“We hope,” Dusty said. “Have you checked your phone? Any word from Kate?”
“Last I heard, they were stuck in traffic.” She pulled out her phone and tapped the screen just as Kate’s text landed.
Kate:NO DAMAGE! Generators are getting set up. Everything survived. How are you???
“Oh, thank God.” She showed the phone to Dusty. “Let’s go.”
While she texted back, Dusty put the truck in reverse and headed back into the mess of trees and traffic. It wasn’t the first time the Summer House was her sanctuary, and might not be the last.
Jonah came up out of sleep slowly, with the disoriented bliss of what felt like his first deep sleep in five months. For a moment, he had no idea where he was, what time of day it was, or who had his child.
He blinked, his gaze landing on a ballet slipper and a trophy, answering question one. Soft light slipped through the blinds, the sun at about four o’clock in the afternoon. He inched up and looked at the playpen, where Atlas was on his back, asleep.
He could hear, very faintly, a bird outside and the sound of a generator he’d gone to war with around eleven that morning—and won. Closer, on the bed, he could hear Pepper breathing in the soft rhythm of restorative sleep.
Her tiny dancer’s body was tucked along his side with her head on his chest, his arm under her shoulders, her hand a warm weight just over his ribs.
For about thirty seconds, Jonah did not think about anything except that this was the most genuinely peaceful he had felt in a long time.
Despite the long, noisy, sometimes terrifying, and frequently delightful night and day they’d just endured, he felt so darngood. Like…unstoppable and in control and hopeful and happy and…
He slid a glance to his right and looked at the sweep of her lashes over her cheeks, the dusting of freckles, the bow of her lips, and that unfairly cute little cleft in her chin.
He felt himself falling so hard he could hear the wind whistle past his ears as he dropped into the unexpected depths of…love.
Could this be love? Okay, not today, but…soon?
She had some inexplicable thing, though. A reason, a secret.
After the door broke and they realized the house did have some vulnerabilities—though no other opening was breached and the roof held—they never did get back to that serious conversation and whatever big reveal Pepper wanted to share.
They’d been on high alert after that, and he’d walked the house and checked every door and window four times an hour as time and Norman blew by. Atlas had been wretched most of the night and they took turns calming and feeding and changing him. They’d crashed for a few hours this morning, but the AC was off and it got too hot for all of them, so he’d tackled the generator.
They had power cords charging, cool air, and the fridge was running.
So when she woke up, they’d?—
A door slammed and both dogs jumped up and took off.
For a moment, he didn’t move, listening to the unmistakablethunkof a man coming home—keys, boots on the entry tile, and dogs’ nails clicking hurriedly on the wood.
“Hey,garc¸on.” That was a low, fond, tired—and sickeningly familiar—voice. “Yeah, yeah, I’m home. Long night? Any damage? Yard’s a mess. Whose pitiful car is that? And why is my recliner in the kitchen?”
Biting back a curse, Jonah sat up, and poor Pepper slid off his chest.
“Hey!”
“Your dad’s home.”
Her face registered this news in stages that went from “not a chance” to “oh no, no, no!”
She blinked at Jonah, then, with mounting horror, looked around the room at the bed they were on, the position they were in, fully clothed but unmistakably sleeping—just sleeping!—together, the baby in the corner, the disarray of…a lost afternoon.
“Dad,” she breathed.
“Peppie? You around, honey?”
It occurred to Jonah that he’d never heard so much affection and love in the man’s voice, but he didn’t have time to think about it as they scrambled to get…nowhere.
