Demanding His Brother's Heirs

by Michelle Celmer

  Jason was instantly awake and on his feet, heart in his throat. “What’s wrong?”

  The words were barely out when Marshall let loose a throaty cough like Jason had never heard before, and his heart plummeted to the balls of his feet. “Oh, my God. Is he choking? Can he breathe?”

  “Relax,” she said, sounding calm but concerned. “Contrary to how he sounds, he seems to be breathing okay, but since he’s a preemie I don’t want to take any chances.”

  “What’s wrong with him?”

  “I’m pretty sure it’s the croup.”

  He blinked. “The what?”

  “The croup. It’s a virus that settles in the vocal chords. At least, that’s what it said on the internet.”

  She was trusting the internet at a time like this? What Marshall needed was a doctor. Though Jason had to admit that other than the cough the baby seemed fine, flashing Jason a goofy, toothless smile even as he was hacking. “What can I do?”

  “Can you get ahold of Faye? I’m sure she’ll know what to do. I would go over to their house, but it’s so dark out there I’m afraid I might trip on something or get lost in the woods.”

  “I’ll call her,” Jason said, reaching for his cell phone and dialing her number.

  Faye answered on the first ring with a sleepy, “It’s 2:00 a.m.”

  “What do you know about the croup?” he asked her. “Holly thinks Marshall has it.”

  “Does he sound like a collie?”

  Marshall started to cough again and Jason held the phone closer to the baby. “He sounds like this.”

  “Oh, yeah, that’s the croup, all right.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive. You used to get it when you were a baby.”

  He told Holly, “She said it’s definitely the croup.”

  Holly exhaled deeply, as if she’d been holding her breath, and sunk against the bedpost in relief. Maybe she hadn’t been as calm inside as she was on the outside. “What does she suggest?” she asked Jason, and he in turn asked Faye.

  “What should we do?”

  “Take him in the bathroom and turn the shower on as hot as it will go. Then sit in there with him.”

  Horrified, he asked, “In the hot shower?”

  “Oh, for goodness sake, no. In the bathroom. The steam from the hot water will help clear the congestion.”

  That made a lot more sense. “Hot water bad, steam good. Gotcha.”

  “Keep him in there until the water runs cold or you drop five pounds. Whichever comes first. Then wrap him up in a blanket and take him outside into the cool air. And tell Holly they’ll be just fine.”

  It took him a second to process what Faye had just said. “What do you mean they?”

  “When one catches something, the other is bound to get it, too.”

  Again, that made sense. As far back as he could remember it had been that way with Jeremy and him, up until it was just Jason who’d been sick all the time.

  “Thanks, Faye. Sorry to wake you.”

  “Anytime, hon.”

  He hung up and relayed Faye’s instructions to Holly. She stood rocking her son back and forth, patting his back softly. “We’ll have to use the bathroom in your room,” he told her. “The ceiling in mine is fifteen feet high. It would take an awful lot of steam to fill it.”

  “Thank you for calling her. I’m sorry I had to wake you.”

  “It’s no problem. Let’s go get him steamed.”

  “I think I’ve got it from here,” she said, clutching Marshall closer. “You can go back to sleep.”

  He was tempted. He had tossed and turned for an hour or so before finally falling asleep around midnight, but something in her expression said she needed his support. Besides, part of taking responsibility for his nephews might mean a sleepless night here and there, but it was a small price to pay. “I’m already up,” he said with a shrug. “It’s no problem.”

  “But—”

  “I can keep you company.” He put his hand on her shoulder to lead her. There was a slight hesitation before she started walking.

  Marshall hacked the entire way there, but seemed no worse for wear. Jason figured that most kids would be crying at this point or at the very least be annoyed. But the baby watched Jason over his mother’s shoulder, wearing that goofy, toothless smile. He was a tough little guy.

  Jason followed her into the bathroom, shut the door behind them. He turned on the hot water in the shower full blast, leaving the etched glass door of the stall open.

  He realized immediately that something wasn’t right. But it wasn’t Marshall this time. It was Holly who had him worried. Her face had paled several shades, she was breathing way too hard and she was trembling. She was hyperventilating, and looked as if she was probably having a panic attack.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, putting a hand on her arm to steady her. She shook her head, and didn’t resist when Jason took Marshall from her arms and guided her toward the toilet. He shut the lid and said, “Sit.”

  Holly sat—collapsed really—and he gently pushed her head down between her knees. “Take slow, shallow breaths.”

  “I...can’t breathe,” she gasped.

  “Actually, you’re breathing too much. Slow it down.” His mother used to get panic attacks near the end of her life, but in her case, she really couldn’t breathe. Her heart had lacked the strength to pump a sufficient amount of oxygenated air through her veins, making her winded and weak. A trip from the bed to the bathroom would exhaust her.

  The room began to fill with steam. Condensation fogged the mirror and clung to his bare skin. He held Marshall up high, where the moisture in the air was more concentrated, while keeping one eye on Holly. Almost immediately Marshall’s hacking began to ease.

  “See,” Jason told her. “He sounds better already. He’s going to be fine.”

