Hailey looked at Becky, waiting, but the latter only shook her head helplessly. “I’m afraid I have no idea. I really don’t know very much about Dillon.” She smiled ruefully at Hailey. “I’m still learning things about Callum,” she confessed.
Hailey felt guilty about prodding the woman. Heaven knew Becky had more than enough to deal with between her job, her new marriage and her little girls.
“I’m sorry, you’re right. I have no business playing twenty questions with you about Dillon. He probably misunderstood what I was saying to him.” She waved away the whole thing as if she could literally erase it with her hand. “Forget I said anything,” she told the new Mrs. Fortune.
Getting up from the small snack table, Hailey handed Becky the fistful of napkins she’d grabbed earlier. “For cleanup,” she explained, nodding at the twins. “Although it does look like they managed to get a little bit of ice cream into their mouths,” she deadpanned.
Becky laughed, wiping the mouth of the twin who was closest to her.
“That’s better than they usually manage to do,” she told Hailey. “I’m just glad you gave them vanilla instead of chocolate. It always looks so much messier with chocolate ice cream. I can’t wait until they grow out of this phase and they can eat like normal people without creating such an awful mess.”
Hailey nodded as she took possession of the used napkins that Becky was discarding. “I understand, but I also know that according to some more seasoned mothers I’ve talked to, you are going to look back someday and miss this.”
Becky sighed as she rose, taking each semi-cleaned twin by the hand. “I know that you’re probably right. But I sure would like the chance to find that out for myself,” she said, then tagged on the word, “Soon.”
“The next Mommy and Me class is the same time on Friday,” Hailey said, calling after the departing woman.
Looking over her shoulder, Becky promised, “I’ll be here.”
Hailey couldn’t help wondering if that meant that Dillon would be coming with Becky, as well. Or had her comment about fatherhood scared him away from here permanently?
Get over yourself, Hailey. If the man doesn’t show up, it’s because his brother was able to take his place. Or rather, take his own rightful place. Callum’s the one who married Becky, the one who adopted the twins. Not Dillon.
Hailey sighed as she walked away, heading to another part of the spa. There was no doubt about it. She could all but hear Janelle’s voice in her head, telling her that she was spending much too much time thinking about Dillon. It was energy that was better spent elsewhere.
But that being true or not, Hailey couldn’t help thinking and wondering about the elusive Fortune brother. She still didn’t know very much about him other than the general information that was available about all the Fortune brothers who were currently working hard renovating and building up the town of Rambling Rose.
She knew that Dillon hailed from Florida, a good place, in her opinion, to be from, if for no other reason than the place was rumored to have mosquitoes you could put a saddle on and ride.
She also knew that he was part of a far larger family than the seven siblings he had mentioned, although it seemed to her that having seven siblings was definitely large enough for anyone. He was involved in the construction company with his brothers, but unlike Steven and Callum, she didn’t have a clue what the man’s marital status was,
Was his family covering for Dillon for some reason?
No, that didn’t seem possible. Ellie didn’t strike her as being a devious person.
Neither, for that matter, did Becky. If her gut impression meant anything, neither were Steven and Callum. They seemed to be rather genuine if she had to make an assessment of the men.
So what was Dillon’s big secret—if there was a secret?
And if there was no secret, why had Ellie intimated that he might not be in the market for a woman at this time? Was he recovering from a bad relationship?
More importantly, why had he suddenly grown so quiet and all but run away when she had said that harmless comment about him having the makings of being a good father?
She chewed on her lower lip, feeling confused and bewildered.
None of it made any sense to her.
But that didn’t mean that she was going to just let it lay there, waiting for someone to say something in passing that would wind up clearing it up for her some time down the line.
No, Hailey told herself, she fully accepted the challenge of unscrambling this mystery, of getting to the bottom of it and making sense of the situation.
Now.
For some reason, what she had said to Dillon about his making a good father had definitely not sat well with the man. That either meant that he secretly wanted to be a father or he already was one and had made what he probably considered to be a horrible, irreversible mess of the situation.
There was a third, sadder alternative to that. He already had become a father but no longer was one because the child had either died or been whisked away by his or her mother, not to be found again.
But if that were the case, wouldn’t one of his brothers have known about that? And if one knew, wouldn’t he have shared that piece of information with his wife?
The logical answer to that was yes, but Hailey had a feeling that there was absolutely nothing logical about this case.
Which meant that she wasn’t going to have any peace until she was able to find out what the big mystery surrounding Dillon was.
And she fully intended to.
Chapter Seven
Despite her best efforts to focus on all the hundred and one details she had to see to in order to keep the spa in top running condition, Hailey still found herself looking forward to Friday and, specifically,
