Todd.

Hannah’s lips formed the word, but she couldn’t summon the breath to give it sound. Her chest ached as fear and panic pressed down on it like a heavy hand.

She’d dreamed of him so often, with fondness and fury, and there he was. His presence seemed to fill the sanctuary from carpet to rafters. She’d tried so hard to forget those eyes, and there they were, staring back at her with that same unnerving intensity.

What was he doing here? What did he want? Why now? Why ever? What was she supposed to do about Rebecca?

He expected her to say something; she knew that. The words just wouldn’t come. Words couldn’t squeeze past the guilt clawing at her insides. No matter what he’d done, no matter how hurt she’d felt, she should have found a way to tell him as soon as she knew. Or at least she could have found some occasion before Rebecca’s fourth birthday. What was she supposed to tell him now?

DANA CORBIT

has been fascinated with words since third grade, when she began stringing together stanzas of rhyme. That interest, and an inherent nosiness, led her to a career as a newspaper reporter and editor. After earning state and national recognition in journalism, she traded her career for stay-at-home motherhood.

But the need for creative expression followed her home, and later through the move from Indiana to Milford, Michigan. Outside the office, Dana discovered the joy of writing fiction. In stolen hours, during naps and between carpooling and church activities, she escapes into her private world, telling stories from her heart.

Dana makes her home in Michigan with her husband, three young daughters and two cats.

A Hickory Ridge Christmas
Dana Corbit

And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”

—Ephesians 4:32

To our firstborn daughter, Marissa, who has been asking me to write Hannah and Todd’s story for four years now. You already have so many wonderful stories in you. I hope you find joy in telling them.

A special thanks to Monsignor John Budde for his biblical research assistance; Michael G. Thomas, C.P.A., for his knowledge of the accounting field; and, as always, to my favorite medical expert, Dr. Celia D’Errico, D.O.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Letter to Reader

Questions for Discussion

Chapter One

For the third time in as many weeks, Hannah Woods awoke smiling. She wasn’t fully awake. Not really. For if she were, then the practical side of her mind would have insisted that she rein in those banned images. She was far too busy and far too focused to entertain little-girl dreams, at least in her conscious hours. She hadn’t been a little girl for a very long time.

Just this once, though, in that private place between slumber and alertness, Hannah couldn’t resist the temptation to let those pictures play out in full color.

Keeping her eyes tightly closed, Hannah let herself glance around in her make-believe world and take in sights and sounds so real that she could almost hear the organ prelude and smell sweet roses and pooling candle wax. Her heart warmed at the sight of her father standing at the altar, his Bible open to a familiar passage.

She couldn’t picture herself, but she could almost feel tulle brushing her cheek and lacy bridal point, making her wrists itch. The last image, though, made her breath catch in her throat. Todd. Always Todd.

Standing across the aisle from her, he looked so handsome in his dark tuxedo. His shoulders had filled out the way she’d always imagined they would someday, but he still had the same boy’s face she remembered, and his green eyes were as mesmerizing as ever. Those eyes still looked as sincere as they had when he’d told her he loved her.

When he’d lied.

As Hannah came fully awake with a start and sat straight up in bed, the twinkling lights of the miniature Christmas tree shifted into focus. They’d set it up the day before while still digesting their Thanksgiving turkey. This morning the tree’s tinsel, garland and tiny red bows replaced all satin and pastel thoughts of the wedding that would never be.

What was she doing, anyway? She didn’t have the luxury of indulging useless, adolescent dreams. And if she continued forgetting to unplug that little tree at night, especially with the apartment’s wiring, they would be sifting through charred rubble before New Year’s.

Clearly, she needed to get her act together. She was twenty-two years old now, not seventeen. She had responsibilities and obligations—things Todd knew nothing about and probably couldn’t have handled if he knew. You never gave him the chance to handle anything, an unwelcome voice inside her pointed out with a punch she did her best to dodge. Forgiveness. She’d given that the old college try these past five years, but she couldn’t quite get beyond the desertion part. Whether or not it had been his choice to leave with his parents when his father had been transferred to Singapore, the fact remained that he had left when she’d needed him most.

Perhaps only God could forgive and truly forget.

A litany of her own sins and failures played in her mind as it always did when her thoughts turned to the boy she should have forgotten—the boy who was now a man. She would have allowed guilt to blanket her as she had so many times while the months stretched into years, but the squeak of her bedroom door offered a reprieve this time.

“I’m awake, Mommy,” Rebecca called out as she bounded into the room, tucked something under the bed and then scrambled on top of the covers.

Though her child made that same announcement and followed the same routine every morning at about ten minutes before the alarm was set to go off, Hannah smiled. “Well, looky there. I guess you are.”

“Is it Friday? Do I have my playdate with Max today?”

“Yes, sweetie, it’s today.”

Since Rebecca had been counting down the days until her playdate with her favorite friend, Max Williams, Hannah was pleased to finally say yes. Technically, the “playdate” was really only a day when Mary Nelson would be babysitting both Rebecca and Max while Hannah worked at the accounting firm and while Max’s mother, Tricia Williams Lancaster, scoured Twelve Oaks Mall on the busiest shopping day of the year. Hannah didn’t bother clarifying the point.

“Today. Today. Today!” Rebecca threw her head back on the bed and wiggled with the type of delight only a child could find before breakfast without a double espresso. Her fine towhead-blond hair stuck up every which way, and she squeezed her eyes shut tight, probably looking for the stars she liked to watch behind her eyelids.

Reaching down, Hannah brushed the hair back from her daughter’s fair-skinned face, all thoughts of obligations flittering away on a wave of pure adoration.

Rebecca opened her eyes and stared up at her mom. Hannah’s chest tightened. It was probably the dream that made her react again to her daughter’s green eyes when she’d been so proud of her ability to no longer notice them. Others probably hadn’t found Rebecca’s eye color remarkable since Hannah’s eyes were a hazel-green shade—close but not the same. She saw it, though. Those were Todd’s eyes that sometimes stared back when her daughter looked at her.

Clearing her throat, she gave the child a tight squeeze. “We’d better get up or we’ll be late.”

Rebecca lifted her head off the bed, and her bottom lip came out in a pout. “But…”

“Why? Do you have a better idea?”

The little girl pointed to the side of the bed.

“Is there something under there I should know about?”

Lying back and wiggling again, Rebecca nodded.

Hannah pressed her index finger to her lips as if pondering and then glanced down at her. “Is it bigger than a bread box?”

Rebecca’s eyebrows furrowed. “What’s a bread box?”

“A thing people used to use to keep bread fresh.” Hannah gave the same answer she did every day.

“Nope.”

“Is it smaller than an amoeba?”

“What’s an amoeba?”

“A single-cell creature.”

“Nope.” A giggle erupted from the child’s rosebud mouth. “Do you want to know what it is?”

“You’d better tell me. I just can’t guess.”

Rebecca climbed off the bed, peered under it and returned with the surprise: today’s choice from their collection of Christmas storybooks they’d recently taken out of storage.

“Ooh, the manger story!” Hannah accepted the hardcover book, pleased with her daughter’s selection with its quotes from the Book of Luke and Michelangelo-style painted illustrations. Hannah enjoyed reading all the festive stories to her daughter, but she was excited that Rebecca had chosen one that spoke of the true Christmas story instead of one about Rudolph and the rest of the holiday gang.

“There’s baby Jesus.” Rebecca pointed to the book cover, which featured a painting of the sweet infant, a halo of glory about his head. “And the sheep and the cows and the donkey.”

“Looks like they’re all there.” Hannah opened the book to the first page, and Rebecca snuggled up under her arm. Only after they’d read the last page could they officially begin their day.

“The end,” Rebecca announced with glee when they were finished.

Again Hannah smiled at her daughter. Rebecca approached everything with that same kind of enthusiasm, as if each hour was an uncharted land just waiting to be explored.

How could Hannah have forgotten, even for a minute, how fortunate she was to know this amazing four-year-old? How grateful she was to God for giving her the privilege of raising her. Loving Rebecca had nothing to do with obligation and so much to do with sharing in the joy and in the discovery.

