Everybody in Pine Valley knew that little Jess Bradley hadn’t spoken a single word since her mother’s death almost three years ago. Everybody also knew it wasn’t a topic you discussed with Hoyt.
“Anyway,” Anna continued after an awkward second, “she must have gone with the rest of them because she’s not here now. I’ve been all alone for the past couple of hours. Oh, no.” The worried lines grooved into Hoyt’s face suddenly made sense. “Is Jess missing?”
* * *
Missing. His Jess.
Fear slammed into Hoyt like a three-hundred-pound linebacker. Let me find her, Lord, he prayed silently. And keep her safe until I do. Please.
“All I know is I can’t find her. I went to pick her up at the McAllisters’, and she wasn’t there. Trisha took Jess from day care with the rest of the kids, but she can’t seem to remember where she lost track of her.” He couldn’t wrap his mind around that, but right now he had to stay focused on finding his little girl.
He’d deal with Trisha Saunders later.
“Oh, Hoyt.” Anna’s ice-green eyes warmed with sympathy, but the change didn’t make him feel better. If Anna Delaney was feeling sorry for him, things were even worse than he thought. “You must be worried out of your mind.”
Yeah. Pretty much. He ran one hand impatiently through his wet hair. “I thought she might be here with you. She likes this place.” That was an understatement. Jess was crazy in love with this store. She tugged him in here every time they passed by, and she never wanted to leave.
That was why he’d been hoping...
“She’s not here, Hoyt.” Anna’s forehead was creased with concern. “Do you think you should go talk to the sheriff?”
“I’m headed there next.” He couldn’t believe this had happened. If Marylee were still alive...
But she wasn’t. The grief he’d lived with for three long years stabbed him like a broken rib. It did that sometimes. Mostly it was just a dull ache these days, but every now and then it flared back up and sucker punched him.
Especially when he felt like he was flunking single fatherhood big time.
Like now.
But he couldn’t waste precious time feeling guilty. Not until he found Jess.
“I’ll go talk to Sheriff Towers. If you see her—” He’d started to turn toward the door, but he froze, listening. His eyes locked with Anna’s. “I thought you said you were alone.”
“I am. That’s nothing. Just a silly possum I can’t keep out of my storage room.”
“Maybe not.” Hoyt shouldered past Anna and headed in the direction of the noise.
There was only one door at the back of the store. He tried the knob, but it was locked. He shot a questioning look at Anna.
“I’ll unlock it.” Anna moved to the checkout area and started opening and shutting drawers, riffling through their contents with hurried fingers. “But I’m telling you, it’s nothing but that stupid possum. I can’t get rid of him.”
Hoyt’s fear, mixed with his newfound hope, made him vibrate with impatience. He needed to know right now if Jess was in that room. “Could you hurry this up, Anna?”
“Hang on a second. I know the key’s here somewhere because I used it just a few hours ago. I moved some breakable items in there when the kids got wild playing hide-and-seek, and— Oh!—” She stopped, her eyes wide. “I unlocked the door while they were here,” she said slowly, “for just a few minutes.”
That was all Hoyt needed to hear. He wasn’t waiting for any key.
“Jess, baby, if you’re in there, move to the back of the room. Okay?”
He reared back and kicked the door. The flimsy lock broke instantly, and the door flew so wide that it banged against the wall like a gunshot.
And there she was, his little girl, crouched on the floor. She blinked up at him like a startled baby owl.
Hoyt crossed the room in two strides and swept his daughter up into his arms. Pressing her against his chest, he closed his eyes, breathing in the familiar scent of her baby shampoo.
“Daddy’s got you, honey. Are you all right?” Hoyt murmured the question raggedly against his daughter’s wispy blond hair. She nodded against his chest, but Hoyt pulled her gently away to check her over for himself. Her eyes, the blue of a robin’s eggs, were wide, but she didn’t seem to be hurt. He nestled her back against him, feeling her little fingers twining tightly into the fabric of his shirt.
Other than being a little spooked, Jess seemed all right.
Which meant everything else was all right.
Hoyt squeezed his eyes closed. Thank You, God.
As his heartbeat slowed back down into its regular gear, he opened his eyes. His gaze caught on the window across the room.
“Anna?”
“Hoyt, truly, I had no idea she was in there.” Anna spoke from behind him, her voice shaking. He turned to look at her. She’d gone so pale that the half dozen freckles on her nose stood out like flecks of golden paint on a white wall. “She must have slipped in while I was talking to Trisha. I guess I was so distracted that I didn’t notice her before I locked the door.” Anna’s worried gaze shifted to Jess. “Sweetie, I’m so, so sorry.”
“Not your fault.” Sure, he and Anna had been like oil and water ever since their big blowup back in high school, but Hoyt knew she’d never do anything like this on purpose. “This was nothing but a crazy accident.” One that had almost given him a heart attack, but now that Jess was safely back in his arms, he was feeling a lot more forgiving. Hoyt drew in a deep breath and shifted Jess’s weight on his arm. Might as well get this next part over with. “Speaking of crazy accidents, was that window over there already broken?”
“What? Yes. Three of the panes have been cracked forever, but—” Anna broke off and bit her lip as she studied her window. “Oh.” The damaged glass had fallen completely out of the frame and splintered on the floor, leaving gaping spaces behind. “Well, no. Not like that.”
That was what he’d been afraid of. “When I kicked the door in, the impact must have jarred the cracked panes loose.” He’d broken the door, too, but he didn’t feel as bad about that. It was a cheap hollow core not original to the building. He could get dozens of those down at the building supply store.
That window was a different story. Hoyt’s contractor brain kicked in. The watery-looking glass in the intact panes meant he was looking at an antique fixture. Not a standard size, either. It was going to be ridiculously expensive to repair, if he could even get glass to match, which was doubtful. The whole window would probably have to be replaced.
