The Lawman's Runaway Bride

by Patricia Johns

“I wouldn’t mind seeing the famous dollhouse,” he said, and a smile tickled one corner of his lips. He looked like the old Chance standing there. He was relaxed and there was that glitter in his eyes that most people didn’t notice, but she did. She always used to know when Chance was joking, and most people couldn’t tell.

  Sadie pulled out her key and unlocked the door. “I can give you the tour.”

  Chance followed her into the warm house. It smelled of freshly baked cookies, and Nana looked up from an armchair where she was crocheting.

  “I was going to show Chance the dollhouse,” Sadie said.

  “Of course.” Nana put aside her doily and rose to her feet. “Hello, Chance. Nice to see you again. I just made a batch of cookies. I’ll go rummage some up.”

  They bent to take off their boots, and Sadie took a little longer than Chance, easing the boot off her tender leg, then hung their coats on the hooks. Sadie led the way, limping slightly, down the hallway to the study. She turned on the light and stepped inside. The room was colder than the rest of the house, as usual, and she shivered. Chance filled the doorway, and when she glanced back at him, she caught his gaze fixed on her, not on the dollhouse. His attention flicked to the dollhouse when she’d noticed his scrutiny, but her cheeks still warmed. Was he remembering it, too—the last time he’d been here?

  “It’s amazing.” Chance bent to look into the miniature rooms. “Wow—you two did this together?”

  “Most of it.” Sadie stepped closer and reached into the tiny kitchen to open a cupboard door. Inside was a miniature pitcher.

  “This is really something.” She could hear the smile in his voice.

  “It helped—after Mom left,” she admitted. “Gave me something else to focus on. My grandmother and I built our relationship as we put together this dollhouse. Nana had only started on it when I arrived. I guess I was pretty goal-oriented, even then.”

  “You always were...” he murmured.

  “Did I tell you about my mother?” she asked.

  “Not a lot.”

  “She wasn’t satisfied. Ever. I remember her dating a guy who was really nice. I called him Uncle, and he visited a lot. He was sweet to both of us. She dumped him. She was always the one to do the dumping.”

  “Why did she dump him?”

  “He wasn’t right.” Sadie shrugged. “I don’t know. I was a kid. I didn’t really understand the relationship stuff. All I know was that she kept moving from guy to guy, and we kept moving for these men until we landed in Nana’s house and Mom disappeared.”

  “How come she did the dumping, do you think?” Chance asked.

  Sadie sensed the probing in that question. Just like Sadie had walked out on Noah...

  “Mom was the kind of person who always thought things would be better somewhere else,” Sadie said with a shrug. “I remember her telling me that she got itchy feet. She said I was better company than most boyfriends. Apparently not that good of company, though.” A boyfriend had eventually won out over her.

  She tried to sound like she was joking, but she wasn’t sure she pulled it off. Chance didn’t smile, and his gaze stayed locked on her face.

  “Have you heard from your mom?” he asked.

  “I found her,” Sadie said. “In Denver.”

  “That’s not far from here.” He frowned, crossed his arms over his broad chest. “She was there the whole time?”

  “Not far at all,” she agreed. “That’s the thing. I always hoped she’d come back. And that when she did, she’d have some excellent excuse for having been away for so long.” She shook her head. “She didn’t have much of an excuse.”

  “What’s she doing now?”

  “Working a part-time job at a Laundromat and telling anyone that will listen that she can stop the drug use anytime she wants—” She winced. This wasn’t the kind of thing that people wanted to hear. It was ugly, painful. She’d told herself she’d keep her trap shut about this stuff. She was there to start her own business, and that wasn’t achieved by airing personal laundry. She was trying to get some boundaries back again. But Chance wasn’t a client, and he probably knew the most about her anyway, since any privacy she might have expected from Noah would have been expired once she walked out on him.

  “I’m sorry,” Chance said.