During her conscious hours, Hannah didn’t give herself time for regrets, not when she and Rebecca enjoyed so many blessings. If only she could rein in the images that crowded her dreams, as well. Those snapshots of the past hurt more than they healed, leaving her to awaken feeling empty and wondering whether something vital was missing from her life.

Todd took a deep breath as he stepped inside the church’s glass double doors Sunday morning. If only he could remove the golf-ball-sized knot clogging his throat. He felt as queasy as an actor on opening night, only this wasn’t a play and the only reviewer who mattered was sure to give him a scorching review.

Before he could even stomp the snow off his dress shoes and hang his coat on the rack that extended the length of the vestibule, an usher approached him.

“Welcome to Hickory Ridge Community Church,” the man said as he gripped Todd’s hand and pumped briskly. “Is this your first time visiting with us?”

Clearing his throat, Todd answered, “No—I mean it’s been a long time, but—” he coughed into his hand and looked back up at the usher “—it isn’t my first time.”

“And we sure hope it won’t be the last.”

Todd tilted his head to indicate the crowded sanctuary, visible through a wall of windows. “I’d better get in there. I’m already late.”

The man brushed away the comment with a wave of his hand. “Ah, they’re just getting warmed up in there.”

Todd thanked the man and continued past him. He’d hoped that arriving after services started would allow him to miss a formal greeting at the door, but he should have known better. Hickory Ridge had always been a friendly church on the “Bring-A-Friend Sunday” and the “Homecoming” events he’d attended with Hannah, and clearly that hadn’t changed.

Plenty of other things were just as familiar, he found, as he peered through the windows into the sanctuary. Same stained glass window behind the choir loft. Same red carpet and red-padded pews. Same crowd of strangers. Same two guys sitting on the twin benches on either side of the pulpit.

Only the draped garland in the front of the sanctuary and the candles in the sills of the other stained glass windows even hinted at how long it had been since he’d visited. Those things suggested that months and seasons had sped by, but that mammoth second building behind the church where a field had once been, announced the passing of years.

The years scared him most of all.

Now that he was twenty-two, maybe it was too late. Maybe it had always been too late, and he’d only been deceiving himself, balancing on a tenuous lie of hope. The messages contained in airmail letters marked Returned To Sender and in the clicks of hang-ups for international calls should have been enough to convince him, but he’d refused to take the hints.

With his hand pressed on the door separating the vestibule from the sanctuary, he hesitated. His chest felt so tight that it ached to breathe. How could he move forward when it felt as if every moment of his life for half a decade had led him to this point?

How could he not?

Straightening his shoulders, he swung open the door and followed its path into the sanctuary. He slipped into the third pew from the back just as a music leader asked everyone to stand. Even as he turned pages in his hymnal, Todd couldn’t help scanning the sea of heads. Where was she? Would he recognize her now? Even though he had it on good authority that she still attended Hickory Ridge, it didn’t mean she wouldn’t be sick this morning or out of town for Thanksgiving weekend.

Soon strains of “Just a Closer Walk With Thee” swirled around him, its lyrics celebrating the promise of God’s presence. Warmth spread inside him, relieving some of the tightness in his chest. It was just like his God to find a way to remind him He was there, even when Todd was too preoccupied to sing the words.

As the song ended and the congregation sat, youth minister Andrew Westin stepped to the lectern. “Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Hickory Ridge. I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving.”

Andrew’s gaze settled on Todd, and a smile pulled at his lips. Of course, Andrew had been expecting to see him there. Todd should have known that he hadn’t fooled anyone with his veiled questions when he’d called the church office a few days before. Especially not Andrew Westin. The Harley-riding youth minister never had struck Todd as any kind of fool.

As if Andrew recognized the question in Todd’s eyes, he turned his head and directed his gaze toward a group of young adults sitting on the second pew. A couple of people on one end, a fancily dressed middle-aged woman on the other, and there she sat in the middle.

Todd didn’t know if the world stopped turning or if time hiccuped, but for a few seconds or minutes, everything beyond her ceased to exist.

Even from behind that crowd of blondes, brunettes and silver-haired ladies, he couldn’t imagine how he’d missed her before. He should have recognized that long, light blond ponytail anywhere, as it flowed down the back of her simple peach sweater. Hannah had often worn her hair just that way—smooth, neat and without fuss—and it was the feminine style he still found most attractive.

A piano introduction pulled Todd from his daze, but he couldn’t wrap his thoughts around the words or the message of the second hymn. It shouldn’t have surprised him. He’d always had tunnel vision when it came to Hannah, and that apparently hadn’t changed. He couldn’t remember a time when he didn’t love her, and he couldn’t imagine a future when he would be able to or even want to stop.

Around Hannah, Todd studied the group of young adults in her row and the one behind it, but none of them looked familiar. A tall, light-haired guy shared a hymnal with Hannah, but Todd couldn’t remember seeing him, either, during his handful of visits. A few people were paying attention to the hymn, anyway. Todd was far too busy craning his neck and trying to get a glimpse of Hannah’s face.

When the song ended, Reverend Bob Woods, who had grayed the last few years and now wore glasses, stepped to the lectern. He scanned the congregation, hesitating only briefly when he reached Todd. The minister’s expression didn’t change, but his Adam’s apple bobbed. Guilt had Todd shifting in his seat.

Just because Hannah’s father recognized him didn’t automatically mean she’d confided in him about humiliating past events. Todd hadn’t changed that much since they were next-door neighbors—at least, not on the outside. Anyway, it couldn’t make any difference what Reverend Bob or Andrew Westin or anyone else knew about mistakes they’d made when they were still teenagers. He was here to make amends no matter what.

For a few seconds, the minister bowed his head as if in prayer, and then he looked up and smiled. “I’d like to add my welcome to Andrew’s. We’re so glad you’re here. Whether you’re longtime members or looking for a new church home, we’re setting out the welcome mat.”

Todd blinked. The minister probably offered that same greeting every Sunday, but this invitation felt more personal than that. For the first time since he’d pulled his car into the church parking lot and prepared for his past to collide with his present, he felt his confidence returning.

He did his best to focus on worship as Reverend Bob delivered a message on the birth of John the Baptist, that had taken place just prior to Jesus’s birth, but no matter how hard Todd tried, he couldn’t keep his attention from returning to Hannah. He’d waited so long to see her, had imagined this moment for what felt like forever, and here he was waiting again.

Please give me patience, Lord, and give me the words to make things right. Amen.

Hannah turned so that her lovely profile came into view. Her skin still looked as soft as he remembered, but the sprinkling of freckles across her nose appeared to have faded with time. Had her dimples, the tiny ones that only appeared when she really smiled, deepened as she’d entered her twenties? Did her eyes still crinkle at the corners when she laughed? Did those same eyes flood with tears whenever she spoke of her mother?

She tilted her head, appearing engrossed in her father’s sermon. Todd hoped she’d had many reasons to smile and to laugh in the years since he’d left. More than anything, he wanted happiness for Hannah, who’d already known so much pain.

If only he could have been a better friend to her, could have provided a strong shoulder and a listening ear, instead of allowing his comforting touch to become something more. No, he hadn’t been alone in that bed or alone in his decision to seek passion over purity, but he couldn’t help believing he was more responsible than she was. He’d known how fragile Hannah was even so many months after her mom’s death. Only one of them had been in any emotional state to put on the brakes in their relationship, and he’d ignored thoughts of sin and regret and gave into temptation anyway.

He’d known a lot of regret since then.

With effort, Todd set aside the emotions that threatened to distance him from his purpose. He glanced up at her again just as the congregation was singing the last chorus. The blond guy leaned close to Hannah and whispered something in her ear, and though she put her finger to her lips to hush him, her dimples appeared as she chuckled.

Todd’s stomach tightened, and for the first time he gave the guy standing next to Hannah more than a passing glance. He’d worked so hard and had planned his return from overseas so carefully. Earning his engineering degree from Nanyang Technological University, targeting his job search to test engineering positions at General Motors Proving Grounds—everything—had been part of this long-term plan to work his way back to her.

