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grandmother.”
    “Of course you do. And it’ll be great. I promise. Let’s see…”
Jesse consulted the notes. “You mentioned you wanted a gold locket for her. And
you want it to hold four photos. One of each of her grandkids, I’m guessing?”
    “Right,” Christopher said.
    “And on the back there’s a quote you wanted engraved.”
    “Yes.” He hadn’t left it on the machine because he’d been a
little embarrassed to say it out loud back when he’d thought Jesse Birch was an
old man. Now that he was here looking at Jesse’s thick eyelashes and sexy
mouth, he found it even harder. “It’s a song. She used to sing it to me. Well,
she sang it to all of us.”
    Christopher remembered vividly the way it felt to be five
years old, tucked up against his grandmother’s side as she rocked him, singing
quietly in his ear until he was warm and sleepy and safe.
    “But when she sang it, it felt like it was just for you?”
Jesse asked quietly.
    “Yeah. How did you know?”
    Jesse stared at him, his gaze lowering down to Christopher’s
mouth, and then slowly coming back up to his eyes again. Christopher’s blood
zipped through his groin, and he bit his cheek in a sudden fear that he might
begin to get hard if Jesse kept looking at him like that.
    “I’ve felt like that before. Listening to someone sing.”
Jesse jerked his head down and picked up a pen. “The quote?”
    Christopher cleared his throat, but even so the line from “You
Are My Sunshine”came out in a whisper.
    Jesse glanced at him, raw heat flashing across his face, and
then he turned his attention back to his notes. Christopher watched Jesse write
the words down in a square, small script different from the loops of the notes
from the message he’d left.
    “It’s cheesy, I know,” Christopher said, wanting to sweep
his embarrassment and arousal away with an apology of sorts.
    Jesse sang the first few lines of the song in a soft,
pleasant baritone. His eyes glittered when he broke off and asked, “Will you
sing it? For a fan?”
    Is there a hidden camera? Christopher’s
palms went damp. “I don’t…”
    “Never mind. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”
    “No, no, of course not. I mean, I do it for a living—”
    “I’m willing to pay.” Jesse’s mouth wobbled suspiciously
like he was going to laugh.
    “Are you teasing me?”
    “A little, but not about being a fan. Don’t worry about it.”
Jesse looked back at his paper and Christopher wished he’d just done it because
now he felt like he’d not only disappointed Jesse, but somehow failed a test. “The
locket. You mentioned that you didn’t have any particular ideas for the front
design. Were you thinking of something with gemstones, or gold filigree? Maybe
braiding?”
    Christopher linked his fingers together and willed his blood
to stop rushing so hard. “I really have no idea. Something pretty, but not too
dainty. She’s a strong woman, and I want it to reflect that.”
    “Not too fancy?”
    “No. Nothing over the top. She’s eighty, and she’ll probably
be mad I even had this made for her. She’ll tell me it’s a waste of money
because her next stop is the grave, and she won’t need a locket in heaven. That’s
the kind of woman she is.”
    “This might not be good business sense, but I’m curious. Why
are you getting it for her then?”
    “Because that’s the kind of grandson I am,” Christopher said
with a shrug.
    “Because you want her to have it.” Jesse studied him a bit
longer and added, “Because you feel like you owe her for something, and you’ll
never be able to repay her, and you want her to know that you’re grateful, and
that you love her.” Jesse tapped his pen lightly on the paper. “I make a lot of
jewelry for a lot of people, and they all have their reasons. A lot of them are
the same reasons.”
    “So you have a lot of customers like me?”
    “Not really. But I do have a lot of clients who want to give
the jewelry more