Copyright © 2015 by Jackie Braun Fridline
Helen Lacey
Oliver looked so peaceful and content resting against Tanner’s chest.
Cassie watched Tanner push up from the chair effortlessly. Oliver didn’t protest, but instead seemed to snuggle closer to his uncle. “He was restless,” Tanner explained and gently touched the baby’s head. “And he seems to like this.”
She smiled warmly. “Thank you for taking care of him for me while I was sick.”
Tanner met her gaze. “That’s what family is for, Cassie.”
Her throat tightened. Family. It had been so long since she’d thought she had anyone to call her family, besides her baby son. To have someone to rely upon … to need someone herself, was a different kind of feeling.
“How about I put him in his crib and then make you some tea?” Tanner suggested quietly.
Cassie nodded. “That would be good.”
He moved across the room and stood beside her. Cassie’s heart rolled over when she gazed into the sleeping face of her son and she touched Oliver’s head gently. She glanced up and saw Tanner watching her with a kind of blistering intensity, and the look made her insides quiver.
This was physical attraction … pure and simple.
An attraction she’d always been able to ignore. Until now.
HELEN LACEY grew up reading Black Beauty and Little House on the Prairie. These childhood classics inspired her to write her first book when she was seven, a story about a girl and her horse. She loves writing for Mills & Boon® Cherish™, where she can create strong heroes with a soft heart and heroines with gumption who get their happily-ever-after. For more about Helen, visit her website, www.helenlacey.com.
For Nani
Because big sisters really are the best!
Cassie Duncan placed her four-month-old son in his bed and gently rubbed his belly through the pale blue cotton onesie. Oliver’s breathing slowed and she watched his tiny chest rise and fall, marveling at the perfect little person who’d come into her life.
If only your daddy was here...
But Doug was gone. Killed eight months earlier while on tour in the Middle East, he never got to see his son born. Now it was just the two of them, getting through each day. Cassie adored being a mother and loved Oliver more than she’d imagined she could love anyone. But she was sad that Doug would miss seeing his son grow up. He’d had very little family, just a younger brother in South Dakota he rarely saw. And Crystal Point was a long way from there. With a population of eight hundred, the small Australian beachside town sat at the southernmost point of the Great Barrier Reef. It was the perfect place to raise her child—quiet and safe—a place where she fit in, where she led a valuable life.
She grabbed the baby monitor, flicked on the colored shaded night-light and left the nursery. Mouse hunkered down the hall when he saw her. The one-hundred-and-sixty-pound black-and-white Great Dane always stood point at the end of the hall when she was in the nursery with Oliver. The dog pushed his big head against her leg and Cassie rubbed his neck.
“Feel like a snack?” she asked and kept walking.
Mouse followed her through to the kitchen. She gave him a couple of doggy treats and filled up the kettle. Oliver would stay asleep for a few hours, so she had time to make dinner and watch a movie. She rummaged through the pantry and settled on tinned soup and sourdough toast. The dog climbed into his bed by the door and Cassie set about making her meal.
Friday nights always seemed the quietest somehow. In the old days she would have called her best friends, Lauren and Mary-Jayne, to come around and they would have opened a bottle of wine and eaten cheese and crackers and shared stories about their week. But Lauren was recently engaged and making wedding plans with her fiancé. And Mary-Jayne was locked away in her workshop and wouldn’t be around for a week.
And I have Oliver.
Having a baby had changed her priorities. Not that Cassie had ever been much of a party girl. She’d dated Doug for three years before his death and although they hadn’t seen much of one another in the last eighteen months, she had stood by her commitment to their relationship. Being involved with a career soldier had been difficult. However, the long absences and constant worry for his safety hadn’t altered her feelings. She’d loved him, and now she loved their son.
She cranked the lid off the soup tin, poured it into a saucepan and sliced some bread while she waited for the soup to heat up. The baby monitor was quiet and Cassie relaxed when she sat down at the big scrubbed table and ate her dinner. The house was silent, except for its usual creaks and moans. But she loved the house and had lived in it for most of her life.
When her grandfather had fallen ill four years ago and needed full-time care, the house had been sold to an investment buyer to pay for his care and she had become a tenant in her own home. Of course she was grateful to have been able to stay on and lease the property from the new owner.
The new owner had turned out to be Doug and when he briefly returned from his tour and came around to check on the house, they’d quickly fallen for one another. There weren’t fireworks or a rush of crazy heat, but they’d shared something more...something lasting. It was grounded in friendship and Cassie would have happily spent her life with him had fate not intervened. But only months after she’d told him she was pregnant Doug was dead, killed by a sniper in a secret operation along with two other soldiers.
She’d been living in the house ever since, paying the rent and utilities, and had begrudgingly started looking for another place to live while waiting for the home she loved to be pulled out from under her and Oliver.
Because the house now belonged to Doug’s brother, Tanner McCord. She’d met him twice and on both occasions he’d proven to be the disinterested, brooding loner Doug had described. She knew the tension between the two men went back a long way and whenever she’d asked Doug about it he’d quickly dismissed her questions. Now all she could do was wait until she learned what Tanner planned to do with the house. Eight days earlier she’d received an email. He was coming back to Crystal Point. He wanted to see her. He wanted to talk.
He wants to kick me out of my home...
Cassie shuddered. Damn. She should be better prepared. She should have found somewhere else to live. She should have contacted a lawyer again and ascertained whether Oliver had any rights to Doug’s estate. Instead, she’d buried her head in the sand, plastered on her regular happy smile and hoped things would work out. Like a naive fool. As always.
She shook off the unease in her blood and finished her meal. Once she’d eaten and washed up, she left the kitchen, checked the baby, gathered her things and headed for the bathroom. Twenty minutes later she was showered, dried and wearing her comfiest gray sweats. By seven she was in front of the television watching a DVD.
But not even her favorite romantic comedy could hold her attention. She’d had a headache all afternoon, amplified by the increasing funk she’d been in since Tanner’s email had arrived. She was nervous. On edge and restless at the idea of facing him without Doug by her side. And she felt...alone.