Falling for the Wrong Brother

by Michelle Major

  “No more from you,” Jim said. “You will turn this around, Morgan. You’ve been given a chance here.”

  “What about Cole?”

  Their father narrowed his eyes. “That boy is not my responsibility.”

  “Dad,” Maggie and Morgan said at once.

  Jim blew out a long breath. “Fine. I’ll make sure Griffin understands that Cole is trying to take the blame for something he didn’t do. I won’t let anything bad happen to him.”

  With a soft cry, Morgan threw her arms around their father’s waist and burrowed into his chest. “Thanks, Daddy,” she whispered.

  Maggie met his gaze and nodded, her nerves settling at the knowledge that one section of her life was slowly getting back on track.

  * * *

  It was nearly midnight before she made it back down to the cabin to pack up from earlier. Her father had suggested she wait until the following day, but Maggie knew she wouldn’t sleep tonight and so welcomed the distraction.

  Her heart stuttered as her headlights picked up the outline of Griffin’s Land Cruiser already parked in the driveway.

  The lights were on in the cabin, and she could see him in the kitchen, moving back and forth from the refrigerator to the counter. She hadn’t bothered to lock the door when they’d rushed out this morning.

  She wanted to put the car into Reverse, to speed away and avoid the confrontation she knew was inevitable. But this was her mess to clean up as much as his, so she parked and walked up the steps to the front door, trying to keep her heartbeat steady.

  He glanced up as she entered the kitchen.

  “I can take care of this,” she said, wishing he would leave without speaking.

  “I made you hurry out this morning.” He picked up a pan from the drainer next to the sink and began to wipe it dry. “It’s the least I can do.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest, hating the implication of his words. “You didn’t make me do anything.”

  One side of his mouth curved. “Good to know.”

  “I’m sorry about the tasting room,” she said quietly, moving forward to put the rest of the supplies into the cardboard box he’d set on the counter.

  “We’ll rebuild.”

  “My dad and I brought Morgan over to talk to your mom today.” Maggie shouldn’t have brought her sister into the conversation. There was enough tension between Griffin and her without adding more. But she had to address it.

  He inclined his head. “Your dad left me a message.”

  She waited for him to say more.

  “It wasn’t Cole’s fault,” she whispered when he remained silent.

  “I know.”

  “But Morgan isn’t all of the things you accused her of being. My family doesn’t have it out for yours that way.”

  He shrugged. “If you say so.”

  “Do you really believe that?”

  “I don’t know what to believe at this point,” he admitted.

  “Me, neither,” she agreed. “It’s all so complicated.”

  “Complicated isn’t really my thing.”

  “I understand.”

  “Do you?”

  “No, but I get what you’re telling me. You can’t be with me.”

  “I want to.”

  “Sure.” It felt like a boot was stomping across her chest.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered and then closed his eyes. “Damn, I hate apologies.”

  “I need you to leave,” she said.

  “Maggie.”

  “Please, Griffin.” She hated that her voice broke on his name. “Please,” she repeated, looking down at the floor, unable to watch him walk away.

  Listening to his footsteps and then the front door opening and closing was bad enough. She gripped the edge of the counter, willing herself to stay standing as tears poured down her cheeks. This moment would not break her. She’d been through too much to be felled by an aching heart now.

  But she wouldn’t force back the tears. She needed to feel everything if she had any chance of moving forward. She walked through the cabin, packing her belongings and loading them into her car. Griffin had packed his stuff and done most of the cleaning before she arrived, so once her bags were in the trunk, she turned off the lights, locked the front door and headed back home.

  As she entered her father’s darkened house, a light flipped on in the living room, revealing her dad in the big leather recliner that had been his official chair since she was a girl.

  “You doing okay?” he asked gently.

  “No.” She dropped her backpack to the hardwood floor. “Griffin was at the cabin.”

  “Things didn’t go well, I take it?”

  She leaned against the door frame. “Spencers and Stones aren’t meant to mix.”

  “I could have told you that,” he said with a quiet chuckle.

  “Why didn’t you?”

  He gave an apologetic shake of his head. “I never thought you needed my advice. You were always so sure of yourself, Maggie. You and your grandmother never seemed to have doubts about anything.”

  “I have plenty of doubts,” she admitted, “and Grammy is at the heart of most of them.”

  “I’m a lousy father,” Jim said with a sigh.

  “You did good today.”

  “Thanks, girl. But I want to do good for you, too.”

  “Was I elected mayor only because of Grammy?” she asked.

  Her father smiled. “No, despite what your grandmother would have you believe.”

  “I want to lead this town, all of it.”

  “You can,” he assured her.

  “But if I go against Grammy, will it cost me the election?”

  “I hope not. I guarantee you’ve got my vote.”

  “Thanks, Dad,” she whispered and smiled. One way or another, she’d find a way to keep going. Maggie’s heart might be splintered, but she refused to break.

  The life she’d created was too precious to give up on it now.

  * * * * *

  Can Maggie and Griffin settle their families’ feud?

