. She blamed him for the entire mess that had her sitting in the mud and the rain with Phil standing too near her and her under-utilized hormones.

At the flash of lightning and thunderclap, Phil's youngest son flinched and hid his face against Phil's shirt.

"Oops, probably not a good idea." The dimples Jerry inherited from Phil deepened as he sucked frantically on his thumb. Phil's hand uselessly flicked rain from the child's blond hair. "It's okay, Jerry. As soon as Martha and the dogs get through playing in the mud, we'll go in the house."

Playing? The man regarded everything as playing. One of the reasons, Martha didn't want to handle his financial portfolio. Unfortunately for her, the stinking good-little-girl habit was so ingrained into her psyche she automatically said, "Yes, sir" when handed the assignment by Phil's brother.

"I have three million reasons why I'm working for your brother and your dad. You are not one of them," Martha muttered under her breath and the rumble of thunder.

She'd lost more than a failing marriage in the car accident last year that crippled her and killed her second husband. He had to have stashed that money somewhere when he gutted the assets of the company she'd purchased from her father. She just needed to figured where and how to get it back.

Grateful as she was for Phil's brother's and father's help, she did not owe them her personal life. Ten years ago were other issues in the divorce besides the public problems.

"You're really a mess," Phil informed her with an irrepressible grin that Martha refused to acknowledge. "You look like the Accountant That Came in from the Mud."

"I am an accountant. Now, help me up." Her pale gray formerly pristine suit now bore decorations of dog hair and paw prints. She pushed a wet scraggly strand of hair from her face, mentally noting she needed a new highlighting.

Her bedraggled appearance didn't quench the familiar blaze showing in his blue-green eyes. Those eyes that had mesmerized her almost half her life. Traitorous, long dormant hormones sent heat rippling through her body and added to Martha's growing irritation. Her nails dug into her palm at the amusement lifting his sandy-brown eyebrows and deepening the laugh creases surrounding his smiling mouth. She was not going to cave into his smile this time or accept the invitation in those provocative sea green eyes. She firmly reminded herself that just because she'd been stupid enough to fall in love with this idiot when she was seventeen, didn't mean that at thirty-seven she had to let him rip out her heart again.

She was here in a strictly professional capacity, and their meeting was going to stay strictly professional. Period. Neither her personal animosity nor her inappropriate attraction to Phil would interfere with her professional acumen.

"Shannon, get in the house, Toots. Take the dogs with you."

"Oh, yeah, Pop, like Cleo's gonna let me leave her out here." If the mutt had arms, it would have itself tied around Shannon as tightly as Jerry clung to Phil. "Joe, Star. In."

Shannon picked up the handle to Martha's cart and towed it to the open doorway while calling, "Joe, Star. In."

The Cocker headed to the open door, but the Pekinese stayed to continue to yip at Martha.

"Star, in," Martha commanded. Reluctantly, the Peke made its way into the house.

Phil offered a hand to help Martha out of the mud. Below his blue jean shorts, rain slithered through the soft hair on his legs. His calves and thighs, taut with the results of his frequent twenty mile bicycle rides, tightened when Phil shifted to pull Martha upright with one firm tug.

"Thank you," Martha said. She released his hand and, reluctantly, let go of the warmth, the strength.

In the year since the accident, she'd progressed to a cane she'd use the rest of her life. She had to do it herself, to trust herself to be strong. Anchoring her cane as firmly as she could in the wet ground, she stepped once, only to have her leg collapse under her.

Phil reached an arm around her waist to steady her before she landed in the muck again. "I've got you," he said quietly. Thunder still rumbled overhead. His warm body shielded her against the wind-blown rain.

For a brief moment she was reminded of summer warmth, and the rain became sea spray across her face. For an instant she was twenty again, standing by the ocean with her best friend's sexy boyfriend while her friend caught the last wave of the day. Giddy, light-headed, brimming with the easy joy of self-confidence, knowing the world had limitless possibilities.

But possibilities meant making choices. She had made hers. Some had been made for her.

She had to remain grounded and not float away just because he had his arm around her. She was no longer twenty and this was not her friend's young sexy boyfriend. That image belonged to the past every bit as much as the memory of the sweet boy Phil had been back then.

