by Loree Lough
She knew he was right. And yet…how lovely would it have been if the baby had seen his first rainbow during this trip?
Within minutes, he was steering onto Captains Quarters Road.
“Well,” he said, parking in the open garage beneath the condo, “here we are.”
She stifled a groan as he helped her from the car.
“I feel about a hundred years old after sitting that long.”
“Your body has been through a lot, so that’s to be expected.”
Brooke watched as Connor kicked at the wet sand, then sat down and grabbed handfuls of it, giggling as it clumped and stuck to his fingers.
“I’d love to drive that car,” she admitted.
“Sorry. It’s a stick shift, and your leg hasn’t healed well enough to hold down the clutch.”
She sighed. “I know, but a girl can dream.”
“If you don’t overdo it, you might be able to take it for a short spin before we leave.”
Brooke didn’t know what to make of the look on his face—something akin to fondness—and the affectionate tone of his voice. There were still too many questions unanswered, too many problems unsolved to put all of her faith in this man. Hunter he hoisted the baby’s backpack, then picked Connor up, and after unlocking the door he helped Brooke inside.
“I’ll put Connor’s porta-crib in my room—first door on the right there—and you can have the master. You’ll rest better that way, and so will I.”
Brooke thought of Sun Tzu’s famous quote, “Choose your battles wisely, and do not fight battles you cannot win.”
He dumped the contents of the backpack on the living room floor. “He’ll be okay while I bring in the crib.”
She nodded.
“I’ll get him set up first thing, and once he’s down for the count, you can do the same. Deal?”
The drive must have tired her out more than she’d realized, because a nap sounded wonderful.
“Okay, but only if you’ll promise to let me help with supper.”
“We’ll see,” he said.
Four hours later she walked into the kitchen feeling almost normal. Hunter was chopping vegetables at the bar counter.
“How can I help?”
“Everything’s done,” he said, using his salad knife as a pointer. “I figured we could eat on the deck.”
A light breeze fluttered the canvas awning, startling a gull that had perched on the railing. The sky glowed like a canvas of Texas bluebonnets, and the sun hung low in the sky. Soon it would slip behind the horizon like a big gold coin dropping into a slot. Bay water slapped gently against the boat dock mere feet from the deck, and in the distance, sailboats and pontoons crisscrossed the gray-blue surface of the water.
“Since you’re cooking everything, I’ll set the table.”
Hunter gave it a moment’s thought. “Okay, I’ll carry the stuff out there after I fire up the grill.” He used the tip of his knife to poke the marinating steaks. “Oh, yeah. They’re ready.” He slid open the door, then locked the gate at the top of the stairs. “C’mon, buddy,” he said, gathering Connor in his arms. “Get ready for the biggest playpen you’ve ever seen!”
Brooke followed and leaned against the railing, drinking in the view. “Beautiful,” she whispered. “Like a postcard.”
An hour later, the threesome sat around the bistro table in the corner of the deck. Since the condo didn’t come with a high chair, Hunter held Connor on one knee. It amazed her that he managed to eat while feeding the baby and prying flatware, salt and pepper shakers, and napkins from quick little hands. Watching the two of them was like sitting front-row center as a comedy team performed slapstick.
After the meal, Hunter spread a quilt on the deck and covered it with Connor’s toys. Brooke began stacking plates.
“That can wait until we get Short Stuff over there to bed,” Hunter said. “Besides, we haven’t had dessert yet, and there’s no point cleaning up twice.”
“Cake?” Connor said, toddling over to Hunter.
“Aw, why not,” he said, carrying the baby inside.
When they returned, Connor led the way, smiling proudly as he carried a fat white envelope that said Brooke. Behind him, Hunter wore a lopsided grin.
“Sorry,” he said, leaning left as he put the cake in front of her. “It’s kinda…tilted.”
“Sorry,” Connor echoed, slapping the card down beside it.
Hunter picked him up, and Brooke said, “It looks delicious.” And to prove it, she swiped a fingerful of frosting from the tall side.
He put a dozen or so toothpicks on the table and proceeded to poke them into the cake one by one. “Forgot to buy candles,” he explained. “Sorry.”
“Hoppy birthday!” Connor hollered. “Hoppy birthday!”
“You guys are just as silly as silly can be,” she said, grinning. “My birthday isn’t until—”
“Don’t be a party pooper,” Hunter whispered. “Can’t you see the kid’s really into this?” He deposited Connor on the nearest chair. “I hope this isn’t a sign that he’s gonna be one of those kids who’ll worry us to death, partying his way through high school and college.”
Brooke’s heart beat harder at the mention of us. It made no sense to feel this way, because they’d spent half a lifetime trying to avoid one another.
