Come Closer

by Brenda Rothert

  Brody Tillman works closely with Daniel now so Daniel can have time off. He takes two days a week just for our family. We hike in the woods with Gracie in a carrier on Daniel’s back, and we camp with her nestled in between us. Those are my favorite times.

  “Put that tomato in your basket,” I tell my daughter. She toddles off to get the small wicker basket she carries around the gardens.

  Everyone here loves her. For people with such small biological families, Daniel and I are able to surround our daughter with love. We’re careful not to expose her to anything she’s too young for, but it’s also important to us that she knows people with mental illnesses are people just like everyone else. The patients who work for me sometimes spend time laughing and coloring with her while I’m crunching numbers nearby, and though it’s untraditional, for us, it works.

  Leonard’s Garden Sauce was just the start of something big. When Gracie was old enough for solid foods, I pureed vegetables from the garden, making my own organic baby food. Just like with the sauce, the baby food was soon in demand.

  Last year, I started Allie Bee, my organic baby food company. Allison’s middle name was Beatrice, and Dad called her Allie Bee when we were little. It was the perfect name for my business.

  Allie Bee is booming, and we quickly outgrew the cabin Joanne was letting us use. I had a new log building constructed near the gardens for the manufacturing operations. Fortunately, Hawthorne has unlimited outdoor space. Joanne had our new family cabin built near the Allie Bee shop. She’s still wooing Daniel with perks, always worried he’ll leave Hawthorne. But this is our home. We travel to Spain a few times a year to see his parents, but it always feels good to get back to the big sky country of Montana.

  “Daddy!” Gracie squeals. She runs toward him, tomatoes bouncing out of her basket on the way.

  Daniel bends down and scoops her up, his adoration for our daughter written on his face. “How’s my girl?”

  “I got ’mato,” Gracie says, looking in the basket and frowning at its emptiness.

  Daniel points at the tomatoes she dropped, and she scrambles out of his arms to retrieve them.

  “Are you on lunch?” I ask him, standing up and brushing my hands off on my shorts.

  “I am.” He comes over and kisses me. “Mario made us lunch to eat in the gazebo.”

  “That sounds nice. I’ll go wash my hands.”

  When I walk into the gazebo a few minutes later, Daniel’s white coat is folded over an empty chair and Gracie is helping him take food out of a picnic basket.

  “How’s your day?” Daniel asks me.

  “It’s good. I just got a big order from a grocery store chain.”

  He grins. “A grocery store chain? That’s great, babe.”

  “It is. I’m happy about it, but Morgan’s gonna blow a gasket when I tell her. She’s already stressed.”

  Morgan is my operations manager. She oversees the production side of Allie Bee, and she’s very good at it. She’s a lot like me—driven to do well because it feels good, not because she needs the money. Milo was only here for six months before getting discharged, and I know she still misses him. They write letters, but it’s not the same as seeing him every day.

  Madeline avoided jail time by testifying against Dax. She paid a price, though, when I won a large legal settlement from her over Brighton Cole. I offered to sell her the company, but she couldn’t afford it due to the settlement. We sold it to a big label, and I did well on that, too. Money will never be a worry for us, and for that, I’m grateful. But we don’t want Gracie to grow up surrounded by material things. Everything we really need, we had in the small, cozy cabin we lived in before Joanne had our new one built.

  We would have needed more space eventually, so I’m grateful for our new home. Now Caleb has his own room when he comes to stay with us, and we have room for more kids.

  “I think Morgan thrives on stress,” Daniel says, handing Gracie a small section of a cheese sandwich.

  I laugh, agreeing with him. Morgan and the other patients who work for me would do it for free, but I’d never allow that. They like having a job to go to and a purpose. Ty, the new psychiatrist Daniel recruited and hired, spends time in the shop every day, just talking and making sure everyone’s doing well.

  The only price Dr. Heaton paid for her wrongs was the loss of her medical license. But since that means she can’t see patients anymore, it’s enough for me. What happened with her seems so long ago now.

  After we’re finished eating, one of the nurses comes to the gazebo and asks if she can take Gracie to walk in the gardens. Gracie goes happily, her basket in hand.

  I’m packing up the last of our lunch when Daniel gets up from his side of the table and walks over to me.

  “Leave that, babe. I’ll get it.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  He smiles and wraps an arm around my waist, pulling me close. “You take such good care of us.”

  I nestle against his chest, taking in his faint, spicy cedar scent. “You take good care of me back.”

  “I talked to my mom earlier. I was thinking next month we could take the kids to Spain for a week and let my parents hang with them while we spend some time in Formentera.”

  “Ohh.” I look up at him with a wide smile.

