Springtime at Hope Cottage

by Annie Rains

  “Do you think she’ll listen to you?” Josie asked when Tuck was back at her side.

  “If she knows what’s good for her,” he muttered, folding his arms in front of him. “But she’s eleven so she has no idea what’s good for her yet.”

  Josie laughed softly. “We’ll both just have to keep our eyes on her.”

  Tuck nodded. “I’m glad you talked me into coming out tonight.”

  “See? It’s not so bad.”

  “No, but I’d still rather be on my back deck with Shadow, looking out at the stars and hearing myself think.”

  “You can do that any night of the week. It’s good to be among people.” She reached for his hand and tugged, a mischievous glint flashing in her eyes. “It’s also good to let yourself dance every now and then.” She dragged him toward the middle of the dance floor, and then she pivoted and looped her arms around his neck. “There. This is much better,” she said.

  “Watch your feet. I’m not much of a dancer, remember?”

  “If you step on my feet, I might need a PT when the night is over,” she teased.

  “I know a good one.”

  Josie’s heart did a little jig of its own. With her arms still looped around his neck, she slid a finger under the silver chain he always wore and then lifted it off his chest to look at the dangling pendant with an engraving of a bear. She’d seen the chain disappearing under his T-shirt before and had wondered about it. “What’s this?” she asked, leaning in closer so he could hear her over the loud music.

  “A bear.”

  Josie rolled her eyes. Then she put the charm down and clasped her hands back together. “You are a bear.”

  “And yet you keep poking me,” he teased.

  “Sorry,” she lied. She loved joking with Tuck. Loved talking to him. Being in his arms felt right too. She’d thought maybe he was still too hung up on his late wife but now she wondered if that was true. He’d overcome a difficult past, and she admired him more for that. It made him the man he was, a guy who was kind, giving, and who looked at her with unprecedented desire.

  “I feel like people are watching us,” she said after a moment.

  “I’m sure they are. I’m single, and I’ve come to a town event with the famous Josie Kellum, who shone a light on the town with her talented writing.”

  “Hmm. What if I kissed you right now?” she asked.

  Humor danced in his dark eyes. “Then we’d be doing everyone a favor and giving them something to talk about for at least a week around here.”

  Heat swirled in her belly. They were already dancing so closely that all she’d have to do was lift slightly on her tiptoes and press her lips to his. Anticipation lingered between them, and it almost felt like a shame to cut it short by going in for a taste too fast. Desire was sexy.

  * * *

  Every sense that Tuck had was on overdrive. Josie looked and smelled amazing, and the feel of her curves underneath his hands was driving him out of his mind.

  Being under a strobe light on a dance floor thrust him back to his high school days. Even back then, he’d avoided scenes like these. He’d met Renee during her sophomore year, and they’d preferred to skip these kinds of things. This wasn’t torture though, especially in the company of Josie. What is going on with me? Somewhere in the last couple of weeks, he seemed to have lost his mind over a city girl who seemed to be fitting in just fine here in Sweetwater Springs.

  “You’re a pretty good dancer,” she commented, pressing her body to his. “Almost as good as you are at kissing.”

  Reflexively, he gripped her more tightly. “Don’t tell anyone, okay?” he said in her ear.

  “Don’t worry. I’ll take your secrets back with me to New York.”

  That was a mood kill. The fact that she was temporary meant this new energy and lightness he felt were also temporary. “Any news on your apartment?” he asked, hoping the answer was no.

  She shook her head. “But I haven’t called to check on it either. I’m surprisingly not in such a hurry to get back. Maybe your quiet, easygoing ways are rubbing off on me just a little bit. I’m stopping to smell the roses and enjoy the moment. Especially this one.”

  “Me too.” In fact, he wouldn’t mind staying rooted in this one spot and holding Josie in his arms for the rest of the night.

  A commotion arose from the corner of the room. They both turned to where Maddie was sitting. Keyword was. She wasn’t there anymore. Now she was on the floor, just like he’d envisioned in his worst nightmares for tonight.

