Harlequin Superromance December 2013 - Bundle 1 of 2: Caught Up in YouThe Ranch She Left BehindA Valley Ridge Christmas

by Beth Andrews

  What had happened? Max had gone with Lena after school acting like his usual good-natured, quiet self, only to return as a miniature grizzly bear.

  Damn it, Eddie should have listened to his first instinct and refused to let Max spend the night with Lena at her hotel. Now he was paying the price.

  “Go to your room,” Eddie told his grumpy, bratty kid as they walked into their kitchen. He set his phone and keys on the table. “And stay there until I call you down for dinner.”

  Max’s jaw dropped. “But it’s one o’clock!”

  “I know what time it is,” Eddie said with restrained patience, but really, his kid was getting on his last nerve. “And you’re lucky you only have to spend the afternoon in your room. The way you’ve been acting, maybe I’ll just keep you there for the rest of the weekend.”

  “That’s not fair!”

  “What’s not fair is you hurting that little girl.”

  Max had been given a major penalty, and after that, the coach had rightfully benched him. When the game was over, Eddie had told Lena he was taking their son home and putting him in his room. She hadn’t argued, something he was grateful for.

  “They check in real hockey.”

  “You don’t play real hockey.” Eddie tossed his son’s hockey bag on the floor. “You play in a no-check league. There are no hits. You could’ve hurt her and she didn’t even have the puck. Go up to your room and think about what you did, and while you’re thinking, write her, your coach and the opposing team’s coach an apology.”

  “She pushed me first.”

  She had. Eddie had seen it, but it wasn’t a no-contact league, and she hadn’t done more than nudge and annoy Max. “Too bad. Just because someone does something wrong, doesn’t mean you have to retaliate.”

  “I didn’t!”

  “Do you know what retaliate means?”

  Max sniffed, crossed his arms, looking like a miniature Lena when she’d gotten a good mad going. “No.”

  “It means you don’t have to do it back. Remember what we talked about last year? What I said about fighting?”

  “It’s not fighting. It’s hockey.”

  “It’s fighting. And you were disrespectful to your coach and your grandparents.”

  “I want to go to Grandma’s,” Max cried, tears running down his face.

  “I already told you, the only place you’re going is to your room.” Rose had offered to take Max for the rest of the day in an effort, Eddie suspected, to save her son’s sanity. But while Eddie didn’t mind his parents or siblings pitching in once in a while, he preferred to handle most things on his own.

  He had to make sure Max understood this kind of behavior was unacceptable and to do that, he had to punish him.

  “Go on,” Eddie said. “And you know the rules. No video games so just leave your bag right here.”

  “I’m going to call Mommy.”

  It was like a knife to the heart. Max had never, not once, threatened to call Lena, had long ago stopped asking for her because what was the point? She wouldn’t come. Eddie had thought his son realized that.

  Except she had come, had taken Max for the night, after seeing him only two weeks ago.

  “You’re not calling anyone,” Eddie said, fear coating his mouth. What if Max preferred Lena? What if he wanted to be with her? What if she continued to want him more often? “You’re going to your room. When you come down for dinner, you can call your mom and maybe see her before she leaves.”

  That was reasonable. And the right thing to do.

  “I want to call her now,” Max said, crying full force.

  “We don’t always get what we want.” It amazed him how he loved his kid more than anything, would lay down his own life if it meant keeping Max safe and yet, no one and nothing could make him as angry and frustrated as the little boy in front of him. “If you don’t go upstairs by the time I count to three, I’m taking your video game for an entire week. One.”

  “No!”

  “Two.”

  “You’re mean!”

  “Buddy, I’ve been called worse.” He held Max’s gaze, noted his son’s defiant stare, the trembling of his lower lip. “You really want to push this all the way?”

  He could almost see his son’s mind working. Max knew Eddie always followed through with what he said, good or—in some cases, and no doubt in his son’s opinion—bad.

