“Probably,” Sara said. “I’m not sure if I can eat a bite of anything, but since when don’t I stress eat?”
Daisy nodded sagely and grabbed the pie and the container of half-and-half, and Sara brought over the mugs to the table. By the time Sara sat down and took her third sip of the coffee and her second bite of pie, an idea had started forming in her mind.
An either really good idea or a really bad one. She truly wasn’t sure.
* * *
Noah barely heard what his ranch hand was saying about the hay bales, but the guy was smiling, so Noah smiled back and nodded. Two days before the grand opening was no time to have his mind elsewhere, but every cell in Noah’s body was focused on his cabin. And what was going on in there.
He knew, actually. Sara was reuniting with the daughter she’d never gotten to hold. Never gotten to meet, let alone know.
And soon she’d text him that she was ready for him to come back so they could talk, so he could fill her in on the last seven weeks.
So he could say goodbye to the baby girl he’d taken care of. His daughter who wasn’t.
The pain gripped his chest again, and he sucked in a breath.
“You okay, boss?” Dylan asked, adjusting his cowboy hat as he peered at Noah. “You don’t look so good.”
“A-okay,” Noah assured him. “So everything’s in order in the main barn. What about the petting zoo?”
Dylan nodded, his mop of blond bangs shifting. “We’re all set. I did inventory this morning. We won’t need to place orders till Tuesday. Layla’s feeding the farm animals now.”
Noah nodded. “Thanks,” he said. He’d hired several experienced hands for the land and animals and knew he could let go for a little while to deal with what was going on with Annabel.
He walked the quarter mile to his cabin and saddled up Bolt, riding her out to the gate a half mile down the gravel drive. He stopped and patted Bolt’s flanks, staring at the hunter green metal that stretched across the road, Dawson Family Guest Ranch in gold letters, the silhouettes of a cowboy and a cowgirl on horses on either side. His grandparents had made belt buckles with the logo to sell in the gift shop, and one Christmas, he’d had six personalized with the grandkids’ names. Noah still had his. In fact, he kept it on his desk, always had, and the past five months the buckle had served as a talisman, a lucky charm.
And for the past seven weeks, Annabel’s presence had spurred him on to go even farther with making sure every detail of the ranch’s reopening was perfect. This was going to be her future.
Now she wouldn’t be part of it. She wouldn’t be around at all.
His phone pinged with a text, and he reluctantly took it from his pocket. The sooner Sara was ready for him to return, the sooner she’d leave. With his baby.
But it was Daisy texting him.
U ok? Where R U? Heard whole story from S in the cabin.
At the gate, he texted back. No, not OK.
She texted back, Be right there.
A few minutes later, Daisy rode up on her bike. She jumped off, one hand on her belly, and threw her arms around him.
“Sara’s going to take her away,” Noah said, letting his sister comfort him for a second before pulling back. He stared out at the woods beyond the road. “Just like that.”
“I’m so sorry,” Daisy said. “You know I love that baby girl.”
“At least Annabel will be with her mother. And Sara will be with her daughter. I should focus on that. She got her daughter back. It’s a friggin’ miracle.”
Daisy nodded. “It is.”
“And I guess Annabel as a Perry and not a Dawson will have every creature comfort, certainly more than I could ever provide.” He knew the Dawson Family Guest Ranch would do well; he was already booked for the weekend and had bookings stretching all the way to fall. Not every cabin was filled for every day, but word of mouth would spread, and the ranch would be a big success. He believed it. But he’d never be able to give Annabel the life Sara could as richer-than-rich Willem Perry’s widow.
“You know what’s crazy, Daize?” he said. “My heart’s been broken before, so I know what that feels like. This feels like that.”
His sister put her hand on his arm. “Look, I don’t know what happened between you and Sara two years ago. But maybe you can stay in touch, visit Annabel.”
He could just see it now. “Uncle” Noah coming to visit every couple of months, bringing a stuffed animal. How could he become Uncle Noah when that baby had changed his entire life and world? She’d turned him into a father, something he wouldn’t have seen coming in a million years. And dammit, he’d been good at it. Another shocker.
His phone pinged with a text, and his heart sank.
Come talk?—Sara
He stood there, his head hung, unable to move.
“I’m so sorry, Noah,” his sister said again. “I know how much you love Annabel.”
Even he hadn’t known just how much he loved that ten-pound little human until this moment. More than he’d ever realized.
Chapter Three
Sara was sitting in the kitchen of the foreman’s cabin, thinking, thinking, thinking, when the tap came on the front door.
“It’s me,” Noah called out.
How was it possible that his voice still had the power to send goose bumps up her arms, make her feel such anticipation? No matter what she’d been going through as a kid, as a teenager, the sound of Noah Dawson’s voice...
“Come on in,” she said, standing up, then sitting down. Why had she told him to come back so soon? Maybe she wasn’t quite ready after all.
It felt funny inviting him into his own home, but what about any of this didn’t feel surreal?
Like the fact that Sara had spent the last fifteen minutes—with Annabel napping in her carrier beside her brother—working over the idea in her head.
Good idea? Bad idea? Her only option?
