The Return of Brody McBride

by Jennifer Ryan

  Stretching out his legs and leaning back against the seat behind him, he put the people around him out of his mind and watched Rain and his girls in action. Focused on them, he could almost ignore the instinct to find cover and safety. When he rubbed his palm over his injured thigh, it wasn’t from the pain, but because of his sweaty palms.

  Owen grounded balls to some of the girls, Autumn included, helping them practice fielding as the ball bounced off the ground. When the girls missed, Owen encouraged them to hustle and get the ball and throw it back to him. Rain worked with Dawn and another girl on pitching. Dawn had her mother’s arm.

  The girls took their positions around the field. Owen crouched behind home plate, Rain grabbed a bat, and Dawn and the other girl pitching stood on the pitcher’s mound. Autumn took her place at first base.

  The crack of the bat drew him to home plate. The ball sailed out past the shortstop to left field. The little girl ran to grab the ball and threw it to Autumn at first. She caught it effortlessly, touched her foot to the base bag, and threw it to Dawn on the pitcher’s mound. All the girls showed surprising coordination. Rain had everything to do with that. She’d obviously worked with all the girls to make the game fun, but she put the girls in positions that suited their skills. The longer he watched, the more she and the girls impressed him.

  To give the girls a chance to bat, Rain took over field positions as each girl ran to home plate to take their turn. Some of the girls struck out, but got a second chance until they got a hit. All the while, Rain called out directions and encouragement. The other girls followed Rain’s example and cheered their fellow teammates on.

  A comment by one of the other parents caught his attention, making him frown. “The girl at bat should be dropped from the lineup. She can’t hit the ball.”

  Brody studied her next swing and identified the issue. Whistling to Owen, he held up his hands and showed Owen the girl needed to spread her hands to give her more leverage and control of the bat. Owen stood behind the little girl and showed her what to do and allowed her a couple practice swings. Dawn sailed in a pitch. The ball cracked off the end of the bat, flew high over second base to the outfielder. The little girl at bat smiled hugely when all the girls cheered. Brody caught Owen’s nod of approval before he glanced out to Rain. She touched her finger to the brim of her ball cap, then pointed at him. An old signal she used to give him when he’d come to watch her games. His heart warmed and his chest went tight at the old familiar gesture.

  The feeling was ruined as he tuned in to several comments coming from behind him on the bleachers.

  “He was shot . . . I heard he survived a roadside bomb . . . The paper said he was awarded a Purple Heart, another medal for valor, and a bunch of others . . . She didn’t tell him about the girls . . . I read he started his own business . . . He’s rich now . . . No way will he let her keep those kids from him . . . He’ll probably take those girls from her after what she did . . . Wait till Roxy finds out he’s back in town . . . The paper said he’s rebuilding the old cabin and raising horses out on the ranch . . . His company is based in Atlanta, but he’ll be working from here . . . It’s awful she’s been raising those girls alone without their father . . . She’s a spiteful bitch, who took another woman’s baby and kept them both from their father . . .”

  The last voice he recognized, but couldn’t place the woman’s name. She and Roxy had been friends back in the day. Practice wound down, and he couldn’t sit another minute listening to the people around him gossip, thinking they were being discreet and he couldn’t hear them.

  Rain shot him a concerned look. His confusion and irritation must have shown on his face. Standing, he headed her way. She met him several strides from where the girls did some warm-down exercises with Owen.

  He stood over her and said between clenched teeth, “What article about me is everyone talking about?”

  “Probably the article in yesterday’s paper,” Rain supplied, looking as innocent as a bank robber holding a bag of money outside the bank doors.

  “Did you talk to a reporter about me?”

  “No,” she scoffed. “The last thing I want is someone asking me a bunch of questions about you, me, and the girls. I wouldn’t give the people of this town anything more to talk about,” she added.

  “Everyone is talking,” he pointed out, “because of some article they read.”

