Winning the Nanny's Heart

by Shirley Jump

  Now, Katie lowered herself into a chair and let out a long breath. Her back ached, no matter how often Sam rubbed the sore spot at the base of her spine. She watched Della Barlow hand out cookies to Libby, Henry and Maddy, her face filled with joy at the sight of her grandchildren. She’d officially declared herself Libby and Henry’s grandmother, even if the familial link was several times removed. Katie didn’t mind. It was nice to be wrapped in the warm embrace of the Barlow family, sort of like cocooning under blankets on a cold winter’s night.

  “Here you go,” Sam said as he handed her a plate and took a seat in the Adirondack chair beside her. “Though I have no idea how you’re eating that.”

  She laughed. “Don’t blame me for the menu. Blame the baby.” The final stages of her pregnancy had left her with a lot of weird cravings, including hot dogs topped with potato chips and mustard. Not to mention the pickle and apple slices on the side.

  Sam’s hand slid across her belly with a soft, slow, proud swirl. The sun glinted off the gold in his ring. “I can’t wait till we finally get to meet him.”

  “Her,” Katie gently corrected as the baby let out a gentle kick. “I think it’s a girl.”

  “And I’m betting on boy.” He grinned. “Either way, we’ll know in a week.”

  For months after she saw the positive result on the pregnancy test, Katie had held her breath, too afraid to hope. Then as the first trimester stretched into the second, and then the third, she’d begun to plan, to paint the nursery with Sam, to fill a crib with stuffed animals (and even a bear that Libby and Henry had picked out for their new sibling). Now, with only a few days to go, Katie was filled with nervous anticipation. Sam was ecstatic, as were the kids. It was a bright new beginning for all of them, a perfect start that had begun the day she’d said “I do” to Sam on this very lawn last year.

  Her hand covered his and their fingers interlaced. “It’s a first baby. It might be late.”

  Sam leaned in and kissed her. He pressed his forehead to hers and met her gaze. “It’ll be worth the wait.”

  “Quit kissing my sister.” Colton grinned at the two of them. His wife, Rachel, was holding his hand, looking up at Colton like the sun rose in his face. They still had that just-married look, fourteen months after their own wedding. There were days when Katie could hardly believe she’d first come to Stone Gap a year and a half ago. So much had changed in that time.

  “You do know where that kissing business leads, don’t you?” Colton added.

  Katie laughed and gave her belly a pat. “I do indeed. And if I’m not mistaken, so do you.”

  Rachel blushed and a hand strayed to her abdomen, the kind of unconscious gesture of a woman with a new life inside her. “How did you know? We just found out ourselves a few days ago.”

  “This family is having a baby boom,” Sam said. “It only seemed right that you guys would be next.”

  Meri Barlow came over to them, with Jack right beside her. Jack had a sleepy six-month-old on his shoulder, a little blonde girl who looked as beautiful as her mother. “As much as I’d love to let Sam take credit for some kind of familial ESP, I might have let the news slip,” Meri said, then turned to her sister-in-law. “You kinda told me yourself, Rachel, when you asked if I still had Liz’s newborn clothes.”

  Rachel’s face reddened even more. “I said I was asking for a friend.”

  The Barlows and the Millwrights laughed. “Yeah, we all know that’s code for asking for yourself,” Jack said. “Either way, I’m glad to see you and Colton joining the party.”

  Luke and Peyton came strolling over, hand in hand. Luke clapped a hand on his brother’s back. “What are the girls roping you into now, Colton?”

  “The one thing you and Mac haven’t been roped into yet,” Colton said. “Kids.”

  “I already have one of those, you know. If I want more, I can borrow from a wide selection of Barlow youngsters.” Luke drew Peyton into his arms and pressed a kiss to her temple. His arm looped around her waist and his voice lowered when he spoke again. “Though I don’t think I’d mind adding one or two to our mix.”

  Peyton’s eyes widened and a smile took over her face. “Is that you saying you want to have a baby?”

  “It is.” Luke’s love for his wife showed in his eyes, his voice. They were rarely apart, even when Luke was working at the family garage. Most days, Peyton and Maddy stopped by there to eat lunch or share an early dinner with Luke. He tore his gaze away from her, then shouted over his head at Mac, who was helping Savannah slice a watermelon. “What do you say, Mac? Want to see who can have a son first?”

  Mac arched a brow. “Are you seriously challenging me to an offspring challenge?”

