tell me the McCays couldn’t possibly kill their innocent grandchildren.”
“I...won’t.” The fear in Holly’s eyes surprised Chris, because it wasn’t fear of him. It wasn’t even fear for herself as a target of the McCays. No, the fear was for her children. Then her face changed, and the fear morphed into fierce determination to protect her children at all costs, no matter what. If Chris had needed one more bit of proof Holly McCay was a good mother, he’d just received it.
“They’re not getting anywhere near Ian and Jamie,” Holly stated unequivocally. “What do you want me to do?”
He glanced away and thought for a moment, then nodded to himself. His eyes met Holly’s. “I’ve got a house on the outskirts of Granite Gulch. No one lives there, but Peg looks after it for me, so it’s not...abandoned.” A wave of pain went through him and his right eye twitched as he remembered this was Laura’s dream house, the one he’d built for her right before she died. The house she’d never had a chance to live in. The house he couldn’t bear to occupy after her death. “It stands all by itself on several acres, and it’s up on a ridge—you can easily spot someone coming almost a mile away. I can’t think of a safer place for you and the boys to hide out.”
“Just us?”
“And me. Until we can set a trap for the McCays, I don’t want you out of my sight if I can help it.”
“What about your job? You can’t just—”
Chris’s jaw set tightly. “I run my own business. I haven’t taken a day off since Laura’s funeral, so I think I can manage this. Besides, I do a lot of my work over the phone or on the computer. I can work from the office in the house. We designed the house—” ...with that in mind, he started to say, but his throat closed before he could get the words out.
Holly didn’t respond at first, just assessed him with an enigmatic expression on her face. The silence stretched from ten seconds to twenty, to thirty. Nearly a minute had passed before she said, “Okay. I appreciate the offer. And I’ll accept it on my children’s behalf. If it was just me...that would be a different story, but it’s not.”
* * *
A half hour later everything Holly and the twins had with them was loaded into her SUV, with the exception of the two fold-a-cribs she’d bought when she moved to Rosewood. Chris stashed those in the back of his truck, and Holly realized if she’d taken Ian and Jamie and run, she would have had to leave the twins’ cribs behind—they just wouldn’t fit.
“I’ll follow you to Peg’s,” Chris said as he raised the hatch and clicked it firmly closed. “But first, we’d better stop in town and get some groceries. The utilities at the house are on—so we’ll have water and electricity—but there’s no food.”
Holly nodded. “Sounds good.”
“And while I’m at it, I’d better stop off and pack a suitcase, and pick up my laptop from my apartment. I live above the Double G Cakes and Pies.”
“Oh, I love that place!” she exclaimed. “Mia—the woman who runs it—she always gives Ian and Jamie special cookies she makes just for them.”
Chris smiled. “Sounds like Mia. She and my sister Annabel are best friends—they were foster sisters together.” His smile faded, replaced by the closed expression that was becoming familiar to Holly, and she knew instinctively this was another topic of conversation he’d never intended to bring up. Foster care joined the growing list of subjects to avoid...unless Chris brought it up himself.
As they drove the short distance to Granite Gulch, Holly wondered about Chris. About his motives for doing this—protecting her boys and her. She also couldn’t help wondering about his wife, Laura, and what had happened to her. Car accident? Some kind of illness, like cancer? Peg had never mentioned Laura that she could recall. But it wasn’t just idle curiosity. She really wanted to know, because it was obvious Chris had been in love with his wife.
Holly glanced in the rearview mirror at the man in the truck behind her and sighed. If only Grant had loved her the way Chris had loved his wife. If only...
She couldn’t help feeling a dart of envy comparing Chris to Grant. Not that Grant hadn’t been a good man—he had been. So very different from his parents. No, the problem was that Grant had been her best friend growing up, and while he’d loved her, he hadn’t been in love with her. Not the way she’d been in love with him.
She’d grieved for Grant. Those first few months after his death she’d been devastated...but she hadn’t been able to grieve for long. The McCays had seen to that.
Was that why I recovered from Grant’s death so quickly? she asked herself now. Because Grant’s parents tried to gain custody of Ian and Jamie and that took all my energy and concentration? Because when that didn’t work they tried to have me killed, forcing me to take my babies and flee?
The first time a car unexpectedly swerved into her lane on the expressway just as she was approaching an overpass, Holly had dismissed it as merely poor driving on someone’s part. The second similar attempt only two weeks later had raised her suspicions, especially since she thought she recognized the car. But the third try on her life had been the clincher—someone had deliberately attempted to run her down in the grocery store parking lot, and she’d escaped with her life only by diving between two parked cars as the vehicle in question sped away without stopping.
Holly glanced in the rearview mirror again. Or is the reason I’m not still grieving because Grant never loved me the way I wanted him to love me? The way I loved him.
She would never know. All she knew was that not quite a year after Grant’s death she was ready to move on with her life...if the McCays would let her.
* * *
Holly buckled Ian into one car seat while Chris buckled Jamie into the other. She’d been surprised at first at how baby-knowledgeable Chris was, but she quickly realized she shouldn’t be—Peg’s kids adored their “Unca Chris,” as Susan called him. Which meant even though she’d never met Chris at Peg’s house in the three months the two women had been friends, he had to be a fairly frequent visitor.
Holly turned back to thank Peg just as the other woman came out of the house with a bag of dog food balanced on one hip, a bag of doggy treats perched precariously on top and a leashed Wally dancing joyously beside her.
“What the—” Chris began, but Peg cut him off.
“Holly’s kids adore Wally, and he’s attached to them, so that will help the kids acclimate faster. Besides, it won’t hurt to have a guard dog out there, Chris. You know that. It’s why you got Wally for Laura in the first place.”
Chris’s slow smile did something to Holly’s heart. She wasn’t sure what it meant, but she wouldn’t have minded having that smile aimed at her.
“Thanks,” Chris said, relieving Peg of the dog, the dog food and the doggy treats before planting a kiss on her cheek. “Come on, boy,” he said, opening the door of his F-150 and letting Wally scramble up onto the front seat as Chris plopped the dog food on the floor.
Holly turned to Peg. “Thanks for watching the boys for me,” she said softly. “I wasn’t going to leave without telling you—please believe that.”
Peg smiled and hugged her. “I do.” She stepped back and
