“Do you think he remembered something while he was out there?”
Amelia sighed. “I can’t think of any other explanation. They seemed to be talking friendly enough when I looked out there. And Finn did seem especially interested in the truck even before he asked Boone to go look at it.”
“Did you ask him about it?”
“I didn’t get the chance,” Amelia replied. “He didn’t come down for the rest of the night and he still hadn’t come down when I left for Bible study this morning. I tell you, something happened out there in my driveway. I just don’t know what it was.”
* * *
Finn had wrestled most of the evening and the early part of this morning about what to do with Boone. The man in him knew it was Boone who had knocked him down out there on the hillside. The Ranger in him knew he couldn’t prove it. If he was going to upend Amelia’s family by taking his suspicions to Lucy, he needed rock-solid evidence.
By the time Amelia headed off to church, he’d made up his mind and had a plan. The trouble with that plan was that he couldn’t do a single thing about it until tonight, so the waiting was driving him crazy. A conversation with Luther would probably lead to a discussion of Boone, and that was dangerous. Finn was pretty sure Luther shared his suspicions of Boone, but this was no time to tip his hand to the old man. He was better off steering clear of any Klondike for as much of the day as possible.
Any Klondike, that was, except one.
He had gotten Bug to manage half the flight of stairs this morning, egged on by a carefully placed trail of oatmeal cookies and a whole lot of encouragement. At the moment Finn was lying beside a puffing Bug in the middle of the stairs, trying to get the fat little beast up to the top.
“Come on, boy, I know you have it in you. Dig deep, you little piglet.”
Finn nudged the oatmeal cookie bit a little closer off the end of the next step, watching Bug strain his thick furry neck and give a little lick. “That delicious cookie is just sitting there waiting for you. Come on.” In desperation he gave the dog’s rump a declarative nudge while snapping his fingers above the cookie. The combination startled Bug into action, who made two steps into a scrambling leap, then shuffled himself around to survey his new altitude with a canine mixture of fear and pride.
“Don’t look down, Bug!” Finn cried, scooting up two steps to put his head even with the dog’s. He’d become ridiculously invested in the chubby little guy’s ascent, he knew that. It made no sense except that somewhere inside he needed a victory—any victory—and this one was the closest at hand.
“Come on, Bug, ol’ boy!” came Luther’s cheer from the bottom of the steps, cane brandished like a cavalry flag. “The top is yours. Get on up there for both of us!”
The last four steps loomed above him, and Finn knew he was not getting off this staircase until both he and Bug stood victoriously at its top. He snapped his fingers and gave Bug another nudge. Bug was no slouch—he’d figured out the system, and with a mighty snort, he hoisted his body up over the step to munch another bit of cookie.
“That’s it. You got it now, you old hound!” Luther cried from below them. “Show us what you can do!”
Finn crawled up to the top of the stairs, not caring how absurd this whole thing must look, and fixed his gaze on Bug’s bulging black eyes. The dog was panting, licking his chops for the feast of cookies before him, but he had fire in his eyes. He wanted it. Victory was within reach. “Come on, Bug. The top is waiting for you.”
With a final surge of canine courage, Bug waddled, scrambled and lunged himself up to the landing, where he was lauded by two grown men cheering like idiots. Finn picked the dog up and ruffled his squat head. He handed Bug an entire cookie, not minding the drooly licks that scooped the treat from his palm.
“I’m gonna go see if we have any steak in the freezer,” Luther said. “I’ll grill that dog his very own for doing it. Who knows? If Bug can get upstairs, I just might be next.”
Finn laughed, Luther laughed, and Finn dared anyone to argue that Bug wasn’t laughing, as well. Ten minutes later, while the steak was thawing, the trio did the whole thing again—this time with oatmeal cookie bits on every other step.
While Luther fired up the grill, Finn’s chest glowed with absurd pride while Bug made it all the way up the stairs for a single cookie. Bug earned every bit of the steak Luther was going to make him, and Finn felt the buoyancy of at least one solid accomplishment fill his lungs. “All hail Bug the Conqueror!” He laughed, scooping up the dog to bring him out to the patio, where his victory dinner awaited him.
