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With school districts cutting budgets all over the country, plenty of coaches and teachers with more experience than Josh were looking for work. He wasn’t naive enough to believe his position as a wounded veteran and the son of a local rancher hadn’t influenced the school board’s decision to choose him over half a dozen other candidates for the job. The knowledge didn’t sit easy with him. He’d always wanted to be judged on his accomplishments, not his circumstances or his name.
“Coach, do you have a minute to answer a few questions?”
The feminine voice made both men turn around. Josh found himself staring into the warm brown eyes of Amy Marshall. He felt again the little jolt that had hit him when he’d looked into those eyes yesterday at her grandmother’s produce stand. “Hello again,” he said.
“Where’s Cody?” Zach asked. “Not that you aren’t an improvement.” He grinned.
She ignored the compliment. “Cody’s out sick. I’m covering the game for the Herald.” She extended a mini recorder toward him. “What’s the significance of tonight’s win?”
Zach clapped Josh on the shoulder. “I’ll just leave you two alone.” He slung the strap of one of the equipment duffels over his shoulder and shambled away.
Josh focused his attention on Amy once more, and shifted into interview mode. “Some people might say this win is meaningless, since we’re already eliminated from the finals,” he said. “But I don’t look at it that way at all. The team has overcome a lot this season, and the players have worked together to improve. Every win builds their confidence and skills—things they’ll take forward with them into next season, and into life.”
“Had you ever coached baseball before you were hired to coach the Wildcats?” she asked.
The question surprised Josh, but he didn’t let it rattle him. “I hadn’t had that opportunity. But I played for many years.”
“Since you don’t have any experience coaching, to what do you attribute your success?”
He shifted from one foot to the other. What did these questions have to do with tonight’s game? The focus should be on the players, not him. “I’m working with a great group of kids,” he said. “I try to teach them what I know, but they’ve done the rest with their hard work.”
“Would you say luck had anything to do with your winning record?”
“Luck always plays a part in this game, but I give the credit to the team’s hard work.”
She punched the button to switch off the recorder. “Thanks. If I have any more questions, I’ll give you a call.”
“Don’t you want to ask anything about tonight’s game?”
“I got a copy of the official scorecard from Dirk Fischer and a nice quote from Chase Wilson, so I think I’m good. But I’ll let you know.” She turned to leave. By this time the area around the field was all but deserted, the stands and most of the parking lot emptied.
Josh followed her up the steps out of the dugout. “Let me walk you to your car,” he said.
“You don’t need to do that.”
“No, but it goes against my grain to let a woman walk off into a dark, deserted parking lot alone, so humor me.”
She looked out across the parking lot, which was indeed dark, and empty save for a few cars. “All right. Thank you.”
He followed her across the gravel-and-dirt lot to a dusty blue Subaru. She paused beside the door, keys in hand. “Thanks for seeing me to my car,” she said. “I forget sometimes how dark it can be out here, away from the city lights.”
“We see more stars here, though.” He looked up at a sky filled with sparks of light, as if some kid had spilled a whole bottle of glitter.
She tilted her head back to join him in admiring the sky. “Beautiful.”
“The stars are like this in Iraq, too, at least with the blackouts for the war.” Why had he brought up the war, a subject she probably didn’t want to discuss, considering she’d lost her husband over there? But she regarded him calmly, as if waiting for him to continue. “When I had guard duty I’d stand at my checkpoint and stare up at the sky and imagine I was back here at home,” he explained.
She tilted her head up toward the sky again. “Afghanistan has stars like this, too.”
“Your husband was in Afghanistan?”
“I was in Afghanistan, before the war. Well, he was, too. We were in the Peace Corps there. That’s how we met. When the war broke out, he wanted to help. He thought with his familiarity with the country and the language, they could use him in Afghanistan, but the army had other ideas.”
“Where did you live before you came back here?”
“Chloe and I were in Denver. Then my grandmother fell and broke her hip and I knew she needed help with the orchard. And I needed a place to pull myself together and decide what to do next.”
