The Seal's Second Chance Baby

Back at Mabel’s ranch, Effie was surprised to find a familiar red Ford pickup in Mabel’s drive. What was Wallace doing at the house? Had he driven himself without a license? More importantly, her racing pulse wondered, had he brought his grandson? If Marsh was even out of the hospital.

After parking her minivan, she flipped down the visor to check if she looked as bad as she felt—just in case Marsh was feeling well enough to tag along. In a word? Yes. Her once-neat ponytail sagged, and dozens of wispy curls framed her flushed face.

“What’cha lookin’ at, Mom?” Remington still sat in his safety seat, but Colt had already unbuckled himself and opened the van’s side door.

Since she couldn’t tell her son she was checking herself out for a possible encounter with the handsome neighbor, she crossed her fingers behind her back before saying, “I, um, thought I had something in my eye.”

“Oh.” He scrambled from his seat to take Cassidy from hers. “Ready to see Great-Gramma?” he asked his baby sister in an adorable soft tone.

Cassidy grinned, bucking with excitement.

“Sure you’re strong enough to carry her?” Effie asked.

“Mo-om.” He rolled his eyes. “I’m really big, and she’s really small.”

“Oh, well in that case, you can always carry her.” She kept a close eye on the pair while opening the van’s rear door. “How about you start by taking her in the house. Colt and I will grab your school supplies.”

“Okay.” He took his time with his baby sister, being extra careful on the short step to the porch.

“There you are.” Mabel burst out the front door.

Wallace followed behind her, then spotted Effie. “Let me help with that. Looks like you’ve got your hands full.”

He bounded out in front of Mabel to take Effie’s bags.

“Thank you.” She eyed her blushing grandmother, whose expression landed between the cat who swallowed a canary and a randy teen who’d been caught making out. “Everything all right?”

“Oh, fine, fine,” Wallace said. “Marsh!” He waved toward the barn, where his grandson exited at a snail’s pace. “Come on over here. You should both hear our happy news.”

Mabel beamed.

What in the world is going on?

And how did any man have a right to look so good straight out of the hospital? Should he even be walking? Marsh’s left hand was bandaged. He wore jeans and a white T-shirt with NAVY written on the front in big blue letters. She couldn’t tell which was in worse condition, his battered cowboy boots or his equally shabby brown leather cowboy hat. The closer he got, the more she couldn’t help but wonder how she hadn’t before noticed his eyes being quite so dark. Like decadent fudge pools.

“Hi,” she said with a painfully awkward wave in his direction, willing her runaway pulse to slow. “Should you already be up and around?”

“Judging by how crappy I’m feeling, nope.” He winced. “But I needed to check on my horse. Thanks for taking care of him.”

“It’s been my pleasure. If you want, he can stay here till you feel up to riding.”

“That’d be great. Thanks.” His half smile turned her knees to rubber. Shame on her. As the single mom of three kids, the last thing she had time for was checking out a cowboy—especially one with even more emotional baggage than her.

“Did you kill the snake that bit you?” Colt asked.

“I did not,” Marsh said.

“Aren’t you mad at him?” Her son had already taken his new Batman backpack from the van and now wore it.

“Nah.” Marsh ruffled the boy’s hair the way Moody used to. “I figured he was just protecting his land the same way I would mine. Make sense?”

“I guess?” Colt cocked his head and frowned.

Wallace cleared his throat. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but me and Miss Mabel have some mighty exciting news.” He slipped his arm around her slim shoulders. “Don’t we, darlin’?”

Mabel beamed. “We sure do.”

Much as they had at the hospital when their grandparents had been fighting, Effie shared a look with Marsh. Was he as confused as she was?

“Look here.” Marsh’s grandfather took Mabel’s hand, waving it for all to see. A massive diamond solitaire glinted in the setting sun. “Effie, honey, your gorgeous grandmother has agreed to marry me.”

“What?” Effie pressed her hands to her galloping heart.

Marsh looked ready to topple over.

“You heard right,” Mabel said. “We’re getting married! And we want the two of you to be our best man and maid of honor.”

Chapter Four

“Wait...” Marsh fought the temptation to conk the side of his head to check for something in his ear, because surely he hadn’t heard right. “Did you just say you’re getting married?”

