Sheltered in His Arms

Sam grabbed hold of her hand.

Taking a deep breath, offering a short silent prayer, he ran his other hand down his daughter’s coal-black hair. “This is Mariah, Mom. I adopted her three months ago. She’s been waiting to meet you.”

CHAPTER TWO

“HEY! ZACK AND I are on our way to my folks’ for a barbeque and swim. You want to come along?”

Cassie jumped, her pen slashing across the journal subscription form she’d been filling out. The voice coming from her office doorway—when she’d thought herself alone in the clinic—gave her a shock. Not her partner’s voice, as she might have expected, but his wife’s. Zack would have made a lot of noise as he entered, to warn her that she wasn’t alone.

In case she’d been doing something private. Like crying…. Reaching for the remote just beyond her right hand, Cassie turned down the volume on the small television she’d been listening to while she worked.

“I’ve got reports to catch up on,” she said, smiling in spite of her refusal. Zack Foster had been her sole confidante and best friend for more than nine years. They’d met after she’d left Shelter Valley to finish her education in Phoenix. Now that he’d married Randi, she had a second best friend.

A friend who was far less predictable than Zack—

Randi leaned over Cassie’s desk, peering at the paperwork she’d just messed up. “Looks like important stuff to me,” Randi said, raising both eyebrows.

Cassie pointed to the pile of manila folders stacked in the tray on the far corner of her desk. “Those are the reports.”

“That pile doesn’t look as big as Zack’s.”

And he has time to take the day off, Cassie finished for her.

“He writes faster than I do.” She had no intention of crashing her friends’ family gathering, but Cassie didn’t mind continuing their banter. Even though she intended to stand by her refusal, she was actually enjoying herself. She enjoyed arguing with Randi over big issues and small ones. Randi’s professional sport days might be over, but the woman was a born competitor.

“Ah,” she was saying now, “but it takes Zack longer to figure out what to say.”

“And I have to supply forms to fill out. My medical supply rep is coming by first thing in the morning. Your husband tends to get a little testy when he doesn’t have the syringes he needs.”

Randi shoved aside the folders and perched on the corner of Cassie’s desk. “It’s not good for you to be here alone on a Sunday afternoon.”

Though Randi’s concern wasn’t necessary, Cassie was warmed by it. “The last million or so haven’t hurt me any.”

“That’s debatable.”

“I’m fine, Randi, really,” Cassie said, brushing a lock of red hair away from her face. She usually wore it pinned up or tied back, but since she’d been planning to spend the day alone, she hadn’t bothered with her hair. Or her clothes, either. She was wearing jeans she’d owned since high school.

Randi frowned, apparently not satisfied with Cassie’s assurances. But then, Randi was stubborn. It was hard for her to accept being wrong. It usually took her a couple of minutes to figure out that she was.

“How’d your meeting with Phyllis go yesterday?” Randi asked, referring to a mutual friend, psychiatrist Phyllis Langford.

“Wonderful,” Cassie said. “Even better than I’d expected.” Her enthusiasm for the pet therapy project she and Phyllis had discussed infused Cassie’s voice. “She gave me some great insights that I’m going to incorporate into my next article. And an idea for a case I worked on back east this winter. A woman who’d lost several babies and was suffering from acute depression. Phyllis thinks a puppy might satisfy her mothering instinct to some extent, perhaps helping her accept adoption as another choice.”

Randi scoffed, though Cassie knew full well that during the past months, working with Zack on his nursing-home project, Randi had been won over to the miracles that happened regularly through pet therapy. “You think a puppy who pees everywhere in the house, chews up her shoes and bites at her ankles is going to help the poor woman?”

“Brat’s giving you problems, eh?” Cassie grinned. Zack had adopted the dalmatian puppy the week before, when the owner of its mother had despaired of finding the runt of the litter a home. Randi, though, had been the one to name him— Miserable Little Brat, or Brat for short.

“It’s Zack’s dog,” Randi said, rubbing at the leather on her pristine white tennis shoe.

Cassie knew better. She’d been over at Randi and Zack’s for pizza a few days earlier and had seen Montford University’s seemingly tough women’s athletic director cuddling that puppy.

