Somebody's Hero. Marilyn Pappano

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      It was beautiful, peaceful and exactly what she needed. Just looking made her breathe a little deeper, a little slower, and eased the tightness in her chest. Maybe she hadn’t made a mistake after all. Maybe this really was the change she’d needed.

      “Can we go out and play?”

      The idea of voluntarily going out into such wet and cold made Jayne cringe. She’d hated going out in the snow every winter of her adult life…but she’d loved it when she was a kid. Cleaning, unpacking, firewood and breakfast could wait.

      “Okay. Let’s get dressed.”

      Within fifteen minutes they were ready to go. Lucy was bundled in her favorite pink snowsuit. Lacking a snowsuit of her own, Jayne settled on jeans under sweatpants, a long-sleeved T-shirt, a sweatshirt, coat, hat and gloves. Neither of them was particularly mobile.

      Lucy didn’t seem to notice that moving through the snow was more hassle than fun. Even when she slipped into drifts that were deeper than she was tall, she came up coated in white and laughing. More of the tension inside Jayne eased. As long as Lucy could laugh, life was good.

      Lucy was trying to start a snowman when the sound of a door closing echoed across the clearing. She popped to her feet, gazed at their neighbor’s house as if noticing it for the first time, then broke into a broad grin. “Puppies!”

      The dogs who’d just been freed from their house saw her at the same time and immediately detoured toward them, bounding across the snow as if it was no more than a minor nuisance. Easy to do when they were both the size of small ponies.

      As Lucy moved to meet them, Jayne followed, struggling to catch up. Neither she nor Lucy had ever had any pet more rambunctious than a hamster, not even a blip on the landscape next to these creatures. The dogs were moving quickly, clearing the board fence that circled their yard in one leap, and they were so big that they could trample her little girl into the snow without even noticing it.

      Ten feet out, the dogs leaped. Jayne shrieked Lucy’s name, certain the next sound she would hear was her daughter’s screams. Instead it was a sharp whistle that split the air. The dogs landed a few feet away and stood stock-still except for the excited quivering of their tails.

      “Diaz, Cameron,” Lewis called, but Jayne couldn’t take her gaze from the animals to look in his direction. “Sit. Stay.”

      Both animals obeyed, though the smaller didn’t actually touch the ground. It hovered there, butt a few inches above the snow, as if it might leap for Lucy’s throat any minute now, Jayne thought hysterically…or as if it knew that snow was too cold to be sitting on, common sense forced her to admit.

      “Are they your dogs?” Lucy asked as Lewis approached.

      “More or less.” He shifted his gaze, no friendlier than last night, to Jayne. “They’re just excited to see someone smaller than them. They won’t hurt her.”

      Maybe not on purpose, Jayne thought doubtfully.

      “Cameron Diaz is Princess Fiona in Shrek,” Lucy pointed out. “Are they named after her?”

      Looking as if he had no clue what Shrek was, Lewis shrugged. “Maybe. I didn’t name them.”

      “Are they boy dogs or girl dogs?”

      “Boys.”

      Lucy splayed one mittened hand on her hip. “But Cameron Diaz is a girl, or she couldn’t be Princess Fiona. You can’t name boy dogs after a girl.”

      He shrugged again. “Like I said, I didn’t name them.”

      “Can I pet ’em?”

      “Yeah,” he replied at the same time Jayne said, “I don’t think—” She clamped her mouth shut at Lucy’s chastising look. Greg had often accused her of being overly protective, a judgment she’d had difficulty accepting from a man who was the very personification of reckless. There was nothing overprotective about not letting her delicate little girl within snapping distance of animals who could take her whole head in their mouths.

      Well-behaved animals. Whose owner was standing between them. Who hadn’t yet disobeyed his command to stay despite the obvious temptation to do so.

      Gritting her teeth to keep in her objections, Jayne shrugged and Lucy bounded forward. Lewis crouched, pulled off his glove and curled his fingers under. “Hold your hand like this and let them sniff you first.”

      Lucy yanked off her mitten and did as he directed. Both dogs eagerly sniffed her hand from all angles, then worked their way up her arm, over her body and to her face, making her giggle. “Their noses is cold! You’re good puppies, aren’t you?”

      Jayne reluctantly agreed that they did seem to be good. Despite their excitement, they both remained seated—though the smaller one did scoot forward a few inches—and they didn’t lick, show their teeth or make any threatening gestures. Though being twice Lucy’s size was threatening enough, in her opinion.

      “I’m Lucy,” her daughter announced, gently scratching each animal behind its ear. “And that’s my mom. Mom, come meet Cameron and Diaz.”

      “I can see them just fine from here.”

      “She’s afraid of dogs,” Lucy confided in a confidential tone. “She doesn’t like pets. She didn’t even like my hamster just ’cause it got scared and bit her finger. A little blood, and she squealed.”

      Jayne’s cheeks heated as Lewis looked at her. “It was more than a little blood,” she said defensively. “And I didn’t squeal. I shrieked.”

      “An important distinction.” Was that sarcasm or amusement in his voice? It was hard to tell, so finely veiled was the tone, and his expression was totally blank.

      After scratching both dogs for a moment, Lucy looked up at their owner. “My name’s Lucy,” she announced again. Of course, her first introduction had been made to the dogs. “I live here now. What’s yours?”

      “Tyler Lewis.”

      Tyler fitted him every bit as much as Lewis hadn’t, Jayne thought. A Tyler would be handsome, brooding and rugged—a loner…until he found the right woman to share his solitude. A Tyler was hero material—strong, with an equally strong code of honor. Champion of the downtrodden, protector of the weak, guardian of—

      Jayne gave herself a mental shake. This wasn’t some character she was creating for her next book but a real, live individual with strengths and weaknesses, failings and flaws. Rule one—no romanticizing him. It would just lead to disappointment, and Greg had given her enough of that for a lifetime.

      He eased to his feet, his six-foot-plus frame towering over Lucy. A sharp crease ran the length of his jeans legs, and his shirt, visible through the open parka, was pressed, as well. When was the last time she’d seen a man in a pair of starched, creased jeans? Probably never. Whose wife had the time to do that for him?

      “Is there a Mrs. Lewis?” she asked without thinking.

      His dark eyes turned a shade darker. “No.”

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