by Shirley Jump
“I’m about tuckered out now,” Ernie said, swiping at the sweat on his brow. “I think that’s the most work I’ve done in a year.”
“The yard should be good for a while now,” Colton said. “I’ll come by next week and give it another mow.”
Next week? Did that mean Colton was thinking of staying?
Rachel handed each of them a glass of ice water. “You guys did a great job. The yard looks amazing.”
Ernie put a hand on his daughter’s back. “That’s a good man you found. I’d keep him around if I were you. I’m going to go wash up for supper. Be right back.”
She couldn’t have been more shocked at the change in her father if she tried. He had a little color in his cheeks, a little spring in his step. And all because of whatever Colton had said to him that got her father outside and working.
Once her father was out of earshot, Colton turned to Rachel. “Seems I got the paternal vote of approval.”
She grinned. “That doesn’t mean you move out of the friend category.”
Colton leaned in close to her, so close she could feel the heat of his skin, catch the whisper of his cologne. She watched his pulse tick in his neck. “What’s a man got to do to impress you, Rachel Morris?”
She swallowed hard and thought it was a good thing they weren’t alone in the house. She wanted this man, with his lopsided smile and his easy way with her father, in the worst possible way. In the kind of way that clouded all rational thought and pushed all her pretty little reasons for not having a relationship off a mental cliff. “I think you’re already doing it, Colton Barlow.”
Colton grinned then pulled away and turned to wash his hands in the sink. “Good to know. Maybe I should do more of whatever it is I’m doing right.”
“What did you say to my dad that got him to work with you?”
“My mom would go through these periods of depression.” Colton picked up a dish towel, leaned against the counter and dried his hands over and over again. “There were days when neither me nor my sister could get her to eat, never mind get out of bed. A thousand times, I was patient, and took care of Katie, and helped her. But then one day I went in there and asked her if this was how she wanted her kids to remember her, because she was killing herself, one day at a time.”
“You said that to my father?”
“Not in that way. I was a little nicer in how I said it to your dad. I mentioned that he had a really great daughter who wanted to spend some quality time with him. Your dad cursed a couple times then grabbed the hedge trimmers and said he better do them himself because I wouldn’t know the way he liked the shrubs to look. But he wasn’t mad at me. More...concerned about you.”
She laughed. “That sounds like my dad.”
“He took it well. And by the time the lawn was finished, we were buddies. With my mom, she got out of bed and never really sank to that same level of depression.”
“Thank you.” The two words were as thick as paste in her throat. They couldn’t come close to expressing her gratitude, how deep that thanks reached inside her. With a simple household chore, Colton had fostered the change that Rachel had been trying to create for over a year.
“It was nothing.”
“No, Colton, it was everything.” She swiped at her eyes, cursing the tears that sprang there. Colton chuckled softly and stepped forward with the dish towel.
“Don’t cry, Rachel. It was only yard work.” He dabbed at the tears on her face and then cupped her cheek. “Okay?”
She nodded, and the tears gave way to laughter. “Maybe so, but it was a lot of yard work.”
“Which means I’m hoping there’s a lot of dinner as a reward.”
She would have made a month’s worth of meals to thank him if she could have. “Oh, there is, Colton, there definitely is.”
Her father came into the kitchen. “Watch out, you two lovebirds. Old man coming in the room.”
“Dad, we’re not—”
“Definitely not,” Colton added.
Ernie chuckled. “Whatever you two say. Now, let’s eat.”
Her father was laughing. Of all the things that had happened in the last couple hours, hearing the sound of her father’s laughter filled Rachel’s heart with joy. For the first time in a really long time, she had hope. It was still fragile, but it was there. She could see a new road ahead—if her father kept going in the right direction.
Her father sat at the head of the table, with Colton and Rachel on either side of him. He glanced around the dining room, and his eyes grew misty. “We haven’t had a meal in this room in a long, long time.”
“Too long, I think,” she said. It was something she needed to change. Maybe now that her father was coming back to his life, he would step outside that kitchen, in more ways than one.
“Your mom used to do such great Sunday dinners, didn’t she? Before she got...sick.”
That was the term they all used to describe her mother’s alcoholism. The years before she got sick. Maybe that made it easier, Rachel thought, to accept her mother’s choices. But it didn’t ease her guilty feelings about not being here at the end, not getting that closure and, most of all, leaving her father to deal with it all.
“I thought it would be more comfortable to eat in the dining room,” she said. “And maybe a way to kind of include Mom, too.”
Ernie’s eyes watered. “She’d like that.”
Rachel covered her dad’s hand with her own. His weathered palm grasped hers, tight and sure. “Thanks, Dad.”
Ernie’s smile wobbled on his face, then he cleared his throat, dismissing the moment, moving on. Her father wasn’t a man given to expressing his emotions much, and it didn’t surprise her when he grabbed the bowl of mashed potatoes and started dishing them up. “Let’s eat before this all gets cold.”
They shared the dishes around, family style, and the conversation gradually turned from the condition of the lawn to the weather to Colton. “So, what do you do for work?” Ernie asked.
“I’m a firefighter, sir. With the Atlanta Fire Department.”
