The Carpenter & the Queen Read Online Free PDF Page B

to,”
Garrett said as he climbed into his truck Monday afternoon. Claire
stood on the sidewalk holding her unzipped coat closed.
    “I’ll be fine, Garrett. Sam and I just have
to get our bearings.”
    “Say the word, and I’ll be here with boxes
and the trailer to move you back.”
    “I’m where I want to be.”
    “I just don’t want you to think that you have to be here. The will didn’t say you had to keep
it.”
    “I know. I want to keep it.”
    Garrett eyed the house with a frown.
“There’s a lot of work to be done. You know I’ll help with
whatever—“
    “I know.” She smiled.
    Why couldn’t men understand what a woman
wanted without her having to spell it out? She wasn’t opposed to
dropping hints in order to help a guy a long, but clueless men
exasperated Claire, her brother most of all.
     
    * * * * *
     
    “We’re registering you for school today,”
Claire told Sam. Garrett had just left, and they were unpacking
Sam’s books and putting them on the shelves in his room.
    “Aw, man!” Sam wrinkled his nose.
    “You don’t want to repeat the third grade
because you missed something.”
    “I know all the third grade stuff already. I
was the smartest kid in my class.”
    “Well, this is a new school and the rules
are different.”
    “Mom,” Sam’s voice dripped with disdain,
“all schools have the same rules. Don’t run in the hallways. Obey
the teacher. Keep your hands to yourself. Stuff like that.”
    “True, but the way the kids behave will be
different. You’re the new kid, so you’ll have to learn the way they
do things here and fit in.”
    Sam shrugged. Claire could tell he had heard
all he was going to hear, so there wasn’t much point in continuing
her lecture. She changed the subject instead.
    “Have you decided what color you want to
paint your room?”
    “I can’t decide if it should be green or
blue.”
    “We could do both. Maybe blue down below,
then a light green up top.”
    Sam grunted his approval.
    “We’ll get paint while we’re out today,
then, and some wallpaper remover.”
    She glanced at the yellowed wallpaper with
faded vines and shuddered. No wonder the kid was having trouble
sleeping.
    “Can I play now?”
    He had just put the last book into the shelf
and looked at her expectantly.
    “Go toss the box in the garage and then you
may.”
    “I don’t like to go down there. It’s
creepy.” Seeing that Claire didn’t look convinced, Sam added,
“There are spiders down there.”
    Claire rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll take
it.”
    “I’m going to have a battle. Will you play
with me?”
    “In a while. I need to look through the
boxes in my room and figure out what to do with them. Set up my
side for me, OK?”
    Sam grinned mischievously. “I’m going to
plant spies in your fort.”
    “I’m sure you will.”
    She left his room while he was still pulling
his plastic green army men and Legos out of the closet.
    Of the six boxes sitting in her room, Claire
already knew two she wouldn’t unpack—the box of special baby
clothes she had saved from Sam’s first year and her wedding dress
wrapped in tissue paper. Another three boxes were books that would
go on the shelves of her library wall upstairs. Using the open
blade of her scissors, she cut through the tape of one box to look
inside. She smiled at what she found—her collection of books on the
Middle Ages, from Robin Hood to jousting, castles to cottages,
fairy tales to guidebooks she and Will had bought in their travels.
All these had to come back out. She shoved the boxes off to the
side, prepared to carry them upstairs later.
    When she popped open the last box, Claire
felt like it was Christmas again. The box held all her souvenirs,
the things she had packed for the move back to Michigan and never
had room for. She unrolled a taped bundle of tissue paper to reveal
eighteen pewter soldiers.
    “Hey, Sam? Come here for a second.”
    She heard the thump-thump-thump of Sam’s
feet as he ran