Sierra’s Homecoming by Miller Linda Lael & Jackson Brenda

Author:Miller, Linda Lael & Jackson, Brenda
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2023-12-26T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

1919

Hannah’s hands trembled slightly as she raised the cover of the family album and reached for the remembrance book tucked inside. She held her breath as she opened it.

Only her own words were there, alone and stark.

She was a practical woman, and she knew she should not have expected anything else. Spirits, if there was such a thing, did not take up pens and write in remembrance books. And yet she was stricken with a profound disappointment, the likes of which she’d never experienced before. She’d suffered plenty in her life, seeing three sisters perish as a girl and, as a woman grown, losing Gabe, knowing none of the brave dreams they’d talked about with such hope and faith would ever come true.

No more stolen kisses.

No more secret laughter.

No more cattle grazing on a thousand hills.

And certainly no more babies, born squalling in their room upstairs.

Hannah told herself, I will not cry, I have cried enough. I have emptied myself of tears.

So why do they keep coming?

“Hannah?”

She started, looked up to see Doss standing at the foot of the stairs. He’d been working in the barn, the last she knew, doing the morning chores. Chopping extra wood because there was another storm coming. It bothered her that she hadn’t heard him come in.

“Tobias is worse,” he said.

Alarm swelled into Hannah’s throat, cutting off her wind.

She started for the stairs, but when she would have passed Doss, he stopped her.

“I’m going to town for the doc,” he told her.

“I’ll just wrap Tobias up warm and we’ll—”

Doss’s grip tightened on her shoulders. Only then did she realize he hadn’t merely stepped into her path, he was touching her. “No, Hannah,” he said. “The boy’s too sick for that.”

“Suppose the doctor won’t come?”

“He’ll come,” Doss said. “You go to Tobias. Don’t let the fire go out, no matter what. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

Hannah nodded, bursting to get to her son, but somehow wanting to cling to Doss, too. Tell him not to go, that they’d manage some way but he oughtn’t to leave, because something truly terrible might happen if he did.

“Go to him,” Doss told her, letting go of her shoulders.

She felt as though he’d been holding her up. Swayed a little to catch her balance. Then, on impulse, she stood on tiptoe and kissed him right on the mouth. “You be careful, Doss McKettrick,” she said. “You come back to us, safe and sound.”

He looked deeply into her eyes for a moment, as though he could see secrets she kept even from herself, then nodded and made for the door. The last Hannah saw of him, just before she dashed up the rear stairs, he was putting on his coat and hat.

Tobias lay fitful in his bed, his nightshirt soaked with perspiration, like the sheets. His teeth chattered, and his lips were blue, but his flesh burned to the touch.

Hannah could not afford to let panic prevail.

She had mothering to do, and however inadequate and fearful she felt, there was no one but her to do it.

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