"Trust me," Phil said, his arm snug around her waist.

Trust him? Martha trusted Phil once upon a time. She ended up divorced. And ultimately alone.

Firmly Martha planted her cane on the walkway.

"Thank you for your help." She shrugged away his supporting arm. Unhampered by Jerry's barnacle grip on him, Phil stayed close to Martha. They stumbled through the rain and mud into the foyer of the house.

"Gosh, I'm glad to see you." Her dog pressed against her, Shannon kissed Martha's cheek in greeting.

"I'm glad to see you again, too. You, too, Jerry."

Phil set his baby on the floor. Jerry kept himself wrapped around Phil's knee. Martha bent down and Jerry lifted his round baby cheek for her kiss. His thumb still firmly planted in his mouth.

"What about me?" Phil leaned over and Martha stepped back.

"You have managed to ruin my entire day. You could have come to the office. The sooner we get your portfolio straightened out, the better. And then I'm gone."

"Didn't Tessie tell you I was waiting on Jake?"

"No, she didn't." Martha overrode the flash of pain and concentrated on her aggravating secretary's bad habit of telling Martha only what she thought Martha needed to know. Martha made a mental note not to get Tessie flowers on Secretary's Day, just chocolates, especially with Tessie on a continual, but frequently ignored, diet. As casually as she could, Martha asked, "Jake's coming home early?"

"Got home about half an hour ago. His camping trip closed early because they didn't want to worry about flash floods in the hills with this rain coming through."

The Peke put muddy paws on Martha's pants leg, begging for a head rub which Martha was happy to oblige.

"Shannon, run and get some towels, please," Phil said when the Cocker Spaniel gave yet another shimmy and splattered more mud droplets on them.

Shannon darted up the staircase that arched in a graceful dark golden oak curve from the creamy brown tile of the foyer, trailed by two dogs and leaving muddy sneaker prints behind her. Petting the Pekinese who was wiggling with joy she was there, Martha winced at the muck on the floor and the oak treads of the staircase. Phil shrugged sheepishly at Martha's unspoken disapproval.

"Shannon."

"What, Pop?" Shannon leaned over the railing half way to the top.

"Back down, Toots. Let's get the dogs cleaned before they destroy the upstairs worse than it already is. We'll use the shop towels in the mudroom."

Over the ruckus of thunder and Shannon and the dogs barreling back down the stairs, Martha said, "Phil, we need to discuss ... "

"Later," he interrupted. With Jerry still attached to his leg, he grabbed the Cocker's collar and headed deeper into the house, followed by Shannon and her mutt, Cleo.

"Star, come." Shannon added a whistle to her call.

"Go, Star," Martha encouraged the reluctant Pekinese to obey Shannon.

Knowing Phil's one-track mind and lack of interest in organizing his financial records, Martha decided she might as well try to clean some of the muck off herself in the lavatory.

She left the cart with her laptop and briefcase where Shannon had parked it in the foyer. Next to her cart, a silk flower arrangement and framed photos on the delicate cherry wood table were shoved aside in favor of piles of mail, school pack, and toys. Gently she ran her finger over a photo of a buoyant Phil sprawled on the grass, his three laughing children piled around and on top of him. Once more Martha forced herself to ignore the sobbing in the back of her mind. Even after five years, she still missed her son all day, every day.

In the bathroom near the entry hall, Martha cleaned away what mud she could using the sliver of soap left after Phil and Jerry used the bar soap to finger-paint letters and pictures across the mirror.

Jerry's pictures and backwards letters broke her heart. All she saw was the memory of her own son's pictures. It hurt to have lost so many years.

Martha took a deep resigned breath. Like the physical pain left from the accident the emotional pain also had to be endured.

After drying her hands, she used the towel to wipe off the mirror. Automatically, she hung the towel so Mickey no longer smooched Minnie at a drunken angle.

Then she repaired her make-up to hide the scar on her face. She'd learned to do her cosmetics without looking at the remains of the jagged rip from the top of her cheekbone to the corner of her mouth. Now that the necessary surgeries were finished, she'd schedule the single cosmetic surgery to minimize the appearance of facial damage. The rest of the scars she'd continue to hide under her clothes.

