Montana Hero (30 page)

One kiss and
he was putty in her hands. Soft, moldable, stupid putty—except for the part of him that was rock hard and wouldn’t take no for an answer. But, sex—as great as it was between them—wasn’t enough.

Was it?

Her tongue explored his mouth and traced the underside of his chin as if to memorize every inch of him. She unbuttoned his shirt and dug her hands under the loose flannel to squeeze him tight. Her smell danced across his olfactory senses, reminding him of flowers and forest.

He was totally ready to cave in—say to hell with his pride—when her phone rang.

She groaned. “Damn. I have to answer. It may be the school.”

She pulled the phone out of her purse, which she’d leaned against the wall and listened, her expression going from indulgent to straight up concern. “Hello? Oh, hi, Georgette. How—?” She froze. “What? You’re kidding. When?”

Flynn braced for bad news.

“Oh, my God. That’s terrible. Is everybody okay?” She looked at Flynn, her eyes signaling for him not to worry as she listened a bit longer. “Yes, of course. I will. Thanks for calling the insurance company. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

His hands fell to his side as he watched the woman he loved get her game face on. “Well, I didn’t see that coming.” She shook her head. “That was my property manager in San Antonio. The family that rents my house was barbecuing last night and apparently they put live ashes in a plastic bucket and set it on the deck.”

Flynn groaned. “Oh, good God.”

“The fire spread and they were lucky to get out alive. My house is probably a complete loss. The insurance adjusters are there, now.” She shook her head. “This is the second fire in under five years. What are the chances?”

“Different circumstances. Accidents—and human stupidity—happen.”

“I have to go. Georgette said the storage unit where I put the stuff I didn’t want to move was untouched, but she’s worried that it might get vandalized without anyone living in the house.”

Flynn moved to his knees. “How can I help? Do you need me to pick up Roger? Or call Bailey to let people know you’re not going to be here tomorrow?”

She took a deep breath and let it out. “I don’t know. I can’t think. I guess the first thing I need to do is check on flights to San Antonio. Do you have Wi-Fi?”

“Not yet. Sorry.” He stood and reached for her hand. “Let’s go.”

“Where?”

“You’ll see.”

“I have to pick up Brady after school.”

He grabbed his phone and typed in a quick text. “Got that covered. Come on. I’m driving. You’ve had a shock. Your mind is not going to be on road conditions.”

She didn’t argue as they slipped on their shoes.

He turned off the lights and locked the door then remotely started his truck as he led her to the passenger side door.

Once he was behind the wheel, he told her, “You know, Katherine, I did some research when you first told me about your mother. Plus, I was curious about what was going to happen to Molly. I’m no scientist, but I took biology in college.”

She watched him backup and swing the truck around. “If I remember correctly, even if you inherit two copies of the risk gene, you have a higher
possibility
of developing the disease but it’s not a certainty. Right?”

She sighed. “No doctor has ever told me I’m going to develop Alzheimer’s. Only that my risk is greater than someone who doesn’t have a history of it in their family.”

He shrugged. “Probability isn’t the same as a death sentence. Nobody really knows the underlying cause, right? They haven’t ruled out environmental factors. Sweetheart, there are as many questions as there are possibilities.”

“I want to believe that, Flynn. Most days I’m more optimist than pessimist, but my stepfather died because my mother refused to admit she was ill. I would rather live in a box than risk the life of someone I love.”

He reached across the center console to squeeze her hand. “I’d never let that happen. I’m not your stepfather. I get that you have lived with this disease for so long you’re convinced it’s your albatross. But, I am blind to that possibility. I believe just as strongly that you’re healthy, vital and you will not lose your memory when you’re a young woman. But, there’s only one way to find out.”

“How?”

“By growing old together.”

Her chuckle was soft, and maybe a bit ironic.

He decided to go for broke. “And I’m just going to throw this out here, but your mother and grandmother both had one child, correct?”

“Yes.”

“Well, maybe if they’d had more—like two or three….”

From the corner of his eye, he saw her fighting the smirk forming on her lips. “You want to have kids? Plural?”

“I do. Soon. So Brady can be a big brother to them.”

“But—”

He held up his hand to stop her. “I’m just giving you something to think about, Katherine. I love you. I want to marry you…someday. Be a father to Brady and as many children as you wish to give me. And I will cherish you until
my
brain goes, which could happen. And if it did, you’d care for me and love me to my last breath, right?”

She gave a soft sob and brushed away a tear. “Of course.”

“Me, too.”

Neither spoke for a minute.

Flynn had one more thing to say before he dropped the subject. “I don’t expect you to give me your answer right now. I just want you to know how I feel, and, hopefully, you’ll take that into consideration in case you get back to Texas and feel a strong desire to stay.”

She leaned her head against the seat, eyes closed. “I loved that house at one time. When we moved, I told myself it was Brady’s ace in the hole in case I got sick. Hopefully, by the time he needed it, the value would have gone up and he’d be able to sell it and use the money for my care.” She let out a small sob. “Now, it’s gone. Just like everything else.”

It killed him to hear her in pain. The sooner she could get to Texas and assess the damage, the sooner she’d be able to chart a new course and get her life back on track—in Montana.

They’d just reached the outskirts of Marietta.

“Where are we going?”

“To call in reinforcements. Did you know all of the Zabrinskis fly?”

‡

K
at closed her
eyes, weary beyond words. So much emotion, change, pain and possibility had been squeezed into three, long and very challenging days. And, yet, she knew the entire ordeal would have been so much more difficult if she’d been alone.

For the first time in what felt like forever, she had back up.

Starting with the man across the aisle from her. She didn’t know where she’d found the courage to ask Flynn to join her on the trip to San Antonio, but he hadn’t hesitated even a heartbeat before answering. “Of course. If you’re sure I won’t be intruding on your bonding time with Roger.”

