SUSAN MEIER - Hunter's Vow

Thinking about how much Hunter had loved her, walking from Tyler’s school to the diner, Abby smiled. He had been wonderful. Funny. Effervescent. Handsome. And passionate. Incredibly passionate! He had loved life and refused to be beaten by a horrible childhood. He’d intended to be something…someone. And he’d promised to take her with him.

That had been the plan. Lying naked in the back seat of his old car, cuddling after making love, he would tell her his dreams and the very resonance of his voice could convince her he was right. He would have it all. They would have it all—together.

She almost couldn’t equate the withdrawn stranger with the extraordinary man who had loved life, who had seen the future as bright and beautiful in spite of his humble, disheartening beginnings, and who couldn’t wait to make love to her.

Even as Abby served breakfast to the residents of Brewster at the diner, she kept thinking about the way Hunter made love to her. The memories, replete with feelings and sensations, haunted her. The pictures in her mind were so vivid and so complete, she was abundantly grateful for the distraction when the wives of all three Brewster brothers entered the restaurant, each carrying a toddler triplet.

Both little girls, Taylor and Annie, wore pink dresses with ruffle-rump tights and Cody wore a navy one-piece romper that looked like a sailor suit. The babies, now over a year old, got a refill of milk in their “sippy” cups and each woman ordered toast.

Though they tried to make it look as if they’d decided to bring the kids into town for a treat, Abby knew they’d come in to hear about her meeting with Hunter. Evan’s wife, Claire, a stunning brunette, was the only one of the women Abby had actually known since childhood. But Kristen, Grant’s wife, and Lily, Chas’s wife, had become close to Abby in a very short time. When the Brewster brothers became guardians of their father’s triplets, Evan met Claire and married her. Lily was hired to be the triplets’ nanny and Chas fell in love with and married her. Then when Kristen, the triplets’ aunt, came to Pennsylvania to try for custody of her nieces and nephew, she and Grant fell in love. Now all three Brewsters were married. Each of them had responsibility for one of the triplets and Abby had three friends. She decided not to spare the details of her meeting with Hunter. Lord knew the truth always got out eventually.

“He said what?” Lily asked, her big blue eyes wide and round with confusion. A breathtaking blonde with a sharp mind for details, Lily was the most sensitive of the three.

“He threatened to file for custody.”

Though Abby didn’t want to admit it, and though she didn’t want to see it come down to a battle between husbands and wives, she was glad that the Brewster women considered her a part of their clique. Because she didn’t know how to handle Hunter, it was a comfort of sorts to have an “in” with the other people in his life. If she couldn’t get him to listen to reason, maybe the Brewsters could.

Glancing from Claire to Lily to Kristen Devereaux Brewster, Abby sighed and wondered about the fairness of using them. In the end, she chose not to. “I probably shouldn’t be talking with you guys about this.” Her gaze drifted over to Kristen, the green-eyed blonde who was also the aunt of the triplets, babies who had been in the custody of the Brewster brothers since the death of their father and Kristen’s sister, the babies’ parents. “Especially you,” she said to Kristen. “After all, your husband is Hunter’s partner. I wouldn’t want to say anything to cause trouble or hard feelings.”

“Well, you just hush up, now,” Kristen said, her Texas accent obvious in the hills of central Pennsylvania. “Hunter may be Grant’s partner, but you’re my friend. And where I come from friends take care of friends.”

“Thanks, but I don’t think anybody can take care of this.”

Claire frowned. “Frankly, I don’t see what the problem is. For seven years you’ve been waiting for Hunter to ride back into town and take you away from all this,” she said, waving her hand to indicate the aging diner. Cody, the triplet for whom she and Evan took responsibility, patted her cheeks as she spoke. “If you ask me, everything will be fine after a few weeks of the two of you getting reacquainted.”

Abby shook her head. “Reacquainted” didn’t quite fit the bill of what was happening between them. While Abby remembered a bright, wonderful man full of promise, the Hunter Wyman who had returned was quiet and brooding. And bossy. They couldn’t even have a reasonable discussion about Tyler. Getting “reacquainted” was completely out of the picture. “I don’t think so,” she said.

“Why?” Claire demanded. “Has he suddenly grown a second nose?”

“No,” Abby said, heat suffusing her when she brought up Hunter’s image in her mind. His looks were the very last of his problems. If anything, age had made him even more gorgeous. “He hasn’t lost one ounce of his attractiveness.”

“Oh, look at you,” Lily said with a laugh. “You’re blushing.”

“She’s always adored Hunter Wyman,” Claire told Lily as if speaking a confidence, but she didn’t bother to lower her voice. “He was the older man in her life. The rebel.”

Both Lily and Kristen sighed with delight, but the observation made Abby frown. “Maybe that’s it.”

“What?” Kristen asked.

“Maybe I don’t like him because he’s not a rebel anymore.”

Claire gave her friend a confused look. “You don’t like him because he’s not a borderline criminal?”

“No, that’s not quite it.” Abby pulled her lower lip between her teeth as she tried to draw her conclusion. “I think I don’t know how to deal with him because he’s not a rebel. Seven years ago, if Hunter would have decided he wanted Tyler, he probably would have kidnapped him.”