  Will Maggie’s mayoral dreams come to fruition?

  Find out in

  Second Chance in Stonecreek

  Book 2 of the Maggie & Griffin trilogy,

  available October 2018 wherever

  Harlequin Special Edition books

  and ebooks are sold!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Special Forces Father by Victoria Pade.

  Join Harlequin My Rewards today and earn a FREE ebook!

  Click here to Join Harlequin My Rewards

  http://www.harlequin.com/myrewards.html?mt=loyalty&cmpid=EBOOBPBPA201602010003

  We hope you enjoyed this Harlequin Special Edition story.

  You know that romance is for life. Harlequin Special Edition stories show that every chapter in a relationship has its challenges and delights and that love can be renewed with each turn of the page.

  Enjoy six new stories from Harlequin Special Edition every month!

  Visit Harlequin.com to find your next great read.

  Connect with us on Harlequin.com for info on our new releases, access to exclusive offers, free online reads and much more!

  Other ways to keep in touch:

  Harlequin.com/newsletters

  Facebook.com/HarlequinBooks

  Twitter.com/HarlequinBooks

  HarlequinBlog.com

  Join Harlequin My Rewards and reward the book lover in you!

  Earn points for every Harlequin print and ebook you buy, wherever and whenever you shop.

  Turn your points into FREE BOOKS of your choice

  OR

  EXCLUSIVE GIFTS from your favorite authors or series.

  Click here to join for FREE

  Or vi
sit us online to register at

  www.HarlequinMyRewards.com

  Harlequin My Rewards is a free program (no fees) without any commitments or obligations.

  Special Forces Father

  by Victoria Pade

  Chapter One

  “It’s princess hair.”

  Really bad princess hair, Dani Cooper thought as she looked at herself in the hand mirror that her four-year-old hairstylist Evie Freelander brought her.

  But she said, “Oh, I feel like a princess now.”

  “That’s not princess hair,” Evie’s twin brother, Grady, decreed when he looked up from his coloring book to assess his sister’s work. “Princess hair looks pretty.”

  “It’s pretty because Dani is pretty!” Evie insisted.

  “Thank you,” Dani said with a laugh, turning her head from side to side to get the full view of her long dark mahogany hair. Evie had attempted to braid four different clumps of it and then secured those clumps with neon hair clips haphazardly around her head.

  Dani had applied light makeup that April morning to accentuate her golden-brown eyes, her thin nose and her full lips, and that was still in place this evening, but she was glad no one outside the Freelander home would be seeing her like this.

  “Okay, clean up now,” she said. “It’s time for our ten-minute dance party to get the wiggles out, and then it’s pajamas and your wind-down for bed.”

  “Dance party!” Grady shouted, quickly putting his markers in their box while Evie made a face and fell back on the sofa as if in a faint.

  “Can Grady help me?” she moaned.

  After three years as the twins’ nanny, Dani knew this routine. “Nope,” she answered Evie. “Grady is picking up his stuff and you need to pick up yours. Or we’ll dance without you!” she finished with a cheery reminder of what the consequences would be.

  Evie groaned again, sat up as if it was a chore for her and gathered the mirror, toy hairbrush and what remained of the clips to put away.

  “I’ll meet you in the dance room,” Dani called after them when they headed for their rooms to return their things.

  The Freelander house was a large, starkly contemporary structure of glass, steel and concrete. It sat far back on a huge lot at the end of a cul-de-sac in one of Denver’s upscale gated communities in the Cherry Creek area. The distance from the street allowed for some privacy despite the undraped windows that comprised almost the entire front of the house.

  The twins’ mother had taken ballet lessons several times a week as her workout and the in-home studio occupied one of the front-facing rooms. The kids liked to cut loose there. They got a kick out of the echo. So that was where Dani let them have their dance parties.

  As she went into the dark room she could see outside, where the curved drive was illuminated by in-ground lighting. But the minute she turned on the lights the windows reflected only inside the room.

  She got the music started just as the four-year-olds ran back in.

  “Ready?” she asked them before all three of them launched into some free-form jumping, footwork and wiggling around that amounted to wild gyrations more than anything that resembled dancing.

  Their ten minutes were nearly up when the doorbell rang.

  Dani’s friend Bryan had said he might stop by tonight after the kids were asleep, so she hadn’t yet turned on the security system. He was early.

  At the sound of the doorbell the dancing stopped and, as Dani turned off the music, both kids went to the window, where they bracketed their eyes with their hands and pressed their faces to the glass to see out.

  “It’s a so-dyer,” Grady announced.

  “A soldier?” Dani repeated the word he’d mispronounced.

  “It is,” Evie confirmed.

  With the twins following behind, Dani left the studio and went to the marble entry hall, certain that the eight-foot-high steel front door was locked. Beside the door were an intercom and a small screen that displayed the images picked up by the camera outside.

  “You’re right, it is a soldier,” she mused, convinced by the officer’s service uniform and the straight, stiff military stance of their visitor that made him look as if he were at attention out there.

  She pushed the button on the intercom and said, “Can I help you?”