“This is a good place for that kind of thinking.” He’d spent plenty of hours in his cabin on his parents’ ranch trying to answer that same question.
“Is that why you’re here?” she asked. “To decide what to do next?”
He told himself it was a logical question. But he couldn’t help feeling her quiet gaze assessed him more accurately than he was used to. Amy Marshall had an air of perceptiveness that was both intriguing and unsettling. “I’m here because this is home,” he said. “The whole time I was away, all I could think of was getting back.”
Her expression grew pensive. “I lived all over the place growing up, so I never really had that kind of attachment to one spot.”
“I didn’t think I did, until I went away. After this—” he held up the hook “—I decided Hartland was where I belonged.”
She tilted her head. “Can I ask a question?”
“Anything.” He could always refuse to answer, though he doubted this woman could ask anything he wouldn’t be happy to tell her. He believed in being up front with people. Losing his hand—and almost losing his life—had erased any patience he might have once had for dissembling.
“Why a hook? Don’t they make pretty realistic-looking prosthetic hands?”
“They make hands that look good, but a hook is more practical.” He opened and closed the pincer ends. He’d become adept at manipulating most items with this simple tool. “And a hook is a little more in your face.” His method of confronting his loss had been to embrace it head-on. He’d told himself denial was for cowards. “This is who I am now and I wanted it out there for everyone to see. If they don’t like it, that’s their problem.”
“Do people have a problem with it?”
“A few.” He thought of Rick, who’d told one of the city council members—who’d passed the news on to Josh—that it made the school look bad to have a “gimp” for a coach.
Time to change the subject, though. Shift the focus away from him. “Do you like writing for the paper?” he asked.
She looked pleased. “I like to write, and this gives me a chance to get a few credits to my name, and some experience. Though the subject matter isn’t always that exciting.”
“I don’t know about that. I’ve seen some of your articles. You did a good job of making a city council discussion of sewer repairs interesting.”
She laughed, a light, musical sound that transformed her expression into one of startling beauty. Her eyes held a new light and the muscles of her face relaxed and softened. A soft blush suffused her cheeks and her lips curved invitingly.
He realized he’d been staring when she looked away. “I really have to go,” she said. “Thanks for your help.”
“Anytime.” He wanted to say more—that talking with her had been the best conversation he’d had since coming home. That he liked the way her eyes crinkled at the corners when she laughed.
But the words stuck in his throat. So he let her get into her car and drive away without saying any of these things. When she was gone, he looked up at the stars again. Those stars had saved him from losing it some nights on duty—the nights after he’d lost friends or seen children die, and the nights after days of endless tension and boredom. He’d imagined himself back here, in this little corner of Colorado he’d once wanted so badly to leave.
War was a sure cure for wanderlust, he’d decided. If he never left Hartland again, that would be fine with him. For better or worse, he was home now.
* * *
AMY GRIPPED THE steering wheel and tried to get as tight a hold on her emotions. What had just happened? One moment she’d been standing, chatting with Josh as if they were old friends and then wham, she’d been aware of the two of them, alone in the darkness. The moment felt too intimate, as if at any second he might pull her close and kiss her.
She shook her head, banishing the image. Since Brent’s death she hadn’t even thought of kissing anyone. For the past three years she’d paid attention only to what was in front of her, what had to be done—making a living and taking care of her daughter. But lately—since coming to Hartland—she’d begun to notice more...the smell of fresh strawberries from the greenhouse, the feel of a soft breeze on her bare arms, the curve of hard muscle in the forearms of a handsome man. And she’d begun to remember things, such as how good it might feel to have a man’s arms around her.
But why now? And why Josh? Because he reminded her of Brent?
He bore no physical resemblance to Brent; it was probably just the whole military thing—knowing he’d been where her husband had been and done things her husband had done. That he’d been injured and Brent had been injured, but Brent was the one who never came home.
