Butler, Vermont Series: Boxed Set, Books 1-3

by Force, Marie

  “I have no idea what you mean.”

  “Sure, you don’t.”

  Elmer hugged and kissed Mary and shook Patrick’s hand. “I hope you’ll both be very happy.”

  “So I guess there’s no need for any kind of announcement, then,” Patrick said, seeming overwhelmed by the Abbott family dynamics. They were still in the foyer, and the cat was already out of the bag.

  “Well, we do still have one additional thing to share,” Mary said, extending her hand so they could see her ring.

  While everyone exclaimed over the beautiful ring and congratulated the happy couple, Charley said, “Who had engaged in the betting?”

  “That’d be me,” Max Abbott said, grinning as he held Caden in his arms.

  “Crap,” Charley said. “That makes you the big winner. Five hundred bucks.”

  “These people don’t mess around, do they?” Patrick asked.

  “You have no idea,” Mary said, patting his arm as she took in the chaos with a bittersweet feeling. She’d miss them all so much. Thank goodness Patrick’s daughter lived here so they’d have an excuse to frequently return to visit.

  “Congratulations, dear friends,” Molly said, hugging Mary and then Patrick. “I’m so happy for both of you.”

  “Thank you so much, Molly,” Mary said, returning her embrace. “For your advice and for not telling Linc before we were ready.”

  “I still can’t believe you kept this from me,” Linc said to his wife, a playful glower directed her way.

  “She did what I asked her to,” Mary said. “We weren’t ready for people to know yet. I just hope you can find someone to take good care of you all after I’m gone.”

  “About that,” Colton’s fiancée, Lucy, said, grinning widely. “I hear my sister and niece might be moving to Butler to come to work for the family business.”

  “Oh,” Mary said, clapping her hands. “Emma! How perfect! You must be so excited, Lucy.”

  “I still can’t believe it,” Lucy said. “And she talked my dad into coming with them. Everyone I love in one place.”

  “That makes me so happy,” Mary said. “I feel so much better about leaving knowing you’ll be in such good hands.”

  Patrick slipped his arms around her from behind. “And so will you, my love.”

  * * *

  Bonus Epilogue

  “So,” Elmer said over coffee at the diner, “Mary and Patrick are engaged. How about them apples?”

  “I like them apples,” Linc said. “He’s been alone for thirty years, and if anyone deserves a second chance at love, it’s him. And Mary…” Linc shook his head. “I love her like a sister. I’m going to miss her so much, but I couldn’t be happier for the two of them.”

  “They’ll be back to visit a lot, especially now that there’s going to be a grandchild in the mix.”

  “True.”

  “Are you worried about Cam? Because of what happened to her mother?”

  “I actually talked to Will about it, and you won’t believe it. Before they even tried for a baby, she spent two nights at Mass General to make sure there was no reason she shouldn’t have kids.”

  “And?” Elmer asked.

  “All clear.”

  “Well, that’s a huge relief.”

  “Indeed. Molly and I were so proud of them for taking such a proactive step.”

  “They’re good kids, and they’ll be great parents.”

  “Yes, they will. We’re in the midst of what could be the biggest baby boom in recorded history.”

  “You’re the one who had ten kids,” Elmer said with a huff of laughter.

  “Speaking of my ten kids, have you heard any more about the situation with Mia, the woman Wade is interested in?”

  “Formal charges were filed last week against the people arrested in the drug bust.”

  “Mia wasn’t charged with anything, was she?”

  Elmer shook his head. “From what I can tell, she wasn’t involved, but I can’t help but wonder what she knows.”

  “This whole thing makes me very nervous. I don’t want my son anywhere near this crap.”

  “Understood, but I wonder… Do you suppose he knows that everyone around her was scooped up in this big bust and that she might be available?”

  Linc pondered that for a long moment. “What’re you suggesting?”

  “I’d like to have a conversation with him. Feel him out. See what he knows—and what he doesn’t. What do you think?”

