Jodi's Mail-order Man

“Hello, Tadd.” Donovan set Penny on the floor so he could shake hands with the reluctant boy. They were nice-looking kids, though undoubtedly Tadd took after his father. There was nothing in his brown eyes and olive skin that resembled the feminine side of the family.

“Are you an accountant, too, Mr. Masters?”

Donovan’s eyebrows shot upward at the boy’s hostile tone.

“That’s enough,” Jodie ordered quickly. Donovan Masters would think her son was a rude little monster, and it wasn’t true. As a rule, Tadd was very well behaved; his grandfather made certain of that. She unconsciously winced at the thought of her father. General Thaddeus McBride was a career air force officer who treated his family with the same rigid discipline he drilled into his flight crews.

“Actually, I’m a pilot,” Donovan murmured.

Tadd’s face brightened. “In the air force?”

“No, I have an air-transit business here in Alaska.”

“Wow. Did you hear that, Mom? He’s a pilot, just like Dad.”

Tension coiled tighter in Jodie’s stomach and she gave Tadd a warning glance. “I heard him the first time.”

In all the letters she and Cole had exchanged, he’d never mentioned that his thirty-six-year-old brother was a pilot. His descriptions had included phrases such as fun-loving, laid-back, and doesn’t take anything seriously. But not pilot.

Jodie swallowed. She didn’t need her son getting any smart ideas about playing matchmaker. She’d come up to meet Cole Masters, not his brother. Which meant she could just forget about that kiss, and Tadd could forget about her marrying a pilot “just like Dad.”

“I think coffee would be a good idea, Mr. Masters. Is anything wrong with Cole?”

An odd expression crossed Donovan’s face. “No, but it’ll take some explaining. At any rate, please call me Donovan.” He winked at Tadd. “The same goes for you.”

“All right, Donovan.” Tadd had the rapt face of a first-year cadet at the academy, listening to one of his favorite instructors.

Academy.

Jodie rolled her eyes. She’d grown up all over the world as an air force brat, and then she’d married an air force officer. Heck, she was so saturated with the air force, she couldn’t think in any other way. That was one of the reasons she wanted to marry someone not connected with the armed services. Her children needed to know there was a different world out there, with different possibilities.

“There’s a café down this way,” Donovan murmured. He took her suitcases.

“Fine.” Holding Penny’s hand, Jodie followed him down the airport concourse. It was larger than she’d expected for the size of Fairbanks, though she knew the town was a transportation center for the interior of the state.

A faint thrill of excitement crept through her, despite the unexpected turn of events. Her father had been stationed in Alaska when she was a child, right before her mother had died. She’d loved it—even the cold and wild storms of winter. It was a far cry from the heat and humidity of Florida where they’d been living for the past couple of years. There was a part of her that had always known she’d come back to Alaska.

“Have a seat, and I’ll get the coffee and treats,” Donovan said when they reached the coffee shop. He put the luggage next to a table, then pulled a chair out for Jodie. “That is…if it’s all right for the kids to have milk shakes?” he asked. “We could get sandwiches or something.”

“Milk shakes are fine,” Jodie said as she settled Penny into a chair of her own. “We ate on the plane.”

“Great. What flavor do you want, Tadd?”

“Strawberry. Penny likes it, too, but she can’t have any ’cause it makes her itch, so she has to have chocolate,” Tadd answered.

“Is that so, Penny?”

Penny sighed with a comically adult expression. “No taw’berries.”

He grinned. It was hard not to smile at Penny; she was a living ray of sunshine. A child like that could bring laughter into the darkest Alaska winter, yet it still boggled his mind that Cole was considering marriage at all, much less to a woman with two kids.

The thought nagged at Donovan as he waited in line at the cash register. The Masters family didn’t have a great track record with marriage, though his mom seemed happy enough with her second husband.

Did Cole know about the children?

Perhaps Jodie had failed to mention them in her letters. Donovan glanced at the young woman across the restaurant, then shook his head. She seemed pretty direct.

Hell, direct was an understatement. For all its innocent brevity, that kiss had sent his temperature up ten degrees. It was hard to imagine her concealing anything.

“Here you go,” he said a minute later, putting a tray down on the table. “One chocolate shake, and one strawberry. And two cups of coffee.”

Tadd’s eyes gleamed as he began drinking the concoction with a deliberate speed. “Grandfather doesn’t like us to have ice cream in the middle of the day,” he said between sips. “We can have it after dinner, but he gets upset when Mom gives us some early. Then they have a big fight.”

Hmmm.

The Richardses were getting more and more interesting. Donovan handed Jodie her cup and sat back with his own, watching her. A hundred questions begged for answers, such as: What had happened to her first husband? Were they divorced? And why would a woman with Jodie Richards’s face and body need a mail-order marriage? One thing was sure—she didn’t look old enough to have an eight-year-old son, but Cole had said she was in her late twenties.

“Sounds like you and your father have some disagreements over raising children,” he murmured.

Jodie took a sip of the steaming coffee. She shifted uncomfortably under Donovan’s curious gaze and shrugged. “Father can be rather strict. He believes in three square meals a day and a very limited amount of indulgence.”

“My grandfather is a two-star general,” Tadd contributed, his expression a peculiar mix of pride and ambivalence. “We live with him.”

“Look,” Jodie said, setting her cup down, “I’d like to know what’s going on with Cole. He said he’d meet us.”

“Yeah.” It was Donovan’s turn to look uncomfortable. “He tried to call a couple of days ago, but he couldn’t reach you.”

Her eyes narrowed. This didn’t sound good. “I decided to take an earlier flight and spend some time with a friend in Denver. So, where is Cole?”

Donovan tapped his fingers on the table. “Well, right about now he’s in the preliminary stages of climbing the West Buttress of Mount McKinley.”

Jodie stared. She didn’t know a great deal about mountain climbers, but she knew they risked their lives for the sake of climbing a chunk of rock. A rock. They couldn’t enjoy looking at the mountain from a safe distance, they had to see it close up, coupled with risk and danger and adrenaline. She understood all about adrenaline junkies. She’d married one of them.

“So,” she said carefully, trying to keep a grip on her temper, “Cole is an avid mountain climber.”

Donovan nodded. “One of the best.”

“That’s pretty great, Mom,” Tadd exclaimed. He’d finished his own milk shake and was polishing off his sister’s. “Maybe he won’t be so bad after all.”

She spun her head around, her patience strained to the limit. “Not now, Tadd. Go look after your sister.” Penny had climbed down and was exploring a rack of brightly colored postcards.

Tadd opened his mouth to protest, but a single look from his mother silenced him. Jodie was a softer touch than his grandfather, but when she laid down the law, that was that.

She waited until her son was out of immediate earshot. “Cole never said anything about being a climber.”

Donovan whistled silently at the angry sparks in Jodie’s eyes. He was right—there was a lot of fire inside Jodie Richards.

He cleared his throat, uncertain whether she was angry about Cole not telling of his favorite hobby, or that he’d taken off on a climb when he was supposed to be meeting her. Or maybe she was angry about both.