Gabriel’s heart constricted. A child shouldn’t have such fears, but loss wasn’t new to Sam. He patted Sam’s narrow back, instinctively rocking his child from side to side in the universal comforting motion. “It wasn’t that bad. I just got stuck at Lolly’s house because the roads froze sooner than I expected.”
Sam lifted his head and looked directly at Gabriel. His tear-wet eyes narrowed. “Lolly. That’s the stupidest name I ever heard.”
“It’s short for Lorelei.”
Gabriel half turned to see that Lolly and his dad had entered the kitchen behind him. He’d been so caught up in his reunion with Sam, he hadn’t heard them come in. Lolly, who had offered the explanation for her name, smiled gently, showing no outward sign of the trauma she’d experienced. For Sam’s sake, he knew, and for that he was grateful.
Sam was not appeased. He’d been terrified, and obviously Lolly was to blame. “If my name was Lorelei I’d make people call me something else, too. That’s even stupider than Lolly.”
“Sam,” Gabriel chided gently. “That’s rude. Apologize.”
He ducked his head, his small jaw set. “Sorry,” he mumbled, spitting out the word without an ounce of real regret. He wouldn’t overtly disobey, but that was about as far as he was willing to go.
Lolly took no offense—or at least, she didn’t appear to. She took a step forward, moving closer. “I imagine you’re pretty mad at me for dragging your dad out of the house in a storm.”
A sullen Sam nodded. “You shoulda left before the storm got here.”
“I understand that,” Lolly said. “Ah … something happened, and I couldn’t leave.” She reached out to tuck a wayward strand of hair away from Sam’s face. “And I’m sure you understand that your daddy is a real, live, honest-to-goodness hero, in a world that needs all the heroes it can get.”
“Well, yeah,” Sam agreed. “Duh.”
Gabriel watched Lolly bite back a laugh. She was doing this right, not coming on too strong, not trying to act like Sam’s best friend when they’d just met. “You look very much like him. Are you a hero, too?”
At that, Sam’s spine straightened. With Gabriel holding him, he was able to look Lolly in the eye for a moment, before he nodded.
“I’m so glad to hear that,” Lolly said with a friendly smile. “The world needs heroes like you and your dad.”
Sam looked closely at Lolly’s bruised face. “What happened to you?” He pointed to her cheek, and Gabriel held his breath. He couldn’t protect Sam from all the ugliness in the world, but the kid didn’t need to know that it had all but landed on his doorstep.
Lolly gently placed a hand over her cheek. “I fell,” she said simply. “That was before your dad arrived, and I have to tell you, he saved me from falling several times.”
“The ice is slippery,” Sam said in an almost grownup voice. “Gran wouldn’t let me go outside, even to meet Dad.”
“Your Gran is a very smart woman,” Lolly said sincerely.
Gabriel could see the wheels in his son’s head turning, as he sized up the situation and the woman before him. “Sorry I made fun of your name,” he said, more sincerely this time.
“You’re not the first,” she said in a confidential tone, as if there weren’t three other adults listening in. “Your father used to call me …” She glanced around, then leaned in and whispered in Sam’s ear. “Lollipop.”
Sam started to giggle, and Gabriel put the kid on his feet. He didn’t go far, though. Sam stayed close, leaning into Gabriel, occasionally grabbing on to his clothing, or his hand, to make sure he didn’t go away again.
Valerie McQueen, always prepared, had a spread ready for them. Soup, sandwiches, coffee, cookies. Gabriel and Lolly sat at the kitchen table, Sam perched on Gabriel’s knee, and ate until they couldn’t get another bite down. It didn’t take Sam long to relax with Lolly, or to release the remnants of his fear that his dad wasn’t coming home. “Relaxed” didn’t mean exactly friendly, but even as an infant Sam had always taken a while to warm up to strange adults.
For someone who didn’t have kids, Lolly was good with Sam. Before he’d moved Sam to Maine, the friends—his and Mariane’s—who’d spent time with Sam tended to smother him with sympathy. That sympathy was deserved, but after a while it didn’t do the kid any good. Lolly talked to Sam almost like he was an adult, and the kid responded.
When she started telling Sam stories about his dad as a child, though, Gabriel had to interfere. He didn’t want his kid—or his parents—hearing how he’d tormented Lolly. He called time-out and Lolly laughed—a real, honest laugh that warmed him to his bones.
Sam only called her Lollipop once, and they both immediately fell into a fit of laughter while Gabriel and his folks looked on, bemused and surprised. And Gabriel realized that at some point in the last twenty-four hours, his world had shifted.
Lolly leaned her head back and closed her eyes, letting the hot water do its work on her tired, overworked, once-frozen muscles. Usually she jumped in the shower, got clean, and got out. It had been a long while since she’d indulged in a real, soaking bath.
The McQueen bathroom was larger than the one at the old house, built years later when so much space was no longer a luxury but a necessity. The bathtub was wide and deep; the counter on the other side of the square room was long and crowded with soaps, towels, shampoos, and two flickering candles. This house still had electricity, though much of Wilson Creek did not. Lolly wasn’t taking any chances, though, hence the candles. If there was a disruption in the power, she wasn’t going to be plunged into darkness—not tonight.