by Lisa Carter
“The last thing I heard about you from Matt was that you were at college.”
She took a breath. “I’d finished my junior year when I came home that May to work the summer season with Mom and Dad. But Mom—” Her voice broke.
“Matt said your mother was trying to rescue a kid trapped on the river.”
Amber nodded. “There’d been a lot of spring rain. The river was high and fast. From the outset, it was going to be dicey. I wanted to call for a swift water helo rescue, but Dad was afraid the boy wouldn’t last that long. He wanted to go in alone, but you know Mom—” Her voice quavered. “You knew Mom. She wasn’t one to let things happen without her.”
“If Matt and I had been here...”
“The what-ifs are the quickest way to melancholy. You and Matt were serving our country.” She injected a teasing note in her voice. “Saving the world from tyranny.”
He gave her a small smile. “There is that.”
“You know the rest of the story. Dad saved the boy. He couldn’t save Mom. By the end of summer, he’d turned completely into himself. I was so unhappy and alone. Tony made me feel something besides numb.”
Ethan dropped his gaze, continuing to send Stella and Lucy skyward.
“I quit college and went off with him.” She looked away. “But I had hardly been married a month before I realized I’d made a mistake I figured I’d spend the rest of my life regretting.”
“Was he cruel to you? Did he hurt you?” Ethan’s voice sounded strangled.
Her gaze returned to his. “No. But I’d married Peter Pan, you see. A happy-go-lucky, never-wants-to-grow-up wanderer. In fairness, I think he soon realized he wasn’t cut out for marriage. Of course by that time, I was pregnant and he freaked.”
Ethan’s eyes blazed, but she understood his anger wasn’t directed at her. “A decent man doesn’t walk away from his children, nor his wife.”
He was thinking of his own father. Amber touched his shoulder. “No, he doesn’t.”
A muscle jumped in his cheek. “You’re better off without him.”
“I think so, too.”
“His loss.”
As if her hand possessed a life of its own, she brushed her fingertip along his jaw. “Your father, too.”
Something raw blazed from his eyes before he clamped it down into the region Ethan stored his emotions. “Do the girls ever hear from him?”
“No. They don’t even share his last name.” She dropped her hand, appalled at her boldness. “Last I heard through the rafting grapevine, Tony is somewhere out West. On yet another freewheeling adventure.”
Ethan’s brows bunched. “Do the girls ask about him?”
Her eyes flitted toward Callie and Jake, chatting with ErmaJean. “Only since Maisie found her daddy last autumn.”
“I didn’t realize...”
“Callie and Jake have only been married since November. It’s a long story. I’ll tell you about it another time.”
“I like the sound of that.” He nodded. “It’s a date.”
She blinked, but he stepped away to help the girls. They’d grown tired and wished to disembark their chariots to the sky. Amber decided he probably hadn’t meant that the way it sounded. As in a “date-date.” Probably something more along the lines of a calendar “date.”
Don’t be a silly fool, she told herself. Don’t read more into what’s there.
They were friends, nothing more. Doing each other a favor. And though it appeared he’d dropped his plan to relocate Miss ErmaJean, she would be wise to remember he’d eventually return to the beach. This interlude with Ethan was too good to be true. Too good to last.
After the catastrophe with Tony, Amber didn’t believe in happily-ever-afters.
Chapter Six
Monday had barely begun before Grandma Hicks started worrying about an upholstery job she owed a client. “I usually work in your granddad’s shop, but if you tote the chair into the dining room along with my tools, I think I could finish the project.”
Ethan nursed his second cup of coffee. “You’re supposed to be resting, Grandma. And with your leg in a cast, your maneuverability is iffy. The customer will have to wait until you’re better.”
She got the stubborn glint in her eye he recognized all too well. “But I promised.”
“Not happening, Grandma. For the time being, you’ve got to accept you have limitations.”
“The chair is his wife’s favorite. It’s supposed to be her birthday gift.” His grandmother wrung her hands. “I’ve never failed a customer before. People in the community know if your granddad or I promised something, our word was our bond.”
