Page 33 of Lost and Found

Good question, kid. Wes didn’t know how he’d answer that, much less Bailey.

Her smile wavered. She clearly didn’t want to lie, but she also wouldn’t needlessly worry Matt. “We used to work together.”

Wes didn’t like the description, but he couldn’t think of a better one. They weren’t friends. Had never been. Yet when she laid the truth out there for Matt, Wes wished the answer had been different.

She tipped her head toward the living room. “Why don’t you keep watching the movie?”

Matt didn’t move. Stubborn like his mom. Wes liked that for the kid but had to imagine Bailey found it less amusing. How old was Matt? Couldn’t have been over four or five years old. Wes didn’t know exactly, but too young for the wariness in his blue eyes.

Wes kept his distance. “What movie are you watching?”

Matt skirted his eyes to Bailey, then back to Wes. “Cars.”

“Nice.” Wes smiled and weighed the dynamic. Mom in need of protection. Nervous kid. Bailey’s cold case was no longer Wes’s main concern. She’d been dealing with a break-in when she had a kid at home. That was definitely something she and Vivian should have told him. “I like Mater. Mater always makes me laugh.”

Surprise took over Matt’s face. “Me too!”

Wes took a careful step closer. Matt’s worry returned. Wes retraced his step and backed up once more, just to be sure. Yeah, he was missing a big piece of the puzzle.

Bailey faked an easygoing grin. “You can watch Cars with a Popsicle. What do you say?”

She was breaking out the big guns. Wes smiled too. It felt like he was showing too many teeth. Kids could read people like a lie detector machine. Could Matt see the way he was floundering? Or faking it? Or completely trying to rearrange everything he understood to get a handle on this situation? “I wouldn’t mind a Popsicle.”

Matt eyed them. The kid clearly knew the Popsicle offer was a tactic but couldn’t resist the call of sugar. “What color do you like?”

“Purple,” Wes said.

Matt gave an approving nod at his answer and turned toward Bailey. “Can we both have purple?”

“I wonder if there are three purples.” She headed toward the freezer and rifled through a box. “Success!” Bailey turned around with three Popsicles. “One for you. Two for Wes.” She handed him a Popsicle. “And three for me.”

“Thank you.” Matt tore the paper off.

“Now go watch your movie.”

With the Popsicle in his mouth, he hustled away. A moment later, Cars played in the living room. Wes could finally take a breath.

“The magic of Popsicles,” she said. “You don’t actually have to eat that if you don’t want to.”

“When in Rome.” He unwrapped his. Was he scared of children? Absolutely not. He’d just been caught off guard. “You have a kid.”

She tore off her wrapper and waved him to sit across from her. “I do.”

He couldn’t sit down yet. Wes took her Popsicle wrapper and dumped their trash into the bin. A kid explained why she hurried out of the office today at approximately the same time she left yesterday. Wes returned to the far side of the table from Bailey and tried the Popsicle. “Not bad.”

“You can’t go wrong with purple.”

He glanced around the kitchen. “Anyone else here?”

“Nope.”

That didn’t mean no one else lived with her. “Did you remarry?”

She licked the Popsicle. “Nope.”

This was a little awkward. “Could you throw me a bone here, Bailey? I don’t know what the hell’s going on.”

“That’s not my fault. Do you usually show up at your colleagues’ houses without calling ahead?”