  “I don’t know. My better judgment is telling me to stay away from this. It’s got trouble written all over it.”

  “If you could’ve heard the way he talked about her, you’d be singing a different tune. He’s crazy about her, and this could be the perfect opportunity for him to step up for her in a time of need.”

  “What if it turns out she was involved in the same stuff her friends were?”

  “Wade’s no fool. If that’s the case, he won’t go near her. He’s such a health nut that he wouldn’t have anything to do with drugs or anyone who was involved in dealing them. You know that.”

  “Still… Love makes people do crazy things.”

  “Our Wade Abbott will never be crazy enough to get anywhere near drug dealing, love or no love.”

  “You make a good point.” Linc released a deep sigh. “Okay. You can talk to him and see what he knows.”

  Elmer rubbed his hands together gleefully. “I’ll get right on that. And PS, if it works out between them, this one is all mine.”

  “How did I know you were going to say that?”

  * * *

  Turn the page to keep reading Here Comes the Sun, book 3 in the Butler, Vermont Series.

  Chapter 1

  “I love those who yearn for the impossible.”

  —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Even with snow swirling around him, Wade Abbott knew the way home. He could find it blindfolded, which he was basically doing since the whiteout snow made it so he had to rely on everything but his vision. He’d been out with his brothers for hours looking for two young boys who’d gone sledding in the foothills of Butler Mountain and disappeared in the blizzard.

  They’d found them alive but hypothermic forty-five minutes ago and dispersed to head home to warm up. His younger brothers, Lucas and Landon, both paramedics, had transported the boys to the hospital, where they’d be reunited with their grateful parents.

  The snowmobile’s headlight illuminated the Nelsons’ mailbox, a green monstrosity that indicated Wade was about five hundred feet from his own driveway. He noticed a pattern in the snow that looked an awful lot like footprints. Who would be foolish enough to be out in a full-on blizzard if they didn’t have to be?

  Was he hallucinating, or were the footprints leading to his place? A trickle of unease traveled down his back, which was odd because he never felt unsafe in Butler, Vermont. Hell, he never even locked his door. He didn’t have to. His place wasn’t easy to find unless you knew where it was.

  He hung a right into his driveway and followed the deep footsteps for a quarter mile of twists and bends until his cabin came into view, nestled into a copse of evergreens, his own piece of paradise.

  Biting one of the fingers of his glove, he pulled it off and reached for the flashlight strapped to his hip to further illuminate the yard. The flashlight’s beam cut through the snow to identify a huddled lump on his porch.

  “What the hell?” Wade cut the engine and jumped off the snowmobile. Fighting the foot-high snow, he crossed the yard and went up the stairs. “Hello?”

  Nothing.

  He nudged the lump with his foot.

  It moaned.

  He scooped up the bundle and carried it inside, where heat from the woodstove he’d stoked earlier swept over him. Dropping to his knees in front of the fire, he deposited his visitor.

  She moaned again.

  Dear God, it’s a woman—a half-frozen woman. Moving quickly, he threw two more logs on the fire and began unwrapping the ice-
crusted scarf that covered her face so the heat could penetrate. Bruises. Her face was black, blue and swollen, so much so he didn’t immediately recognize her.

  And then he knew.

  His heart skipped a beat and shock reverberated through him as he began to frantically remove her wet coat and gloves.

  “Mia.” He could hear the panic in his own voice. “Mia!”

  She moaned again. Her lips and fingers were blue.

  Wade rubbed her hands between his. “Mia, talk to me.” What was she doing here, and who had beat the hell out of her? Rage simmered in his gut. He’d suspected from when he first met her almost two years ago at a yoga retreat that the man in her life— Wade assumed it was her husband—was hurting her, but they’d never reached the point where he felt comfortable asking her about it. Throughout their friendship, he’d seen the signs: skittish, jumpy, secretive, scared, but she hadn’t shared anything overly personal with him.

