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Ned had become increasingly morose in recent weeks, muttering things under his breath such as “What’s the use?” and “I can’t keep doing this.” Molly hadn’t thoroughly understood what he meant and she certainly hadn’t wanted to overstep her bounds. After all, she was helping out the Thorn family in a temporary capacity.
Another unsettling thought occurred. Surely Ned hadn’t left the twins alone in the house.
What if he had?
Molly wrapped her arms around Sadie’s neck. “Come on, old girl.” She gave a gentle kick to the mare’s ribs. “I need you to run faster than you ever have before.”
The horse responded with a burst of speed. Once they were on Thorn land, Molly urged Sadie to a trot, guiding her past the outbuildings, around the corral and on to the main house, a simple, one-story, whitewashed clapboard structure.
Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed smoke coming from the bunkhouse, a sure sign Cookie had already started making breakfast for the handful of ranch hands CJ employed.
Was CJ eating with the hands, as he did every morning? Was he even aware his brother had left the main house?
Molly pulled Sadie to a halt and scrambled off the horse’s back. She hurried onto the porch she and the girls had swept clean yesterday afternoon. Without bothering to knock, she rushed inside the house.
Thick gloom closed in around her. The silence was so heavy she decided the children were surely still asleep.
The children.
Molly must get to Anna and Sarah. She must ensure they were safe. She moved deeper into the house and froze when she caught a faint whiff of whiskey. Oh, Ned.
The situation was far worse than Molly had feared, and certainly explained Ned’s increasing unpredictability. Her friend’s husband had evidently turned to the bottle to swallow his grief. Unfortunately, consuming alcohol was not a wise solution.
Heart in her throat, Molly blinked through the darkness. Her vision slowly cleared, then locked on the tall silhouette of a familiar figure.
A ripple of longing flowed through her before she ruthlessly shut it down.
CJ Thorn stood before her, silent, his eyes on the piece of paper in his hand. His features were inscrutable in the dim light cast by the lamp on the table beside him, but Molly knew every line and curve by heart.
She knew every precious angle of his handsome face, the strong, square jaw and the dark eyebrows slashed over eyes the color of freshly brewed coffee. He was more than merely good-looking. He was a man of integrity and one who’d worked hard to keep his brother from following in their father’s footsteps.
Ned had taken to whiskey, anyway. CJ must be so disappointed.
“CJ?” She gently touched his sleeve.
He looked up. Blinked. Then blinked again, as if he hadn’t expected to find her standing so close.
“I saw Ned riding away from the ranch.” She waited a beat, then supplied the rest of the bad news. “He was on your horse.”
Surprise flared in his eyes. “Ned took Thunder?”
She nodded.
Anger replaced the earlier shock, followed by such sorrow Molly could actually feel the weight of the emotion in her own heart. The vulnerable expression made him more compelling than usual.
CJ Thorn was not a man who needed to be more compelling than usual.
The children, she told herself. Anna and Sarah must come first. With the twins in mind, Molly released CJ’s arm and stepped back.
* * *
In the predawn gloom, CJ tried to focus on the woman standing beside him. But his mind kept returning to Ned and the terrible choice his brother had made.
No matter how hard CJ fought to keep his breathing steady, his gut roiled with regret. This was the moment he’d been dreading for weeks, when his brother gave up completely.
Rage boiled into something CJ couldn’t begin to name. Ned had not only made his escape on CJ’s prize stallion, he’d not only abandoned his own children, but he’d left the girls alone in the house. Any number of things could have happened to them.
Even for Ned, that was an all-time low. What was next? Cattle rustling? Bank robbery?
For months, CJ had held out hope that the worst of Ned’s grief was behind him. He’d prayed that his younger brother was on the brink of returning to the man he’d been while Penelope was alive.
Obviously, that had been wishful thinking.
All the emotion CJ had been holding back threatened to spill over, filling him until he thought he might explode.
“Is that a note from Ned?” Molly’s voice seemed to come at him through a thick wall of water.
