Love Inspired September 2014 - Bundle 1 of 2: Her Montana Twins\Small-Town Billionaire\Stranded with the Rancher (11 page)

Could she do this? Did she dare?

She swallowed and gave him a tremulous smile. “You were probably more worried that you'd be stuck with my kids.”

“That might be what it was,” he agreed, a half smile curving his lips. “But I think we both know that's not true.”

She let the sentence lie between them ripe with possibilities.

Then the door opened, and Brody and Hannah both lowered their hands with record speed.

“There you are,” Gina said to Hannah, sounding as relieved as Brody had sounded worried. She glanced from Hannah to Brody, her expression expectant, and Hannah wondered if her cheeks looked as flushed as they felt. Thankfully, Gina said nothing as she waved them inside. “Well, come on in, you two. Supper is ready and the twins are hungry.”

“Let's not keep Their Majesties waiting,” Brody said, standing aside to let Hannah precede him.

The table was already laid out, Chrissy and Corey sitting in booster seats strapped to the dining room chairs. “Look at you two, all ready to eat at the big people's table,” Hannah said, bending over to brush a kiss over each of their foreheads. They were all clean and shining in their sleepers, and their hair was soft and silky and smelling of baby soap.

“I got the seats last night,” Gina said. “After you left. I figured it would be easier to feed them this way than to juggle them on our laps all the time.”

“You didn't have to do that,” Hannah said. “I could have given you mine.”

“And taken away all of Gina's fun,” Winston said, coming into the dining room. “She's been stocking up on all kinds of stuff for those kidlets.”

“Winston, you don't need to tell her that,” Gina said, looking as if she was blushing.

“You should see all the toys and paraphernalia she's gathered together,” Winston continued.

“Winston,” Gina said again, her voice holding a note of reprimand.

Brody raised his eyebrows and rubbed his hands together. “Why don't we eat,” he said.

Hannah sensed some awkwardness but decided it was best to do as Brody did and carry on.

“You sit down, Hannah, my dear,” Gina said. “I'll get supper on the table.”

“Do you need any help?” Hannah asked.

“No. Winston can give me a hand.”

Brody pulled out her chair between Chrissy and Corey. “May as well sit down,” he said. “The sooner we all get settled, the sooner we all can eat.”

His courtly gesture created a dull ache. David used to do that, she thought as she slipped into the chair. She caught herself, wondering if she would always be using David as a yardstick in one form or another.

Then she looked over at Brody as he settled down on the other side of Corey and thoughts of David faded away.

Chapter Seven

“T
ell your mom thanks again for supper,” Hannah said as she clipped the buckle of Corey's car seat tight. “It was absolutely delicious.”

“I'll let her know again,” Brody said, setting Chrissy in her car seat on the other side of Hannah's car.

“I'm sure she called your mother to get some ideas.”

“She did?” Hannah's surprise made him wonder if he should have told her. He knew his mother was campaigning heavily and he hoped Hannah didn't notice.

“My mom lives to please,” he said, pulling the belt around Chrissy's arms.

“Do you need a hand?” Hannah asked as Brody tried to get Chrissy to sit still long enough so he could buckle her in.

“I'm good.” He made another attempt to attach the clip but he couldn't make it reach.

Hannah came over to his side of the car and watched his struggles. Finally he had to admit defeat and step back. “I can't figure that thing out,” he said.

Hannah leaned in and with a few deft moves had the straps clipped down and Chrissy was secure.

“Don't smirk,” Brody warned as Hannah straightened.

“I'll try not to,” she said, but her lips flirted with a grin.

Brody glanced at the waning light. “You'd better get going. Make sure you watch out for wildlife on your way home, especially moose and elk. Their eyes will shine back at you but they're so tall, you won't see them in your little car.” He didn't want to imagine what a large animal like that could do to her little car and the precious cargo it held.

He and his father had checked the car but couldn't find anything wrong. Brody had tried to convince Hannah to let him drive her back but she refused. So he let it go.

“I'll drive carefully.”

“And don't forget to turn your cell phone on,” he warned.

“You sound like my mother.”

“Is that good or bad?”

She held his eyes, her expression softening. “It's nice” was all she said. Then she turned away and slipped behind the wheel. She closed the door, started the engine, reversed out of the lot and with a wink of her taillights was headed down the road.

He watched her leave and, as he had the last time she'd driven away with the twins, he sent up a prayer for their safety.

He glanced at his parents' house. He should go and help clean up but right now he didn't want to see his mother's hopeful face and feel the pressure of her expectations. He had enough of his own, thank you very much.

