He found himself winding his arms around her and holding on tightly, as if he hoped some of her strength would transfer to him. Because as the oldest of his siblings, he’d always felt like he had to be the strong one. The one who’d held it together when they’d been forced to move away from Willow Creek as kids and to the big city that he and his brothers had hated. He’d been the one who’d held it together when their mom died. When their grandma died…
And when Frank Dempsey, Brett’s best friend and mentor, died, he’d held it together then, too. For so many years, Brett had forced himself to put his own feelings and fears aside so that he could assuage his siblings’ fears and feelings.
Now they all had someone who would do that for them. Liam had Elise, and Blake had Maci, and Livvy had Colton. And Brett was alone. More alone than he’d ever felt in his life despite living in a house full of people. And that was why he’d come here.
So he wouldn’t feel so alone.
* * *
Trish was alittle older than Frankie and Maci, so she’d had her license first and had driven the route between the ranch and Maci’s house many times over the summers she’d come home. She knew it well, and her lawyer had verified that Maci still lived there, that she still drove the same vehicle she had since high school, and that she also rented office space in Willow Creek. So, to know all of that, he must have been spying on her, just as Maci had accused him of doing. Trish needed to learn more about those accusations and the will. Fortunately, since she’d woken up so early, she’d caught Maci at home instead of at her office. She would have gone on to it if Maci’s little SUV wasn’t parked in the driveway and there wasn’t a light on inside. Yet she hesitated to ring the bell or knock on the door.
Those summers long ago, she would have just walked right in, but she wasn’t the teenage girl she’d once been any more than Maci and Frankie were. Even though Frankie had helped her change the sheets in the main bedroom suite at the ranch, she’d barely spoken to her. Trish had felt strange being in her dad’s room now that he was gone, and she would have liked Frankie to stay with her, the way they used to when they were kids. Trish had felt like a little girl again, afraid of whatever monsters might be lurking in the dark.
But Frankie had refused; maybe she believed that Trish was the monster. She hadn’t admitted it, though; she’d just said, “You’re tired. We’ll talk tomorrow. All of us, together.”
Frankie had clearly aligned herself with the Lemmons, leaving Trish to feel left out and alone. She didn’t want it to be her against them. She didn’t want to have to explain herself to all of them at once. She wasn’t even sure she wanted to explain herself at all to the Lemmons. What she’d gone through with her divorce and IVF and the usual drama with her mother wasn’t something she cared to share with anyone but the women she’d once considered her sisters.
But with Frankie being so cold toward her the night before, Trish worried that she might have permanently damaged her relationship with her cousin. Maci had also defended the Lemmons to her, insisting that they weren’t the con artists Nolan Stokes thought they were. And apparently it was possible Maci had fallen for one of them, but Trish figured Maci was more likely to pick whatever side Frankie was on than anyone else’s. Those two had always been so close. Trish had lost that closeness with them years ago, long before her dad had died.
She’d started slipping away from them after she got engaged. Her mom, and her expectations for the wedding, had taken over Trish’s life. She’d let her mother and then her ex-husband take over way too much of her life. And now some men she’d never met before were taking over the ranch.
It was all too much.
She didn’t have to be here alone, though. Her lawyer had offered to handle everything for her just as he’d handled her divorce. But after talking to Frankie and Maci over the phone, she had some concerns about his motivation.
“Why aren’t you just walking in?” The question came from behind Trish, and she turned to find Frankie walking up the driveway from where she’d parked her old conversion van along the curb a short distance down the street.
“Did you follow me here?” Trish asked. She’d been so quiet when she’d awakened that morning that she hadn’t thought anyone else had noticed her leaving.
“I think your bigshot lawyer has made you paranoid,” Frankie said.
She couldn’t necessarily argue against that; Nolan Stokeshadmade her a bit paranoid about her ex and about the Lemmons. He’d been right to caution her about her ex, so he could possibly be right about the Lemmons, too. Maybe they had conned her dad into including them in his will, as Nolan suspected, and maybe they’d also conned Maci and Frankie into thinking that was really what her dad had wanted.
“I came to Maci’s to talk about you,” Frankie brazenly admitted. “About how you showed up last night all knocked up and how you disappeared already this morning. And here you are, so I guess I don’t have to talk about you behind your back.”
Instead of being offended, warmth filled Trish. She’d missed Frankie so much. She’d missed how open and honest her cousin was. Appreciative of the honesty, she closed her arms around Frankie’s shoulders and hugged her. And one of the babies pushed against her belly, kicking with his or her usual vigor. She gasped.
And so did Frankie. “Was that a kick?”
“Yes, they do that a lot,” Trish replied. And she thanked God every time that they did, grateful for the assurance they were strong. They were healthy. They were viable after all the failed pregnancies.
“They…” Frankie shook her head. “I can’t believe you’re having two.”
Trish patted her huge belly. “I can. Sometimes it feels like I have a whole chorus line in there.”
“A what?”
The question came from behind Trish, and she turned around to find the door open behind her and Maci standing in the opening. Then Maci saw her belly, and her blue eyes widened in shock.
“Chorus line,” Trish replied as she patted her belly. “From the way they kick me.”
“They?” Maci asked.
“Just two,” Trish said. “That’s all I had left of my embryos and the money I’d saved for my IVF treatments.”
Maci’s forehead creased with deep furrows. “I don’t understand any of this…” She turned toward Frankie as if she had the answers.
Frankie shrugged. “I don’t know. She showed up late last night, and I thought she would fill us all in this morning. But after I took care of Cocoa, who I think Brett must have already fed, I found her truck gone. Her trailer was still there, though.”