  Tuck took off toward her, weaving around and through couples. “You okay?” he asked once he was crouched at her side.

  Maddie’s face was drawn up in pain as she clutched the side of her leg. “Yeah. I think so. Just…Ow!”

  Tuck palpated the area she was holding, looking for any abnormal lumps. “I don’t think you broke anything,” he finally said.

  “How do you know?” Maddie asked with a strained look on her face.

  “For one, you’d be screaming if you had.” He should’ve been keeping a closer eye on Maddie instead of lusting after Josie. This was his fault.

  All the dancing in the room had ceased, and now a crowd was gathered around.

  “Need me to call an ambulance?” Kaitlyn Russo asked, standing among the group.

  “No.” Tuck turned to Josie. “Can you get the wheelchair?”

  She nodded quickly and rushed to grab it from against the wall and unfold it.

  Maddie looked resigned, almost forlorn, as he helped her stand and pivot into the chair’s seat. It was either this chair or the cane, and Maddie had just proven to him that she wasn’t ready for the latter.

  “Let’s go,” he said to Josie.

  The three of them weaved through the thick crowd, dodging concerns, questions, and well-wishes until they were through the double doors.

  Maddie kept quiet with her head down the whole way.

  “Looks like you had fun for a while,” Josie said, once they were inside the Jeep.

  Maddie huffed. “That was so embarrassing. My friends will probably never talk to me again. I can’t even stand with a stupid cane.”

  “You will,” Tuck encouraged. “We just got ahead of ourselves.”

  “We? There is no we. I’m in this on my own. I’m the one who looked like an idiot in there.”

  Where was his pocketful of chocolate when he needed it?

  “You only think you look like an idiot. People fall. It happens all the time. Josie fell just a couple of weeks ago.”

  “Maybe older people fall for no reason. People my age only fall while doing cheerleading and playing sports. I can’t even stand,” Maddie said, her voice cracking with obvious frustration. “Everyone is probably laughing and talking about me now.”

  Tuck glanced at her in the rearview mirror. “I doubt that’s true. By tomorrow, everyone will probably have forgotten.”

  “You’re just saying that because you feel bad for not watching me like you were supposed to.”

  “I was watching you,” Tuck said.

  “No,” she countered from the back seat, “you were kissing your girlfriend.”

  * * *

  Beverly was awake and sitting on the living room couch when Tuck helped Maddie inside.

  “Is everything okay?” Beverly asked, looking between Maddie and Tuck.

  Maddie was still visibly upset with her arms tightly crossed over her chest as he wheeled her in.

  “We had a little accident at the dance,” Tuck explained. “But Maddie is fine.” At least physically. It was her emotional well-being he was concerned about.

  “I’m tired. I just want to go to bed.” Maddie pushed her wheelchair toward the hallway that led to her room. Beverly offered an apologetic smile and then got up from the couch and followed her granddaughter.

  “Good night,” Tuck called after them. “I’ll check in tomorrow!” He turned to let himself out. Josie was waiting for him in the Jeep, and despite Maddie’s fall, he c
ouldn’t wait for some private time with her.

  He took a few steps, once again thinking that Beverly’s house needed straightening up. This was no place for a kid. Then he saw a photograph of a woman hanging on the wall beside the door. She looked like a younger version of Beverly with her pale skin and hair color. She had gray-blue eyes that he remembered. He knew her.

  Crystal Sanders.

  Why hadn’t he made the connection between their last names before? He’d dated Crystal briefly in college when he was broken up with Renee. Crystal had told him she lived on the outer limits of Sweetwater Springs but they’d dated so briefly that he’d never visited her outside of her dorm. If he remembered correctly, they’d called things off just before winter break, and Crystal had never returned for the next spring semester. That had been a good thing because Tuck had reunited with Renee that Christmas, falling more deeply in love with her than he’d been before. Crystal was the one and only time he’d ever felt anything for a woman other than Renee—until Josie.