  “I’m Liam Madison. I got a message from someone named Dani Cooper. I’m looking for the Freelander house...”

  Ohhh, she knew the name Liam Madison.

  Not the man but the name.

  But since she didn’t know the man and she was very protective of the twins, she said, “Do you have some identification?”

  He produced a military ID, complete with a picture, and held it up to the camera.

  Holy cow, he was handsome!

  And that was only his ID picture.

  She’d been distracted by the uniform, but when he took the ID away from the camera lens she took in the sight of his face, realizing that he was definitely hella-handsome. He also was, indeed, Liam Madison, and since it was Dani who had reached out to him, and the twins who were in need of him, she unlocked the door and opened it.

  “Hi,” she said simply, taking in what neither the four-inch security screen nor the ID picture had done justice to.

  Not only was the guy gorgeous, he was also over six feet tall, broad shouldered, toned and muscular. His hair was closely cropped and the color of unsweetened chocolate. His face was a masterpiece of chiseled bone that gave him refined cheekbones, a sharp jawline, a sculpted chin and a nose that was kept from being completely perfect by a bit of a boney bridge. He had slightly thin lips, and the bluest eyes she’d ever seen, streaked by silver to make them even more remarkable.

  “I’m Dani Cooper,” she introduced.

  “Ma’am,” he said formally to acknowledge the introduction.

  “This is a surprise,” she said.

  “I was granted an emergency family leave and just got off a plane at Buckley Air Force Base.”

  “Even though you’re a—”

  “Marine. Yes, ma’am.”

  “Is he a so-dyer?” Grady asked, hiding behind Dani while Evie stood to one side of her.

  “Soldiers are army,” he corrected.

  He got points for understanding the word, but getting so technical with a four-year-old only made Dani smile.

  Just before she remembered what Evie had done to her hair and how she looked meeting this man for the first time.

  But if he’d noticed that she was unsightly there was no evidence of it. And there was nothing she could do about it now, so she merely said, “This is Grady and this is Evie,” nodding to each child in turn. “Guys, this was a friend of your mom’s. His name is Liam.”

  Any mention of their late parents sobered them and this was no exception.

  “Say hello,” she prompted when neither the kids nor Liam Madison responded to the introduction.

  “H’lo,” both children parroted, eyeing him somberly the way they did all strangers.

  “Nice to meet you,” the marine said as much by rote as the kids’ greeting had been.

  It occurred to Dani just then that she’d kept their guest outside long enough. She invited him in and dispatched the twins to put on their pajamas.

  “Get your blankets for wind-down and I’ll bring your yogurts and milk in just a minute,” she instructed as Liam Madison stepped across the threshold to stand at attention inside rather than out.

  Hella-handsome but not warm and fuzzy. Dani was familiar with that military-instilled rigidity.

  As the kids bounded out of the entry she closed the door, motioned behind her with a thumb over her shoulder and said, “Why don’t we talk in the kitchen? I’ll be able to hear them better from there.”

  The marine nodded curtly and followed her as she led him in the same direction t
he kids had gone, to the rear of the expansive house.

  “Can I get you something to eat or drink?” she asked along the way.

  “Thank you, no. But you could tell me who you are, exactly.”

  Like the rest of the house, the kitchen was industrial, and she offered him a seat on one of the metal bar stools at the stainless steel island in the center of it.

  He didn’t accept the offer, remaining standing at one end of the island while Dani went behind it and got out bowls, spoons and glasses, and then took yogurt and milk from the fridge.

  “I’ve been Evie and Grady’s nanny since they turned a year old and switched from a baby-nurse. Well, I’ve been their primary nanny. There was one who came in at bedtime for overnights, and another for the weekends. But after the accident—”

  “What kind of accident?” he interrupted. “Your message said that’s how Audrey and her husband died but you didn’t give any details.”

  Dani had no idea what kind of feelings this man might still have for Audrey, so she trod lightly when she answered. “It was a car wreck. I don’t know what you know about Owen, Audrey’s husband...”

  “When she ended things with me she just said she’d met someone else,” he said matter-of-factly, giving no indication that he had any lingering resentments. Or tender feelings either.

  “Owen Freelander was an acclaimed architect. He designed and built this place—it was his showpiece. His crowning glory just before he retired.”

  “Retired?”

  “He was a lot older than Audrey. He’d just turned sixty-eight a few weeks before the accident.”

  “Sixty-eight?” the marine repeated in surprise. “Audrey was a year younger than I am so she was thirty-one... Her husband was thirty-seven years older?”

  “He seemed like a young sixty-eight, but there was definitely an age difference. And even though he also seemed healthy, he had a heart attack driving home that night three weeks ago. He died when he lost control of the car and hit a tree. Audrey was critically injured. She only lived for two days...”

  Still unsure how the marine felt about her late employer, Dani paused a moment and then said, “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s a shock—this whole thing is a shock—but I haven’t seen or heard from Audrey in over five years. I didn’t wish her any harm but I moved on a long time ago. I don’t think I’m in line for condolences.”