Annie Jones - Home to Stay

But when Emma moved to take a look, her gaze fell on Hank directing his dogs here and there, calling out to Ruth with the promise of tea parties and maybe even real cake.

“This window, in fact the whole attic, is off-limits, young lady.” Claire took the child’s chin in her hand. “I don’t care how interesting you find that crane.”

“Crane! I can make a crane!” Ruth spun around and headed for the stairway again. “I’ll show you.”

“Use the handrail on those steps, baby,” Emma called after her child. When Ruth singsonged back something indistinguishable, Emma turned back to the view of Hank and sighed. “Things haven’t changed around here. Never a dull moment.”

“Oh, things have changed plenty.” Claire came up beside her, gazed out into the distance, then at Emma, then down at the ground below where Aunt Sammie had made her way into the yard, with Ruth on her heels, to speak to Hank. “Stick around a while and you’ll see just how much.”

“I can’t stick around,” Emma said softly. What she really wanted to do was ask her sister just what she meant by that cryptic remark, but thought better of it. No use stirring things up when she knew it wouldn’t affect her reality—she wasn’t going to stay. “I just came to Gall Rive to help me clear my head and figure out what’s best for Ruth and me, what I really want to do with the rest of my life.”

“Hmm. So, you came here for that?” Claire made a show of looking out and down to the man standing below them, trying to keep the circus that was Sammie Jo, Ruthie, Otis and Earnest T in check and looking very grown-up and handsome while doing it. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

As Claire turned and walked away, Hank looked up to the window.

Emma let out a tiny gasp to have been caught staring at the man.

He smiled, waved, then pointed with his thumb over his shoulder toward his truck, letting her know he needed to get going.

Emma waved and mouthed the words Thank you, though she doubted he could see that.

A long, sharp whistle for his dogs and Hank started for the truck. He only paused to shake Ruthie’s hand, a gesture she barely acknowledged in favor of showing her paper crane to the dogs, who seemed more interested in tasting it than admiring it. In short order the dogs were in the truck, Ruth was in the care of Sammie Jo and Hank climbed behind the wheel.

As he drove away, Emma leaned her forehead against the glass of the old window. She was mentally, physically and emotionally exhausted. She was overdressed, under-rested and needed to spend the rest of this day dealing with her aunt and sister, unpack the few things she had thought to bring along and find what she needed to beg or borrow to get by. But first she needed to find a hammer and nail and get this window taken care of, then another nap to help her get some focus back.

Too bad the issues that had prompted her to make the all-night flight home weren’t so easily addressed. Ben Weaver wanted to marry her. He wanted to take care of her and to enable her to take care of Ruth in whatever way Emma saw fit. And to top it off he was willing to give her time to fall in love with him. On the surface it seemed like everything a struggling single mom could ask for, but Emma kept thinking that maybe what seemed good for Ruth might not be what was best for the girl, or for Emma. That wasn’t the kind of problem she could fix with a hammer and a nap.

Emma thought of her sister’s response to Emma’s claim she was only here to help find the right path to the future. You came here for that? I hope you know what you’re doing.

“I do, too,” Emma whispered as Hank’s truck disappeared around a curve in the old road. “I do, too.”

His sense of responsibility motivated Hank to go out to the migratory-bird sanctuary the next morning. That’s what he told himself. And that’s what he kept trying to convince himself of—that he hadn’t made the ten-mile drive from his home/vet clinic after his morning appointments because Emma Newberry kept dropping into his dreams and popping into his thoughts. He told himself that he hadn’t come out here to try to make a connection with her, despite the realization that she looked perfectly at home even in an outfit that left no doubt that she had another life, a life of diamonds and doctors and dinner at places that were more than a notch above the handful of places to grab a bite and get the gossip around Gall Rive.

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