A Man 0f His Word (Round-The-Clock Brides Book 4)

by Sandra Steffen

  “He called me C.C.,” he said as he accepted Will Avery’s handshake.

  Will’s grip was strong, and in it he conveyed the strength of what he was feeling. Cole accepted the handshake but was relieved the younger man didn’t voice his thoughts out loud.

  “Are you a plumber?” Cole asked since it seemed to him that the silence called for conversation.

  Will Avery put a wrench in a small toolbox and put the toolbox under April’s sink before he said, “I’m a passing do-it-yourselfer at best. All the more reason to have enormous respect for tradesmen’s abilities.”

  April’s voice startled both men. “Will teaches English literature at our local high school. He and Kristy and their three little boys live behind us, one yard over. The girls are playing there this morning.”

  Cole felt April’s smile clear to his knees. “So that’s who’s making all the racket back there,” he said.

  She nodded.

  “And that explains why there isn’t an extra car in your driveway. He walked over.”

  “What did you think?” she asked.

  “Never mind.”

  Her smile only broadened. “Both of Jay’s brothers keep this place from falling down around the girls and me. Will was also enormously instrumental in helping me get back into teaching. Nobody writes a letter of recommendation quite like an English literature teacher.”

  “I didn’t know you were a teacher,” Cole said to her.

  “Fifth grade. I was a teacher when I met Jay, but I’ve been out of the classroom since the girls were born. I’m starting back at our local elementary school this fall.”

  Cole was aware she’d been a homemaker, but he’d never asked Jay what she’d done before that. It made him realize there was a great deal about her he didn’t know.

  “I’d planned to stay home until the twins were a little older,” she continued. “But then—”

  They both felt what she’d left unsaid.

  Jay’s brother cleared his throat. Oh. That’s right. They weren’t alone.

  “I need to get going, April,” Will said. “The new baby is a dream but I’m sure Kristy could use a break.” He held the front of his shirt away from his body. “I think I’ll hit the sprinkler on my way through my backyard. Thank God we have air-conditioning. It was good to meet you, Cole. I mean that.”

  “You, too,” Cole said.

  “Would you send Gracie and Violet home?” April asked after thanking her brother-in-law for his help.

  When Will was gone, April said, “I’ve been thinking about the project.”

  “That’s why I’m here.” He reached down and opened his laptop on the table as she came up next to him.

  “Cole, what happened?” She gently laid her fingertips next to the welt on the back of his neck.

  “Just a little bee sting.” He straightened, causing her hand to land on his shoulder.

  He didn’t know how long they stood that way, her hand resting lightly on the breadth of his right shoulder while his hands remained at his sides, itching to touch her. Why did she have to be beautiful?

  “A bee stung you?” she asked. “I hope you’re not allergic.” As she spoke, his gaze was naturally drawn to her mouth. Pretty, it was bow-shaped, her bottom lip fuller than the top. So kissable.

  He tore his gaze away and eased backward. “I’m not allergic,” he said. “And it wasn’t the bee’s fault.”

  She went to a cabinet near the sink and reached to an upper shelf. For a moment, her stretch bared a patch of skin at her waist. Cole wasn’t a prisoner to his hormones, but it sure wasn’t easy to look away.

  Taking out a tube of ointment, she returned to the table and pulled out a chair. “Have a seat,” she said. “This medicine works miracles on bee stings. It’ll relieve the itch and burn, guaranteed.”

  He reached for the ointment, but she was already squeezing a small amount onto her finger. Eyeing the chair she held, Cole wavered, but in the end he did as she instructed. From behind him, she drew the collar of his shirt away from the welt. Her touch indescribably soft, she gently applied the ointment in a circular motion.

  “It shouldn’t take long to begin working,” she said, dabbing on more cream.

