Holiday in Stone Creek: A Stone Creek Christmas. Linda Miller Lael

with his normal world. “You watch HGTV and DIY?” he asked after taking a sip of java to steady himself.

       “Doesn’t everybody?” Sophie countered. “I’ve been thinking of flipping houses when I grow up.” She looked so much like her mother, with her long, shiny hair and expressive eyes. Right now those eyes held a mixture of trepidation, exuberance and sturdy common sense.

       “Trust me,” Tanner said, treading carefully, finding his way over uncertain ground, because they weren’t really talking about real estate and he knew it. “Flipping houses is harder than a thirty-minute TV show makes it seem.”

       “You should know,” Sophie agreed airily, taking in the pitiful kitchen again. “You’ll manage to turn this one over for a big profit, though, just like all the others.”

       Tanner dragged a chair back from the table and sort of fell into it. “Sit down, Soph,” he said. “We’ve got more important things to discuss than the lineup on your favorite TV channels.”

       Sophie crossed the room dramatically and dropped into a chair of her own. She’d had the pajamas she was wearing now stashed in her backpack, which showed she’d been planning to ditch the school group in New York, probably before she left Briarwood. Now she was playing it cool.

       Tanner thought of Ms. Wiggins’s plans to steer her into the thespian program at school, and stifled a grimace. His sister, Tessa, had been a show-business kid, discovered when she did some catalog modeling in Dallas at the age of eight. She’d done commercials, guest roles and finally joined a long-running hit TV series. As far as he was concerned, that had been the wrong road. It was as though Tessa—wonderful, smart, beautiful Tessa—had peaked at twenty-one, and been on a downhill slide ever since.

       “You’re mad because I ran away,” Sophie said, sitting up very straight, like a witness taking the stand. She seemed to think good posture might sway the judge to decide in her favor. In any case, she was still acting.

       “Mad as hell,” Tanner agreed. “That was a stupid, dangerous thing to do, and don’t think you’re going to get away with it just because I’m so glad to see you.”

       The small face brightened. “Are you glad to see me, Dad?”

       “Sophie, of course I am. I’m your father. I miss you a lot when we’re apart.”

       She sighed and shut off the drama switch. Or at least dimmed it a little. “Most of the time,” she said, “I feel like one of those cardboard statues.”

       Tanner frowned, confused. “Run that by me again?”

       “You know, those life-size depictions you see in the video store sometimes? Johnny Depp, dressed up like Captain Jack, or Kevin Costner like Wyatt Earp, or something like that?”

       Tanner nodded, but he was still pretty confounded. There was nothing two-dimensional about Sophie—she was 3-D all the way.

       But did she know that?

       “It’s as if I’m made of cardboard as far as you’re concerned,” she went on thoughtfully. “When I’m around, great. When I’m not, you just tuck me away in a closet to gather dust until you want to get me out again.”

       Tanner’s gut clenched, hard. And his throat went tight. “Soph—”

       “I know you don’t really think of me that way, Dad,” his daughter broke in, imparting her woman-child wisdom. “But it feels as if you do. That’s all I’m saying.”

       “And I’m saying I don’t want you to feel that way, Soph. Ever. All I’m doing is trying to keep you safe.”

       “I’d rather be happy.”

       Another whammy. Tanner got up, emptied his cup at the sink and nonsensically filled it up again. Stood with his back to the counter, leaning a little, watching his daughter and wondering if all twelve-year-olds were as complicated as she was.

       “You’ll understand when you’re older,” he ventured.

       “I understand now,” Sophie pressed, and she looked completely convinced. “You’re the bravest man I know—you were Special Forces in the military, with Uncle Jack—but you’re scared, too. You’re scared I’ll get hurt because of what happened to Mom.”

       “You can’t possibly remember that very well.”

       Benevolent contempt. “I was seven, Dad. Not two.” She paused, and her eyes darkened with pain. “It was awful. I kept thinking, This can’t be real, my mom can’t be gone, but she was.”

       Tanner went to his daughter, laid a hand on top of her head, too choked up to speak.

       Sophie twisted slightly in the chair, so she could look up at him. “Here’s the thing, Dad. Bad things happen to people. Good people, like you and me and Mom. You have to cry a lot, and feel really bad, because you can’t help it, it hurts so much. But then you’ve got to go on. Mom wouldn’t want us living apart like we do. I know she wouldn’t.”

       He thought of the last dream-visit from Kat, and once again felt a cautious sense of peace rather than the grief he kept expecting to hit him. He also recalled the way he’d abandoned himself in Olivia’s arms the day before, in his bed, and a stab of guilt pricked his conscience, small and needle sharp.

       “Your mother,” he said firmly, “would want what’s best for you. And that’s getting a first-rate education in a place where you can’t be hurt.”