Line of Fire. Julie Leto
would be a true friend to her new friends, and she would be the best aunt her niece and nephew could ask for.
“His name is Skyler Buchanan,” Jayne Stryker added. “Rumor has it he’s broken the hearts of nearly every girl in town. He’s a complicated man. But then, aren’t they all?”
Meredith eyed her newest and most interesting friend. She’d heard other women claim that men were simple. As far as Meredith was concerned, nothing was simple, least of all men. Evidently, Jayne felt the same way. Jayne Kincaid had come to Jasper Gulch last Christmas to visit her brother, Burke, who’d set up his medical practice here. She’d had no intention of staying. An ex-rodeo champion named Wes Stryker, who had happened to be Kate’s and Dusty’s best friend, had changed her mind, along with her plans for the future. Now, Jayne and Wes were raising Logan and Olivia. From what Meredith could see, they were doing an admirable job, too. Not that Logan and Olivia always made things easy. Which brought her back to the fact that nothing was easy.
“Meredith?”
Ah, yes, Meredith and Jayne were in total agreement when it came to their philosophies on life. Life had a way of getting complicated.
“Meredith?”
Throw in a man, and it usually spiraled out of control. That’s what had happened that night a month ago. She’d been rocked clear to her soul from the news that Kate and Dusty had died. In had walked Skyler Buchanan. Their eyes had met, and a tornado might as well have swept everybody and everything else away, leaving the two of them in its center to ride out the storm. That storm had turned out to be an idyllic interlude unlike anything she’d ever experienced. She’d been foolish enough to believe, for those few brief hours, that it had been the same for him. She’d been wrong, of course. But she’d tried to put it out of her mind.
She’d known she would see Skyler Buchanan again. Which made forgetting the night she’d spent in his arms even more impossible to do.
“Earth to Meredith.”
What? Oh. “Yes, Jayne?”
“Are you sure you want to keep Logan and Olivia with you while I attend this business lunch this afternoon?”
The area surrounding Meredith’s heart swelled with gratitude. Jayne knew how much Meredith loved her only niece and nephew, and this was her way of giving Meredith an opportunity to spend time with the children. “Of course I’m sure. You said yourself it’ll only be for an hour. Besides, I’m looking forward to it.”
Jayne’s careful perusal made Meredith feel like a fly under a microscope. It was a relief when Jayne turned her attention to the lanky cowboy sauntering toward them, a ten-year-old boy on one side, a five-year-old girl on the other. The first time Meredith had seen the children with Wes and Jayne Stryker, instead of with their parents, Kate and Dusty, she’d felt as if a knife had twisted in her heart. But the ache lessened each time she saw them. The kids were happy, and well adjusted. Meredith knew that Wes and Jayne had been worried that she, the children’s closest living relative, might want to take them away. Meredith had put their minds at ease, for she didn’t want to disrupt Logan’s and Olivia’s lives further. She only wanted to be near them, to get to know them, and to love them.
“Hi, Aunt Meredith,” Logan called.
“Aunt Meredith, look!” Olivia held up a bedraggled stuffed goose. “Jaynie asked Kelsey’s mama to give Snuggles new eyes, and she did. Now Snuggles is as good as new.”
“Snuggles isn’t either as good as new,” Logan grumbled.
“Is so.”
“Is not.”
“Is so.”
“Uh-uh.”
“Uh-huh.”
Jayne tucked a strand of short, dark hair behind her ear and glanced from her husband to Meredith. With a wink, she said, “Unless you keep them busy, this could still be going on when I return. Burke and I used to be like that.”
“Kate and I did, too.”
“Then you’ll know exactly how to deal with them,” Jayne said.
“Forget child labor laws,” Wes Stryker said, a twinkle in his blue eyes. “Put them to work. There’s nothing like manual labor to work out a kid’s frustrations.” He turned to the children. “We’ll be back in an hour, so try to be good. And you,” he said, easing closer to his wife.
Meredith thought she heard Jayne whisper, “I’ll be good later.”
And she was pretty sure Wes said, “I’m counting on it,” the moment before his lips brushed his wife’s.
The underlying sensuality went right over the children’s heads. Tucking the stuffed goose under one arm, Olivia skipped into the store ahead of her brother. Knowing what could happen when those two were left unsupervised, Meredith hurried after them.
“Logan,” she said, handing the boy the keys while she flipped on lights. “Unlock the back door, would you? Maybe we can get a breeze blowing through here.”
Logan ran to the back of the store, keys jangling, shoes thudding, anything not anchored down rattling as if during an earthquake. Within seconds, the netting hanging from the rafters ruffled, a dozen sets of wind chimes purled, and Meredith sighed. Turning in a circle, she took it all in. She’d put everything she had into this store, all her energy and her life savings. She’d looked at several buildings, but had decided on the store that sat by itself between the Jasper Gulch Clothing Store and Bonnie’s Clip & Curl. It had been nothing but a deserted building then, so full of cobwebs that she’d had the place fumigated before she’d done anything else. Some of the other structures she’d looked at had more history, but none of them had as much personality or potential.
The front portion of the store had a tin ceiling. The rest had an open ceiling, high rafters, and wood floors. A long time ago, it had been a furniture store, which made it the perfect place to house the antiques and fine furnishings Meredith planned to sell here. The work was nearly completed. Track lighting had been installed below the rafters, the entire place scrubbed and painted. She’d made the curtains at the windows herself, and with the help of several local teenagers, the antiques were arranged at one end, the few pieces of new furniture she could afford to stock at the other. The paint she would sell was due to arrive later in the week. Every day she worked from dawn until late into the night down here before retiring to the tiny apartment upstairs. It was all coming together, the kids, her store, her life.
She spread her arms wide and tipped her head back. Whoa. Woozy, she closed her eyes.
“Aunt Meredith, ’Livia,” Logan called. “That alley cat’s gone and had kittens in an old barrel that tipped over back here.”
Olivia ran to see. Meredith blinked, focused, then followed. Logan was on his knees just inside the back door. Olivia was bent at the waist a foot away.
“She must’a just had ’em,” he said. “They’re still ugly and their eyes aren’t open yet.”
“They’re not either ugly,” Olivia exclaimed. “They’re beautiful.”
Meredith braced herself for the argument that was sure to break out, but Logan shrugged good-naturedly and simply said, “You know what I mean.”
“How many are there?” Olivia asked her big brother.
“Six.”
“Six?” Meredith exclaimed. What on earth was she going to do with an alley cat and six kittens?
“Wait. I was wrong.”
Oh, good.
“There are seven,” Logan amended.
“Seven?” Meredith asked. “Are you sure?” The scraggly orange-and-white mother cat stared up at her, blinking tiredly, as if sharing Meredith’s dismay.
“Yup. There are seven all right. Uncle Wes