Slow Heat

Bailey nodded wordlessly.

Her mother’s welcoming smile faded. “Oh, baby. He hurt you. Dammit, I knew this would happen.”

“No.” Bailey shook her head. “I hurt myself.”

Her mother turned to the phone on the wall. “I’m going to call Aaron.”

“No! I don’t need Aaron.”

“What do you need?”

“Cookies.” She gulped some air. “And you.”

And then she burst into tears.

The snowstorm that blew in was indeed massive, closing most of the highways and causing havoc from one end of Colorado to the other.

Thirty-six hours went by and for each of those hours Hud grew more impossible to live with, or so each of his family members told him.

“You want to change your tone, or I’ll shove it down your throat,” Gray suggested mildly when Hud told him where to shove it after Gray had dumped a bunch of paperwork on his desk.

“You kiss your mama with that mouth?” Aidan asked when Hud had to pull one of their snowcats out of a ditch, which took all night.

“Just because I’m a chick doesn’t mean I can’t kick your ass,” Kenna said when he snarled at her for drinking the last soda in his place. “And I could totally do it too,” she told him, “since you’re still pouting over letting the love of your life get away—which, by the way, is your own damn fault, so you might want to stop taking your dumbass moves out on the people who actually still like you.”

That night Hud stood in his kitchen staring out at the storm that wouldn’t end. Every year for as long as he could remember, a storm like this had been a dream come true. It meant feet of fresh powder that, at first light, he and his brothers could plow through, racing each other through the trees, hip deep in snow the consistency of sifted flour.

In more recent years it also meant good business. People flocked to Cedar Ridge from far and wide for snow like that, snow that only came along like this once or twice a season.

But right now he’d give anything for it to be summer.

“Want to talk?” Gray asked, coming into the room.

“Hell no.” Hud let out a breath. “I waited too long to tell her how I felt. You warned me and I still waited too long.”

Gray waited until he turned to look at him. “It’s never too late.”

Hud hoped like hell that was true.

The next day finally dawned clear and bright, and Hud did something he’d never done before. He took himself off the schedule on a workday.

“Thank God,” Penny said fervently, and took the dry-erase pen from him and marked him off for the rest of the week. “Don’t take this personally, but no one wants to see you back here until you’ve handled your shit and have the girl.”

Hud followed the GPS to Bailey’s Denver address and found himself in a neighborhood that had seen better days. Snow covered the yards in huge berms, but he’d bet even in spring there wasn’t much landscaping going on. There were few cars in the building’s lot, which suggested this was a hard-working area and everyone was on the job.

When he parked and walked the not-quite-shoveled path, a woman stuck her head out the first apartment, which had MANAGER printed on the door.

“Can I help y—” She broke off at the sight of him and narrowed her eyes. “You.”

It was Bailey’s mom. “Me,” he agreed. “Is she here?”

She slammed the door on his nose.

He dropped his head, studied his shoes, counted to five, and knocked on the door.

It opened slowly. “I don’t talk to heartbreakers,” Bailey’s mom said.

“Mrs. Moore, I screwed up with your daughter, but I’m here to tell her I was an idiot and that if she’ll let me make things up to her, I’ll never be an idiot again.”

She sniffed. “No man can promise to not be an idiot. It’s in your blood. You’re cursed.”

“Okay, true enough,” he allowed. “I’ll probably be an idiot several more times this week alone, but if she’ll let me, I’ll love her for the rest of time in spite of it.”

She stared at him for a long beat. “She won’t let you love her,” she finally said, but her voice was warmer and hey, she hadn’t slammed the door on his nose in a whole minute now.

Both good signs. “Why won’t she let me?” he asked.

“She talks a good game, wanting to live the life she could only dream about before,” she said. “But she’s not all that good at putting herself out there. She used to do that with her dad. He’d promise to come visit and she’d get all ready for him, using energy she didn’t have to waste, making him cards and stuff. And then she’d sit in the window in the living room and wait for him.”

Hud’s gut tightened for the little girl she’d been.

Her mom made a noise of anger and remembered frustration. “He’d show up just enough to completely mess with her head, but more often than not, he’d forget.”

Hud knew that feeling. His dad had been no better.

Bailey’s mom hesitated. “And then there’s Aaron. I love that boy as if he was my own, but he screwed up once and Bailey’s…” She shook her head. “She’s used to a black-or-white world. Sick, not sick. Alive, making plans to not be alive. No gray. No middle ground.” She paused. “When she was so sick, forgiving came easy. Too easy. She was way too kind. But now…” She smiled a little. “Healthy Bailey isn’t quite as forgiving. It’s as if getting to live made her more human. And we all know humans are flawed. She’s working on that. She’s working on a lot of things. And she’s forgiven her father and Aaron, but she hasn’t forgotten. Karma or fate or God, whatever you want to believe, gave my daughter a second chance at life and she’s taking it. Thank God. But I’ve influenced her decisions enough. And I learn from my mistakes. She makes her own now, with only loving support from me.”

And with that, she pulled her head back inside her place and shut the door.

Hard to argue with that.

Hud continued along the path, winding his way until he found 10A, which was the address Bailey had listed as hers. Heart pounding against his ribs, he knocked.

No answer.

He knocked again and would’ve sworn he felt someone watching him. “Bailey,” he said, hand flat on the door. “Listen to me, I was wrong, okay? About a lot of things. But mostly about us. I want an us. I always did, I was just…” He sighed and set his forehead to the wood. “Scared.” He blew out a breath. “Bay, I need you to open up the door now and forgive me.”

Her door didn’t open.

Instead the door across the way did and… shit… Aaron stood there. “Nice on the spilling your guts,” he said, “but typically an apology involves more ‘I’m sorry’ and ‘please’ and question marks, not a demand to forgive.”

Hud ground his back teeth. “Where is she?”

“Not here.”

Hud blew out a sigh. “You all live in the same building?”

“Yes.” Aaron paused and his voice warmed slightly. “When someone you love gets as sick as she was for as long as she did, it takes a lot of care, twenty-four-seven sometimes. She and her mom had to downsize, sell the family house. The medical costs devastated them. They moved here and so did I, to be around to help when she needed it.” He paused. “She hasn’t needed it for a while,” he admitted.