Her Only Hero

He lowered his hands cautiously, probably not sure she was really disarmed. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I thought you were at the hospital.”

“I came back to check the house.”

He nodded toward the teddy bear that was clutched under her arm. “And to find something important, I guess.”

She held the bear a little tighter. “He’s important to Mandy. She likes to sleep with him.”

“How is she?” Ryan leaned against a sooty counter, hands braced against its edge, apparently not minding the dirt. He’d exchanged his uniform for jeans and a dark-blue knit shirt, and he’d picked up a streak of soot across the front of the shirt, presumably since he’d entered the house. The concentrated light of the torch cast his strong face into sharp relief.

She forced herself to concentrate, her wits still scattered after finding him here so unexpectedly. “She’s going to be all right. The doctor thought she should stay until tomorrow to be sure there aren’t any aftereffects from the smoke.”

“That’s good.” He studied her face. “You look as if they should have kept you, too.”

“I’m fine.” She was getting tired of saying that. “I don’t want to be rude, but what are you doing here?”

“Fixing the door.” He gestured toward the door that led onto the porch, and she realized belatedly that the powerful torch he’d set on the counter was trained on the opening. The door sagged on its hinges.

“You don’t have to do that.”

He shrugged. “I broke it. Seems like the least I can do is fix it.”

“I can take care of the door. I don’t need any help.” She had to sound strong, because she was unaccountably weepy at the thought that Ryan Flanagan had actually come back to do something for her.

“Not even from an old school friend?” He gave her the easy grin that charmed so readily.

She blinked, startled. “I thought you didn’t recognize me.”

“You’re Laura Jane Phillips. At least, it used to be Phillips. You were a year behind me at Suffolk High. Am I right?”

She nodded. So he had remembered her. Or perhaps someone had told him who she was.

“Why didn’t you tell me who you were yesterday?” His eyebrows lifted. “Or didn’t you remember me?”

“No one could forget the Flanagans.” She answered the second question first, evading his eyes. “I just—didn’t think it was appropriate to get into old home week when you were here on business.”

He leaned casually against the filthy counter, as if ready to stay and chat all night. “It bugged me all day, trying to figure out why you looked so familiar to me. How are your folks?”

“They’ve retired to Arizona. My dad’s health isn’t very good.” The usual pang of concern gripped her heart at the thought of her father.

“I’m sorry to hear that. I guess otherwise he’d be here doing the renovation for you.”

She nodded. It wasn’t necessary to confide in Ryan that her father didn’t know she was doing the rehab herself, for that very reason. If Dad knew, he’d try to come and probably kill himself in the process.

As for her mother—well, she’d stopped trying to figure her mother out a long time ago. She just knew she couldn’t count on her for help with this or anything else.

Ryan relaxed his long frame against the counter, not seeming in any hurry to get on with the door-fixing. “Anyway, I didn’t know you’d come back to Suffolk. I thought you were living in Philadelphia.”

“How on earth would you know that?” She hadn’t imagined he’d remember who she was, let alone know where she’d gone after school.

He grinned. “You’re forgetting my mother, with her encyclopedic knowledge of anyone who’s ever attended our church. Once I mentioned you, she trotted out everything she knew, including the fact that you were married and living in Philly. She was surprised we haven’t seen you in church since you’ve been back.”

Siobhan Flanagan had taught her in church school twice—once in kindergarten, then again in junior high. She had a gentle manner, a warm smile and a love that extended to even the most rebellious of teens.

Still, however warm her memories of Ryan’s mother, she was not going to defend her failure to attend church to him. “Please greet her for me. And really, I can take care of the door.”

He shoved away from the counter in a smooth, even movement. “Tell you what. You hold the boards and I’ll pound. We’ll have it secure in no time.”

That was probably the fastest way to get him out of here, so she set the flashlight and teddy bear down and went to the door. The acrid scent of wet, burned wood from the back porch sent a wave of nausea through her, and she forced it down angrily.

Ryan had apparently brought a few two-by-fours with him, because the wood gleamed new. He put one of the boards against the door, and she braced it with both hands.

He used the hammer with quick, effective strokes. The board vibrated from his force, jolting her hands.

“So, after your husband’s death, you decided to come home and buy this place.” The pounding punctuated his words, and she felt the flex of his muscles where his arm brushed her shoulder.

“Not exactly. My husband had bought the building a couple of years ago for some business venture he had in mind, but he never got around to doing anything with it. So I decided to fix it up.”

She wouldn’t add that this building was the only legacy Jason had left her and Mandy. That everything else he’d received from his father had been frittered away on one foolish scheme or another, until his father had finally cut him off, saying Jason would have to pay for his own mistakes. Apparently he’d put her and Mandy in the mistake category.

“You plan to live here?” Ryan propped another board across the door, and it gleamed palely against the blackened frame.

“I’m fixing it up to sell. I have a buyer who has an option, if I can get the renovation done before she loses interest or finds something better.”

Ryan paused, looking over his shoulder at her. Her pulse gave a little jump. Her hands were planted next to his on the board, and his face was only inches away.

“And then you’ll leave Suffolk again?” He looked at her as if he really wanted to know. As if it might matter to someone what she did.

Her mouth was dry. From the smoke, she assured herself. Not because Ryan Flanagan had any effect on her.

She moistened her lips. “I haven’t decided yet. Mandy is going to have a cochlear implant—at least I hope she is, if all the tests go well. I can’t plan beyond that right now.”

The implant could give Mandy a chance at a normal life. How could she think of anything else?

“At the hospital here?” His eyes lit with interest.

“That’d be Dr. Marsh, I guess.”

“You’ve heard of him.” She was faintly surprised. Franklin Marsh was well-known to parents of deaf children, but why would Ryan know of him?

“My sister-in-law, Gabe’s wife, trains animals to work with people who have disabilities. She introduced me to Dr. Marsh at a benefit. I understand he does good work.”

“He’s the best.” She wouldn’t trust her daughter’s hearing and her future to anyone who wasn’t. “If he decides Mandy will benefit from an implant, it will make all the difference in the world to us.”

And if he did accept Mandy for the procedure, she somehow had to come up with the over fifty thousand dollars the process would cost. The minimal insurance program she was able to afford would cover Mandy’s stay in the hospital, but it didn’t cover a cochlear implant.

As if he felt all the things she didn’t say, Ryan put his hand over hers where it rested on the board. “I hope it works out.”

“Thank you.” She cleared her throat. “I appreciate that. And really, I can finish up the door. I’m sure you have other things to do with your evening.”