Cross My Heart (A Contemporary Romance Novel)

how much she hates being here, and then all of a sudden she’s talking about staying another month. Sometimes I get whiplash from the mood swings.”
    “Teenage girls can be hard to take,” Jenna said, carrying the asparagus into the dining room while he took the salmon and the rice. “They don’t mean half the things they say.”
    “Yeah, but which half?” he asked as he set the dishes on trivets. He took the asparagus from Jenna and set that down as well.
    Jenna laughed. “It depends on the day and the mood. Adolescent hormones are terrible things.”
    He did one last check of the table—he’d set out the salad and rolls before she arrived, and everything else was ready. “If I tell you the dumbest thing I ever did as a father, do you promise not to laugh?”
    In the softer light of this room, her eyes were darker, almost midnight blue. But they were still warm. “I’ll do my best.”
    “Last summer during her visit, Claire burst into tears for no reason. And I…well, I thought it would be helpful if I explained the science behind her mood swings. So I did. I even drew pictures.”
    “Pictures?”
    “Yeah. To illustrate the molecular structure of hormones.”
    She managed not to laugh out loud, but he saw the corners of her mouth twitch.
    “I guess I don’t have to tell you how that went over,” he said wryly. “It’s just…” he could still feel the frustration of that moment, the frustration he felt every time he talked to his daughter. “I really do want to help her. But all I have to offer is the kind of thing that helped me when I was her age. And it never works with Claire.”
    She was looking at him thoughtfully. “So even as a kid, you were into science?”
    She’d put a hand on the back of one of the dining room chairs, and he was struck by the way her fingers curved over the wood. She had graceful hands, sensitive and elegant. They could have been a surgeon’s hands.
    He nodded. “Big time. Science helped me through everything. Being able to understand the world around me was like a lifeline. An antidote for anything that was wrong.” He shook his head. “Claire doesn’t care about science at all. Everything I love, she hates. And I don’t understand the things she loves. Like music.”
    The laughter was gone from Jenna’s eyes, replaced by sympathy. “Sounds rough,” she said gently.
    How had the conversation turned so serious?
    “Sorry,” he said as he heard Claire coming down the stairs. “I didn’t mean to lay that all on you. I invited you for dinner, not an episode of the Dr. Phil show.”
    “I don’t mind at all,” Jenna said, reaching out to give his arm a quick squeeze. It was just a friendly gesture, there and gone, but he wasn’t expecting it and his pulse kicked into high gear. Luckily Claire came into the room before Jenna could notice his reaction.
    “I only brought one of your CDs with me because I have all your songs on my MP3 player, but it’s my favorite and I was wondering if you could sign the liner notes?”
    Claire sounded eager and excited, and Jenna grinned at her. “Of course I will.” She took the pen Claire held out, opened the CD case, and spent a few minutes writing.
    “There you go,” Jenna said, handing the case back to Claire. Curious, Michael came closer and read over his daughter’s shoulder. The page Jenna had written on was mostly white space, which had given her plenty of room.
    Sometimes it feels like nothing’s alive
    Everything dead but my raging heart
    Every beat a pain that drives, drives
    I want to be so alive I shake and quiver
    So alive I could believe in forever
    For Claire, from Jenna.
    Believe in forever.
    “That’s from my favorite Red Mollies song. How did you know that was my favorite song?” Claire asked, clutching the CD as if it were precious.
    “Lucky guess,” Jenna said. She was smiling, her blue eyes gentle, and it was obvious she understood things about Claire—about being a teenager—that he never would.
    His next door neighbor, a virtual stranger, had formed a closer bond with his daughter in half an hour than he had in fourteen years.
    “Dinner’s ready,” he said abruptly, and Jenna shot him a quick glance before she took her seat at the table.
    Claire was still chattering. Watching her talk and laugh so easily with Jenna, he realized how much he wanted a better relationship with his daughter.
    When he looked at Jenna, he found himself wishing for something else, too.
    But he knew