  Holly nodded and continued to breathe slowly, elbows on her knees, head cradled in her palms. When she finally raised her head and looked up at him and Marshall, she was still pale but her breathing had returned to normal.

  “Feeling better?” he asked her.

  She nodded, looking embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what just happened.”

  “You had a panic attack.”

  “Swell,” she said, dropping her head back in her hands with a what-next huff. “I’m stronger than this.”

  “You’ve been through a lot,” he reminded her as the steam drifted lower and sweat began to dampen his upper lip.

  “Thank you,” Holly said softly, gazing up at him through the curtain of her lashes, looking so vulnerable and lost that he wanted to take her in his arms and hold her. Tell her that everything would be okay. But he knew that just holding her would never be enough. Once he got his arms around her he wouldn’t want to let go.

  “I was so scared,” she said. “If you hadn’t been here...”

  “You would have managed just fine. You would have called their pediatrician and he would have told you what to do.”

  “You think so?”

  “I know so. You don’t give yourself enough credit.”

  A mixture of steam and sweat trickled down the side of his face, soaking into his T-shirt. Loose strands of pale blond hair stuck to Holly’s face in damp ribbons. Damn, she was pretty. He’d always preferred blondes. Natural ones.

  “I feel as if I’m flying blind,” she said.

  “I would imagine that all new moms probably feel that way.”

  “Yes, but it was so stressful when the twins were born. They spent the majority of their first month in the NICU. I spent every day in the hospital nursery with them.”

  “What about Jeremy?” Surely he must have been there with her.

  “He didn’t like hospitals,” she said, loo
king embarrassed by the truth. “Because he spent so much time there as a child. Or so he said.”

  Had it been Jason’s children, he wouldn’t have left their side. For a split second he considered telling Holly the real reason Jeremy hated hospitals, but now just didn’t seem like the right time. “What kind of father was my brother?” he asked instead, and her hesitation didn’t bode well.

  “The boys came home with heart and breathing monitors. It was a stressful time. Jeremy had difficulties coping. We were fighting all the time. There were times when he would storm out, and not come home until late at night. A few nights he didn’t come home at all. Then he would stroll in the next morning like nothing was wrong. I think in a way he resented the boys for taking up too much of my time. He actually accused me of loving them more than him.”

  “Did you?”

  “Maybe. Probably. But I should have realized that something was terribly wrong. I didn’t let myself see it. I just wanted everything to be okay. I wanted that fairy-tale life he promised me. So I made excuses for him.”

  “Trust me, we’ve all done that. Me, my parents, even Faye and George. We all wanted so badly for him to change, and he used that to his advantage.”

  “He had me fooled,” she said, and she looked so sad, as if she thought it was her own failure, but Jason knew better.

  The steam began to dissipate as the water cooled. Marshall was awake but limp on Jason’s shoulder. Though the baby’s coughing had all but ceased, his breathing still sounded raspy.

  Jason reached into the shower stall and shut off the water. As the air cleared he could see that Holly was just as soggy as he was, and as a result her shirt clung to her body, accentuating everything underneath. And though she was painfully thin, under the oversize white shirt she was still 100 percent woman. And being a red-blooded man, he couldn’t help but look. But only for a second before he forced himself to look away.

  “What now?” Holly asked him.

  “We take him outside into the cool air.” He was about to hand Marshall over to her, but she still looked a bit unsteady. “How do you feel?”

  “A little dizzy, from the steam I think.”

  In that case it probably would be safer if he carried his nephew downstairs and outside. “Why don’t I head out to the back deck while you check on Devon.”

  She paused, gazed at her son, then nodded and said, “Okay.”

  He opened the bathroom door, letting in a rush of cool, dry air. “Grab the quilt off your bed and wrap us up in it,” he told her.

  She tugged the quilt off the bed and draped it over his shoulders. He tucked it tightly around Marshall and himself, so that only his nephew’s face was exposed. Jason didn’t want him catching a chill and aggravating the virus he already had.

  Jason headed downstairs and out the back door into the clear, moonlit night. The thermometer on the back of the house said it was sixty-four degrees, but the air felt cool on his damp face and the deck was slippery with dew. Jason paced in the dark with Marshall cradled in the crook of his arm. His nephew gazed up at him, cooing contentedly. He sure seemed like a happy-go-lucky kid.

  The first time Jason had held the boys they’d seemed so small and fragile, but they were far sturdier than he’d imagined and he was starting to get the hang of holding them. What a difference only a few days made.

  The back door opened and Holly stepped out.

  “How is Devon?” he asked her.

  “Sound asleep and breathing fine. But I suppose his catching it is inevitable.”

  “Faye thought so, too. But this time you’ll know what to do.”

  “And I won’t have to wake you.”

  “But it’s okay if you do.”

  In the pale bluish light he could see her smile, and though it was damned pretty, he caught his gaze drifting lower. Her T-shirt was so damp it clung to the swell of her breasts, and so transparent he could see the pale outline of her peaked nipples. He imagined how good they would feel cupped in his hands, or pressed against his chest. In his mouth...