  His head listed forward of its own accord. His breathing deepened as he relaxed, her fingertips working the cream into the sting that already seemed to burn less. He imagined those fingers gliding along the top of his collar, perhaps skimming the side of his jaw before coming to rest at the base of his throat. From there he imagined them moving languidly down the center of his chest, pausing briefly, moving again.

  “Where were you when you got stung?” Her question brought his head up.

  He heard a wrapper of some sort being torn close to his ear. “Somewhere between Division Street and Elm. The bee probably thought he’d take a quick shortcut through the cab of my truck on his way to the flowers across the street. The light was turning green and I didn’t notice him until I’d already started through the intersection. Apparently he didn’t appreciate being shanghaied.”

  “I see.” She applied a Band-Aid and drew his collar over it, her touch so light it was almost as if she’d followed up with a kiss. The notion made him ache.

  He fought it with everything he had. She was Jay’s widow. He was here to find peace and hopefully bring her a little, too. Nothing more.

  Finished with her ministering, she recapped the tube and returned it to the cabinet. This time, he didn’t watch.

  Before he heard the cupboard door close with a quiet thud, Cole got to his feet and pushed his chair back in where it belonged. “Would you like to take a look at other windows?” he asked.

  “About that,” she said. “I’m sorry for wasting your time.”

  He braced for imminent bad news. She must have guessed what he’d been imagining, and decided against letting him do her remodel. He wouldn’t blame her, but eyeing her guardedly, he waited for her to confirm it.

  “I’m considering making some changes to your design,” she said.

  That was all? Relief washed over him. Every remodel went through changes, especially in the beginning. “It’s Jay’s design, but by all means,” he said. “This is your home and your decision, and I want you to be absolutely happy with the renovations. What would you like changed?”

  “We’re home, Mama!” The door slammed and Gracie bounded into the kitchen, dripping wet, dragging her beach towel behind her. The door slammed a second time and Violet followed her sister inside, also dripping, her towel wadded into a ball beneath her arm.

  “Uncle Will turned the sprinkler off and said we had to come home,” Violet said.

  “We didn’t wanna, but then he told Aunt Kristy Cole was here,” Gracie explained. “So we ran all the way.”

  Violet looked up at him. “Wanna watch us ride our bikes without the training wheels? We just learned how last night.”

  “Girls, he can watch you ride your bikes another time. You’re leaving puddles.” While the twins looked down with shock and dismay so genuine it was comical, their mother dried them both with Violet’s towel and wiped the floor with Grace’s.

  These two looked more alike than Cole had first thought. They wore one-piece swimsuits; Gracie’s was green, Violet’s was yellow, both had ruffles around the legs and bows on the straps. Wet, Violet’s curly hair was almost straight and Gracie’s blond hair appeared darker, more like her sister’s. They had similar noses and chins, knobby knees and narrow feet, which currently had blades of grass stuck to them.

  How many times had Jay told him they took his breath away? Cole would never forget the wonder and the ache in Jay’s voice when he spoke of them.

  April instructed her daughters to change into dry clothes. “Is Cole staying for lunch, Mama?” Gracie asked.

  Three pairs of eyes were on him suddenly.

  “I�
��ll ask him,” April said, pointing firmly at the doorway leading to the hall. And the girls ran to do as they were told.

  Cole shook his head lest she voice the invitation. “About those changes,” he said instead.

  “Could we go over them another time?”

  “Ah. Sure. Of course. No problem.” He clamped his mouth shut before things got worse.

  “It isn’t that I’m not interested in discussing them with you. It’s just that I’m having a cookout tonight,” she explained. “It’s in the early planning stages,” she told him, her chin lowering in a conniving manner.

  “How early?” he heard himself ask.

  “I just decided this minute. And you should join us.”

  “I—that is, I don’t, I mean...” Forfeiting his idiotic stammering, he stopped shuffling backward and held still.

  “What I meant to say is, we would be honored if you would join us, Cole.”

  He could hear the girls talking as they slammed drawers, and he knew he didn’t have long to let their mother down gently.