  Rain rolled her expressive eyes and huffed out a frustrated breath. “Fine. It was me. But not the way you think. Owen knows a reporter at the paper. His friend wrote the article using Owen as an anonymous source. Everyone will talk about us—you and the girls, more specifically. You left town with less than a stellar reputation. I didn’t want our girls hearing everyone talk about the old you.”

  “The old me,” he repeated, hoping she really saw the changes in him.

  “We aren’t those young reckless people we used to be. I wanted this town to know what you made of your life. No matter what they say about me, what you’ve accomplished is extraordinary.”

  “Those people think you’re some evil bitch who took another woman’s baby and kept the girls’ existence from me for spite.”

  “They’re not far off the mark.”

  “Bullshit.” He leaned heavily on his right leg because his left was killing him. Planting his fists on his hips, he added, “There isn’t a cruel bone in your body.”

  “I have Autumn and I didn’t tell you about either of them.” She pointed out the obvious, but not the whole picture. There was a hell of a lot more to why she’d kept the girls from him. Most of the reason was his own damn fault.

  Frustrated, he gazed up at the sky and prayed for patience.

  “I wanted the people of this town to talk about your accomplishments. So that when the girls overheard, they’d hear all the good things about you.”

  “Is this about my company and the money I’ve made? You want everyone to know I can keep you and the girls in style,” he accused.

  Too late, he realized his mistake. Her controlled rage was something to see. “You think this is about money. I haven’t asked you for a dime. I’ve put a roof over those girls’ heads, fed them, clothed them, paid their doctor bills, made sure they always got the things they need. Maybe I couldn’t always afford the best, or they had to go without things they wanted, but I always made sure their needs were met. I don’t need to be kept in style and neither do they.”

  She paced away from him and came back, fire and fury burning in her eyes. “I can’t win with you. I’ve tried to be nice, let you come to the house and see the girls, include you in their lives, bring you into the family. Haven’t I?”

  He opened his mouth to answer, but she went on without waiting to hear what he had to say. “All this time you thought all I want is your money.”

  “No.” He tossed his hands up and let them fall. He had to rub his palm over his leg to try to ease some of the pain. “I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night. That’s your fault,” he accused, pointing a finger at her. “I’m tired, surly, and in pain, as you very well know. I overheard them talking about the roadside bomb and my injuries and . . .” He couldn’t tell her it brought it all back, and all he wanted to do was blank it all out.

  “You don’t want people talking about what happened to you and your friends.” She spoke what was on his mind. “You saved three of your buddies, Brody. You busted out the back window and dragged Tom out of the burning vehicle, even after you were hurt. You gave him CPR until he came back. You never gave up. None of the details were in the article. Only that you risked your life and the military rewarded you with your medals. You’re a hero, Brody. Nothing can change that fact, even if you wish away the years you served our country, because of that one terrible day.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t want people asking me about it.” A trace of desperation escaped in his voice.

  “You don’t have to talk about it. That was one of the purposes of the article. To let people know the
facts without them asking you. If they talk to you about it, change the subject, tell them you don’t want to talk about it, tell them you left that life behind. Whatever makes you comfortable. Hell, show them a glimpse of the old Brody and tell them to go to hell.”

  “Wait, how did you know about Tom?” At her guilty look, he said, “Owen couldn’t have known those details.”

  “I guess it doesn’t matter if you know now. I was at the hospital, Brody.”

  “You came to see me.” Surprise didn’t cover the emotions running through him. He didn’t remember her being there when he’d spent every miserable second of agony wishing she were with him.

  “Did you think I’d leave you in some hospital to die alone? You scared me half to death.” She adjusted her ball cap nervously. “Your burns were pretty bad, but the infection was worse. They kept you sedated those first few days. I met Tom’s wife in the hospital. She told me he was holding his own. Alive, thanks to you.”

  “You saw the burns?”

  “The nurses would come in and change the dressing every couple of hours. You must have been in terrible pain.” Her eyes went soft, glassing over.

