Raising Connor

by Loree Lough

  A fire trap? “Not the whole house…”

  “Afraid so.”

  She could keep up with the mortgage and regular household bills, thanks to her savings account, but with the cut in her salary, Brooke wondered how she’d pay to have the place rewired.

  “I have skids of materials left over from other jobs just sitting around taking up space at the shop. Say the word and I’ll get started.”

  “I guess I should be grateful the place didn’t go up in smoke.” Her hands were shaking, and she clasped them together.

  “You’ll do the work yourself?”

  “My crew, working alongside a licensed electrician.”

  She sighed. “How long will it take?”

  “Depends on what we find when we tear out the walls. If we’re lucky, all we’ll find is outdated wiring. Could take a couple months.”

  “Months?” She groaned softly.

  “Keep in mind that this place is pushing a hundred and twenty-five years old. I’ll work the guys as hard as I can, but to preserve the historic integrity and make it safe for you to live in, we’ll have to approach with caution.”

  Eyes closed, she tilted her head toward the ceiling.

  “Look at the bright side.”

  “What bright side?”

  “You’re paying the bills around here now. You’re well within your rights to turn it into the home of your dreams.”

  Chin on her chest, she inspected her fingernails. “I’m not sure I can handle that much change right now.”

  Connor threw a handful of Kix, then whined because his tray was empty.

  “And neither can Connor,” she said, adding another handful of cereal to his tray. “But that’s beside the point.”

  “Well, you’ll have some time to think about it. Last I heard, Deidre’s garage apartment was available, but if it isn’t, you guys are welcome to stay with me during construction. I’ll hole up in the den and you and Connor will have the whole upstairs, all to yourselves.”

  Oh. Right. Move in. With the guy who’d played a role in her mother’s death.

  “That’s very thoughtful, but last I heard, Gram’s garage apartment was vacant. Connor has been up there dozens of times, so it won’t feel like a strange new place.” On her hands and knees, she started picking up the cereal he’d thrown. “How soon do you want to start?” she asked without looking up.

  “The sooner, the better. I can probably line up a crew by day after tomorrow.”

  On her feet now, Brooke dumped the cereal into the trash can, starting up a whole new round of wailing from Connor.

  “Mine!” he shouted, pounding his tray. “My Kix!”

  She rummaged in the cupboard and found the box of teething biscuits. Today was Monday…for a few more hours, anyway. She’d start a new job on Wednesday and had three interviews lined up with potential sitters tomorrow. What choice did she have but to postpone them and move her things and Connor’s from the house to the apartment instead?

  “I have enough in savings to pay for the move,” she said, mostly to herself. “Gram puts on a good show, but she’s not as well off as she likes people to think.” She sighed. “I’ll need to pay rent while making mortgage payments. And utilities and—”

  “Well, you can cross construction materials off the list. I already told you. I have everything we’ll need over at the shop. Stuff left over from other jobs. Rehab won’t cost you anything but time and patience and the inconvenience of living in a three-room apartment until we’re finished here.” He hesitated, then added, “You could cross rent off the list, too, if you and Connor moved in with me.”

  She shook her head. “No offense, Hunter. I’m grateful for all you’ve done for us these past few weeks. But we can’t move in with you, because…” It was her turn to hesitate. “Because—”

  “Because I killed your mother.”

  “No. It’s… Seriously. How would it look…me living in your house?”

  Hunter nodded. “Okay,” he said, drawing out the word. “I hear ya. Loud and clear.” He put his mug in the sink, none too gently. “We need to get Connor out of this place, the sooner, the better.” He walked toward the door. “I have some cartons at the shop. I’ll drive over and get them, and while I’m gone, maybe you can sort through the things we’ll box up when I get back.”

  He opened the door, started to leave but changed his mind. “How long since there was a tenant in that apartment?”

  “I don’t know. Six months? A year, maybe?”

