Starstruck

Chapter Sixteen

"Do I have to?" Kendyl asked, looking suddenly miserable.

"Yeah, you do, shortcake."

"You’ll be mad."

"Probably. But we still have to talk about it."

She perched on the edge of a leather ottoman, her hands tightly folded on her lap. He sighed, not sure where to start.

"I thought you loved school," he finally said. "You talk about it all the time. But Miss Barnes says you’re not doing your work and you’re not participating in class. What’s going on?"

"I was just pretending I didn’t like school," she said, her voice small. She lifted her gaze to give her teacher a look of earnest entreaty. "I really do, Miss Barnes. I promise. I love playtime and I love circle time and I love snack time. My favorite is story time. I love, love, love story time."

Ashley gazed at her, her lovely features baffled. "Why would you want to pretend you don’t like it? It’s wonderful to love learning!"

Kendyl's chin wobbled. "It was Sierra’s idea. She’s my friend in California. She said if I was bad in class, my dad would have to come to school for a conference. And then he would fall in love with you and you would get married like Sierra’s mom is getting married and then you could be my new mom."

Okay. This was just about the most horrifying moment of his life. A dead silence greeted Kendyl’s stunning declaration and Jason couldn’t think what to do, what to say. He risked a look at Ashley and saw her features had leached of all color. Not a good sign.

He knew he had to step into the terrible silence. "Kendyl…" he began, then faltered as he found himself at a loss for words. "People don’t, uh, fall in love like that," he said after a moment. "You can’t manipulate them into doing what you want just because you want it. Life doesn’t work that way."

Sometimes it did, though. He had to be crazy, but he suddenly knew he was in serious danger of falling for this soft, sweet woman who loved children and smelled like a dream.

"But Miss Barnes already loves you, Daddy. You just have to fall in love with her."

"What?!" Ashley exclaimed. To his somewhat thunderstruck fascination, all the color soaked back into her cheeks in a hot, relentless tide.

Kendyl fidgeted, looking almost as miserable as Ashley. "I heard Miss Weller in the school office talking to you about Daddy a few days after school started. I had a stomachache and went to lay down in the sick kid place, and I heard her ask if you had met Daddy yet and you said no and Miss Weller asked if you would mention at parent–teacher conference that you had his picture in your locker in school and that you used to write Mrs. Jason Williams on things."