Page 107 of Stripping Bare

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When Tessaand Micki arrived at Tupelo Hill, Miss Joan threatened to permanently take away Micki’s laptop if she didn’t give it a rest and go lie down. Micki frowned and stomped up the stairs to the second floor with Badger on herheels.

“Do people realize you rule with the iron-fist-in-a-velvet-glove strategy?” Tessa asked MissJoan.

With quick competent movements, she was transferring four different types of holiday cookies into gift boxes. “Early on, I only gave my kids two choices, both of which were acceptable tome.”

“Like juice ormilk?”

“You get theidea.”

“That’s downright brilliant.” And a strategy she’d be slipping into her back pocket for any future children she and Jonah… No, it was too soon to start conjuring up hopeful images of bright and broody little boys who looked likeJonah.

“That’s the only way I could handle six of them without being trampledon.”

“I understand you raised them primarily by yourself.” Wheedling out that little detail had taken Tessa months ofaccidentallyrunning into Jonah in the Steele Trap breakroom.

“You’re asking about Eddy, aren’tyou?”

“I met him last night. He stopped by the Murchisonbuilding.”

“Really?” She paused in her cookie box packing. “Do you knowwhy?”

“Jonah didn’t”—or wouldn’t—“say. They had a private conversation that he didn’t share withme.”

“I was brought up believing that the good Lord doesn’t give anyone more than she can bear. But when my Eddy started disappearing for longer periods of time, I sometimes thought God had finally blown his perfect record.” She chuckled. “Especially on cold days when all the kids were cooped up inside. Britt tried his best to be an impartial referee for his younger siblings. But it’s not a role he ever should’ve had to take on.” She slid a platter of cookies onto the table and went back to the counter to fetch two big mugs filled to the brim with hot chocolate and fat marshmallows. “Micki’ll pout when she gets up and realizes we had cookies withouther.”

With the mound of them—sugar with red sprinkles, almond biscotti, shortbread, and gingerbread people—on the plate, Micki didn’t have to worry about leftovers. But Tessa might have to start worrying about her waistband if she spent more time with Jonah’smother.

That would be a reasonable price to pay if she could get to know this wonderful womanbetter.

Miss Joan eyed the laptop. “I know you’re chomping at the bit to get back to your research, so feel free to snack andwork.”

“How did youknow?”

“Two of my children are technology prodigies, although how that happened, I will never know. For years, I’ve watched the way they fidget when they can’t wait to get their hands on some kind of machine because they justhaveto knowsomething.”

Oh. She had been tapping her fingernails against the side of her mug, hadn’tshe?

“So don’t mind me. I’m going to grab a pad of paper and start thinking about all the ways I want to spoil my newgrandbaby.”

Tessa needed to go back though all her Steele Trap sessions, but found herself opening the recording she’d made the night she’d strong-armed Jonah into talking with her after they had sex. She should’ve deleted it when Micki regained access to herfiles.

No, she should’ve deleted it longago.

What she hadn’t realized until later was that when her jacket had fallen to the floor the night they made love in his office, her recorder had clicked on. Had captured every word, every sigh, every moan of pleasure betweenthem.

She fast-forwarded past the illicitly recorded sex and listened to the conversation—if it could be called that—they’d hadafter.

“I don’t want to be like them,” she heard him say. “They paid, but it wasn’t enough.” The few times she hadn’t been able to resist listening to the file in the past, she’d always focused on Jonah’s first statement. But now, the wordsthey paidseemed louder than all theothers.

Who hadn’tpaid?

He couldn’t have been talking about Shaw and the others because they hadn’t paid.Unless…

Had Jonah decided to somehow make thempay?

Stirring that pot now might destroy this tenuous bond between her and Jonah, but she had toknow.