Читать книгу The Maverick's Return - Marie Ferrarella, Marie Ferrarella - Страница 10

Chapter Two

“Well,” Jamie said in response to the unreadable expression on his brother’s face, “think of it as the price you have to pay if you want to get to meet your nephews and niece.”

The triplets, Dan thought. He’d almost forgotten about them.

“Okay,” he replied gamely, “if you’re really serious.”

Jamie managed to keep a straight face for approximately fifteen seconds, and then he finally broke down and laughed.

“I’m just curious about what you’ve been doing, but if you don’t want to talk about it,” he said more soberly, “that’s okay.”

Dan appreciated that his brother wasn’t pressuring him for information. The very fact that Jamie wasn’t encouraged him to share.

“It’s not that I don’t want to talk about it, Jamie. I just don’t want to put you to sleep.” The smile on his face was a tad sheepish. “The last twelve years have been pretty boring.”

The sadness Jamie saw in his brother’s eyes told him that those years weren’t boring so much as they might have left a scar on Dan’s soul. Jamie found himself aching for his brother.

“Tell me when you’re ready,” Jamie said. “No pressure.”

Dan was about to say something in response, but just then, a slender, willowy redhead with lively blue eyes and an infectious smile walked into the room, coming from the back of the house. She looked straight at him.

“I thought I heard you talking to someone,” she said to Jamie.

Both Jamie and his brother rose to their feet in unison.

“Danny,” Jamie said, putting his hand out to the woman who had just crossed over to them, “I’d like you to meet the light of my life, my wife, Fallon.” Affectionately wrapping his arm around her waist, Jamie continued the introduction. “Fallon, this is my older brother Danny.”

Jamie expected a nod of acknowledgment from the pretty young woman. A smile at best. But he quickly discovered that Fallon was just like her husband. Rather than greeting him with a few pleasantries, she left the shelter of her husband’s arm and went straight to him.

The young woman embraced him, giving him a warm hug that swirled straight into his heart.

“Danny! It’s so wonderful to finally meet you,” she cried enthusiastically. “Jamie’s told me so much about you!”

Stunned, still caught up in Fallon’s embrace, Dan looked over her shoulder at his brother. He’d thought that by now, Jamie would have thought of him as a distant memory—if that.

“Really?” he asked.

“Yes,” Fallon replied. Releasing her brother-in-law, she stepped back next to her husband. “Can’t get to know the man without getting to know his family. Though I must admit it took a bit of work at first. Jamie wasn’t much of a talker in the beginning,” she confided. “I think he kind of felt overwhelmed, and under the circumstances, who could blame him?” she said, looking at Jamie fondly. “But once I got him going, he told me all about you and Luke and Bailey, as well as your sisters. Bella and Dana, of course, I got to know myself. You’ve all had a rough life,” she readily acknowledged, “but it can only get better from here on in.”

Before Dan could ask about either Bella or Dana, Jamie told him, “Bella’s still in Rust Creek Falls. She’s married now. And Dana came for a while late last year. Turns out she’s living in Portland, Oregon with a nice family who had adopted her. No word on Liza yet, but we’re still looking.” He smiled broadly at Danny. “Bella and Dana will both be thrilled to know that you’re actually alive.”

The revelation stunned Dan. He stared at his brother. “You didn’t think I was alive?” he asked Jamie incredulously.

“Well, I didn’t hear from you for twelve years. The thought had crossed my mind,” Jamie said. “Anyway, it was Fallon who encouraged me to start looking, not just for you but for all the lost sheep of our family,” he said. He paused to press a kiss to his wife’s temple. “I don’t mind telling you that this woman saved my life.”

Fallon put her hand on her husband’s chest. “Now, don’t get all melodramatic on your brother, Jamie,” Fallon chided.

“No melodrama,” Jamie responded. “Just the plain truth. I was in a really bad way after Paula died,” he told Dan.

“Paula?” Dan asked. It occurred to him that he knew next to nothing about what Jamie had gone through in the last twelve years, just what he had gotten from the TV program.

A pang twisted his gut. He should have been here. Somehow, even though his grandparents had all but thrown him and his older brothers out, he should have found a way to be there for Jamie and his sisters. A way to get over his all-but-soul-crushing guilt, a way to keep them all together as a family.

“His first wife,” Fallon interjected.

