"Mummy! Kayla ouch! Kayla ouch, Mummy!" Bronwyn sank to her knees, and her heart dropped like a stone when she registered the genuine fear and pain on her little girl's face. As the child crept into her mother's open arms and snuggled against her chest, Bronwyn allowed her furious eyes to meet Bryce's. His face had closed up like a shutter, a remote look in his eyes as he stood watching them, his hands thrust into his trouser pockets.
"What did you do to her?" she hissed, her maternal instincts on full alert. "I trusted you to look after her and I come back to this?" Kayla had stopped her hysterical sobbing and was hiccupping into Bronwyn's chest, her tense little body relaxing as she clung to the familiar comfort her mother represented. Bryce's shadowed eyes revealed absolutely no emotion; his clenched jaw the only visible sign of his tension. She got up, Kayla in her arms, and advanced toward him, a stalking lioness intent on protecting her cub.
"What happened here?"
His eyes remained level but he refused to say a word.
"Bryce, answer me! She never cries like this unless she's hurt. How did she get hurt?"
His eyes flickered a little, as he cast an involuntary look down at the little girl who was staring up at him with huge, tear-drenched blue eyes. Her thumb was propped in her mouth and her breath still hitched. Bronwyn glanced over her daughter's little body, doing a damage assessment. Her eyes detected no visible signs of injury until she reached one plump little bare foot. Her big toe was bleeding and looked somewhat swollen. Bronwyn made a soft sound of dismay and lifted the foot to inspect it more closely. Fortunately the damage seemed minimal, and judging from Kayla's ever-lessening sniffles, the immediate shock of pain had worn off already. As the haze of panic dissipated, Bronwyn began to recognize that the damage she had done by storming blindly into the fray may have been a lot worse than the injury to Kayla's toe. She had shown an appalling lack of trust by assuming Bryce had been responsible for the toddler's injury, and she was beginning to feel like an overprotective fool.
"Bryce," she began hesitantly, taking a step toward where he stood. He was as still and remote as a statue. He ignored her and swung on his heel to leave the room abruptly. Bronwyn made a dismayed little sound, and Kayla, her pain mostly forgotten already, dragged her thumb from her mouth to add her own opinion.
"Daddy go bye-bye," she observed solemnly before resting her head on Bronwyn's shoulder and sticking her thumb back into her mouth.
"Yes," Bronwyn whispered, burying her face in her daughter's silky curls. "Daddy's gone away." But that wasn't entirely true; he hadn't left the house, she had heard his study door slam and knew that he was probably brooding in there. She knew that she would have to get to the bottom of things sooner rather than later and also had the sinking feeling that she was the one who would have to make serious amends. She glanced over at the appalled Celeste and nodded down at the drowsy little girl in her arms.
"I'll take care of her toe," she said hoarsely, and Celeste mumbled that she'd be in the kitchen. Bronwyn fussed over Kayla for a while, her mind on Bryce while she kissed the toe of her now-giggling baby all better and placed a cute Finding Nemo Band-Aid on the tiny cut. Kayla's eyelids started to droop after half an hour of cuddling and playing with her mother-it was way past time for her afternoon nap. Bronwyn carried her to the housekeeper in the kitchen.
"Celeste, would you mind . . ." She left the question unfinished, and Celeste nodded immediately and bustled forward to take an unprotesting Kayla into her arms. Bronwyn dropped an affectionate kiss on the sleepy child's forehead before hurrying out of the room toward Bryce's study. With each heavy step she took, she felt more and more like Daniel preparing to beard the lion's den. When she reached the ominously shut study door, she paused to listen but couldn't hear a sound coming from behind the door. She cautiously knocked on the solid wood before berating herself for her thoughtless action. Now she faced an unfamiliar dilemma: did she just enter? Or did she wait until he eventually came out on his own? She regarded the suddenly insurmountable obstacle of the door cautiously before deciding to take the bull by the horns and open the door.
Bryce sat behind his huge desk, with his elbows resting on the gleaming wooden surface and his face buried in his hands. His large shoulders were shaking slightly. He looked terribly vulnerable, and in that moment Bronwyn felt like a voyeur of the worst kind. She cleared her throat to alert him of her presence and then swore softly beneath her breath when she realized that the gesture was as futile as her knock had been.
"Bryce . . ." Again she swore, feeling like a complete idiot, and hesitantly took a few steps toward him, lifting her hand to his shoulder in the process. He leaped out of the chair like a scalded cat and swore furiously. He glared at her, looking a bit a shaken and a lot furious.
"Don't sneak up on me," he berated hoarsely.
"I didn't," she protested, shocked by the near violence of his reaction. "I knocked but . . ."
"You knocked?" His voice dripped with derision. "I can't hear, damn it!"
"Well, what was I supposed to do, then?" she responded defensively.
"There's a doorbell," he informed, calming down marginally, and she stared at him in confusion.
"A doorbell? But how . . ." her question trailed off when he pointed toward the lamp on his desk.
"The lamp is rigged to flicker when the bell rings. It works for both the front door and the study door. Two flickers for outside, one for inside."
"Oh. That's quite clever," she murmured, impressed by the ingenious device and feeling like a complete idiot for not realizing sooner that the flickering lights that she had absently noticed intermittently since her return were not the result of an electrical fault as she had assumed.
"Clever, yes." He smiled humorlessly and practically sneered the words. "It's a common-enough device for the deaf. There are so many ways to make our lives as convenient as possible, clever little toys that light up and vibrate, tablet computers and smart phones with face-to-face call capabilities, SMSes and various other little gadgets designed to ease my life. Yet not one of these clever little toys would ever be able to alert me to the fact that my little girl is standing right behind me, trying to get my attention, not one of them could prevent me from turning around and treading on her before I'm able to stop myself." Oh God! After her initial panic at finding Kayla in floods of tears and obvious pain, she had suspected that it might be something like this. Of course it was an accident, something that Bryce would tear himself up over, a situation that she had worsened with her stupid overreaction. His eyes were tormented, and she swallowed back a sob as she cupped his jaw in her slender hands.
"Bryce," she whispered, her eyes liquid with regret and sympathy. He saw nothing but the sympathy and mistook it for pity. He jerked away from her and turned his back on her.
"No," she moaned softly, not willing to allow him to close himself off when he was clearly in pain. She stepped around him and forced him to meet her eyes.
"Mikayla and I are going to have to learn not to sneak up on you then," she told him firmly. "You are not at fault here, Bryce, it was an accident!"
"You've changed your tune rather quickly," he mocked, and she flushed.
"I overreacted," she conceded. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have gone off the deep end like that. I know that you would never intentionally hurt our daughter."
"Intentionally or not, I did hurt her," he pointed out harshly. "And I can't promise that it won't happen again in the future. And she-she's frightened of me now. I don't think . . ."
"She's a baby, Bryce," Bron pointed out firmly. "She was shocked and in pain, but she'll soon forget. Children are resilient and have a much larger capacity for forgiveness than we do. She has also learned her lesson, and I doubt she'll be coming up behind you without warning you in some way in the future. One thing about your daughter"-she smiled fondly-"she's a fast learner!"
"She was crying so much," he remembered in a shaken voice. "I couldn't make her stop! Her little face was so sad and confused. I felt like a monster."
She took a step closer to him, her heart going out to him.
"Oh, Bryce," she began, not sure how to make this better. "I'm so sorry."
"I don't need your pity," he snarled, as defensive and dangerous as a wounded animal. Bronwyn blinked, his abrupt mood swing throwing her completely off guard.
"I don't pity you," she denied, placing one tentative hand on his forearm, but he shrugged her off and signed something at her, glaring wildly while he did.