  “Somebody’s got to make you finish settling down.” Luke grinned. Mac had been the last of them to get married. He and Savannah had had a simple affair in Della and Bobby’s backyard just three months ago.

  “If you all would quit keeping my wife so busy with renovation projects, maybe we could find time to have kids.”

  Savannah swatted at him. “Shush. I love doing this work.”

  “And you do it well, sweetheart,” Mac said softly, then kissed her. As much as the other men teased Mac, Katie could see every one of the Barlow family members were glad to see so much happiness among the brothers.

  Della came up the little hill with the nearly empty tray of cookies still in her hand. “Did I just hear something about more grandchildren?” When she saw Rachel and Colton’s twin smiles and shy nods of yes, Della let out a whoop, handed off the cookies to Luke, then grabbed the two of them in an excited hug.

  Life was good, Katie thought, as she watched her children running along the edge of the lake with Bandit, and treasured the warmth of her husband’s hand in hers. How things had changed in the space of time since she first arrived in Stone Gap, a town she couldn’t imagine ever leaving. Especially not since she’d put down roots, and watched them grow into a family tree.

  Even though she’d had an offer from the Stone Gap accounting firm, Katie had opened a little accounting practice out of the house, using what would have been the parlor as a home office. She worked part-time, which left her enough time to be with the kids when they got home from school, and spend lots of time with Sam, going on family scavenger hunts along the lakeshore. The new mall project that Sam had worked on filling had gone so well that the developers had asked him to help them fill another mall being built thirty miles outside of Stone Gap. He worked hard, but he’d stuck to his promise to spend more time with his family and not let work bleed over into that precious personal time. He’d already planned for a two-week vacation for after the baby came. It’d be nice to have him around more often. Very nice.

  “I hear Savannah designed one hell of a garage for you, Sam,” Jack said. “Want to take us guys on a tour so we can drool over it?”

  “Yeah, and we’ll take the cookies for sustenance since we might be in there awhile, making up our own wish lists for Christmas.” Luke swiped the rest of them into his palm, then handed the tray back to his mother.

  Sam chuckled, then got to his feet. He bent down toward Katie again. “Are you going to be okay if I leave you for a bit?”

  She laughed and gave him a nod. “Yes, worrywart, I will be. We’ve got a week, remember? And besides, I’m not going anywhere.”

  Love warmed Sam’s brown eyes. “I’m never going to get tired of hearing you say that,” he whispered, then gave her a kiss before heading off with the Ba
rlow brothers. The men joked and laughed as they walked away, teasing Sam about the “man cave” Savannah had built in one of the garage bays.

  Della took a seat beside Katie and gave her a quick hug. “I’m so glad you came to town and joined our crazy clan,” she said.

  “Even if I’m barely related?”

  Della took Katie’s hand in hers and gave it a squeeze. “You’ve been family since the day you arrived at the Stone Gap Inn, Katie.”

  The words warmed Katie, and filled her heart. The family she had found—Sam, Libby, Henry, the Barlows—had welcomed her and Colton with open arms. She could feel her life becoming full and complete, becoming the world she had never dared to dream existed when she was little and staring at those cracks in the ceiling.

  A low, heavy pain rippled across her abdomen, and Katie let out a little gasp. She’d had several of those throughout the day, and kept thinking they were just more Braxton Hicks contractions. But this one was different, stronger somehow, and Katie’s instincts told her this first baby wasn’t going to be late, after all.

  Katie looked over at Della. “I think you need to go get Sam.”

  Della’s gaze dropped to Katie’s belly, then back up to her face. “It’s time?”

  Katie nodded, and felt tears of joy spring to her eyes. She may have taken almost three decades to get here, to this town, to this man, to the family she’d dreamed of, but the wait, as Sam had said, had been worth it. “It’s time.”

  * * * * *

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  Wild Horse Springs

  by Jodi Thomas

  CODY WINSLOW THUNDERED through the night on a half-wild horse that loved to run. The moon followed them, dancing along the edge of the canyon as they darted over winter buffalo grass that was stiff with frost.

  The former Texas Ranger watched the dark outline of the earth where the land cracked open wide enough for a river to run at its base.

  The canyon’s edge seemed to snake closer, as if it were moving, crawling over the flat plains, daring Cody to challenge death. One missed step might take him and the horse over the rim and into the black hole. They’d tumble maybe a hundred feet down, barreling over jagged rocks and frozen juniper branches as sharp as spears. No horse or man would survive.

