Patrick's Destiny by Sherryl Woods Page A

“even if I don’t see nearly enough of you these days.”
    Alice slid onto a stool and faced her friend. “I’m sorry.”
    “Don’t apologize, just start coming around a bit more. You class up the place.”
    Alice laughed. “Hardly. If anything, having the kindergarten teacher around will kill your business.”
    “Since your visiting is such a rare thing, to what do I owe the honor…or need I ask? I imagine you came by to find out what went on with Patrick after you left last night,” Molly said, giving her a sly once-over.
    “Why would you think that?” Alice asked, as heat crept into her cheeks.
    “Oh, please! When you were in here with the kids yesterday, you were watching the man as if he were covered in Belgian chocolate and you were in desperate need of a major fix of the stuff. You were no better last night.”
    “Don’t be ridiculous!” Alice protested indignantly.
    Molly grinned. “Then I suppose it is of absolutely no interest to you that he’s sitting over in the corner, brooding over his fourth cup of coffee.”
    Alice barely resisted the sudden desire to bury her burning face in her hands. “He’s here?”
    “Has been for a couple of hours now. His brothers just left.”
    “Why didn’t you say something sooner?” Snippets of their conversation came back to her. “Molly, what if he heard?”
    “Honey, he’s lost in his own thoughts. And I wasn’t exactly shouting, you know. I do know a little bit about being discreet.”
    “Since when?” Alice asked, getting in her own barb. “Aren’t you the girl who kept a record of the boys she’d kissed on the front of her English notebook in seventh grade?”
    “I’m better now,” Molly said primly. “All the juicy stuff about my love life is in the journal beside my bed.” She studied Alice intently. “So, are you going to go over there or not?”
    Alice glanced across the room and spotted Patrick inthe corner. He was staring into his mug of coffee as if he’d never before seen anything so fascinating…or so sad.
    Alice made a decision on impulse, something she’d done more in the past two days than she had in years. “Pour me two cups of coffee,” she told Molly.
    “Want me to slip a little Irish whiskey in his? It might loosen his tongue. I tried earlier, but I couldn’t get a word out of him.”
    Alice was tempted, but she shook her head. If she could get a shy five-year-old to start chattering like a magpie, surely she could deal with one stoically silent male.
    Coffee in hand, she crossed the room and slid into the booth opposite Patrick. He didn’t even seem to notice her until she shoved one mug under his nose. Then he blinked and stared.
    “Where’d you come from?” he asked, sounding cranky and not the least bit delighted to see her.
    Relieved at the evidence that he’d heard none of Molly’s teasing, she ignored the lack of welcome. “Are you asking in the cosmic sense?”
    A half smile tugged at his lips. “It’s too early in the morning for that.”
    “It’s past ten.”
    Clearly startled, he stared at the clock over the bar. “How the hell did that happen?”
    “The usual way. Time goes by, tick-tock, minute by minute.”
    “Very funny.” He sat back and studied her, the tension in his shoulders visibly easing. “So, Alice Newberry, what are you doing hanging out in a bar at ten o’clock on a Saturday morning? Do the parents of your students know where you spend your free time?”
    She bit back the first response that popped into her head. It would be way too revealing to admit that this was the first Saturday morning she’d ever ventured into Jess’s. Patrick might have been lost in thought there for a minute, but he wasn’t dense. He’d likely make the connection between her presence here today and his the night before. She didn’t want him guessing that she was here to check on the outcome of his meeting with his brothers, after she’d made such a point of not intruding on it.
    “Actually,