Autumn Promises (4 page)

E
van put Wade into his cradle and went to answer the phone. “Hi,” an eastern voice said in greeting. “I wondered if my aunt Meg is there? This is Cole Taggert.”

The name Taggert no longer made him tense, and that pleased him. His talk with Meg the day before had allowed him to see his son’s birth mother in a new light. He thought they could work together to care for the twins much more easily now.

“I’m sorry, Cole,” he told Meg’s nephew. “Meg went into Greeley to see Beth. You only missed her by minutes.”

“Actually it was Beth I was calling about. How are things going?”

“We’re all mighty worried.”

“Then she’s no better?”

Evan could hear the worry in the voice of Beth’s best friend. “I’m sorry the news isn’t better, but no, nothing has changed. Maybe you and your wife should visit.”

“We’d love to fly out and see her, but CJ isn’t doing too good herself right now. She got tossed off a horse earlier in the week, right after Aunt Meg left. She has a pretty bad femur break. I wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving her right now, and she’s not up to coming there with me.”

“Rough luck. I’m sure Beth and Jackson will understand. When I talk to Jackson again, I’ll let him know you called.”

“Thanks. Tell Aunt Meg about the accident for me, will you? Let her know the doctors are sure CJ will make a full recovery.”

Remembering what a talented trainer CJ Taggert seemed to be when he’d met her while on an extended visit to Laurel Glen, Evan said, “I sure will. That must be one mean horse to toss that wife of yours. I’d swear she had superglue on her seat the way she rides.”

“Maybe they should rename him Acetone,” Cole growled. “Dad already ordered the owner to get him off Laurel Glen.”

Evan could understand his actions. Meg’s brother, Ross, had lost his first wife when a horse had gone wild, and a teenaged Cole had been watching. He shuddered remembering that in a nearly identical in
cident both Beth and his daughter, Cris, had nearly been killed by a dangerously drugged horse. It was that incident that had taken Evan east to Laurel Glen.

“I’ll have your aunt call you when she gets home. You take it easy and take good care of CJ. I still owe both of you for stepping in and helping save Cris and Beth. I’ll be sure to pass your get-well wishes on to Beth, and you do the same with mine to CJ.”

After that Evan promised to keep the folks at Laurel Glen up to date on Beth’s progress and hung up. It occurred to him then that Beth’s parents had yet to call. He knew there were hard feelings between her and her parents over her marriage, but he would have thought the Boyers would bend now that their daughter was so seriously ill. In fact, he asked Meg about them and the possibility of their visiting when she got back later in the day. But Meg just shook her head as she sat on the sofa facing the fireplace. Evan sat on the hearth facing her. “I doubt they’ll budge even now. I’ll call Beth’s brother, Adam, and ask him if he’s contacted them but I don’t think it will make a difference. Jack asked me to call Adam anyway. He’s thinking maybe Adam and his wife, Xandra, should come. Perhaps you should think of calling Crystal and Jim, too.”

Evan’s heart sank. “Beth’s that bad that we’re calling the whole family to her side?” He lived every minute in the fear that his daughter-in-law wouldn’t live. That Jackson would feel the kind of utter
devastation he had when Martha breathed her last. Though he’d reacted badly to the news that Jackson had decided to stay in Greeley, he was relieved. At least this way Evan didn’t have to pretend he thought it would all turn out okay. Because he didn’t.

Meg looked as if she was about to cry. “She barely woke up the whole time I was there, and when she did her fever was so high most of what she said made little sense. Jack thought he saw something in her eyes when she saw me, though. Fight, I guess is the best way to describe it. He’s hoping if she sees some more familiar faces from back home, it’ll help her fight.”

“What do the doctors say?”

“That they’ll try a new antibiotic tomorrow if she doesn’t respond to this one by then.”

“But this
was
a new one. I think her OB should have cultured her when what Doc Reynolds put her on didn’t work.”

Meg sighed. “There’s nothing to be gained by speculation. Her OB is off the case anyway. There’s an infectious-disease specialist on the case now. And who knows, maybe a visit from her brother will help. And I’m sure Crystal being here would be good for Jackson. I may call Cole, too.”