“Isn’t it exciting?” Effie’s grandmother gushed. “And since neither of us is getting younger, we want to hold the ceremony right away—but with enough time to do it up right.”

Her beaming groom slipped his arm around her waist and the two shared a kiss.

Lord...

Marsh sneaked a peek at Effie and found her looking as bewildered as he felt.

“Grandma,” she said, “and Wallace, I’m thrilled for both of you—really, I am. But don’t you think this is a little sudden? At the start of the week, you hated each other.”

Wallace waved off her concern. “Like your grandmother said, at our age, there’s no sense in putting off till tomorrow what should be done today.”

“Mom?” One of the twins tugged the bottom of Effie’s pretty floral shirt. “Do married people share beds? ’Cause my friend Scotty said—”

“Gosh, Colt.” Effie clamped her hand over her son’s mouth and steered him toward the coop affixed to the side of the barn. “I’m pretty sure you and your brother forgot to feed the chickens this morning.”

Remington thankfully followed.

Marsh struggled to hold back a laugh. But then he thought of his grandfather’s upcoming honeymoon night and wanted to cry. How was it fair the old guy would soon be seeing more action than him?

“Ready to set our big date?” Wallace asked his bride.

“Absolutely.” Mabel was already heading for the house. “I’ve got one of those big bank calendars on the side of the fridge.”

“Perfect.” Wallace took her hand to walk her into the house. It was a damn shame his grandmother had held tight to her grudge for so many years. Wallace clearly had an abundance of affection to share with no previous outlet. Maybe this marriage was a good thing after all?

“Quite a turn of events, huh?” Effie tucked her hands in the back pockets of faded jeans that hugged her in all the right places.

“No kidding.” Marsh tried not to notice the strain her pose placed on her shirt’s pearl buttons.

“How are you doing? Let’s get you off your feet and out of the sun.” She led him toward a bench in the barn’s deep afternoon shadow.

“Better now.” He hated feeling as if his normally strong body had betrayed him. Upon sitting, he released a long sigh. “Crazy, isn’t it? How a critter no longer than my arm put me out of commission.”

“If you think that’s bad, don’t mess with a brown recluse. When I was a nursing student—”

“Hold up—you’re a nurse? No wonder you took such great care of me.”

“No. Not quite.” She leaned against the barn wall and lowered her gaze. “I, ah, dropped out just before my last semester.”

“That sucks. Not that it’s any of my business, but why?”

“Long story. Let’s just say I caught a bad case of bull rider fever that led to an even more serious condition called marriage.”

“Uh-oh...” He nodded. “I can relate—only the other way around.”

“I’m sorry. Wallace told me the highlights—or I guess that would be lowlights—of what happened. Sorry doesn’t seem adequate.” Initially, Marsh had been irked by the fact that his grandfather had shared his private pain with a stranger, but for the instant it took Effie to cover his hand with hers, and he glanced up to find her blue-green gaze shimmering, his annoyance faded into appreciation for this woman who’d done more for him in the past week than his ex had in the past three years.

“It’s okay.” He stretched his legs out in front of him and leaned back. “I mean, clearly, it’s not, but you get the picture.”

She nodded and swallowed hard. “I can’t imagine losing your son. You must have—”

“Stop.” He straightened. “That’s not a part of my life I care to hash over, so could we change the subject?”

“Sure. Sorry. I never meant to—”

“Damn, it’s hot out here.” Since she apparently hadn’t gotten his earlier memo, Marsh stood. “Wonder when this heat’s going to let up?”

He made the mistake of looking her way, only to find her big blue eyes once again shining. Swell. If there was one thing he couldn’t abide more than heat, it was a crying woman. Unable—or hell, maybe just plain unwilling—to make more small talk, he nodded toward her grandmother’s ragtag house. “I’m gonna see what’s keeping Wallace.”

Instead of waiting for her to acknowledge his statement or even follow him, Marsh took off. Over the years, Wallace had done a lot of crazy things, but this engagement took the proverbial cake to a whole new level. Marsh was partially pleased as punch for the old coot, but another part of him knew if the planning constantly threw him and Effie together, the next weeks could be rough.

