Finding Home (St. John Sibling Series Book 2)

by Barbara Raffin

  Maybe the South Seas. The exchange rate on the dollar could allow him to live a long time before the money ran out. He could bask in the sun and wander barefoot on the beach.

  No. Too much idle time there to think.

  Alaska?

  Frostbite.

  South America?

  Snakes.

  Maybe he could just ride the Ducati across the country. It was fun the last three times he did it.

  Sam waited for the jolt of enthusiasm that would tell him he had a plan. All he got was a dreary done that, been there.

  His gaze fixed on Dixie, the warmth in her eyes enveloping him. She'd made it clear he was welcome to stay at The Farmhouse. And hadn't he sensed Mickey had something to do with the storm preventing him from leaving? Or was that just wishful thinking?

  But, she did need his help. Not that he could do much about her Gran, but he could at least be her chef, take that burden off her shoulders. He might even be good for Ben. In spite of their abundance of testosterone, his uncles weren't here nor could they teach Ben about his father the way he could. What harm could there be in sticking around The Farmhouse for a while?

  Lightning strobed through the little room, its accompanying thunder more like a sign from Stuart than Mickey. What harm could there be in staying? The longer he stuck around, the more likely he was to find some dirt Stuart could use against Dixie.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Sam's voice drifted up the stairwell amidst the aromas of hot, maple syrup and percolating coffee. In spite of how well he'd handled Nana's entrance last evening, Dixie still wouldn't have been surprised to find him gone this morning, especially since the restaurant was closed for the day and his chef's talents not needed. But Sam, who had a reputation for running from responsibility, had stuck it out.

  "Atta boy, Sam," she murmured and continued down the stairway.

  She reached the bottom step just as Sam flipped a flapjack into the air and spun around to catch it in a frying pan behind his back. Ben, who sat on Nana's lap at the table under the steps, squealed with delight. But it was to her Sam's gaze strayed as she stepped off the last step.

  "Mornin', Red," he said through an impish grin that made her own lips twitch. She liked that Sam Ryan, who grew up in a family short on showing affection, accepted sticky hugs from a four-year-old and didn't run at first sight of an old lady's dementia…nor from said old lady's intonation of the wedding march. Michael hadn't run from her nontraditional family, either. Likewise, Michael had blossomed to their offbeat way of accepting someone into the family, but he hadn't needed TLC to the extent Sam did. And that was all the attraction she dared allow herself where Sam was concerned.

  They met mid-kitchen, Sam on his way to serve the flipped flapjack, she on her way to the coffeepot. She rose onto her tiptoes, planted a chaste kiss on his cheek near his ear, and murmured, "You're a useful man to have around, Sam Ryan."

  "Useful? Me?" he said, drawing back from her. "First time anyone ever accused me of being useful for anything."

  Poor, self-effacing Sam.

  She laid a hand on his forearm, holding him a moment from fleeing all together. "Few men would cook breakfast for a high energy preschooler and a dysfunctional senior citizen."

  Behind her, Nana and Sam broke into a chorus of "We're off to see the Wizard."

  If only life were that simple. See Wizard. Get wish granted. Live happily ever after.

  But, life was lived in the real world where happily ever after didn't always work out. Michael dying proved that—Michael whose affection-starved cousin stood in her kitchen not recognizing his own worth. Sam, who made her itch in places she wasn't sure she was ready to scratch.

  Releasing him, she headed to the coffeemaker. She plucked a mug from the mug tree in the corner between the stove and wall phone, then glanced back at Sam. He was tipping the pancake from the frying pan onto Ben's plate, giving her a three-quarter view of his backside.

  He was an underdog with a darn cute behind. She was doomed.

  He was back at the stove by the time she filled her mug. She turned and watched him pour a new puddle of pancake batter into the frying pan.

  "Heart shaped?" she questioned of the spreading batter.

  "For your grandmother."

  "You're a sweetheart, Sam."

  "Your grandmother's the sweetheart."

  Dixie peered over the rim of her coffee mug at the little table under the stairs. Nana was cutting Ben's pancake into bite size pieces and telling him how she used to do the same for his Mommy.