  “Me, too.” She shrugged. “But I can’t fix her, and I can’t make her into a decent mother. It is what it is.”

  That’s what she’d told herself, at least. She’d had Nana, and that was a far sight better than being raised by a drug addict. Her mother had always been chasing a better guy, a better situation, another high. Maybe she’d been addicted to more than the drugs.

  “Was she glad to see you?” Chance asked.

  “She...” Sadie sifted through the jagged, painful memories of those awkward visits with her mother. “She asked me for money a lot. At first, I’d give it to her because I felt so sorry for her, but I knew what she was doing with it. And I couldn’t keep it up. When I started saying no, she’d get angry. She’d do anything for her next fix.”

  Chance’s expression had softened and he nodded slowly. “Are you still in contact?”

  Tears misted her eyes. What was it about her mother that made her yearn for the woman even when she knew her mother was bad for her? She’d been raised by Nana, and she’d been loved and supported. She hadn’t suffered, but no matter how good to her Nana had been, there was a space in her heart that only her mother could occupy.

  “I’m actually scared to call,” she admitted. “I know she’ll ask for money, and I’ll say that I can’t, and she’ll—” Sadie sucked in a breath and blinked back the tears. Her mother had a way of saying the most cutting things when Sadie turned her down.

  “But Mom didn’t used to be like this,” Sadie went on. “She wasn’t like this. She liked to party a lot, but she was fun, and I remember that she’d do my hair for me in front of the big mirror in her bedroom. She wasn’t like this.”

  “So, that’s where you went when you left town,” Chance said. “To find her.”

  “I needed to get some answers.” She wasn’t sure that Chance could understand all of this—not deep down. He came from the picture-perfect Morgans here in Comfort Creek. They all attended church and were supportive and kind. Chance and Noah came from a different kind of family than she did.

  “No, I get that,” he said with a faint shrug. “I’d have done the same if it were my mom.”

  “Yeah, but your mom is great.” She shot him a wry smile.

  “And your mom is still your mother,” he replied, and she felt her smile slip. Why did he have to be so insightful?

  “Yes.” She swallowed back the emotion that tightened her throat.

  “There are addiction centers and rehab places that could help your mother,” Chance said. “I could give you some contact information.”

  “I know.” She wasn’t telling Chance all of this so he could fix it for her. In fact, she wasn’t sure why she was telling him this at all. “I said that when she was ready to get some help to give me a call and I’d help her to check in to a rehab center not too far from where she lives. I think it’s all I can do.”

  Chance nodded. “It is all you can do, Sadie. Besides prayer.”

  Prayer had gotten Sadie through those emotional meetings with her mother over the last couple of years. God had been by her side, and she truly believed that He had guided her back to Comfort Creek. Home—at least the only home she’d ever been able to lay claim to. Except even in the midst of Nana’s love and encouragement, there had been a part of Sadie that couldn’t completely settle there. Maybe it was the part of her that would always long for the affection her mother couldn’t provide.

  Chance’s gaze had softened, and the little room had warmed with the two of them inside it. She’d told herself that she’d come back with her head held high and s
he wouldn’t let it drag her down. She had her answers, and she needed to move on with her life. She wouldn’t talk about it—that had been her resolution: silence. It was easier when she didn’t have Chance Morgan asking her questions in that quiet bass of his.

  Sadie forced a smile. “Sorry. I didn’t really mean to talk about that.”

  “It’s okay. I’d rather hear the truth.”

  Would he really? Because Chance didn’t seem too open to the truth about her feelings for his brother. He seemed to prefer his ideals, and really, who didn’t? The sound of Nana’s slippered footsteps came down the hallway, and both Sadie and Chance looked toward the door as Nana poked her head into the room.

  “I have sugar cookies in the kitchen,” Nana announced.

  “I should get going,” Chance said, straightening. “Thanks all the same, Abigail. I’ll have to take a rain check.”

