by Vivi Holt
He sighed. “I think you’re right. I’ve never loved them the way I should’ve. I mean, I love them, but I don’t show them—I don’t know how to act, how to be an uncle. I just…it’s not easy for me.”
She caressed his cheek with one hand, meeting his gaze. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears. “No one could blame you. But don’t judge the children because their parents didn’t have to struggle to bring them into the world.”
He nodded. “I know you’re right.”
How had he been so blind to it before? He loved Will, Cade, and Milly, but he’d never let himself feel that love the way he should have. Their very presence worried the wound in his heart that’d never healed when the baby died in Mia’s womb that day, three years earlier.
His head hung against her shoulder, and he shuddered.
“Milly!” Sasha’s scream pierced through his grief.
His head jolted up, and he saw Sasha running toward the pond. Just downhill from the ranch house and hidden from view from where he stood, the pond was frozen over this time of year, but still they didn’t allow the children to go near it unsupervised.
He took off at a run, tearing down the porch steps and across the yard then down the hill beside the house.
Milly stood in the middle of the field beyond the pond, frozen in place. Her face was white with a fear he could see even from a distance. A wolf, all yellow and gray fur, thick and bushy, with long, thin legs and ears pricked to attention, prowled around her, dwarfing the child. Sasha was just ahead of him, barreling down the hill. He sprinted past her.
“Milly! Don’t move!” he shouted.
Sasha’s feet pounded the ground behind him as they skirted around the pond. His own heartbeat thundered in his ears.
The wolf looked up at the sound of their approach, eyes like amber-colored holes peering, expressionless, at the world.
“Get out of here!” he cried, waving his arms over his head.
The wolf jerked to one side then stepped toward Milly, teeth bared. The girl squealed again and pressed her hands to her eyes.
“Uncle Chris! Mommy! Help!”
He pulled to a sudden halt then stepped confidently forward.
“It’s okay, Milly. Uncle Chris and Mommy are here.”
The wolf snarled then stalked away from Chris. Chris strode over to Milly and scooped her up into his arms, shouting again at the wolf. The animal’s eyes narrowed, then it trotted off over the frozen tundra in the direction of the woods.
Sasha reached them with Kate close behind, both breathing hard. He handed the child to Sasha, and she held her tight, kissing her all over her chubby little face.
“Milly, what were you doing all the way out here? I thought you went into the house.”
“Let’s get her inside,” he said.
Just then, Todd came running from the house, with both boys trailing after him. He stopped short, puffing.
“What’s going on? What happened? Will said something about a wolf.”
Chris nodded. “It went that way. Disappeared into the woods a moment ago. She’s fine.”
Todd puffed out a long breath. “Thank God.”
He cupped Milly’s cheek in his hand. “You’re okay, Pumpkin?”
She hiccoughed and burst into tears. “Daddy, the wolf growled at me.”
“Are you okay?” Kate whispered to Chris.
He nodded, slipping his hand into hers and kissing the back of it. “I’m fine. I’m just glad Milly’s all right. It could’ve been so much worse.”
She squeezed his hand. “Uncle Chris to the rescue.”
He chuckled. “I guess you don’t know just how much you love someone until you see them in danger.”
They all walked together back to the house, and the boys soon joined them, talking a mile a minute, asking every question they could think of.
“How big was the wolf?”
“Did it bite Milly?”
“Where did it go?”
Chris laughed and tousled their hair and answered their requests as best he could. Todd and Sasha were too busy to pay them any attention, their entire focus on the little girl crying herself dry against Sasha’s shoulder.
Inside the house, Mom fussed over Milly, getting her a gingerbread man and a hot chocolate. Then she hovered over her until Sasha handed her over for a cuddle in Granny’s special rocking chair. Mom rocked her and sang to her, and before long, the two of them were busy looking through a picture book while the rest of the group watched on, quiet in the aftermath, each absorbed in their own thoughts.