Amelia came in the kitchen door just as he passed. She had every right to look as astonished as she did—he had no doubt this doggy celebration must look as if the Klondike household had lost its collective marbles.
“What on earth is going on?” She looked from Finn to Bug to Luther out on the porch brandishing a barbecue fork. “Gramps, whatever are you doing out there?”
“What does it look like I’m doing?” Luther grinned. “I’m fixin’ a steak for the dog.”
Amelia balked at the obviousness of that declaration, raising one blond eyebrow at Finn. “Mind explaining why Bug’s getting steak?”
Finn put the dog down, who rushed over to his owner and began snuffling excitedly as if to announce his own accomplishment. “It’ll all make sense in a minute.” After she shot him an “I doubt that” look, he amended his remark to “Well, it might make more sense in a minute.”
“That’s good,” she said, eyeing Luther’s position at the grill with a fair amount of concern, “because it doesn’t make a lick of sense at the moment.”
“Go on and show her, son,” Luther called from the porch. “I’ll be finished up here in a minute.”
Amelia’s eyebrows rose and her lips pursed. “Show me what?”
Finn pulled another cookie from the Christmas-tree-shaped cookie jar, showing it to Bug, who immediately scooted to his place at the foot of the stairs. “Show you this.”
He gestured to the stairs as he and Amelia followed Bug to the hallway. Finn would probably never be able to explain how he was so proud of the tubby little dog for this feat. Then again, he couldn’t explain a lot about his life. It just felt so good to accomplish something, to jump just one hurdle in life, even if it wasn’t his own. He pointed at Bug. “Stay, boy,” he said, and then proceeded to climb to the top of the stairs and place the cookie in sight at the edge of the landing.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Amelia said. Her tone was a delightful mix of disbelief and astonishment. Bug’s little curly tail began to twitch, evidently as eager to show off the new skill as Finn was.
Coming back down the flight to stand beside Amelia, Finn patted Bug on the rump. “Go on, Bug. Show your mama what you can do.”
Bug put his paws on the first step and began his ascent. “I don’t believe it,” Amelia whispered. Finn felt the astonishment in her voice tickle down the back of his neck. “Can he?”
“Twice today,” Finn whispered, crazy pride puffing up his chest.
With a series of snuffles and scrambles, Bug worked his way up five of the twelve steps. Finn felt every single step, astonished to realize he’d been holding his breath. It was a dog, for crying out loud. A fat, adorable, brave little dog. Maybe Amelia had every right to think the Klondike household had lost its senses.
Bug turned with one paw on the sixth step, as if to make sure everyone was watching. The dog actually looked nervous—which couldn’t possibly be true, but those big eyes were so comically expressive Finn couldn’t help but be nervous for the beast. “Go on, Bug, smell that steak grilling and be a champ.”
As he turned back to his ascent, Bug lost his footing and slipped back down one step. Amelia gasped and lunged for the dog, but Finn caught her and held her back by both shoulders. “No, he’s okay. He can do this.” The move brought them close, and when Amelia turned to look at him with that “I’ve got to help” plea in her eyes, something unwound in
Finn’s chest. Some tightly coiled knot that had begun to loose back in the car slipped out of his control. “You don’t have to help him,” he said, the tender tone of his voice sounding as if it belonged on some other man. “He’s going to be fine.”
Bug kicked and scrambled his hind legs back up onto the fifth step, and Finn felt Amelia leaning toward the dog. He held on to her shoulders, noting how the top of her hair brushed his chin and the rosy smell of whatever scent she wore. He was looking at the dog but noticing every detail of how close they were. She was looking at Bug as well, but by the catch in her breath and the tension in her shoulders, he knew it was the same for her.
Bug settled himself on the sixth step, and then the seventh, and Finn knew he ought to let go of Amelia but didn’t. “Seven,” she called in the gently encouraging tone that for now was his first memory. “Come on, boy, eight.”