He’d thought he’d looked at every obstacle. Clearly, he’d missed a huge one by never considering that Hannah might have dated other guys or even have found someone special in the last five years. Any man would have been crazy not to recognize Hannah for the amazing person she was and consider himself blessed to be with her.

The thought that Hannah might have dated others tore at his heart though he had no right to feel that way. Just because there had never been anyone else for him didn’t mean she’d felt the same way.

What was he supposed to do now? No. He shook his head to clear his thoughts. He’d returned to Milford for two reasons only: to apologize to Hannah and to earn her forgiveness. Okay, he’d had secret hopes of building a life with Hannah, but he should have learned by now that he wasn’t the type of guy meant for happy endings. Still, he was the type of guy who, just this once, would do the right thing no matter what it cost him.

By the time that Todd returned his attention to the front of the church, Andrew had stepped forward to pronounce the benediction.

“Father, lead us as we go out into Your world. Teach us to really love as You love and to forgive as You forgive. In the name of Your Son. Amen.” After the prayer, Andrew ascended the aisle, waving at Todd as he passed.

Suddenly, a few things made sense. Was that what Andrew had really meant when he’d said some of the people Todd might know from the youth group had moved away? Had Andrew been referring to Hannah moving on with her life…without him?

Todd steeled himself again. It didn’t matter. He couldn’t let it matter. He’d waited an awfully long time and gone to more trouble than most men would ever consider to give this apology. Nothing, not even his owns fears, could stop him from doing what he had to do.

With resolve, he looked to the front of the sanctuary, past the other congregants who were chatting and gathering their coats. At first, he thought he’d missed her and that she’d left by one of the side aisle doors. Some of the people she’d been sitting with, including the blond guy, were already gone. But then she straightened from where she’d bent to retrieve her Bible.

Hannah turned her head to say something to the woman next to her, and then she stopped. He knew the minute she recognized him because her eyes widened, and her lovely mouth went slack.

For several seconds, neither moved. Todd felt like a spectator to his own life, unable to look away while the one woman he’d ever loved stared back at him as if he was the last person she ever expected to see again. Or maybe ever wanted to see.

As the Bible she held slipped from her fingers, its pages fluttering open on its path to the floor, Todd felt as if some small part of him—something elemental like hope—died.

Chapter Two

Todd.

Hannah’s lips formed the word, but she couldn’t summon the breath to give it sound. Her chest ached as fear and panic pressed down on it like a heavy hand.

She’d dreamed of him so often, with fondness and fury, and there he was. His presence seemed to fill the sanctuary from carpet to rafters. She’d tried so hard to forget those eyes, and there they were, staring back at her with that same unnerving intensity.

What was he doing here? What did he want? Why now? Why ever? Rebecca. What was she supposed to do about Rebecca?

Hannah didn’t know how long she’d stood there staring or even that she’d dropped her Bible until her friend Steffie Wilmington pressed it back into her sweaty hands. She could barely hold on to its smooth leather cover.

She lowered her gaze to the Bible’s gold lettering and then turned back to the college freshman standing next to her. “Um…thanks.”

Remembering where they were and how well attended the Sunday service had been, Hannah glanced around, hoping none of the other church members had noticed her strange reaction. Could they tell who he was just by looking at him?

“Hannah, what’s wrong…”

Steffie, who probably preferred “Stephanie” now but hadn’t been able to squash the nickname, didn’t even get the question out of her mouth before the source of Hannah’s problem started up the aisle toward them.

Hannah couldn’t answer. Her mouth was dry, and her heart raced. She felt this overwhelming need to run and hide. Why should today be any different? She’d been running and hiding from the truth since the second dot on the home pregnancy test had turned pink.

She stiffened, but she couldn’t take her eyes off Todd’s steady approach. He looked older than she’d imagined he would, his shoulders even wider than she’d predicted in the well-tailored navy suit he wore. He’d finally filled out his over-six-foot frame and could no longer be called lanky. His hair had deepened to a dark blond, but it still had that tousled look he’d never been able to control.

His face, though, had changed most of all. It was no longer sweet and boyish but was framed with the handsome, hardened planes of manhood. If he’d been smiling, his face probably would have softened and the dimple in his chin would have been more pronounced, but his expression was serious. Cautious.

“Who’s he?” Steffie tried again, looking back and forth between the two of them. “Wait. He looks familiar. He looks like…”

The younger woman’s words trailed away as Todd reached the front of the room and sidled into the pew behind theirs. Around them, church members continued to make their way toward the exit, but several glanced curiously at Hannah, Todd and Steffie.

“Hi…Hannah.” His voice cracked, so he cleared his throat.

He expected her to say something; she knew that. The words just wouldn’t come. Words couldn’t squeeze past the guilt clawing at her insides. No matter what he’d done, no matter how hurt she’d felt, she should have found a way to tell him as soon as she knew. Or at least she could have found some occasion before Rebecca’s fourth birthday. What was she supposed to tell him now?

“Look, I didn’t mean to startle you,” Todd told her. “I only wanted the chance to—”

“Sweetie, are you okay?” Steffie interrupted, reminding Hannah she was still there, observing entirely too much. “Do you need me to get your dad?”

Hannah shook her head and raised a hand to stop Steffie, but she still couldn’t look away from Todd. He appeared just as frozen.

“Is there somewhere we can talk?” he finally choked out. “There are so many things I need to say.”

Panic welled deep within her, its acidic tang bitter on her tongue. She couldn’t tell him. Not now. Soon, but not yet. She jerked her head, breaking the cold connection of their gazes. Slowly, she started shaking her head and backing toward the aisle.

“I can’t do this, Todd. I just can’t. I have to go.”

Turning, she pressed past Steffie and hurried up the side aisle.

“Hannah! Wait! Stop!”

His plea pounded in her ears, but she couldn’t wait. She couldn’t stop. She couldn’t even look back as she rushed through the vestibule and into the hall leading to the Family Life Center. Rebecca would be waiting for her there in Children’s Church.

Hannah could feel his gaze on her as she went, but she didn’t hear his footsteps. If he followed her and tried to air out their past right now, he would find out the truth. He would know the secret she’d wasted so much energy trying to keep from him and everyone else. Part of her prayed he would do just that.

Todd watched her go, somehow managing to keep from chasing after her through the church and making a bigger fool of himself than he had already.

She hurried past the line of members shaking hands with the ministry team. Instead of continuing through the glass doors leading to the parking lot, she turned left and headed down a hallway toward the rear of the church.

Only after she’d disappeared completely from sight did Todd turn his attention to the young woman standing next to him. The tall redhead with a dusting of freckles on her nose was looking at him nearly eye to eye. She raised a delicate brow.

Finally, he remembered his manners and shot out his right hand. “Hi. I’m Todd McBride.”

“Todd. Todd.” She frowned while rolling the name around on her tongue as if she expected it to ring a bell. Then she shrugged. “I’m Stephanie.”

He let go of her hand and then glanced at the sanctuary’s rear door again. “I should go after her.”

“She didn’t seem all that thrilled about talking to you.”

“Probably not.” He ignored the hopeless feeling threatening to resurface. “But she’s going to have to anyway.”

With a quick wave, he strode out the door. Finding only Andrew shaking hands and saying goodbye to the last of the stragglers, Todd assumed that Reverend Bob had slipped away to check on his daughter. As inconspicuously as possible, Todd started to follow the same path he’d seen Hannah take.

“Wait, Todd.” Andrew caught up to him and gripped his hand in a firm handshake. “Glad you made it. You’re probably looking forward to starting your new job. Did the folks at GM Proving Grounds give you a little time to get settled, or did they want you right away?”

“I guess they needed someone right away because I had to negotiate to wait until Tuesday.”

“Isn’t that just the way it goes? No rest for the weary.”

“Guess so.” Distracted, Todd cast a furtive glance down the hall. Was she still back there somewhere?

Andrew’s gaze followed his. “So, besides Reverend Bob and me, did you see anyone you recognized at the service?”