Limping in bare feet and leaning on her cane, she retrieved her cart and slowly followed the muddy foot and paw prints past the music room where a gleaming black grand piano reigned. A cello and half a dozen guitars kept it mute company. A block building climbed almost to the bottom of the piano. A stuffed monkey clung to a music stand. All the way to the kitchen, Martha used her cane to clear the obstacle course of toys, clothes, magazines and dishes from her path.

She stopped at the sight in the kitchen. Dishes, modeling clay, the trimmings from magazine ad photos, construction paper, multicolored markers, glue, and glitter covered the large oak table and the floor beneath it. Dozens of small, metal vehicles created several traffic jams around building blocks and stuffed toys. Cereal boxes and bowls still containing milk dredges were shoved aside at the breakfast bar to make room for a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, an open bag of snack chips, a box of cookies and sodas. Somewhere under that mountain of dishes there must be a sink. She made a mental note to speak to Phil about hiring a full-time housekeeper instead of a once-a-week service.

Martha was not going to clean this mess. She'd always been the one to clean up after Phil and his friends' late night music sessions. He couldn't even be counted on to recap the peanut butter. She pulled the knife from the jar, scraped it clean, and gave the lid a hard twist, cleared some of the art projects from a portion of the table and set her briefcase on it. She was here strictly to review Phil's quarterly statement and investments, not organize his life.

Through the pounding rain and rumbles of thunder, Martha heard Phil calming Jerry, commenting to Shannon. The dogs' howls echoing from the utility room between the kitchen and the four-car garage nearly overwhelmed Shannon's answering treble. Envy snaked through her. She so missed that closeness with her son.

Martha forced herself to stop thinking about his absence in her life and to stop stacking dishes in the dishwasher. She snatched a tablet and a pen from her briefcase. Boldly, she wrote a firm reminder to help Phil find a full time housekeeper. She emptied the milk from the breakfast bowls and ran some water over them to clean the remaining dried scum.

What was he doing? Martha scowled at the door to the utility room. She knew part of the reason she was here, in Phil's house, thanks to her devious secretary, was they were all matchmaking. Again. Forget the box of chocolates from her for Secretary's Day. Tessie would be lucky to get a bag of supermarket chocolates. A small bag.

Divorced from Phil, she would also have divorced Rick if he hadn't died first. Two-time loser in the marriage market did not make her bullish to try again. Even if a drug-free, sober, and slightly more mature, Phil was the most charming man in her circle of acquaintances. Not even if he still had the ability to make her blood sing with a look and a crooked smile. Nope, not Martha. She was old enough to ignore singing blood. Older and wiser. She was not going to get involved with Phil. She was no longer enchanted with a smile and dimples.

She was going to stay balanced this time. She could read a prospectus. But she couldn't read a man's heart. She could get into the market as it began a climb and, more importantly, judge when to get out to maximize profits for her clients and herself. But she couldn't judge when a man was using her heart to meet his own agenda.

No, Martha was not going to get involved with a man again, especially not Phil. She'd focus on her own strengths to rebuild her clientele and construct her portion of the business.

The telephone's ring startled Martha. She dropped a handful of newspapers, and realized she'd sorted most of them into stacks for the recycle center. She marked through 'help find' on her housekeeper memo and wrote 'GET.'

Who on earth would call in the middle of a thunderstorm? Martha grimaced when she heard Phil's voice boom through the mudroom's closed door when he answered the phone.

"Mo-ther, you promised," wailed Shannon from behind the mudroom door. "Mother, you said you'd come."

Phil jerked open the mudroom's connecting door and stalked into the kitchen. Grim lines etched his usually laughing face. He allowed the Pekinese into the kitchen. He grabbed the telephone receiver from the wall unit.

"Just wait," he said into the handset. He stomped back to the mudroom door with the phone cord stretched behind him. Despite the anger in his face, his voice was gentle when he pushed the mutt, the Cocker Spaniel, and Jerry back into the mudroom. "Jerry, stay with Shannon a minute. Shannon, hang up the phone, Toots."

Martha tugged at Phil's sleeve. "Call her back."

"Star, no," she told the bouncing Pekinese. "Sit, Star." The Peke sat, still obedient to her command.