  She’d broken off contact with him a year ago, and he’d suffered ever since, wondering why she’d stopped calling him and worrying whether she was safe.

  “Mia, honey… Wake up. Please wake up.” He would’ve called for help if anyone could’ve gotten to them in the storm. Since outside help wasn’t an option tonight, it was up to him to get her warm. Unzipping his parka, he pulled it off, removed his boots, kicked them aside and then took off the survival suit that allowed him to be out in a storm for hours without suffering hypothermia. He stripped down to underwear so he could use his body heat to warm her.

  Then he went to work on her clothing, moving carefully in case she had other injuries. Working from her boots up, he took off soaking-wet clothes that had him wondering just how long she’d been out in the storm.

  Other than the violent tremors that rattled her body, she never stirred as he stripped her down to panties and a tank top, both of which were damp. He laid her wet clothes on top of the woodstove to dry and then stopped short at the sight of arms and legs mottled with bruises of various colors.

  Wade choked back the rage that burned through him. He blew out a deep breath, grabbed a down comforter from the sofa and pulled it over them as he molded his body to hers, hoping his body heat would help to raise her core temperature. It would be better, he knew from his lifesaving training, if they were both bare, but he didn’t think he could handle that.

  Hopefully, he could get her warm without having to strip down completely.

  He was enveloped in the sweet, fresh scent of her hair, while his heart beat erratically, his palms felt sweaty despite the cold and his mind raced. What had brought her here? Who had hurt her? What did she want from him? Could he bear to see her again and then watch her go back to wherever she’d been the last year? He tightened his hold on her. He wouldn’t let her go back to the man who’d been hurting her, that much he knew for certain.

  “Mia, honey, you’re safe. It’s Wade. I’m so glad you’re here. We’re going to get you warm.” He ran his hand gently up and down her arm, wishing she would wake up and talk to him. He’d missed her so much. Talking to her had once been his favorite thing. After they first met at the yoga retreat, they’d connected a few times at coffee shops between his home in Butler and hers in Rutland. He’d driven more than an hour each way for the chance to spend thirty minutes in her presence.

  The last time he’d heard from her, she’d told him she couldn’t talk to him anymore. He’d begged her to reconsider and promised to keep his distance so as not to cause her any further difficulty. But he hadn’t heard from her again, until he found her on his doorstep, nearly frozen and obviously injured.

  Her poor face was so terribly swollen that it made his heart hurt to look at her.

  God… He’d gladly kill the man who’d done this to her, and he had no doubt it’d been a man.

  He pressed his lips to her forehead. “Sweetheart, wake up and talk to me. It’s Wade. It’s okay now. No one will ever hurt you again.”

  The only reply he got was a tortured-sounding moan.

  “Mia.”

  Her lids fluttered open, revealing the gorgeous navy-blue eyes that had once looked at him with such affection. She stared at him, almost as if she couldn’t believe her eyes. “Wade,” she whispered.

  “It’s me, honey. You’re safe with me.”

  She began to cry.

  Her tears broke him. “Shhh, it’s okay. Everything is okay now.”

  She shook her head as her teeth chattered. “N-no, it isn’t.”

  “It is for right now. The only thing you need to worry about is getting warm. Hold on to me and let me warm you up.”

  Mia burrowed deeper into his embrace, her arm sliding around his waist and her leg slipping between his.

  Wade swallowed hard. Here in his arms was the woman he’d dreamed about since the day he met her. He was supposed to be helping her get warm, but her nearness was making him hot in more ways than one. He took a deep breath and scooted his hips back a crucial inch so she wouldn’t be able to feel what she had done to him.

  What did it mean that she’d come to him? He’d once written down his home address and phone number as well as the address and phone number for the office and told her to use the info if she ever needed him for anything at any time. With cell phone service nonexistent in Butler, he didn’t own a mobile phone, so he’d given her all the other ways to reach him. After so much time, he figured she’d thrown away the scrap of paper and forgotten about him.

