Rand narrowed a gaze at the lawyer. “What about the housekeeper? Where can I find her—talk to her?”
Henry shook his head. “She died from lung cancer six months ago.”
Grace slipped her hand over his and squeezed. That simple gesture, and the look of concern in her eyes, dispelled the fury and disappointment spilling into his veins.
Rand linked his fingers with hers, then looked back at the lawyer. “If everyone is dead or gone, then how do you know any of this?”
“Rosemary’s daughter found a journal detailing everything that happened that night, including names,” Henry said. “Rosemary must have kept the journal for her own protection against William. No doubt she feared for her own life.”
After what his uncle had done, Rand thought, it was hardly a surprise that the man would be capable of murder if he had felt threatened. Rosemary had been smart to keep a journal as insurance.
Rand was anxious to see that journal. To see the words in black-and-white on the pages, to know every detail of what had happened that night, to his sister and brother.
Still, it felt as if something didn’t fit, didn’t make sense, and it dawned on him what it was. “But if Rosemary’s dead,” he asked the lawyer, “then who hired you to find me?”
“Lucas Blackhawk.”
“Lucas Blackhawk?”
Henry nodded. “Your cousin.”
Rand furrowed his brow. “I have a cousin?”
“Actually, you have two. But for right now, let’s talk about Lucas. Your father had two brothers, William and Thomas. Lucas is Thomas’s only son. He lives here in Wolf River.” Grinning, Henry leaned forward. “Why don’t we give him a call and tell him you’re here?”
Ten
Lucas Blackhawk’s house was a few miles off the main highway, just outside of town. Rand pulled his truck up and parked in front of a pretty, two-story, blue-gray clapboard, with white shutters and trim and an inviting front porch with freshly potted containers of yellow daisies and orange marigolds. Beside the gravel-lined circular drive, there were a pair of child’s plastic toy bikes, one pink, one blue. On the corner of the porch, a colorful wind sock of suns, moons and stars danced in the late-afternoon breeze.
Grace looked at the red roses blooming under the porch railing, the neatly manicured green grass and a painted wooden sign stuck into the ground beside the porch steps that said, Welcome. It was like a picture in a magazine advertising the perfect life, a dream home complete with two point three children and the proverbial station wagon.
Her heart swelled just looking at it all. The house, the children’s bikes, the homemade welcome sign. She wanted this, too, she realized. All of this, even the flowers and that silly wind sock.
And the kicker was—life’s little joke on her—was that she wanted it with a man who’d made it perfectly clear he had no interest in hearth and home or settling down.
She glanced over at him, saw him staring intently at the house, not with yearning but with apprehension. She set her own feelings aside, knew that she’d have plenty of time later to deal with them. Considering everything that was happening in Rand’s life, she was being selfish to think about what she wanted.
He hadn’t said more than a dozen words for the past hour. Not that being quiet was anything unusual for Rand. But the tension radiating from him had been almost tangible. Grace understood he was still trying to sort through and absorb everything he’d learned about what had happened the night of the accident, how Rand and his sister and brother had been the puppets in his uncle’s cruel and sick plan. And now, finding out he had a cousin right here in Wolf River was only more fuel for the fire of turmoil burning inside him.
Though it had been subtle, she’d already felt him pull away from her, not just emotionally, but physically, as well. He hadn’t touched her once since they’d left the lawyer’s office, and it seemed as if he’d intentionally kept his distance.
Already she felt as if she didn’t belong here. That he had too much in his life at the moment, and that she would only complicate matters even more. He’d been impulsive when he’d asked her to come with him, and she’d been impulsive when she’d agreed.
And even knowing all that, it didn’t matter. Because if she had to do it all over again, she’d still say yes. She still would have come with him.
She would have gone to Antarctica with him if he’d asked.
She forced a smile on her lips and a light tone to her voice. “Here we are.”
He nodded, then got out of the truck and came around to her side. She slid out before he could open her door, and together they walked up the porch steps. From inside the house Grace heard the sound of children screaming in laughter and a woman’s voice saying, “I found you!”