  "She's the quintessential nurturer," Dixie said quietly.

  He gave her a sidelong glance. "Unlike you who moved back here to take care of her?"

  Dixie stopped blowing on her coffee. "I was broke. I needed a place to stay. Besides, it's the sort of thing family does for its own."

  "Not mine."

  He nudged the bubbling edges of the heart-shaped pancake with his spatula, no longer looking at her. She wanted to smooth the hurt from his wounded brow. She wanted to hug the dejection from his shoulders.

  She wanted to kiss the smile back onto his lips…which went beyond Tender Loving Care.

  She skirted him to the refrigerator, opened the door, and let the cool air spill out over her. That would do the trick. It had to.

  She plucked a fried chicken leg from a platter in the fridge and shook it at Sam. "Stuart is the one who'll lose in the end. You know that, don't you?"

  Sam nodded at the leg she held and quipped, "First time I've ever seen anyone use last night's leftovers to make a point."

  The playfulness may have returned to his voice and the devilish slant to his lips, but the truth—his skepticism—still crimped the edges of his eyes. She hip-bumped the fridge door shut, her gaze never wavering from Sam's sad eyes. "Stuart's rigidness already cost him a son."

  "And a grandson," Sam muttered, smile slipping, eyes blinking away from her.

  "Perfect example," Dixie retorted, careful to keep her voice low enough that the child in question couldn't hear. "Stuart's welcome to visit Ben any time he wants. I've made that clear."

  She moved closer to Sam, so close she could feel the tension radiating from his elbow as he flipped the heart-shaped pancake. So close, she needed only to whisper her words. "But he looks at me and sees only the woman who took his son away from him."

  "You didn't take Mickey away from anyone," Sam muttered. "Mickey was his own man."

  "I know. But it's easier for Stuart to blame me than for him to face the truth of why he lost his son."

  Sam looked at her through eyes that spoke volumes about loss. Loss of a father. Loss of nurturing, approval, and encouragement.

  Loss of Michael who had been more brother to him than cousin. She'd heard the affection in Michael's voice whenever he'd spoken of Sam. She saw it now in Sam's eyes. It hadn't mattered that they'd been an ocean apart the last years of Michael's life. The bond had never broken.

  She was half a second away from plopping the chicken leg into her coffee mug, setting the whole mess aside, and enveloping Sam into her arms when he broke into a grin.

  "Too early in the morning to be maudlin, Red," he wisecracked and bit into her chicken leg.

  She laughed even though she knew Sam hid his pain behind quippy comebacks and mischievous twinkling eyes. She laughed because he needed her to laugh. And she laughed harder when he came away with the major portion of the chicken leg caught between his teeth.

  "Some gentleman." She waved the all but denuded bone in his face. "You didn't leave me much."

  He sucked the meat into his mouth with a slurpy sound and mumbled around the mouthful, "Who said I was a gentleman."

  "Whatever you are, you have grease on your chin." She set down the coffee mug and wiped his chin with her fingers.

  His eyes darkened in the soft morning light of the kitchen. "Watch it, Red," he said in a low, husky voice. "A man could get used to being taken care of like this."

  For an instant, only the two of the
m existed in that small space of a kitchen. Sam with his heavy-lidded eyes angled at her and her tilting her head in a way that invited him to keep looking. Then his bedroom eyes slid past her and he frowned.

  "Why is that woman pointing a monkey at us?"

  Dixie turned and found Miss Weston watching them from the stairway, hugging her ever-present, over-sized purse to her chest and clutching the neck of the stuffed monkey that seemed to be peeking out from the top of her purse. Leave it to Weston to cool a girl's libido as effectively as a cold shower.

  "Lions and tigers and bears, oh my," chanted Nana and Ben from the table.

  Reason number two for why the kitchen was the wrong place to contemplate a lip-lock with Sam.

  "Isn't she a little old to be carrying a stuffed animal around?" Sam whispered, his words a warm breath against her ear.

  Dixie shrugged and her shoulder brushed Sam's chest, he stood so near. Damn but she wanted to lean into him. Sam—Michael's cousin. Reason three why Sam was off-limits.