Todd was barely paying attention, so the words took a moment to sink in. When they did, he turned back to the youth minister. “No disrespect intended, Reverend, but let’s not dance around this anymore. We both know I came here to see Hannah.”

Andrew nodded, the smile he usually wore absent. “And I noticed that you did see her.”

“No one probably knew we were more than friends.”

“I knew. Serena knew.”

Todd’s head came up with a jerk. “Oh.”

“Remember that day all of us spent at the beach?”

“I guess so.” Of course Todd remembered. It was one of the memories he’d replayed in his mind in the last few years.

“We saw the way you looked at Hannah when you thought no one was watching.”

Todd cleared his throat. He could only imagine the emotions that had been written all over his face. Because there didn’t seem to be any way to respond to that comment, he changed the subject. “We built a sand castle with Serena’s little girl…uh…”

“Tessa,” Andrew said to fill in the blank.

“You had a thing for the single mother.”

“Still do. But she’s married now. To me. Five years.” Andrew glanced down at the plain gold band he wore. “Tessa’s got a brother now. Seth. We’re having another one in March.”

“Wow. Either a lot of time has passed, or you’ve been busy for a few years,” Todd said with a chuckle.

Instead of laughing at his joke, Andrew became serious. “A lot of time has passed.”

The words felt like weights being draped across Todd’s shoulders. He stared at the floor and waited for whatever else the youth minister had to say.

“Hannah didn’t seem happy to see you today.”

“I suppose not.” Todd reluctantly met the other man’s gaze. “I didn’t go about things the right way.”

“It’s hard to know the right thing to do sometimes.”

Andrew now wore his concerned minister’s face. Todd remembered Hannah once mentioning that Andrew had been a clinical counselor before entering the ministry.

“Apologizing to Hannah is the right thing to do,” Todd said. “I know it. She just didn’t give me the chance.”

“I don’t know everything that happened between the two of you or the full reason she ran out of here, but—”

“No,” Todd said to interrupt him. “You don’t.” His sharp tone surprised even him. It wasn’t Andrew’s fault that Hannah had refused to talk to him. He had no one to blame for that but himself. Taking a deep breath to clear his thoughts, he tried again. “I’ve been waiting five years to talk to Hannah…about a lot of things.”

“Have you ever considered that healing this relationship might not be as easy as you’ve imagined?”

“You mean that it might be too late? Sure, I’ve thought about it.” A lot. He took a long breath and shook his head in frustration. “But I have to do the right thing. I’ve prayed about it, and I’m convinced it’s what God wants me to do, so I’m just going to have to find a way to get Hannah to listen to me.”

“You sound pretty determined.”

“I am.”

“I guess you’ll be needing this then.”

Andrew withdrew a pen and notebook from his pocket, wrote something on it and handed to him. It said, “Hannah,” and it had a street address and an apartment number on it. Todd drew his eyebrows together as he looked up from it.

“You didn’t think she still lived at home, did you?”

He answered with a shrug. As a matter of fact, he had. He’d already driven by his old home and that particular house next door several times since he’d arrived in town on Friday. He’d studied that familiar dwelling, wondering whether she was inside and hoping she would pick that moment to go out to her car.

Todd closed his hand over the slip of paper. “Thanks, Andrew.”

“Will you do me one favor when you talk to Hannah?” Andrew waited for his nod before he continued, “When you’re talking, will you be sure to listen, too?”

Of course he would listen, Todd thought as he climbed in his car and turned out of the church lot onto Hickory Ridge Road. He would listen, but he couldn’t imagine what Hannah would have to say. She had nothing to apologize for; that was his department alone. Yet, an uncomfortable sensation settled between his shoulder blades. Why did he get the sense that Andrew knew something he didn’t?

“What are you doing, Mommy?”

Hannah turned from the medicine cabinet mirror where she was repairing her makeup. Rebecca, dressed only in a pair of red cotton tights, underwear and a lace-trimmed undershirt, stared up at her from the bathroom doorway.

Quickly, Hannah turned her back to her daughter and brushed the last of her tears away with the back of her hand. “Nothing, honey. You go ahead and finish changing your clothes. Remember to lay your dress out on the bed so I can hang it up, okay?”

“Okay,” Rebecca answered, though she would likely forget and leave the Christmas plaid dress in a pile on the floor. She started to leave and then stopped, turning back to her mother. “Are you crying?”

“No. Not really.” Hannah pressed her lips together. Now she was even lying to her daughter. When would it all stop? “I guess I am a little sad.”

“Don’t be sad, Mommy.” Rebecca wrapped her arms around her mother’s thighs and squeezed.

“Go on now,” she said, fighting back another wave of emotion.

As soon as Rebecca skipped down the hall, Hannah started swiping at the dampness again. She’d managed to hold herself together all through the ritual of collecting her daughter from her church program and through the drive home, but Hannah’s control had wavered the moment she was alone, changing out of her church clothes.

Todd? In Milford again? Come to think of it, she didn’t even know why he was in town. She might know that answer now if she’d given him a chance to speak. But how could she? Without any notice, she wasn’t prepared to face him. Who was she kidding? Even with six months notice, she wouldn’t have been able to come up with a valid explanation for what she’d done.

All of her excuses for not telling him—her anger for his leaving, her choice to never reveal the identity of her child’s father, her rationalization that Todd didn’t deserve to know—now sounded like the incoherent ramblings of a teenage girl.

That was what they were.

How could she ever have thought she had the right to withhold the information from him that he was a father? No one had that right to wield so much power over other people’s lives.

She had to tell him; that was a given. And she would. Soon. She just needed a little time to regroup first. After that, she would ask around and find out whom he was visiting and how long he would stay. She would tell him everything then, but she would do it on her terms.

Hannah nodded at the mirror, her thoughts clear for the first time since Todd appeared at her church and tilted her world on its axis.

A knock at the front door, though, set her thoughts and her newly settled world spinning once again. Was it Todd already? No, it couldn’t be. He wouldn’t even know where she lived, although he would only have to ask her father to get that information. Reverend Bob, who still didn’t know the whole truth, either.

Rebecca reappeared in the bathroom, this time wearing a reindeer sweatshirt with her tights. “Somebody’s knocking on the door.”

“I heard. I’ll get the door. Why don’t you go put your jeans on? Then go set up your dolls in the living room, and I’ll be there in a minute to play.”

Again, Rebecca scurried off, but this time, Hannah followed, turning down the hall to the front door. She stopped as her hand touched the wood. Without a peephole to check for sure, she could only hold her breath and hope she was wrong.

Lord, please don’t let it be Todd. It’s too soon. Please give me strength when the time comes. Amen.

Her hand was on the doorknob when his voice came through the door.

“Hannah, it’s me. Todd. I know you’re in there. I can see the lights.”

Panic came in a rush that clenched inside her and dampened her palms. No. She couldn’t tell him now. She wasn’t ready. Not yet.

“Go away, Todd.”

Though she recognized the voice as her own, the words surprised even her. She was taking the easy way out again rather than facing this mess she’d created, but she couldn’t seem to help herself.

For a few seconds, there was no sound on the other side of the door. She almost expected to hear the crunch of snow as he trudged down the steps and away from her apartment, but instead there was a more insistent knock.

“You might as well open the door because I’m not leaving.”

Hannah stared at the door. Todd sounded different. The laid-back boy she remembered had been replaced by this determined and forceful guy she didn’t recognize at all, and yet she still found herself cracking the door open to him. Whatever happened to your fear of strangers? But irony encased that thought, for even this new Todd was in no way a stranger to her.

He stood on the porch, the collar of his wool jacket flipped up to shield his ears and his hands shoved in the front pockets of his slacks. Several years on an island off the southern end of the Malay Peninsula hadn’t prepared him for a Milford December. She was surprised by the impulse to warm his hands with her own, but she remained behind the cracked door.

“How did you find out where I live?”

“Andrew gave me your address.” He withdrew his hand from his pocket and held out a crumpled piece of paper.

“Why did Andrew—” she started to ask but stopped herself when the answer dawned.