  “Then it’s probably a pigsty.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Soon as Connor has something to eat, I’ll drive you both to Deidre’s. After you put him to bed at her house, meet me at the apartment. We’ll get the place cleaned up, and then I’ll bring your stuff upstairs.”

  She started to object, but he didn’t give her a chance.

  “You start a new job on Wednesday. If we don’t get this done tonight and tomorrow…” He shrugged, as if to say, When do you expect to get it done?

  Did he always have to be right?

  “Look. I know you’re determined to walk in Beth’s organic shoes, but Connor can’t have cereal for supper and I don’t have time to hunt for a health food store. So I’ll pick up chicken nuggets for him, and burgers and fries for you and me—”

  Though she hadn’t said a word, he held up a hand.

  “—and I’ll bet Stone Contracting on this—one fast-food meal won’t kill any of us.”

  Then he stomped out and slammed the door behind him.

  Hunter probably hadn’t made it to the corner stop sign before it hit her: he loved Connor as much as she did.

  Why else would he be so angry?

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE BREATH CAUGHT in her throat when she heard the rumble of his truck’s motor.

  For Connor’s sake, she had to find a way to put the past behind her.

  Starting now.

  She opened the door for him, and when Connor saw the tower of cartons, he jumped up and down in his playpen. “Uncle Hunter!” he said, pointing. “Big blocks? Blocks for Conner?”

  Chuckling, Hunter peeked around the stack. “They’re boxes, buddy, not blocks.”

  His expression went from pleasant to dour as he shifted his attention to Brooke. “Where do you want these?”

  This didn’t seem the time to issue a half-baked apology. She cleared a space near the closet. “Just drop them here.”

  And when he did, Connor said, “Boxes go boom.”

  One glance at Connor was all it took to soften Hunter’s hard expression.

  “C’mere, you li’l pip-squeak,” he said, lifting Connor high into the air, “before your jumping tears that playpen apart at the seams!”

  “Fuzzy?” Connor said, patting Hunter’s cheeks. “Uncle Hunter fuzzy.”

  “Yeah, I guess you could call me that.” He grabbed Connor’s hand and gently whiskered his palm. “Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear,” he said as the boy giggled. “Fuzzy Wuzzy had stubbly hair.”

  It was good to hear Connor laughing, good to see Hunter happy, too, and she hoped the contented mood would last.

  “What’re you grinning about?” he asked her.

  Until that moment, Brooke hadn’t realized she was grinning. An opportunity to bridge the gap her recent rudeness had put between them? Only one way to find out….

  “I was just thinking—”

  “Uh-oh,” he said, left brow rising slightly.

  Her college psych professor used to do that…right before launching into a humdrum lecture. She didn’t like the class, but it had been a requirement for her nursing degree. The comparison of Hunter to the teacher seemed weird on a couple of levels. For one thing, Mr. Delano had been short, chubby and mostly bald, and thanks to the fluorescent glare on his thick horn-rimmed lenses, she’d never seen the color of his eyes. Something told her they hadn’t been long-lashed and hazel like Hunter’s. For another thing, Hunter had never lectured her, even when she’d been wrong.

  “
I was thinking—that you look as good in jeans and a T-shirt as you did in a suit and tie.”

  The eyebrow returned to its normal position. “Thanks.” He pursed a corner of his mouth. “I think.”

  Not his usual soothing DJ voice, but what did she expect, making up an answer on the spot that way?

  “Be right back. The burgers are in the truck.”

  Minutes later, as she doled out paper plates, he put the paper sack on the table.

  “I didn’t take you for a cheeseburger kind of gal, so I got you a regular burger.”

  “You figured right.”

  He put Connor into the high chair. “So this no-cheese thing of yours,” he said, sprinkling a few fries onto the tray, “is it a diet thing?”

  She placed a napkin beside each plate. “It’s more a texture thing.”

  “Good, because you’re the last person who needs to watch her weight.”

  So he’d noticed something other than her bad manners, had he?

  “Guess I made the right call, then, getting you regular instead of diet soda?”

