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Janet’s mom arrived late Wednesday night. Barbara Cullman had only met her baby granddaughter once before, and after demanding at least a peek at the sleeping baby, Janet led her around the house to familiarize her with it.
Janet introduced her mother to Jeff in the process, but her mom backed out of the study fairly quickly, saying she didn’t want to bother him at his work.
Settling into kitchen chairs with hot tea, the two women began talking. “Dear Lord, child, are you sure you know what you’re doing?” her mom asked.
“I already admitted that I have no clue. So, what do you mean exactly?”
“That man.” Her mother said simply, as if that were explanation enough.
Janet nodded her head. “He’s pretty intense.”
“Do you trust him?”
Janet licked her lips. “Trust him how?”
“Trust him not to hurt you or Hannah,” her mom asked in a deadly serious tone.
“Yeah, I do.” After Janet answered, her gaze was caught and held as Zach walked into the kitchen and saw them sitting there. His feet stalled in obvious conflict. Janet didn’t want the boy to be upset at all—this was his home first and foremost.
She stood to her feet and lifted her hand toward him, motioning for him, but she didn’t touch him. Much to her relief, he took a couple of steps forward. “Zach, this is my mother, Barbara Cullman. Mom, this is Zach.”
Her mother wore an open, happy expression. Zach dragged his eyes away from Janet to look at her mother, almost as if he was being forced to. And then his eyebrows lifted. “Whoa. Y’all look alike,” he mumbled.
Her mother’s smile became sunny as she beamed at him. “Well, I’m going to take that as a compliment, darlin’. Aren’t you the sweetest?”
Zach looked pained for a moment before twisting his lips into a smile that Janet knew was forced. He turned away, retrieved a Coke from the fridge and fled the room.
Both women watched him leave and then Barbara’s gaze left the doorway and landed on Janet. Janet broke out into a huge smile and so did her mom as her mother said, “Honey, I hope all this works out for you because I definitely see the appeal of those two men.”
****
On Thursday, after Zach left on the school bus, Janet and her mother sat down with their coffee and had some girl time. Catching up with each other as well as giving Barbara a chance to really get to know her granddaughter.
Later, as Jeff was eating his lunch, Barbara came back into the kitchen and announced that the baby was down for her nap, and didn’t they need to run to town for wedding errands or whatnot?
Jeff seemed to jump on the chance for a babysitter and after Barbara’s ready agreement, he packed Janet up in the farm Jeep and they headed out, his intent to show her the ranch.
It was an extremely mild day, and with the canvas top removed, they set off. It didn’t take too many minutes before Janet was totally floored. She’d known the ranch was big, but it encompassed so many acres that the landmass physically changed as the miles sped by. Going from flat cotton fields to pasture, the land even held a deep canyon with a spring-fed pond.
Jeff had been mostly silent during the drive, only pointing out places that he thought might interest her. As they parked in front of the pond, Janet was smitten with everything she saw—and interested in what would soon be her permanent home if Jeff got his way—and it seemed as if he was going to get his way. “The house seems so new. You had it built recently, right?”
“Yep, about four years ago.”
“I don’t see an old homestead. Did your parents raise you out here or did you grow up in Redwood Falls?”
“Parents?” he asked, as if the concept were foreign to him.
“Yeah, you know, two people who make a baby and then raise said baby into adulthood?” she asked with an amused grin.
He shook his head with a humorless laugh. “I didn’t have any of those.”
Janet didn’t know if he was kidding or not. “What do you mean?”
He frowned and reared back as if the explanation should be self-explanatory. “It means I didn’t have any parents.”
She was sure the shock and sorrow she felt for him could be heard in her voice, but she tried to temper it, knowing he wouldn’t want pity in any form. “But you said you went to school in Redwood Falls. I figured you were raised around here.”
“Yeah, I was raised here—here, meaning in town.”
She was seriously confused. “Did a grandparent raise you?”