Rand hesitated, then knocked on the door.
The door swung open a moment later. A woman, her face flushed and her short crop of pale-blond hair mussed, stood on the other side. Her eyes were smoky blue, large with excitement and pleasure. In her late twenties, Grace guessed.
She was stunning. Absolutely beautiful. And very pregnant, Grace noticed through the loose floral dress the woman wore.
Two point three children, Grace thought with a bittersweet smile. “Lucas!” the woman called over shoulder. “He’s here!”
Then she reached for Rand, took his hand in both of hers and pulled him inside the house. Grace followed hesitantly, feeling like an intruder at such a personal, important meeting between Rand and his relatives.
The house was beautiful inside, as well—white walls, shiny hardwood floors, polished oak banister on the stairway. And the intoxicating smell of baking cookies filled the air.
“I’m Julianna.” The woman smiled brightly and nodded to her left. Two small children, one boy, one girl, stood perfectly still in the entryway of a dining room. “That’s Nicole and Nathan. You can’t see them ’cause they’re invisible right now.”
The children were undoubtedly twins, Grace realized. Probably around three or four, both with dark-brown hair, dressed in jean shorts and white T-shirts. Mischief sparkled in their big, dark eyes.
“Hello, Nicole and Nathan,” Rand said, though he intentionally looked at the stairway directly ahead, instead of at the children, and Grace realized that he was actually playing with the children. “It’s nice to meet you.”
Nathan and Nicole giggled, but when a man dressed in paint-splattered jeans and a navy-blue T-shirt came down the stairs, wiping his hands on a rag, they both ran and jumped on his legs at the bottom step. “Daddy!”
He was a tall man with black hair, both traits obviously dominant in the Blackhawk genes. He was a handsome man—another Blackhawk trait—with deep-brown eyes and a warm smile.
“Just finishing up the trim in the nursery,” Lucas said, stuffing the rag into his back pocket. He scooped one child up in each of his arms, kissed both of them, then set them down again. Grinning, Lucas held his hand out to Rand. “Is this the damnedest thing or what?”
“That’s putting it mildly.”
Grace felt tears burn her eyes when the two men firmly clasped hands. She sensed both Rand’s and Lucas’s hesitation, their assessment of each other. But she also sensed their excitement, felt it herself as she watched them. Still, they were being cautious with each other, Grace realized, another Blackhawk trait.
“And this is?” Lucas looked at Grace and raised a brow.
“Grace Sullivan.” Grace offered her hand to Lucas. “Just a friend.”
Lucas and Julianna both shook her hand, then Lucas furrowed his brow. “Grace Sullivan? The same Grace Sullivan with the Edgewater Horse Adoption Agency?”
Surprised that Lucas would know about her and the foundation, Grace hesitated. “Ah, well, yes, I am.”
“You sent us an invitation to your fund-raiser next week. I believe my office manager, Shelby Davis, RSVP’d that we’d be there.”
Lucas Blackhawk. No wonder the name Blackhawk had sounded so familiar to her. Grace had seen the list of p
eople invited, but she’d been busy trying to track down Rand. Mattie, one of the volunteers with the foundation, had been in charge of organizing the event and handling the guest list.
Even after Rand had told her his birth name was Blackhawk and he’d been born in Wolf River, Grace hadn’t connected him with the Blackhawk Ranch. How could she have missed such a blatant link between the two?
But she knew how she’d missed it. Since she’d met Rand, Grace hadn’t been thinking clearly. She hadn’t been thinking about the foundation or the fund-raiser or anything else besides Rand himself.
Embarrassed and at a complete loss for words, she simply said, “I—I’m so glad you’ll be able to attend.”
“Why don’t you take Rand and Grace into the den, and I’ll bring everyone something cold to drink?” Julianna said. With a serious expression on her face, she looked around the room, right past her children, who stood shoulder to shoulder at the foot of the stairs. “If I can find Nicole and Nathan,” Julianna said, still searching the room, “I might have some cookies for them in the kitchen.”