  “Hunter, I need to explain. No, not explain. I need to say…I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?” he repeated, wiping crumbs from Connor’s chin. “Sorry for what?”

  “For taking my bad mood out on you earlier. You didn’t deserve that. Especially after all you’ve done for us lately.”

  “No big deal.” He unwrapped his burger. “It’s been a rough few weeks. Guess you’re entitled to be a little short-tempered.” He slid the pickle to the middle of the burger and put the top bun back on. “Besides, I’ve had years to get used to having you mad at me.”

  Brooke flinched. She’d left herself wide open for that one.

  Connor held up a chicken nugget. “Dip?” he said. “Conner dip?”

  She watched Hunter peel back the cover of a sweet-and-sour container, then hold it tight as Connor dunked.

  “It’s been rough for all of us,” she continued. “That doesn’t give me the right to behave like a spoiled brat.”

  He leaned back in his chair and took a big bite of his burger. “So what’re your thoughts about leaving Connor with Deidre,” he said around it, “while we get your stuff moved up there?”

  She glanced at the baby, who seemed satisfied…for the moment. “We can probably let him stay here in his own bed for just one more night.” Now he had her saying we, too.

  “My thoughts exactly.”

  “Tomorrow once we’ve moved the boxes from your truck to the apartment, you’re welcome to get back to work. Or relax at home. I can handle the unpacking.”

  Hunter only nodded as Brooke listened to the steady tick of the wall clock and Connor’s nonstop mumbling. A jet roared overhead, and in the distance the rumble of a lawn mower competed with the whine of a weed whacker. And paper crinkled as Hunter wadded burger and fry wrappers into tight balls and bank-shot them, one by one, into the trash can.

  With all that going on, why did the room seem strangely silent?

  An hour later, Brooke packed towels and bed linens while Hunter emptied the baby’s toys into a box. He’d barely said a word since she’d tucked Connor in for the night. Maybe a joke would break the somber mood.

  “Look at these,” she said, holding up a pair of tiny tasseled bedroom slippers. “Did his feet graduate or something?”

  It might as well have been Donald hunched grimly over that carton. Except…Donald wouldn’t have offered to help her pack. Or make the repairs at Beth’s that inspired the move in the first place.

  Brooke tried again and held up a blanket sleeper emblazoned with a big yellow crown. “Where does a baby king keep his armies?”

  Hunter glanced at the pj’s and frowned. “Where?”

  “In his sleevies, of course!”

  “I’d laugh,” he said around the hint of a smile, “but…I wouldn’t want to wake Connor.”

  “I don’t know why, but I’m reminded of something Donald said the first—and only—time we played chess.”

  “I’ll probably regret asking, but what did he say?”

  “Half an hour into the game, he said, ‘I know how to make this game more interesting!’” She gave him a moment to consider the possibilities, then added, “He packed up the game pieces and put the board away.”

  Hunter’s eyes narrowed slightly. And then he said, “Looks like we’re finished here. How ’bout we head into your room?”

  On the day Brooke arrived from Richmond, she’d put her suitcase on the extra twin bed in Beth’s guest room…and that was where it sat now.

  “It won’t take long, since I never really unpacked.”

  “But you’ve been here for more than a month.”

  “It didn’t make sense to go to all that bother for just a few days, since I expected to move into my own place after…”

  Hunter sat on the stool of the gliding rocker beside the playpen. “After Beth and Kent came home,” he finished, patting the chair’s cushion.

  She’d decided to be a little more polite, but it seemed a bit extreme to start by sitting nose to nose with him.

  Then why was she doing it?

  He leaned back a bit as she stepped between him and the stool, waited until she was settled and took her hands in his. “You’re shaking like a leaf. Are you cold?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Hunter blew a stream of air through his lips. “There’s no shame in admitting you’re scared. Letting your guard down once in a while is healthy.”