Have you told Todd? Andrew’s words from that long ago night flashed through her mind. The youth minister and his future wife, Serena, had counseled her when she’d first discovered she was pregnant. She’d denied Andrew’s assertion that Todd was the father, and neither of them had pressured her to reveal her secret.

The secret that had come back to haunt her today.

Hannah sighed, suddenly exhausted by the energy it had required to keep the truth hidden. “Todd, what are you doing here?”

Todd’s teeth chattered as he zipped his jacket higher. “I told you I want to talk to you.”

She cocked her head to the side and studied him. Now that the shock of seeing him was beginning to wear off, old, mixed emotions began to resurface. Anger she realized she had no right to feel and long-buried hurt collided, leaving her insides feeling exposed. “After five years? Why would we have anything to talk about?”

“We do. I know I do.”

Hannah stared at him. He’d surprised her again with his certainty when she felt so unsure. “Maybe in a few days but not yet. I’m not ready—”

As she spoke those last three words, she started closing the door. Todd pressed his foot into the space before it could close completely.

“Isn’t five years long enough?” he said.

Staring at his dress shoe, Hannah waited, but he didn’t say more, so she finally lifted her gaze to his. In his eyes was a look of anguish so stark that Hannah could only remember seeing an expression like it once before. She’d found it in the mirror the day that Todd’s family left for the airport.

He glanced away and back, and the look was gone. “I’ve waited five years to apologize to you. I’m not leaving until you let me do it.”

Hannah blinked, her mind racing. A million times she’d imagined Todd’s reaction when she told him the truth. Now she only wanted to run and hide with her secret again, to protect her daughter from the fallout and herself from the blame she deserved.

But she couldn’t run anymore. Todd was right. It was time.

“Then I guess I’d better invite you in.”

Chapter Three

As Hannah pulled open the door, Todd released the breath he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding. His foot ached, more likely from standing out in the cold than from where she’d squeezed it in the door, but he didn’t care. He was here, she was here, and that was all that mattered.

“Nice place,” he said before he even stepped on the mat and took a look around.

And it was nice. Though one of the four smallish apartments in a renovated older house, Hannah had made it look warm and homey with overstuffed furniture and soft pillows. It was decorated in earth tones and dotted with artistic, framed black-and-white photographs of children.

The Christmas tree he’d first glimpsed through the front window radiated warmth, as well, with its homemade ornaments, popcorn strands and spatter of silvery icicles. No hand-blown glass balls and fussy velvet bows for Hannah’s apartment.

The woman herself looked as warm and casual as her house, dressed in well-worn jeans and a black long-sleeved top. She had fuzzy slippers on her feet. But her expression showed she was anything but comfortable with him in her space, and she looked as if she’d been crying.

“Yes, we like it.”

We? The smile that had formed on his face slipped away as he turned to her. What had he missed? Hannah took a few steps into the living room and motioned for Todd to follow.

There in the corner that he couldn’t see from the front door was a tiny blond girl, surrounded by baby dolls, blankets and play bottles. For several seconds, Todd stared at the child who was looking back at him with huge, haunting eyes. She looked familiar somehow.

“Come here, honey,” Hannah called to the child. When the little girl stood under her protective arm, Hannah turned back to face him.

“Todd, this is Rebecca. She’s my daughter.”

Daughter? Hannah had a daughter? He looked back and forth between them, his thoughts spinning. Though their features were slightly different, they both had lovely peachy skin and light, light hair. They were clearly relatives.

When he glanced away to collect his thoughts, his gaze landed again on the amazing photos dotting the walls on either side of the Christmas tree. The subjects of those photos, taken in a variety of natural backdrops, weren’t children, but rather one child—the same sweet-looking little girl standing right in front of him.

Clearing his throat, he turned back to them. “Nice pictures.”

“Thanks.”

“The photographer did a great job.”

She nodded but didn’t look at the portraits. Instead, she turned to her daughter. “Rebecca, this is Mr. McBride.”

“Hi,” she said quickly before taking refuge behind her mother’s jeans-clad leg.

“Hello, Rebecca.”

Todd shook his head, trying to reconcile the new information. Parts of this puzzle weren’t fitting together easily. Was Hannah married now? Was that what Andrew had been trying to tell him when he’d suggested that healing the relationship might not be easy? If that was it, how could the minister have been so cruel as to let him go on believing…hoping?

His gaze fell to Hannah’s left hand, the one she was using to lead the child back to her toys and out of earshot of their conversation.

Hannah wore no ring.

Suddenly all of Todd’s other questions fell away as one pressed to the forefront of his mind: a question too personal for him to ask. Still, when she returned to him, he took hold of her arm and led her around the corner to the entry so he could ask it.

“Who’s her father, Hannah?”

She shot a glance back at her daughter, as if she worried Rebecca had overheard. He couldn’t blame her if she shouted, “How dare you” for the private question and more. He deserved it.

But instead of yelling, she began in a soft tone. “You have to understand—”

“Who is it?” He couldn’t help it. He didn’t want an explanation; he wanted a name. Jealousy he had no right to feel swelled inside him, burning and destroying. The thought of another man touching her left his heart raw. If only he and Hannah had waited, their story might have turned out differently. Hannah might have been his wife. Her child, theirs.

Hannah stared back at him incredulously, as if she was shocked that he’d had the gall to ask. It wasn’t about wanting; he had to know.

“Is it that blond guy from church?”

“Grant?” Her eyes widened and then she shook her head. “He’s just a friend.”

“Do I know him then?”

“Of course you do.” She spat the words.

Strange, she sounded exasperated. She seemed to think he was an idiot for not knowing the answer. He stepped around the corner and studied the child again. She was so fair and beautiful, just like her mother. Rebecca must have sensed his attention on her because she looked up from her dolls and smiled at him.

And he knew.

His gut clenched, and he felt helpless to do anything but stare. Why it wasn’t immediately apparent to him he couldn’t imagine now. Her green eyes had looked familiar because he saw eyes like those in the mirror every morning.

Though he was no expert on children’s ages and this particular child was probably small for her age, as her mother had been, he could see from her features that she wasn’t a toddler. Rebecca looked about four years old, just old enough to have been conceived five years before.

“She’s mine, isn’t she?”

Hannah didn’t answer, but her eyes filled and a few tears escaped to trail down her cheeks. She brushed them away with the backs of her hands.

“Tell me I’m right, Hannah. Am I Rebecca’s father?”

Instead of nodding the way he was certain she would, Hannah shook her head. Her jaw flexed as if she was gritting her teeth.

“How could you have thought—” She stopped whatever she’d been about to say. Closing her eyes, she pressed her hands over her closed lids and took a few deep breaths before continuing. “If you’re asking if you supplied half of her DNA, then you’re right. But for her whole life, I’ve been both parents to Rebecca. She’s mine. Just mine.”

“Not just yours. She’s mine, too.”

Todd wasn’t sure whether he’d spoken those words aloud or just in the privacy of his heart until Hannah stalked from the room and crouched down by her daughter. No, their daughter.

Maybe he hadn’t said the right thing, but what did she expect when she’d just dropped a bomb like that? He didn’t know what to think, let alone what to say.

How naive he’d been with his big plans to return here and to earn Hannah’s forgiveness and her heart. He’d thought he and Hannah were the only two involved, that their old conflicts were only between the two of them, when a third person had been growing inside Hannah before he’d ever left.

Father. He couldn’t wrap his thoughts around the title yet, let alone apply it to himself. Everything he knew about himself changed with that single admission.

“Why did you have to come back?” Hannah whispered when she returned to him, appearing more agitated than before. “We were doing fine. Just fine. Now you’ve messed all of that up. We’ll never be the same.”

“Come on, Hannah. We have a lot to talk about.”

“I don’t think so. You’ve got your answer now, so go.”

“I can’t leave now that you’ve told me this.”

“Please go.” Her eyes filled again.

Her plea tore at his heart. Clearly, they had more to say to each other, but maybe now wasn’t the best time. He was still too shocked, too confused to make any decisions that would affect their lives. Three lives.