As Bug moved from the ninth stair to the tenth, Amelia’s hand came up to cover Finn’s on her shoulder. The feel of her small hand atop his opened up some wide space under Finn’s ribs, the knotted spot all but gone. For the first time in all he could remember, he felt like a normal man again, not some kind of walking disaster. She turned to look at Finn, and he felt everything a normal man would feel in the astonished gaze of a beautiful woman.
At the moment, for a split second he wanted to freeze and keep forever, Finn’s heart didn’t feel dead, nor did it feel locked down and lost. He hadn’t forgotten how to care for a woman. He knew, right then with her eyes sparkling in excitement for the same absurd victory that glowed in his own chest, that “forgotten” was not the same thing as “gone.” Not at all.
Bug’s “woof” pulled their eyes back to the stairway, where he sat alternately gobbling up the cookie and running in excited circles around the top landing. “You’ve done it!” she cried, rising up on tiptoes to throw her arms around Finn’s neck in delight.
There was no hesitation in how his arms slipped around her waist to hold her close. It was like walking out of a dark room into a burst of sunlight, and the feel of her tight against him cracked some internal shell that had bound him to darkness. This, his brain told him in the slowed-down potency of the moment, is what they mean when they say holding on to hope. He hadn’t even recognized how hopeless he’d become until this woman and her silly little dog gave it back to him.
Chapter Fifteen
“This was the big surprise? I didn’t know what to expect, but it sure wasn’t this. It’s like the little guy is in training for Mount Everest,” Lucy admired as she and Amelia stood at the bottom of the stairs Thursday afternoon. Silly as it was, Amelia couldn’t resist showing off Bug’s new accomplishments. “He’ll be fighting trim by Valentine’s Day if he keeps this up.”
“That’s if we can get him to do it without the oatmeal-cookie finish line,” Amelia admitted. “And no more steak.”
“Did you really cook this dog a victory steak?” Lucy called into the den, where Gramps sat reading in his recliner.
“What? Are you going to arrest me for it, Sheriff?” Gramps called back. Lucy and Gramps always found opportunities to tease each other.
“No, sir. I was just wondering what I’d get if I climbed the stairs.”
Gramps rumpled his newspaper. “My best smile.”
Amelia laughed, and Lucy pointed a finger at Bug as he made his way down the staircase. “It’s clear who got the better of this deal. You always were a charmer, Bug.” Then in a soft voice, Lucy added, “Speaking of charmers, where’s Finn?”
Amelia headed for the kitchen, keeping this conversation away from Gramps. “I let him borrow my car for the afternoon to go to his final appointment with Dr. Searle.”
“He can drive now?”
“He faxed his police report down to the Department of Motor Vehicles and they mailed him a temporary document care of Dr. Searle. He picked it up a few days ago.”
Lucy stared at her with an odd expression.
“What?” Amelia asked, worried by Lucy’s response.
“The DMV requires a verifiable mailing address. Any document they sent him would show that address. So if he has it, Finn knows where he lives. He can go home.”
Amelia sank into one of her kitchen chairs. “I hadn’t thought of that.” He’d told her about the paperwork, but hadn’t shown it to her.
Lucy put her hand on Amelia’s arm. “So you have to ask yourself why? Why hasn’t he gone home?”
Lucy was right; Finn knew his address now. He had what he needed to go back to his own life—and had known for a few days. The facts told her what her own heart already knew: Finn hadn’t left because he wasn’t ready to leave—and not in the medical sense. The same way she knew yesterday, when he held her for that long moment during Bug’s stair climb, that she didn’t want him to leave. She didn’t want Finn to pull himself out of her life and go back to his.
There wasn’t any point in pretending—especially not with Lucy. “I don’t think he wants to go.” She paused for a moment before daring to add, “And I don’t want him to go.” Amelia put her hand on her chest, an unsettling combination of panic and awareness throwing her off balance. “I don’t want him to go, Lucy. I’m falling for him. There’s a dozen reasons why it won’t work, but...but I’m falling for him. Hard.”