Chris and Kate pulled themselves away and wandered into the den to sit on the loveseat by the fire. The brown leather upholstery was cold against his jeans, and he leaned his head back on the round headrest.
Todd joined them, standing in front of Chris and sighing.
Chris straightened. “What’s up?”
“Thank you.”
“For…”
“Thank you for rescuing Milly. Sasha told me you saved her. If you hadn’t been there, who knows what might’ve happened. Perhaps it would’ve attacked before Sasha could reach her…”
“Probably not.” Chris ran a hand through his hair. “But you’re welcome. I love that little girl. I’d do anything for her.” He stood, holding out his hand to his brother. “I don’t want us to fight.”
Todd swallowed before taking Chris’s hand. “I don’t want to fight either. I’m sorry for the things I said. I shouldn’t have—”
“No, you have a right. But I want you to know—you’re the only one who could take over this ranch. That’s not me. I’m not the right person to run it, and Dad knows that.”
“Thank you for saying that.”
“It’s true.” Chris shook his head. “And I’m sorry I haven’t been around much. You know how much I’ve struggled after what happened to Mia.”
Todd nodded. “I know it was hard on you, but honestly we don’t know much more than that because you haven’t told us. We can help, if you’ll let us.”
Chris ran a hand over his face. “I wish you could…”
Todd embraced him and then offered a quick nod of the head. “We’re here for you if you need us.”
When he left, Chris slumped down onto the loveseat beside Kate again and sighed. When he met her gaze, her eyes glistened with moisture.
Chapter 15
December 29th
Kate stared out over the pasture in front of the ranch house. The long drive wound down a sloping hill that opened up into a pasture where longhorns used their hooves and snouts to dig through the thin coating of snow for shoots of grass to eat or followed the tractor with its fresh bales of hay.
Todd was feeding the livestock, and instead of joining them today, she watched from the rocker on the front porch, her coat buttoned tight around her thin frame and her knit cap pulled low on her forehead.
She shivered and breathed warm air over her gloved hands. Her thoughts wandered from Chris to what the future might hold for them and then to her birth mother.
If only she’d gotten out of the truck to meet Tamera. She shouldn’t have driven away until they’d had a chance to talk. She supposed she could call her, but meeting over the phone seemed so impersonal.
She and Chris would be back in Atlanta in a couple of days, and her chance to meet the only family she had would be gone, at least for the near future. Who knew when she’d save enough money to be able to travel back to Montana. The money from Chris would go a long way toward paying some of the bills she owed, fixing her dilapidated car, and stockpiling some much-needed art supplies. But would she have enough left over for cross-country airfare? And when could she get enough time off work to make the trip? She had art classes starting back up again at the local community college in two weeks.
“You look deep in thought,” said Chris through a cracked front door. He pushed it all the way open, offering her a grin. “Can I join you?”
She nodded. “Of course.”
“What are you
thinking about?”
“You,” she replied. It was true she had been thinking of him, right before her thoughts veered off onto another track entirely.
“And what were you thinking about me?”
“I was wondering…what would happen when we go home.” She bit down on her lower lip and looked up at him through half-lidded eyes.
His lips pursed. “I…”
A vehicle pulled off the highway. It turned into the drive and plowed slowly up the hill. Chris’s eyes narrowed. “Who is that?”
The white Ranger Rover drew to a stop in front of the house, and a woman climbed out. Her blonde hair fluttered against her shoulders in the faint breeze, and she spun about in place until her gaze landed on the two of them.
Chris stood and marched down the front steps to greet her.
“Hello.” His voice drifted faintly over his shoulder back to where Kate sat. “Can I help you?”
They murmured together a moment, but Kate couldn’t hear. She couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe. She’d recognized Tamera the moment she’d stepped from the SUV.
What was she doing here? She couldn’t possibly have tracked her here. Could she? The truck—maybe she knew the Everetts’ truck. It was one of the vehicles they used on the ranch, and perhaps she’d seen it before.
