“And,” he said in a voice low enough that only she could hear, “the checker called him an idiot in front of the customers. Among other insults.”
Her gaze shot to Jeremy again, her eyes darkened with worry. And a deep sorrow that Will wished he could erase permanently. “Is he okay?”
“He’s fine. Your brother is resilient. Compassionate, too. He actually asked me not to have the woman fired, because she’s got a sick mother.”
Leaning forward, she slid her plate onto the coffee table, and somehow, when she sat back, she seemed farther away from him. “Why did he think you were going to have the woman fired?”
“I made her apologize. In front of everyone who had just witnessed her acting like such a jerk.” He shook his head. “I know I’m always telling you not to apologize, but when people do something they know is wrong, they need to apologize for their actions.”
He was one to talk, wasn’t he, considering he could never say he was sorry for all the things he’d done in the past. Still, that didn’t mean he would allow Jeremy to be denigrated.
“Do you know what it’s like in that store at that time of day?” he asked.
She frowned again. “I know it’s busy. I just never thought—”
Belatedly realizing his question might have sounded too harsh, he touched her hair again, drawing her back in. “What I’m trying to say is that I’m not so sure it’s the best place for him. It’s too chaotic.”
Her jaw tensed as though she was clenching her teeth. “It gives him purpose. He’s always said he likes it.” Once again, her gaze shifted to Jeremy.
This was Will’s chance to make a difference for them. “I’ve got a better idea. I talked to my people and I found him a place in my mailroom.”
Her nostrils twitched. Like a mother rabbit sensing danger to her young. Yet again, she reminded him of Susan, who had taken better care of him than anyone in the world. Better care than he’d ever thought anyone would.
“You work in the city,” Harper said. “He has school until noon, and the bus drops him off at the store. I can’t get him all the way up to your office.”
“I have a driver who can pick him up after school. And I can bring him home at the end of the day.”
“I see you’ve thought everything through.”
Yes, he’d considered the proposal from every angle. That’s what he did: analyzed each scenario and conquered every possible problem that could arise. “I’ll make it good for him, Harper. And he told me he’d like to do it, that he won’t miss his job at the grocery store.”
In a heartbeat, she went as cold as a Chicago night in winter. “You already told him about this? Without discussing it with me first?”
He felt the stillness settle around them. The TV played on, and so did the leopard cubs, while a chilly silence dropped over Harper and him.
And that was when Will realized, far too late, that he’d just made a huge tactical mistake with the woman who had already become the most important person in his life.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Jeremy, don’t you have some homework for tomorrow?” Harper heard the snap in her voice, but she wasn’t able to moderate it just yet.
Her brother looked at her over his shoulder. “Uh-huh.”
“Then you’d better go do it.” She heard a sound in her head like rocks grinding. It was her teeth. “And say thank you to Will for dinner.”
“Thanks, Will.”
As Jeremy turned off the TV and headed for his room, Harper continued to feel like the breath had been knocked out of her. Her brother had been verbally abused at work. And she shouldn’t have had to hear it from Will. She should have known, should have been checking in with Jeremy to make sure everything was okay at the store every day. But every evening when she picked him up, he came bounding out full of stories about anything and everything. She’d told herself that must mean things were okay.
How could she have been so careless?
She stood and grabbed her plate of food, which was growing more unappealing by the second.
“Harper,” Will said, but she stalked out of the room without answering.
Will had figured out how to fix the situation. How to fix her failure. How to fix the fact that she was a rotten sister and a terrible guardian. She thought she’d been doing everything for her brother, but had she really, when all Will had to do was walk into the grocery store and spot all the problems in a second?
“Harper,” Will said again, following her into the kitchen.
She almost slammed the plate down on the counter. The immaculate counter. He’d even cleaned up after her like she couldn’t take care of her house. Like she couldn’t take care of Jeremy. If she hadn’t folded the laundry last night, he probably would have done that, too, showing what a mess she was. And look—he’d even cleaned up Jeremy’s crayons.
Damn it, she thought as frustration ate her up from the inside, I’m doing the best I can.
But clearly it wasn’t good enough.