As he silently summed up the damages, gusts of wind blew in through the empty holes, bringing heavy splats of rain with them.
“Excuse me.” Anna made a worried noise as she brushed past him. She grabbed the flaps of a rain-spattered cardboard box and began tugging it away from the window.
“I’ll do that.” He reluctantly set Jess on her feet. “Stay put for a minute, pumpkin, okay?” He waited until she nodded and then made short work of moving boxes out of the danger zone while Anna hovered on the sidelines.
“Thanks,” she murmured. Opening one of the dampest boxes, she checked the contents. She made unhappy clucking sounds as she unpacked the books. She gave each one a quick once-over before stacking them on a nearby table.
Hoyt watched the process with a sense of confusion. There was at least six or seven hundred dollars’ worth of structural damage in this room, but Anna was worrying over a box of wet books?
He’d never understand this woman.
Anna made it to the bottom of the box and sighed. “Most of these are okay. I might have to discount a couple for water spotting, but other than that, I don’t think you did any real damage.”
Hoyt waited, eyebrows lifted.
Nothing.
“Except for your busted window and door,” he finally poi
nted out.
“Oh, right.” Anna considered the broken glass. “There is that. Not that it really matters now,” she muttered under her breath.
What did she mean by that? No telling. Hoyt shook his head.
Nope, he’d never understand Anna Delaney. Not in a million years.
He grabbed a broom leaning against the wall. “Hand me that dustpan there. I can’t do much tonight because I need to get Jess on home to bed, but I can at least get this mess cleaned up a little.”
“I can manage,” Anna protested. He ignored her.
He swept up the broken glass and dumped it in the trash. Then he snagged some rags off a pile of cleaning products and wadded them into the empty panes. He was able to shut out the worst of the blowing rain, but just to be on the safe side, he shifted three more boxes of Anna’s precious books farther from the window.
Mainly because he figured that if he didn’t, Anna would do it the minute he left.
Then he picked Jess up and settled her back against his chest. “That’s the best I can do for now. I’ll be by first thing in the morning to take some measurements so I can get the materials I’ll need for the repair.”
“You’re fixing it?” Anna looked so jittery at the idea that it was almost funny.
Almost.
“I’m a building contractor, Anna. Fixing things is what I do.” That doubtful expression she was wearing was a little insulting. “Is that a problem? Because I can get somebody else to handle the repair, but I can’t promise you when it’ll happen. Summer’s a busy season, and every man worth his salt is up to his elbows in work right now. But if you’d rather have somebody else fix this—”
“No! You fix Miss Anna’s bookstore, Daddy. I don’t want Miss Trisha to make this place go away.”
A man’s life could change on a dime. Hoyt had lived long enough and hard enough to know that firsthand. And when it did, for a second or two, time just sort of...stopped.
As he looked down at Jess, Hoyt could hear the ticking of the old clock on the wall of the bookstore and the flapping of the flimsy awnings Principal Delaney had paid some jackleg out-of-town guy to install on the front of the building. But as far as Hoyt was concerned, the whole world had narrowed down to a tiny girl in a pink T-shirt.
After three long years of silence, Jess had finally spoken.
Dr. Mills had assured him this would happen one day, but he’d almost stopped hoping for it. Even the therapist had started to worry. He’d seen it in her eyes the last time he’d taken Jess to Atlanta for an appointment. Both of them knew the statistics for selective mutism, and they knew Jess’s silence had dragged on way too long.
Act normal when it happens. The counselor’s optimistic instructions replayed themselves in his head. It’s a delicate moment. Don’t make a big deal out of it.
Yeah, right. Turned out that was a lot easier to talk about than it was to do. He’d never been much of a crier, but right now his eyes were stinging like he’d been chopping onions.
“Wh—” His own voice came out so rusty that he had to clear his throat and try again. “What did you say, sweetheart?”
Jess put her small hands on each of his cheeks, tilting his head down until their foreheads bumped together. She looked deeply into his eyes. “Fix Miss Anna’s bookstore, Daddy. Pretty please promise?”
Pretty please promise. His gut twisted as he remembered the last time he’d heard that cutesy phrase. The memory was sharp. He could almost smell that weird hospital odor again and see a smaller Jess’s tear-streaked face.
The moment wasn’t something he was likely to forget. It was the last time he’d heard his daughter speak...when she’d asked him to keep the promise he never should have made in the first place.
Mommy will get better, honey. I promise.
He shook off the memory. This time was different. This time Jess was asking for something he could do.
“Sure thing, baby. Daddy’ll fix everything, don’t you worry. This bookstore’s not going anywhere. I promise.”
Anna cleared her throat, but Hoyt jerked his head sharply and cut her a pleading look.
Not now.
Anna must’ve read his face correctly. She bit her lip. “We should talk, Hoyt.” Her voice was carefully calm, but her expression wasn’t.
“We will. I have to get Jess home now, but I’ll come back tomorrow. We can talk everything over then.” He didn’t wait for her to respond.
He had no idea why Principal Delaney’s run-down old bookstore had been the key to unlock Jess’s speech when nothing else had worked, but he wouldn’t waste time wondering about it. The game he’d been losing had finally changed, and Hoyt had possession of the ball for the first time in three years.
Tomorrow he’d find out exactly what that funny expression on Anna’s face meant, and he’d work his way around whatever problem was standing between him and the end zone.
Whatever it was, he already knew it didn’t stand a chance.
Copyright © 2019 by Laurel Blount
ISBN-13: 9781488042966
The Cowboy’s Faith
Copyright © 2019 by Danica Favorite
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