  “Yeah.” He nods and arches his brows. “What better place to get busy making the next baby than our honeymoon spot, right?”

  I sigh happily. “Work is crazy busy, but I can’t say no to that. I’ll figure it out. Let’s go.”

  He kisses me, the brush of his stubble against my skin still making my stomach flutter. “My parents will be thrilled.”

  “I’m all for Formentera and baby-making, but you should know . . .”

  Daniel furrows his brow and studies my expression. “What, babe? Everything okay?”

  A smile spreads across my face. “I think I may already be pregnant.”

  His eyes shine with happiness. “Yeah?”

  “I mean, it’s early, but . . . I’m late. I ordered some tests.”

  “I’ve got some in my supply room.” He takes my hand and leads me toward the main lodge. “Let’s go do one.”

  I laugh at his enthusiasm. “But it’s still early.”

  “As long as you’re late, we’re good.”

  I call out to the nurse walking with Gracie and ask her to keep an eye on her for a few minutes. She says she’s happy to, and I stop Daniel so we can get the lunch basket and his white coat from the gazebo.

  “If I am pregnant, do you still want to go to Formentera?” I ask him.

  “Yeah, definitely. We’ll have something to celebrate, then. Either way, you won’t need to pack many clothes.”

  He gives me a sexy grin as he puts his white coat back on over his polo, takes the basket with one hand and my hand with his other, and heads toward the lodge, his strides so big and fast I have to run to keep up.

  My heart is hammering, and it’s not from our pace. It’s because not only am I alive, I’m in love with my life. It’s everything Allison would have wanted for me, and so much more.

  BRENDA ROTHERT LIVES IN CENTRAL Illinois with her husband and three sons. She was a daily print journalist for nine years, during which time she enjoyed writing a wide range of stories.

  These days Brenda writes New Adult Romance in the Contemporary and Dystopian genres. She loves to hear from readers.

  Visit Brenda Rothert at www.brendarothert.com.

  Thanks for reading Come Closer! If you enjoyed Allison and Daniel’s story, I’d greatly appreciate a review on the site you purchased it from.

  If you’re on Facebook, I’d love to have you in my group Rothert’s Readers, where I share the latest on my work and do special giveaways.

  Would you like to know when my next book is available? You can sign up for my new release e-mail list at Newsletter or like my Facebook page at Facebook.

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  Standalone books

  Unspoken
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  Barely Breathing

  Blown Away

  Dirty Work

  His

  Hooked

  Lockhart Brothers

  Deep Down

  In Deep

  Drawn Deeper

  Hidden Depth ~ Coming Soon

  On the Line Series

  Killian

  Bennett

  Liam ~ Coming Soon

  Fire on Ice Series

  Bound

  Captive

  Edge

  Drive

  Release

  Now Series

  Now and Then

  Now and Again

  Now and Forever

  I’ve wanted to write a book about twin sisters for a while now, but I couldn’t come up with a story line I was excited about. That is, until the idea for this one hit. From the moment I started thinking about this story, I knew it would require more planning and plotting than I typically do. That process was surprisingly fun.

  Two amazing friends helped with this book from those beginning stages. Janett Gomez read it chapter by chapter, her feedback helping steer my writing. Stephanie Reid read the open and then had an epic brainstorming session with me at Panera that helped me fill in all the plot holes. There would be no Come Closer without the two of them, and I love them so much.

  I was inspired during the planning stages by the photo I bought from Sara Eirew for the cover. She also worked tirelessly on the design for the cover—twice. The first time I came up with ideas for the design that just didn’t work out. The second time I let her do what she does best and she rocked it.

  Editor Lisa Hollett made this story better, as always. Copy Editor Taylor Bellitto ironed out all my mistakes, and Joanne Thompson did a great job on the final proofread.

  The rest of my beta reading team is Chelle Northcutt/M.E. Carter, Chantal Gemperle and Michelle Tan. They all read this book at different stages of completion to help me make sure I wasn’t ruining any of the plot turns. They’re the best team I could ask for.

  My formatter and interior designer, Christine Borgford, helped make this book beautiful. It meant everything to work with her on this book, because she puts passion and creativity into her work, and that’s what I wanted for Come Closer.

  There are so many authors, bloggers and readers who made this book possible. Thank you all for your friendship and support.

  I hope I kept you guessing with this story, readers, and I hope I surprised you in places. But more importantly, I hope you take away from this story that we sometimes never recover fully from the losses of those we love. We move forward to honor them and we learn to smile and feel hopeful again. We’re grateful we knew and loved them. But never feeling quite the same after a deep loss is okay. Asking for help to grieve those losses is okay, too, as is seeking help for mental illness. There is goodness out there. If you need it, reach for it, and don’t stop reaching until you find it.