Evan smacked his forehead. “I’m sorry. Your nephew called right after you left this afternoon,” he began, and gave Meg the news about CJ. After that Meg called Cole and Adam Boyer, then Evan called
Cris and her husband, Jim Lovell. About dinnertime Cris called back with the news that Jim’s sister, who was a pilot, had offered to fly both couples out to Colorado the next day. CJ wasn’t up to the trip even in a private plane but she’d insisted Cole come while she spent a few days at Laurel Glen with his father, Ross, and Ross’s wife, Amelia. Also staying behind at Laurel Glen was Adam’s sixteen-year-old son, Mark.

He and Meg made dinner together, then fed the twins. After tucking Maggie into the bassinet next to Wade’s, Evan returned to the living room to rest until the next round of feeding and changing. The fire in the living-room fireplace was blazing cheerfully when he found Meg sitting on the hearth gazing into the leaping flames. Her beauty nearly took his breath away. And when his pulse leaped and his heart began to pound, Evan realized that his reaction to her since they met had been triggered by something he hadn’t even felt in years. Something he hadn’t recognized.

Attraction.

No wonder he’d been angry when he’d seen her as an enemy. This wasn’t something anyone would want to feel for a foe. In a way, he should still be angry with her. The part of himself that felt attraction was supposed to have died with Martha. Yet just looking at Meg Taggert made him feel completely alive once again.

And scared witless!

He told himself it couldn’t be. He wouldn’t let it be. She was his son’s mother and would be in his life on and off for years to come, so he’d better just learn to get a handle on his feelings and deal with them.

“All’s quiet on the baby front,” he told her as he strode into the room, proud how matter-of-fact he sounded. He flopped as nonchalantly as he could onto the overstuffed sofa, determined to carry on a normal conversation. “Honestly, at the end of a day I feel like a general in the aftermath of a battle. I sit here analyzing how the day went so I can prepare for the new battle. You think that’s normal?”

Meg was so lost in thought, she hadn’t heard Evan come into the room. She wasn’t startled, accustomed as she was to big men who moved like cats. But when she looked away from the fire, her heart stopped for a moment.

Evan Alton was—simply put—a stunning man. As he had said of her, his iron-gray hair was the only thing about him that marked him as being in his fifties. And like her, he was as active as people decades younger. He had what she’d always thought of as a horseman’s build. Wide powerful shoulders, a broad chest, slim legs and narrow hips. His blue-gray eyes contrasted with skin tanned by the summer sun. He was devastating to her equilibrium.

And now that the conflict between them had been put to rest, she was hit by an even more devastating
thought. This man, this father of her son, made her heart pound as no man since Wade had. And what was more disturbing was that for the first time, Wade’s face was nearly impossible to recall.

This couldn’t be. She’d spent time around many men before! This was a journey she refused to take.

“I wouldn’t have thought it was normal to look at baby-sitting as a campaign, no. Two days ago, that is. But today, General Alton?” She chuckled. “Your second in command thinks it seems perfectly normal. In fact, it smacks of self-preservation. Now I know why the good Lord decided to send children to the very young even though we gain so much more tolerance and patience as we get older,” she mused, grinning. But her levity was all a smokescreen to hide the embarrassing fact that she was a bundle of nerves. She felt like a silly schoolgirl with a crush.

It was time to retreat. Regroup.

She pretended to yawn expansively. “Well, I’m turning in early. I suppose I’ll see you at two.”

Evan grinned, and her stomach turned over. “Or three. Or four. One of these days I expect to wake at dawn and panic. I think Jackson was six weeks old when the sun woke us instead of him. We both went charging into his room expecting to find heaven only knows what. He looked up at us, happy as you please, with an expression on his face that said, ‘What is with you two nuts? Can’t a guy play alone for a while without causing a big ruckus?’ We both saw that look
and read the same thing into it. Martha and I nearly fell down, we laughed so hard. He slept through the night every night after that. Kid ate like a pig all day, though.”

“Still does,” Meg said. “Jack’s appetite has become a legend at Laurel Glen. Thank you for sharing that glimpse into his early life. I’m glad he made you both laugh. When I gave him up I tried to think of it as giving a gift to a couple who wouldn’t have gotten the chance to be parents without my sacrifice.” Meg smiled and stood. She’d really better get out of there before softer emotions broke down her resistance to him.