  “I’m gonna run away,” Max said, his cheeks wet, his nose running, sweat dampening his hair.

  Eddie nodded. “Drop me a line when you find work.”

  “I’m gonna,” Max promised. “You’ll see.”

  Some days Eddie wouldn’t mind running away. “You’ll have to do so without your video game,” he said, pocketing the handheld game. “See you at dinner.”

  Eddie turned, grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge. Kept his back to his son. A minute later, Max stomped off, his feet pounding on the stairs. His bedroom door slammed. Eddie blew out a breath and took a deep drink of water.

  Shit. Most of the time Max was easy to raise. But he was growing up, and the lack of sleep, plus Lena disrupting his life and schedule with her sudden reappearance, had his son acting up. It’d pass. A good, long nap would help.

  Eddie threw in a load of laundry, then cleaned the kitchen. He needed to go to Montesano Construction’s shop, put some hours in on the cabinets for the Simpsons, but that could wait until tonight or tomorrow—once Max was out of trouble.

  Twenty minutes later he walked upstairs, a basket of clean towels in his arms. He tiptoed up to his son’s closed door, pressed his ear against the wood but couldn’t make out anything. He opened the door to find his son sitting cross-legged on the bed.

  “You’re gonna be in trouble,” Max said, glaring.

  Eddie held the basket under one arm. “Why is that?”

  But then he noticed his phone on the bed. Max must have taken it when he’d gone upstairs.

  Narrowing his eyes, Eddie picked up his phone. “Did you call Nonna?”

  Max shook his head.

  Eddie dropped the basket. “Did you call—”

  The doorbell rang, cutting him off.

  Did you call your mother?

  Max took off.

  Eddie hurried down the stairs, his hands fisted, his mind racing. Damn it, Lena had no right to come here, no right to interfere in something that wasn’t her concern. Yes, she was Max’s mother but she had no say in how Eddie disciplined their son. Not when she was the one who’d left.

  Eddie put up with her visits, but he would not put up with her interference. Fuming, trembling with his fury, he reached the entryway as Max opened the door. To find Harper standing on the porch holding a sleeping Cassidy.

  Max smirked at him. “Told you you were in trouble.”

  * * *

  HE WASN’T GLAD to see her.

  Max was, but Eddie? He looked ready to slam the door in her face.

  Harper considered letting him but then she glanced back down at Max, saw how miserable he was, the tear tracks on his face, his hair a mess, and she sighed.

  “Hi,” she said softly so as not to wake Cass.

  “What are you doing here?” Eddie asked in a low growl.

  She flinched. Definitely not happy to see her. Too bad. She wasn’t here for him.

  Max needed her.

  “I called her,” Max said, the lift of his chin defiant but he sidled closer to Harper.

  Eddie opened his mouth but she spoke before he could. “Do you mind if we come in?” she asked, lifting Cass higher onto her shoulder.

  Eddie stepped aside like a man letting in his own executioner. Harper smiled down at Max but she didn’t feel all that reassuring. Not when Eddie looked angry enough to tear the door apart with his tee
th, chew it up and spit out splinters.

  Eddie shut the door. “This doesn’t concern you.”

  “Probably not. But I drove all the way across town because your son called and told me there was an emergency, so why don’t you humor me?”

  He led her into a messy living room. “I didn’t know anyone was going to stop by.”

  “Please, you’ve seen my house. I know what it’s like to have kids and a life. Do you mind if I lay her on the couch?” she asked, with a nod toward Cassidy, who was out for the count. When her kid napped, she napped hard.

  He cleared a space on the couch and she laid Cass down. Eddie tucked pillows around her and moved the armchair over so Cass couldn’t roll off, then he led Harper into the small kitchen, jabbed a finger at the kitchen table. “Sit.”

  Harper laid her hand on Max’s shoulder. “Which one of us are you barking at and ordering around?”

  “Both of you.”