  The girls were just about ready to pack up their gear. He didn’t have much time before Autumn and Dawn came to them to go to dinner.

  “You saw them,” he said again. “They’ve healed a lot, but the skin . . . it’s kind of . . .”

  Rain put her hand on his arm as he stumbled through trying to explain.

  “Brody. Stop. You don’t have to say anything. I saw the burns and the other scars on your body. They don’t frighten me,” she went on to reassure him.

  “They’re ugly,” he admitted, knowing she’d probably feel the same.

  Her laugh startled him. “There’s never been anything ugly about you, Brody. I’m sure women still fall at your feet. I did,” she added when he only stared.

  He couldn’t speak, didn’t know what to say. Reading him the way she always did, she put her hand over his heart in her achingly familiar way. This time, he managed to hold back the instinctive flinch.

  “Brody, honey, I see the outside of you with my eyes, but when I really look at you, I do it with my heart. I always have. I didn’t fall in love with your handsome face and that outstandingly fit body,” she said with a cocky smile. “I fell in love with who you are. The real you, not just the parts I can see.

  “Remember my senior year? The championship softball game, and I got beamed in the side by the other pitcher.”

  “You were the best player. She wanted to take you out of the game.”

  “She cracked two of my ribs with that pitch.”

  “You sucked it up and hit a home run on the next pitch and won the game. You were a badass back then. Still are,” he added.

  “You picked me up for school, carried my backpack for me, did my chores around the house, and helped out at Pop’s shop, until I could do it myself. That’s the Brody I fell in love with. The one who can’t stand to see me hurt and who drives a half an hour out of town to my favorite Mexican restaurant to buy me tacos just to make me feel better.”

  “I don’t deserve you.” Barely able to get the words out for the lump in his throat.

  “You don’t deserve what I did to you. I’ll explain it all to you tomorrow night at your place, but please know, I did it for Autumn. I did it so you could be in that war with your head in the game and not on what you’d left behind.”

  “You were always with me,” he said. “I was fighting my way back to you.”

  “You made it. The people of this town should know you served them proud. Your daughters know you did.”

  “I can’t believe you came to the hospital.” He rubbed his hand over his aching thigh. “Why didn’t you stay, so I could see you?”

  “You made it clear you didn’t want Owen or me anywhere near you. Once I knew you’d make it, I had to fly home to the girls. Owen stayed a few days longer to be sure you were on the mend. We respected your privacy and need to recuperate alone.”

  “In other words, you knew I’d have a difficult time with the grueling physical therapy and I didn’t want you to see me struggle.”

  “I knew you’d take it on with the same single-minded determination you go after everything you want.”

  Like I’m coming after you. “You had no doubt I’d get through it.”

  “Quit. Stop. Lose. These are not words in the Brody McBride dictionary.”

  “Then why are you fighting me, honey? Be with me again.”

  “Give me a kiss,” she said, and took a step closer.

  Just to tease her, he said, “You told me not to kiss you because it confuses the girls.”

  “I need you to kiss me because Becky Johnstone, previously Long, is on the phone right now with Roxy. She’s telling her everything she sees the two of us doing. Now, since a few minutes ago it looked like we were having an argument,” she said with a not-so-genuine smile on her face, “I need you to kiss me, so Becky will tell Roxy all is right between the two of us. Hopefully, that will make Roxy believe she can’t use you to take Autumn from me.”

  “How do you know Becky is talking to Roxy?”

  “Roxy always knows what’s going on with me and Autumn. At first, I wasn’t sure how she got the information and details. Through process of elimination of some of the events Roxy knew about, I was able to figure out who was feeding the information to her. Becky is one of those people. Not to mention she’s been staring at you since you arrived.”

  “Not because of my good looks, huh?”

  “That’s probably a lot of it, and she’s telling Roxy right now how good you look in minute detail. So kiss me and give her something to talk about.”

