Their Second Chance Love. Kat Brookes

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СКАЧАТЬ chance to say goodbye. Even if she had pretty much abandoned Jack when she’d moved away, her visits too few and far too short. Jack deserved more from his only child.

      “I see,” his friend said with clear disapproval.

      Betraying Jack wasn’t something Logan had done lightly. But his momma had raised him to do the right thing. This, in his opinion, had been the right thing to do, whether Jack liked it or not. “I’d do it again if the situation called for it,” he admitted.

      Hope turned her head, looking up at him. “And I thank you. I’m sure it wasn’t an easy call to make, seeing as how Daddy asked you to keep this to yourself.”

      She had no idea how difficult. Not only because of the news he’d had to give her, but also because hearing her sweet voice again had succeeded in twisting him up in emotional knots all over again. It had also stirred up the bitterness and hurt he’d long since tucked away.

      “If not for your finding Daddy...” she continued, emotion drawing her voice tight.

      “Yes,” Jack agreed with a nod. “If you hadn’t been there... Thank you, son. For everything.”

      “Don’t thank me,” he told the older man with a smile. “Thank the man above. Appears He’s still got plans for you.”

      “Appears that way.”

      “Well, now that you’ve got family here, I’ll be on my way,” he said, needing to put some distance between himself and Hope. Pulling Jack’s smartphone from the front pocket of his flannel shirt, Logan placed it atop the narrow lap table that hovered over the foot of Jack’s hospital bed. “In case you need to reach me. Take care of yourself, Jack. I’ll be by tomorrow to check on you.” Looking to Jack’s daughter, he tipped his hat. “Hope.” Then turning, he made his way toward the open doorway.

      “Logan,” Jack called after him, his voice weak.

      He stopped then turned to find knowing eyes watching him.

      “Everything will work itself out, son. The good Lord’s got plans for you, as well.”

      He didn’t miss Hope stiffening at her daddy’s words of faith in the Lord. Just as she had earlier.

      He acknowledged Jack’s words with another nod and then walked out of the ICU room. Back to what he knew best—landscaping.

      But when his thoughts should have turned to that day’s business, they stubbornly refused. They were caught up in the change he’d seen in Hope. She wasn’t the sweet, smiling girl he remembered. The one he’d spent countless Sundays sitting beside in church all those years ago. The one he’d laughed with. Learned with. Loved. No, the woman he’d seen today had lost that spark of joy that used to light her green eyes. Even more troubling, she seemed to have lost her trust in God’s will.

      He sighed, wishing he could push the troubling thoughts away. Getting caught up in Hope again wasn’t something he would ever allow to happen. But it didn’t mean he wasn’t affected by her rejection of a faith she’d once held dear.

      Granted, there had been a time when her trust in the Lord had been shaken. Right after her momma had lost her long, courageous battle with cancer. But she’d been young and scared and hurting. His momma, who had been close with Hope’s, had done her best to step in and help fill in some of the void. She’d also been there to help an eleven-year-old little girl understand and accept that the Lord had a far greater plan for her momma.

      Now he had to wonder if Hope had ever really accepted that. Had she merely put on a front about having faith all these years just as his own brother had done after the loss of his wife? Logan couldn’t even begin to guess what was going on inside her head. He’d already been so wrong about so many things where Hope Dillan was concerned. Best thing for him to do was keep his distance.

      * * *

      Hope watched him go, tears pooling up in her eyes. Logan Cooper was no longer the boy that she had fallen in love with all those years ago. He was a full-grown man. Tall, lean, broad-shouldered and with an even greater ability to make her heart pound. He was everything she had always dreamed about. Everything she could ever hope for. Not that it mattered. She had lost him long ago.

      Frowning, she turned back to her daddy, who was watching her, his tightly pressed lips pulling downward. “Are you hurting?” she asked worriedly, forcing all thoughts of Logan Cooper from her mind.

      “I’m thinking I should be asking you that question,” her daddy said.

      She forced a smile. “I’m not the one lying in a hospital bed. Now stop worrying yourself over me.”

      “No can do, honey,” he replied. “You’re my baby girl. It’s my job to worry over you.”

      “Well, there isn’t anything to be concerned about,” she said, wondering if she was trying to convince her daddy or herself. Seeing Logan again, talking to him again, being so near to him, had left her thoroughly shaken. Pushing thoughts of him from her mind, she said, “And it’s my turn to worry about you. Not the other way around.” Standing, she reached out to dim the light over the hospital bed. “Now get some rest. We can talk more later.”

      Jack nodded, his heavy-lidded eyes drifting shut.

      Hope sat watching him for a long time, knowing how close she had come to losing him. The thought of no longer having him in her life had shaken her to the core. The Lord had already taken her mother away. A hurt that had only deepened when she’d learned she would probably never be a mother herself.

      As it had so many times over the past nine years, a deep ache filled her at the thought. Her hand moved to smooth over her flat stomach, unshed tears filling her eyes. It would never grow round with a child. She would never feel the stirrings of life that came with carrying a baby of her own. Never find the true happiness she’d come so close to having before her life as she had known it came crashing down around her.

       Chapter Two

      “Logan?” his brother said, concern knitting his brows as he studied Logan from across the door’s threshold. Boone, the bloodhound mix Carter had adopted from the pound for Audra’s children, stood faithfully at his side.

      “I know it’s late,” Logan began apologetically as he reached down to give the dog a scruff behind his ear.

      “It’s never too late for family,” Carter countered. “Come on in.” He stepped aside, Boone moving with him as he swung the front porch door open wider.

      Removing his cowboy hat, Logan made his way inside, his gaze sweeping the entryway of the old farmhouse his brother’s wife had purchased when she’d moved to Texas from Chicago with her two young children. Carter, who co-owned Cooper Construction with their brother, Nathan, had helped Audra with renovations on her house and the two had ended up falling in love. Now married and on the verge of adding to their already existent brood, Carter was happier than Logan had ever seen him.

      “Audra in bed already?” Logan asked with a glance toward the stairs. He knew the children would be for sure. They both had school in the morning.

      “Not yet,” his brother replied. “She’s in the kitchen cleaning up after the finger painting СКАЧАТЬ