Grace watched the two children run to their mother, yelling, “Here we are, Mommy. Here we are!” then race off into the kitchen.
There it was again. That little ping in her heart. Grace drew in a slow breath to steady herself, then smiled at Rand. “I’m going to see if I can help Julianna in the kitchen. Why don’t you and Lucas go on?”
He’d need this time alone with his cousin, Grace understood. From everything the lawyer had told them, Rand and Lucas had a great deal to talk about.
“Take your time,” she said, already turning toward the kitchen. “I’m going to see if I can beg a cookie or two from Julianna.”
“Beg a few for us, too, will you?” Lucas said as Grace made her way toward the kitchen, then he turned to Rand and grinned. “My wife gains twenty pounds with this baby and puts me on a diet. Women.”
Rand’s thought exactly, as he watched Grace disappear into the kitchen. She’d been acting odd ever since they’d pulled into his cousin’s driveway. He’d seen the longing in her eyes as she’d stared at the house, and he hadn’t missed the soft, dreamy expression on her face when she’d looked at Lucas and Julianna’s twins.
As he followed Lucas into the den, Rand glanced around the house, noticed the toys spilling from a yellow plastic toy box, the wedding photos on the walls, the balls of blue and pink yarn beside the half-knit baby blanket on the leather sofa.
Rand knew it all looked picture-perfect. The house, the kids. Roots. But what did he know about roots? Everything had been ripped out from under him when he was nine years old. Hell, everything he owned would fit in a suitcase, and even his suitcase had wheels.
He couldn’t offer any of this to Grace. And she deserved it, all of it.
“I found this in a box of my mother’s old photos.” Lucas handed Rand a picture shot from an old Polaroid camera. “I thought you might like it.”
The picture had faded with age; the edges had turned amber and brown. But clearly the smiling faces of Jonathan and Norah Blackhawk stared back at Rand.
His whole family was in the picture. Rand guessed he was probably around five or six, Seth maybe three or four, and Lizzie, wrapped in a blanket, looked like a newborn. They were all sitting on a hospital bed.
Rand felt as if a metal band were closing around his chest, squeezing every last drop of air from his lungs. He couldn’t look at it now, not with Lucas watching him. Rand slipped the picture into the back pocket of his jeans, had to swallow the lump in his throat before he could speak. “Thanks.”
“I’m sorry we didn’t know each other when we were kids,” Lucas said. “Maybe if we had, things would have been different somehow.”
There were so many questions racing through Rand’s mind at the moment. Why hadn’t they known each other? What had happened to Lucas’s parents? What did he know about Seth and Lizzie? He didn’t know which one to ask first, so he chose the one that he’d been wondering about since he’d left the lawyer’s office.
“Why are you doing this?” Rand asked. “Why, after all these years, would you go to all this trouble to bring me and my sister and brother together?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” Lucas asked. “You’re family. You and your sister and brother.”
“You don’t even know us,” Rand pointed out.
“We’re blood, Rand,” Lucas said evenly. “I lost my parents when I was young, too. My mom when I was eleven, then my dad not long after that. He died in prison.”
“Prison?”
“You would have only been around seven or eight at the time. Both of our families were busy with problems of their own during those years, not to mention our dear uncle William doing his best to cause upheaval wherever he could. He made sure the family stayed divided.” Lucas sighed. “William was the only person who could have helped clear my father of the false charges against him. He never returned even one of my father’s phone calls. He let my father die in that prison and me be shipped off to foster homes.”
“Why?” Rand asked. “Why would a man tear his own family apart like that?”
“His brothers married off the reservation,” Lucas said. “He hated them and all their children for that. And then, of course, there was the money.”
Rand shook his head. “My parents had no money. We barely got by on a fifty-acre horse ranch.”
Lucas turned his head at the sound of the women’s laughter from the kitchen, then put a hand on Rand’s shoulder and gestured toward the sliding French doors that led to the outside.
