He came back with a full glass. She had a few sips.
“What else can I do, Carrie?” he asked. “Should I take you to the hospital?”
She waved off the suggestion with a vigorous shake of her head. “That’s the last thing I want.” She sat up in the bed. “Sitting a bit higher helps for a while.”
“You scared the...out of me,” he said, omitting the word he would normally use for an emotional reaction like this one.
She smiled. “I’m sorry. This was a bad attack, but it’s happened before. I’m fine now, really.”
“Your father has seen you this way?”
She nodded. “I suppose you’re going to say he has a good reason for wanting to keep me in a bubble.”
“Not a bubble, exactly,” Keegan said. “But he definitely has an excuse for wanting to protect you. What brought this on? The fire was nearly out. The dog wasn’t in the yard. I wasn’t smoking a cigar.” He smiled at the last one.
“Asthma attacks can be caused by many things. This one must have come on by stress.”
“Stress? Something I did? Something I said?”
She took his hand. Her palm was warm, so he felt her forehead. No fever.
“I guess I reacted this way because you discovered my secret.” She laughed softly. “Leave it to a nosy reporter to uncover the very details a woman tries to hide the most.”
He knew what she was referring to. He was still recovering from the shock—both of the dramatic revelation and the result. A virgin? And Carrie was beautiful, sweet, smart...and thirty.
He sat on the edge of the bed and tucked her head in the crook of his neck. “Oh, baby, it’s all right...”
“Don’t call me that. It’s bad enough that I’m the baby of my family. I don’t need to be reminded that I’ve never had an intimate relationship with a man.”
He grinned against the top of her head. “Let’s see... I can’t call you baby. I can’t call you princess. I certainly can’t call you a ruined woman. I’m running out of options, Carrie.”
They sat that way for several minutes, neither one speaking, and Carrie breathing with a blessed regularity. She placed her hand on his chest, and he covered it with his.
“You know, it’s a good thing I didn’t follow my instincts a couple of times this week. It’s no secret that I’m starting to consider you my girlfriend...” He cocked his head to try to see her face. “I’m allowed to use that one, aren’t I?”
“I suppose. It’s better than any of those other names.”
“Infinitely.”
She leaned back. “Keegan, I think I could eat something now. If you’ll help me up, I can make it to the kitchen and fix it myself.”
“Good. I was beginning to worry about your refusal of the last two meals I offered.”
“I don’t blame you for having a past,” she said. “You’re a very interesting man, you know.”
“I am?”
“Oh, yes. My reaction to Jeanette was due to my sudden and unexpected discovery of the kind of man you are versus the kind of woman I am. Naturally I figured you had had experiences—you’ve been married even—but seeing Jeanette with her arms around you brought it all into a clarity I wasn’t ready for. It’s safe to say that I’ve had problems with men in my life.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not until I’ve eaten, okay?”
“Right.”
He left the bedroom and began to tremble. He hadn’t had the shakes since he’d left the last war zone, but Carrie’s attack had scared him senseless. Wrapping his arms around his midsection, he went into the kitchen. Get a grip, Breen, he said to himself. And then the simple words she’d spoken a few minutes ago came back. “The kind of man you are versus the kind of woman I am.” She was right. He was not the kind of man she needed, and she was not the kind of woman he deserved.
“What do you think you’re doing, Breen?” he said aloud. Even thinking of bringing a sweet thing like Carrie into your muddled world is crazy. You could spoil the best thing that ever happened to you.
But what was he going to do? The truth was, he was falling for her. His terrifying fear during her attack convinced him of that fact. But was he good for her? Was a man who’d seen it all, done it all, witnessed the worst, good for a woman who communed with trees? It didn’t seem bloody likely.
* * *
JUDE CALLED SOON after Keegan went to the kitchen. Carrie took a deep breath, cleared her throat and answered. “Hi, Jude. How’s everything?”
Jude’s voice came across as anxious and high-pitched. “You’ve had an asthma attack!”
Jude could tell that from hearing four words? “I’m okay. For heaven’s sake...” Deep breath. “Don’t always assume the worst.”
“Then why is your breathing staggered? Why is your voice hoarse? Have you been coughing?”
Carrie had put up with this concern all her life, and sometimes it was difficult to find excuses for where she worked and how she felt. “I have a slight cold, that’s all.”
“I hope you’re telling me the truth. Maybe you need to see a doctor. Asthma can be worse if you have any kind of infection.”
“You think I don’t know that? I’m fine!”
“I’ll believe you, but if you aren’t, I’m coming to Michigan to get you.”
“Don’t do that. Waste of gas.” She paused for another breath. “What’s going on at home?”
“I’m engaged, but you know that. I just never get tired of saying it.”
“Have you set a date yet?”
“We’re aiming for the spring. But there’s so much to do. We have to decide where we’ll live. I can’t expect Liam to drive an hour each way to work. Maybe we’ll find something closer to Cleveland where I can keep a horse or two and my one remaining goat. Obviously, his Lakeshore Drive condo won’t work.”
