Heart of the Family

Jacob began removing the pegs from the board. “You’d better do as she says or I might not get to read you a story. If there’s not enough—”

Gabe leaped toward the table and scrambled to put up the game. Andy’s head nodded forward. Nancy stifled her own yawn.

Hannah made her way to Andy’s side and knelt next to him. “Time for bed.”

His head snapped up, his eyes round as saucers. “No. No, another game. I haven’t won yet.”

“Sorry. You’ll have to wait for another day.” Hannah straightened.

“Andy, I’ll make you a promise, and you know I don’t go back on them. The next time I’m here, we’ll play any game you want.” Jacob stood and moved to the boy, saying to Hannah, “Here, I’ll take him to his room,” then to Andy, “I think everything has finally caught up with you, buddy. You’ve been great! I can’t believe you went this long. Most kids would have been asleep hours ago after the day you had.”

As Jacob scooped up the eight-year-old into his arms and headed to the boys’ side of the house, Andy beamed up at him, then rested his head on Jacob’s shoulder.

After hurriedly putting the game away, Gabe raced to catch up with them. “We share a room.”

Nancy looked sleepily up at Hannah. “I want a story, too.”

“How about if I read one to you? You get ready for bed while I check on the others finishing their homework.”

Nancy plodded toward the girls’ side while Hannah went back into the dining room where Terry and Susie were the only ones still doing their work. “How’s it coming?”

Susie looked up, a seriousness in her green eyes. “We’re almost done.”

“Need any help?”

“Nope.” After scratching his fingers through his red hair, Terry erased an answer to a math problem on his paper. “Susie had this last year in school. She’s been helping me.”

Leaving the two oldest children, Hannah walked to Nancy’s room and found the little girl in her pajamas, stretched out asleep on her twin bed’s pink coverlet. Her clothes were in a pile on the floor beside her. Her roommate was tucked under her sheets, sleeping, too. Hannah gently pulled the comforter from under Nancy and covered her, then picked up the child’s clothes and placed them on a chair nearby.

With the youngest girls in bed, Hannah made her way to the boys’ side to see how Gabe and Andy were doing. The evening before, her first night in the cottage, both of them had been a handful to get to bed. Even with Andy half asleep, Jacob could be having trouble.

Sure, Hannah, she asked herself, is that the real reason you’re checking on them?

At the doorway she came to a halt, her mouth nearly dropping open at the scene before her. Andy was in bed, lying on his side, desperately trying to keep his eyes open as he listened to the story Jacob was reading. The doctor lounged back against Gabe’s headboard with the boy beside him, holding the book on his lap and flipping the pages when Jacob was ready to go on to the next one. Neither child was bouncing off the walls. Neither child was whining about going to bed. Jacob’s voice was calm and soothing, capable of lulling them to sleep with just the sound of it.

Cathy is right. Jacob would make a good father.

That thought sent a shock wave through her. She took a step back at the same time Jacob peered up at her, the warmth in his gaze holding her frozen in place. For several seconds she stared at him, then whirled and fled the room. She didn’t stop until she was out on the porch. The night air cooled her face, but it did nothing for the raging emotions churning her stomach.

How could she think something like that? For years she had hated Jacob Hartman. In her mind he wasn’t capable of anything good. Now in one day her feelings were shifting, changing into something she didn’t want. She felt as though she had betrayed her family, the memory of her brother.

Her legs trembling, she plopped down on the front steps and rubbed her hands over her face. Lord, I’m a fish out of water. I need the water. I need the familiar. Too much is changing. Too fast.

She leaned back, her elbows on the wooden planks of the porch, and stared up at the half-moon. Stars studded the blackness. No clouds hid the beauty of a clear night sky. The scent of rich earth laced the breeze. Everything exuded tranquility—except for her tightly coiled muscles and nerves shredded into hundreds of pieces.