“I won’t stay gone, you know. I’m living in Milford now, and I’m sticking around this time.”

Either she didn’t hear him or she refused to answer, but Hannah hurried him toward the door and closed it behind him. As the cold enfolded him, this time seeping to his very core rather than only touching his extremities, Todd realized that Hannah was right about one thing: None of them would ever be the same.

It wasn’t until Todd was back at his Commerce Road town house and eating chicken noodle soup that refused to warm his chilled insides that he realized he’d never apologized to Hannah. After traveling from the other side of the world in miles and in years of effort, he hadn’t even managed to do the most important thing he’d come to town to accomplish.

“You were too busy trying not to swallow your tongue to remember anything else,” he said to the stacked boxes around him.

Sitting at the new glass dinette in the kitchen, he stared down into the soup bowl and stirred the noodles into a whirlpool. His thoughts traveled in a similar circular pattern, but unlike the liquid, they wouldn’t stop spinning.

A child. His child. Of course, he should have considered the possibility that Hannah could have become pregnant. He knew the textbook mechanics of reproduction and the potential consequences of unprotected sex, but he’d never once considered that they might have made a child together. He and Hannah had only made love that one time. Apparently, it only took once.

The returned letters and unanswered calls made sense now. Not only had he left her alone with her guilt over what had happened between them, but he’d also left her alone with his child.

Alone. He felt that way now as he sat with only the bare walls and the truth to keep him company. He suddenly felt a stronger need to connect with his parents than he had at any time since he’d hugged them goodbye in Kranji a week earlier. But what would he say to them if he called? He could just imagine how that conversation would go: “Hello, Mom and Dad. Or should I say Grandma and Grandpa? I have just the best news.”

He shook his head. No, that conversation would have to wait for another day when he was prepared to hear disappointment of that magnitude over international phone lines. He wasn’t ready for that when he hadn’t digested it himself yet.

But there was one call he could make now. He pulled out the phone book, looked up the name and dialed. He didn’t even identify himself when the man answered on the second ring.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Todd said simply.

Andrew Westin sighed loudly into the line. “Todd. I had an idea I would be hearing from you.”

“You could have saved yourself the call by telling me before.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

His jaw was so tightly clenched in frustration that it took Todd a few seconds to be able to answer at all and a few seconds more to answer civilly. “It was easy. The first time I called the church, you could have said, ‘Hey, Todd, it’s good to hear from you. Just thought you should know, you’re a dad.’”

“Sure, I could have done that.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

“It wasn’t my place. Then or now.”

Todd stalked over to the tan striped couch, dropped onto it and sank into the backrest. “Then or now? What do you mean by that?”

“Hannah never told anyone who the father of her baby was. Until now.”

“Until now?” Todd straightened in his seat. There could be no slouching after a comment like that, one that crushed as much as it confused. Hannah had been more ashamed of him than she’d been of being an unwed mother. He didn’t know what to do with that information.

“Wait. Then how did you know?”

“I told you Serena and I had guessed you two were more than friends when we saw you together.”

Todd swallowed. “Oh.”

“So, when Hannah became pregnant, we suspected. Then when little Rebecca arrived, we…well knew.”

The image of those pretty green eyes filled his mind again. If Andrew and Serena had already been suspecting, he could easily see how they’d connected the dots to solve the puzzle. They’d probably put it together faster than he had.

“What about Reverend Bob?”

“If he knows, he’s never mentioned it to me.” Andrew paused. “Bob was always more concerned with supporting his daughter than tracking down his grandchild’s father.”

“Another reason I never found out the truth.”

“Todd, I always thought she would open up eventually, that she would tell you. But she didn’t. So when you called looking for answers, I figured God was suggesting that I help the truth along.”

“I don’t know whether to say thanks or not.” Todd shoved his free hand through his hair.

“But you know now, right?”

Todd blew out a breath. “Yes, I know.”

“And how do you feel about that?”

“Don’t use all that psychobabble on me, okay Reverend?”

“Fine. But she’s a cute one, your daughter.”

Emotion filled Todd’s throat with a speed that surprised him. Rebecca was his daughter, and she didn’t even know him.

“Yeah…she’s beautiful,” he choked out finally.

Andrew chuckled into the line. “Spoken like a true father. I do have one more question for you.”

“What’s that?”

“What are you going to do about it now that you know?”

What are you going to do? Todd didn’t have an answer for the minister’s question or for his own as they said their goodbyes. He clicked off the phone and laid it on the end table. It was a given that he would take some responsibility for the care of his child. His parents would expect that, and he expected that of himself. He didn’t even want to remember all the other things he’d expected to happen when he returned to Milford.

Disquiet had him pushing off the sofa and crossing to the light wood bookshelf he’d just purchased and already had crammed with books. His fingers closed over a heavy cloth-covered album his mother had insisted he take with him on the plane at Changi International Airport. He took it back to the table and plunked it next to the bowl of soup that had already congealed.

He sat and opened it to the first page. It was as he predicted: a tribute to the lives and loves of the McBride clan. He would expect nothing less from Sharon McBride than a maudlin display, sure to cause more homesickness than to cure it.

The first few pages were all family pictures, both of the posed professional variety and informal shots taken in front of their homes in Milford and then in Kranji. His mother had a talent for pulling heartstrings.

Todd flipped through images of himself eating his first birthday cake, standing proudly on the first day of kindergarten and marching in the high school band. Then came photos of his friends in Singapore and even a few of Todd and Hannah hanging out at the Milford Memories festival. Because those last shots tempted him to feel sorry for himself, he turned the page.

The next pictures made him smile: first the wedding portrait of Roy McBride and the former Sharon Quinn and then a few other black-and-white snapshots of the two of them as children.

When Todd reached the last yellowing image at the bottom right, he stopped. He stared at the little girl looking out at him from the paper. In the white trim at the photo’s bottom edge, someone had written in a slanted script, “Sharon, age four,” but the picture could just as easily have been of Hannah’s child. Not subtle like the similarity his daughter had to him, the resemblance between his mother and Rebecca was so obvious that at the same age they could have been twins.

Why that was the trigger—this mirror image— Todd couldn’t explain, and yet he was suddenly furious. His hands clasped the edge of the table so hard he could feel the glass side imprinting on his palm. His jaw flexed, and he could feel his pulse beating at his temple.

How could Hannah not have told him? No matter what he’d done, no matter how angry she was with him or how much she wanted to cast him as the villain who deserved all the blame, he still had the right to know he’d fathered a child. The chance to be a father to his child.

He’d deserved the truth.

Would he have been a great father at seventeen? It was hard to say, but he’d deserved the chance to try. So much time had already passed. Rebecca was four years old. Whether she’d done it consciously or not, Hannah had stolen that time from them, time they could never get back.

The whole situation just didn’t make sense. The Hannah he’d known could never have been so cruel as to keep this monumental secret from him. Then a thought struck him at his foundation. Maybe he hadn’t known her at all. Maybe the girl he’d fallen in love with had only existed in his mind, and the future he’d planned for them was just as much of an illusion.

None of what he thought before could matter. Everything was different now that he knew about Rebecca. He still wanted to apologize to Hannah for past events, but the present was much more important. They needed to discuss Rebecca’s care and to work out a plan for him to get to know his daughter.

Hannah would fight him on that, he was sure, but she didn’t know him, either, if she thought that battle would be an easy one. Maybe he hadn’t fought hard enough when Hannah had decided to eliminate him from her life five years ago, but he’d done a lot of growing up since then—physically and spiritually. Hannah had just better get it through her mind that he was here and he wasn’t going away.

Chapter Four

“I’m hungry,” Rebecca announced as she raced through the front door her mother had just unlocked. “When are we going to eat dinner?”

Hannah somehow managed to keep her sigh a silent one as she followed behind her with several plastic grocery bags draped over each arm. It wasn’t Rebecca’s fault that Hannah’s day had been lousy, or even that they’d had to stop at the grocery store on the way home from Mrs. Nelson’s because there wasn’t any food in the house.