"Listen, Denise," Phil hissed into the phone. He shook off Martha's hand and crossed the room to glare at the storm slamming leaves and rain against the window, phone cord stretched to its fullest length. "This appointment's been changed twice already for your convenience. Don't do this to Shannon again."

Lightning flashed outside, making Martha flinch at the idea of what would happen to Phil if lightning hit the house and came through the phone line.

"I don't give a-" Phil broke off the sentence and bit out, "I don't care what the Senator needs. Your daughter needs you here." His voice carried above the thunder.

Why the man came into the kitchen to talk privately to Shannon's mother was beyond Martha's comprehension. If Phil were alone in the forest and a tree fell on him, everyone in a fifty-mile range would hear the bellow.

And the automatic count Martha made between flash and thunder made her realize that the most intense part of the storm was getting closer.

"Phil, hang up." Martha had to get him off the phone. His children did not need their father zapped by lightning because he wouldn't shut up.

"Denise, are you going to be here next weekend? No, I do not need time for myself. Shannon needs you. You, Denise." Phil's fury rivaled the storm's.

"Phillip Jedidiah Russell, get off the phone before you get electrocuted!"

Her shriek rose above the thunder, the dogs' barks and howls, Shannon's angry sobs and mutters, and Jerry's calls of "Pop, Pop." Phil took a step away from Martha in amazement.

She caught a glimmer of amusement through the agitation in his eyes. He studied her as though he had never seen her before.
The amusement eased his temper. A sparkle came into his eyes.

A sparkle that annoyed her, especially the way that particular sparkle always sent sparks through her body. She did not want sparks from him that heated her blood at this stage of her life. She especially did not want to be grateful to him for igniting sparks in her. She didn't want her blood to heat. Definitely not when caused by Phil.

He spoke once more to his ex-wife. "Yeah, that was Martha. Really it was. Never heard her yell before either. She's here to go over the accounts. Look, she's right. I've got to get off. We're catching a feeder band from that tropical storm that's pounding Corpus Christi. But I promise," his voice grew cold, "we will discuss this later. I'll call. Soon."

In her anxiety to get Phil off the phone, Martha hadn't realized how close she stood to him. Not until he ran his fingers under her wet messy hair, pushing it behind her ear and resting his hand against her neck. His thumb lightly caressed her last facial scar. His smoothing fingers sent tendrils of warmth through her. Her blood soared.

She forcibly kept herself from leaning into his gentle strokes. She couldn't meet his eyes. She looked at the damp Pekinese leaning against her calf and prayed that same adoring, worshipping, enthralled look hadn't shown on her face when Phil touched her.

"You've never yelled at me before." A note of wonder crept under the amusement in his voice.

"Sorry. I was worried." Martha stepped slowly away from his fingers' enchantment. "It was rude of me."

"I've given you plenty of reason in the past, but this is the first time I've ever heard you raise your voice." Phil lightly rubbed his hand across her fingers.

Martha picked up the Pekinese with one hand and white-knuckled her cane with the other to keep from clasping Phil's hand.

"I've missed you," he said simply. "It scared me when you nearly died last year." He took a deep breath. "I'd like us to start over."

"We can't."

"Martha, I've changed. I'm not the same person I was when you divorced me. You know that."

Anger snaked through her. "Yes, you changed. But even if I can forgive what happened to us, I can't forgive what you and Karen did."

His eyes shuttered and looked away. "That was for the best."

"Not for me, Phil, not for me. I'm doing your financial planning because your father and brother asked me to. That's it. I'm not getting involved with you again."

She had to control her rage. Focus on something else. The lights flickered. His four-year-old son wailed. "Jerry's scared. And we still have to go over your accounts."

Phil scooped up the sobbing child who pulled open the door and hurtled through it, then braced Martha when the Cocker Spaniel broke free of Shannon to jump and slobber over Martha's ruined suit.

"No, Joe," Martha said firmly. She set down the Peke with an affectionate pat and pushed the spaniel into a sitting position. "Sit. Good dog, Joe."

"Go on," she said to Phil in the same no-nonsense tone she used to control the dogs, "take Jerry and get him calmed down so we can work on your accounts and I can get out of here."

