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about on a daily basis. Coffee?”
    She draped his coat over a hook and turned to find him blocking her way. “What happened, Faith?”
    â€œWe made a mistake.” She said it calmly, even coolly. It was a tone he’d never heard from her before.
    â€œBut there was Clara.”
    â€œDon’t.” Fury came into her eyes quickly and simmered there. “Leave it alone, Jason. I mean it. Clara’s my business. My marriage and divorce are my business. You can’t expect to come back now and have all the answers.”
    They stood a moment, facing each other in silence. When the kettle let out a whistle, she seemed to breathe again. “If you want to help, you can peel some potatoes. They’re in the pantry over there.”
    She worked systematically, he thought, angrily, as she poured oil to heat in a skillet and coated chicken. Her temper was nothing new to him. He’d felt the brunt of it before, sometimes deflecting it, sometimes meeting it head-on. He also knew how to soothe it. He began talking, almost to himself at first, about some of the places he’d been. When he told her about waking with a snake curled next to his head while he’d been camping in South America, she laughed.
    â€œI didn’t find it too funny at the time. I was out of the tent in five seconds flat, buck naked. My photographer got a very interesting roll of pictures. I had to pay him fifty to get the negatives.”
    â€œI’m sure they were worth more. You didn’t mention the snake in your series on San Salvador.”
    â€œNo.” Interested, he put down his paring knife. “You read it?”
    She arranged chicken in the hot oil. “Of course. I’ve read all your stories.”
    He took the potatoes to the sink to wash them. “All of them?”
    She smiled at the tone but kept her back to him. “Don’t let your ego loose, Jason. It was always your biggest problem. I’d estimate that ninety percent of the people in Quiet Valley have read all your stories. You might say we all feel we have a stake in you.” She adjusted the flame. “After all, no one else around here’s had dinner at the White House.”
    â€œThe soup was thin.”
    Chuckling, she put a pan of water on the stove and dumped in the potatoes. “I guess you just have to take the good with the bad—so to speak. I saw a picture of you a couple of years ago.” She adjusted a pin in her hair and her voice was bland. “I think it was taken in New York, at some glitzy charity function. You had a half-naked woman on your arm.”
    He rocked back on his heels. “Did I?”
    â€œWell, she wasn’t actually half-naked,” Faith temporized. “I suppose it just seemed that way because she had so much more hair than dress. Blond—very blond, if my memory serves me. And let’s say—top-heavy.”
    He ran his tongue around his teeth. “You meet a lot of interesting people in my business.”
    â€œObviously.” With the efficiency born of habit, she turned chicken. Oil hissed. “I’m sure you find it very stimulating.”
    â€œNot as stimulating as this conversation.”
    â€œIf you can’t stand the heat,” she murmured.
    â€œYeah. It’s getting dark. Shouldn’t Clara be home?”
    â€œShe’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.
    â€œI 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