Hannah had no one to blame for either of those things but herself. When Todd had finally left Sunday, she’d been too exhausted to even think about grocery shopping for the week. She’d barely been able to just keep her promise and play dolls with Rebecca.

As they’d sat together on the floor, diapering, swaddling and feeding two hairless baby dolls with plastic milk and juice bottles, her thoughts kept returning to another baby and the father who’d just been blindsided by her existence. Would Hannah ever be able to forget the look of bewilderment that had strained his features? Even the fresh ache she felt every time she remembered that Todd hadn’t immediately recognized Rebecca as his child couldn’t compete with that. Still, it hurt her that he’d assumed she’d been intimate with someone other than him.

I won’t stay gone. As they had several times in the twenty-four hours since he’d spoken them, his words echoed in her thoughts. Until the evening service and after it, she’d sat anxious and alert, waiting for him to make good on his promise.

All she’d gotten for her trouble was a sleepless night and a drowsy day at work when she needed to be sharp while doing year-end accounting for several small businesses. Too many more days like that and she could add joblessness to her list of problems.

“Mommy, didn’t you hear me? I’m hungry.” This time Rebecca said it in the woeful tone of the starving. She still hadn’t learned that mothers often heard even when they didn’t answer.

“Have patience, sweetie. Your chicken nuggets are coming right up.”

At least they would come up as soon as Hannah preheated the oven and baked them for twenty to twenty-five minutes, but she didn’t want to give Rebecca that bad news and risk a meltdown. That was the last thing she needed when her friend, Grant Sumner, would arrive at any time for the home-cooked meal Hannah had promised him weeks ago. She didn’t even have the pork chops defrosted.

A bachelor who claimed an allergy to anything domestic, Grant already could recite every take-out menu in Milford verbatim. He didn’t need her ordering a pizza on the one night when he could have been enjoying home cooking.

“But I’m hungry now,” Rebecca whined. “Can I have a cookie?”

Irritation welled in her, but Hannah forced it back. “Maybe after dinner.”

Already, Rebecca was cuing up the waterworks, so Hannah grabbed the first distraction that came to mind. “Why don’t you watch your video until dinner’s ready?”

“Yay, TV!”

Her daughter’s glee came with its own sting of reproach. Hannah was convinced she was a bad mother now. She’d even started using “Aunt TV” as a nanny. “Just for a few minutes. Mr. Grant should be here soon for dinner.”

Rebecca hurried off before the offer of the rare visual treat evaporated with the arrival of company.

As if he recognized his cue, Grant rang the bell, pushed the unlocked door wide and stepped inside.

“Hannah, you know better than to leave your door unlocked like that. Anyone can walk right in off the street and—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Hannah interrupted, smirking at her friend over the fact that he’d done just that.

Grant flushed in a way his fair skin failed to hide and shrugged out of his coat, hanging it on the coat tree next to the door. “You know what I mean.”

“Of course I do. And thanks for worrying about me.”

“Somebody’s got to do it.” As Grant started pushing the door closed, another pair of hands on the other side stopped it.

“Hannah, it’s me.” Todd’s voice slipped through the crack.

“Me?” Grant yanked the door back open and came face-to-face with the man a few years younger and a couple of inches taller. “Who are you?”

“Todd McBride.” With that curt answer, Todd pressed past him into the entry. “Who’s asking?”

“Grant Sumner, Hannah’s—”

“Friend,” she finished before Grant had the chance.

Hannah didn’t miss the confusion in Grant’s eyes or the irritation in Todd’s, but she wasn’t about to have a scene here with Rebecca in the next room. “Todd, this really isn’t a good time.”

Grant shot her a perplexed glance but jumped in with his support. “Yeah, sorry, buddy. We were just getting ready to have dinner.”

Todd’s jaw tightened, but he stood where he was. “It’s never going to be a good time to—”

Hannah put her hand up to cut him off before he could say more. “I wish you would have called first.”

“You mean so that you could not answer.” Todd closed the door behind him and stood in front of it with his arms crossed. “Been there, done that. I’m over it. How about you?” His gaze locked with hers and wouldn’t let go.

“What are you two talking about?”

At Grant’s words, Hannah could finally pull her gaze away. Her friend was staring at them both by turns, and then he faced her alone.

“It’s him, isn’t it? He’s the reason—”

Grant managed to stop himself before he said more, but Hannah ached for his hurt feelings. That she’d never led him to believe there could be more than friendship between them didn’t seem to exonerate her for putting him in this awkward situation.

“I’m sorry, Grant,” she found herself saying, though she couldn’t imagine what she would say next.

Rather that looking at her for confirmation of his assumption, Grant turned back to Todd. “Maybe you’d just better leave right now.”

Todd started out by holding his hands wide. “Look, friend, I don’t have a problem with you, but—”

“I’m not your friend.” Grant took a step toward Todd, but instead of holding his hands wide, he had them tight by his sides, fisted. “But I am Hannah’s. And since she doesn’t seem to want you here…”

Immediately, Todd’s posture tightened, and he stepped forward, as well. “Don’t you think that’s her decision?”

“She already said this isn’t a good time.”

Hannah couldn’t believe her eyes as she looked back and forth between them. With all this male posturing, they looked like a pair of gorillas, pounding their chests and announcing their dominance. The two of them standing their ground, just feet apart, would have been comical if the situation hadn’t been so not funny. Her daughter was right in the next room.

Stepping to the side, Hannah peered into the living room. Rebecca was sprawled on the floor in front of the TV with her elbows jutting out and her head cradled between her tiny hands. Maybe “Aunt TV” wasn’t so bad just this once.

When she returned to the front hall, Hannah stepped between the two men. “You know, maybe we should all just call it a night. Can I give you a rain check on dinner, Grant? I didn’t get started the way I’d planned, anyway.”

Grant gave her a distracted glance. “That’s fine, Hannah. I’ll just show him the door first.” He pointed around her at Todd.

“I’m not leaving again until Hannah and I have some things settled, so you can go ahead.”

Sidestepping Hannah, Grant faced Todd again. “Can’t you see she doesn’t want you here?”

“And can’t you see this is between Hannah and me? I’m her friend, too—at least I was, once upon a time.”

“Some kind of friend you were.” Grant spat the words. “Friends don’t take advantage of an innocent girl and leave her alone and pregnant.”

“Stop it, you two!” Hannah looked around when she realized she’d raised her voice, but since Rebecca didn’t scurry into the room, she figured she hadn’t been as loud as she thought. Still, she spoke at just above a whisper. “I mean it.”

Todd looked directly at Grant, not appearing to have heard Hannah at all. “It wasn’t like that. I lo—” He stopped himself, waving his hand as if to wipe away what he’d almost said.

That nearly spoken word stopped Hannah when she should have been shoving both Neanderthals toward the door. After everything, Todd still claimed he’d loved her back then. Maybe he really remembered it that way, though it had probably just been infatuation, just a teenage hormone-induced haze. She knew that feeling well. She’d made the same mistaken assumption in her own heart.

“You don’t know anything about it,” Todd said to Grant.

“I’ve been around for the last few years. That’s more than you can say.”

Todd tilted his chin up. “I’m here now.”

“For how long?”

Grant posed the question, but Hannah was dying to know the answer to it.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but I start a job at GM Proving Grounds tomorrow. I’m here in town. To stay.”

“What if she doesn’t want you here? What if no one wants you here?”

Todd raised his hands in surrender. “Resent me all you want. It doesn’t change the fact that I’m Rebecca’s father, and I intend to have some kind of relationship with her no matter what you think.”

Hannah gasped and closed her eyes. Please God. Please God. Tell me she didn’t hear. But when she opened her eyes again, the expressions on both men’s faces told her the bad news before she could even turn toward the living room. In the doorway, Rebecca stared at Todd, her eyes wide with amazement. Finally, she turned back to Hannah.

“Is it true, Mommy? Is Mr. McBride my dad?”

Todd let the phone ring four times, waiting for the answering machine to pick up as it had each time he’d called Monday night and again since he’d been home from work that day. This time the machine didn’t answer, which could only mean that Hannah had returned from work and had shut it off.