“But Harry offered him a job here,” Rachel added. A big part of her hoped Colton took the job. She definitely wanted to spend more time with this man who had made her father laugh and brought some sun to his cheeks.
Not to mention that every time she was within a few feet of him, she couldn’t help but gravitate closer to Colton. Even sitting at the table with him, Rachel had this awareness of Colton, a constant hum in her body.
Ernie forked up some more meat loaf, already on his second helping. “Harry’s a good man. He runs that department like a tight ship, but he’s fair and smart. I’ve known him most all my life.”
“I’m thinking about his job offer,” Colton said. He toyed with his food. “I haven’t decided anything yet.”
But he had decided to stay another week, which she took as a good sign.
“Atlanta must be a busy department,” Rachel said. “I’ve only been to the city a few times, but it seemed like it was always hopping.”
“It was.” Colton shifted in his seat.
“Firefighting’s a pretty noble profession,” her father said. “My cousin was a firefighter. He lost a leg in a blaze. Got caught under some falling timbers. But the other guys were right there, thank God, and pulled him out. He still gets together with those guys once a week, even though he had to leave the department.”
“That would be tough,” Colton said. “Can you, uh, pass the potatoes?”
Rachel did as he asked then cut off a bite of meat loaf. “So, what was the biggest fire you ever had to fight?”
Colton’s entire demeanor shifted into stone. He dropped the mashed potatoes back into the serving bowl and pushed it to the side. “I, uh, don’t really want to talk about my job over dinner and bore you all. I’d
much rather hear about Ernie’s fishing tips. Since I don’t know much about fishing, and if I’m going to keep up with Rachel here, then I should learn some insider secrets.”
That got her dad talking for the next twenty minutes about lures and rods and secret fishing holes. The two men conversed like old friends, and by the time the dinner dishes were cleared and the dishwasher was loaded, Rachel could see her father flagging. It had been a lot of activity for one day, after almost a year of nothing.
Ernie stood in the kitchen beside his daughter, sipping a glass of water after taking his heart medication. “This was a good night. A good meal.”
“It was, Dad.” She leaned into him and gave him a hug. “It was good to see you feeling better.”
“Yeah.” He started to say something else when a pair of headlights appeared in the driveway. “Huh. Who’s here at this time of night?”
Rachel knew, because most nights she was still up, doing the dishes or working on paperwork, and making sure her dad didn’t need anything. Ernie Morris was normally in bed before eight at night, claiming he was tired as soon as the evening meal was done. But tonight, between the yard work and the conversation with Colton, eight had stretched into eight thirty, and that meant Daryl was coming by for his usual weekly check-in on her dad.
Rachel got to her feet and opened the door. “Great timing,” she said to Daryl. “I made brownies.”
“Who are you offering my brownies to?” her father called from behind her. “And why haven’t I heard about them until now?”
“I was saving them in case we had company.” Rachel opened the door the rest of the way and stepped back. Her father had made great strides this evening. She could only hope the change would continue, courtesy of a little brownie bribery.
Daryl strode in, ducking his head a little under the jamb. He was a tall, lanky man, whose clothes never quite matched the length of his arms and legs. He wore a floppy fisherman’s hat everywhere he went, no matter the time of day. He’d grown a beard this year, and the reddish-brown hair on his face made him look a little like a skinny lumberjack. “Ernie. How you doing?” he said, as if no more than an afternoon had passed since he’d last seen his friend.
Rachel tensed. Her father had made it clear over the last year that he didn’t want company. Didn’t want his friends paying “sympathy visits.”
Her father looked at Daryl, then at Rachel, then back at Daryl again. “Well, don’t just stand in the doorway. Come on in. Rachel says there’s brownies, and we might as well eat them.”
“Good thinking on the brownies,” Colton whispered to Rachel.
Daryl took a seat at the kitchen table beside Ernie. “It’s about damned time you invited me in. You are a pain in the ass, you know that?”
Daryl was probably the only human being in the world that could say that to her father. Ernie grinned. “Hey, we all got to be good at something.”
Rachel dished up the brownies and brewed a pot of decaf while her father introduced Colton, and the three of them talked about fishing. It was an ordinary scene, something that could be happening in a million houses across the world at this very moment. And that was what made it perfect. Absolutely, wonderfully perfect.
Chapter Eight
It wasn’t just the meat loaf and brownies that had Colton falling for Rachel. It was the way she took care of her father, the way she worried and tended, but didn’t hover. She was a woman with a generous heart, and that drew him to her in ways he’d never been drawn to a woman before.
It was that way she had about her that had him thinking about something that lasted a lot longer than tonight. Something that involved dinners around a table and teasing while they stood at the sink, finishing up the dishes.
He reached across the console while he drove her home and took her hand in his. It felt nice. Perfect. Right.
When she’d mentioned she was tired, he offered to bring her home, instead of back to her car at the shop, because that would also give him an excuse to pick her up again in the morning. He didn’t have anything planned for tomorrow, so maybe he could take Rachel to breakfast, drop her off at work then swing by Ernie’s again and tackle the leaky sink in the hall bathroom, or do some touch-up painting on the front of the house.