  "I can see why she freaks Ben out." Sam shivered and strode from her side toward the kitchen table, frying pan in hand.

  By the time he'd dumped the heart-shaped pancake onto Nana's plate, Weston had skittered down the remaining steps to his side to Sam's side. Fastest Dixie had ever seen the woman move. And the closest she'd ever seen Weston stand to anyone. Slowly, Dixie chewed at the cold chicken leg.

  Sam turned toward the black-clad woman and drew up short, holding the frying pan like a shield between them. "You want something?"

  Weston's beady eyes darted between Sam and Dixie.

  "Would you like some pancakes, Miss Weston?" he asked.

  Weston blinked owlishly up at Sam. "Pancakes?"

  "Yeah. Would you like me to make some pancakes for you?"

  Behind Weston, Ben stood on the end of the bench and eyed the stuffed monkey peeking out from the purse. "D-does it have wings?"

  Weston wheeled at Ben and grabbed him by the arm. Before Dixie could so much as utter a single motherly sound or take a single protective step forward, Sam had Weston by the wrist.

  "Let the kid go," he said in a low, ominous tone.

  Weston released Ben.

  "Never," Sam growled, "touch him like that again."

  Sam let go of Weston and she shrank back from him, nodding. Ben slid down in his seat, eyes hero-worship wide on Sam. Dixie knew exactly how her son felt. At the moment, she was feeling much the same way about Sam.

  Without a word, Weston slunk off through the living room and out the back door.

  Sam ruffled Ben's hair. "You okay, Buddy?"

  Ben's syrup-smudged face split into a smile. "Okey-dokey, Tin Man."

  "How about another pancake? I could make this one in the shape of an animal."

  Ben frowned. "No monkey."

  "No monkey."

  He gave Ben's sandy hair a gentle stroke before heading back for the stove. Dixie's fingers flexed around the chicken leg. So much for their giving Sam TLC. Clearly, the man could give better than he got.

  "My hero," Dixie murmured as he passed.

  #

  Hero?

  The word echoed in Sam's ears as he cooked one last bear-shaped pancake for Ben. It nagged him as he wiped the griddle clean and served Miss Weston a plate of pancakes out on the side porch.

  Just when he thought he'd gotten it settled in his head that Dixie's family was too perfect for him to fit into, she calls him her hero. He shook his head in dismay. Mickey's widow, thinking he was some kind of hero. He barely qualified as useful. This is the thanks the universe gave him for vowing to stick around long enough for her to find a new chef. He really needed to leave before she figured out what an impostor he was. Or maybe what he needed to do was confess before another day passed.

  Dixie emerged from the screen door behind him, looped her arm through his, and guided him off the porch and away from the sulking Miss Weston. "Come on," she all but purred. "Time you got the grand tour."

  This was good. They should be alone when he told her what a despicable person he was—that he was nobody's hero least of all hers. That should be enough to motivate her into finding a replacement chef fast.

  Back on the porch, the screen door banged open, Miss Weston shrieked, and Ben and Bear tumbled out across the porch and down the steps after them. Okay, confessions weren't for young ears. He'd have to wait until the little tyke was out of hearing range.

  Ben skipped past them, kicking stones in the driveway between the house and outbuildings. At that speed, he'd soon be out of hearing range. But, he and Dixie would still be within viewing range of boarder Weston. For some reason that prickled the hair at the back of his neck, Sam didn't want Dixie's reaction witnessed on any level by that witchy woman.

  Dixie hugged his arm against her side and drew in a deep breath. "I love how it smells after a good rain."

  He sniffed the air, smelled the freshness of newly-washed earth and apple blossoms. He sniffed again and realized the scent came from Dixie's hair.

  "Don't you just love the way a good rain freshens up everything?" she said, drawing another deep breath.

  "Yeah," he murmured. "Love it."

  She tilted her chin at him just as they stepped from the shadow of the house. The morning sun glinted in her raised eyes, shimmered across her smiling lips, and caught in the curls of her ponytail, turning them to spun gold. A man would have to be a saint to ruin a moment like this with a confession and he was no saint.