Until Randi had noticed Zack and Cassie looking. Then she’d shooed him away, pretending to scold, while passing him a pepperoni slice under the table by way of apology.

“I don’t know why he thought we needed another dog,” she muttered. “As if Sammie and Bear aren’t trouble enough.”

Two of their trained pet therapy dogs, Sammie and Bear weren’t any trouble at all. In fact, Zack had told Cassie that on a couple of occasions Randi had made excuses to take Sammie to work with her. Apparently, the dog was quickly becoming the mascot of the women’s athletic department.

Cassie had Randi’s number. The woman was strong when she needed to be and maintained an effective façade of toughness. But in reality, she was indeed the princess her family had always thought her. Tender, loving, frequently indulged. And kinder than anyone Cassie had ever known. With Zack’s encouragement, she’d gotten over her lifelong fear of dogs, and a latent love of animals had begun to emerge.

Although she and Cassie had graduated from Shelter Valley High School the same year, had grown up together in Shelter Valley—population two thousand when the university wasn’t in session—the two women had hardly known each other. Cassie had been completely besotted with her one true love, Samuel Montford the fourth, the town’s esteemed future mayor and savior of the world. And Randi had been absent a lot of the time, training for her career in professional women’s golf.

Neither woman’s life had turned out the way she’d planned. They were both back in Shelter Valley, Cassie without Sam, and Randi with a bum rotator cuff that had ruined her swing.

“You’d better get back to your husband, or he’s going to be in here looking for you,” Cassie told her friend. Cassie knew her partner. Zack had all the patience in the world; he just didn’t like to wait.

Randi shook her head. “No, he won’t. He said you were going to be pissed if we kept hounding you, so he refused to come in. As a matter of fact, he went to get some gas and wash the Explorer.”

Glancing at her watch, Cassie said, “Which means he should be pulling in right about now.”

Randi didn’t budge. “Other than the few times Zack and I’ve been able to coerce you over to our place, you’ve been hiding out in this clinic ever since you heard Sam was coming home,” she said bluntly. “You can’t keep hiding.”

Retrieving another subscription form from a sample issue of the journal, Cassie started to fill it in. “I’m not hiding out. And I can do whatever I damn well please. That’s the great thing about being single and living alone.”

At least, she told herself that often enough. And it was true. Sort of. She enjoyed living alone. She had to. Or live her life without enjoyment.

“It’s been three weeks,” Randi said. “He’s probably not coming back, after all.”

“It doesn’t matter to me one way or the other,” Cassie lied.

“Uh-huh.”

“Isn’t your family going to be getting mighty hungry?” Cassie asked, still concentrating on the form in front of her.

“Dinner’s not until five.”

Oh. Great.

“Look,” Cassie said, putting down her pen as she met her friend’s gaze. “My life with Sam was a long time ago. I’m a different person now, and I’m sure he is, too.”

“But that doesn’t mean—”

“He killed any feelings I had for him when he went to another woman’s bed,” Cassie interrupted, before Randi could say anything she might have a hard time denying.

It was taking everything she had to keep her mind on the right track. And her heart from splintering into a million pieces with the force of bitterness and regret.

Randi stood up, headed for the door. “You need to learn how to lie better before you go trying it again,” she said, getting the last word. “We’ll bring some barbecue by your place later tonight. You’d better be there, or I’ll make Zack come here and drag you out.”

No question, Randi had won that round.

But Cassie would have her turn. She wasn’t going to let anyone get the better of her again. Not her partner’s new wife. And not the ex-husband she hadn’t heard from in ten long years.

After three weeks of waiting, of constantly looking over her shoulder, of hiding out to avoid the chance of inadvertently running into Sam, Cassie’s nerves were a little raw.

But maybe Randi was right. Maybe he wasn’t coming, after all. His cryptic note had come three weeks ago. Surely it didn’t take that long to get to Shelter Valley, no matter where he’d been.

It was time to get on with her life. She wouldn’t give Sam the opportunity to rob her of it again.

Sam. Where had his letter come from, anyway? The postmark had been someplace back east. But the letter had been sitting on James Montford’s desk for a day or two before his wife had happened upon it in the middle of a party—a celebration to welcome their long lost nephew into the fold. She’d gone to the library to check on her guests’ sleeping babies, had come through James’s office on her way back to the party, and had been reaching for a tissue on his desk, when she’d knocked a pile of unopened mail onto the floor.

