“The girls are very lucky to have someone like you around,” Hailey remarked, adding her praise to Becky’s. “You’re really a natural born father,” she told him with enthusiasm.
Dillon looked at her sharply. Rather than take her words as a compliment, the way she had intended, she saw Dillon’s face darken in response. Not only that, but he seemed to withdraw and totally shut down right before her eyes.
Hailey’s comment had hit far too close to home, Dillon thought. And just like that, it had brought with it all sorts of thoughts, not to mention regrets, that he was trying his best to at least bury temporarily, at least until he was able to do something about the situation.
But right now, given this resurrected frame of mind, he needed to leave. Otherwise, he was afraid he’d wind up bringing the little girls down and that was the last thing he wanted to do.
Hailey saw the change in Dillon immediately.
Stunned, Hailey could only wonder what had triggered it.
For heaven’s sake, she had given the man a compliment, not verbally filleted him, she thought, at a loss.
Confused, when Hailey looked at Dillon’s sister-in-law for some sort of an explanation or enlightenment, Becky only shook her head, a blank, bewildered expression on her face.
Obviously Becky didn’t understand his reaction any more than she did.
She was on the verge of asking Dillon what she’d said that was so wrong, but now that the class over, he gave her the impression that he was going to leave.
Immediately.
His next words, addressed to Becky, confirmed her impression.
“I’ve got to get going, Becky,” he told his sister-in-law. “You’ll be okay?”
“Yes, of course,” she told Dillon with a weary smile.
But his nieces, it seemed, had another opinion on the matter. Each little girl grabbed hold of one of Dillon’s arms clinging like limpets to keep him from leaving.
Although he clearly doted on the girls, Dillon looked resolved. He was leaving.
Bending down to the point that he appeared to be folding up his large frame, Dillon kissed the top of each twin’s head.
“I’m afraid I have to go, girls. But I’ll be back,” Dillon promised. Taking hold of one of the girls’ hands, he gently tried to extricate himself from his tiny rabid fan club.
As he made progress with one, the other little girl would grab onto him, giggling as if this was a fine new game she and her sister were playing.
“C’mon, girls, let go of your uncle,” Becky said a bit more forcefully than the way Dillon had expressed his feelings. “He’ll be back soon. Won’t you, Uncle Dillon?” she asked, looking at her brother-in-law for his confirmation.
“You bet,” Dillon responded. But even so, when he tried to pull his hands away, his nieces continued to hold onto him for dear life.
Hailey sensed that she had to come to the rescue to keep this from ending with the little girls in tears.
“Hey, how would you girls like some ice cream?” Hailey asked, saying the word ice cream as if it were the most wonderful treat imaginable and theirs exclusively to enjoy.
That seemed to do the trick. Letting go of their uncle’s hands, the twins eagerly gathered around Hailey, their eyes huge with anticipation.
“Well, you’re in luck. I just happen to know where we can find some.” Hailey glanced over toward Becky. “Is it okay, Mom?”
Becky laughed. “How could I say no?”
“Well then, come on. Let’s go get these hardworking little ladies some well-deserved ice cream,” Hailey coaxed for the twins’ benefit.
As she herded the girls toward the spa’s designated kitchen area, she glanced over her shoulder toward Dillon. She expected to see him watching them.
Hailey was disappointed to see that he had used the opportunity to make good his escape. He was clearly anxious to get away, and although it could all very well be connected to his business, she couldn’t shake the feeling that it had something to do with what she’d said.
But how could what she had clearly meant to be a compliment have had such an adverse effect on Dillon?
And why? What did he think she meant by it?
Hailey suppressed a sigh as she led the little girls and their mother into the kitchen. It just made absolutely no sense to her.
But she intended to find out, she promised herself. Her curiosity had been aroused and she wasn’t one of those people who was content to just let things go. She wasn’t going to be happy or know any peace until she had an answer.
She began by asking Becky.
“Do you have any idea what made your brother-in-law suddenly turn tail and run like that?” Hailey asked as soon as she had handed ice-cream cups to Becky’s daughters after first carefully pulling off the tops. She also presented each little girl with a small spoon and armed herself with a lot of napkins for the cleanup she knew would be ahead.
“Well, he didn’t exactly run,” Becky tactfully pointed out. “And he did say that he had to be getting back, probably for the same reason that Callum couldn’t make it here in the first place,” Becky surmised.
Hailey thought about letting the matter drop, but her curiosity just wouldn’t let her.
That was why, in the next moment, she heard herself asking, “Do you really think that?”
Becky neatly turned the words around without appearing to be argumentative. “You don’t?”
“I’m not really sure what to think,” Hailey confessed honestly. “One minute, Dillon is all but cavorting with your kids, acting like just another big kid himself. The next minute, he’s acting like a dark rain cloud about to let loose with a deluge, all because I paid him a compliment.” She rolled what she’d said over in her mind, searching for what might have offended him about the words she’d used.
Coming up empty, she decided to say her comment out loud, hoping that might trigger something for Becky. “I said that he had the makings of a really great father. Why would that upset him?