All three of the women gasped. Abby shook her head furiously. “I wouldn’t have let it happen,” she insisted. “But the point is, back then I knew how to handle Hunter. I knew him so well I could have kept him from doing something rash and foolish. I don’t have a clue how to handle the man he is now.”

“I still say you’re worrying over nothing. This is a chance for you to reunite with your one true love,” Claire said dreamily. “So, things aren’t going exactly as planned. Give it a chance. It will all work out.”

“My one true love was passionate and wonderful,” Abby said dully. “This guy isn’t. This Hunter might be handsome and sexy, but the passion is gone. In some ways he behaves as if he thinks passion is wrong. Or as if he believes passion is the ‘bad’ trait that held him down in Brewster County.”

“Or,” Kristen proposed, “because Grant is the passionate partner, maybe Hunter thinks he’s the one who has to be in control. Maybe all he needs is a little time or a little push to loosen up.”

“So what are you going to do?” Lily asked.

“I have no choice but to let Hunter see Tyler,” Abby said. “He’s coming over tonight after dinner.”

“Maybe you should try to be a little seductive and refresh his memory about what you shared,” Claire suggested, waggling her eyebrows.

Abby blushed furiously. “Not on your life.” She might have done that under other circumstances, but she was afraid to now. For all she knew, this Hunter might scold her if she flirted with him.

“What was it you loved about him, sugar?” Kristen asked suddenly.

Though anybody reading her thoughts of the morning would have said the way he made love to her, Abby knew that wasn’t true. “He was honest,” she admitted quietly, because in her life there had not been enough honesty. Poor as Hunter had been, lonely as he had been, he didn’t know any way to behave but with honesty and simplicity. Being with him, loving him, was the easiest thing Abby had ever done. “And direct and genuine.”

“Okay,” Claire said, sounding relieved. “Those things don’t change. Now if you had said his looks, we’d all think you were crazy because looks can fade. But honesty doesn’t fade. Neither does forthrightness. He’s still the same guy, Abby. You only need to bring out the best in him.”

Just the thought that he was the same man filled Abby with yearning. Not simply sexual, but emotional. In that second, she realized how much she missed him, but more than that she understood that she had never stopped loving him. If there was a chance, even a teeny, tiny chance, she could bring out the simple, honest man in him again, Abby knew she had to try.

Dressing that evening, after rushing Tyler through dinner, Abby also reprimanded herself for being impatient. She couldn’t believe she had jumped to the conclusion that Hunter had drastically changed merely on the basis of two short meetings. Good Lord, seven years had passed. Many, many things stood between them. Of course, he wouldn’t act like her best friend the first time he saw her after a long separation. And he certainly wouldn’t behave like a lover.

Confident, composed, Abby jogged down the steps when she heard the front doorbell ring. Though she hadn’t exactly dressed up, she hadn’t worn jeans and a T-shirt, either, as was her usual practice. Instead, she had exchanged the jeans for a short, flared skirt and the T-shirt for a soft mint-green sleeveless sweater. She wasn’t a woman who believed in high heels, but she did have chunky-heeled mahogany sandals that more or less suited the outfit.

Reminding herself that her friends were right and she shouldn’t judge Hunter too harshly or too quickly, Abby pasted on a smile and opened her front door. When she saw him, her jaw fell.

He wore charcoal gray slacks and a black turtleneck sweater that not only made him look wealthy and sophisticated, but also made her short skirt and sandals seem totally inappropriate. She felt poor and humble and something like the beleaguered heroine of Cinderella, instead of the lonely, ivory-tower princess she used to be.

“Hello, Hunter,” she said gaily, though inside she was dying. “I’m afraid I’m a little behind schedule, and I haven’t had a chance to dress yet,” she said, adding the lie because she refused to be in the submissive position with him again. Surely she had something in her closet that could give his charcoal gray slacks a run for their money. “So, I’ll just run upstairs and—”

He caught her hand and kept her from turning to the steps. “You look fine,” he said quietly, then almost groaned. Had he said “fine”? She looked wonderful. Cute. Happy. Sexy. Incredibly sexy. “There’s no need to change on my account.”

“I know,” she said, and yanked her hand out of his grasp. Too late, he realized he’d been holding it forever, as if her hand belonged in his. “But you’re so dressed up,” she added plaintively.

Hunter laughed. “These are comfortable clothes for me now,” he said and moved into her foyer, hoping she would relax and follow him. He hated the fact that he made her nervous. The more nervous she became, the more he wanted to console her. And that was bad, even dangerous.

Not only had Hunter heard from Grant that Abby never spoke harshly of him, but he also realized that the Abby he loved wasn’t capable of being vindictive, which meant she hadn’t said anything but good things about him to Tyler. In one short day every suspicion he had about her had been mitigated or completely resolved by someone, and he kept getting this surge of nearly overpowering emotion that seemed to demand that he ask her to marry him.

Aside from his own miserable marriage failure, he couldn’t dredge up one good reason not to marry her, except that seven years had passed and Abby might not want to marry him. Which was actually the clincher that kept him from making a darned fool of himself. Unless he harnessed all the instincts that continually sneaked up on him, he might blurt a marriage proposal. And he could not let that happen. Particularly since he had decided that moving into the bed-and-breakfast would be the best way for him to get to know his son and for him and Abby to have time to hash out their problems. If they were going to live under the same roof, he had to control himself.