A fresh wave of pain swept over her—would it never go away? Resisting the grief, her mind returned to Josh. He’d been so relaxed and easygoing—so whole, despite his missing hand. Why should he, who didn’t have a wife and a child to come home to, be alive and well when Brent had been taken from her?
She fed this spark of resentment, nurturing it into a tiny flame—anything to avoid dissolving into tears. By the time she pulled up to the town’s only coffee shop, Cookies and Cups, she felt more in control of her shaky emotions.
As she approached the entrance, the door opened and the shop’s owner, Charla Reynolds, dressed in a colorful Mexican skirt and peasant blouse that showed off her ample curves, stepped out onto the front porch. “Amy!” She greeted her friend with a smile and a warm embrace. “I was just about to close up, but I’ve got time for one more cup if you can stay and visit.”
“I hate to keep you, but I could really use it,” Amy said. The two women had met Amy’s second day in town and instantly clicked. Amy’s daily visits to the coffee shop had become long chat sessions in which the friendship had blossomed.
“Thursdays are my late night anyway,” Charla said, as she made her way to the gleaming espresso machine behind the front counter. “I have a novel writers group that meets every Thursday and they always run over. But they’re a great bunch, so I don’t really mind. You should stop by next week, since you like to write and all.”
Amy sat at the table closest to the front counter. “Maybe I’ll do that sometime. But next week is the school board meeting. I have to go for the paper.”
Charla leaned back against the counter and regarded her friend. “All this excitement must be killing you,” she said. “First the town council, then the school board. Do you write obituaries, too?”
“I would if Ed paid me for them.” Ed Burridge, editor, publisher and chief reporter for the Hartland Herald, had hired her to cover school board, town council and county commissioners meetings, as well as write the occasional feature. The pay was pitiful and the hours lousy; Amy loved it. She was being paid to write. It wasn’t Pulitzer-worthy copy, but it was a start.
“What brings you out so late?” Charla asked. “More town politics?”
“Not that. Our sports reporter has mono, so Ed asked me to cover the baseball game.”
“So you got to talk to Smokin’ Scofield?” Charla’s grin was more of a smirk.
Amy laughed. “Please tell me people don’t really call him that.”
“The girls did in high school, or so I’m told. You have to admit, he’s easy on the eye. And single.”
“I don’t care if he’s got three wives, except that would make a good story for the paper.”
“Not even one ex-wife, though considering the dearth of eligible bachelors in this town, he’d have plenty of willing candidates if he showed any interest.”
“And he doesn’t?”
“Are you asking as a reporter, or as a single woman yourself?”
Amy frowned. “I told you, I’m not interested in dating anyone—and especially not a veteran. Every time I look at him, I think of Brent.” She bit her bottom lip, feeling tears threaten once more.
“Sorry.” Charla turned her attention to the espresso machine again, and began making Amy’s favorite mocha latte. She shot a generous dollop of chocolate syrup into a cup with a shot of espresso and added steamed milk. “You’ve never said much about Brent,” she said. “I’m not trying to pry or anything, but if you ever need to talk, you know I’m a good listener.”
Amy let out a ragged breath. “Thanks. It’s not that I blame men like Josh for what happened to Brent—I know he didn’t have anything to do with Brent’s death. But I can’t help resenting the unfairness of it all. War is just so...so random. Why did Brent die when others lived?”
Charla set a full mug in front of Amy and pulled up a chair beside her. “It is unfair,” she said. “You and Chloe sure don’t deserve that kind of pain.”
Amy sipped the mocha, letting the warm sweetness drive away some of the bitterness she still felt over Brent being taken from her. Charla was right—she hadn’t talked much about what had happened. She’d had to be strong for Chloe, and there hadn’t really been anyone to talk to. “When Brent enlisted, I knew there was a chance he could be killed, but I purposely put that out of my mind. It was the only way to survive.”
“You must have been very proud of him.”