“People in the community should also know sometimes life gets in the way of even the best-laid plans.”
Her lips thinned with disapproval. “If you don’t have your reputation, what else matters?”
She wasn’t going to let this go.
Ethan blew out a breath. “When is the birthday?”
“Her husband was hoping to give it to her tonight.”
“What?” He half rose.
“I hate to disappoint them.” She looked at him and then away. “You’re right, of course. It’s probably too much for me to tackle in my condition.”
He sat down again. “Glad you’re seeing sense.”
“But it wouldn’t be too much for you, Ethan.”
His gaze snapped to hers.
“I’ve already removed the old fabric. It will be a breeze to re-cover. Not one of those tricky projects, like the channel-back chair you helped your granddad upholster that time.” Her eyes misted. “It would make me so happy to see you working with his tools. Almost as good as having him here again.”
And before Ethan knew what hit him, he found himself doing just that—re-covering the small old-fashioned lady’s armchair in a gold-woven brocade. He spent the entire morning in the shop.
He would’ve finished sooner, but he couldn’t resist doing a bit of restoration to the carved wooden rosettes scrolled across the top of the chair. The client swung by after lunch to collect the chair and pay Ethan’s grandmother. The guy was effusive in his praise.
Although Ethan’s muscles ached from the unaccustomed bending, he felt good about a job well-done. And he experienced a satisfaction he hadn’t expected from using the tools of his late grandfather’s trade.
Later that afternoon, inching forward in the car pool lane, Ethan reckoned he’d been less nervous storming terrorist strongholds in Fallujah. Having temporarily forsaken the Harley, he felt conspicuously unmanly in his grandmother’s cute lime-green sedan. Cute only if you were a grandma. Or a girl.
But things could be worse. He frowned at the two vehicles boxing him in line. He could be driving a minivan.
The playground was empty. An American flag waved proudly on a pole outside the school entrance. Not yet old enough for kindergarten, the girls were enrolled in an extended-day, head start program for economically disadvantaged children.
It killed him to think about how hard Amber worked. The sacrifices she unflinchingly made. He wasn’t sure he’d ever loved anyone—save Grandma—like that.
The dismissal bell rang promptly at three o’clock. His stomach knotted. He peered through the hordes of children rapidly exiting the brick building. A cluster of children huddled under the open breezeway on the sidewalk.
He spotted the twins almost immediately. Tiny compared to the older kids. Stella, typically solemn. Lucy, who’d never met a stranger. And if for no other reason than they reminded him of Amber, already they tugged at his heart.
They were so stinking cute. Their blond hair had for the most part teased loose from the braids Amber so carefully fashioned this morning.
Catching sight of him at the wheel, Lucy’s face lit up. His heart did a strange lurch. In his lifetime, there hadn’t been many p
eople excited to see him.
Grandma had been one. The old Amber possibly being the other. And now her adorable daughters. At least, one of them. Lucy waved wildly at him. Stella glared fixedly at the pavement.
A school staff member opened the back door. Lucy scooted over the seat and into her booster. Stella reluctantly clambered inside.
The car pool monitor shut the door, and he pulled away from the curb and out toward the street. “So, ladies... Did you make it a good one?”
Lucy chattered away. She recounted in enthusiastic detail about writing her numbers on the whiteboard. And about some upcoming community fund-raiser dance. He recalled seeing the signs posted around town.
Rounding the square, he headed down Main. During Lucy’s monologue, he nodded and grunted in the appropriate places.
The Sweetheart Dinner/Dance was going to be held in the square. Lucy wanted to go so, so badly. It would be fun. She would pretend to be a princess. Everyone in their class was going. Townspeople, too. She ticked off the names of everyone of her acquaintance. It was a long list.
When she finally wound down, Ethan quickly interjected. “Your mom tells me you love art, Stella. What did you make at school today?”
His gaze flicked to the rearview mirror. A scowl marred Stella’s perfect brow. She said nothing, just stared out the window at the passing scenery.
