“I’ll do it,” Kiah said, pushing back from the table. “Your turn tomorrow, Charm and Mina.”
And with a wink Mina’s way, he gathered up the dishes and followed Miss Pearl to the kitchen.
Mina glanced over at Charm and found the young girl looking at her in return. This time Charm didn’t turn away but tilted her chin up in the air.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked, the defensiveness in her voice clear.
“Because I can’t get over how much you remind me of your mom. I’m sorry I’m staring,” Mina added, realizing how rude it must seem.
“In what way am I like her?” Charm shot back, looking as though she didn’t really expect an answer that would suit, and Mina couldn’t help chuckling.
“Well, not just how you look—and you do look a lot like her—but even just then, how you spoke reminded me of her. Do you know what her favorite saying was, when we were young?”
Charm shook her head, still looking skeptical.
“She’d always say, ‘Prove it,’ any time someone said something she didn’t agree with or didn’t know for a fact to be true.” Mina felt a wave of sadness but tried not to let it show. “She didn’t take any nonsense from anyone.”
Charm considered that for a moment and then asked, “Were you good friends with her? Like you are with Uncle Kiah?”
Mina shook her head. “Not as good friends. She was a little younger than us, and...” She hesitated for a moment, and then decided honesty would always be the best policy with Charm. “Well, your grandmother didn’t approve of her hanging out with us. She’d let us take her to the movies or the fair sometimes, but mostly your mom had her own friends.”
She was expecting Charm to ask why, but the youngster just gave a little frown and said, “Did you like her?”
“Your mom?”
Please don’t be asking about your grandmother.
Charm nodded, her gaze intent on Mina’s face.
Heaving a silent sigh of relief, Mina nodded back. “I did. She was the kind of person who was honest with how she felt. You never had to guess what she thought. And she had a great sense of humor. One of those dry, slightly sarcastic ones, you know? But she was never mean. She didn’t say things to hurt anyone, just told the truth, as she saw it.”
A little smile touched the edges of Charm’s lips. Then she glanced toward the kitchen before looking back at Mina once more, the smile fading.
“Granny Pearl and Uncle Kiah don’t talk about her much.”
Mina’s heart ached, and it took everything she had to keep eye contact with Charm and not tear up.
“Sometimes, when something hurts so much, it’s hard to talk about.”
It was the best she could offer, but it seemed to satisfy Charm, who nodded slowly again.
Then, as if she’d had enough of that topic, she tipped her chin toward where Mina’s left arm lay on her lap, and said, “So what happened to your hand?”
Taken aback, Mina didn’t answer right away, and Charm frowned, her eyes narrowing. “Oh, I get it,” she said. “You get to know every little thing about me, but I don’t get to ask about you.”
Mina couldn’t help chuckling, although it came out of a throat that felt too tight for comfort.
“There you go again. You sounded just like your mom.” Then, still being subjected to Charm’s glare, she continued, “My hand got crushed in a boating accident.”
Just saying it out loud again brought a rush of emotions—rage, pain and grief all wrapped up together. Charm’s frown softened, although not totally going away.
“Couldn’t the doctors do anything to fix it?”
Mina shook her head, the irony of it still bitter. “It was too badly damaged, and couldn’t be saved. That’s what I used to do, you know—fix broken, crushed and shattered bones. When I saw the X-rays of my hand, I knew even I couldn’t have done anything other than what the surgeon who worked on me did.”
There were footsteps in the hallway leading from the kitchen, and when Kiah came into the dining room, both Mina and Charm turned to look at him.
“What are you two up to in here?” he asked, giving them an exaggeratedly suspicious glance.
Totally deadpan, Charm responded, “Plotting to take over the world.”
“Well,” he shot back as Mina sputtered into laughter. “I’m sorry to interrupt the planning session, but it’s time for you to start getting ready for bed. All your homework done?”
“Yes,” Charm said. “I didn’t have a lot. Just some math problems, and they were easy-peasy.”
“Lemon-squeezy?” Kiah tacked on, making it a question.
“You know it,” she replied, pushing back her chair and getting up. “Mrs. Hastings is talking about letting me do some advanced work for the rest of the year. I brought home a note about it but told her she’d have to wait for you to get back before she got an answer.”
“I’ll take a look at it tomorrow,” Kiah said, snagging Charm as she was going by and pulling her in for a hug.
Even though Charm said, “Uncle,” in a disgusted tone, Mina saw how she rested her head against Kiah’s chest and smiled when he planted a kiss on the top of her head.
“Have your shower, and then you can read for half an hour before it’s lights out, okay?”
“It’s still early,” Charm said, ducking out of the hug and heading for her room. “If I hurry up and bathe, can I read for an hour?”
“Bathe properly, and then forty-five minutes.”
“Deal,” came her answer from down the hall.
Kiah gazed after her for a moment, and then turned his smile on Mina. Something about the tender set of his lips melted her heart, and she smiled back.
“If I don’t keep an eye on her, she’d stay up all night reading,” he said, holding out his hand to Mina. “Let’s go sit outside for a while. There’s a nice breeze tonight.”
Instinctively she took that outstretched hand, and then everything froze, just for an