“Why don’t I show you around my place while we talk?” Lucas said evenly. “This might take a while.”
“You’re staying for dinner.” Julianna slid a roast into the oven, then set the timer. “I won’t take no for an answer.”
“I really don’t think—”
“I insist.” Julianna placed both of her hands on her lower back and stretched. “After being in this house day after day with two three-year-olds, I seriously need an adult to talk to. Just slap my hand if I start to cut your meat for you.”
Grace glanced at the two children, who were sitting at their own pint-size table and chairs in a corner of the kitchen, eating chocolate chip cookies and drinking milk. “They’re adorable.”
“Put cookies in front of them and they’re angels.” Julianna brought a plate of still-warm cookies to the table and set them down, then slowly eased into a chair across from Grace. “Put carrots in front of them and they turn into little devils so fast your head will spin.”
“They’re so sweet.” Grace accepted a cookie that Julianna offered. “I can’t imagine them giving you any trouble.”
Julianna gave a bark of laughter. “You should have been here last night. They wanted to see what was inside the vacuum cleaner bag.”
Grace’s eyes widened.
“And while I was cleaning that up,” Julianna went on, “Nicole decided to shampoo Nathan’s hair in the middle of my bedroom. Half the bottle was oozing down his face and back, the other half was on the rug. She was on her way for a cup of water when I walked in.”
Grace knew nothing about babies or small children. She’d never thought about what kind of mischief they got into, or the destruction they could cause.
But she wanted to know. She wanted to know it all, experience it all. She wanted a dozen of them—well, maybe just three or four, she reconsidered, as the image of vacuum cleaner bags and shampoo popped into her mind.
“At least she used the no-tears,” Julianna said with a sigh. “Poor Nathan was screaming he didn’t want his hair washed when Lucas tossed them both in the shower. Oh!” Julianna looked down as she smoothed a hand over her stomach. “Soccer time.”
Grace followed the rumbling movement across Julianna’s stomach. While she had certainly seen a lot of mares ready to foal, Grace had never been quite this close to a woman who was quite this pregnant. Fascinated, she couldn’t help but stare. “Does that hurt?”
“Not usually.” Julianna winced at the continuing ripple of movement, then frowned at one direct shot to her ribs. “But he’s definitely got my attention today.”
“You’re having a boy?”
“That’s what the ultrasound shows.” Julianna glanced down at her stomach. “Want to feel?”
Desperately, Grace thought. Not just Julianna’s stomach, but she wanted to know for herself, wanted to experience that life growing inside her, a baby with the man she loved.
With Rand.
She might as well wish for the moon.
One prominent bulge on the side of Julianna’s stomach moved and popped out directly in the middle. Grace hesitantly held her hand toward that bulge. “You…you really don’t mind?”
“Of course not.” Julianna took Grace’s fingers and laid them directly on top of an undistinguishable baby body part.
When that body part moved under Grace’s hand, she felt her breath catch. “He moved!” Grace laughed. “Oh, my heavens, I really felt it!”
Julianna smiled. “I take it you haven’t been pregnant.”
“No.” Though it seemed rude, Grace couldn’t bring herself to take her hand away. “I—I’m not married.”
“That’s not exactly a criterion today,” Julianna said, then moved Grace’s hand to another bulge. “So what’s with you and Rand, then?”
“We, well, we’re—” Grace avoided Julianna’s eyes. “There’s nothing between us.”
“Grace, we just met, and you can tell me to butt out of your business anytime. But, honey, I saw the way he looked at you, and the way you looked right back. That’s not nothing.”
It was strange, Grace thought, how a person could meet someone for the first time yet feel as if they’d been friends for a very long time. That was exactly how she felt about Julianna.
With a sigh Grace reached for a cookie and sat back. “It’s complicated.”
Julianna laughed. “What relationship between any man and woman isn’t? Lord, someday I’ll tell you about Lucas and me, but you better hold on to your eyeballs.”
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