The whole reason he’d come Colorado was to avoid people. Since losing Tucker to drowning and then his wife to a spectacularly civil divorce, Marsh hadn’t been himself. A few months after the ink had dried on their papers, he’d been in Afghanistan watching a terrorist cell. He’d witnessed them strapping a bomb around the chest of a boy who couldn’t have been much older than his son and lost it. Marsh had been on a strict intel-gathering mission that soon turned into a bad-guy bloodbath. He’d come damn close to being court-martialed for failure to follow orders, but by God, that innocent child had survived. Reuniting him with his mother had been one of the few times since losing Tucker that Marsh had felt alive.

Now? Hell, most days he wasn’t sure what he felt—if anything at all. Truth be told, that snakebite had been a blessing if only for the fact that it had shaved a chunk of time from his life when he hadn’t had to think about what happened to his marriage and son.

* * *

THE NEXT MORNING, guilt churned Effie’s belly, because she actually felt relieved and a trifle giddy about waving goodbye to her rowdy twins, who had just climbed on the school bus. It had been a long summer, and later, she looked forward to planting her behind on one of the front porch rockers to linger with Cassidy over a nice cup of tea.

And if her thoughts strayed to the proud, handsome, clearly heartbroken man to whom she would soon be related by marriage?

The unspoken question warmed her cheeks.

Well, there was certainly no harm in thinking about a person, was there? His story was beyond tragic, and lingered with her long after he and Wallace had gone. It had been hard enough losing her husband, but to have also lost a child? No wonder Marsh hadn’t cared to talk about his situation, but the way he’d cut her off had been downright rude—especially when she’d only been trying to help.

She’d just entered the house to clean up the breakfast dishes when she spotted her grandmother not where she’d last been—at the kitchen table, feeding the baby pureed peaches—but emerging from her bedroom wearing her best Sunday dress and a huge smile.

Cassidy squealed while racing down the wood-floored hall in her walker, making an awful racket with the squeaky buttons and electronic horn.

So much for my quiet morning...

“How do I look?” Mabel performed a lively pirouette.

“Pretty as a picture. But where are you off to so early on a Monday morning?” She didn’t drive, so one of her friends must be coming to get her.

“Did you already forget? When Wallace and Marsh were leaving, we decided to meet up for a planning breakfast at Mom’s Café and then hit the ground running. Hurry up and get dressed. We’re supposed to meet them in fifteen minutes.”

“Grandma, you never said anything about seeing your fiancé today.” Just saying the word sounded awkward, but not nearly as bad as spending a whole day with Marsh would be.

“I’m sure I did...” Mabel ducked into the hall bathroom to fluff her white hair. “Now, hurry. I don’t want to be late.”

“For the record, you must have been talking to angels, since you sure never ran any of this past me.”

“Watch your sass, or I’ll downgrade you from maid of honor to punch bowl attendant.”

Effie rolled her eyes.

Under the best of circumstances, prepping Cassidy and all of her gear was never easy, but on short notice? The task was darn near impossible. By the time Effie swapped comfy jeans and a T-shirt for a sundress and wrestled the baby into a cute yellow gingham romper, her fifteen minutes had ticked to five. After loading the diaper bag, stroller, carrier and her purse in the back of the minivan, then plopping the baby into her safety seat, Effie was not only exhausted, but ten minutes off schedule.

She slid behind the wheel, relieved to have at least made it into the car.

“Couldn’t you have at least tried doing something with your hair?” Mabel cast a dour glance in Effie’s general direction. “I don’t want Wallace thinking he’s marrying into a bunch of hillbillies.”

Overheated, Effie turned on the engine and AC before yanking down the visor to peer into the lighted mirror. Good grief. The ponytail she’d slept on hung sideways with more hair out than in. For added flavor, compliments of Colt, there was oatmeal just over her right ear. Effie said a quick prayer for his teacher, Mrs. Logan. She’d need all the help she could get to hog-tie him to his desk.

“Is this better?” Effie asked after yanking out her elastic, only to smooth her hair back and work it back in.

Mabel frowned. “I like it better down. And when you add a bit of curl. For sure wear it that way at the wedding. I don’t want it looking bad for pictures.”

It was official. Her normally sane grandmother had turned into Bridezilla.

* * *

“THERE’S MY BLUSHING BRIDE.”

While Effie struggled into the crowded café with Cassidy on her hip and the diaper bag over her shoulder, Mabel glided to where her groom sat at a table loaded with rowdy geriatrics Effie recognized from the Grange Hall, where she drove her grandmother most Saturday nights. Funny how she hadn’t noticed Wallace, too. Had Mabel deliberately kept her distance?