  "The country air is one of the reasons I moved us here," she said.

  "Your grandmother needing you was another," he returned, remembering how his uncle had insisted Dixie's motives for taking over her grandmother's farm were anything but altruistic. "You're a very noble woman, Dixie Rae Carrington."

  "Noble?" Dixie snorted. "This is also a great place for a child to grow up. So you see, moving here was hardly for noble reasons."

  Any reason you have for being here is far nobler than mine.

  Ahead of them, Ben flung a stick for Bear to chase. The stick didn't go far and it hooked to the left. The boy needed someone to teach him how to straighten out his throwing arm. Mickey had taught Sam how to throw a ball. Maybe he could… No, he wouldn't be here long enough to pass along that lesson from his father.

  Dixie tipped her head against Sam's shoulder and sighed. "This place was the one geographical constant in mine and my brothers' lives when we were growing up. We always came back to visit Nana."

  He covered her hand with his. "Home, huh?"

  She nodded, causing a little frisson of heat to travel down his arm from where her temple moved against his shoulder. "The farm gave us roots. Not that Mom couldn't make any place we lived seem homey. She used to say, home is where the heart is and she could put heart into the dinkiest of quarters."

  "You have a remarkable family, Red."

  "Thank you," Dixie said, lifting her head and looking at him, her smile bright enough to light up half the city of Chicago—a smile bright enough it lit a path clear to his deficient soul.

  Funny, in a lifetime of failing to live up to the standards of his family, he'd never thought about whether or not they lived up to his. He'd never before considered that pride could be a two-way street.

  Not that he was particularly proud of himself at the moment. He harbored a secret from a righteous woman and coveted his cousin's widow.

  He shook his head, attempting to focus on a less enticing landscape. Ben and Bear disappeared into the barn ahead of them and they followed. Dust lazily rode the shafts of sunlight that seeped in through cracks and fly-flecked windows. Even inside a dim, old building, sunshine found Dixie's curls—played in them as she gathered up an armload of buckets. Right or wrong, he wanted to play among those wisps of hair that had escaped her ponytail—to weave his fingers into their soft tangles and pull them fully free of their binding. He wanted to bury his face in those wild tendrils.

  She bent and dipped a bucket into the grain bin, pulling his eye from her
hair to the curve of her jeans-clad hip. He was hopeless.

  "Here you go, Benj," Dixie said, handing the smallest bucket to her son. "You feed the chickens this morning."

  Obediently, child and dog trudged toward the door they'd entered. Dixie called after Ben for him to be sure to spread the feed around. Then Ben and Bear were gone, and he and Dixie were alone in the barn.

  Tell her now, whispered a little voice inside Sam's head. Confess. Put an end to this charade before it turns into an all-out train wreck.

  Dixie filled two buckets with grain, handed one to Sam, and nodded toward a door at the far end of the barn. "Follow me."

  All the way down the yellow brick road.

  She stepped out into the sunlight, her golden halo of curls all but blinding Sam. He followed, only vaguely aware of the sodden earth sucking at his feet and the loamy fragrance adding to the rain-washed fresh air. She walked in front of him, her hips swaying in gentle rhythm with the bucket she carried, her t-shirt slipping back and forth across her spine. She was an angel with the body of a mythological siren.

  And he a weak and heartless mortal.

  She veered to one side and he found himself eyeball to eyeball with a huge, rangy cow. Sam jumped back. From the long, wooden trough where Dixie emptied her bucket of grain, she called back to him, "Moo is quite gentle."

  The huge brown eye blinked at him.

  "Gentle?" Sam squeaked. "Compared to what, Godzilla?"

  Dixie tapped the bottom of her bucket and Moo ambled off toward the wooden trough. Watching that long, brown body pass was like watching a time-lapsed video of a soufflé rising.

  But this soufflé fell as the cow passed out of the way, revealing a sway-backed horse, a gray-muzzled pony, and a three-legged llama headed their way.

  "What are you running here, Red, a retirement home for the walking wounded of the animal kingdom?"

  "Something like that."

  He joined Dixie on the near side of the trough, effectively putting the feed hamper between him and the animals. "Are you serious?"