Was she really hoping to count on Noah Dawson?
She was in dire straits. Nowhere to go, very little money suddenly, and two babies to care for.
And Noah had clearly changed these past two years. Reopening the Dawson Family Guest Ranch had always been his dream. He’d made it happen. And he’d taken very good care of Annabel the past seven weeks. According to Daisy, he’d done 90 percent of that on his own. Daisy had helped out, and a couple times he’d called their old sitter, Mrs. Pickles, whose real name no one could even remember at this point, when he’d had emergencies he had to deal with on the ranch. But for the most part, Daisy said that Noah Dawson had been a full-time, hands-on father, Annabel in that Snugli as he’d directed the crew, made his phone calls, sent his emails, dealt with the invoices.
She heard the screen door open. “In the kitchen,” she called out.
And then there he was. For a moment, she couldn’t take her eyes off him. Earlier, when she’d first arrived, she’d barely been able to think, let alone focus on the fact that she had been reunited with Noah Dawson after two years. Now, his presence in the cabin was almost overwhelming.
This was the man she’d loved her whole life. The tall, sexy cowboy she’d never stopped thinking about. The person who’d taken care of her daughter for the past seven weeks, despite being a single rancher reopening the family business and clearly having a lot on his plate.
Noah had believed the baby was his, and he’d stepped up. Of course, Sara would take Annabel to Chance’s pediatrician and have her fully examined, but her daughter looked healthy and happy and alert. Noah had done a good job.
She could hardly believe it. Noah Dawson.
Annabel started fussing, her eyes opening and fighting to close. Her little face turned red and scrunched up a bit, and Sara’s heart leaped as she stood to go pick her up.
“May I?” he asked, gesturing toward Annabel.
No. She’s mine.
The instinct was so strong that Sara instantly felt guilty. “She’s only napped for about thirty-five minutes.”
Sara wanted to go to her baby girl. She knows her mother now and wants her mama.
That was what Sara wanted to believe, anyway.
Noah might feel very differently. Like that Annabel sensed her daddy was back and wanted to be held by him. Noah was the only father Annabel had ever known.
Oh God. She hadn’t really thought about that until this moment.
Suddenly, her idea, either good or bad, seemed like the only idea, the best plan for right now.
“Sure,” Sara said.
Noah smiled and knelt down in front of the carrier, unbuckling the harness and taking Annabel out. She watched the way he carefully cradled Annabel against him, gently rocking her, and she knew this was not the same man she’d left two years ago.
That Noah Dawson was in there, she was sure. But a new one had emerged. The one who was about to make her cry with how loving he was being to the baby girl, how tender, the care he was showing in how he held her, cooed to her, rocked her.
“Her eyes are shutting,” Noah said. “There’s a baby swing she loves in the living room. Can you go grab it for me?”
She popped up, relieved to have something to do, somewhere to go other than sitting right there and staring at Noah Dawson in wonder. She went into the living room and got the swing and carried it to the kitchen. She set it beside Chance’s carrier; he was still sleeping.
Noah knelt down again and laid Annabel in the swing, her eyes slightly opening. He pressed Gentle Sway, and the swing began moving lightly, the softest of lullabies playing from the side speakers. The baby’s eyes closed.
He touched a finger to her cheek, then looked at Chance for a moment, smiling so sweetly at her son that her eyes almost welled up. She was insanely hormonal. Willem had never looked at Chance that way, with that kind of tenderness, awe. Her late husband had only looked at his son as the trophy heir.
Yes, her idea was a good one. Not just for her and Noah. But for the twins’ sake.
Noah stood up and walked over to the coffee maker. He switched out the decaf and brewed a cup. “Can I get you anything?”
“I had coffee with Daisy. I’m fine for now.”
“She told me,” he said. “We were talking by the gate until you texted.”
There was so much to say, but she didn’t want to say any of it. She just wanted to sit here and not talk.
“They’re both asleep now,” he said with a nod toward the twins.
She glanced at them, then back at him. “You really seem to know what you’re doing when it comes to babies. I’m very impressed, Noah.”
She caught the way he glanced at her—the “when it comes to babies” hanging in the air as if he didn’t know what he was doing in every other regard. Of course she didn’t think that was true. Before Noah had started going a little too wild, heading down a road like his father had taken, he’d still been a good person, someone she could turn to. Steady. Trustworthy. Someone she could always count on. Until she gradually couldn’t.
“I had to,” he said. “I thought I was her father. Thank God for YouTube,” he added.
She smiled. “I watched a few videos myself those first few days. Took me a while to get a good burp out of Chance. I’d been afraid to pat him too hard. Turns out I was way too gentle.”
“Been there, learned that,” he said with a nod, his gaze going to Chance. “Is Chance a family name?”
She shook her head. “It’s a nickname I gave him the moment he was placed on my chest since I couldn’t imagine calling him by his given name—Bancroft.”
Noah rolled his eyes and she had to smile. “Willem’s idea, I presume.”
“His late mother’s maiden name. I wanted to name him after my father, but he insisted that Preston wasn’t stately enough.” She shook her head. “If I could go back...”