  “Just wanted to be clear,” she said lightly. Then, because honestly, he wasn’t the boss of her, she pulled a chair out for Max and remained standing. “What’s going on?” she asked the little boy.

  “He’s mean,” Max said, his voice quivering. “And that lady who came in to talk to us said that if our parents are hurting us we needed to tell a grown-up like our teacher.”

  Harper glanced at Eddie, who was glowering at her. He didn’t give excuses, didn’t try and convince her that he hadn’t hurt his child—probably because it was obvious he hadn’t. Anyone who’d seen him with Max could easily see he wouldn’t raise a hand to the boy, and other than being tired and angry, Max wasn’t hurt.

  “Uh-huh.” Harper knelt and gently brushed the hair off of his forehead. “How did your dad hurt you?”

  Max shrugged and averted his gaze.

  “Because you know,” Harper continued, “when that police officer said for you to tell a teacher if your parents are hurting you, she meant if they were being abusive. If they were hitting you or saying really mean things.”

  “He made me go to my room. He yelled at me.”

  “You think that was yelling?” Eddie asked, his eyes narrowed. “You just wait.”

  Harper straightened. “Okay, I think I’m beginning to see what’s going on here. Max, I’m going to talk to your dad for a few minutes. Do you want him to wait here or in his room?” she asked Eddie.

  He jabbed his finger at Max yet again. “Don’t. Move.”

  Max dropped his chin to his chest, hunched his shoulders.

  Harper and Eddie walked back into the living room. Cass slept soundly on her back, her arms splayed, her tiny, pudgy hands out.

  “Before you lay into me,” Harper said, “I want you to know I came here with good intentions.”

  “This isn’t your concern.”

  “So you’ve said and you’re right but—”

  “You can stop at the part where I’m right.”

  “But,” she repeated, stressing the word, “I get a frantic phone call from Max. He’s sobbing that he’s going to run away and you’re being mean...well...you get the drift. The only way I could calm him down was to promise him that I’d come over. I did try to get him to put you on the phone but he can be mighty stubborn when he sets his mind to it, and I couldn’t find the number for your house in the phone book.”

  “It’s unlisted,” he said, as if relenting a little. “I wrote it down as the contact number, though, when you sent home those dozens of papers at the beginning of the school year.”

  “Papers that are all at the school. I thought the easiest way to calm him down and to stop him from calling his uncle Leo—his next step according to what he told me—was to just come over.”

  “You thought I was really hurting him? Hitting him?”

  “Of course not. If I’d thought that, you would’ve answered the door to find the cops and a social worker on your porch.” She didn’t hesitate when she thought one of her kids was being abused. She’d had a girl a few years ago who’d confessed to Harper that her brother “slept on top of her.” Harper had told the proper officials and it’d been discovered that the precious little girl had been sexually abused.

  Shady Grove was a small town. Safe. But even in small towns, bad things happened.

  “I can handle this,” Eddie said.

  “I have no doubt about that. But something must have happened to push Max into calling me.”

  “He’s pissed I punished him. He acted out at hockey, has been miserable ever since his mother brought him to hockey this morning.”

  “Lack of sleep can have that effect.”

  “He needs to realize there are consequences for bad behavior.”

  Poor Max. And poor Eddie. He looked as miserable as his son. She could only imagine how hard it must be on both of them to have Lena in and out of their lives like that. Add in a sleepover, too little sleep, probably too much excitement and junk food and things had just exploded into this mess.

  Well, she was really good at cleaning up messes.

  “There are definitely consequences for bad behavior,” she agreed. “And Max deserves to be punished for being mouthy and disrespectful—”

  “And calling you,” Eddie muttered.

  She grinned. “And for calling me. But why don’t you hold off on that for an hour or so? Take a walk—”

  “It’s raining.”

  “Clear your head,” she continued determinedly. “Go for a drive or run down to the coffee shop and grab a latte.”