"Got to take care of my girl first." Phil went to the other room with Jerry still shivering in his arms. "Shannon? Honey?"

Shannon lifted her angry, tear-streaked face from the mutt's shoulder. The mutt affectionately and sloppily washed her face. She began to towel the last of the raindrops from the dog's thick coat. Her voice hardened, but didn't quite disguise the gulp of tears. "I'm okay, Pop. Go get Jerry warmed up. I just need to finish Cleo and do a little more on Joe."

Martha closed her eyes at the pain of a nine-year-old who shouldn't sound that old. She got a firm grip on the spaniel's collar and followed Phil into the aptly named mudroom, shutting out the clean Pekinese.

Long, elegant fingers massaged a towel through the child's hair while Jerry burrowed his face into his father's shoulder. The lights flickered again, staying off a little longer than the previous times. Jerry whimpered and tightened his hold on Phil's neck. "Hush, Frog. I'll keep you safe. Shannon, sweetheart, I'll be with you."

"It doesn't matter, Pop." Shannon focused on mud caught between the mutt's toes.

"Shannon, talk to me," Phil pleaded.

Some things hurt too much to talk about. A lesson Martha knew well. Shannon needed quiet time to deal with her hurt in her own way. Martha cleared her throat and caught Phil's anguished eyes. Silently she tried to reassure him. Then Martha jerked her head to the door. "Why don't you go get Jerry some dry clothes like Shannon suggested. I'll help her finish the dogs."

With a last look at Shannon's determined, downcast face, Phil started from the mudroom. At the door he turned and regarded Martha's legs, her slacks coated with mud and dog hair. "Looks like you could use some dry clothes, too. How about some running shorts and a tee shirt for now? My stuff will be loose on you, but at least it'll be dry."

Martha shuddered at the thought wearing shorts. Show that twisted muscle, those scars? "Shorts? No, thank you. I don't wear shorts." She managed to keep her voice crisp and even. "I'll be fine. I just need to discuss your account with you, then I'll be on my way."

Pecans and branches torn from one of the old trees by a wind gust banged and clattered against the window. They all flinched. Jerry and the dogs howled.

"By the looks of this, you won't be going anywhere for awhile. I'll find something for you to wear." With that, Phil and Jerry were through the door.

Lightning snapped and thunder rattled the windowpane. The lights flickered again. The dogs whined and whimpered. The brushes swished through their fur.
Martha rubbed her calf to ease the aching knot.

"Leg hurt?" Shannon's voice was quiet under the rain.

Martha concentrated on the last of the mud in Joe's plumed tail. "Yes. I've turned into a regular barometer, got a weather ache. I've finished with this fellow." She patted the dog, avoiding the Cocker's slurping tongue.

"I'm done, too." Shannon tossed the brush on the floor. The towel she'd used landed on top of the brush. The Cocker was through the door Shannon opened, but the mutt stayed pressed tightly against her.

Martha surveyed the towels and mud covering the floor. "Shannon, could you help me get up, please? Let's load these towels in the washer."

"Oh, sure." Shannon helped her regain her footing, then handed her towels. "Martha, does surgery hurt?"

"There's some pain afterward, but the medication helps. Are you worried about your grandma?" Phil's mother's recent breast cancer treatment was one of the reasons for his father's semi-retirement. Glad to be employed with Phil's older brother, Martha only wished there had been happier circumstances for going to work with Pete in Jerrold's absence.

"Kind of." Shannon hesitated. Her shoulders drooped and her lower lip protruded with a slight quiver. "I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow. Mother was supposed to come back to go with me."

Martha reached an arm around Shannon's thin shoulders and hugged her the way her own mother couldn't, the way she desperately missed being able to hug her son. "You're not scheduled for a booster shot at your age. It'll be just a simple check up for athletics. Your pop will be with you."

Shannon buried her face in Martha's shoulder while the mutt whined and the storm howled. The words came in a scared rush. "I found a lump in my chest. I didn't tell Pop 'cuz he'd worry."

Martha rubbed Shannon's back, feeling the sharp prepubescent bones. "Does your mother know?"

"Yes, but she thinks I'm making a big fuss over nothing," Shannon's voice was almost inaudible against Martha's shoulder. "I know what happened to Karen and Grandma."

