He was silent long enough that I knew he was thinking, too.

“We’re taking Bismarck to meet my parents tomorrow,” I said to change the subject. “Does he sense hostility?”

“Your parents were never hostile to me.”

“And, you know, that stunned me.”

“Give them some credit.”

“Thanks for loaning us your dog, Teo.”

“Renting. I’m keeping track of the minutes you have him. The cost goes up and up and up...”

We hung up. I switched off the light and turned on my side. Even with Bismarck snoring beside me, I fell asleep quickly.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

On Saturday afternoon I learned something else about my nieces. Holly and Noelle were not fans of cauliflower, including the smell of it roasting in the oven for dinner. Forcing children to eat anything that wasn’t necessary for their health was not in the Good Aunt handbook. So I promised I would buy Happy Meals on the way to my parents’ house if they helped me put together the main dish.

With cauliflower cooling on the counter, I held up the next part of the recipe. “This is quinoa, and we’ll cook it in coconut milk with yummy spices. It’s white, your favorite color.”

Both of them made gagging noises. I wondered what Wendy normally fed them, other than pizza. Still, since neither of them had run from the room, I opened the quinoa and got out the measuring cup for Holly.

“Does Gram know we have a dog?” Noelle asked.

“I thought we’d surprise her.” I planned to bring Bismarck along tonight so Mom could see we were well protected, but I didn’t plan to warn her. Inside every adult lurks a crafty teenager.

“My daddy likes dogs,” Holly said.

Bryce seemed like the kind of man who might, one who hugged his family and friends without fanfare, a man who could command a nuclear sub and still have tea parties with his daughters and their favorite stuffed animals.

“Do you know I was so little when I first met your dad that he used to read me storybooks?”

Noelle scrunched up her face, as if the idea that I, too, had once been a child, might take getting used to.

“He reads to us whenever he’s home,” Holly said. “But he’s not home a lot.”

“I know you miss him.”

“He listens when I talk, but I can’t talk to him about everything.”

That seemed like a strange thing for an eight-year-old to say, but maybe even at her tender age, Holly had realized that men didn’t always want to talk about things that matter to girls.

“Some things are hard to talk about,” I said, reflecting her words back with my best interview technique.

“I could get in trouble.”

This was the most she had revealed in all the years I’d known Holly. I took a few seconds to come up with a response. “I think your daddy would understand whatever you had to say.”

Holly shook her head. “But he’s not home most of the time.”