He gave a brief nod before returning his gaze to the hastily scrawled note. The handwriting was messy, the message even messier.
Ned had always preferred the easier tasks on the ranch, but he’d been a decent man at the core. Penelope had brought out the best in him. Since her death, Ned had slipped deeper and deeper into despair.
CJ thought he’d be able to save Ned, given time.
Time had just run out.
“CJ, did you hear me?”
He lifted his head and glanced once again at the woman he’d grown to rely on far more than he cared to admit. “Ned took off.”
“Yes, I know.”
His heart began to thump harder.
Five years peeled away and he was twenty-two again, meeting Molly for the first time. She’d been full of light and goodness back then, the same as now. Just being in her company made him wish for…more. But he knew he could never reach so far above his station in life. He’d learned that cruel lesson from another woman and her upright, proper parents.
“Talk to me. Tell me what’s happened.”
He handed her Ned’s note.
Feeling oddly nostalgic, he held silent while she read. During Ned and Penelope’s courtship, Molly had acted as chaperone. CJ had been attracted to her from the start. But he’d never let her know. Lillian’s harsh words had taught him a valuable lesson. No decent woman from a respectable family would have a man like him, a man with the last name Thorn.
Penelope had taken the risk and married Ned. Look how that had ended.
“Oh, Ned.” Molly’s hand flew to her mouth. “How could you?”
“I’ve been asking myself that same question.”
How could his brother surrender custody of his own daughters to CJ?
Eyes shadowed with sadness, Molly returned the piece of paper. Her fingertips grazed CJ’s knuckles. The touch was barely a whisper, yet he felt the impact like a blow to the gut.
He closed his fist around the words Ned had penned. In a quick, careless scrawl of ink across paper, his brother had become the man CJ feared was deep inside every Thorn. He shuddered to think what would become of Ned now that he’d given in to the dark side of his nature.
“I suppose I understand how he could give up on himself,” Molly said. “But how could he give up on his own children?”
CJ heard the tears in her voice, saw the sorrow in the slump of her shoulders. He wanted to comfort her.
He took a large step back instead.
An awareness of her as a woman had been gnawing at him ever since she’d taken over Sarah and Anna’s full-time care following Penelope’s funeral.
Though he’d often wondered why Molly continued to serve his family, and CJ hadn’t interacted with her very often, he’d been grateful for her help. The girls adored her and he didn’t take that for granted. She’d been the stable force in all their lives. He realized that now.
Once, months ago, CJ had offered to pay Molly for her kindness. She’d been insulted by the mere suggestion and so he’d never brought up the subject again.
Did she understand how much his family relied on her? How much he relied on her? Every day, he felt her presence acutely, hovering on the edge of his life but not really part of it.
“I hadn’t realized Ned’s grief was this great. I thought…” Her brows pulled together in confusion. “How did I miss this?”
“We both missed it.”
Ned hadn’t begun drinking immediately following Penelope’s death, yet it hadn’t been very long afterward. When CJ had first confronted his brother, Ned had claimed he didn’t have a problem. He simply missed his wife. Apparently, the loneliness hit hardest at night, and he needed help sleeping. He’d promised CJ that it was only one drink, after the girls were in bed.
CJ had wanted to believe his brother. For a while, there’d been no reason not to trust Ned’s word. Still, CJ should have been more observant. He should have seen the signs that Ned was slowly spiraling out of control, in the same way their father had.
“Surely your brother will come to his senses and return in a day or two.”
“Perhaps.” CJ spoke without conviction. There was an unmistakable finality to Ned’s actions. By leaving a note that included awarding CJ custody of the twins, his brother had made his intentions clear.
What had Ned been thinking?
CJ knew nothing about raising children, especially girls. He was a rancher, most comfortable around cows and horses. The Triple-T was barely showing a profit. He couldn’t run the ranch and take care of two small children at the same time.
His life had just changed dramatically. He needed to move back into the main house. The twins couldn’t sleep here alone. He’d have to learn new skills, too many to sort through at once.
“I should start breakfast before the girls wake up.”
