The Morning-After Proposal. Sheri WhiteFeather

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      JJ went inside and approached Henry. She knew the parlor, with its cherry wood curio cabinet and doily-covered end tables, was his favorite room in the house. But only because his wife had crocheted the doilies and had packed the curio with things that were special to her, including a faded photograph from their wedding day.

      JJ glanced at the picture and tears sprung to her eyes. She didn’t have any photographs of her mother. They’d run off in the middle of the night, leaving nearly everything behind. No keepsake items. No tangible memories.

      “What happened?” Henry asked, when he saw her expression. “What did that boy say to you?”

      “He told me that my mother was murdered.” She gripped the edge of the sofa. “But he told me that he buried her, too.”

      Henry came forward and gave her a gruff yet tender hug. “I’m so sorry about your mama.”

      “Me, too.” She knew the old cowboy understood grief. He’d been rattling around without his wife for the past five years. She gulped some air into her lungs and stepped back, afraid she would cry and not be able to stop. “I don’t know what to say. How to explain all of this.”

      “Just start from the beginning, honey. Tell me who you are, and who Dylan is to you.”

      “My real name is Julia Joyce Alcott, and eight months ago Dylan rescued me from a kidnapping. He stumbled upon me by accident. Afterward, my mother and I left town, and Dylan started searching for us because he learned there was a hit man on our trail.”

      She kept talking, repeating everything Dylan had told her. Summoning personal details, she admitted that her mother was a compulsive gambler who’d borrowed an excessive amount of money from loan sharks and couldn’t pay it back. “I didn’t know who the kidnappers were until my mother told me what kind of trouble she was in. Then she begged me not to say anything. She said they would come after me again if we gave them up. But if we ran away, if we got new identities, we would be free. But once we were on the run, she started gambling again.”

      “So you and your mama had a falling out?” Henry asked, filling in the blanks.

      “Yes. And that’s how I ended up here and she ended up dead.”

      “That hit man could have gotten you, too.” The old man shivered. “But you’re safe now, JJ. And you’ll always have a home here. You’ll always be part of the refuge, even if we’re struggling to make ends meet.”

      She glanced at a blue and white doily, where the pattern frilled into a scalloped edge. “Thank you, Henry.”

      They sat in silence for a moment. They both knew the refuge gave him purpose. He’d always been a cowboy, breeding cutting horses, but he’d started saving abused and abandoned animals after he’d lost his wife.

      “So are you and Dylan sweet on each other?” he asked suddenly.

      She shook her head, keeping her feelings, the heat Dylan evoked, to herself. “He keeps calling me Julia.”

      “’Cause that’s the name he knows you by. Do you want me to call you Julia, too?”

      “No. I want to be JJ.”

      “It still fits, you know. Didn’t you say you’re real name was Julia Joyce?” He sent her a small smile. “You can still be JJ.”

      She smiled, too. “Dylan wants me to go to Arizona with him to visit my mother’s grave.” Her smile fell. “But I don’t know if I can.”

      “You have to, honey. You’ll suffer inside if you don’t make peace with her.”

      “But it’s over now.”

      “No, it isn’t. You haven’t even begun to mourn. You’re still in shock, still trying to wrap your mind around all of this. When it hits you, it’s gonna tear you apart. And if you don’t say a proper goodbye to your mama, it’ll only get worse.”

      “Is that what happened to you when your wife died?”

      He nodded. “I was angry at her passing on and leaving me alone. So for a while, I avoided saying goodbye. But that didn’t do anything but mess me up even more.”

      JJ protested, defending her jumbled emotions. “I’m СКАЧАТЬ