She sounded worried, and North tried to think of a way to make her feel better and then realized that was ridiculous. She was doing a job for him, she hadn’t called for comfort, they weren’t married anymore no matter what lies she was telling down there, he had Mrs. Nash waiting, and there was nothing he could do anyway… “Do you need me to come down there?”

“No, I can handle this,” she said, her voice as confident as ever. “It’s the kids I’m worried about. I don’t know if I can make things normal for them. I think I can make things better.”

“You always make things better.”

The silence stretched out at the other end of the phone as he thought, Dumb thing to say, and then she said, “Thank you.” Her voice was softer than it had been, and it brought the past rushing back again.

“You’re welcome,” he said, thinking, Get off the damn phone. “I’ll get you your cable and your contractor and somebody to fix the phones.”

“I know you will. You always come through.”

Jesus. “Call me if there’s anything else,” he said briskly, trying to find his way back to normal.

“I thought we weren’t supposed to talk to each other.”

“I was going through an independent phase,” North said, and then closed his eyes as her laugh bubbled through the phone.

“That was a helluva long phase. I’ll call if there’s anything else. You have a good day.”

She hung up, and he sat there with the phone in his hand for a minute, trying to find his way back to normal, until Kristin came in.

“She needs cable down there,” he told her, hanging up the phone. “Get it for her, please.”

“That’s going to cost you,” Kristin said.

It’s the only thing she’s asked for in the entire time I’ve known her. “Get it for her. Also find a good contractor down there and have him go out to talk to her, not to Mrs. Crumb. And call the phone company and find out why they lose service and if there’s anything we can do about it. Bills to come here.”

Kristin nodded. “And Mrs. Nash in the waiting room?”

“Give me a couple of minutes,” North said, and Kristin nodded again and went out.

Andie had never asked for anything. He’d kept waiting for her to, it was crazy of her not to, to ask for a house instead of his apartment in the attic of the family’s Victorian-he’d heard her bitching at the stove once and sent in people to redo the kitchen for her-for a car instead of public transportation-he’d surprised her with a bright yellow Mustang and she’d loved it-hell, for an engagement ring and a decent wedding ring-he’d tried to give her a good ring once and she’d insisted on keeping that damn green band-but she’d just gone on with her life, tromping around in those crazy skirts and tight tank tops, her hair wild no matter how much she fought it, arguing with him, laughing with him, falling into bed with him…

He closed his eyes and thought, I really was an idiot.

He just wasn’t sure if he’d been an idiot for marrying her or for letting her go.

Not that it mattered anymore. She was gone, and he had a client to interview. He punched a button on the intercom and said, “I’ll see Mrs. Nash now,” and went back to work.

After North hung up, Andie put more coins in the phone and called Flo and told her everything was fine, and then called Will and said the same thing, but he wasn’t as easily put off.

“Have you talked to North?” he said.

“Yes,” she said. “I asked him to get us cable.”

“I wish you weren’t talking to him.”

“I’d talk to Satan to get cable,” Andie said, and changed the subject, giving him half her attention while she watched Alice lean against Carter’s arm, sitting as close to him as possible. “I have to go,” she said when they’d finished their ice cream, and then realized she’d interrupted him in mid-sentence. “Sorry, the kids… I have to go.” She hung up and went back to collect the kids, taking a phone number tab from a flyer for the Happy Housekeepers cleaning service she found on the Dairy Queen’s bulletin board. She lost the kids again as soon as she stopped the car on the flagstones behind the house, Carter taking the bookstore bags and Alice dragging the bags of clothes and office supplies. Andie took everything else into the kitchen and put the food away, taking a surprised satisfaction in seeing the fridge and cupboards fill up. Then she took the rest of the bags upstairs, dropped Carter’s striped comforter off in his room without getting so much as a glance from him, and took Alice’s blue comforter into the nursery where she set up her sewing machine, tore the sequined chiffon into strips, and sewed the strips all over the comforter.

Then she went to Alice’s room, knocked on the door, and said, “Alice, I have your comforter.”

“Come in,” Alice said, suspicion heavy in her voice, and Andie opened the door and went in.

Alice watched critically as Andie pulled the old pink bedspread off and shook the glittery blue comforter out, snapping it over her bed and making the chiffon strips flutter and gleam as it settled. Alice looked closer at it. “It should have swirls,” she told Andie.

“Swirls.”

“Like dancing. I’ll do it with my marker.” Alice narrowed her eyes. “Okay?”

“Okay,” Andie said. “You do that, and I’ll go make dinner.”

Alice got the blue marker out of her new set, put the headphones to her Walkman back on, and began to draw swirls on the chiffon.

Half an hour later, Andie came back with two bowls of tomato soup, two grilled cheese sandwiches, and two glasses of milk, and put half on Alice’s bedside table. Alice ignored her and kept making swirls. Then Andie took the rest of the tray in to Carter, who ignored her knock and glared when she came in, closing the new sketchbook he’d been drawing in.

“Dinner,” she said, and put the tray on the table beside his bed.

He looked over at it, picked up a wedge of cheese sandwich, bit into it, and opened the sketchbook again, careful to shield it so she couldn’t see what he was doing.

“You’re welcome,” she said, and went back to her bedroom to work on the curriculum since she was going to start beating education into them the next day.

At eight o’clock, she went to collect their dishes and call bedtime. Alice was sitting on her bedspread, her dinner gone, staring at the sequins and the swirls she’d marked all over the chiffon. “It’s bee-you-tee-ful,” she was saying when Andie walked in.

“Yes, it is,” Andie said, and Alice looked up surprised, as if she hadn’t noticed she was there.

“Brush your teeth,” Andie said, prepared for a fight, but Alice went off to the little bathroom on her own. When she came out, changed into her too-big Bad Witch T-shirt, Andie said, “Bedtime,” and Alice picked up her Jessica doll, got into bed, and smoothed the comforter under her hands after Andie pulled it up over her knees. “Let me get the scrunchie out of your hair.”

“NOOOOOOOOOOOO,” Alice began, and Andie said, “We’ll put another one in tomorrow,” and pulled the scrunchie out while Alice was taking a breath to scream again.

Her white-blond hair dropped around her ears, smooth and silky now. Alice scratched the top of her head and said, “Okay,” in a normal voice and slid down under the covers.

So far, so good, Andie thought, blessing her mother for the tip on the sequins.

Now maybe if they started a bedtime ritual, Alice would start talking to her.

“So this bedtime thing,” she told Alice. “Is there anything I should be doing for you?”

Alice looked down at the rocker at the end of the bed.

“Get you a glass of water?” Andie said. “Read you a story?”

“Tell me a story,” Alice said, and Andie thought, Oh, hell, and sat down in the rocker.

Alice froze.

“What’s wrong?” Andie said, looking around.