  Crystal is Maddie’s mother? Crystal is dead?

  His knees felt weak with the realization, and he almost needed to sit down. Instead, he opened the front door and let himself out, gulping in the fresh mountain air. A million questions sprung into his mind as he descended the steps and got back inside the Jeep.

  “Everything okay?” Josie asked.

  “Yeah,” he said numbly. “Maddie’s upset but she’ll be fine.”

  “Good.” Josie reached out and rubbed her hand along his arm. Until now, her touch had only worked to fuel his desire. Now it comforted him, whether she knew it or not. He hadn’t seen Crystal in at least eleven years, maybe twelve. She’d been a beautiful person inside and out, and she was far too young to die.

  “Are you sure everything is okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost or something,” Josie said, pulling her hand back to her lap as he pulled out of the driveway and onto the road.

  He glanced over. That’s exactly how he felt but this new information was too raw to discuss right now. “Just worried about Maddie, I guess. And her grandmother. Beverly isn’t looking too good.”

  “I wish I could help.”

  “Me too.”

  They drove back to Hope Cottage quietly. He’d considered that he might bring Josie inside his house after the dance tonight. Not necessarily to sleep with her. He wasn’t sure his heart was ready for that, even if his body was long past. But now the news of Crystal’s death was weighing too heavily on him. And the realization that she was Maddie’s mom.

  He parked, walked around the vehicle, and opened the passenger door.

  Josie stepped into him, going on her toes to kiss him sweetly. “You have a lot on your mind. I understand,” she said, even though he hadn’t spelled it out for her. “Thank you for tonight. See you tomorrow.”

  “Thank you,” he whispered against the chorus of crickets and bullfrogs, and the worry humming inside him as he watched her go.

  Was it just a coincidence that he was treating the daughter of a woman he’d once dated? Or something more?

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  She was dreaming. Josie didn’t have to be awake to know that. But she was at the edge where the dream felt real enough. Tuck’s hands were running along her inner thighs, working their way up while he kissed her, slow and deep.

  Teetering on the edge of being asleep and awake, she could opt in to the dream or opt out and get started with the day ahead.

  Josie opted all in. Dreams were the playground of the subconscious after all, and she’d spent far too much of her life working.

  She wriggled closer to his body as they kissed, willing those hands of his to move higher up on her thighs but they wouldn’t. Tuck laughed softly against her mouth, teasing her the way he did.

  She flicked open a button on his shirt, kissing the hard-muscled chest as she popped more buttons. Then she sank lower until her mouth reached his chiseled abs. They clenched under her butterfly kisses so she stayed awhile, teasing him right back. That seemed to be their thing, both in real life and dreamland.

  “I want you, Josie,” he groaned.

  Those four words increased her need one hundred–fold. She wanted him too. And she was going to have him. Right here, right now. No more games.

  A cat jumped between them and meowed in Josie’s face. She tried to push it off Tuck’s washboard abs but the cat had ninja skills. It swatted a paw at her cheek, defending its territory.

  Meow.

  Josie’s eyes fluttered open, and she sighed deeply.

  Meow.

  Couldn’t they have at least gotten to second base in the dream? Her cell phone meowed again from the nightstand. Then after another moment, it began to ring. She had no issues with cell reception now, and yet some part of her wished she did.

  She pulled her phone to her ear. “This better be good,” she said, not caring who was on the other end of the line.

  “Hi,” Kaitlyn said. “Just calling to check on Maddie after last night.”

  Josie’s heart tugged, remembering the commotion and the dull look in Maddie’s eyes when they’d dropped her off.

  Josie massaged the sleep out of her eyes. “She didn’t injure anything, except her already fragile self-esteem.”

  “Self-esteem is so important when you’re her age,” Kaitlyn said. “Poor thing.”

  Josie sat up in bed. “Yeah. I wish there was something I could do to help her.”

  “Are you serious? You’re the queen of ideas. When I need an idea, I always go to you.”