  Only, tonight Cody wasn’t worried. He needed to ride, to run, to feel adrenaline pumping in his veins, to know he was alive. He rode hoping to outrun his dark mood. The demons that were always in his mind were chasing him tonight. Daring him. Betting him to take one more risk...the one that would finally kill him.

  “Run,” he shouted to the midnight mare. Nothing would catch him here. Not on his land. Not over land his ancestors had hunted on for thousands of years. Fought over. Died for and bled into. Apache blood, settler blood, Comanchero blood mixed in him as it did in this part of Texas. His family tree was a tumbleweed of every kind of tribe that ever crossed the plains.

  If the horse fell and they went to their deaths, no one would find them for weeks on this far corner of his ranch. Even the canyon that snaked off the great Palo Duro had no name here. It wasn’t beautiful like Ransom Canyon with layers of earth revealed in a rainbow of colors. Here the rocks were jagged, shooting out of the deep earthen walls from twenty feet in some places, almost like a thin shelf.

  The petrified-wood formations along the floor of the canyon reminded Cody of snipers waiting, unseen but deadly. Cody felt numb, already dead inside, as he raced across a place with no name on a horse he called Midnight.

  The horse’s hooves tapped suddenly over a low place where water ran off the flat land and into the canyon. Frozen now. Silent. Deadly black ice. For a moment the tapping matched Cody’s heartbeat, then both horse and rider seemed to realize the danger at once.

  Cody leaned back, pulling the reins, hoping to stop the animal in time, but the horse reared in panic. Dancing on his hind legs for a moment before twisting violently and bucking Cody off.

  As Cody flew through the night air, he almost smiled. The battle he’d been fighting since he was shot and left for dead on the border three years ago was about to end here on his own land. The voices of all the ancestors who came before him whispered in the wind, as if calling him.

  When he hit the frozen ground so hard it knocked the air from his lungs, he knew death wouldn’t come easy tonight. Though he’d welcome the silence, Cody knew he’d fight to the end. He came from generations of fighters. He was the last of his line and here in the dark he’d make his stand. Too far away to call for help. And too stubborn to ask anyway.

  As he fought to breathe, his body slid over a tiny river of frozen rain and into the black canyon.

  He twisted, struggling to stop, but all he managed to do was tumble down. Branches whipped against him and rocks punched his ribs with the force of a prizefighter’s blow. And still he rolled. Over and over. Ice on his skin, warm blood dripping into his eyes. He tried bracing for the hits that came when he landed for a moment before his body rolled again. He grabbed for a rock or a branch to hold on to, but his leather gloves couldn’t get a grip on the ice.

  He wasn’t sure if he managed to relax or pass out, but when he landed on a flat rock near the bottom of the canyon, total blackness surrounded him and the few stars above offered no light. For a while he lay still, aware that he was breathing. A good sign. He hurt all over. More proof he was alive.

  He’d been near death before. He knew that sometimes the body turned off the pain. Slowly, he mentally took inventory. There w
ere parts that hurt like hell. Others he couldn’t feel at all.

  Cody swore as loud as he could and smiled. At least he had his voice. Not that anyone would hear him in the canyon. Maybe his brain was mush; he obviously had a head wound. The blood kept dripping into his eyes. His left leg throbbed with each heartbeat and he couldn’t draw a deep breath. He swore again.

  He tried to move and pain skyrocketed, forcing him to concentrate to stop shaking. Fire shot up his leg and flowed straight to his heart. Cody took shallow breaths and tried to reason. He had to control his breathing. He had to stay awake or he’d freeze. He had to keep fighting. Survival was bone and blood to his nature.

  The memory of his night in the mud near the Rio Grande came back as if it had only been a day ago, not three years. He’d been bleeding then, hurt, alone. Four Rangers had stood on the bank at dusk. He’d seen the other three crumble when bullets fell like rain.

  Only it had been hot that night, so silent after all the gunfire. Cody had known that every Ranger in the area would be looking for him at first light; he had to make it to dawn first. Stay alive. They’d find him.

  But not this time.

  No one would look for him tonight or tomorrow. No one would even notice he was gone. He’d made sure of that. He’d left all his friends back in Austin after the shooting. He’d broken up with his girlfriend, who’d said she couldn’t deal with hospitals. When he came back to his family’s land, he didn’t bother to call any of his old friends. He’d grown accustomed to the solitude. He’d needed it to heal not just the wounds outside, but the ones deep inside.