LITMIR.BIZ

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can I have my bat back?”

      “Nope.” He started toward his new barn. “Come on.”

      “Where?” Murphy’s voice was rife with suspicion.

      Erik’s stride didn’t slow. “To get some tools other than your baseball bat.”

      After a moment, he heard the shuffle of footsteps following behind him.

      At least it was something.

      “I’ve got a dozen women signed up for a second yoga class.” Lucy Ventura sat on the edge of the desk in her small office, jiggling the baby she held against her shoulder.

      Isabella swiped her neck with her hand towel. Tap dancing—even with six-year-olds—was a lot of work. “I can hardly believe a couple dozen women exist in Weaver who want to take yoga.” She’d been happy to think they had enough for one class. Two would be amazing.

      Lucy grinned. “You’d be surprised, Iz.” A small burp filled the office. “Genteel as always, my daughter.” She turned the infant around until she was sitting on her lap, facing Isabella. Where Lucy was fair, her daughter, Sunny, was dark. A mop of dark brown hair was tied at the top of her little round head with a bright red bow, and her dark brown eyes fairly snapped with cheer.

      Until Jimmy, Isabella had never aspired to motherhood. Not with the childhood she’d had. Then he’d swept her off her feet, and her orderly life had flown right out the window. She couldn’t help wondering what might have happened if he’d lived. What their baby—if he’d ever changed his mind about not having any—might have looked like.

      An image of Murphy swam into her head. He looked like his father.

      Would Erik Clay’s children have his violet eyes?

      She banished the errant thought and draped the towel around her neck before giving Sunny her finger. The baby latched on and yanked it around. “She’s so beautiful, Luce. I can’t believe how life has changed for us.”

      Lucy smiled gently. “Weaver’s a good place to heal, Iz.”

      “I hope so,” she murmured. Sunny’s skin was as soft as down. “Murphy has a lot to heal from. He adored Jimmy.”

      “I was talking about you, too.”

      Isabella lifted her shoulder. “I’m a big girl. I’ll survive, as usual.”

      “Surviving isn’t necessarily the same as living,” Lucy countered. She’d dropped by the studio only to see how Isabella’s classes had gone and was dressed in a pretty sundress that Isabella herself had made for her a few years ago as a gift. “I learned that when I met Beck.”

      “He seems like a good guy.”

      “Oh, he’s good all right.” Lucy’s eyes suddenly danced. “Anyway, what did you think about the Rocking-C? Erik’s place,” she prompted when Isabella gave her a blank look.

      “I didn’t see much of it. The road out there is terrible.” She didn’t want to think about him. “I just hope this whole deal works out between him and Murphy.”

      “If Erik has any say in it, it will,” Lucy assured. “I told you. He’s one of the good ones.”

      The baby had lost interest in Isabella’s finger and she moved to peer through the window that overlooked the dance studio. The room wasn’t large but it was perfectly outfitted, which was typical for Lucy. “I don’t want Murphy to forget that his father was one of the good ones, too.” Her thumb nudged the engagement ring Jimmy had given her around and around her finger.

      “You miss him.”

      Isabella sighed. “Sometimes it feels like I haven’t had a whole lot of time to miss him.” She exhaled again. “I loved him, but there are times I want to scream over his lack of planning.” Only the fact that she and Lucy had been friends for more than a decade allowed her to admit it. “The standard life-insurance policy the department offered? Only once he was gone did I discover that he’d never updated the beneficiary from Murphy’s mother.” Even though, when he’d realized just how serious his situation was, he’d told her he had. If there was anything left after the medical bills, he’d believed she would need it to care for Murphy.

      Lucy was wincing. “Maybe he didn’t have time,” she suggested tactfully. “Considering how fast everything happened. Does anyone even know where she is?”

      Isabella shook her head. “Not since she finished serving her prison sentence. Jimmy had no idea where Kim went after that. Seems horrible to think of one’s life in terms of money, but it would have gone a long way toward the medical bills.”

      “Not to mention paying restitution for Murphy’s stunt.”

      Isabella didn’t deny it. She might not have been named on the life insurance, but she was in charge of settling what was left of Jimmy’s estate. She’d sold off nearly everything, except their clothes and a few other personal possessions, to take care of the debts he’d left. “He always figured he’d die in the line of duty. Not—” Her throat tightened. She shook her head. A firefighter, Jimmy had been largerthan-life. But dealing with the minutiae of real life had not been his forte. Even in the short time they’d had together, she’d realized that. And she hadn’t cared because she was good with real life. She’d had to be since she’d been orphaned as a baby. And she’d loved him.

      When the staph infection had hit after a seemingly simple scrape he’d gotten during a fundraiser for a homeless shelter, there had been nothing any of them could do. Despite Jimmy’s excellent health, every treatment the doctors had tried had failed. In a matter of weeks he’d been gone; the only thing he’d left behind was his trust in her that she’d take care of everything. Most importantly, his son.

      “Well,” Lucy said after a moment, “you give Weaver a chance to work its magic. On both you and Murphy.”

      Chapter Three

      Erik heard the sound of the car approaching long before it arrived.

      He looked at Murphy, who was unenthusiastically pulling nails from a stack of boards. “Your—Isabella is here.”

      Murphy immediately flipped the heavy hammer he’d been using down onto the messy pile of boards. “’Bout freakin’ time.”

      Erik decided to ignore the comment. “Hammer goes back in the barn on the wall with the other tools.”

      The kid gave him a sidelong look. They’d already had about a half dozen of what Erik was kindly considering instructional moments. The first one, over wearing safety goggles while they started the demo, had earned Erik a blue earful of what he could do with his orders.

      Erik had heard the boy out, told him the next time he spoke like that he’d toss him in the water tank and held out the goggles. Murphy had begrudgingly put them on, possibly because he’d noticed the big metal tank was surrounded by a half dozen mama cows that didn’t look particularly eager to share.

      Not that he hadn’t put Erik to the test again soon after. But the second time Murphy had mouthed off, Erik had pitched him headlong into the deep, cold water.

      Hopefully, he’d learned by now that Erik meant what he said.

      Now he just eyed the kid back, waiting for him to make his decision. Fortunately for Murphy, working in the sun had gone a long way to drying out his soaked clothes.

      Grumbling, Murphy pulled off the goggles and picked up the hammer to carry over to the new barn.

      Erik blew out a breath, glad the kid hadn’t pushed him again. He wasn’t sure what he could resort to after the tank, which was a pretty harmless punishment all in all. He didn’t figure Isabella would appreciate his washing the kid’s mouth out with soap, which is what he’d earned once when he was young.

      Leaving his sledgehammer propped against the side of the partially dismantled barn,

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