He fished a book of matches from his shirt pocket. “Now, let’s not drag out the birthday song,” he said to Connor, “because I have no idea how fast toothpicks burn.”
As they sang, loud and off-key, Brooke laughed and cried at the same time. She’d never been happier…or more afraid. Her life seemed even more lopsided than the cake.
“You guys are great,” she said, accepting their hugs and kisses as Barry White crooned “You’re the First, the Last, My Everything” from the radio Hunter had leaned on the kitchen sill. Quirky fate? Brooke didn’t think so. If this rough, tough cake-baking carpenter didn’t have feelings for her, he sure had a funny way of showing it.
Everything he’d said and done, from that morning on Beth’s porch to this amazing, heart-stopping moment, was proof that he cared about her. Who said love had to be hearts and flowers, bells and whistles? Couldn’t it be sticky chocolate frosting topped with charred toothpicks, instead?
Brooke realized in that moment that she’d just admitted she loved him. It made no sense. But who said love had to make sense?
*
HUNTER HELD UP the baby monitor’s receiver and held out one hand. “Are you up for a short walk?”
Brooke joined him on the deck and put her hand in his. What better time to ask him about the adoption than under the round, glowing moon?
They’d only gone a few steps when he said, “I have a confession to make.”
Maybe she wouldn’t have to pull the adoption information out of him after all.
“Remember when we were moving you into Deidre’s apartment, and that big ugly spider blocked the door?”
“I still cringe every time I think about spider goo covering the entire palm of my hand.” If he needed to lead into the confession in dribs and drabs, it was okay with her.
“You saved me that day.”
She laughed. “Yeah. I guess I kinda did, didn’t I?”
“But before you mashed that monster—” he lifted her hand and pressed a kiss to her palm “—I was in the back of the truck looking for something to whack it with. And I remember looking at you cowering up there on the landing and thinking, ‘I’ve never seen a more beautiful sight.’”
He stopped walking and stood in front of her, put both hands on her shoulders. “I was wrong,” he said, sounding a little frightened, a little shy. “You knocked that vision out of the ballpark looking the way you do tonight.”
This was what he wanted to confess?
“I wanted to bring you out here earlier,” he continued. “Thought maybe I could show you the green flash at sunset. But Connor got hungry and, well, you were there, so you know how that went.”
A crafty gleam twinkled in his eyes. “Yeah, maybe.” He took her hand again. “Let’s get back to the condo so you can open your birthday card from me.”
“But you signed the one Connor made.”
“Only because he forced me to.” Hunter chuckled. “That’s some kid we’ve got there.”
First us, now we…
While he went inside to get the card, she used the matches that had lit her birthday toothpicks to fire up the tiki torches at each corner of the deck. There was a fat candle on the railing, and after putting in on the table between two lounge chairs, she lit that, too.
The window of his bedroom was open, and she could hear him, humming as he dug through his suitcase in search of her card. Brooke sat in one of the chairs as an old classic wafted from the stereo, “We’ve Only Just Begun.”
Seconds later, he sat down beside her. “Here you go,” he said, holding out a 6 x 9-inch manila envelope.
Too large to hold an ordinary birthday card. Would she find adoption papers inside?
She lifted the flap and found a smaller white envelope inside, as well as a packet of blue-sheathed papers. Tempting as it was to look at the papers first, Brooke read the message he’d written inside the card: “From the bottom of my heart, happy birthday.” And it was signed “Love, Hunter.”
She closed the card and traced the glittery pink ballerina decorating its front. “This seems as good a time as any,” she said, “to ask what all the ballerina references are about.”
He told her about his niece’s figurine, how after reassembling it with construction adhesive, it was even stronger than before.
He reached across the table and, taking her hand, added, “You remind me of that ballerina. Delicate and beautiful, but sturdy. You’re a fighter, too. I love that about you.”
He cleared his throat, then traded the card for the document.
A tiny nervous giggle escaped her lips as she realized they weren’t adoption papers after all. “Is this…” She pointed at the top page. “It’s a deed?”
“I didn’t know what else to get you.”
“So you bought Beth and Kent’s house.”
Grinning, he said, “Well, technically, it was Connor’s.”
How had he arranged all this without her knowledge?
“I…I don’t know what to say.” He looked hurt by her reaction. Disappointed, too.
She’d held her tongue far too long. It was time to clear the air once and for all.
“I owe you an apology, for holding you solely accountable for what happened to my mom. I’ve never admitted this to anyone, but if I hadn’t whimpered and whined when we ran out of ice cream that night, Mom wouldn’t have been in the store when the gunman came in.
“I had a lot of time to think about it, lying there in the hospital. And I finally figured out that blaming you made it easier for me to cope with my part in her death.
