A Conard County Courtship - Rachel Lee

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Sooner or later, she would have to do a walk-through with him. He could understand her being angry with Higgins, but the house? No, she hadn’t wanted it, but surely she didn’t have anything against the house. It was an inanimate object.

      “Ms. Welling, this is my son, Matthew.”

      She had lifted her head at the approach of their footsteps, and now she managed a faint smile. “Hello, Matthew. If you want, you can call me Vannie.”

      “Vannie?” he repeated as if memorizing it. “I got a new library book. Wanna see?”

      Kids, thought Tim. They got through the rough spots as if they weren’t there, skipped over the awkwardness of first meetings and just accepted everyone as a friend.

      “I’d love to see,” she answered. Her expression remained pleasant and her tone neutral. Okay, she’d be polite.

      “We can’t take too long, Matthew. Vannie’s going to need to get some groceries before the snow starts.” He looked at Vanessa. “The cold out there will snatch your breath.”

      “Already?” She frowned faintly. “Here or the motel, huh?”

      “Well, I have a guest room, if you’d rather. No problem for me.”

      The offer was out before he knew it was coming, and then Matthew seconded it. The idea of having someone new in the house seemed to appeal to him.

      Vanessa’s hesitation appeared obvious. Matthew was already running on about how they could read his library book together, but she had drawn away. He could feel it. Pulled back into herself.

      “Look,” he said finally. “I’ll guide you to the motel if you want, but like I said, mostly truckers and transients stay there. This house is okay if you want to stock it up. I was only thinking about you being here alone if the blizzard gets bad. You’d be stuck, and the phones here aren’t working. Cell phones can become unreliable when the air’s full of blowing snow.”

      He could have sworn she felt torn in a bunch of different directions. But then she surprised him.

      “If you’re sure I won’t put you out...”

      That settled it, he decided. A night or two. As soon as she’d made her decisions about the house, she’d drive away.

      Matthew was ecstatic. Tim watched him with a faint smile, but once again reflected on how much that boy must miss having a mother. He hoped a couple of days wasn’t long enough for him to fit Vanessa into that role.

       Chapter Two

      Vanessa hoped she hadn’t made a mistake. Tim Dawson seemed like a laid-back sort of guy, however attractive, and his son was a trip. It ought to be okay for a few days.

      But honestly, the thought of being stuck alone in Bob Higgins’s house because of a blizzard had been more than she could face. As she’d sat there, waiting for Tim to return with his son, memories had clamored, and maybe the worst part was that they were so confused.

      So much for thinking she’d dealt with the past and put it away. The house had dug it all up again. It would have been okay if the memories had been bad, but the thing was, they were good memories, which made Bob Higgins’s betrayal all that more difficult to deal with.

      When she stepped outside to follow Tim to his house, the icy air astonished her. The temperature had fallen that fast? She wore what she’d thought would be an adequate wool coat, but it wasn’t enough.

      She hurried to get into her car and out of the wind. Matthew had told his father he wanted to ride with her, but before she could say anything Tim had squashed that. Good. She liked the kid as much as she could, having only just met him, but she was far from being ready to drive him around. Also, she knew next to nothing about children.

      Maybe she should have gone to the motel. The town had only one, it seemed, and the reviews hadn’t been exciting. Truckers and transients? And what if she got snowed in there?

      She shook her head at herself. She wasn’t usually a ditherer, but then she’d never faced a situation quite like this before. Not as an adult making her own decisions.

      A town she had nearly forgotten that held secrets about her family that might cause people to judge her. Her dad had certainly thought so. A house from the man who’d destroyed her family. She couldn’t imagine staying there by herself to deal with the good memories that refused to jibe with later reality. Worse, the bad memories from later were more sharply engraved on her mind. She didn’t want to relive her dad’s deterioration and death. All that bitterness. Her mother’s despair.

      She hoped Bob Higgins had gone to hell, then caught herself. She didn’t wish that on anyone. But that was the problem with being back here. Having thoughts like that. She was going to face a very ugly part of herself until she was able to walk away.

      Tim lived right around the corner. He pulled into a paved driveway that left enough room for her to pull in beside him. She was relieved she wouldn’t be blocking him in or leaving her car on the street to interfere with snowplows.

      From the outside, the two-story house appeared tidy—freshly painted white, black shutters all in good condition. A side door led into a mudroom, and from there into a warmly decorated kitchen, painted yellow with sunflower decals along the soffits. A woman’s touch.

      “Your wife won’t mind?” she asked, a belated concern. It almost embarrassed her that she hadn’t asked earlier.

      “I’m widowed,” Tim said as he bent to give Matthew a friendly pat on his behind and sent him to put his backpack away. “Homework before dinner.”

      “Okay, Dad, but I still haven’t showed Vannie my book.”

      “After the work sheets are done, okay? She’d probably like to put her suitcase in the spare room and settle a bit.”

      Matthew looked at Vanessa and grinned. “I don’t have much homework.”

      “Then I’ll have to hurry my settling in.”

      Matthew dashed off, leaving Tim and Vanessa alone for a moment.

      “He’s cute,” Vanessa offered.

      “He’s also endlessly energetic. Don’t let him bug you too much. Come on, I’ll show you your room.”

      Miserable as she had been by herself at the Higgins house, now she felt a desperate need for a few minutes alone. With her emotions all topsy-turvy, she needed just a little time to let them settle.

      Closing the door behind her in the guest room seemed like a sure way to get that done. Tim brought in her suitcase, told her where to find the facilities, then left her alone in a lovely room.

      She suspected he cherished the memory of his wife, because little enough had been done to erase a woman’s touch. No man had chosen those white ruffled curtains or thought to put an embroidered oval doily on the top of the mirrored dresser. A comforter decorated with forget-me-nots covered the queen-size bed, and matching rugs scattered the polished wood floor.

      Definitely his wife’s choices, she thought, along with the pale lavender paint on the walls.

      So he hadn’t changed a thing. That told her something about his grief. Then she thought of his son, the boy without a mother, and reluctantly her heart went out to them both. The fact that she didn’t make relationships didn’t mean she didn’t care.

      It was the relationships that could frighten her. But for Tim and Matthew...that wasn’t enough to unnerve her. She didn’t intend to be here that long.

      She enjoyed a few minutes by herself, changing out of her traveling clothes into more comfortable green fleece, pants and thick socks. Then she decided it was time to go out and face the world of Tim and Matthew. Hanging around in her room might seem rude to Tim after he’d been awfully nice to invite her to stay here.

      As

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