  Josie reached for a cardigan, pulled it on, and dragged her body toward the small coffee maker on the kitchen counter. “Well, ideas never come before caffeine. I’m not sure there’s anything anyway—” Josie started to say when Kaitlyn cut her off.

  “Wait. I have an idea.”

  Josie went through the motions of setting the coffee maker to run. “Okay, I’m listening.”

  “Let’s have a girls’ day out. I’m involved with the Ladies’ Day Out group that gets together regularly. We do all sorts of fun stuff.”

  Josie remembered Lula talking about it when she brought over her Three Sisters Stew the other day.

  “What if we did something similar? Just you, me, and Maddie. I can get Gina to watch the inn. There are all kinds of sales and specials going on downtown right now for tomorrow’s Sweetwater Springs Festival. We can take Maddie shopping and give her a little makeover. We can get mani-pedis at Perfectly Pampered Salon too. It’ll be a blast. Exactly what a girl who’s low on the self-confidence barometer needs.”

  Josie stared at the dark liquid pouring into her coffee mug. Even without it, she could appreciate what a great idea this was. She wouldn’t mind a girls’ day out herself. Painted nails and some new clothes might also be just what a sexually frustrated woman needed. “That sounds like fun.”

  “Great. Can you set it up with Maddie?”

  Josie grabbed her full mug and headed over to the kitchen table. “I’ll ask Tuck for her number and make the call right after we hang up.”

  “Yay! This is so exciting. Text me the time, and I’ll swing around to pick you and Maddie up.”

  “Sounds good.”

  They disconnected, and Josie sat for several minutes drinking her cup of coffee and slowly feeling herself return to the land of the living. Excitement began to rumble inside her at Kaitlyn’s genius idea. Josie couldn’t wait to tell Tuck about it. He seemed to really like Maddie and was protective of her. It was just one more thing she found attractive about him.

  After showering and dressing, Josie walked over to Tuck’s house to get Maddie’s contact information but he’d already left. She tried calling his cell phone but he didn’t answer. He was probably already working with a patient.

  Josie dialed Kaitlyn’s number. “Bad news. Tuck has already left, and he isn’t answering his phone. I have no way of getting Maddie’s number.”

  “No problem. Mitch can look it up for me at the police station. I’ll call hi
m right now.”

  “You are full of ideas today,” Josie said, looking out on Blueberry Creek from Tuck’s front porch. It really was beautiful. She couldn’t imagine living here for the rest of her life. Or she could, and that was scary. She was a city girl, always had been. She and the simple mountain life weren’t supposed to be a good match.

  Her phone meowed from her pocket. She pulled it out and read a text with an attached phone number for Maddie.

  Will you call her? Kaitlyn asked.

  Sure.

  Josie tapped the number into her phone and dialed. She was just about to hang up when Maddie answered.

  “Hey, Maddie. It’s Josie. How are you this morning, sweetheart?”

  “Never better,” the girl said in her usual sarcastic voice.

  “Well, I wanted to see if you felt like coming out with me and my best friend for a girls’ day today. We want to take you out for some shopping and time at the salon. Everything is better after a day of pampering. Trust me.”

  “Um,” Maddie hummed into the receiver, “I don’t know.”

  “Oh, come on. It’s your spring break. It’ll be fun—I promise,” Josie said.

  “It’s not that.” Maddie hesitated. “I just don’t really have any money.”

  “Oh. Well, you don’t need any. It’s my treat today.”

  “Why?” Maddie asked with a note of suspicion in her voice.

  “Because we’re friends and you need a pick-me-up. Say yes. Pleeease?” Josie added.

  “Okay,” Maddie finally said. “But only if I don’t have to bring my wheelchair.”

  “That’s not a promise I can make, sweetheart. Tuck says you still need it to get around, and I can’t overrule him. I hope that doesn’t change your mind about going with us.” Josie grew nervous as she waited for Maddie to answer.

  “Whatever. I use the chair every day at school anyway.”