“You can’t expect to bully me into giving you your way, Harlan Adams.”
“Who’s talking about bullying?” he said, closing a hand gently over her breast and teasing the nipple until he could feel it harden even through the silk blouse and the lacy bra he knew was underneath. “There are other ways to tame a skittish filly.”
His expression sobered then. “I love you, Janet Runningbear. I’ll make you happy. For all my teasing and taunting, you can count on that as a solemn promise.”
“I love you, too, Harlan.” The smile she turned on him then was radiant. A bride’s smile. “It ought to be downright fascinating, don’t you think?”
“What?”
“Our marriage.”
He grinned back at her. “I’m counting on it.”
* * *
Janet stood at the back of the church barely a week later and fussed with her white antique lace dress. “Are you sure I look okay?” she asked Jenny for the thousandth time.
“You look beautiful, Mom. Every hair is in place,” she added, anticipating Janet’s next question. She twirled in her own dark rose dress. “How about me? Do I look grown-up?”
“Too grown-up,” Janet declared, wondering where the time had flown.
It seemed only yesterday that her daughter had been small enough to rock to sleep in her arms. And yet she wouldn’t go back for anything. Jenny was going to make her proud one day. She was bright, spirited and intrepid. With Harlan as a father, she could be anything she chose to be.
Lone Wolf would have been satisfied with how far his descendants had come and how far they would continue to go, she thought. Perhaps she had fulfilled her promise to him, after all.
“Isn’t it time yet?” Jenny asked. “What’s taking so long?”
“Blame me,” Harlan said from the doorway to the church, taking them both by surprise.
“Harlan,” Janet protested. “You shouldn’t be back here. It’s bad luck.”
“You and I have one last detail to settle before you walk down the aisle,” he said, pulling a thick packet of papers from his pocket and handing them to her.
Janet regarded him warily. “What’s this?”
“It’s one of those prenuptial things you seem to like so much. I ripped up yours,” he said, handing her the shreds of paper as proof. “I set out a few terms of my own.”
Janet allowed the remains of her prenuptial agreement to filter through her fingers, then took Harlan’s papers with a hand that trembled. She wasn’t sure what last-minute fears might have driven him to clarify the status of things between them in writing.
“Read it,” Harlan insisted, putting an arm around Jenny’s shoulders and giving her a squeeze as Janet began to scan the familiar legal language.
She’d read no more than a clause or two before her gaze shot up to meet his. “This isn’t a prenuptial agreement at all. It’s a will.”
“I knew a fine lawyer like you would see that right off,” he taunted.
“You’re putting Jenny into your will as one of the heirs to White Pines?” she whispered, incredulous.
“She’ll be my daughter,” he said firmly. “She’s entitled to her share, not just as my daughter, but as a descendant of Lone Wolf’s.”
Tears welled up in Janet’s eyes. “The land should belong to your sons. They were raised on it.”
“‘Just putting what’s right in writing’,” he insisted, quoting her. “If things had gone differently a hundred years ago, maybe you’d have been raised on this land. Maybe Jenny would have been born here. I just see that paper as bringing things full circle.”
“She’ll probably put a shopping mall on it,” Janet threatened.
Harlan winced, but stood firm. “That’ll be her choice,” he said, gazing fondly at Jenny, who was staring at the two of them in stunned silence. “Thanks to you, she has a good head on her shoulders and good, decent values. She’ll make us both proud.”
Oblivious to wedding day conventions, which had already been shot to blazes anyway, Janet threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. “Oh, Harlan, I do love you.”
He grinned. “It’s a darn good thing, ’cause there’s no way you’d get out of this church today without saying ‘I do’. I can’t wait to walk down that aisle in there, so the whole world will know how proud I am to be your husband.”
“Even if I don’t change my name from Runningbear to Adams?”
He winced. “Even then,” he conceded. “You’ve worked hard to be who you are. I guess you’ve earned the right to call yourself whatever you want, as long as it’s me you come home to at night.”
“Count on it,” she said softly, then took his hand. “Since we’ve already made a mishmash of tradition, how about walking down that aisle with me to stand before the preacher?”
“Mom!” Jenny protested with a wail. “What about me?”
Janet grinned. “You can still go first. You’ll probably have to revive the organist. She won’t know what’s going on.”
“That’s exactly why I’m so anxious to get started on this marriage,” Harlan declared, winking at Jenny. “With your mom around, there’s no telling what’ll happen next. I expect there will be surprises in store for all of us.”
* * *
The ceremony wasn’t nearly as tospy-turvy as their arrival for it, Harlan reflected late that night while Janet was changing into some fancy negligee he was going to take pleasure in stripping right back off.
He let his mind wander over the days and weeks since she’d come into his life and counted each minute among his blessings. He was so engrossed in his memories, he never heard a thing as she apparently managed to sneak up behind him and circle her arms around him.
“I love you, Harlan Adams,” she whispered.
At the sound of those sweet words, a tremendous sense of peace stole through him. They were going to be so damned good together. Family had always been the most important thing on earth to him. Now, after losing his beloved Mary and his son, Erik, both in terrible tragedies that had taken them too soon, his family circle was going to grow once more. His life was once again complete.