He set his jaw. He was going to win over Stella Fleming if it killed him. Which, at this rate, it might.
Leaving the outskirts of town, Stella lifted her eyes when they passed the sign that said Welcome to Truelove. “This isn’t the way to Gigi’s.”
“I thought we’d take a quick detour. Meet some friends of mine I think you’d enjoy.”
“Yay!” Lucy cheered.
Stella pointed an accusing finger. “After school, you’re supposed to take us to Gigi’s.” Like her mother, Stella had trust issues.
Her twin pouted. “It’s a field twip, Stehwaa.”
Stella shook her head. “Gigi is waiting for us.”
He smiled into the mirror. “Gigi packed snacks for us to share with my friends.”
“Snacks?” Lucy leaned forward, stretching the belt harness. “For us, too? Awe dey yummy?” In signature Lucy fashion, she didn’t wait for him to respond. “Awen’t you hungwy, Stehwaa? I’m hungwy, Efan.”
“Gigi made sure there are enough yummy snacks for all of us.”
Stella—so much like her mom—wasn’t as easily won over. “We have homework.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Mommy says we must always do our homework.”
“And we will.” He steered the car past Apple Valley Farm. How much homework could a four-year-old have? “Soon as we visit my friends.”
“Dat’s Maisie’s house.” Lucy motioned as they bypassed the orchard.
“When I was your age, your mommy, Maisie’s mommy—Callie, Uncle Matt and I were the best of friends.”
“Maisie used to be wike us, but she has a daddy now.” Lucy gave him a look out of the corner of her lashes. “Do you fink someday we will get a daddy?”
Two thoughts occurred to Ethan so quickly as to be nearly simultaneous. One—Lucy was going to be a handful in about ten years. Dear God, help the mountain boys.
And two—some guy becoming their father and Amber’s husband rubbed Ethan the wrong way.
“Efan?”
He opened his mouth, but Stella beat him to the punch.
“No, Lucy,” Stella scolded. “Maisie’s daddy got lost, but then he found her. He always loved her.”
Lucy jutted her jaw. “Our daddy got wost. When our new daddy finds us, he’ll always wuv us, too.”
Stella snorted. “Daddies don’t work that way, Lucy.”
“They do.” Lucy’s voice rose. “You fink you know ev-wee-fing but you don’t. Not about daddies.”
Stella pushed Lucy’s shoulder. “I do so know.”
Lucy shoved back. “You don’t.”
“Girls!” He cut in as the wrangling escalated.
He frowned at them in the mirror. He’d negotiated peace settlements between rival warlords less fractious than these two. Weren’t girls supposed to be easier to handle?
Venturing beyond the turnoff to the trailer, he drove onto a farm road. “Hang on to your hats.” He gripped the wheel as the sedan jostled along the pitted track.
Lucy giggled. “We awen’t wear-wing hats, siwee Efan.”
Stella’s mouth resumed its normal pinched appearance. Her default expression with him. Rounding the curve of the winding road, the car emerged on the other side of the glade of trees.
Ethan braked beside the small pond, sending up a swirl of dust. “We’re here.”
He waited for the dust to settle before getting out. Opening the rear door, he leaned inside to help Lucy unfasten the booster buckle. She scrambled down.
Ethan reached to help Stella but, pressing the lever, she released the safety harness by herself. With a little sniff of pride, she scooted out and brushed past him to where Lucy waited.
“Where are your fwiends, Efan?”
He retrieved the bag with their snacks and closed the door.
Gasping, Stella gestured at the pond. “Look!” A flotilla of brown and white ducks floated into view.
Score one in his ongoing quest to connect with the notoriously hard-to-impress Stella. Who, like her mother, appeared impervious to his widely acknowledged charms.
“Baby ducks!” Lucy shrieked, dancing in the grass.
“Shh...” He put his fingers to his lips. “Not so loud. You’ll scare the ducklings away.”
