The manager of the booth appeared at her elbow. She’d been hustling for the whole two hours he’d signed autographs. “Hey, if he wants a shirt, we’ll make him a shirt,” she joked. Speaking out of the side of her mouth, she added, “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?”
“He’s not my—we just met.”
Owen held out his hand. “Hi, I’m Owen Mattox.”
“Nice to meet you, Owen,” she said to him, before speaking out of the side of her mouth again. “See, he has manners.”
“You know I can hear you, right?” he teased.
The woman brightened like a megawatt bulb, ignoring his lighthearted pestering. “I’m Doris, and this beautiful young lady is my daughter, Bree.”
Her daughter looked like she wanted to duck under a table and not come out.
“Daughter?” he asked as her words overruled the becoming way Bree’s hair fell across her cheek. He took in Doris’s arm around Bree’s shoulders and the way her hand clamped onto her arm as if holding her in place. He watched Bree’s discomfort, and his survival instincts sprang to life. Time to run. “It was nice meeting you both.” He spun, sidestepped around a fishing pole, and kept going.
He overheard Doris ask, “What was that all about?” and wished he could hear Bree’s answer, but a mother-daughter combo was too much to take on again. He’d been sideswiped by that play before, and he wasn’t going to fall for another woman who couldn’t break free from her parents’ grasp.
Chapter Five
“What’s this?” Brent Sawyer asked Bree bright and early Monday morning.
The library bustled with activity. The first few weeks of the summer were like that—parents had all sorts of good intentions. As the lazy days dragged on and the temperatures rose, motivation was harder to come by. Bree had worked hard to create a summer reading program she hoped would inspire children to prod their parents for a library visit each week.
Brent was as smart as a whip and a cute little stinker to boot. His blond hair hung in his eyes—by choice. His mom had confided in Bree that Brent proclaimed haircuts were not a summer activity and refused to go near a pair of scissors. He was six, so pick your battles, right?
Bree reached for the plastic baggie filled with mini marshmallows and toothpicks. Kids clambered to her desk to collect their prizes for reading 20 minutes a day—or more. She loved to track their progress with them and encourage them to keep reading.
“It’s a construction kit.” She flipped the baggie over to show a paper with several different buildings made out of the contents. “You can build one of these. And then you can take it apart and build another one. When you find one you like, let the marshmallows dry out and it will stay that way.”
“Sick.”
Bree blinked. She heard the wordsickfrom the YA readers, but this was the first time she’d heard it from someone under ten. Funny. The evolution of a word for the dictionary maestros.
Brent’s mom rolled her eyes. “Now he’s going to want to use our marshmallows and toothpicks to build stuff. I’ll be stepping on them all summer long.”
“What a great way to spend the summer,” Bree chirped. “He could be a future award-winning engineer, and when he gives his acceptance speech he’ll tell them he owes it all to his mom and the marshmallow summer.”
“Maybe,” she mused. “What’s the grand prize this year?”
Interested in the answer, Brent looked up from tracing his finger over one of the pictures.
Bree’s throat tightened, warning her not to lie. “It’s a surprise.”
“It’s never been a surprise before. I’ve brought three kids through summer reading programs, and we always know what we’re working toward.”
“I know. I’m sorry, I can’t tell you what it is just yet.”Because I don’t know!She kept her smile in place and hoped the deception didn’t show through her eyes. She’d never been good at lying, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t improve. Her smile stayed until Brent tugged his mom out by the shirt hem to go for an ice cream cone at the Dairy Queen.
Bree deflated like a four-day-old balloon.
“Still don’t have a grand prize?” asked Audrey, the inter-library loan specialist and Bree’s closest friend.
“Shhh.” Bree spun around and placed her hands on her hips. “Do you know how hard it is to fund a summer reading program on my budget?”
Audrey gave her a sympathetic tilt of her head. She had one of those faces without an identifying feature. Her blonde eyebrows practically blended into her face, her eyes were basic blue, and her nose and lips were well proportioned, but she had a rockin’ bod. Barbie was jealous of Audrey’s curves. The only difference between the plastic doll and Audrey, besides what they were made of, was that Barbie knew how to work those curves and Audrey did her best to hide them in square tops and baby-doll dresses. “If anyone can do it, it’s you. I don’t have the patience to count 37 toothpicks and 21 marshmallows a hundred times over.”
Bree waved the compliment away. She loved her job. Where else would she be paid to talk to children about books, plan fun projects, read with moms and tots, pick themes for check-off sheets, introduce preteens to Nancy Drew andThe Dork Diaries, and count toothpicks? Seriously? Best. Job. Ever. “Do you want to grab a double chocolate milkshake later?”
Never one to turn down ice cream, Audrey grinned. “Sure.”