Rachel turned and smiled at him. “Thank you. Again. I haven’t seen my father that interested in life in a long, long time. I can’t believe he was still talking to Daryl when we left.”
“Making plans for fishing trips, too.”
“And he said he was going to come to the shop tomorrow.” Her smile widened. “If my dad gets back to work, then maybe...maybe eventually I can get back to my business.”
“Planning all those happily-ever-afters for everyone?”
She laughed. “Exactly.”
“And what about you?” He took a right onto Main Street and drove past the dark, closed stores that lined the downtown area.
“What about me?”
“Why hasn’t some very smart man married you yet?” Had he just asked that question? It had to be the sugar overload from the brownies. Colton wasn’t looking to settle down. Especially not in this little town. But then he thought of the dinner, the laughter, the smile on Rachel’s face, the feel of her beside him in the kitchen, in the car. And thought if this was settling down, it wouldn’t be so bad. Not at all.
“Maybe I’ve just been an even smarter woman who hasn’t wanted to marry any of those men,” she said.
He chuckled. “Touché.”
“And what about you? Why haven’t you gotten married yet?”
“To be honest, I haven’t met anyone who made me want to stay in one place long enough to put a ring on it.” Until now. Until this woman with her determination and her caring came along and made him want something more. A lot more.
“This isn’t exactly second date conversation,” she said with a slight laugh in her voice. “Aren’t we still supposed to be talking about our favorite pets or what we were like in fourth grade?”
“My favorite pet was my dog Tommy, a little mixed breed spaniel. I got him when I was six, and he lived until my senior year of high school. Someday, I’ll get another dog, but working as a firefighter...” He shrugged. “I can’t leave a dog overnight several days a week. And as for fourth grade, let’s just say my report card had big words on it like overly enthusiastic and stubbornly energetic.”
Rachel laughed. “Stubbornly energetic?”
“My fourth grade teacher was trying to nicely say I was a complete pain in the neck.” He grinned.
“Now that, I believe.” She sat back against the seat. The golden glow from the streetlights danced highlights in her hair as they drove, and speckled diamonds across her skin. “My favorite pet was a turtle I kept in a tank in my room. I always wanted a dog, but my mom was allergic. So I had a turtle, until I went to college. Then I gave him to my little cousin Sharlene, who promised to take good care of him.”
“And did she?”
“He’s still alive, last I heard. Sharlene became a veterinary tech, so I think my turtle is in safe hands. And I’d like to think I was part of what drove her into animal care.”
“Look at that. A turtle inspiring a life of giving back to the animal kingdom.”
“Exactly. As for fourth grade, I was the one getting all As and receiving the perfect-attendance award.”
“Teacher’s pet?” He pulled to a stop in the parking lot of her apartment building and turned the car off.
“Not exactly. I guess...” She shrugged. “My childhood was kind of chaotic and I guess I thought if I kept everything perfect at school, maybe that would make things better at home. Crazy thinking.”
“Not when you’re in fourth grade.” He unbuckled, then reached across to brush a long blond lock off her forehead. “I know how hard it is to be the one who feels resp
onsible.”
And to be the one who had let others down. Who had tried his best, and his best still hadn’t been enough. To be the one left behind, with guilt and regret sitting on either shoulder.
She cupped his jaw and met his gaze with her own. “You made everything different today and I...I really appreciate it.”
God, she was beautiful. He was drawn to her intensity, the way her gaze seemed to hold him captive. He couldn’t have left right now if he tried. “Really, it was nothing. I’m just glad I was there. But you know what I’m even more grateful for?”
Her eyes widened, and a tease lit her face. “What?”
“Meeting you.” He leaned closer, fumbling with one hand for the button at her waist. He released the seat belt, and it retracted with a soft whoosh. Colton closed the distance between them and kissed Rachel.
He’d intended a simple, easy good-night kiss. One that would punctuate the thank-yous with one of his own. Thank you for including me. Thank you for looking at me like I’m someone amazing. Thank you for making my days brighter.
But she let out a little moan as he kissed her, and all those simple, easy intentions disappeared. He groaned, and the kiss deepened. His hands roamed over her hair, her shoulders, her back, and her touch matched his, sliding down the back of his arms, around to his waist, back again.
The stupid console sat between them like a wall. The bucket seats felt too small, too confined. He briefly considered climbing over the console, but was pretty sure he’d risk serious injury with the gear shift.
“Let’s go inside,” she whispered against his mouth.
Thank God. “I think that’s the best idea I’ve heard all day.” They broke apart just long enough to get out of the car then meet up again on the walkway. His arm went around her waist; his head dipped to kiss her again, the heat building as they walked and kissed, and tried to hurry without running into a wall.
An interminable minute later, they were on the third floor of her building and she was cursing as she tried to jam the key into the lock. Colton closed his hand over hers and the key slid into place, then turned and the lock released. They stumbled into her apartment, and he kicked the door shut then kiss-walked down the hall to her bedroom. Rachel nudged the bedroom door open with her hip. Colton scooped her up, thinking how light and perfect she felt in his arms, then he took a few steps forward and laid her on the bed.