  “Up to you, but I can’t promise when I’ll make them again,” Nana said, retreating once more, and Chance and Sadie exchanged a look.

  “She makes it sound like she never bakes,” Chance said with a wry smile.

  Sadie chuckled. “I know. Her threats don’t hold much water.”

  It felt good to laugh with someone who knew Nana...who knew this town. These were the moments she’d missed the most when she’d been in the city—the inside jokes and the shared laughter with Chance. She’d missed Noah’s family more than she missed Noah, and when he died, she’d been guilty about that. She still was.

  It was nice to be home, though.

  “I’ll walk you out,” Sadie said.

  * * *

  Chance needed to cut this visit short. He hadn’t meant to get into the personal stuff about Sadie’s mom, but he could feel the sadness emanating from her and he’d wanted to comfort her somehow. He couldn’t hold her, but he could listen. He could only imagine what a mother’s betrayal must feel like, and looking at Sadie as she pretended that it didn’t stab as deeply as it did had given him the same jolt he’d felt when he saw her fall on the street. There was a part of him that would always be looking out for Sadie—and it wasn’t just the cop in him, either.

  Abigail was back in her chair in the living room when they came out, sitting with her Bible on her lap this time, and seemed to have been in prayer.

  “Good night, Chance,” Abigail said. “Drive safe, now.”

  “Will do,” he said. What was it about Abigail Jenkins that just made the world seem safer? She was the kind of lady whose very presence reassured the younger generation that there was good in the world still.

  “Sadie,” he began, keeping his voice low. He glanced toward the old woman in her rocking chair. This might not be the best time to talk.

  “Yes?”

  He smiled ruefully and glanced toward her grandmother again. “It’s okay.”

  “Hold on.” Sadie grabbed a blanket from the sofa and wrapped it around her shoulders, then plunged her feet into her winter boots. When he opened the door, she followed him out onto the porch and shut the front door behind her. She was already limping less, so whatever she’d done to herself when she fell mustn’t have been too permanent.

  Chance glanced toward the living room window. He couldn’t see the old woman from where they stood.

  All was still outside on the porch, and big, soft snowflakes drifted down, making the night even closer to absolute silence. Every sound was muffled by the falling snow. The porch light shone golden around them, and Chance could see the white of Sadie’s neck exposed to the winter cold, and he reached forward and rolled up a fold of blanket to cover her a little better.

  “What were you going to say?” she asked softly.

  For the life of him, he couldn’t remember. He just hadn’t wanted the evening to end quite yet, and he’d wanted to offer something...friendship, maybe? None of it had been formulated into words yet.

  “You aren’t alone here, you know,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “I mean—” Why did this have to be so hard? He didn’t know how to scrape it all together. “You’ve got me, too.”

  Sadie frowned, her expression uncertain.

  “I missed you.” He plunged on. “Maybe more than I had a right to.”

  Her breath hung in the air and she looked up at him with sadness in that dark gaze. “I missed you, too.”

  “You should have talked to me,” he said. “Before you left, I mean. You should have said something—yelled at me. Something...”

  “It wasn’t you, Chance.”

  Did he believe that? He wasn’t sure. He’d been the one to come within a hair of kissing her the night before she dashed out on her wedding. Coincidences weren’t that big.

  “Are you cold?” he asked instead.

  “I’m okay.” She tugged the blanket closer, then nodded toward the yard. “I like this time of day—especially when it’s snowing.”

  Chance remembered that—the way Sadie used to look out at the snow as it came down. She was the only person in this town who got excited at an early snowfall. He’d never been a fan of snow—it complicated everything. His driveway needed shoveling. There were more accidents, the cruisers needed their winter maintenance, and all the drivers suddenly forgot how to drive when the first snowflakes spun through the air. But Sadie—she didn’t care about the rest. Never had.