“You had no choice but to marry Perry,” he said. “Even I understand that. Barely, but I do. Your father was diagnosed with stage-two cancer when he had no health insurance. The bills took your savings, and then there was no way to pay for treatment when he needed to start radiation.”
She felt tears well in her eyes. It meant so much that he did understand, that he didn’t judge her. “I didn’t realize how awful a person Willem was.” She told him what was in the letter that Willem had written.
Noah’s expression went from shock to horror to disgust. “Well, his sickening plan failed.” He shook his head. “I’d like to scream every nasty thought I’m having about him from the rooftops, but I’ll control myself because of these two,” he added with a nod toward the twins. “I’d prefer never to hear his name again.”
Exactly her thoughts since the lawyer’s office. “Same here,” she said.
She’d once really believed that Willem had loved her. He’d chased her all through high school, even though he was the town golden boy and she was the motherless daughter of a guest-ranch foreman who lived in the staff cabin she was in right now. Willem had truly seemed crazy about her—he listened when she spoke, told her interesting stories about his family, but she noticed the demeaning way he spoke to people, and she didn’t like it. Besides, she’d loved Noah Dawson back then, and no one could ever compare.
Noah had been a wild child with a streak of good, and they’d been best friends since they were little. He’d always told her she was crazy for wanting him as a boyfriend and went for girls in his own circle instead, girls who skipped school and flashed boys in the hallway. Part of her always thought she’d dodged a bullet, but when they’d finally gotten together—for about six months—two years ago, when he had a small ranch of his own and was trying hard, she thought she’d help bring out the Noah Dawson who’d always been there. That was a mistake she’d made over and over, thinking people could change. They didn’t, really. Maybe they could go a few degrees this way or that, but the core? That was settled. She understood that now.
So when Noah was sabotaging his fresh start on the ranch he’d wanted so bad, sabotaging their fledgling relationship, and then Willem Perry had started asking her out again, listening as she cried about Noah, about her sick father who would die without treatment, she’d let Willem take her away from her troubles. He’d promised her the moon, that he’d take care of her dad, and all he wanted in return was the woman of his dreams: her. She’d fallen for it all.
But what she’d really been was a notch. A conquest Willem had never been able to make until she’d been totally desperate. And the truth behind that made him resentful. And mean.
Just when things were so bad that she planned to leave her husband, determined to find a way to continue her dad’s medical care, she found out she was pregnant—with twins. The news, for a while, turned things around; for a few weeks, Willem was kinder, until that changed too. He’d accused her of cheating with Noah, had gotten paranoid the twins weren’t his. A prenatal DNA test confirmed they were Willem’s, but his mind had gone twisted. He’d threatened her every time she told him she was leaving, and once, when she had left him, he sent a lawyer after her who scared the hell out of her that she’d lose custody of the babies entirely. She’d gone back home numb, not sure what she was going to do, how she’d get away from him and not lose her children. Then her father died, and she’d been too grief-stricken to even think about Willem.
All that was in the past, including her husband. The very recent past with lessons she’d not soon forget.
Noah came over to the table with a steaming mug of coffee. He sat down across from her, and again, she was overwhelmed by how close he was.
“Before I came here,” she said, “I’d just heard from Willem’s lawyer that you’d restored the guest ranch and are reopening this weekend. I immediately noticed the new signs on the road leading to the turn and the huge sign on the shiny gates. The la
ndscaping, the foreman’s cabin, the barn—you’ve done an amazing job. A lot of the place looks even better than when I lived here.”
He smiled. “Thanks. Wait till you see the farmhouse, the cabins, barns, the pastures and the trails. We still have work to do, but the heavy lifting is done.”
A wistfulness crept into her expression, her gaze moving around the kitchen. “It feels so good to be back here.”
“That’s how I felt when I first came home. My brothers, not so much. But I guess for some of us, roots have a grip, even when they’re a tangled mess.”
She nodded, her gaze shifting to the napping babies.
“I guess after we talk,” he said, “you’re getting back in that Range Rover and I’ll never see any of you again.”
There’s your in, she thought. Good idea, bad idea, whichever—right now it was all she had. “Actually, quite the opposite, if you’re open to my idea.”
“What idea is that?” he asked, his eyes intense on her.
“I need a job and a place to stay,” she said. “I’ll work for you for room and board and a reasonable salary so I can get on my feet. There’s a lot I can do on the ranch.”
He looked at her like she’d grown an extra head. “You married one of the richest men in Wyoming. Selling that Range Rover alone could set you up for a while.”
“He left me with nothing,” she explained. “Chance inherits the bulk of the estate when he’s twenty-one. I have fourteen days to vacate my house, and anything that isn’t clothing or personal jewelry stays. I don’t even want to go back there, knowing now what that monster did.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “My dad’s gone—and I’m alone. Except for my children. Children,” she repeated, her voice breaking. “Look at what I have now. Both babies. I just need some time and a way to get back on my own two feet.”
The emotion that settled on his face looked a lot like relief. “Of course I’ll hire you,” he said. “Anything you need, Sara. Always.”
For the Twins' Sake Page 4