“I love you, Janet Runningbear. And I love the daughter you’ve brought into my life.”
Her eyes lit with a teasing glint. “Who knows, Harlan? Maybe I’ll give you another one before we’re done.”
It was a good thing she slid into his lap and kissed him then, because he was too darned flabbergasted to say a single word. A father again? What an astonishing, incredible idea! One thing for sure, any child they had together was bound to be a hellion.
He could hardly wait.
EPILOGUE
By golly, if Janet didn’t go and make good on her promise. Barely nine months to the day after their honeymoon, Harlan found himself pacing the hallways at the hospital waiting for her to give birth. The whole danged family was there, fussing and carrying on, teasing him unmercifully about getting a second chance at parenthood.
“Maybe this time you’ll get it right,” Cody teased.
“There’s not a thing about the way I did it the first time that I’d do over,” he shot right back, then sighed heavily. “Except with Erik. I’d do that over if I could.”
Luke put his arm around him. “Daddy, Erik made his own choices.”
Jessie stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “That’s right. It’s time to let it go. Besides, this should be a happy occasion. We should be concentrating on the new baby, not sad memories.”
Jenny, who’d been standing impatiently in the corridor outside the delivery room for the past hour, came up in front of him and scowled. “I just don’t get it. What’s taking so long? And why aren’t you in there with her?”
“Because he’d be telling the doctor what to do, that’s why,” Cody chimed in. “The delivery room staff signed a petition to keep him out.”
“But you took those classes with Mom and everything,” Jenny protested. “Now she doesn’t even have a coach in there with her. If I’d known you were going to chicken out, I’d have taken the classes.”
Just then a nurse appeared in the doorway. She zeroed straight in on Harlan. “Mr. Adams, your wife is asking for you.”
His breath caught in his throat. “The baby?”
“Should be here any minute now,” the nurse said. “She says you’ll probably only have to suffer through a contraction or two.”
When his sons heard that, they hooted. “Now we know,” Jordan taunted. “Janet was terrified you were going to faint in there, wasn’t she?”
“We reached an agreement is all,” Harlan said defensively.
The truth of it was, Janet had fought like a demon to keep him from seeing her in pain. He’d fought just as hard to be in that delivery room. He’d missed out on the birth of his sons, because that was the way of the world back then. He’d regretted it more than he could say. This time he wanted to be there for the miracle, just one of many to come into his life since the day he’d met Janet and Jenny.
As promised, he walked through the door of the delivery room just in the nick of time. Janet’s face was bathed in sweat, but the smile she turned on him was enough to fill his heart to overflowing. He clasped her hand.
“I hear you’re doing great,” he said.
“So they tell me,” she said, suddenly clenching his hand in a grip so fierce he thought for sure the bones would break. “This is it.”
“Sure is,” the doctor agreed. “That’s it, Janet. Come on. Just a little more.”
Harlan’s incredulous gaze was fixed on the doctor, watching his concentration, then the smile that slowly spread across his face just as he lifted their brand-new baby into the air.
“It’s a girl,” he announced. “A big one, too. Pretty as her mama.”
If there’d been a chair close by, Harlan would have collapsed onto it. Tears welled up in his eyes as he turned a tremulous smile on Janet. “A girl,” he repeated softly. “Another daughter.”
“I promised, didn’t I?” Janet whispered.
He leaned down and pressed a kiss filled with gratitude and love to her lips. “Thank you for my two girls,” he murmured. “Most of all, thank you for loving me and making my life complete.”
Just then a nurse approached carrying their daughter in a pretty pink blanket. “Here she is, Mr. Adams. Would you like to hold her?”
An awe unlike anything he’d ever before experienced spread through him as he took that precious bundle into his arms and gazed down into his daughter’s tiny, scrunched-up face.
“She is so beautiful,” he said, barely getting the words past the lump in his throat. “What are we going to name her? Have you decided?”
“I had a thought, but I wasn’t sure how you’d feel about it,” Janet said.
“What?”
“I was thinking of naming her Mary Elizabeth,” she said, watching his face intently.
He was stunned by the generous, unselfish gesture. “Wouldn’t you mind naming her for Mary?”
Eyes shining, she reached for his hand. “It’s something I’d like very much to do for you and your sons. I was thinking we might call her Lizzy.”
He gazed down at the child in his arms and grinned. “Lizzy, huh? What do you think?”
Mary Elizabeth Adams opened her tiny mouth and wailed. There was no telling if that was a sign of approval or dissent, but Harlan took it as a positive reaction. He smiled at Janet. “Lizzy, it is.”
“So,” she said, as they wheeled her and the baby to her room, “do you think there are any more surprises in store for us?”
“You bet,” he promised. “They’re around every corner.”
* * *
Keep reading on for a sneak peek of
The Littlest Angel,
from New York Times bestselling author
Sherryl Woods!