Molly’s words brought CJ great comfort and reminded him that decisions didn’t have to be made today. Watching her in the pale dawn light, he wondered just how much she did around the house when he was out working the ranch. “I’d be grateful.”
“It’s my pleasure.” She turned quiet, thoughtful. “I see no reason to upset the girls just yet. We probably should tell them as little as possible and hope that Ned changes his mind.”
This was one of the reasons CJ admired Molly. She always put the twins’ needs first. “We’re in agreement.”
Her smile filled him with the sense of peace he craved, but always hovered just out of reach. He cleared his throat. “I’ll head over to the bunkhouse and see if anyone spoke with Ned this morning. Maybe he told one of the men where he was going.”
Or maybe Cookie knew something about Ned’s departure.
Frowning, CJ reached for his hat, slapped it against his thigh. He wasn’t looking forward to speaking with his ranch cook. The grizzled former army captain wouldn’t be sympathetic. He’d warned CJ this day was coming.
CJ had chosen to believe matters weren’t all that dire and that Ned would eventually snap out of his grief.
“We’re moving the herd to the north pasture today.” He paused at the door. “If Ned shows up—”
“I’ll send Cookie to find you.”
“Good enough.” CJ opened the door, paused when Molly called out his name.
He turned back around. The hem of her lavender dress swung in soft waves around her ankles as she approached him. Her eyes, so blue, so beautiful, held the strength of her determination. In that moment, CJ felt a little less alone.
“I want you to know I’m not going anywhere.” She gave him a warm, kind smile that reached inside his heart and squeezed. “We’re in this together. We’ll take it one day at a time.”
She couldn’t know how much her support meant. As he stared into her startling blue eyes, CJ fought to contain thoughts of what might have been, were he a different man. But he couldn’t change who he was or where he came from.
“Thank you, Molly.”
“You’re welcome.”
She was so good, so pure, so beautiful. She deserved better than a Thorn. She’d had better. She’d married a preacher.
CJ could never measure up to a man of God. He wouldn’t even try. All he could do was work to make his ranch a success and ensure that the twins had a safe, stable home. One day at a time, as Molly said, he would provide a secure, loving home for his brother’s children. Who, according to Ned’s note, were now CJ’s.
He jammed his hat on his head. “I’ll see you later this afternoon.”
“The girls and I will be right here.”
For now, that was enough. He turned and walked out of the house. One day at a time, he told himself. With God’s help, CJ would face the future one day at a time.
CHAPTER TWO
Molly stood immobile in the doorway, unable to tear her gaze away from CJ as he strode toward the bunkhouse. She liked the way he moved, with that loose-limbed gait of a man comfortable in his own skin. He rode a horse with equal confidence.
As if sensing her eyes on him, he looked over his shoulder. Their gazes connected and, in that instant, time stopped. A silent message passed between them, something her heart understood but her head couldn’t quite grasp. She’d never felt this connected to CJ before.
With a sad, lopsided grin, he gave a tug on his hat, then disappeared inside the bunkhouse. For several long seconds, Molly stayed where she was, drawing in air, willing her racing heartbeat to settle.
She and CJ had a common purpose now, and were facing a shared task that went beyond helping out a friend, or assisting a brother in need. There were two young girls relying on them to work together.
Momentarily overwhelmed by the enormity of the situation, Molly pressed a hand to her throat. She ached from the inside out for the Thorn family, and that included Ned.
She understood what he suffered. She’d experienced her own pain after losing George. Where she’d focused on serving others to help her through her grief, Ned had concentrated solely on himself, to the detriment of his daughters.
Sarah and Anna were too young to understand why their father had taken off without saying goodbye. If Penelope were alive, she’d be devastated by her husband’s selfish behavior.
A ragged sigh worked its way past Molly’s lips. Ned hadn’t even bothered asking CJ if he would raise the girls in his stead. He’d simply assumed.
Well, CJ wouldn’t have to care for them alone. Molly would watch the girls for as long as he needed her. Eventually, he would want a more permanent solution.
Would he take a wife?