So he headed back to his own house, turned on the television for noise and company and started folding the laundry he had done yesterday and had dumped on his sofa. Canned laughter filled the quiet of the house but it annoyed him. As soon as he had his clothes put away he shut off the television, dropped into the old worn recliner he'd inherited from his father and picked up the book he'd been reading. An adventure story that Dylan had recommended, but he couldn't get into it.

Visions of Hannah drifted through his head. He didn't know what to do about his attraction to her. At times it seemed she felt the same. Other times he sensed her pulling back. Was she thinking of David during those times?

Brody set the book aside with a sigh of frustration and was about to get up and go outside when his cell phone rang. He pulled it out of his pocket, grateful for the distraction.

Hannah's name showed up on the screen.

He hit the answer button. “Hello?”

“Brody...” Her voice faded away and he could hear crying in the background.

“Hannah? What's wrong? Are you okay?” The staccato questions burst out of him as he jumped to his feet, already headed to the door.

“I'm okay. The kids...the kids...they're fine.” She stopped, her voice strained. “But my car is in the ditch.”

“Hannah, sweetie, what happened?” Brody grabbed his keys off the hanger by the door, snatched his jacket off the table where he had left it and was out the door, running to his truck.

“I was driving and I saw something big and dark on the road. I thought it was a moose.” She stopped again, as if she was trying not to cry. “I tried to avoid it, then I heard that clunk again and my car ended up going off the road.”

Brody got into the truck and started it. He slammed it into gear and spun the wheel one-handed as he reversed out of the yard. “Where are you?”

“Just on the highway. About fifteen minutes from town. I tried to call my dad...” Her voice broke again.

“You're sure you're okay? Should I call the ambulance?”

“No. I just drove into the ditch. I didn't hit anything, but I can't drive out. The car won't go ahead or back. It just runs.”

“I'll be there as soon as I can.” He heard her shushing one of the twins and he gunned it, flicking his own lights on high beam.

“Thanks so much.”

“It'll be okay,” he assured her. “Do you want me to stay on the phone?”

“No. I should see to the twins. I'll just wait here.”

The setting sun cast a golden glow in the darkening sky. Brody dropped his phone in his pocket and peered through the dusk, on the lookout for wildlife. He wouldn't be any good to Hannah if he plowed into an elk or moose on his way to rescue her.

Ten minutes later he saw a set of taillights in the ditch and headlights shining toward him. He assumed the taillights were from Hannah's car. The others, probably from someone heading out of town. Brody put his lights on dim and pulled up beside Hannah's car. An older man wearing baggy overalls, a worn suit coat and a battered felt bowler hat stood beside Hannah, holding Corey. It was Alfie Hart and he looked as if he would have preferred to be anywhere but here. Hannah was rocking Chrissy, her cries piercing the night air.

Alfie saw Brody and scurried over. “Here. Take this,” he said, shoving Corey into Brody's arms as if the child was a sack of feed he badly wanted to get rid of. Brody checked Corey over, but aside from the track of tears still shining on his cheeks, he looked okay.

“You going to take care of everything?” Alfie asked, edging away from them both. “I gotta get to my buddy's place. Promised him I'd help him out.”

As Brody nodded, Alfie scooted off to his car, his relief evident. At least he had stopped, Brody told himself as he walked over to Hannah.

She held Chrissy close to her, shushing her as she rocked the crying baby.

“Are you okay?” he asked, putting his hand on her shoulder, squeezing lightly to assure her.

Hannah sniffed and nodded. “Just shook up. I wasn't going that fast when I hit the ditch.” Her voice wavered, broke.

He took Chrissy from her and strapped both children into their car seats. What else could he do but slip his arm around her and hold her close. She dropped her head on his chest and shuddered, as if trying not to cry.

“It's okay,” he whispered, pressing his cheek on her silky hair, rocking her slightly as he would a little child. “Nothing happened. You just got a scare.”

She stayed where she was a moment longer, then slowly pulled away. Brody released her reluctantly, then gave in to an impulse and gently brushed her tears from her cheek with the knuckle of his forefinger.

“I'm sorry,” she said, swiping her hand over her cheeks. “I feel like such a wreck.”

“You don't look like a wreck at all,” he said, fingering a strand of hair away from her face. “But your car isn't going anywhere tonight.”

She sniffed again, looking back at her vehicle illuminated by the headlights of his truck. The back tire was flat and Brody was sure the “clunk” she said she heard would make the car undrivable.

“I'll check out the kids and see if they're okay,” he said.

Not for the first time Brody was thankful for his EMT training as a firefighter.

But a quick check of the children, smiling and safely strapped in their car seats, showed him they were fine. He wasn't surprised. The car had simply driven off the road.

He took Chrissy out, handed her to Hannah, then took Corey out and stepped away from the car. “You go sit in the truck with the kids,” Brody said. “I'll move the car seats. We'll get you home.”