The fact that Jamie had been married to someone else first didn’t seem to bother her, Dan observed. She seemed to take it all in stride. Jamie had really lucked out with Fallon, Dan thought. He was genuinely happy for his brother. At least one of them had found happiness, despite the fact that the odds had felt as if they were against all of them.

“The triplets were born prematurely,” Jamie explained, continuing to fill his brother in. “Paula died shortly after that from complications caused by the C-section. For a long while, I felt it was all my fault.”

Confused, Dan wondered how that could possibly be his brother’s fault.

“Paula didn’t want kids. I did.” A semi-sad smile played on his lips. “I guess I missed the sounds of a big family.”

Fallon took over her husband’s narrative. It was clear that she didn’t want him to dwell on what she felt were his unfounded feelings of guilt.

“The whole town pitched in to help Jamie out when Paula passed on. A bunch of us took turns volunteering to take care of the triplets so that he could regain his foothold.”

“I wouldn’t have made it without you,” Jamie told her.

“Without us,” Fallon corrected. “Like I said,” she told Dan, “the whole town pitched in.”

Deftly, Fallon changed the subject, asking Dan, “So, have you come back to Rust Creek Falls to stay?”

“Not to sound as pushy as this redhead,” Jamie interjected, “but have you?”

Dan was still trying to make his mind up about that. “I’m not sure yet.”

Fallon didn’t hesitate. “Well, you’re staying with us while Jamie helps you to make up your mind,” she told Dan. Her tone, warm and friendly, left no room for argument.

Still, Dan felt he had to at least offer a protest. “I can’t impose.”

“Family never imposes,” Jamie insisted. “End of discussion. You’re staying,” he said with finality. Then he got back to his initial question. “So where have you been all this time?”

That was simple enough to answer. “The last ten years I’ve been in Colorado.”

“Colorado?” Jamie repeated. “I can’t picture you in Colorado.”

Dan understood where Jamie was coming from on that. Colorado brought up images of big cities and he was a country boy at heart.

“I’ve been booking dude ranch vacations for city dwellers who fancy themselves cowboys,” Dan told his brother and Fallon. “It’s not a bad living,” he was quick to add. “And I get to spend most of my time on horseback.”

“Now, that I can picture,” Jamie told him. “You said you’ve been in Colorado for the last ten years, but you’ve been gone from Rust Creek Falls for twelve. Where did you go before then?”

“Cheyenne,” Dan answered. “I worked as a ranch hand there—along with Luke and Bailey. But they didn’t much care for it,” he confessed with a sad smile. “They got restless and then, one night, they just took off.” He paused, trying to deal with an unexpected wave of sadness that washed over him. Suppressing a sigh, he told Jamie, “I haven’t seen them since.”

Fallon leaned forward and put her hand up on her brother-in-law’s shoulder. “We’ll find them,” she promised.

“Isn’t she amazing?” Jamie asked him. There was pride in his eyes. “She just keeps spreading optimism wherever she goes, no matter what.”

A light pink hue rose to Fallon’s cheeks as she pointedly ignored her husband’s compliment. Rerouting the conversation again, she asked Dan, “Would you like to meet our kids?”

He could think of nothing that he would like better. “I’d love to,” Dan responded.

“Then come this way. You can come too, Jamie,” she added playfully, as if it was an afterthought. “Now, brace yourself,” she told Dan. “These are not your typical year-and-a-half-old babies. They could use Jared, Henry and Kate in caffeine commercials,” she confided.

“By the way, Kate’s the one with a bow on her head,” Jamie told him as they walked to the bedroom that the triplets occupied when they were downstairs.

He explained that the official nursery was upstairs, but because they wanted the triplets near them as much as possible, they’d created a second room for the babies downstairs where they could take their naps.

“She had such short hair,” Jamie explained, “everyone thought I had three sons. After a while, I got tired of telling them that Kate was a girl, so I put a bow on her to set them straight.”

“Now her hair is finally growing in,” Fallon told him as she led the way into the back room. “Which is a good thing, because she keeps pulling that bow off.”

Dan couldn’t hold back the smile when he stepped into the room and saw the triplets. The two boys were both on their feet, their chubby little fingers grabbing the side of their playpen and shaking it. Dan had a feeling that the playpen’s life expectancy was in serious jeopardy of being severely shortened.

The third triplet was seated on her well-padded bottom, serenely playing with a floppy-eared stuffed bunny, seemingly totally oblivious to the commotion her brothers were creating.

