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business.”
    “Obviously.” With the efficiency born of habit, she turned chicken. Oil hissed. “I’m sure you find it very stimulating.”
    “Not as stimulating as this conversation.”
    “If you can’t stand the heat,” she murmured.
    “Yeah. It’s getting dark. Shouldn’t Clara be home?”
    “She’s right next door. She knows to be home by five thirty.”
    He went to the window anyway and glanced at the house next door. Faith studied his profile. It was stronger now, tougher. She supposed he was too, he had to be. How much was left of the boy she’d loved so desperately? Maybe it was something neither of them could be sure of.
    “I thought of you a lot, Faith.” Though his back was to her, she could almost feel the words brush over her skin. “But especially at this time of year. I could usually block you out when I had work to do, deadlines to meet, but at Christmas you wouldn’t let go. I remember every one we spent together, the way you’d drag me through the shops. Those few years with you made up for all the times as a kid I woke up to nothing.”
    The old sympathy welled up. “Your father couldn’t face the holidays, Jason. He just couldn’t handle it without your mother.”
    “I understand that better now. After losing you.” He turned back. She wasn’t looking at him now, but bent industriously over the stove. “You’ve been spending Christmas alone, too.”
    “No, I have Clara.”
    She tensed as he walked to her. “No one to fill the stockings with you, or share secrets about what’s under the tree.”
    “I manage. You have to alter life to suit yourself.”
    “Yeah.” He took her chin in his hand. “I’m beginning to believe it.”
    The door slammed open. Wet and beaming, Clara stood dripping on the mat. “We made angels in the snow.”
    Faith raised a brow. “So I see. Well, you’ve got fifteen minutes to get out of those wet things and set the table.”
    She struggled out of her coat. “Can I turn on the tree?”
    “Go ahead.”
    “Come on.” Clara held out a hand for Jason. “It’s the best one on the block.”
    Emotions humming, Faith watched them walk out together.

Chapter 5
    They were still humming when the meal was over. She knew her daughter was a friendly, sometimes outrageously open child, but Clara had taken to Jason like a long-lost friend. She chattered away at him as though she’d known him for years.
    It’s so obvious, Faith thought as she watched Clara stack dishes. Neither of them noticed. What would she do if they did? She didn’t believe in lies, yet she’d been forced to live one.
    The other two paid little attention to her as they settled down with Clara’s books. In the easy, flowing style he’d been born with, Jason began to tell her stories about Africa—the desert, the mountains, the thick green jungle that teemed with its own life and its own dangers.
    As their heads bent together over a picture in Clara’s book, Faith felt a flood of panic. “I’m going to go next door,” she said on impulse. “I have a lot of work backed up.”
    “Mm-hmm.” With that, Jason dismissed her. A laugh bubbled in her throat until it ached. Grabbing her coat, Faith escaped.
    They were more than toys to her. They were certainly more than a business. To Faith the dolls who filled her shop were the symbol of youth, of innocence, of believing in miracles. She’d wanted to open the shop soon after Clara had been born, but Tom had been adamantly set against it. Because she’d felt indebted, she’d let it pass, as she’d let so many other things pass. Then, when she’d found herself alone, with a child to support, it had seemed the natural thing.
    She worked long hours there, to ease the void that even the love for her daughter couldn’t fill.
    In her workroom behind the store were shelves filled with pieces and parts of dolls. There were china heads, plastic legs and torsos. In another section lay the ones she called the sick and injured. Dolls with