She waited for the lecture Lucy was sure to deliver. She’d deserve every word of it, too. Lucy closed her eyes and pushed out a breath. “Amelia, heaven knows I want you to be happy. I don’t want to see you hurt again. And I’m not saying Finn couldn’t be the guy to make you happy, but there are so many questions. Why he hasn’t told you where he lives if he knows? I hate to be the one to ask this but, Amelia, don’t you wonder what else has hasn’t told you?”
“Of course I do.” The words felt weak on her tongue. She’d been pretending he wasn’t keeping things from her. Which was silly—he’d already told her he knew more than he was saying. Could she believe his story about wanting to sort it out for himself before sharing? Or was her heart running off with her better judgment?
“You need Finn to be straight with you before this goes any further. There might be a logical explanation, but you had better know what it is right now.”
Lucy was right, of course. Everything she’d felt there at the bottom of the staircase—and all the other places she’d fought off the strong connection growing between them—couldn’t override all the questions.
“If he really cares for you, he’ll be honest with you. You know that. Rafe may have had his priorities all wrong, but he never deceived you. Don’t let Finn string you along just because it feels good to help him. I know you’re the one who found him in the woods, but remember, we still don’t even know how he got there.”
Amelia let her head sink into her hands. “This is all such a mess. I don’t know what to do.”
Lucy’s hand came to rest on her shoulder. “Yes, you do. I’ll stay here if you want. I’ll be with you when you ask him if that’s what you need. I’ll go run his name through the system if that’ll help.”
A background check on Finn Brannigan as if he were some kind of criminal? Amelia’s stomach turned at the thought. “No. I don’t want that. If I can’t hear it from Finn himself, it won’t matter what I learn through that system of yours. I’d rather hear terrible news straight from him than good news from detective work.”
Amelia straightened in her chair. She was a Klondike. If she couldn’t trust Finn on her own, there was no point in trusting him at all. She was starting to glimpse Finn’s heart, seeing the true man underneath all the trauma. If she couldn’t count on her intuition to tell her if Finn was deceiving her now, when could she? “You don’t need to stay. I’ll ask him to tell me everything. I’ll just have to trust that God will help me handle what I hear.”
Lucy pulled her into a tight hug. “You can handle anything. You’re the strongest person I know. But even the strongest people can let their heart get in the way of good sense. If you don’t need me there when you talk to him, w
ill you promise to tell me what Finn tells you?”
That felt like a violation of privacy, but then again, Amelia knew her objectivity regarding Finn was fast slipping out of her fingers. “So you’re going to go all ‘sheriff’ on me?” Amelia held on to the hug, grateful for a friend like Lucy, one willing to say the hard things when they needed saying.
Lucy pushed back to hold Amelia at arm’s length. “Just this once.”
As she said goodbye to Lucy, Amelia settled into her favorite chair with a cup of coffee and her Bible. The worn book lay unopened on her lap as she closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the soft cushions, feeling Bug settle down at her feet the way he always did when she spent time with God. Gramps, who’d been a high school chemistry teacher, always teased that Bug got his faith by “osmosis”—the process of one chemical seeping from one solution into another. Feeling the rhythm of Bug’s panting chest against her feet, it wasn’t so hard to believe.
I know You sent Finn into my life, Lord, but I can’t yet see why. I can’t stand to be hurt again—You know that. And Finn seems like he’s dragging so much pain around. You see my heart, You see what I feel for Finn. And You see Finn’s heart, too. Only You know what’s best here. I know I can trust that, but I’m all mixed-up inside. I don’t even know what to pray for, except that You work all this out to Your purposes. When Finn comes back, give me the strength to ask him everything I need to ask. And help me cope with the answers, whatever they are.
* * *
“Physically, you are in good shape,” Dr. Searle said as he closed his file. “Mentally and emotionally, I want to recommend—again—that you talk to someone who can help you sort this out. You Ranger types are quick to tout your strengths, but getting help in such an extreme situation as this isn’t a sign of weakness.”
“I hear you.” Finn’s acknowledgment wasn’t an agreement, and Dr. Searle’s eyes showed he recognized the difference. “Thank you for all your help.”
A Ranger for the Holidays (Lone Star Cowboy League) Page 13