Eyes big as dinner plates, both girls froze, Lucy in midclap. Only the busy drone of bumblebees in a nearby patch of clover broke the near-DEFCON silence that suddenly reigned. He was going to have to remember that. He needed every trick he could muster in his twin-sitting toolkit.
“How would you girls like to give my friends an afternoon snack?” he whispered.
“Yummy snacks,” Lucy reminded him in a softer indoor voice.
He lifted a sandwich bag in each hand.
Stella scowled at the kernels of sweet corn. “Not yummy.”
He’d done his research. Bread wasn’t a healthy choice for ducks. “Corn is yummy to ducks.”
And frozen peas. Oats. Rice, too.
He winked at them. “After we feed them, Gigi sent other kinds of snacks yummy to little girls’ tummies, I promise.”
Both girls reached for the bags.
He held on a moment more. “Remember, we have to go slowly. No sudden movements or noise. No arguing. We don’t want to frighten them.”
Lucy gazed earnestly at him. “We won’t be bad, Efan. We pwomise, don’t we, Stehwaa?”
Had someone told them they were bad? It wouldn’t have been Amber or his grandmother, who believed the sun rose and set with these small pip-squeaks.
Then a memory from his own boyhood hollowed his gut. Maybe no one had needed to tell them. Perhaps the lack of a father had already convinced them there was something inherently bad about them.
As if somehow he wasn’t—they weren’t—as good or worthy as other children. In a child’s mind, when your own parents leave you, there must be something wrong with you.
Only with maturity and Dwight Fleming’s interaction in his life had Ethan come to realize the fault lay not so much within himself as with the two very flawed human beings who’d given him life.
He crouched. “Lucy, you and Stella aren’t bad.”
Brows bunched, Lucy tilted her head. “Miss G’Anne says we act too wild.”
He locked gazes with her. “You are not too wild. And even if sometimes you forget and are noisy, you two are good girls.”
Stella slitted her eyes at him. “Even when we fight?”
“No one is perfect all the time. Even when you argu
e, you are still good, sweet girls.”
High-spirited. Impulsive. Loud. But melted-butter wonderful in his humble but accurate opinion.
Lucy smiled. Stella’s usual glower abated somewhat. Which, considering Stella, was a huge win for him. He’d take a win any way he could get one.
Clutching the bags, the twins crept forward on tiptoe. Perhaps overdoing his warning to be cautious. Resembling not so much a pair of children as pint-size cat burglars. He smiled. These girls cracked him up.
Lucy vibrated with barely contained glee. Stella, as was her way, was more self-contained in her joy. Only allowing herself a taste for fear it wouldn’t, couldn’t, last.
So much like her mother it made his heart ache. Making him more determined to paint a smile on Stella’s stubborn, distrusting little face.
Once the first handful of corn was tossed into the water, the quacking ducks crowded the bank. The more aggressive ones waddled into the grass.
Lucy gave an excited squeal before clamping her free hand over her mouth. Wings flapping with eager greediness, a larger duck brushed against Stella’s white tights. Instinctively, she drew back, plastering herself against Ethan for safety.
Kneeling beside the startled child, he placed one arm around Stella and with his other hand shooed the too-inquisitive creature. “It’s okay, Stella. I’m here.”
Biting her bottom lip, she frowned, but she didn’t pull away.
“Let me show you girls something.” Placing a handful of kernels in his palm, he held out his hand to a small duckling.
The brown-feathered baby bobbed forward, poking his yellow bill into Ethan’s hand. Stella went rigid. Lucy sucked in a breath.
“It’s okay,” he said in a quiet voice. “I just keep my hand flat and my fingers out of the way.”
The duckling quickly gobbled the remaining kernels.
“Let me t-why, Efan...” Lucy bobbed on her tiptoes. “Me next.”
“No, Lucy.” Stella took firm possession of his hand. “My turn first.”
Swallowing a smile, he opened her hand and sprinkled a few kernels of corn on her palm. The duckling returned. Ethan laid his hand under hers as a support. When the duckling’s bill touched her skin, Stella quivered.