  “It’s come as you are,” April continued, the fan whirring on the counter behind her, fluttering the curls around her shoulders. “We’re a very low-key bunch, dress code-wise.”

  “We who?” he asked.

  “I won’t have an exact head count until after I actually start inviting everyone. It’ll be the girls and me for sure, Jay’s brother Ben, his wife, Gabby, and their daughter, and Will, Kristy and their boys. I’ll also invite Jay’s parents, two of his sisters and their husbands and kids, and a few friends and my next-door neighbors, if they’re not busy.”

  He was shaking his head long before she’d finished.

  Growing up an only child, Cole steered clear of large families and noisy crowds. There were too many undercurrents and too much past and way too many nuances. He preferred small groups. And besides, this was Jay’s family.

  Not Cole’s.

  He’d been recovering from a serious infection in the wound in his side in a hospital stateside the day they’d buried Jay, so Cole had been unable to attend the funeral. Now, he tried to recall what his friend had told him about his parents and siblings. It seemed there were two brothers, three sisters, half a dozen in-laws and several nieces and nephews. Jay’s descriptions had blurred in Cole’s mind, and he’d never tried to keep them straight.

  “I’m really not much for crowds, April.”

  “You mean, since—”

  “No. I mean, yes, more so now, but I’ve never enjoyed crowds.” It was true. Cole had been an only child, and had no first cousins. He had a few friends at school, but until college he was content for the most part to talk to adults or be alone. He’d dated, thought he was in love a few times, but those relationships hadn’t lasted. He used to be on a softball team, played a little racquetball, but by then he was working day and night to get the business off the ground and fitting the National Guard into his schedule, and being alone didn’t feel lonely. Nobody was more surprised than he was when he and Jay struck a chord the first time they met.

  She leaned her back against the counter again and crossed her arms as she had the last time he was here. Now he knew the stance wasn’t as innocent as it appeared. Any second now she was going to attempt to change his mind.

  “You heard Gracie,” she said. “Will told Kristy you’re here. By now, she’s called Gabby, and they’ve probably both texted Beth and Regan. Word’s out you’re in Orchard Hill. You can either meet them all, all at once, or you can wait for them to stop by individually to get a good look at you.”

  He stared at her incredulously. “Those are my only two options?”

  Her melodious laugh snuck into his chest.

  “Trust me, they’ll come because you’re a link to Jay. The fact that you’re going to be renovating my upstairs sweetens the honeypot.”

  Cole was glad that damn bee hadn’t followed him into the house because he was pretty sure his mouth was gaping.

  “Don’t worry,” April continued. “They’re good people. They’d give anyone in need the shirt off their backs. Okay, maybe they’re a little bossy. They all have strong opinions and will probably share them with you in regard to the upstairs. On a slow night they’ll discuss politics with you, and gas prices, religion and the weather.

  “If you don’t attend the impromptu gathering tonight I guarantee they’ll find some reason to stop over one at a time while you’re trying to work on the upstairs. I’ve found it’s better to get things like this over with in one fell swoop.”

  He didn’t know what to say.

  “You look stupefied.” She made a wry face. “Now there’s a word you don’t hear every day,” April said.

  He didn’t even try to smile. “I’m trying to keep a low profile while I’m here.”

  “You’re about to discover that’s impossible.” She held his gaze but it wasn’t enough to sway him to promise to come over later. Before he had the chance to say he wouldn’t attend, she said, “I hope you join us, but attendance isn’t mandatory. I’ll put you down for a maybe.”

  End of discussion. The woman was good.

  He waited to say goodbye until the girls had rejoined their mother in the kitchen. Although their forlorn faces were hard to resist, their pleas didn’t persuade him to stay for lunch, either. He left before he changed his mind.

  Once outside, he took a deep breath. He’d known, in the furthest recesses of his mind, that finishing Jay’s upstairs would test his reclusive tendencies. The idea of meeting the Averys all at once brought back his last dreams, the ones he’d had before Jay died.

