Brittany reached over, licked the soap goatee from Cassie’s chin and barked, bubbles spilling from her mouth. Cassie sputtered with laughter, then she grabbed the liverand-white puppy to her bare chest in a hug.
“Don’t be mad, Sharon. Brittany didn’t mean to be bad.” Her shining eyes—Grant’s eyes—begged forgiveness. Just as his had countless times throughout the years, and just as easily melted Sharon’s heart.
Perhaps it was her destiny to be won over by those thickly lashed Parker eyes, so dark blue they bordered on black, be it father’s or daughter’s. She shook her head with a sigh, leaned against the door frame, arms crossed, and just watched, as a rush of love flooded her.
“Brittany is my very best friend. I love her,” Cassie declared, pink coloring her cheeks. Black hair the exact shade of Grant’s slipped from where it was pinned at the top of her head.
Sharon smiled, then went to kneel next to the tub and tuck a strand of hair beneath a pin. “Well, best friends or not, we had better get her out of the tub and dried. Otherwise you won’t be able to have her on the bed tonight.”
As if she understood, Brittany leaped from the tub, then shook herself, spraying water and soap every direction. “Brittany,” Sharon gasped.
Brittany ducked her head and woofed. Cassie snorted and choked, trying to swallow her laughter, while Sharon rolled her eyes, then grabbed a towel and began drying the pup. Then she turned to Cassie, fresh towel in hand. “Your turn, little goose.”
Cassie giggled and climbed out of the tub with a splash of water and a flurry of slim arms and legs. Bittersweet warmth spiraled through Sharon at the way the little girl snuggled into the thick bath towel and leaned against her, hungry for contact from a woman and for a hug or a kiss, which Sharon happily gave. The child needs a mother, she thought with a sudden ache of heart. An ache that lessened only slightly when she squeezed Cassie.in a tight hug, as if she were able to somehow make up for the loss.
If only she could.
She slowly released the girl and reached for a soft, flannel nightgown that swallowed Cassie, the little girl’s bony ankles poking out below the hem. She stood and turned, and came face-to-face with herself in the steam-rimmed mirror.
Her thick, russet curls corkscrewed in every direction, as usual, heedless of attempts to tame them. Her round cheeks were flushed, her brown eyes wide and full of suppressed good humor.
At one time she would have grimaced and wrinkled her freckled nose in despair, but now she just shrugged with a grin. She had long accepted that no one would ever beat down the door to put her on the front of a glamour magazine, and that there were worse things in life than being plain.
Two bedtime stories and one damp pup later, Cassie raced from the living room to the spare bedroom, Brittany galloping at her heels. They jumped into bed as one as Sharon entered the room. Cassie turned with outstretched arms for a soap-scented hug and a slightly wet kiss that wrapped an iron-clad fist of love around Sharon’s heart and promised no relief.
She wanted no relief.
A little over a year ago her childhood friend, Grant, had returned to Valdez with his wife, Catherine, a tall, elegant blond beauty with a cool manner. Everything that Sharon was not. And with them was their tiny daughter, Cassie, the image of Grant when he was young.
Sharon had fallen in love with Cassie, as she had fallen in love with Grant years ago. But this time it was a love eagerly returned, making Sharon ache with happiness and long with all her heart for a little girl, a child of her own. And mourn once again the fact that she would never be a mother.
She pushed the dark thought away and dropped one last kiss on Cassie’s warm cheek. She left the little girl, covers pulled to her chin, whispering to Brittany, who snuggled next to her and was doing her utmost to hog the pillow.
Sharon probably shouldn’t let the dog sleep there, but Brittany had been a highlight in Cassie’s life in the several months since Catherine’s death from cancer. So much so that Sharon had considered giving Brittany to Cassie as a gift. But her own heart had been so totally won by the puppy that she couldn’t bear to part with her. Instead, she made sure that Cassie had lots of time to spend with the dog. Sharon refused to deprive Cassie of anything that made her happy.
Wind moaned around the eaves as Sharon paused at the living room window. Snow swirled and danced in the night, captured by streetlight, while naked tree branches bent and swayed with the storm.
Not the best of nights to be driving back from Anchorage, she thought, and hoped that Grant would get in soon. Three hundred miles of often winding, steep roads made more dangerous by darkness and thickly falling snow. It was hard not to worry.
He could probably make the drive with his eyes closed, she reminded herself, then pulled the drapes, able to shut the storm out but not her concern. No doubt because she had been worrying about Grant most of her life, off and on. She shook her head at the thought. Old habits were hard to break.
She flipped the front porch light on, then padded down the hall to check on Cassie. The house seemed warmer, snugger, more a home with the child there. Cassie lay on her side, one hand folded beneath her cheek, the other nesting on Brittany’s neck. Nose to nose, sharing the pillow.
When she was fourteen, Sharon had dreamed of doing this very thing, except the child she would be checking on would be her own. And the father, Grant, would be at Sharon’s side.
Stuff that fantasies were made of, little to do with reality, she thought with a soft smile. Even as a teenager she should have known better. It hadn’t taken long to figure out that Grant, with his dark good looks, was not interested in his childhood friend. Hope died hard, but a few years later she finally accepted that he never would be hers, and she settled for friendship, instead.
Sharon shrugged memory aside and turned back toward the living room to curl on the couch in a puddle of lamplight. She pulled an afghan over her lap, book in hand, to listen to the groan and whisper of the storm at the windows. And to wait for Grant.
Thick snow swirled through the black of night, quickly adding depth to the eight inches on the ground, coating the windshield almost faster than the wipers could push it aside. A gust of wind rocked the four-wheel drive. Grant slowed his speed. January. The heart of another dark Alaskan winter that had settled with a vengeance over the land.
Not that it mattered to him. Seasons and weather were something out of his control. He had learned, while growing up, that winter in Valdez meant short days, long evenings, delayed or canceled flights, which was why he was driving back from Anchorage. There would be over three hundred inches of snow by spring if Valdez got her average snowfall. They were well on their way to the average. All a fact of life that no amount of complaining could change.
He used to look forward to winter, the first snow, skis waxed, snow machines tuned. Now the skis were covered with dust, the snow machines untouched, and likely to remain that way.
He wheeled the pickup into town, streetlamps casting light and shadow along empty streets. A neon pink-andyellow sign flashed from a bar window, washing brilliant color across the snow. The grocery store was darkened, the parking lot vacant except for one lone, battered sedan quickly being covered with fresh snow.
Sharon’s front porch light reached through the darkness in welcome. The soft glow of a lamp behind the living room curtain told him she was probably up, waiting, though he had told her not to. He should have known to save his breath.
Grant smiled in spite of himself, tension easing as he pulled into the driveway and cut the engine. He slid from the pickup, weariness fading as he strode to the front porch. The door swung open as he reached for it.
“Grant.”
Sharon’s voice was soft, her hair a riot of curls. Baggy gray sweats hung from her slender frame.
“You made good time. Come in. Come in.”
She