Mabel and Wallace shared a brief embrace and kiss, then he pulled out a chair for her alongside his.

“Hope you don’t mind,” he said to Effie, “but there’s no more room here, so I figured you could sit with Marsh.” He nodded to the room’s far corner, where his grandson glowered over a mug of coffee.

Effie opened her mouth to tell him that as a matter of fact, she very much minded, but the group of three women and four men was too loud for her voice to have even been heard. Resigned to her fate, she lugged the baby a little farther.

As if the whole town was relieved school was back in session, honky-tonk played on the jukebox. Laughter and high-spirited conversations rose above the music. The scents of strong coffee and bacon and the café’s famous cinnamon rolls had Effie’s stomach growling.

“Are you as sick of this wedding as I am?” she asked upon reaching Marsh’s table.

“Oh, hey. Yes.” He jumped up to help her with Cassidy’s bag. “Welcome to the kids’ table. I wouldn’t be surprised if the waitress shows up with a pair of smiley-face pancakes.”

“I know, right?” The brief brush of the back of his hand against her shoulder had her fighting a flutter of awareness low in her belly. Gracious, he was a looker. He hadn’t shaved, and if possible, when he politely removed his cowboy hat, his hair looked even worse than hers.

She’d always had a thing for untamed cowboys.

Case in point—her no-good ex.

Once she’d sat herself in a chair, her cell on the table and Cassidy on her lap, Marsh asked the waitress to bring a high chair, than slapped his hat back on.

“Thank you,” Effie said, relieved to duck behind the laminated menu. When the waitress returned with the high chair, Effie hefted Cassidy in, then ordered hot tea and a cheese omelet with hash browns.

“Question,” Marsh said once they were alone. “Do you remember hearing anything about this meeting yesterday afternoon?”

Laughing, Effie shook her head. “I walked my boys to the school bus, thinking Cassidy and I had the whole day to ourselves, only to learn I was wrong.”

“Sorry.” Marsh sipped his coffee.

“Why should you apologize? I assume you had better things to do this morning, too.”

“True—no offense.”

“None taken.” She fished the baby’s favorite rubber whale teething toy from the diaper bag and set it on the high chair’s tray. “This engagement happened so fast. The wedding’s the third week in October. My head is spinning.”

The waitress came and went with her tea. Effie added plenty of sugar.

“What if we divide and conquer?”

Effie wrinkled her nose. “You mean like Mabel and I handle flowers and you and your grandfather tackle beer and wine?”

“Exactly.” He leaned in. “You have no more time or desire to be around me than I have to be around you. This way, we make Wallace and Mabel happy without the two of us being miserable. Sound like a plan?”

“Sure.”

The waitress arrived with their meals, and Effie dived in, closing her eyes while savoring the gooey cheese.

But upon glancing into Marsh’s hooded, dead-sexy gaze only to realize she wasn’t miserable, she swallowed and then froze. What had she just agreed to? It wasn’t as if she craved seeing the guy, but now that she’d lugged Cassidy and her gear into the real world outside her grandmother’s modest home, she recognized that along with the café’s food being far tastier than her own, she’d been tapping her toe to the lively music. Her baby girl grinned from all the neighboring diners’ waves and silly faces.

Marsh might have admitted he was miserable, but she was far from it. Breakfast out was actually kind of a fun treat.

As for the view across the table? Whew...

Even brooding, Marsh Langtree’s chiseled features were ridiculously easy on the eyes. Proven by the fact that she wasn’t the only woman staring. How could his wife have left him? He seemed like a stand-up guy. Why had the death of their son driven them apart instead of bringing them closer?

Her cell rang.

One glance at the caller ID snapped her from her thoughts—Admiral Byrd Elementary.

“Need to get that?” Marsh asked.

“Unfortunately.” What had Colt done? Dipped a girl’s braids in paint? Freed the occupants of the teacher’s hamster cage or ant farm? Effie steeled herself for the worst. “Hello?”

“Mrs. Washington? I’m sorry to bother you, but—” Effie recognized the voice of Samantha, the school office clerk.

“What did Colt do?”

