"Huh?"
She dragged her mind away from Marc. "It is a story of my homeland, of a princess who was also a dragon. I will tell you this if you show me how to make apple pie."
It took a few more minutes of tantalizing bits from the story, but she soon had them hooked. One boy swept the floor clean, and then they showed her how to make apple pie. Brian fell asleep in her arms sometime during the story. Damian offered to take him from her.
"No, I wish to hold him." She smiled at him, thanking him for his concern. "He's so very light, I worry."
"He's sick a lot. I think he misses Becky."
"Becky?"
"His twin. When their ma and pa died, they put Brian here and Becky in some girls orphanage," Damian explained.
"But that is wrong! In Zulheil, it's said that two who are born together are each other's heart. They are not to be torn apart." No wonder the boy was so frail,
"Marc's doing something to help him."
Hira thought to ask her husband about this later. For the moment she'd enjoy the children's honest company, and try not to think about the depths of tenderness this place revealed about the dark and moody man she'd married and was only now beginning to know.
Marc returned with Larry and Jake, carrying six containers of ice cream. What the boys didn't eat today would be savored later. He expected to find the kitchen in chaos, his princess overwhelmed by these tough kids who'd known more hurt than humanly bearable and yet had survived.
When he'd realized that she was following him, he'd let his temper drive him into a situation that could mean terrible pain for those who least deserved it. Furious at her lack of trust in him, he'd reacted without thought, a strange experience for a man known in business circles as having a will of iron and a heart of ice.
He hoped he hadn't damaged the boys' trust in him by leaving them with a woman who could destroy with one scathing comment. To her credit, she'd never disparaged either his scars or his background as a dirt-grubbing child, but even after he'd loved her this morning, her eyes had looked at him with such distance that he'd felt taunted into trying to tame her.
He'd wanted to rub off some of that aloof sophistication and find out if there really was a living, breathing woman beneath the ice. He didn't want her to be only a beautiful shell who could shut off her emotions as easily as she'd shut him out of her bedroom last night. But, a part of him whispered, she hadn't locked the door. And he'd taken full advantage of that lapse.
"Let's hope for the best," he muttered to himself, shouldering through the swinging door.
He walked into a kitchen filled with laughter. Little Brian was fast asleep in his wife's arms, and tall and shy Beau was blushing but trying to tease her about something. The other children were gathered around her.
She had flour on her nose and elbows. There was a streak of dirt on her designer yellow dress from Brian's shoe, and handprints on her skirts from other little hands. She'd begun the afternoon with her hair pinned on top of her head, but Brian had pulled strands loose. She looked disheveled and messy, and her face was full of such joy that his heart stopped for a minute. Lord, she was beautiful when she was all prettied up; messy and with a child in her arms, she was devastating.
Painful tenderness cramped his heart. His hands froze around the bags he held. This was no ice princess. Despite all the times her facade had cracked, how had he failed to spot the truth about his wife?
"What's so funny?" One of his ice cream helpers asked.
Damian looked over. "Hira's been telling us stories."
"Oh, man! We missed it," Larry grumbled.
"Don't worry, I'll tell more."
Marc couldn't believe the way she had them all in the palm of her hand. As the late afternoon progressed into evening, he expected her to wilt under the emotional demands of the attention-starved boys, but she seemed to glow. Much later, after dinner and the supervised completion of various pieces of homework, they sat down to watch the first hour of a video, a midweek treat the boys only got for good behavior.
However, it quickly became clear that they weren't enjoying it. Despite the nonchalance they tried to portray, they were very worried about Brian. Once again he'd barely eaten anything. After settling the boys down, Hira went into the kitchen and made something with milk, sugar and the other ingredients she'd asked him to buy. Cuddling Brian into her lap on her return, she lifted a spoonful of the mixture to his mouth, her other arm holding him carefully.
"Come, laeha, you must eat this. I have made it just for you," she coaxed, her voice holding the exotic music of a faraway land of desert and sunshine.
The sad-faced little boy opened his mouth and let her feed him a spoonful. His eyes widened. When a second spoonful was raised, he made no protest. Carefully, while the other boys ostensibly watched their movie, she managed to get a whole bowl of the rich mixture into Brian. Drowsy after eating, he snuggled into her body and fell asleep again, his thumb in his mouth. The habit had developed after the traumatic separation from his twin.
Marc took the bowl and spoon from his wife, his chest tight with pride. "Thank you."
Worried eyes met his. "He is too small." "I know, cher" he whispered. "I'm trying to find his sister." He touched her hair once and then walked into the kitchen, finding that she'd made more of the sweet treat than had been needed for Brian. Deciding the rest of the boys would like a taste, he took out small servings. "Here, extra dessert thanks to my wife."
Soon, sighs of repletion sounded around the room. When he looked to see how Hira was taking this, he found her fast asleep, Brian's head cushioned on her breasts. In sleep, his princess looked as guileless as the child lying trustingly against her body. If he only knew which face-the sophisticate or the innocent-was her true self, he might have a way to understand the woman he'd married.
Hira woke when Marc took Brian from her. "We are leaving?" she asked, rubbing at her eyes.
He nodded. "The others have gone to bed. They said good-night and come back soon." His eyes looked at her with a gentleness she couldn't understand.
While he carried the sleeping boy upstairs, she went to the kitchen to tidy up, only to find it sparkling clean. Smiling, she located the shoes she'd kicked off, and stepped into them. When she went to say goodbye to the elder, it was to find the study disappointingly empty.
A big hand came to rest on her hip. "Father Thomas didn't want to disturb you when he went to bed."
She turned to look up at her husband, feeling drowsy and happily tired. "He is a nice man."
Marc pressed a kiss to her forehead. It was so far from his usual passion, so tender that she just stared.
He chuckled at her dazed expression. "You are not driving home. I've moved your car to the parking lot behind the orphanage. We'll get it later."
Nodding, she let him lead her out to his truck.
The drive home went quickly because she was exhausted. The next time she woke, it was to find Marc carrying her up the stairs to their bedroom. When she blinked and pushed at his shoulders, amused gray eyes looked down at her.
"Did I sleep?"
His grin was bright in the warm light of the small lamps he'd apparently switched on, on his way up. "You dozed off against my shoulder, just like Brian did on you."
She yawned and then, without thinking about it, snuggled her face against his neck and went back to sleep. She was vaguely aware of him undressing her and laying her down on their bed. He didn't put her nightgown on her, but she'd expected that. But, though he slipped in naked beside her, he didn't do more than hold her tight.
"Sleep, princess." A kiss on the pulse in her neck.
He was cuddling her, she thought, smiling into dreams that were soft and pleasant. It was nice to be cuddled by an American hunter who was pleased with you.