Free The President's Daughter by Mariah Stewart

was this child not deaf? “You know, you shatter the windows down there, you’re going to have to clean it all up.”
    William laughed self-consciously, then turned the radio down even more.
    “I thought
soothing
music was recommended for plants, William. What is that, anyway?”
    “Mötley Crüe,” he told her. “The hollyhocks like metal.”
    Dina rolled her eyes and shook her head as if to shake away the ringing in her ears.
    “Now, the annuals, I think they like classic rock the best, but the perennials, they definitely prefer metal.”
    She could imagine her young employee, his brown hair pulled back from his face in a ponytail, his glasses etched with a touch of condensation, his quietly amused smile as he offered his theory on the musical preferences of plants to his boss.
    “Is Polly down there with you?” As soon as she asked the question, Dina realized how unnecessary it was. If Polly had been there, the radio would have been tuned to golden oldies and the Crüe would have been replaced by the smooth sounds of Motown at a fraction of the decibel level.
    “Polly went up to her place around one. She was here for a while, but she was sneezing and coughing a lot so I told her I’d finish up mixing the soil for the stuff you wanted to pot up this week.” William paused, then asked, “Was that okay? I mean, she seemed really sick.”
    “No, that was fine. Absolutely. She’s been coming down with that cold for the past few days. Thanks for taking over there.”
    “No problem. I like this part of the work, you know? I like the greenhouse and all. Planting up those flats and watching the little shoots come up. It’s cool.”
    “William, you have the makings of a fine nursery-man.”
    “Thanks,” he mumbled.
    “You’re welcome.” She smiled, knowing that his adolescent face had turned scarlet, as it always did when Dina praised his efforts. “I’ll be coming down in a while. If you leave before I get there, just leave the door unlocked.”
    “Okay. I’ll probably be heading out after I finish with this mix. Unless you need me for something special.”
    “No, you go on whenever you need to. There’s nothing that has to be done this afternoon. Just don’t forget to fill in your hours on the calendar.”
    He was a good kid, she thought as she hung up the phone. In spite of his dizzying taste in music, he was an all-around good kid. Hard worker. Honest. Dependable. A quick study. A raise was probably in order, she was thinking as she pulled on waterproof boots to prepare for her short trek to the greenhouse.
    Dina stopped in the kitchen to call Polly, then chatted with Erin, who informed her that her mother was napping because she had a cold.
    “Don’t wake her, honey,” Dina told her. “Just let her know that I called and that she can get back to me whenever she’s feeling better. It’s nothing important.”
    “Okay.”
    Dina was smiling to herself as she got a rain jacket out of the closet. Erin was such a sweet child. For the briefest of moments, Dina considered the special tie that held Polly to Erin, mother to daughter, that same tie that connected her to Jude.
    Endless circles,
Dina reflected as she trod on stepping-stones touched with a silvery glaze where sleet had turned to ice. Mother to child and child to mother, on and on, through time, a certain and necessary continuation. Dina wondered if it was in her cards to one day form a link of that chain with a daughter of her own.
    Assuming, she thought wryly, that she’d find that man who could . . . what had she said to her mother? Raise her heart rate? A man who set her pulse racing and brought a smile to her lips and filled her nights with dreams.
    He had to be out there somewhere.
    She wondered what it was going to take to find him.

CHAPTER SIX
    Miles Kendall reminded Simon a bit of his grandfather, who, in spite of his frail physical condition and his own loss of memory, had lived to the ripe old age of eighty-six before succumbing