  He had never forgotten her. Thoughts of her and what she might be going through had tormented him through months of sleepless nights and long days at work in which he’d moved through his life in a perpetual state of despair. He’d known Mia a year when he first shared his complex feelings for her with his sister Hannah. His sister Ella knew about her, too, and he’d told his grandfather a little about her, but he hadn’t told anyone else, preferring to keep his feelings—and his despair—to himself.

  As one of ten kids, most of whom worked together running the family’s Green Mountain Country Store, it wasn’t easy to keep secrets in his family. But he’d been aided by the fact that he was considered the “quiet” one of the bunch. No one thought much of it when Wade sat back and took in the madness of their family rather than actively participating. So he’d been able to keep his situation relatively private, which, in his family, was saying something.

  He had so many questions for her—especially why now and what now—but he didn’t ask any of them. Rather, he stayed focused on warming her and containing the desire zipping through his body, a reminder of how much he’d wanted her from the first time he laid eyes on her.

  For a long time after Wade settled them in front of the fire, Mia shivered so hard, her teeth ached. She’d never been so cold in her life. Her car had gotten stuck in a snowdrift on the outskirts of Butler. Fortunately, she’d spent hours studying road maps into and out of Butler. In the back of her mind every second of the last miserable year had been Wade’s address, the phone numbers she’d memorized, along with the map of Butler that had represented her path to freedom.

  Her biggest concern as she’d plotted her escape was that Wade might not be willing to help her. She’d had to hope and pray that he would still want her the way he once had, even if he’d never said the words. A woman knew these things, and her life now depended upon him still feeling the same way.

  He was so warm and solid as he caressed her back in small, soothing circles that made her want to purr with pleasure. She had no idea how long they lay cuddled up to each other under the heavenly blanket, but after a while, her teeth stopped chattering and sensation returned to her extremities in painful pricks. The warmth flooded her mind and body, filling her with a sense of security that was even more blissful than the heat coming from the woodstove—and his muscular body.

  For so long, she’d had to wonder what it might be like to be touched by Wade Abbott, and now she knew what heaven must be like. She took deep breaths of the woodsy, natural scent of him and noted that he’d cut
his hair since she’d last seen him. Once upon a time, she’d sat across from him in coffee shops and wished she could run her fingers over the sharp planes of his face and touch the longish hair that wasn’t brown or blond or red, but rather, an interesting golden mix of all three colors.

  During those visits, she’d memorized every detail, right down to the flecks of gold in his eyes that glittered with pleasure whenever he looked at her while they talked until their coffee grew cold and the sun dipped toward the horizon.

  Every time she’d left him, she’d done so under a veil of panic, certain this would be the time her secret friendship with Wade would be discovered by a man who would kill her before he’d let anyone else have her. But somehow, they’d gotten away with it. Other things had transpired that’d convinced her to stay away from Wade, for his safety as much as hers, but she’d never stopped thinking about him, wondering about him or wishing that things were different.

  Had he thought about her, too? Or had he moved on with someone else? Was there a woman sleeping in his bedroom at this very moment? Would he hold her this way if he had someone else? If it meant saving her life, she knew for sure he would. But once her body was warm, would he leave her to join the woman he loved?

  That was like a knife to her heart. Thoughts of him had kept her alive long before tonight, and all her hopes were pinned on him being willing to help her now. She wiggled even closer to him and encountered evidence that he wanted her as much as he always had.

  He gasped as she rubbed against him. “Mia…”

  The proof of his desire freed her to ask for what she wanted more than anything. “Will you kiss me, Wade?”

  He stared at her, seeming incredulous. “Are you really here asking me to kiss you? Will I wake up tomorrow to find out I dreamed this?”

  She placed her hand on his face because she’d wanted to for so long and now she could. “It’s not a dream. I’m really here, and I’ve been dying for your kiss for as long as I’ve known you.”