She’d recognized her son’s handwriting on the envelope with no return address. After ten years, she still recognized Sam’s handwriting.

Cassie knew she’d have recognized it, too.

What else about Sam would be recognizable?

No. She shook her head, pulled the stack of files toward her. She wasn’t going to spend another minute of her life thinking about something that hadn’t been real for a very long time.

He wasn’t coming, anyway.

THE CLINIC WAS NEW, built since he’d left town. Not too far off Main Street, it sat on a lot that had been vacant Sam’s entire life. With its fresh stucco finish and smoothly paved parking lot, the clinic spoke of success.

It spoke of Cassie.

Leaving his truck parked under the shade of a tree, Sam took Mariah’s hand, drawing as much comfort as he gave. Somehow, his having a child made facing Cassie more tolerable. He didn’t question that Cassie would have a family; it was all she’d ever wanted. He wondered briefly about the man she must have married—someone he knew?— then dismissed the thought. It occurred to him that in some ways, Mariah’s presence put him and Cassie on a more equal footing. They’d both moved on. She wouldn’t be the only one who was a parent now. They were both parents…although not of each other’s children. He slowly approached the door of the veterinary clinic. It was Monday morning; he wasn’t ready for this. Could hardly drag the air through his lungs. But he’d become a man who faced hardships and challenges head-on, and this was one of the biggest.

There were only a couple of cars in the parking lot. He hoped one was Cassie’s. And that she’d have a minute or two to spare for him. While he and his parents had spent a miraculous five hours talking the night before—about their lives and his, about Mariah—they’d never mentioned Cassie.

The unspoken message was very clear.

He’d have to clean up this mess on his own. And until he did, his parents weren’t going to give him anything where Cassie was concerned. They loved her like their own daughter. Always had.

They were on her side.

Sam couldn’t blame them. He’d be on her side, too, if there were any way for a man to be in two places at once.

“We’re going to see an old…friend of Daddy’s,” he told the silent child who’d refused to leave his side in the eighteen hours they’d been in town.

His mother had been enchanted—as Sam had known she would be—with Mariah. Though the little girl was completely unresponsive, at least outwardly, Carol Montford hadn’t lost any opportunity to make contact. To touch Mariah’s hand. To smile at her, tend to her, stroke her hair. To get some food—any food—into the child’s stomach.

His father was already wrapped around Mariah’s little finger.

Mariah just didn’t know it yet.

She didn’t know she’d met her match in those two. They were going to love Mariah back to life. Period. Between him and his parents, she wouldn’t have a chance not to become the vivacious, happy child she’d once been.

They walked across the parking lot. “Her name is Cassie and she’s just about the prettiest woman you’ve ever seen,” Sam said, remembering.

He had to do this, to see her first thing. It wouldn’t be fair to either of them to accidentally bump into each other in town. And he hoped that seeing her at work would mean he wouldn’t be face to face with her children. Or her husband. At least not yet. Unless it was in the form of a photo on her desk.

It was what he wanted for her, what he’d been imagining all these years. A husband who deserved her love, who cherished her as Sam had promised he would. All the children she’d dreamed of raising. It was the only way he could live with himself, believing that without him she’d managed to have everything she wanted. That she was happy.

“She used to be Daddy’s best friend, a long time ago.”

Mariah walked solemnly beside him, her long black hair in a high ponytail tied with a blue bow that matched the jeans overalls and pink-flowered top he’d chosen for her that morning. Before the disaster that had changed her life so completely, Mariah had insisted on choosing her own outfits every day. And on doing her own hair, as well. She’d looked a little lopsided a time or two—but Sam would trade that for the smile she’d worn any day.

She’d been so proud of herself back then. So sure that life was there just for her. Sure there wasn’t anything she couldn’t do, couldn’t have, if she just got big enough.

She’d been sassy and confident and too smart for her own good.

And she’d chattered from the time she got up in the morning until she’d gone to bed at night, innocently sharing her every thought with anyone lucky enough to be around.

Sam had never tired of listening.