The Littlest Angel
by Sherryl Woods
1
Angela hadn’t wanted to come home like this, with her belly the size of two watermelons, and not one single proud accomplishment she could claim. She’d always meant her return to be triumphant, proof that she could succeed on her own without relying on the Adams name that meant so much in one little corner of West Texas. She’d envisioned a banner across the porch and a barbecue in her honor in the backyard and her name in lights, if Grandpa Harlan had his way.
Instead, it was the dead of night and no one even knew she was coming. Until she’d driven down the last stretch of deserted highway, anticipation mounting with every mile, she hadn’t known for sure herself if she would have the courage to face her family. The car had settled that for her. It had conked out less than a mile from home. She sat in the rapidly chilling air and shivered, wondering if fate was on her side this time or just out to humiliate her further.
Home. The word had always conjured up a barrage of images for her, some good, some bad. Over the last six years the bad ones had faded until only the special memories remained. With her birthday tomorrow and Christmas just a few days away, it was no surprise that it was the holiday memories that came back to her now in a flood.
The celebrations always began early and lasted through New Year’s, with everyone—aunts, uncles, cousins—traipsing from home to home for one party or another, but always, always ending up at White Pines. Grandpa Harlan insisted on it. He claimed he could spoil his grandkids rotten in his own home on Christmas Day if he chose to, while anywhere else he might have to show some restraint.
Rather than feeling deprived that her birthday was so close to Christmas, Angela had always felt as if all of the holiday trimmings made the day more special than it would have been at any other time of the year. Other kids got cakes and a single party. Angela’s celebration included a huge tree, blinking colored lights, endless music and nonstop parties that went on for days.
She’d missed that while she was away, missed it when she’d noted the occasion all alone in a college rooming house already deserted by students who’d headed home for the holidays. Last year she’d almost forgotten it herself. She was too caught up in love, too excited about sharing her first Christmas with a man who really mattered to her.
Now, though, the memories were as vivid as if she’d never left. Even from her stalled car way out here on a lonely Texas highway she imagined she could see the lights twinkling on the ceiling-scraping Christmas tree, smell the aroma of Consuela’s fresh-baked sugar cookies and bread mingling with the scent of fresh-cut pine. She could almost hear the sound of carols being played at full volume, while her dad chided her mom that she was going to deafen all of them.
She sighed as she remembered the angel of shimmering gold that was ceremoniously placed on top of the tree each and every year and the pride she’d felt when that duty had been given to her. At five she’d been too small to reach the top, so her father had hoisted her up on his broad shoulders so she could settle that frothy angel onto the tree’s highest branch. Then and only then, in a room that had been darkened for the ceremony, did they switch on the lights, always too many of them, always so magical that she and her mom had gasped with delight, while her dad had grinned tolerantly. The same ceremony had been repeated at White Pines, where as the oldest grandchild she’d always been the one who’d put the angel on her grandfather’s tree.
So many wonderful traditions, she thought now. How could she have run away from all the warmth and love in that house? she wondered in retrospect.
Rebellion, pure and simple. She had chafed at all the bright expectations and what she now suspected had been imagined pressures. Like all families, hers had only wanted what was best for her.
It was just that the Adams men, particularly Luke and her grandfather, had a tendency to think they were the only ones who knew what
was best. No two men on earth could be more mule-headed once they’d charted a course of action, for themselves or someone they loved.
Ironically, they had rarely agreed on what that course should be. One plan would have been hard enough to fight, but two were impossible. Angela had wanted to decide her future for herself, and leaving—choosing a college far from Texas where the Adams influence didn’t reach—had been the only way she’d seen to do it. She’d limited contact to occasional calls, an infrequent e-mail to her computer-literate father.
Now, with snow falling in fat, wet clumps and the roads turning into hazardous sheets of ice, she sat in her idled clunker of a car less than a mile from home and wondered if anything else could possibly go wrong. Even as the thought crossed her mind, she glanced quickly heavenward.
“Not that I’m tempting fate, You understand,” she said wearily. “But even You have to admit my life basically sucks these days.”
She was twenty-two, unmarried, unemployed and no more than a week or two from delivering a baby. She was virtually back on a doorstep she’d vowed she wouldn’t cross again until she’d made something of herself and done it totally on her own without the Adams power and influence behind her. If she’d taken one thing away from Texas with her, it had been the fierce Adams pride, the determination to buck everyone and chart her own path.
She supposed, in a manner of speaking, that she had. She had made a royal mess of things. No other Adams that she knew of had gone so far astray. She’d skated through college with grades no higher than they had to be. She’d lied about who she was and run away more times and from more places than she could count. Rather than upholding the noble Adams tradition, she’d thumbed her nose at it. Oh, yes, she’d made something of herself, all right, but she wasn’t especially proud of it, and this was hardly the triumphant homecoming she’d once envisioned.
The only thing she had going for her was the absolute certainty that the two people inside would welcome her back with open arms and without making judgments. Luke and Jessie Adams accepted people for who they were, flaws included. That went double for their only child, the daughter they adored. They would be relieved that she’d finally realized that her heart and her identity were all wrapped up with the tight-knit family who’d been patiently waiting for her all this time.
Winter's Proposal Page 37