Her brows were still drawn together when she brought her gaze to his. “I guess she didn’t like me.”

He heard everything just as clearly as if she’d spoken her thoughts aloud. He was greatly touched, and not a little impressed. “Couldn’t stand you.”

Her eyes widened, then brightened with laughter. “Because I’m such a brat.”

“Right. I can barely stand you myself.”

“Well.” Sarah huffed a moment. “She didn’t look stupid, but I guess she is if she wouldn’t marry you.” She cuddled against him, and knowing it was to comfort, Hunter warmed with love. “I liked her,” Sarah murmured. “She was nice, kinda quiet, but really nice when she smiled. I guess you love her.”

“Yes, I do.” He didn’t offer her any words of reassurance—it’s different from the way I love you, you’ll always be my little girl. Hunter simply held her, and it was enough. “She loves me, too, but she has to make her own life.”

Sarah didn’t understand that, and personally thought it was foolish, but decided not to say so. “I guess I wouldn’t mind if she decided to marry you after all. It might be nice to have somebody who’d be like a mother.”

He lifted a brow. She never asked about her own mother, knowing with a child’s intuition, he supposed, that there was nothing to ask about. “Aren’t I?”

“You’re pretty good,” she told him graciously. “But you don’t know a whole lot about lady stuff.” Sarah sniffed the air, then grinned. “Meat loaf’s done.”

“Overdone, from the smell of it.”

“Picky, picky.” She jumped off his lap before he could retaliate. “I hear a car coming. You can ask them to dinner so we can get rid of all the biscuits.”

He didn’t want company, Hunter thought as he watched his daughter dash out of the room. An evening with Sarah was enough, then he’d go back to work. After switching off his machine, he rose to go to the door. It was probably one of her friends, who’d talked her parents into dropping by on their way home from town. He’d brush them off, as politely as he could manage, then see if anything could be done about Sarah’s meat loaf.

When he opened the door, she was standing there, her hair caught in the light of a late summer’s evening. He was, quite literally, knocked breathless.

“Hello, Hunter.” How calm a voice could sound, Lee thought, even when a heart’s hammering against ribs. “I’d’ve called, but your number’s unlisted.” When he said nothing, Lee felt her heart move from her ribs to her throat. Somehow, she managed to speak over it. “May I come in?”