4
Well.She hadn’t died a virgin. There wasthat.
She hadn’t died. Now she had time to work on that wholevirginthing, too. If she reallywantedto, anyway.
Hope Coleson’s first thoughts after she woke in the hospital bed were completely irrelevant. Probably wildly inappropriate, considering her situation. And totally exactly what she was thinking.
That…
And that someone was holding her hand. Shethoughtit was a man’s hand. It was probably her brother-in-law Norm. Norm took the whole stand-in dad thing he’d had going on for the last eighteen years seriously, after all. He’d been there. Every time Hope or one of the girls she called her sisters-of-the-heart—various sisters and nieces her older sister Bonnie had raised after they were all orphaned—had needed them, Norm Halson hadbeenthere. The onlydadany of them had had.
He was the best man she knew. And always would be.
It was possibly Norm. Or her big sister Heather. Or her sister Marcia, Norm’s wife. Or—no, she didn’t think it was her sister Joy. Joy had a smaller hand than Heather. Joy was kind ofrunty. Joy was six inches shorter than Hope’s five-six, but Joy outweighed her by five pounds or so now. Bonnie, Joy, Cashlyn, Cara and Samia were all the runty Colesons—just like Hope. But Heather, Marcia, Summer, Eden and Crispin were all at least five foot nine and the kind of women men fought wars over. Crispin topped out at over five-eleven now.Shelooked the most like Hope—except Crispin was supermodel gorgeous.
Hope most certainly wasn’t that. She was the perpetually ‘cute’ version of the rest of them.
That had led to that whole ‘still a virgin at twenty-four thing’.
Hopereallywanted to open her eyes and see who it was holding her hand right now. But her eyes were refusing to cooperate. She would have said something, but well…her chest really hurt, too. She’d been shot—she remembered that part. It was bound to hurt like the fires of hell. It was just bound to.
“Hey, Coleson. Going to sleep all day?”
That did not sound like Norm.
Her eyes flew open.
To stare into eyes so light brown they were almost golden. Beautiful eyes. She’d thought that before. He was a very beautiful guy. And he was staring down at her now.
It was a man. With dark hair, those eyes, and a tanned face. It was most definitelynother beautiful—and blond—brother-in-law Norm.
She hadn’t expectedhim.Not this guy. No. Definitely hadn’t been expectinghim.
The dude had arrested her before, after all. So why was he here?
“Hey, Miggy,” she shot him a smirk, calling him the nickname she’d given him when she had been handcuffed to his desk that day. He was a big guy. Six-seven or -eight. Like…huge. Three-hundred fifty pounds of solid, beautifully sculpted man muscle. He was a former college linebacker, she’d heard before.He had a face that was made for Hollywood. Hard to miss. And the guy just seriously got under her skin. “Feels like I’ve been kicked in the chest by a mule. Where’s my mom?”
She really wanted to see her mom right now.
“Bonnie’s downstairs, in the cafeteria. She took my three monsters for ice cream. She needed a break. Met me at the doors and swooped the kids off for Grandma time.”
Hope didn’t ask what had happened—she remembered it far too much already.
“Guess I lived, then. Mads okay?” Hope looked toward the other side of her hospital room. She knew she wasn’t in a private room. No Coleson could affordthat.Well, not her branch, anyway.
Her eyes widened when she saw a familiar face in the opposite bed. It wasn’tMadisonright there. That…that was Haldyn. How had Haldyn—why…? “What did Kimball do to Hal? Where’sMads?”
“How much do you remember about what happened to you?” He was leaning over her, brushing the hair out of her eyes. Gently.
That was one thing about Commander Miguel Rodriguez she had to say kind of fascinated her. The man could be very gentle when he wanted to be. Especially with those smaller and weaker than he was. Which…was just about everybody he encountered, probably. Totally built like a Greek or Roman god, this guy.
She’d had a hard time missingthat,since he’d been staying in her family’s guest room for the past week. With his three kids, too. His three exceptionally adorable children that Hope loved completely.
His fourteen-month-old daughter had been sleeping in a playpen right next to Hope’sbed for over a week now. Since someone had ambushed this man in the Finley Creek TSP postparking lot. And Miguel had fallen, shot and bleeding, at Hope and her sister Heather’s feet.
She wouldneverforget him almost pleading with her—and Heather, who he was reallyasking—to make sure his three children stayed together if he’d died. The man loved his kids more than anything. And he hadn’t had anyone else on earth to take care of those kids if something happened to him.
The man adored his kids. It made him tolerable.