“No.” His hand lifted between them as he pushed a strand of hair behind her ear, making her insides tingle. “I guess you could say the State of Texas raised me.”
The statement caught her completely off guard. Afraid of what she might find out after such a cryptic comment, Janet sat still in her seat, her fingers twisting in her lap. “The State of Texas?”
“It’s not a big deal,” he seemed to soothe, as his finger trailed from her ear to her cheek before pulling his hand back almost as if he were being forced to. “There’s a children’s home in Redwood Falls. Maybe you didn’t know that.”
She shook her head, every fiber in her being not wanting to know the truth—but of course, she wanted to know.
He shrugged his shoulders and stared into the glistening waters of the pond. “I guess I was four years old when I came here—to Redwood Falls. They said I was abandoned in Dallas, so I was probably born there. I don’t remember much of anything before Redwood Falls, just glimpses and pictures in my head, but too few to get anything solid, but there were definitely no parents that I can remember.”
Janet tried to show a calmness that she wasn’t feeling. How was she supposed to compute this information? First finding out that Zach had lost his mother when he was six, and now this? She swallowed, feeling the hot rush of tears trying to break free, but she refused to let them. He’d probably think she was being silly, anyway. She cleared her throat. “So, the State placed you here and you started school here, like in Kindergarten?”
His gaze left the pond and returned to hers. “Yeah.”
“Was it horrible?” she whispered. God, she really shouldn’t have asked that question, or asked it in that particular way, but it was too late.
She was relieved when one side of his mouth tipped up. “No, not at all. The number of kids in the house changed from year to year, but we were always small in number, and Bonnie was always there.”
“Bonnie?”
His focus turned more serious. “My wife.”
Oh, wow, okay. His wife’s name had been Bonnie. “So, it wasn’t foster care per sé, but more like an orphanage?”
“Yeah. It was a group home, but the good thing was that it was in a small town with caring citizens.”
“And you met your future wife there.”
His eyes shifted away from her for a bit. “I wouldn’t call it ‘met’, because I don’t remember a time when she wasn’t there.”
Oh, Christ. He must have loved the other woman unconditionally. Two orphans, thrown together. He must have loved her like a drug, like a hero in a romance novel who wouldn’t be denied
. The kind of love where he’d never need or want another one like it. The kind of love where nothing else could ever compare. It made her so sad for him.
And it made her sad for her, for what she’d probably never have with him.
Maybe she wasn’t admitting it to herself just yet, but deep down, she knew the reason she wasn’t backing away from this marriage. She wanted it to work out in the long run. She wanted Jeff McIntyre to fall in love with her and she wanted to fall in love with him. Hell, she was infatuated already.
But how could he fall in love with her if he’d lost his heart already?
She couldn’t start feeling sorry for herself this soon. That was ridiculous—it had only been a few weeks.
But she couldn’t help it. And she was already feeling guilty because she didn’t want to talk about his dead wife right now, not the day before their own marriage ceremony. Maybe that was selfish on her part, but she promised herself she’d do better later, she’d be more selfless in the future.
So, for now, she put her hand on his, her fingers lacing through his with a sympathetic touch, wanting him to feel her care, but asked him a different kind of question, one she was still very curious about. “How did you accomplish so much, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“What do you mean?”
In answer, she lifted her hand, palm up, and gestured to the land in front of them, as if what she was asking was self-explanatory.
He chuckled a bit as his gaze went to the horizon. “I was determined, I guess. I loved Redwood Falls. It was my home and I was determined to stay here forever. The folks who worked at the home were townspeople, they cared about each and every one of us. The local churches made sure we had everything we needed. The teachers at school gave us extra attention, or at least, it seemed so to me.”
“So you were one of the lucky ones.”
“Oh, baby,” he chuckled. “You have no idea. I’ve read about group homes in big cities. The way I was raised in no way resembled anything remotely close. Well, except for the fact that when the time came, the State gave me two days to find a new home.”
“What did you do?” she asked, trying to picture him so young.