Beaming with unabashed pride, Jamie introduced his triplets.

“Dan, I’d like you to meet Henry and Jared,” he said, indicating the two standing boys. “And this little sweetheart is Kate. Kids,” Jamie said to his triplets, “this is your uncle Danny. Can you say ‘Hi’ to him?” he prompted.

An uneven chorus of something that could be thought to pass for “Hi!” rose up following Jamie’s request.

“They talk?” Dan asked, his voice a mixture of surprise and envy. He knew next to nothing when it came to children and even less than that when it came to babies.

“Talk?” Jamie echoed, then said with a laugh, “They don’t stop talking. Not even in their sleep. Of course, most of the time it sounds like gibberish and I can’t understand what they’re saying, but they seem to be able to communicate with each other just fine.”

“That’s because twins and triplets have a language all their own,” Fallon told her husband.

Dan dropped to his knees beside the playpen to get closer to the three little people who had been instrumental in getting him to finally come home. Something stirred within him as he watched them for a moment.

“Hi, kids.”

Again he received an uneven chorus echoing the greeting. Kate pulled herself up to her feet and made her way over to him. She offered him a sunny smile and just like that, she took him prisoner.

Dan ran his hand along her silky hair. “She’s going to be a charmer,” he told Jamie.

“What do you mean ‘going to be’?” Jamie asked. “She already is one.”

“You’re right,” Dan laughed, unable to take his eyes off the little girl. “My mistake.”

* * *

Dan spent the next hour getting to know his brother’s children as well as his brother’s wife. It was the best hour he could remember spending in the last twelve years.

But then it was time to put the triplets down for a nap.

“I’m afraid you’re going to have to leave the room now,” Fallon told him, apologizing. “I’ll never get them down for their naps if you’re in eyesight.”

“I understand,” Dan said. He was already at the bedroom door, although he did pause for one last backward glance.

“They’re something else, aren’t they?” Jamie said with pride.

“They’re beautiful kids,” Dan agreed. And then he thought of the circumstances that Jamie had been forced to go through shortly after the triplets’ birth. “You must have had a really hard time coping right after Paula’s death,” Dan said with immense sympathy. Again, he fervently wished he could have been there for Jamie.

“It was hard,” Jamie admitted. “But Fallon wasn’t kidding. It felt like the whole town pitched in to help. Otherwise, quite honestly, I don’t know what would have happened or what I would have done. When you have just two hands and three kids, the numbers aren’t exactly in your favor,” he told his brother, his words underscored with a good-natured laugh.

Dan had been under the impression that Fallon had really meant a few people at best. But there was no reason for Jamie to exaggerate. That hadn’t been in the nature of the boy he’d known.

“The whole town?” Dan asked in amazement, just to be sure.

“Yeah, the whole town.” Jamie paused for a moment before adding, “Anne helped, too.”

The mere mention of her name was like a fissure in the dam. The crack split open, spewing forth a deluge of memories upon Daniel.

“Have you been by to see Anne since you got back?” Jamie asked, breaking into his thoughts.

Not a day had gone by in the last twelve years that Dan hadn’t wanted to see Anne Lattimore. That he hadn’t wanted to pack up his meager belongings and find Annie. But he had staunchly never given in to that desire.

Mainly because he was convinced that she was far better off without him.

And even now, as he stood in his brother’s house, battling the urge to ride up and see the woman he had loved practically from the first moment he’d drawn breath, a part of him still felt that she would be better off if he just left well enough alone.

“No,” Dan answered quietly, “I haven’t. When I came into town, I didn’t stop anywhere else. I came straight to your place.”

“I appreciate that, I really do,” Jamie told him. “But if you ask me, I think that you really should go see her.”

Jamie was tempted to say more, but he stopped himself. He pressed his lips together, as if physically blocking the words that had risen to his tongue.

“Maybe later,” Dan demurred.

“There’s already been too much ‘later,’ Danny. Twelve years of ‘later.’ You need to go see her. Now. Before any more time is lost. You can’t get that time back. And the more you drag your feet, the more time you lose,” Jamie insisted.

“When did you get this philosophical bent?” Dan asked, amused.

“Right about the time that I realized that I’d been in love with Fallon for a long time and needed to make her aware of it. Now, no more talk. It’s still early. Go!” He opened the front door and all but pushed his brother out. “And when you’ve seen Anne and talked to her,” he told Dan, “you can come back here—to your home.”