“So you need to know, I’m sorry for the way I’ve treated you all these years. Sorry that I behaved like an ungrateful brat when you offered to help with Beth’s house. And for thinking you were working behind my back, trying to take Connor from me.
“I’m sorry about all of it, Hunter. You deserved better then. You deserve better now. And I hope you’ll forgive me.”
To his credit, Hunter didn’t interrupt, not even once, and when at last she finished, Brooke stuffed the papers back into the envelope. “Well?” she said, tossing it onto the table. “Did you buy the house for me?”
One side of his mouth lifted in a grin as he studied her face. How dare he sit there looking all handsome and innocent, making her want to be in his arms instead of in this stiff-backed chair, waiting for forgiveness.
“Please say something!”
He broke into a full-blown smile. “You’re gorgeous when you’re flustered and confused.”
Flustered? Confused? She pointed at the envelope. “You bought my sister’s house right out from under me. How am I supposed to feel?”
“Whoa. Wait. I didn’t buy the house. It’s a transfer of deed. Which you’d know if you had read the papers. And here’s why….”
He explained that while she’d been unconscious and completely vulnerable, her boss had called and asked him to tell Brooke that she felt awful about having to replace her. And within days of that, Mrs. Damian had threatened to put Connor into foster care.
“She’d read about your accident in the newspaper. Somehow found out you’d lost your job, too, and felt she had no choice but to start hunting for a foster family.
“I couldn’t let that happen, so I did what I had to do. To protect you. To protect him. I never intended to keep it a secret forever. Only until you were…better.”
He drove a hand through his hair. “If that makes you mad, well, I’d rather live with that than stand by while that old bat stuck our boy in some foster home with strangers, and you had nowhere to live.”
“I could have stayed Beth’s.”
“No, you couldn’t. You had eight, maybe ten months’ savings left. And don’t look at me like that. Yes, I went through your stuff. Had to so I could keep the lights on and the water running and make sure that stuffed shirt at the bank didn’t have any excuse to start foreclosure proceedings.”
“So let me get this straight. You paid my bills while overseeing the renovations at Beth’s house and making sure Connor was safe. Spent countless hours at my side in the hospital, and worked to open a school for troubled teens. And did it all without me knowing about it.”
“Yeah. So? I didn’t sneak around because I wanted to. You weren’t healthy enough to deal with any of it. Dr. Norris spelled it out in plain English. Stress could have killed you. Literally.”
He was on his feet now, one hand pressed to the back of his neck, the other waving in the air as he paced the length of the deck. “If you’re gonna get your nose all outta joint over this…if you’re willing to let it end us over it, well, maybe I misjudged you.”
He stopped in front of her chair, gripped her biceps and brought her to her feet. “I know that head injury was serious, but for the love of Pete, surely you can figure out that I didn’t have a choice.”
She stared into his beautiful grief-stricken face and felt ashamed, from the soles of her feet to the itchy almost-bald spot on her head.
He gave her a little shake. “Don’t you get it, Brooke?”
Where should she begin? By admitting that yes, she got it. With another apology for letting stubbornness and resentment blind her to everything good in him?
“I get it,” she began. “I get that you figured out how I’ve always felt like a misfit, traipsing along one road, then another, never feeling that any place was home. I get that you took me off that lonely road, made me feel like finally, I belong. I get that you’ve provided me with a home that’s made of far more than bricks and boards and mortar. I get that I don’t deserve any of it after treating you like I have all these years…”
Brooke stood on tiptoe—not an easy feat in her condition—and kissed him long and hard. Then she stepped back just far enough to look into his eyes. “I’m sorry, Hunter.”
“Sorry? For that?” He chuckled. “Don’t be. I’m not. ”
“No…I’m sorry for not telling you what I’ve known in my heart all these years. You could have died that night, too.”
Brooke looked up, straight into his eyes. “And where would that leave Connor?” She leaned her head on his shoulder. “Where would that leave me?”
She heard him sigh as his arms wrapped around her.
“Deidre told me what she overheard,” Hunter said.
This habit he had of jumping from one subject to another was maddening.
He sat her down. Told her about the DVD, how he’d used it to gain temporary guardianship of Connor.
She felt like a fool for having doubted him. An idea sparked, and as it grew, Brooke smiled.
“Go ahead,” she said. “Adopt Connor. I won’t stop you—”
Her announcement stunned him, and he took a half step back.
“—if you marry me.”
Hunter looked up into the inky, star-strewn sky. He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. And she was afraid maybe she’d just made the biggest mistake of her life.
He drew her close and kissed her. Then he smiled and said, “I thought you’d never ask.”
*
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ISBN-13: 9781460320631
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Copyright © 2013 by Loree Lough
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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