Martha hugged Shannon closer. There was no other way she could help the almost ten-year old for whom the very real fear of cancer had replaced the monster under the bed. Despite her own animosity toward Karen for supporting Phil's selfish decision, Martha knew Jerry's mother couldn't love Phil's two older children more if she'd given birth to them. Her death nearly three years ago from ovarian cancer had devastated them. Now her grandmother's recent mastectomy and chemotherapy had Shannon all too frightened of some of life's grim realities.

"Shannon," Martha cupped her fingers under Shannon's chin and held it up to look into her eyes. "The odds are slim-to-none that you have cancer. It's probably nothing more than a cyst that can easily be taken care of."

"You think?" Phil's only daughter looked at her through his green-blue eyes. Eyes that should be laughing and happy not scared and hurt.

"Yes, I do. And I bet that's what the doctor will tell you when she examines you tomorrow."

"Will you come with me? I don't want Pop to see my bare chest when the doctor looks at it." Shannon wrapped her arms around herself where buds would blossom someday soon.

Martha mentally ran a quick survey of tomorrow's schedule. Nothing or no one who couldn't be postponed or handled by Pete. With a daughter of his own, Pete would understand why his niece needed a woman with her. If he didn't, her secretary would bluntly explain why.

"I'd be happy to. I'll call Tessie and get her to rearrange tomorrow's schedule." Maybe handling Phil's accounts wouldn't be such a hard job after all. Sooner - much sooner than Phil would be ready - his little girl would bloom into a beautiful woman. Martha was going to enjoy the sight from the sidelines, watching Phil go crazy when the boys began sniffing around his darling daughter. "I'll go with you, but I really think that your pop needs to know about this."

"I don't want him to worry."

"I think he'll be more upset if you don't tell him. Parents like to worry about their kids," Martha confided. "It makes them feel like they're still in charge."

Shannon gave a snort. "Pop? In charge? Are we asking Peter Pan to grow up?"

Martha eyed the child, knowing Shannon was parroting her mother. Martha knew Phil deserved his children's respect, despite how little she and Shannon's mother respected him. She set about doing damage control. "He's good at his job. That's responsible."

"Pop just likes to play his friends' songs and yak with people who call in. Deejaying's a play job, not a real one."

Martha could just bet that was another direct quote from Shannon's mother. "The best job is one that you enjoy so much it feels like play time all the time. He also wants the best for you children. I really do think he needs to know about this lump. Would you like me to tell him?"

"Well," Shannon was quiet a moment, "okay, but tell him that I want you in the doctor's office with me. Not him."
"He'll understand." Shannon dropped the last towel into the washer while Martha set the washer controls. "There. When the storm passes, just pull the knob to start the washer."

Shannon giggled while they quickly washed their hands to the accompaniment of pounding rain and thunder grumbles. "We couldn't find Jerry's blankie earlier in the week. The cleaning service left it in the load in the washer and told Pop that he needed to put the load in the dryer. He forgot. We were under the beds, moving the couches, going through all the cabinets and closets, looking for blankie."

"When did he finally remember the blankie was in the washer?" Martha opened the door just as the flickering power finally went off completely. Her dog still beside her, Shannon tucked her hand securely into Martha's.

"He didn't," Phil said.

Martha's heart lightened at Phil's rueful chuckle. She'd never been able to resist Phil's ability to laugh at himself.

"The kids are searching for a nursing home for me. They claim Alzheimer's is setting in the closer I get to forty. I was still trying to get Jerry to go to sleep without it and Shannon was setting out her clothes to wear in the morning and couldn't find her favorite tee shirt, and discovered the load wasn't dry. Voila! Blankie."

A flashlight beam shone through the darkness. Wearing his pop's Harley helmet and leather jacket, Jerry rode Phil's shoulders, blankie wrapped around his shoulders like a super hero cape.

Footsteps pounded down the back staircase into the kitchen. By the flashlight's beam, Martha could see Phil's oldest clone, all legs and arms, still gawky from a spurt of teen-age growth. She hastily stepped away to avoid being bowled over.

"Pop, hey, Pop?" he yelled. "The power's off."