From the Heart

“You’re not old enough to be my mother, are you?”
    Kasey fell in love. Her heart was lost, and there was no turning back. She was needed. “No, Alison, I’m not old enough to be your mother.” Her voice was soft, understanding. When the girl dropped her eyes, Kasey lifted her chin with a fingertip. “But I’m old enough to be your friend. I could use one, too.”
    “Really?”
    The child was crying out to be loved, to be touched. Kasey felt a wave of anger for Jordan as she cupped Alison’s face inher hands. “Really.” She watched the smile start slowly until it bloomed over the child’s face.
    “Will you show me how to make a dog?” Alison demanded and stuck her hands into mud.
    When they walked back to the house an hour later, they were giggling. Each carried a pair of mud-caked shoes. Kasey’s mind was clearer than it had been for days. I need her as much as she needs me, she thought and glanced down at Alison. She laughed and stopped to lift the child’s streaked face.
    “You’re beautiful,” Kasey told her. Bending, she kissed her nose. “However, your grandmother might disagree, so you’d better get upstairs and into a tub.”
    “She’s at a committee meeting,” Alison commented and giggled again, seeing the mud on Kasey’s cheek. “She’s always at meetings.”
    “Then we won’t have to bother her, will we?” Kasey took Alison’s hand and began to walk again. “Of course, you’re not to lie to her. If your grandmother asks you if you were building mud sculptures behind the rhododendrons, you have to confess.”
    Alison pushed her untidy hair behind her ear. “But she’d never ask me anything like that.”
    “That simplifies things, doesn’t it?” She pushed open the patio door. “I liked the dog you made. I believe you have artistic talent.” As they walked through the brocaded parlor, Kasey began to search her pockets for a match. The room jangled her nerves.
    “I liked your bust better. It looked just like— Uncle Jordan! ”
    “Yes, it was rather good.” Kasey stopped at the foot of the stairs and dug in her back pockets. “You know, I never seem to have a match when I need one. I wonder why that is.” Then, noting Alison’s stunned expression, she glanced up. “Oh, hello, Jordan.” She smiled amiably. “Have you got a light?”
    He came down the steps slowly, looking from girl to woman. Alison’s linen pants suit was splattered with dirt. Her hair had escaped from its band and had traces of mud clinging to it. Her eyes stared out at him from a thoroughly dirty face.Her hands were brown past the wrist. So were Kasey’s. A dozen reasonable explanations coursed in and out of his mind and were discarded. If he had learned nothing else during the past days with Kasey, it was to explore the unreasonable first.
    “What the hell have you been doing?”
    “We’ve been engaged in art appreciation,” she returned easily. “Very educational.” Kasey gave Alison’s hand a squeeze. “You’d better go see about that bath, love.”
    Alison’s eyes flew from her uncle’s to Kasey’s. She scurried up the stairs and disappeared.
    “Art appreciation?” Jordan repeated, staring after his niece. He frowned back at Kasey. “You look as if you’d been wallowing in mud.”
    “Not wallowing, Jordan. Creating.” She pushed her own untidy hair out of her eyes. “We’ve been building mud sculptures. Alison’s very good.”
    “Mud sculptures? You were playing in mud? We don’t even have any mud.”
    “We made some. It’s really very easy. You just take some water—”
    “For God’s sake, Kasey, I know the formula for mud.”
    “Of course you do, Jordan.” Her voice was soothing and calm, but he caught the laughter in her eyes. “You’re an intelligent man.”
    He could feel his patience ebbing. “Would you stay on the point?”
    “What point was that?” She gave him a guileless smile that nearly turned into a grin as he heaved a deep breath.
    “Mud, Kasey. The point was mud.”
    “Well, there’s little else I can tell you about that. You said you knew how it was made.”
    He swore as his fingers tightened. “Kasey, don’t you think it’s a bit juvenile for a grown woman to take an eleven-year-old girl and spend the afternoon in a mud pile?”
    So you know how old she is, Kasey thought and gave him a long look. “Well, Jordan, that depends.”
    “On what?”
    “On whether you want an eleven-year-old girl for a niece or a forty-year-old