“Cassie is an animal doctor,” Sam told Mariah now, as she hesitated outside the door of the clinic. “She’s the one who gave Muffy to Grandma and Grandpa.”

Muffy hadn’t worked the magic on Mariah that Sam had hoped. The child, having always begged for a dog, had shown no pleasure at finding herself finally living with one.

But then, Muffy was old. And fat.

Sam had been saddened to see such obvious signs of the years he’d lost.

His parents had aged, too, but they still looked great. A little grayer, perhaps, a little more lined, but robust and healthy.

Apparently they walked a couple of miles every morning. And swam every afternoon. They were hoping to take Mariah out to the heated pool in the backyard with them this afternoon.

Sam wasn’t sure he could persuade the little girl to let go of his hand long enough to walk into the next room, let alone outside the house. But he was willing to try. If anyone could reach Mariah, his mother could.

“Look, honey.” He gently guided Mariah’s head in the direction his finger was pointing. “See the plastic fire hydrant? That’s for boy doggies to go to the bathroom.”

Mariah might have been facing the fake hydrant, but he could see that she was still watching him out of the corner of her eye. Sam wished he knew what kind of expression could reassure the frightened child. A big smile? A calm, neutral look? A devil-may-care grin? He had no idea.

The inside of the clinic was as pristine and plush-looking as the outside. Brightly upholstered chairs lined the walls of the waiting room. At the moment, they were all empty.

There was a fancy digital four-foot scale along one wall. Sam supposed it was for animals. He liked the decor, the bright yellows and oranges, the tile floor that would serve for easy cleanup.

With Mariah by his side, Sam walked up to the waist-high solid oak receptionist’s counter.

“Is Cassie in?” he asked, as though he stopped by often. As though he wasn’t asking a question he’d been yearning to ask for the past ten years.

“Dr. Tate?” the college-age girl asked. “Yes, she’s in her office.” She glanced down at the appointment book open in front of her. “Is she expecting you?”

“No,” Sam said, glancing down at Mariah’s head. “I grew up with her here in Shelter Valley. I’m an old friend, just dropping in to say hello.”

“Oh!” The girl’s expression changed from professionally polite to warm and friendly. “You’re visiting?” she asked, rising to her feet.

Again, Sam glanced at Mariah. “Uh, no,” he said. “I’m moving back to town. Just arrived yesterday afternoon.”

“Welcome back, then,” she said. “My name’s Sheila.” She grinned. “I’ve only been in Shelter Valley a couple of years, but I feel like it’s been my town forever. I love it here.”

The town had a way of doing that to people. Unless you were the “savior of the world,” as Cassie had jokingly called Sam. The heir apparent, future mayor and all-around best guy for the job. The man loaded down with everyone else’s expectations.

“Hi, Sheila. I’m Sam. You going to Montford?” he asked, years of Shelter Valley friendliness automatically kicking in.

The girl nodded. “I was, but I got married and just recently had a baby. Now I work here full time.”

Mariah’s little hand was getting sweaty inside his. Releasing it, Sam slid his arm around her shoulders, as he smiled at the receptionist. “She’s in her office, you said?”

“Shall I tell her you’re here?”

“No,” Sam said quickly, and then added, “I’d like to surprise her, if you don’t mind.”

He didn’t want to take the chance that Cassie would refuse to see him.

“Oh. Sure.” Sheila grinned at him again. “You just go through that door, and down the hall. Her office is on the right.”

“Thanks.” Sam led Mariah through the open door. “Is her partner in?” he thought to ask as he passed Shelia. There had been two names on the placard out front.

“Zack?” the girl said. “Not yet. His first appointment today is at eleven.”

Wondering if Zack was her husband as well as her partner, Sam braced his shoulders and strode forward. As a Peace Corps member and then a national disaster-relief volunteer, he’d spent the past ten years rescuing people from sickening, tragic situations.

He could handle a ten-minute meeting with his ex-wife.