Too bad he couldn’t turn off his guilt over last evening’s events as easily as she’d switched off the power. If he continued to be as distracted at work as he’d been on his first day at the Proving Grounds, then he wouldn’t have to worry about having a job for too long.

With the phone continuing to ring, Todd switched the handset from one ear to the other, as he shed his maroon-and-white pin-striped dress shirt. He was already sitting on the edge of the bed in his undershirt and trousers when something clicked on the other end of the line.

“Hello,” a small voice said.

His breath caught, but he forced words anyway. “Hi, Rebecca. This is your— This is Mr. McBride.”

“Hi,” she said automatically. Then she added an uncomfortable “oh.”

He frowned. After Hannah had insisted that both he and Grant leave, she had probably initiated a heart-to-heart talk with their daughter. What a four-year-old would be able to understand from this impossible mess, he hadn’t a clue. He barely understood parts of it himself. Whatever else Hannah had told his daughter, he guessed from Rebecca’s surprised reaction that her mother had also said they wouldn’t be seeing him anymore.

That’s where she was wrong. He hadn’t just found out he was a father and then faced his parents’ extreme disappointment when he’d told them know they were grandparents, only to be shut out of his daughter’s life.

He was still coming up with something to say to Rebecca when he heard another voice in the background.

“Sweetie, do you remember that I told you not to answer the phone?” Hannah said.

“But it’s…Mr. McBride.”

After some muffled voices and footsteps, Hannah’s voice came on the line. “Would you please stop calling here? I had to unplug the machine.”

“I’m sorry about yesterday.”

“You and Grant—what you did was unforgivable. This time you hurt my child.”

“Our child,” he corrected, though he couldn’t argue with the rest of what Hannah had said. “I didn’t want Rebecca to find out that way any more than you did.”

“So why’d you tell her?”

“You were there. You know I didn’t intentionally—”

“Anyone who knows the first thing about parenting knows that children hear and see everything that’s going on around them.”

“Whose fault is it I don’t know—” He managed to stop his retort before he said, “How to be Rebecca’s father.” Hannah was at fault for that, but as far as he could tell, there was plenty of blame to go around. He wasn’t going to make any progress by pelting her with accusations.

After counting from ten backward, he tried again. “Okay, this isn’t about fault, but she knows now. We have to deal with that…together.”

“I’ve already dealt with that.” Her voice screeched at the end of her sentence. “Just like I’ve dealt with everything else in her life. Neither of us needs you or your help.”

“Hannah, I might have let you do it before, but I’m not going to allow you to cut me out this time.”

“Me cut you out?” She became quiet for a few seconds, as if she realized she’d said more than she intended. Finally, she sighed. “Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”

“No! I haven’t done enough.”

What happened to that patience he’d just found? But the fact remained: He hadn’t done anything to care for Hannah or to provide for their daughter’s needs. That he hadn’t been given the chance didn’t change the bottom line.

“Don’t call anymore, Todd. I won’t answer.”

The connection went dead as she clicked off the phone. He didn’t bother dialing again. She would probably just leave it off the hook, anyway, and even if she didn’t, she would be screening his calls.

Todd ignored the hopelessness threatening to take hold in his heart. He couldn’t give up, not when there was so much at stake—more now than even a teen romance that had seemed so real at the time. This was about their daughter, and Rebecca deserved to have a father in her life.

A week before, Todd never would have imagined himself admitting this, but he wasn’t sure he even wanted a future with Hannah. At least not this Hannah. She was cold and selfish and spiteful. Is she also hurt and scared? Todd wanted to ignore that charitable thought. He didn’t want to forgive her yet, and that appeared to be just what his heart was tempted to do.

“Lord, why do I have to be the one to keep taking the first step?” he whispered.

But the answer was so clear in his thoughts it was as if God Himself had spoken the words. Because she can’t. For whatever reason, Hannah couldn’t be the one to offer an olive branch. Though his hurt was new, his wounds fresh, Hannah had been harboring hers for a lot longer, allowing them to fester instead of heal. Forgiveness was never easy, but he guessed that it became harder to give over time.

Still, he couldn’t allow Hannah’s problem with forgiveness to keep him from knowing his daughter. Every day that passed with Hannah nursing her resentment was another day he and Rebecca couldn’t be together. That was as unacceptable as Hannah avoiding him by refusing to take his calls.

Suddenly, an idea began forming in his thoughts. Once before, Hannah had been able to avoid him when she’d wanted to, but this time there were no parents, oceans or continents separating them. Just a few traffic lights, the Huron River and a tiny, downtown shopping district.

Since the choices of destinations were limited in Milford, even outside church and school, friends crossed paths whenever they bought a quart of milk at Breen’s IGA, picked out end tables at Huron Valley Furniture or even grabbed a Coney dog or some Thai food from one of those new joints on North Main.

If seeing friends and neighbors regularly was so easy, he imagined that the opposite was true, as well: Avoiding someone a person didn’t want to see would be almost impossible. Because Hannah was on a tight budget, she probably wasn’t in the market often for new end tables, but she needed milk frequently, and she probably craved a good Coney once in a while.

Todd finally understood John Mellencamp’s 1980s anthem, celebrating life in a “Small Town.” Milford was a small town, all right. Hannah was about to find out just how small.

Chapter Five

Hannah had tried her best to make it as normal a Sunday morning as possible. She’d hurried Rebecca through their morning routine, and she’d actively contributed to the discussion in her young adult Sunday school class. Even now she was chatting with several women in the vestibule as she usually did, but nothing about this morning or the last few days had felt normal—not with Todd appearing like a case of indigestion everywhere she went.

The conversation continued around her, but Hannah couldn’t help but divide her attention between it and the door where Andrew Westin greeted members and guests. She expected one of them to be Todd, and she couldn’t decide whether she would be more disappointed if he showed up or if he didn’t.

“Hannah, are you with us?”

She turned back to catch Julia Sims grinning at her, excitement dancing in her dark, heavily lashed eyes.

“You’re missing the news.”

“What news is that?”

Charity McKinley, Julia’s half sister, who was the golden opposite to her raven-dark looks, wore the expression of the cat who had swallowed the canary. Charity reached out her hands to Steffie Wilmington and Serena Jacobs, encouraging those two and several others into a tight circle.

“It’s finally happened. I’m pregnant,” she said in the quietest voice possible for someone fairly bursting with excitement.

“Congratulations,” Hannah said, stepping forward to hug Charity. She was thrilled that God had blessed her friend, who’d longed for a child since she and Rick had married four years before.

“That’s wonderful,” Serena agreed. “Rick must be thrilled.”

Though it seemed impossible, Charity’s smile widened. “That and he’s turned into this broccoli-and-whole-grains-toting drill sergeant. ‘Here, sweetheart, eat wheat germ. It’s for the baby.’” She imitated her husband’s deep voice but she finished with a laugh.

“Was your mom thrilled with the news?” Hannah asked her.

“She’s already knitting booties.”

“I’m happy for her, too.” It was great to see healing in Charity’s relationship with her mother, Laura Sims, after their painful rift from a few years before. But rather than dampen Charity’s excitement by mentioning difficult memories, Hannah changed the subject. “Looks like our church is having a population explosion.”

“Look what you started,” Julia said, shaking an index finger at Serena, whose swollen belly announced her new arrival, expected in March.

Serena rested her hands on her stomach. “I love being a trendsetter.”

“I don’t know about the rest of you,” Steffie said, pausing for effect before she added, “but if I was newlywed, I wouldn’t be drinking the water here.”

Immediately the other women turned to Tricia Williams Lancaster. Married just over a year to Michigan State Police Trooper Brett Lancaster, Tricia definitely still qualified as a newlywed, though she already had three children with her late first husband, Rusty.

“I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” Tricia said.

Tricia turned her head as if in search of a new topic, and her face brightened as a square-jawed man with a military haircut and a football player’s shoulders squeezed through the doorway.

“If that’s not Trooper Joe Rossetti in the flesh and in a church on a Sunday morning,” Tricia said with a grin. “God does work in mysterious ways.”

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