Evan gazed up at her, looking all the more attractive with the firelight playing on his thick hair and that happy memory still twinkling in his eyes. “You made Martha’s last four years happy ones, Meg. It’s something I should have thanked you for long ago. And for the record, the doctors said the only reason she was finally able to conceive Cris was that having Jackson around let her relax enough for it to happen. Without you and your sacrifice, we never would have had either of them.”

“I’m glad,” Meg said, pasting on a smile to hide her churning emotions. “I’ll see you in the morning, be it two or eight.”

Then she retreated, but slumber proved elusive. She lay awake long into the night trying not to think about Evan. When she finally fell into a fitful sleep,
the star of her dreams was Evan Alton, not Wade Jackson. It was the first time and, when she woke, she knew with a sinking heart it wouldn’t be the last.

Evan insisted Meg be the one to greet the plane at the airstrip near the airport. He said he had more experience handling the twins alone and she couldn’t fault his logic. Nor could she pass up the opportunity to put as much space as she could between them. It was a welcome respite.

As she sat across from him eating her breakfast, she’d actually toyed with the idea of renewing hostilities, but she instinctively knew it wouldn’t help. And besides, her heart really wasn’t in it. Even though her life had been less complicated while they were at odds, she now understood that Evan had had his reasons for viewing her as he did. Plus she could see why he’d been so ill equipped to be a single parent. As he’d said, Jack and Cris had both forgiven him, so who was she to continue a battle declared over by the combatants?

She smiled as she pulled into the front gate of the airstrip Joy Lovell had chosen to use. The military metaphors just kept flowing once Evan had brought up the first one. The smile melted into what her rear-view mirror told her was a stunned expression. It was truly frightening how in tune they were. How much they had in common.

There was their shared love for Jack, Beth and the
twins, of course, but it went beyond that. Both of them were Christians. They both had a love of horses and the great outdoors. And having lost the love of their life decades ago, each continued to hold the precious memories of those two people sacrosanct.

Thankfully she was the only one struck with this ridiculous attraction problem. Only she was bothered that he slept only a few doors away. Meg frowned. Maybe she wasn’t so thankful after all! Why should she be the only one suffering? she demanded perversely. Why should she be the only miserable one?

“Because, numbskull, if he felt what you do, one of you might be tempted to do something about it!” she muttered as she got out of the Circle A’s big SUV. She’d driven the big vehicle, since she was fetching five adults.

Meg walked into the building. A cheerful woman greeted her and recommended she sit near the window when Meg said she was waiting for someone inbound. Moments later she watched a baby-blue plane dip down out of the fluffy clouds. The little blue dart cut through the sky, circling the field as it lined up for its approach. It landed smoothly and taxied toward the small terminal, where it pulled to a stop with directions from the ground crew.

“You can go out now that the engines have shut down, ma’am.”

Meg ground her teeth. She hadn’t noticed anyone ever call her ma’am before, but now that she thought
about it, it happened all the time. And she hated it. Ever since Evan had pointed out how much her hair color added to her age, she’d been much more aware of clues she’d missed. Maybe she would try to add a little subtle color. There was nothing wrong with looking one’s best.

The time for self-examination came to a sudden end as Meg pushed open the door to find that the hatch of the blue plane had swung down into a set of steps. The first one down the stairs was the pilot, Jim Lovell’s sister, Joy. Tall and blond like Jim, Joy had the same substantial build as Crystal. She wore an olive flight suit and aviator sunglasses. Jim followed, still the picture of their very own hero cop. When a killer had stalked Crystal, and later Beth, it was Jim who’d unraveled the mystery and stopped the stalker.

The newest of the Laurel Glen newlyweds were next down the steps. Adam Boyer, Beth’s older brother, paused to help his wife, Xandra, down the stairs. An ex-navy SEAL, Adam had returned to Pennsylvania with his troubled teenage son, Mark, in time for Beth and Jack’s wedding. He’d met Xandra Lexington when she was assigned to be Mark’s high school counselor.

Cole was last, after Crystal, and he spotted Meg right away, holding out his arms to her. “How’s she doing today, sweetheart?” he asked.

“No better, I’m afraid. It appears to be affecting
her liver and her kidneys. They’ve decided to change her medication again. She’s so weak.”