CHAPTER THREE

NO MATTER HOW MANY TIMES Cassie flipped through the pages of her calendar, there were no upcoming trips written in anywhere. She’d traveled so much over the past eighteen months, launching her nationwide pet therapy program in cities and universities across the United States, that Zack had been left to handle much of their Shelter Valley veterinary practice by himself. Her travel schedule was why she’d invited Zack, who’d been working at a practice in Phoenix, to go into partnership with her in Shelter Valley. His first marriage had just ended, and he’d been eager for a new start. And now, two years later, Cassie’s wedding present to him and Randi was to stay in town a while.

But damn, a trip sure would be nice. Help her put life in perspective again.

“Hey, stranger.”

Planner pages between her fingers, Cassie froze, staring at the month of May. It was coming up in a matter of weeks. She’d be—

“Cassie?”

She hadn’t imagined the voice. There was only one man who said her name in just that way. With that slight emphasis on the second syllable.

Heart pounding, Cassie didn’t know what to do. Sam was really back. After all this time.

She had to look up. To get through this. Making plans for May seemed so much safer.

Thank God, she was in her office. Private. No one was going to see if she messed up.

Except Sam.

He was standing in front of her desk. She could feel him there. She just couldn’t bear to look at him. Couldn’t be sure she wouldn’t make a total idiot of herself and start to cry.

Sam hated it when she cried. Nearly as much as she did.

There was movement over there, close to Sam, but not really where he was standing. It drew Cassie’s eye.

There, with her little hand clasped in a bigger one that could only belong to Cassie’s ex-husband, stood a little girl. A very solemn, beautiful, dark-eyed little girl. She appeared to be part Native American.

“We—” Sam raised the child’s hand “—Mariah and I just got into town last night. I couldn’t be in Shelter Valley without seeing you first thing.”

Oddly enough, Cassie understood that. She didn’t like it, but she understood. She and Sam would never truly be strangers, or casual acquaintances who just had chance meetings on the street.

“You could have called first,” she said, her eyes riveted on the child. His daughter? His daughter?

Pain knifed through Cassie, so sharp she couldn’t breathe. When he’d left her all those years ago, he’d taken from her any hope that she might have children of her own. Taken away any hope of the family and the life she’d wanted. And now he had the nerve to waltz back into town with a child who should have been theirs.

“I was afraid you wouldn’t see me,” he murmured.

“You were probably right.”

Was the child his? With her obvious coloring and that coal-black hair, the girl didn’t look anything like him. Yet her white heritage was noticeable in those striking blue eyes.

Sam had green eyes.

“This is Mariah,” Sam said, sounding less sure of himself as she continued to watch the silent little girl. “She’s my daughter.”

The knife sliced a second time. Lips trembling, Cassie nodded. And tried to smile at the child. After all, it wasn’t Mariah’s fault her father had hurt Cassie so badly.

“Hello, Mariah.”

The little girl stared wordlessly at her father’s waistline. Which, now that Cassie noticed it, looked as firm and solid as it always had. Clearly, Sam was still in remarkably good shape.

“You’re looking great, Cass,” Sam said, an old familiar warmth enlivening the words.

“Thanks.” Taking a deep, shuddering breath, Cassie forced herself to look up, to meet Sam’s gaze.

And then looked away again almost immediately. His eyes were exactly the same. They met hers— and touched her all the way inside.

Without waiting for an invitation, Sam sat in one of the leather chairs facing her desk, pulling Mariah onto his lap.

“How old is she?” she asked. Morbid curiosity.

“Seven.”

Cassie’s daughter would have been ten this year.

“So how’ve you been, Cass?” Sam asked, glancing around her office at the degrees on the wall behind her, the thick texts lining her shelves. “You’ve accomplished a lot.”

Cassie stared at the little television in the corner. Wishing she hadn’t turned it off after the news ended half an hour ago. It would have given her something to focus on. Taken her thoughts off the bitter pain that had already seized her.

Off the man in front of her.

“Your parents told you about the pet therapy program, I imagine,” she said. It was the sum total of her life’s accomplishments. Had they told him that, as well?

If this was just a guilt-induced duty call, he could leave now. She didn’t need his polite compliments. Or his pity.

The flood of anger felt good.

“They haven’t mentioned you at all,” he said quietly. “I don’t know the first thing about a pet therapy program. I’m just impressed with this office, the clinic, your degrees.”

Cassie shrugged. “I imagine you went on to greater things. You’re probably a lawyer by now.”