better than she remembered. He had grown taller and had filled out. He looked more rugged, more solid. Despite the season, he wore a checkered shirt rolled up at the sleeves, tight jeans and heavy work shoes. But it wasn’t his clothes that riveted her attention. Nor was it his broad shoulders and powerful forearms, which she supposed came from lifting heavy lumber and wrestling with large pieces of furniture. It was his face that defined his character, his powerful jaw and wide forehead, shaggy brows and weather-roughened skin, thick, nearly black hair that refused to be tamed. And black eyes that stared into her until she wanted to run away.
But she wasn’t a little girl now. Even though she hadn’t wanted to come back, she hadn’t the slightest intention of running away.
Gabe’s gaze moved from her to Danny. “Is that my nephew?”
“Of course.” She shouldn’t have snapped at him, but her nerves were on edge.
She hadn’t been unduly upset when she first learned Mattie had made Gabe Danny’s joint guardian with her. She’d assumed a thirty-six-year-old bachelor wouldn’t want to be burdened with a small child. She would agree to take Danny to Iron Springs to visit Mattie’s family during vacations, might even let him spend a few summers there, but she had every expectation of having the child to herself.
Gabe had exploded that belief.
Not only had he insisted that she bring Danny to Iron Springs the minute the boy recovered from his fever, he said Mattie’s stipulation that Danny be raised near his family meant he had to live in Iron Springs. Dana’s lawyer had advised her to work out a compromise with Gabe, but Dana doubted she could. She had come to Iron Springs ready to do battle.
But right now she had to calm down before she upset Danny. He’d had more than enough change in his life. “Sorry,” she said. “It was a long trip to make with a small child. On top of Mattie’s death…well, I’m still strung out.” She couldn’t think of Mattie without wanting to cry all over again.
She still found it hard to believe anyone as young, vital, and healthy as Mattie could be diagnosed with cancer one day and be dead three weeks later. For twenty-five years, they’d been closer than sisters. Mattie had come to live with Dana when she’d learned she was pregnant. They’d gone through morning sickness together, doctors’ appointments, lectures on prenatal care, Lamaze classes, endless discussions about what to name the baby. Dana had been at Mattie’s side in the delivery room. She’d placed Danny in Mattie’s arms. They’d sat up together on nights when he had the croup or a fever, had taken turns walking him when he couldn’t sleep, had shared the tasks of feeding, bathing, changing diapers.
Danny had become part of Dana’s life, her soul, but now everyone expected her to hand him over to his uncle and go back to her old life as if these past three years had never happened. Losing Mattie had been like losing part of herself. That made her all the more determined to hold on to Danny.
“Let me have him.” Gabe held out his arms, but Danny buried his face in Dana’s neck.
“Not yet. He doesn’t know you.”
“He’ll have to get used to him sooner or later,” Marshall said. “He might as well start now.”
“He’ll start when I say.” She could hear the anger in her voice. She tried to control her tone, the rigidity of her body, but she couldn’t help it. The thought of giving Danny to anyone filled her with an anger at the whole world that was as red-hot as it was impotent.
A knock at the back door came as a welcome distraction. A woman accompanied by a young boy let herself in. “I’m Naomi Ferguson,” she said, introducing herself. “This is my son, Elton. I suggested to Marshall that Danny might be happier if I took him off to play while you and Gabe discussed business. Would you like to play with Elton?” Naomi asked Danny.
He hid his face in Dana’s shoulder again.
“I’ll look after him,” Elton said, swaggering like a little man.
Trying not to grin, Dana squatted down until Danny and Elton were eye-to-eye. “Danny’s a little shy. He doesn’t have anybody to play with at home.”
“He don’t have to be scared,” Elton said. “Won’t nobody say boo to him if I tell ’em not to.”
“I’ll keep an eye on both of them,” Naomi said with a wink.
As reluctant as Dana was to let Danny out of her sight, she knew it would be better for everybody if he were at least in another room while she talked to Gabe.
“Do you want to go with Elton?” Dana asked Danny.
The child eyed Elton curiously but didn’t relinquish his hold on Dana’s neck.
“You can have some of my cookies,” Elton offered. He reached inside one of the deep pockets of his baggy pants and withdrew a plastic bag full of chocolate chip cookies. “Mama made ’em,” he said as he took one out of the bag and offered it to Danny. “Can’t nobody make better cookies than Mama.”
The cookie was a sad little thing, bent and twisted from its time in Elton’s pocket. Apparently its sad state didn’t bother Danny. He reached for the cookie.
“I got more,” Elton said reaching into another pocket and drawing out a second bag of cookies. “I’ll get some milk, and we can go sit on Marshall’s porch and eat the rest of them.”
The lure of two handfuls of cookies was too much for Danny. He loosened his grip on Dana and slid to the floor. Elton held out his hand, and Danny took it. “You don’t have to worry about your kid, lady,” Elton said to Dana. “He’s safe with me.”
Naomi laughed as Elton and Danny headed toward the back door. “No child can resist chocolate chip cookies,” she said as she opened the cabinet and took out two glasses.
“I think it was Elton,” Gabe said.
Naomi took milk from the refrigerator. “I’ll keep them on the screened porch.”
Dana couldn’t stop herself from looking through the window. Danny had settled next to Elton, munching on a cookie, looking up at the older boy with wonder in his eyes.
“Your son is an angel,” she said to Naomi.
“Only sometimes,” Naomi said, then closed the door behind her as she joined the kids on the porch.
Dana took one last look, turned to face Gabe.
“Why don’t you leave now?” Marshall asked. “You could be halfway to the interstate before he finishes his cookies.”
His suggestion was so unexpected, so completely without any regard for Danny’s feelings, Dana couldn’t think of the words to tell him what an unfeeling idiot he was.
“We have some things to talk over,” Gabe said.
“A lot of things,” Dana said, recovering her speech. “Not the least of which is this absurd notion you have that you can take care of Danny as well as I can. You don’t know anything about children. Why did you force me to bring him to Iron Springs?”
“Because Mattie wanted him to live here.”
“She didn’t say that.”
“She wanted him brought up with his family. That doesn’t mean New York.”
“I could send him down on vacations.”
“No.”
“Maybe even summers.”
“He lives here. I’ll let him visit you during summers and vacations.”
Dana’s lawyer had already warned her not to expect more than this, but she couldn’t accept the thought of being separated from Danny for months at a time. “He ought to live in one place with somebody he knows, somebody who knows how to care for him. That’s obviously me. How are you going to take care of him? Where is he going to stay?”
“I