She stood slowly to her feet then hurried to intervene. What were they discussing? Tamera pressed her hands to her hips and cocked her head to one side, her eyes narrowed in confusion.
“…came to see me? I saw you. I saw your truck. I thought it was yours, anyway. As you know, Leo’s with the sheriff’s office, and I gave him the tag number. He looked it up and confirmed. It was definitely one of your trucks.”
Kate only caught the end of her sentence, but she understood the gist of it. Who had sat in front of her house and why? She bit down on her lower lip—this wasn’t something she’d expected. She’d known Tamera had spotted the truck, but she hadn’t expected her to follow up on it.
“Hi,” she said breathlessly.
Tamera glanced at her, annoyance in her eyes. “Hello.”
“I’m Kate.”
“Pleased to meet you, Kate.” She held out a hand, and Kate shook it. “I’m Tamera Simpson. I was just asking Chris here why someone from this ranch parked their truck out front of my house and sat there watching us a few days ago.”
“I don’t know what to tell you, Tamera. No one’s been by your way since I got here. Well, except for Kate and I—we went Christmas shopping. But we were at the mall most of the time…” He caught Kate’s eye, suspicion growing in his voice. “You didn’t take a drive in any neighborhoods, did you?”
Her cheeks burned, and she nodded. Then she turned her attention to Tamera.
“Yes, that was me. I was in front of your house.”
Tamera’s eyes widened. “But…why? What were you doing there?”
Kate’s gaze dropped to the ground, and she ran a hand over her head, removing the knit cap. She ground it between her hands and then glanced up again at Tamera’s face.
Tamera’s amber brown eyes widened at the sight of Kate’s hair, so like her own, at the mirror reflection of her own features staring back at her.
“I’m Kate Grant, your daughter.”
“Kate Grant?”
She nodded.
“What?” Chris’s voice echoed his disbelief. “What are you talking about? I thought you said your parents were dead.”
Kate offered him a tight smile. “They are. My adoptive parents passed years ago. Tamera is my birth mother.”
He looked back and forth between them, his eyebrows arched high over wide eyes, his jaw clenched. She should’ve told him, she knew that, but it wasn’t something she was ready to talk about. It might’ve come to nothing. It might still…
“And we’ve never met before.”
Tamera’s gaze was fixed on Kate’s face. Kate’s cheeks flamed, and she shook her head slowly.
Tamera stepped forward, her eyes gleaming. She raised her arms, and Kate fell into them. She heard Chris walking quietly away as her own arms wrapped around her mother. All the years of pain and loneliness, the feeling of not belonging anywhere to anyone, welled up in her eyes and trickled down her cheeks.
“I didn’t know if you’d want to see me…”
Tamera sniffled into her hair. “I wrote you that I did. Of course I do!”
“I drove over there, but when I saw you with your family, I couldn’t get out of the truck. I couldn’t interrupt, didn’t want to cause y’all any pain.”
“Well, I’m glad I found you now.” Tamera pulled back, and her cheeks were as wet as Kate’s. She pushed a strand of hair from Kate’s eyes and stroked her wet cheek. “You look so much like me…I can’t believe it.” She laughed in delight and pulled Kate close again for another embrace then leaned back, her brow furrowed. “Did I hear right? Your parents are both dead?”
Kate nodded, unable to form words.
“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry. Were they good to you?”
She nodded again. “They were the best parents a girl could’ve asked for. They loved me, and I loved them, and I never wanted for anything. But they died several years ago, and ever since, I’ve been so alone. I’ve longed for a family…”
Tamera nodded abruptly, her face full of resolve. “And now you have one.”
Chris pushed Milly on one swing then leaned to the other side and pushed Cade. Will had his own swing, a tire hanging from a long, high branch on the oak tree in the center of the ranch house’s sprawling backyard. But the two younger ones still needed to be pushed, and for the first time in as long as he could remember, Chris was happy to do it.