She nodded and pulled in a quavering breath. He paused, just a moment, watching her make her way up the side of the ditch, a slight figure carrying two babies silhouetted against the lights of his truck.

She looked so alone it hurt his heart.

He shook off the feeling and pulled open the back door of the car, hoping he could figure out how to get the seats out. It took some fiddling and muttering and a few bumps of his head on the roof of the compact car, but ten minutes later he had the seats fastened in the back of the truck.

“I just remembered, my purse and diaper bag are still in the front of the car,” Hannah said.

“I'll get them. Anything else?”

She shook her head.

So while Hannah clipped the kids in, he returned to the car to get what she'd asked for. He found the purse and bag on the floor of the front passenger seat, and as he pulled them out, he caught the glint of metal swinging from the rearview mirror. He paused, looking at David Douglas's dog tags. A potent reminder of Hannah's past.

Was he crazy to think he had a chance with her?

He returned to the truck and gave Hannah the diaper bag and purse and got into his side. “What about the car?” she asked.

“My dad and I will take care of it. And you're positive you're okay?” he asked again, needing the assurance.

“Yeah. Just shook up. I'm so thankful nothing happened to the twins.” He could see her profile in the lights from the dashboard. Though she clung to the diaper bag, her chin was up and she looked as if she was pulling herself together.

“When we get back to Jasper Gulch, I'll call my dad,” Brody said. “And we'll make arrangements to get your car towed to town.”

“I'll have to find a way to get the twins after work—”

“You don't worry about that. My mother can bring them back to town for you, too. Or I can. It will get taken care of.”

“I can figure something out,” she said. “I might be able to borrow a vehicle from my parents.”

“Don't worry about it. My mother is only too happy to help you out. She has often said how much she admires you and how you've gotten through all you've had to deal with.”

“Lots of panicky prayers,” Hannah said. “And lots of help from my parents. I couldn't have managed that time after David's death without them.”

His mind ticked back to the dog tags still hanging from her rearview mirror. He didn't want to bring David into the moment, but he felt he had to ask. He sensed things were shifting between them and he didn't think he imagined those moments of connection. He couldn't be that obtuse or hopeful that he imagined it all.

“Do you still miss him?”

Hannah's silence made him feel like smacking himself on the head. She had just had a traumatic experience and now he was going to bring up her dead husband whose dog tags she still had in her car?

“Not as much as I used to,” she said quietly. “Sometimes it seems so far away I wonder if being married to him actually happened.”

“You weren't married that long.”

“Just a couple of months. Obviously long enough to get pregnant,” she said with a light laugh that surprised him. “But David was a part of my life for so long.”

“You were dating already when my family first moved to Jasper Gulch.”

“You remember that?” she asked, sounding surprised.

He squeezed the steering wheel and decided to go for broke. “I remember everything about you when we first moved. You wore your hair in a ponytail and I always wanted to give it a tug whenever you came bopping past me in the hall, wearing a slouchy sweater, long scarf and skinny blue jeans and laughing with Julie Shaw.”

She said nothing to that and for the next few moments the only sound in the cab of the truck was the hum of tires on the asphalt and the muted country music coming out of his stereo. In the distance Brody could see the glow of lights from town coming closer.

A few minutes later, they were parked in front of the hardware store. Brody got out and carefully released Corey from the restraints and pulled the warm, sleeping bundle of boy into his arms. Corey moaned, then laid his head on Brody's shoulder.

This felt too good, Brody thought as he followed Hannah, who was carrying Chrissy, up the narrow stairs to her apartment. She unlocked the door with one hand and turned to him. “I can take it from here,” she whispered.

“No. Just tell me where to put him.” His mother, thinking ahead, had bathed the kids and put their sleepers on so they were ready for bed.

“Follow me,” Hannah said, leading the way, the light above the stove in the kitchen casting a wan glow through the apartment. She carefully opened a door just off the living area. The room, illuminated by a bear-shaped night-light, was small and packed. Most of the floor space was taken up by two cribs and a change table. But nothing was out of place, he noticed.

Brody laid Corey in his crib and then covered him with the blanket that hung over the side. Corey pulled the blanket over his shoulders and emitted a sigh of deep satisfaction.

Hannah stroked Chrissy's cheek, bent over and kissed her, then Brody moved out of the way so she could do the same with Corey.

He walked out of the room and she followed him, carefully closing the door behind her.

“I think they're out for the night,” she whispered, releasing a slow sigh, smiling at him, the muted light in the apartment casting her face into intriguing shadows.

Brody slipped his hands into the back pockets of his jeans. It was the only way he could stop himself from reaching out to her again.

“That's good,” he said. “And about your car. Like I said, my dad and I will take care of it. We'll bring it into Gary Finney's mechanic shop to get fixed up.”