Page 83 of Valley of Dreams

“Pa-ick.”

He met Eliza’s eye. “She’s getting closer.”

Lydia repositioned herself so she leaned a little against Patrick’s leg while she played with her doll and handkerchief.

He looked at Eliza. “Tell me about your day.”

“Joseph received another telegram from the stage company.” She released a tight breath. “They rejected our proposal to move the inn ten miles south so it could be a first-day stopping point.”

“Ten miles?” Patrick whistled low. “That’s a good pace away from town.”

“The stage company says it’s too far to go the first day, but too soon to stop on the second. But if we build even farther away from Hope Springs as they suggest, the mercantile and Dr. Jones would have to withdraw from the project.”

“Did Joseph have any ideas for how to proceed?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know what to do,” she whispered. “The inn is feeling more and more impossible.”

He brushed his hand over Lydia’s hair as naturally as if he’d been doing it all her life. The O’Connor women had said he’d always had a way with children, a statement that was proving comfortingly true.

“I wish I had some grand solution,” he said.

“I do feel a little better just having talked to you about it. And knowing you’ll be trying to think of an answer helps me feel less alone.”

Was he blushing under those whiskers? She liked that, even being as grumpy and stand-offish as he could be, he was still tenderhearted enough to color up at a compliment.

Lydia looked up at him, her little face pulled in worry that faded to a smile of relief when she saw that he was still there.

“If you aren’t careful,” she said, “Lydia will grow so attached to you that you’ll be forced to fill this house with dolls and handkerchiefs.”

He smiled at that. Heavens, she enjoyed seeing his rare smiles. “That wouldn’t be such a terrible thing.”

“Do your nieces and nephews cuddle up to you as readily as Lydia does?”

He shook his head. “I don’t see much of them. Even when I have dinners with the family, most of them keep their distance.”

“Most of the children?” she asked.

“Most everyone.” Sadness touched the words.

Eliza turned to face him more directly. “Have you told them any bit of what you told me a couple of weeks ago?”

She could see the answer in the stiffening of his posture and the tightening of his lips.

“I’d thought things were a bit better between you and your family. I thought perhaps you’d opened up a bit.”

He accepted the handkerchief doll Lydia offered him. “Even if I’d told them any of what I shared with you, it wouldn’t be enough. There’s just too much between us. Too much I can’t tell them.”

She scooted closer, sitting almost as near to him as her daughter was. “Then tellmea tiny bit of it, just enough to lift some of the weight from your heart.”

He eyed her. She felt certain she saw the tiniest bit of his walls weakening.

“I’ll tell you something about me,” Eliza said, “and then you can tell me something about you. Give and take.”

“I don’t know.”

“Contrary to what you probably believe about me, I don’t share confidences easily. It would be a far fairer exchange than you likely realize.”

Lydia laid her head on his leg, still playing with her doll, but more slowly and droopily. He continued stroking her hair in a soothing rhythm. “I can choose which things I reveal?”

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