It was as though a weight had lifted from his chest. Between the incident with the wolf—and the panic that’d washed over him when he saw his tiny niece in a standoff with the wild dog—and then the resolution of long-standing issues with his brother, he felt empty but in a good way. Depleted and yet content.
He glanced to the side of the house as the sound of tires crunching over the gravel echoed through the still air. Tamera’s SUV traveled briefly into view then disappeared down the drive. He studied the place where it’d been, his thoughts wandering and his eyes glazed. What was going on with Kate? Had she known all along that her birth mother lived nearby? Why hadn’t she told him?
He shook his head. So many questions, and yet he knew she probably needed some time to process things herself. It was hard for him to imagine just how strange it must’ve been for her to find herself face-to-face for the very first time with the woman who gave birth to her twenty-five years earlier.
Just then she stepped into his field of vision. Her hands were shoved deep into her pockets, and her shoulders hunched against the cold afternoon breeze. She’d pushed the knit cap back onto her head, and it sat slightly askew, hair sticking out at various angles beneath it. She saw him and headed in his direction with what looked like trepidation in her step.
“Hey,” he said as he pushed Milly higher.
“Hey.”
“So…that was your birth mother?”
She nodded. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”
“No, no…I get it. I mean, I don’t really, but I can imagine that sort of topic would be difficult to raise. Especially with someone you barely know.”
Her eyes narrowed, and he thought he saw a flicker of pain pass behind them. “I don’t think that’s how I’d describe you. Not anymore.”
His heart warmed, and his voice softened. “I’m sorry, you’re right. I guess I’m curious why you didn’t tell me. Did you know she was here the whole time?”
She inhaled sharply then dipped her head. “I got a letter from her right before I came to your house that day. She said she was living in Billings and asked if I would get in touch with her.”
He stepped away from the swings, followed by cries of dismay and calls for more pushing. Then he took Kate by the hand and led her to the porch where they could talk. They sat on the step
to watch the children as they jumped from the swings and chased each other around the yard squealing.
“I wish you’d felt as though you could tell me, but I suppose I get why you didn’t. I wasn’t exactly charming and warm when you met me. I was stressed about work, and the holidays, and seeing my family for the first time in a year with an email-order date who I was sure mom would see right through from the very first moment. Do you know, last year my mother set me up with no less than six different women?”
She threw her head back and laughed. The sound sent a thrill through him. She had a beautiful laugh; it could light a person up from the inside. A laugh that was full of joy.
“Six?!”
He nodded, his eyes wide. “I’m not kidding. One was from her book club, another from the local school. A third was her best friend’s daughter’s cousin… I mean, it was like a nightmare. Not that they weren’t lovely, but I was here to rest, recover, share the holidays with my family. Instead, I felt like I was a contestant on a dating show.”
She chuckled and stroked his cheek with soft fingertips. “I’m glad I was able to help avert some of that this year.”
“It’s been so much more relaxing. And you’ve helped me get some perspective as well. I guess I take my family for granted a lot of the time and let the little things they do irritate me, instead of looking at what I have and appreciating them. I’m blessed to have a family who cares enough about me to set me up on six blind dates over the holidays.” He chortled, rubbing his hands over his face.
“Yes, you are,” she said. “For sure. Although, I don’t blame you for wanting to find a way out of that. I thought you were crazy when I first met you—I mean, who hires a date to take home to meet the family at Christmas?”
He groaned. “I know. I thought I was crazy as well, so you weren’t alone. When you showed up, I was so worried I’d done something horrible. But then, you turned out to be the best decision I’ve made in…well, in a long time.”
He couldn’t let his thoughts darken. Mia would always be his first love, but he finally felt as though he could let her go. Let her become a part of his past, a past he’d never forget and would cherish forever. But now he thought he just might be able to move on to something new. A second chance at life and at love. He linked his hand through hers, their glove-covered fingers only just fitting together.