  “I’m a man. I don’t drink lattes.”

  “Lots of men drink lattes—” She shook her head. “Don’t try to confuse me.”

  Max stepped into the room.

  “What part of don’t move didn’t you get?” Eddie asked him.

  Max started bawling and ran over to Harper, clung to her legs. “Can I go home with you? I don’t want to live here anymore.”

  Harper patted his back. “Your daddy would be so sad if you didn’t live here with him anymore. Tell you what, your dad has to run a few errands so I’ll stay here with you until he comes back.”

  “I don’t have any errands to run,” Eddie said, making it sound as if he was contemplating murder. Hers.

  “Find some.” She led Max to a chair, sat so he could crawl into her lap. “Go on. We’ll be fine.”

  She didn’t think he was going to listen to her but he whirled on his heel and stormed out. A moment later she heard the back door shut followed by the sound of his truck pulling away. Max looked up at her, his eyes—so like Eddie’s—shiny with tears. “Can I watch TV? I want to watch SpongeBob.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea. But I’ll tell you what, why don’t you bring me a couple of your favorite books and I’ll read them to you?”

  He seemed about as excited about that as if she’d suggested they pull their teeth out with rusty pliers but he sighed and dragged himself over to a built-in bookshelf in the corner. He came back with a ratty blue blanket and several books, all well-worn, which told her they were ones Eddie read to his son over and over again.

  Max climbed back onto her lap, rested his head against her chest in complete trust, his body curling into hers. He was big, stocky for his age, but he was still all little boy with his round face and cartoon character T-shirt. She brushed his hair back, kissed the top of his head while he snuggled closer to her and twisted the corner of the blanket around and around his finger.

  She was only human so of course, she had favorites in her classroom. Each year there was at least one kid who stole her heart, but this was different. Max hadn’t stolen her heart, he simply had it.

  Max had been wrong, she thought as he handed her the first book. Eddie wasn’t the one in trouble here. She was.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  “HEY,” MADDIE SAID,
looking up from the board she’d run through the planer as Eddie walked into the shop. She shut off the machine. “What’s up?”

  “I got groceries.”

  At the snap in his voice, she nodded knowingly. “Yeah, buying food always pisses me off, too. Last week I paid three bucks for a tomato. One tomato.”

  “I didn’t need groceries,” he said through gritted teeth.

  Now his sister frowned, put the board down and set aside her safety goggles. “Then why did you get them?”

  “She kicked me out of my own house.”

  “She who? Mom?”

  “Harper.”

  Maddie regarded him shrewdly. Too shrewdly, damn her. “This might be a stupid question, but why is Harper at your house and why did she kick you out?”

  “Max called her. She thought I needed a break.”

  “Let me see if I can fill in the many, many blanks left in that explanation. Max called his teacher and invited her over?”

  “He was mad at me. He called her to...I don’t know. To help him. To piss me off. To save him from having to spend the day in his room.”

  “Yeah, he seemed like a nice long nap would do him some good.”

  Maddie, like the rest of his family, had been at the hockey match and witnessed Max’s meltdown. Her and dozens of other people, all part of a rapt audience who’d seen how inept he’d been with his own kid.

  “You would’ve thought I’d taken a belt to his backside the way he acted. He called Harper and she came over because he threatened to call Leo next. Probably thought he’d get through using 911.”

  Maddie laughed. “Bree did that once. I could’ve killed her. She wasn’t feeling well and decided I wasn’t giving her enough attention so she called and told them she was sick and her mom had left her home alone.”

  “You left Bree alone?”

  “Of course not. I was outside. You should’ve seen me when the fire truck pulled up with lights and sirens going. I almost had a heart attack. Leo scolded Bree and you know he doesn’t often lecture. I think that alone helped her realize what she did was wrong and made a bigger impact than anything I could’ve said or done. Although if you tell Leo I said that, I’ll deny it.”