Carrie laughed. “Obviously.” She asked about Jude’s son, Wesley, and their sister Alex’s family before getting around to her parents. “How’s Mom doing?”
There was a slight hesitation before Jude said, “The same, unfortunately.”
“Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“No, no. Daddy’s adjusting his hours at the hospital to be able to stay with Mom more.”
Carrie was surprised. Martin Foster loved his duties as the head cardiologist at the hospital. But then again, he would want to spend as much time as possible with his ill wife, especially if the inevitable...
“But Mom’s okay?” Carrie asked again.
“Yes, but...”
“But what?”
“It’s just so sad, you know.”
“We all know, Jude. You’ll tell me if anything changes. And in the meantime, go outside and hold your finger up to the sun. The glint off that new diamond should cheer you.”
“I love you, Care-bear.”
“Back at you. Talk soon.”
Keegan came in the room with a tray. “Everything okay?”
“Yes. I was just talking to my sister. Did I tell you she got engaged a little over a week ago? She’s over the moon. No one deserves such happiness more.”
Keegan put the tray on the bedside table. “Good for her. I brought you two sandwiches and more water. You’re supposed to drink lots of water.”
Carrie smiled at him. “My goodness, has someone been doing research?”
“Could be.”
He pulled a chair close to the bed and sat.
“Are you making sure I clean my plate?” Carrie teased.
“Something like that. Mostly I just like looking at you.”
“Keegan Breen, is that charm I see oozing out of your pores?”
“Couldn’t be,” he said. “I lost all my charm in the first grade and never managed
to find it again.”
“Then you must just enjoy watching someone breathe normally again.”
He grinned. After a moment he said, “So many times I’ve listened to you interact with your family. It’s nice that you are so close to them.”
Around a bite of sandwich she mumbled, “Uh-huh.”
“Both sisters?”
“Yep. We’re all different, but we love each other, just as I do my wonderful nephew and talented niece. And did I mention one brother-in-law who is actively involved in community service at the governmental level? And a soon-to-be brother-in-law who has a gift with numbers and making one very sad lady smile again.” She took a long sip of water. “Then there’s my mother. We all wish we could make things better for her.”
“I remember. Very tragic.”
“And my father is the most self-sacrificing man I’ve ever known, besides being a pain in the butt about my asthma.”
“But you love him, too.”
“I do. He has put up with so much from my sisters and me, yet he’s handled everything with patience and understanding...for the most part.” She tore off a bite of grilled cheese and brought it to her mouth. “But I’m still not going to let him rule my life.”
“This place where you grew up, Dancing Falls you call it?”
“Yeah. It actually has a waterfall at the back of the property. Not a large one by true mountain standards, but it’s pretty nonetheless. At dusk, when the sun is setting, the water looks like it’s dancing over the rocks. We all go there when we have problems. It’s the Foster thinking place.”
“It sounds like you miss it.”
“Sure, but that’s normal. Everyone should miss their home. Otherwise something went terribly wrong with their childhood. Mine was almost ideal. Loving parents, great place to live, lots of opportunities to learn and grow.” Not to mention an abundance of adoration from male classmates—not that I handled their attention very well.
“But for me, getting away from home and doing what I love was more important than staying where everything was comfortable and secure. I had all that, in spades, and I needed to strike out on my own.” She gave Keegan an earnest stare. “Besides my asthma, everything came fairly easy to me. I made good enough grades, had lots of friends. I was never tested in the way I should have been until I found what I wanted to do with my life. I like the challenge of turning wasted land into something beautiful and enduring.”
“Like this campground?”
She smiled so he wouldn’t misinterpret her words as another plea for him to keep his land. “I can’t deny it. This property is like an empty canvas to me. I can imagine vibrant colors and usefulness and stability for years ahead.” She sighed. “But a girl can’t have everything she wants, now, can she?”
“No, I guess she can’t.” He looked at her plate. “Are you finished?”
“It’s all gone, isn’t it? Don’t know how I managed to eat all that while talking a mile a minute. Suppose I must be feeling better.”
“I’m glad.” He picked up the tray. “If you don’t need anything else, I’m going to work at my computer for a while. I want you to rest.”
“No problem.” He left the room, and Carrie settled into the covers. A smile drifted across her face when she closed her eyes. She’d never talked so freely with anyone as she had with Keegan. It felt so good to bare her soul. It felt just right doing it with him.
* * *
THE WORDS WOULDN’T COME. Keegan stared at his blank computer monitor as images from his childhood took front and center in his mind. His upbringing couldn’t be any more different from Carrie’s. He hadn’t known he and his mom were poor until he was ten years old—unless suffering from a lack of parental affection was a by-product of poverty.
His father, who Keegan had come to realize had problems beyond mere discontent, had taken off when Keegan was five. After that, he and his mother had lived on paychecks Sonya Breen earned working part-time waiting tables at a restaurant. And when she wasn’t working, she was out looking for someone, anyone, who could make up for her sad life by supporting her now. She found him when Keegan graduated from high school. She married and died four years later. But at least she’d begged the new husband to help her son get through college. After his mom died, Keegan thanked the man who resented every dime he gave him and never saw his stepfather again.