  In the first dream Cole and Jay had been flying. There was no magic carpet or arms flapping. They were simply soaring high above the earth, darting faster and faster. Behind them dark shadows like bloodhounds hunted them, coming so close Cole felt their hot breath on the back of his neck. Suddenly the rest of their unit was there, too. There was a deafening explosion. Yelling. Chaos. One minute Jay was beside him. The next he was gone.

  Cole had awakened in a cold sweat.

  He’d always been a lucid dreamer. It was common among soldiers to dream of death. Under the circumstances, dreaming of flying wasn’t a stretch, either. It had other connotations, but escape was inherent among them.

  He’d had dreams of explosions before. Once, his unit had orders to secure an abandoned building that according to intel had been headquarters for a band of terrorists. The night before the mission Cole had dreamed that he and five men entered a building where a massive IED immediately detonated. The following day, Cole and his men didn’t enter that building until bomb specialists had neutralized a deadly IED.

  Cole didn’t always dream before an attack. In fact, more often than not, he didn’t dream at all, but when he did, he paid attention. The dreams about Jay and him flying had left Cole feeling unsettled, a knife in the pit of his stomach.

  Two days later their unit was ambushed. There was a deafening explosion. Yelling. Chaos. Men screaming in pain. Cole and Jay were thrown like rag dolls twenty feet backward. Wounded, Cole crept to where Jay lay on the hot sand, alive but barely. They bled together, and despite Cole’s orders for Jay to hold on until help arrived, they both knew that wasn’t possible.

  When Jay took his last breath, Cole wept. He’d stayed with his friend, his war brother, one bloodied hand on Jay’s still chest, until they were lifted onto gurneys. Jay began his final journey home and Cole was taken to a hospital where he would undergo surgery to remove the shrapnel from his side.

  When his injury healed he’d returned to combat until his second injury, one that nearly took his leg and his life. He hadn’t dreamed again. Not once. He’d thought about his dreams, though, all of them, that last one especially. More than anything, he recalled all the stories Jay had told about home. Somehow those tender, humorous depictions of his best friend’s family sustained Cole through bl
eak days, indescribable pain and grueling physical therapy. It was as if Jay’s words had introduced Cole to April.

  Cole supposed he’d fallen a little in love with her while listening to the cadence of Jay’s deep voice painting pictures of their life in Orchard Hill, Michigan. Although he wasn’t proud of it, it was harmless then. During his difficult recovery, those stories brought Cole solace, somehow. But as the weeks turned into months, he started to think about meeting her, just meeting her. Nothing more.

  And now he had.

  He didn’t steal or cheat and he couldn’t tell a lie to save his own skin. He wasn’t a jealous man. He’d never begrudged his best friend his happiness. They’d been joined at the hip, the guys in their unit had often said. He wasn’t about to try to insinuate himself into Jay’s family, certainly not into April’s life.

  Cole would never attempt to take Jay’s place. And that was final.

  * * *

  “Think he’ll come tonight, Mama?”

  Violet and Gracie gazed wistfully out the screen door Cole had just exited. April knew he’d driven away when they left their post.

  Would he join them this evening?

  She wasn’t sure what to make of his hasty retreat. Holding her right hand in her left, she didn’t know what to make of the tingling sensation in her fingertips, either.

  She held them to her cheek as lightly as she’d skimmed them over the welt on Cole’s neck. Doing so brought back the acceleration of her heart rate and the guilt that immediately followed.

  It wasn’t as if anything would come of a few tingles in her fingertips and flutters in her heart. She liked Cole Cavanaugh. She liked most people, but she liked him especially. She didn’t know him well, but it didn’t matter. Something inside him called to her, and she wasn’t sorry he was here.

  Did she think he would join the gathering tonight to meet Jay’s family? Good question. She hoped he would. She hadn’t been exaggerating about her in-laws. They were wonderful people and they would meet him, one way or another.