She’d lived a good part of her life dealing with one change after another—one move after another, the accidental death of her husband after only one year of marriage. She had come to Cimarron City finally to put down roots and hopefully to have some permanence in her life. Instead I’m discovering more change, more disruption.

“Hannah, are you all right?”

She gasped and rotated toward Jacob who stood behind her. So lost in thought, she hadn’t even heard him come out onto the porch. She didn’t like what the man was doing to her. She wanted stability—finally.

“I’m fine,” she answered in a voice full of tension.

He folded his long length onto the step next to her. She scooted to the far side to give him room and her some space. His nearness threatened her composure. Leaning forward, he placed his elbows on his thighs and loosely clasped his hands together while he studied the same night sky as she had only a moment before. His nonchalant poise grated along her nerves, while inside she was wound so tightly she felt she’d break any second.

She didn’t realize she was holding her breath until her lungs burned. She drew in deep gulps of air, suffused with the smells of fall, while grasping the post next to her, all the strain she was experiencing directed toward her fingers clutching the poor piece of wood.

He was no fool. He would want to know what was behind her cool reception of him. And she intended to keep her past private. After today she knew now more than ever the secret could harm innocent people—children. She couldn’t do that for a moment of revenge. Their shared past would remain a secret.

“Have we met before this morning?” he asked, finally breaking the uncomfortable silence.

She sighed. This was a question she could answer without lying. “No.” She was relieved that her last name was no longer the same as her brother’s.

“I thought maybe we had, and I’d done something you didn’t like.”

“I’ve never met you before this morning.” Which was true. Kevin and Jacob hadn’t been friends long when the car wreck occurred. She felt as though she were running across a field strewn with land mines and any second she would step in the wrong spot.

“I get the feeling you don’t care for…my involvement in the refuge.”

Thank You, Lord. His choice of words made it possible for her not to reveal anything she didn’t want to. “I’ve seen how you interact with the kids this evening. They care very much for you. How could I not want that for them? They don’t have enough people in their lives who do.”

Jacob faced her. “Good. Because I intend to continue being involved with them, and I didn’t want there to be bad feelings between us. The children can sense that. Gabe already said something right before he went to sleep.”

“He did? What?”

Although light shone from the two front windows, shadows concealed his expression. “He wanted to know what we had fought about. He thought I might have gotten mad at you because Andy got hurt. I assured him that accidents happen, and I wasn’t upset with you.”

Hannah shoved to her feet. “I should go say something to him.”

“What?”

“Well…” She let her voice trail off into the silence while she frantically searched for something ambiguous. “I need to assure him, too, that we haven’t fought.”

“By the time I left him he was sound asleep. I’ve never seen a kid go to sleep so fast. I wish I had that ability.”

Had he ever lost sleep over what he did, as she had? “You have a lot of restless nights?” slipped out before she could censor her words.

He surged to his feet, and his face came into view. “I have my share.”

The expression in his eyes—intense, assessing—bored into her. She looked away. “It’s been a long second day. I need to make sure the rest of the children go to bed since they have school tomorrow. Good night.”

She’d reached the front door when she heard him say in a husky voice, “I look forward to getting to know you. Good night, Hannah.”

Inside she collapsed back against the wooden door, her body shaking from the promise in his words. Against everything she had felt over twenty-one years, there was a small part of her that wanted to get to know him. His natural ability to connect with these children was a gift. She could learn from him.

On the grounds at the Cimarron City Zoo Hannah spread the blanket out under the cool shade of an oak tree, its leaves still clinging to its branches. Not a cloud in the sky and the unusually hot autumn day made it necessary to seek shelter from the sun’s rays. She’d already noticed some red-tinged cheeks, in spite of using sunscreen on the children. Susie, the last one in Hannah’s group to get her food from the concession stand, plopped down on the girls’ blanket a few feet from Hannah’s.

Where were the boys and Jacob? She craned her neck to see over the ridge and glimpsed them trudging toward her. Jacob waved and smiled.