The only bright spot in Keegan’s life had been his summers at this campground where his dad’s father had taught him to use tools and fix things and basically be a man. His granddad had done for Keegan what he’d failed to do for his own son. But the summers always ended, and Keegan always had to go back.
How does a man talk to the woman he was thinking of going through life with when they were so different? Carrie came from a loving, supportive family. She still enjoyed tight bonds with her sisters and other family members. Her father loved her—often confusing his protective instinct for love, but still...
Besides his grandfather, no one had loved Keegan, really loved him, until he’d met Marta. She would have done anything to make him happy, even travel to dangerous parts of the world to accommodate his assignments. But then she’d become pregnant and all bets were off, and all plane tickets canceled. Marta had been in training for motherhood, and Keegan was on his own.
He could have stayed with her, taken a nine-to-five job, watched his child grow day by day like other conscientious dads did, probably like Dr. Foster did. But, no. A root-bound life was not what he’d trained for, not what his psyche yearned for, not what his creative juices thrived on. After having so little, he wanted it all.
So, what was he going to do about that innocent, lovely, kind woman lying in his bed? Carrie had probably never had a cynical thought in her life. She’d never thought that mankind was doomed for its aberrant behavior. Keegan had never believed in the goodness of man. He never hoped for a better outlook for the world. He couldn’t. His experiences were real and bitter and cold. His dreams, even the simple ones, had died when he was five.
What could he give her? These lousy seven acres of neglected land? And then if they tried to build a future together, could he stay here? He was a man who’d never stayed anywhere. And though comfortable financially, he wasn’t a rich man. Money mattered, yeah, but he’d written many articles that paid very little. Honest storytelling was more important than riches. He needed a job or the profits from the sale of the campground to support himself down the road. Which road? He didn’t know. He only knew his plan had been to leave here as soon as he’d finished his book.
Keegan leaned back in his chair and stared at the bedroom door. What lay beyond that door was everything pure and good. He suddenly felt all used up, as if he were decaying from the inside out. He couldn’t bring Carrie down to his level, and he sure as heck didn’t hold any illusions that he could rise to hers.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CARRIE WAS ENJOYING a break from cold temperatures the next morning. Sitting in the forty-degree weather, she could almost imagine her drawings coming to life. How different these seven acres would look with flowers and trees and blooming shrubs. She’d decided to stay with Keegan until her next doctor’s appointment in seven days, but that only gave her more time to dream and sketch a natural paradise that wasn’t hers to plan.
But there was another risk in her decision. She believed what Keegan had told her about Jeanette; she was falling so hard for him that she could convince herself to believe anything he told her. For a woman like Carrie, that could be a dangerous path. Her past was littered with mistaken trust.
Sipping her second cup of coffee, Carrie noticed the door to Delores’s trailer opening. The elderly woman stepped outside, her coat bundled around her and a plate in her hands. She headed toward the cabin.
Carrie smiled. More scones.
“Good morning, Delores. How are you?”
>
“I’m fine, dear,” she said. “But I’m afraid I have to disappoint Keegan. I was missing one of the ingredients I needed to make my scones, so I’m forced to substitute blueberry muffins today.” She raised a napkin from the platter and offered a muffin to Carrie.
Carrie took a tentative bite and then a much larger one. “These are wonderful,” she said, thinking that if the woman’s scones were half this tasty, Keegan might have married her.
“Thank you. They’re okay, I guess, but my scones are my specialty. I like bringing a taste of jolly old England to the colonies.” She laughed at her humor.
Carrie pointed to the chair that Keegan used when he joined her outside. “Can you sit a minute and talk to me?”
“Love to.” She settled into the deep canvas seat and took a muffin for herself. “How’s our boy doing this morning? How is his mood?” Chuckling again, Delores said, “I don’t need to ask that so much anymore. Your presence has changed Keegan’s demeanor.”
Carrie smiled. “Do you mean made it worse?”
“Oh, no. Surely you can tell, Carrie, but Keegan definitely fancies you. All you’d have to do is bat those long eyelashes a few times, and I’ll bet you’d have a wedding to plan.”
Carrie almost choked on her muffin. “Whose? Mine and Keegan’s? You’re kidding, right?”
“Not at all.”
“Sorry to disappoint, Delores, but my eyelash-batting days are over. I’ve gotten into too much trouble with the wrong men.”
“I can see that you’d be cautious,” Delores said. “I could tell right away that you were smart as well as pretty.”
“Well...”
“And at first you must have been watchful of Keegan’s behavior. I mean, he was always so scruffy and gruff. But he’s changed. Both Duke and I have noticed.” Delores managed a sly grin. “I might even consider paying him some rent now.”
“Delores! Have you been able to afford it all along?”
“This is girl talk, Carrie. And there is a bond between girls. I’m far from wealthy, but I have enough that Keegan might deserve a few shillings.”
Rescued by Mr. Wrong Page 17