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“I’m very pleased to meet you, Ms. Bramble,” said Sam, feeling her face burn.
“You may call me Mabel.” She nodded once, then released Sam’s hand. “And your child is called Jade, you say. Hello, Jade.”
Oh dear. If Aunt Mabel disapproved of Sam’s manners, things were about to take a sharp downward turn.
But Jade turned her dark gaze in the direction of this older woman who was keeping her distance and therefore safe to check out.
“Hello, tall lady. Are you mad at me?”
A bark of laughter shocked them all. Mabel lifted an elegant hand to her mouth.
“Gracious, child. You are an impertinent one. You may call me Aunt Mabel. Can you do that?”
Jade cocked her head in that particular way that told Samara she was uncomfortable but holding it together.
“Hello, Aunt Mabel.”
“Well done. Now, tell me, Jade, who is this creature with you?”
In their email communications, Sam had been careful to ensure that dogs were welcome at Bramble House. Eliza had been understandably cautious, but once Sam explained that the dog was very well-trained, and part of Jade’s coping mechanism after her father’s death, Bob had been approved.
“This is Bob,” said Jade, making the briefest eye contact with Aunt Mabel. “She is part Labrador Retriever, part Border Collie, part luck of the draw. Bob is my best friend. She is five. I am four.”
Samara felt a flush of pride. Jade had recited the explanation just as they’d practiced!
Aunt Mabel was unimpressed. “I’m not accustomed to bringing farm animals inside the house but I’ve agreed to allow it during your stay. I trust she will not be a nuisance.”
Thankfully, Eliza entered the room during Jade’s introduction and heard the veiled insult in her aunt’s response.
“Bob is simply lovely, isn’t she? And smart, too. Now, if you’ll excuse us, Aunt Mabel, I’ll show our guests to their rooms.”
Eliza herded them toward the hallway.
“Don’t mind my great-aunt. I think you’re going to love your stay with us. You’ve got a Jack-and-Jill bathroom connecting your bedrooms and there’s a sliding door to a patio off your room, Samara. Now, let’s get you settled, shall we?”
As she followed Eliza through the once-opulent hallway, Samara felt Aunt Mabel’s keen eyes boring into her back.
She feared they hadn’t made the best first impression on Aunt Mabel.
And that was before she remembered the display of underwear in the street.
*
An hour later, lying on the bed beside her exhausted, maxed-out, melted-down-to-a-puddle little girl, despair threatened to overwhelm her, as it had so often in the bleak months since Michael’s death. To her shame, Sam barely remembered the grief, because of the devastating rush of tasks involved at the time. The mountain of paperwork at the hospital. Calling Michael’s family in Taiwan. Talking with the funeral director.
And the fear that chewed relentlessly beneath everything, of how she would raise the child screaming on her hip, without him.
Samara stroked her daughter’s damp forehead, sad again that this child had no one but her.
Then she elbowed up off the bed. There was nothing to be gained from self-pity.
She went to the window and pulled the drapes tighter, but a small ray of soft evening gold shone through, illuminating her sleeping daughter. Bob lifted her head watchfully, then sighed and tucked her muzzle up against Jade’s arm again.
Sam’s heart caught in her throat. For a moment, the fatigue and worry slipped away as she watched Jade breathe, slow and smooth, her face relaxed, her body loose as a rag doll.
This is what kept her going.
Find out what happens next in Finding Home…
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