How many times had people said this to her? From the soldier who delivered the news of Brent’s death to almost everyone at the funeral, they had all talked about how proud she should be of her soldier husband. “I wasn’t proud,” she said quietly. “I was angry. Furious that he’d decided to leave me and Chloe. I didn’t want him to go and he went anyway.” She squeezed her eyes shut, remembering that last argument, the tears and angry words. They’d tried to patch things up later, long-distance, but he’d died before she’d found it in herself to really forgive him.
She might resent men like Josh who’d come home, but her own guilt kept her grief for her husband alive.
“Of course you were angry,” Charla said. “You wanted him with you and Chloe.”
“He never talked to me about his decision to enlist,” Amy said. “He just did it. He said he wanted to help people—the people in Afghanistan he knew when we were stationed there in the Peace Corps. But all I could think of was that he wanted to be with them more than he wanted to be with me.” She gulped at the mocha, forcing back the tears that threatened, tears of equal parts anger and grief.
“He was a hero and you loved him, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t wrong,” Charla said.
“I was wrong, too. I shouldn’t have let him leave when we were so angry at each other. I should have kept talking until we settled things between us. But we never got the chance.”
“And you can’t keep beating yourself up over that.” Charla patted her hand. “I know—easy for me to say. I’ve never been married. I don’t even have a steady boyfriend.”
“And why is that?” Amy blotted her eyes with a napkin and seized on the opportunity to shift the conversation to a less-painful topic. “Did you scare off all the men in this town?”
“It’s the curse of living in a town this small—your dating prospects are limited. It’s the one thing I really hate about this place.”
“You could always move to the city. Lots more single men there.”
“Don’t think I haven’t thought about it.” She sipped her coffee. “But I really like it here. And I have the only coffee shop in town, so it’s a sweet setup. I keep hoping Mr. Right will decide Hartland is the perfect place to start a new business or visit on vacation. Or maybe he’s tired of the rat race and wants to settle down in a wonderful little town where not much happens.”
Not much happening had been exactly the quality that had made Amy contemplate staying in Hartland, even after her grandmother didn’t need her help anymore. But she doubted she’d be happy for the long term in such quiet surroundings. She’d spent her whole life having adventures, first with her parents, then with Brent. For their honeymoon they’d gone backpacking in the Himalayas, and after Chloe was born they’d talked about taking her on a tour of Europe, or climbing all fifty-four of Colorado’s peaks over fourteen thousand feet in elevation. They’d toyed with the idea of following in her parents’ footsteps and opening their own adventure tourism company. Or maybe she’d become a travel writer and he’d be her photographer.
After so much adventure, she wasn’t ready to settle down to tame, small-town life. This was only a temporary respite, helping her grandmother and hiding from pain, gathering strength for more adventures to come. Her mother always said if you weren’t challenging yourself, you weren’t living. Life in Hartland didn’t feel very challenging.
“Other than the man situation, I really like it here,” Charla said. “We make our own excitement. Speaking of which, how was the game? Did we win?”
“The Wildcats won. Ed will probably want to put the story on the front page.”
“People think Josh is a miracle worker,” Charla said. “He’s done more for the team in his first year than any of the coaches we’ve had before.”
“He told me he’d never coached before,” Amy said. “I wonder why the district hired him.”
Charla shrugged. “I guess he’s qualified. And he’s a local and a veteran. Plus he was apparently a big baseball jock when he was in high school. Clearly, he knows the game.”
“I wonder who the other candidates for the job were?”
“If you’re that interested, I’m sure they’re listed in the school board minutes somewhere, but what does it matter? Josh is doing a good job.”
“Yeah.” An inexperienced coach with a winning record wasn’t the kind of story that was going to get the attention of a big magazine—the kind where Amy wanted to work after she left Hartland.
“How’s Bobbie?” Charla asked.
“She’s great. She’s going to graduate from the walker to a cane soon.” She wouldn’t need Amy’s help with the orchards much longer.
“The woman is amazing,” Charla said. “I hope I’m like her when I’m her age.”