  “I really missed you...” The words were out before he could think better of them, and when she looked up at him in surprise, he felt heat rise in his face. He hadn’t meant to say that. “You should have called. Emailed. You just vanished, and we were left with a gaping hole in our lives.” We. Yes, it had been all of them, but he was talking about himself. “I was left with a hole in my life...”

  It was the truth, and he’d already admitted to it. He’d more than missed her and he’d felt guilty about that. He should have been able to sweep her out of his mind and move forward out of solidarity with his twin, but he’d been in love with her. And while he knew that feelings didn’t excuse poor behavior, in his defense, he’d muscled those feelings back for five years. One slip on a warm summer night before she was to marry his brother...couldn’t that be forgiven?

  “Oh, Chance... You and I, we—” She shrugged helplessly. “You were my best friend. Did you know that?”

  “Was I? What about Harper?”

  “Her, too, but...” She swallowed. “You understood me better.”

  “Not well enough,” he said gruffly. “I didn’t see it coming.”

  The snowfall thickened and they both looked out into the veil of snowflakes that seemed to pull a curtain around them, absorbing the noise from the streets distant, and blanketing them in.

  “I didn’t mean to cause such a mess,” she said softly. “I really didn’t.”

  “And I didn’t mean to spook you. We’re even.” He smiled wanly.

  “And I’m glad you missed me.” A smile came to her face. “There’s no shame in missing a friend, is there?”

  Did that mean that she’d missed him, too? He wasn’t sure he even wanted to think about that. But she’d been a part of his life—a part of his extended family in a way—ever since her engagement to his brother. And she’d taken a piece of him with her when she vanished. Maybe he shouldn’t feel angry about that, but he had. Anger was easier to deal with than the complicated emotional stew it covered. She’d done wrong by Noah, but she’d also done wrong by him.

  “Sadie, I know I messed up,” he said quietly. “But after knowing each other for so long, after a wedding I worked my tail off to help put together... I deserved better than that.”

  She turned back, and as she did, she was closer than he expected, her blanket covered arms brushing against the open front of his jacket. She looked up at him, equally startled, but neither of them moved.

  “I wasn’t punishing you,” she whispered.

  “Sure
felt like it. If we were friends, then why did you freeze me out like that? Why the silence?”

  Her cheeks grew pinker, and then she sighed. “You reminded me of Noah.”

  That stabbed. Of course, Noah was their common denominator, but he wished that for once her thoughts about him could have nothing to do with his brother. Sadie shivered and he put his hands on her arms to warm them.

  “I’m not my brother,” he said gruffly.

  A swirl of snowflakes blew onto the porch and settled onto her chocolate-brown curls. She was beautiful—more than beautiful, she was back. A large, fluffy flake settled onto a curl by her cheekbone, and he reached up to brush it away, but as he did, his eyes met her deep hazel gaze. Those pink lips parted as if she were about to say something.

  “I know—” she began, but then her gaze met his and the words evaporated.

  He didn’t want her to associate him with Noah—not for everything. He and Noah might have had a brotherly connection closer than most because they were twins, but Chance was very much his own man, and when he looked at Sadie, it was the man in him that responded. Not the brother. Not the friend. Definitely not the buddy.

  He didn’t know how to say that—not without sounding like an idiot. And so he did the next best thing, and he closed those last few inches between them and caught her lips with his.

  She froze for a second, and he put his hands on her cheeks, tugging her closer as his lips moved over hers, and she settled against his chest. It was then that he noticed she was kissing him back and he smiled ever so slightly. He wrapped his arms around her, giving her all the warmth he had, and he felt a flood of such immense relief to finally have her in his arms.

  He’d regret this—that was a guarantee—but he’d also never forget it.

  He broke off the kiss and let out a jagged sigh. “Sorry,” he whispered.

  Sadie licked her lips and took an unsteady step back. He hated that chill of winter air that flooded between them. It was like they were cocooned away on this snow-cushioned porch. Just two people in a snow globe. He cleared his throat.

  “Just—” He swallowed. “I’m not my brother.”