So, instead of attending the big Zabrinski “summit,” as Bailey called it, Kat, Roger and Flynn had headed for Texas in a small but comfortably appointed plane piloted by Robert Zabrinski. Could there have been a stranger way to meet the man who almost certainly was her father?

She doubted it.

She lifted her head to look at her son’s grandfather in the co-pilot’s seat. Apparently, Roger was the lone non-pilot in the Zabrinski family. A fact he made up for by underwriting the entire cost of the trip, including first class hotel rooms and a Cadillac SUV rental car.

“Can you believe they’re brothers?” Flynn whispered, nodding toward the front of the plane.

To Kat’s surprise, she’d fallen in love with both men, even though they were polar opposites and rarely agreed on anything—except where Kat was concerned.

“It was like watching two knights in slightly rusty armor take on the insurance giant on my behalf,” she told him. “I will never forget that feeling when the adjuster threw in the towel and agreed to give me full market value for the house.”

Roger and Robert, both successful businessmen in their own right, along with Flynn, who could intimidate the hell out of any number cruncher in a suit, got every penny they felt she had coming. Then, Roger rolled up his sleeves and helped her go through her storage unit while Flynn and Robert arranged for a moving company to haul everything to Montana.

“Wow,” she’d cried, looking at the haphazard stacks of boxes. “I forgot what a mess this turned into when I added Mom’s stuff to it after she died. I was…numb, I think.”

“I know exactly what you mean,” Roger said. “After my brother died, I simply shut down. Drugs and booze helped. Shoving a few boxes in a storage crate so you could take care of your son is a lot healthier choice. I applaud you.”

Kat hadn’t expected him to be so frank about the accident that claimed his eldest brother’s life, but he’d seemed eager to share.

“Hunting is one of the most boring sports on the planet, in my opinion, but I craved my older brothers’ approval. When I think back to that moment, everything goes to slow motion, almost as if time was giving me a chance to change the outcome. I tripped and reached out to catch myself. Somehow, the butt of the gun hit the ground and this horrible loud sound exploded beside my ear. A second later, everyone was shouting, but their voices seemed to come through water as if I’d fallen in the deep end of the pool.”

Roger’s still beautiful blue eyes had clouded with tears.

“Richard was a nice guy. He deserved better. I hated myself for a long time because of that blink in time. I did a lot of things that could probably be labeled masochistic, self-destructive or flat-out stupid. Like marrying a stripper I met at a bar.” He’d groaned and shook his head. “That one cost me a pretty penny, but, worst of all, she’s the reason I lost your mom…and the daughter I never knew I had.”

They’d talked the whole time they moved boxes and pieces of furniture into two groups: keepers and giveaway.

He told her about his decision to run that small nest egg into a big fortune in Vegas. “God, what an ego I had at that time. Unfortunately, I was drinking heavily, losing frequently and stayed half-stoned most the time. Then, along came Candy. I woke up married. After a few weeks of partying and spending boatloads of money in the company of some real low lifes, I realized I needed out. Robert offered me a job in the store if I moved back to Marietta to dry out and clean up my act.”

“That’s when you met Mom?”

“First day on the job. She cut through my bullshit with a been-there-done-that laser. She made me believe I could be a better man. It was the best summer of my life,” he’d told her, his voice thick with emotion.

She looked at Flynn, eyes closed, probably every bit as tired as she was. When they could have been sleeping they were either talking or making love. Finally, she understood what Roger and her mother must have felt for each other.

When Roger described going down on one knee to ask Grace to marry him, she’d pictured Flynn giving her the ring she never took off. “I asked her to marry me, but she said that would be against the law since I was still married. So, I made plans to go back to Vegas to confront my ex. What I didn’t count on was how determined Candy was to keep my money. She set me up. Spiked my soda, and then took photos of the two of us in bed. She told me she sent them to my little ‘girlfriend.’ I don’t know how she found out about Gracie, but by the time I got back to Marietta, Grace was gone. She never told me she was pregnant.”

He’d reached for Kat’s hand and led her to the little settee Mom had brought with her from Grandma’s house. “My Gracie was the most beautiful woman I ever met, but she had some pretty big holes where her self-esteem should have been.”

Kat agreed.

“Her daddy leaving when she was a little girl might have had something to do with it. Other boyfriends cheated on her. Whatever the reason, when I got back and found her letter, along with the photos Candy sent her. I knew she’d left me for good and I pretty much lost it.”

He hadn’t tried to gloss over what happened next—a very self-destructive relapse that ended when some woman he barely knew died and he had to identify her body. He got clean and threw himself into his work. “Building things saved my sanity. My house in Malibu is my sanctuary. I even have a niche in the garden that’s dedicated to your mother.”

Brady had already started bugging her about setting a date to go see Grandpa Roger’s place, but Kat had a lot of things to settle first. Not the least of which was finding a new job. Fortunately, the check she would be receiving from her insurance company would cushion any downtime if the Sheriff decided to hire someone else. Something Flynn assured her wasn’t likely.

They hadn’t talked any more about weddings or babies or the future. He’d seemed to sense that this trip was all about tying up loose ends. He’d stayed back at the hotel when she and Roger had dinner with Greg and his latest girlfriend.

“We’ll meet eventually,” Flynn had said, his usual, calm pragmatic self.

Roger’s opinion of Greg? “You got the best out of him when you had Brady. Now, you’ve got a real man in your life.”

She reached over and squeezed Flynn’s hand. “Are we there, yet?”

He leaned across the small toaster-oven size box resting on the bench seat between them. Mom. Roger had actually broken down and wept when Kat showed him the box containing her mother’s ashes. She hadn’t known what to do with them so she’d left them sitting on Grandma’s settee in the storage unit.