Samantha laughed. “Actually, nothing. The twins’ teacher just wanted me to see if you’re available next Thursday for a brief field trip. The kids are learning about money, so they’ll be walking to the bank at the end of our block. Mrs. Logan is desperate for volunteers.”

“Please tell her I’d be happy to help.” Effie released the breath she’d been holding.

“Perfect. I’ll let her know.”

Upon disconnecting, Effie couldn’t help but smile.

“Good news?” Marsh asked.

“In a roundabout way.” She skimmed her palm over Cassidy’s soft blond curls. “My twins are a handful—well, mostly Colt. He’s oldest by three minutes, and always in trouble. This school year couldn’t have come at a better time, as I’m in sore need of a parental breather. Anyway, during kindergarten, I got far more calls than I would have liked from the boys’ teacher, and with today being the first day of school, I saw the caller ID and assumed the worst.”

“But everything’s okay?” He held a bacon strip to his lips, causing her tummy to flutter. When he’d been in the hospital, she’d stared at him for hours at a time, but he’d always been asleep. Now that he was awake, it was tough not to notice even more—like the way a fraction of an inch up or down at the corners of his mouth made him look happy or sad or devilishly sexy.

“Yes.” Or was it? Face flushed from her latest assessment of her companion, she focused on squirting ketchup on her hash browns. For the moment, her twins might have been behaving, but her overactive imagination certainly wasn’t. It was high time she focused more on this wedding and less on the best man!

* * *

MARSH COULDN’T GET away from Effie and her cute-as-a-button baby fast enough. He’d paid the bill, and Effie was back on her phone, gabbing with someone about healthy school snacks, when the baby dropped her toy. In the moment, he found himself back on parental autopilot, reaching to the floor to get it, then dipping his napkin in his water to wipe the whale clean.

He returned it to Cassidy, and her smile filled him with the kind of awe and wonder he’d long ago had for his son. He never would have pegged himself for the kind of guy who liked kids, but not long into Tucker’s brief life, Marsh found himself wholly consumed with his son. What he ate, what he wore, what toys he played with. Tucker had been his world, and when he died... Well, for all practical purposes, Marsh had, too.

Effie’s crew was his first exposure to kids since Tucker’s passing, and Marsh found the experience to be all at once heady and cruel. He’d caught himself sneaking peeks at little Cassidy’s chubby pink cheeks and big blue eyes that matched her mama’s. When he bent forward to return her toy, he’d caught a trace of her baby-lotion scent, which led him right back to Tucker’s infant years, and to how much fun it had been to make boat noises while playing with his rubber fleet in the tub, then wrapping him in a big soft towel, lotioning him before adding a fresh diaper and PJs before rocking him and watching his wife, Leah, nurse before they’d tucked him into his crib.

Knowing he’d never again kiss his son good-night or play catch with him or watch him shriek at the beach while running from a crab was too much to bear.

He had to get out of there.

Away from Effie and her sweet baby girl and her talk about how relieved she was to have breathing room away from her boys when he’d have literally given anything for one more moment with his son.

In that instant, hearing Effie laugh over the fact that she was actually happy to be away from her kids filled him with irrational rage. Not with her, per se, but his particularly painful lot in life.

On autopilot, desperate for fresh air and the kind of quiet he could only find in the middle of nowhere, Marsh pushed back his chair, pressed his hat tighter on his head and left the diner and town.

Grief drove him to push his truck too fast, and back at his grandfather’s ranch, he followed the same trend while four-wheeling to the old homestead.

Only when Marsh had well and truly driven to the end of his world did he allow himself badly needed release.

He screamed at God.

Cursed fate.

He broke down and cried and wished that damned snake had finished what he’d started. Most of all, Marsh wished for a moment’s respite from the heartache stemming from being well and truly alone.

Chapter Five

“Effie May Washington,” Mabel scolded. “What did you do?”

“Nothing.”

Mabel planted her hands on her hips. “You had to have done something to make Marsh bolt out of here faster than a spooked horse.”

“Did he at least have the courtesy to pay for your meal?” Wallace asked.

Effie nodded.

“Since Marsh ran off with his truck, Effie, looks like you’re our official chauffeur.”

Swell.

“No worries. We’ll have fun.” Forcing a smile, Effie took Cassidy from her high chair, then vowed the first time she saw Marsh again, she’d give him a piece of her mind.