  Brooke had been cynical and cautious for so long she didn’t know if she remembered how to let down her guard. Those who knew her best said she’d been mistrustful almost from birth. But they were wrong. And the proof could be found in her personal phone directory, where half a dozen former boyfriends’ names had been crossed out. She’d trusted every one, and look where it got her.

  “I know you’re tough,” Hunter continued, “but even you have a breaking point.”

  “I’m fine,” she said again.

  “Do you have a girlfriend? A guy friend? Someone you can talk to about all of this? Who can maybe help you make sense of—”

  Brooke withdrew her hands. “I don’t need to talk to anyone.” And even if she did, where would she find the time!

  “Okay,” he said, nodding. “But…if you change your mind, if you ever need a sounding board…” He extended both hands palms up.

  Deidre, Beth, Kent—they all felt she’d overreacted that night in the O.R. waiting room, when she’d accused Hunter of killing her mother. Even if he had walked into the store with his partner, they said, the outcome would have been the same. Brooke’s rational mind knew they were probably right. But what if they weren’t? What if instead, her irrational side had been right: If he’d been where he was supposed to be, might he have stopped the gunman sooner, saving his partner and her mom and the others who’d been there that night?

  “Why don’t you put your feet up for a few minutes and let me finish up in here?”

  “No, you’ve already done—”

  “Brooke, Brooke, Brooke,” he said, shaking his head. “Why is it so all-fired hard for you to let people do things for you?”

  “You’re kidding, right?” She pictured him on all fours, helping clean up the mess on the porch, on the kitchen floor. And sitting beside her at the bank and funeral parlor, lending moral support. He’d taken charge of Connor at the cemetery so that she and Deidre could participate in the memorial, though he’d experienced a double loss, too.

  “You’ve been doing things for me since that awful morning. Maybe you’re the one who has a hard time letting people—”

  “Not ‘people,’ Brooke. Just you.”

  “Me? But why?”

  “Because of what I did—or rather, what I didn’t do that night. I turned your life upside down. Along with your dad’s and Beth’s. And ultimately, Kent’s and Connor’s, too.” He exhaled a shaky sigh. “I know I can never make it up to you—”

  A lot had changed in a few s
hort weeks, she thought.

  “—but I will do everything in my power to make your life a little easier. If you’ll let me.”

  She wanted to believe him. Wanted to put the past behind them, let bygones be bygones. Easier said than done, she thought, remembering how many times she’d put her faith in a man’s empty promises and ended up feeling stupid and used.

  Brooke should have stood up right then and there. Might have summoned the nerve to put a safe distance between them…

  …if he hadn’t chosen that moment to wrap her in a reassuring hug.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  IT HAD BEEN a knee-jerk reaction, pulling her close. He’d had no one but himself to blame when she gave him a gentle shove that left him feeling a little confused and a whole lot like a villain. He’d been up half the night thinking about that moment. Wondering why he kept putting himself in that ridiculous position.

  With Brooke, it was three steps forward and two steps back. Just when he thought he was getting through to her, she hit him with a stinging reminder of the past. Every time it seemed he’d removed a brick in the wall between them, she added another instead. If the plane crash, if sharing Connor’s care all these weeks, couldn’t tear it down, what could?

  Now, Brooke was on her knees in the passenger seat, fetching the toy Connor had pitched onto the floor yesterday. That kid was the only reason Hunter put up with her mood swings. But he had no room to talk about moods. Half the time, he resented the way she treated him. The other half, he felt like a goofy kid plucking petals from a daisy, chanting, “She likes me, she likes me not.” Trouble was, the ritual game accomplished nothing…except to destroy the flower.

  At least one good thing had come of last night’s pacing. He’d decided that he’d keep his hands—and his feelings—to himself from now on. And that he’d check in with his lawyer just as soon as she and Connor were moved into the apartment. A week from now, he’d add a brick to the wall. Because he was tired of trying to protect her from stress and angst when she clearly didn’t give a fig about him…unless he was doing something to make her life easier. Like minding Connor when she couldn’t. And hefting boxes so she wouldn’t have to.