Snowbound - Harlequin.com

94 SNOWBOUND
Her laugh was a lovely cascade of notes. “But he
must have courted her, once upon a time.”
“No, I think she courted him. She asked him to marry
her, and he nodded.”
Fiona giggled. “What does he do? For a living, I
mean.”
“Plumbing. Has his own business.”
“Did he want you to go into it?”
“Fallon and Son? Don’t know.”
Solemnly she concluded, “He never said.”
This time, they laughed together. John was astonished
by the sound. No, not just the sound, but the
feeling. It took him a minute to identify it. Happiness,
or something close. He felt carefree.
She’d opened the dishwasher and begun loading it.
“So what do they think of your taking up innkeeping?”
He tried to stay relaxed. “They’re puzzled.”
You’re not yourself, his mother had said. Johnny,
what happened to you?
He hadn’t been able to tell her. I killed too many
people. Some I didn’t mean to kill.
Mom wouldn’t have understood. She wouldn’t have
had any words to put in Dad’s mouth.
“Your brother or sister?” Fiona asked, as casually as
if the conversation hadn’t become emotionally loaded.
“Or do you have both?”
“Two sisters. They’re puzzled, too.”
That wasn’t entirely true. Mary, much like his mother
in personality, was. Liz, quieter and more thoughtful
like John, had come to him and said, “I’ve been reading
things. I know lots of soldiers have been coming back