  He lifted his gaze and realized that Holly was watching him watch her. And she wasn’t making any effort to cover herself.

  “Sorry,” he said, keeping his eyes level with hers. “I didn’t mean to stare.”

  She surprised him by shrugging and saying almost the exact thing he had told Faye. “No crime in looking.”

  No, but looking was like a gateway to touching. Or was she suggesting that she wanted him to look?

  A gust of wind chilled the air and Holly shivered, wrapping her arms around herself for warmth. Blocking the view that he shouldn’t have been enjoying in the first place. “If you’re cold you can go back inside,” he told her.

  She frowned and shook her head. “I don’t want to leave Marshall.”

  “He’s fine.”

  “I don’t care,” she said, her teeth chattering. “I want to stay. He’s my responsibility.”

  Damn it, she was stubborn. What was he supposed to do? Let her stand there shivering? She was going to wind up making herself sick, too. “You won’t be much good to them if you have pneumonia.”

  She shook her head, refusing to leave. He understood her need to be there for her children, but she was taking it to the extreme.

  “Come here,” he said, and held open the blanket, inviting her into the warm cocoon he and her son had created. Holly stepped closer, hesitantly at first, but her need for warmth won out. She let Jason fold the blanket around her and pull her in closer. She stood stiffly, her arms folded, and her skin was so cold it was a bit like cuddling a popsicle.

  “You’re freezing,” he said.

  “I—I d-didn’t think it was th-this c-cold.”

  “We really need to warm you up.” She didn’t resist—though he sort of wished she would have—as he pulled the blanket tighter around them, wrapping his free arm around her narrow shoulders. As his body heat began to warm her, she stopped trembling and relaxed in his arms.

  “Better?” he asked.

  She nodded, her hair catching in the stubble on his chin, her breath warm against his skin as she tucked her head into the crook of his neck. It felt good. Too damned good.

  With the crisis over, the concerned uncle in him took a step back and the part of him that was all man, the part of him that craved her touch, took over. Though he tried to fight it, reminded himself he was holding another man’s woman and child, his own brother’s wife, his body didn’t listen. And if he didn’t back away soon it was going to become more than obvious to her.

  “This is nice,” she said. “It’s been a really long time since anyone held me like this.”

  Another shortcoming on Jeremy’s part. If she were Jason’s wife, he would have a hell of a time keeping his hands off her. And as far as hugs went, it had been a while for him, too, but that didn’t make it right.

  It didn’t necessarily make it wrong, either.

  “Maybe a little too nice,” she said, flooring him with her honesty. “We can’t deny that there’s chemistry.”

  He wouldn’t even try. He liked a woman who wasn’t afraid to speak her mind. He had grown so tired of the mind games and half-truths. How many times had he dated a woman who swore she had no interest in marriage and kids, only to discover that all the while she’d been picking out china patterns and browsing Modern Bride magazine? Though he was sure it was more about the size of his wallet than genuine affection.

  But there was such a thing as too much honesty.

  “Or maybe it’s just me?” she said when he didn’t replay. “Maybe I’m misreading the signals.”

  “It’s not just you,” he told her, her look of relief making him smile. As if there was any question that he was lusting after her. That or she hadn’t the slightest clue how beautiful and sweet she was. Too sweet for someone such as him.
How many times would he have to remind himself of that?

  As many as it took.

  “You’re not misreading anything,” he said.

  She looked up at him, putting her mouth mere inches from his. Was she trying to drive him crazy?

  “I think we’ll agree that anything beyond friendship would be a bad idea,” she said, so close he could feel the heat of her breath on his lips.

  Jesus. It took everything in him not to kiss her. To keep his libido in check. The only thing giving him the will to resist was the drowsy child lying limp in his arms. He was a much needed buffer. “Are you always this brutally honest?”

  “I denied my true feelings with Jeremy and look where it got me. If we have any hope of making this work, if the boys and I are going to live under your roof, we have to be honest with each other. Even if the truth hurts a little.”

  He could see her point, and her willingness to bare her soul to him said an awful lot about her character. He found himself almost wishing that he had met her before his brother had. But knowing her the way he did now, it was probably better that he hadn’t. He could never give her what she truly wanted. What she deserved. Despite Jeremy’s betrayal he had given her something real and concrete. Two precious sons. It was more than Jeremy was capable of.

  Holly was still watching him, waiting for a response. If she wanted honesty that’s what he would give her. “The truth is I really want to kiss you.”

  Her breath caught and he could swear he felt her pulse quicken, her body go soft.

  “Too honest for you?”

  “I do, too,” she said. “Want to kiss you, I mean. Not myself. And no, it’s not too honest. We have to be able to talk to each other.”

  “In that case, do you want to know what else I’d like to do to you?”

  She blinked. “Um, well...maybe we don’t have to be that honest.”

  “Then this would probably be a good time to go inside.” Marshall had fallen back to sleep, and Jason could see a very cold shower in his immediate future.

  “I think you’re right,” she said. He lifted his arm from her shoulders and she backed away from him. “I’d like to carry Marshall to bed.”