  Sliding his fingers along her jaw and up to her neck, he leaned in close. “You sure you want me to kiss you?” Her body trembled, rippling along his fingertips, telling him how much she anticipated his kiss.

  “Why are you making this so hard?” she asked, her breath catching a bit when he brushed his lips over hers in a whisper of a kiss.

  “Because you’re making me hard just standing there looking good enough to eat.” His mouth brushed hers with every word. He’d like nothing better than to press her body down the length of his, proving his condition in blatant reality, but the bleachers were filled with mothers and fathers here to watch their kids play. Though the only show they wanted to see was him and Rain. So he kept the kiss intimate but light, a melding of his mouth to hers as he held her close, but not pressed to him as he’d like.

  “Dad’s kissing Mom again,” Dawn said behind them, making him smile against Rain’s mouth.

  Brody let go of Rain slowly, turning just enough to see Becky in his peripheral vision. She sat in the stands, talking furiously on her cell phone and glaring at them.

  “Mom, is Uncle Owen coming to pizza with us?” Autumn asked.

  Brody would have laughed at the confused, dazed look on Rain’s face if her lips hadn’t remained slightly parted just waiting for him to kiss her again. Before he gave into the powerful urge, he turned to Autumn and Owen. “You coming, man?”

  “I’ll let you have your girls to yourself. I have some papers for you to sign before you go.”

  “You got them done.”

  “Some of them. I’m not a miracle worker.” Owen gave Brody a hearty slap on the shoulder and turned to Rain, who was trying to quiet the girls around her as they asked her for something with a whole lot of high-pitched pleases.

  “Hey, Rain,” Owen called, getting her attention. He pulled her close, kissed her on the head, then spoke quietly. “Becky’s in the bleachers talking to Roxy.”

  “I hope she’s telling Roxy Brody and I are getting along just fine. That kiss should tell her he’s not about to ally himself with her.”

  “Why the hell would I do that?” Brody cut in. “I told you I wouldn’t take Autumn from you.”

  “You also told me you’d love me forever. It didn’t stop you from sleeping with Roxy and leaving me.�
��

  “I didn’t want to sleep with her.”

  “Well, you did,” Rain shot back. “And you gave her the means to be a part of your life forever.”

  “If she wanted that, she’d have kept Autumn. When she didn’t, she gave me a second reason to be with you.”

  “Don’t mistake my having Autumn with Roxy giving up on you. She’s just biding her time. Now that you’re back, she’ll do something.”

  Dismissing him, she turned her back and addressed the girls. Brody clenched his teeth, frustrated she said things like that, then didn’t finish by telling him what really happened with Roxy, or what was going on now. He also didn’t like people talking about them and reporting to Roxy.

  “I won’t let her take Autumn. She’s ours.” He hated seeing the relief that came over Rain. “Could you just try to trust me? A little bit,” he added.

  “I don’t trust her,” Rain said. Not exactly what he wanted to hear, but he’d take what he could get. For now.

  “Okay, Owen, let’s do a few pitches for the girls before they burst my eardrums with their begging.”

  Brody didn’t know what Rain was talking about, but he definitely wanted the girls to stop jumping up and down and asking her, “Please, Rain, just a couple.”

  “Stand back.” Rain picked up a ball and went to the pitcher’s mound. Owen crouched behind home plate, glove at the ready. Rain fired in the first ball, a resounding thud echoed off Owen’s glove, and a cheer went up from the girls. Dawn and Autumn stood on either side of him, their little hands tucked in his.

  “Mom is awesome,” Dawn sang out.

  “Too cool,” Autumn added.

  Brody had to admit, it was an amazing sight to watch Rain pitch, the balls singing over home plate at more than sixty miles an hour. Rain’s talent always astounded him. That same familiar guilt came over him thinking about all she’d given up, all that talent going to waste, everything she’d worked so hard to accomplish, so she could go to college, never achieved.