Chapter 1
One
Aaric
Ten years later…
“Aaric?”
“Yeah?” I spin around in my chair to find my brother, Adrian, standing in my office doorway. “What’s up?”
His brow is furrowed. “There’s a woman on the monitor. She’s on the west side of the property, heading this direction. She’s stumbling a lot as though she’s injured or something. It’s hard to tell from the camera angle, but she has long blond hair.”
I jump to my feet. “You think it’s Hannah?”
Adrian nods. “That’s my suspicion. Could you take the ATV and go check it out? I’d hate for Asher to see her first. Last time he found a woman on the property, he tied her to a kitchen chair.” Adrian smirks.
I roll my eyes. “Hopefully, Asher is busy minding his own business with Emma. I’ll go.” I’m already jogging toward the steps to ascend from our basement offices.
My heart is racing as I hurry toward the ATV. I really hope it’s Hannah. Her sister Rebekah married my twin brother Adam a few months ago. Rebekah has been worried about Hannah for the last two years. That’s how long it’s been since she last saw her sister.
I’ve been working with a private investigator to try to find Hannah for over a month, but it’s slow work when you’re dealing with remote mountain homesteads.
We had almost nothing to go on. Rebekah’s father, Richard Sharp, told her that Hannah ran away in the night two years ago, but we all suspect he might have lied. He lied about a lot of things.
Now he’s dead, which is, unfortunately, for the best, but I still feel bad for these two women who spent their lives living under his extremely backward rule.
I head toward the dirt path that meanders between our property and the Sharp homestead. It doesn’t take me long to spot the blond in the distance. Fifteen seconds later, I come to a stop, shut off the engine, and jump down from the ATV.
The blond isn’t currently moving. She probably heard my engine and stopped. She has one hand planted on the trunk of a tree, and she’s clutching her stomach. As I get closer, I see she’s been crying. Her eyes are wide, and her cheeks are pink and streaked with dried tears.
She looks like she’s about to collapse from exhaustion.
“Hannah?” It’s an educated guess. My gut tells me this is her. I haven’t seen her since she was about eleven, so it’s hard to be sure.
She gasps. “Yes.” Her voice is weak. She’s shaking so badly, I think she might actually fall to her knees.
I rush closer and manage to catch her as she starts to tumble forward.
“Adam?” she asks, her voice weak, as I lift her to cradle her in my arms. She weighs almost nothing, but she’s wearing a long skirt with several layers, a rough khaki blouse, and a shawl. Honestly, the outfit looks like it belongs on a character in an old frontier movie.
“Aaric,” I reply. I’m used to people mistaking me for Adam.
We’re identical. Even at twenty-eight, we still look almost alike.
The only difference is that Adam has some impressive tattoos, but if we’re both wearing a shirt, it’s pretty hard for the average person to tell us apart.
Plus, Hannah hasn’t seen me in over ten years.
“Never could tell you apart,” she mumbles, her eyes drooping. “Do you know where my sister is?”
“I sure do.” I beam at her. “I’ll take you to her. She’s been worried about you, Hannah. We’ve all been looking for you.” I carry her toward the ATV, wondering if she’s going to have the strength to hold on to me.
When I reach the vehicle, I lower her to her feet.
She grabs the seat. The woman doesn’t have the strength to stand, let alone ride behind me.
I squat next to her and grab her waist. It’s now that I realize it’s not just layers of material under her skirt that’s filling out the dress. She’s pregnant. I lower my gaze to her belly. She’s really pregnant. “Hannah?”
She grabs my shoulders and bites her lip as I tip my head back. New tears fall. “I know I’m going to Hell, but I don’t think God would blame an unborn child for anything their mother did. Do you?” Her words are soft and hopeful.
My chest tightens. Something inside me shifts as I stare into the eyes of this beautiful woman who thinks she deserves God’s wrath for some reason. No matter what she’s done, it can’t possibly warrant that. “No, sunshine. No one is going to Hell. I promise.”
I have no idea what possesses me to call her sunshine .
She’s not mine. I don’t even know her. But suddenly I feel fiercely protective of Hannah.
I want to strangle whoever filled her head with the idea she was in trouble with the Almighty.
It probably started with her father. Richard Sharp was an asshole.
But I suspect someone else has been feeding her lines of shit since then.
“I don’t care if I die, Aaric, but I know you’re a good person. Will you find a home for my baby?”
I swallow back the emotion welling up inside me. “You’re not going to die, sunshine.” I hope to God I’m right. I can’t possibly know what might be ailing Hannah. Maybe she’s in labor. I think that could cause a woman to think she’s dying.
Whose baby is this? Where is the father? I don’t think she needs me bombarding her with questions right now.
She swipes at her tears.
“Are you injured anywhere, Hannah?”
She shakes her head. “No.”
“Are you in labor?”
“No,” she whispers.
“Are you sick?”
“No.”
I keep one hand on her hip and use my thumb to swipe at her tear-stained cheek. Her face is dirty. I get the feeling she walked a long way to get here. “What makes you think you’re going to die, sunshine?”
“I’m a bad person.”
I flinch. Now I really want to kill someone.
I pull her against my chest and hug her tight.
“You’re not a bad person. I’m certain of it.
” I lean her back. “Do you think you can sit in front of me on the ATV? I’ll hold on to you and take you to my cabin.
You’ll feel much better once we get some fluids in you.
I bet a bath and a good meal will help, too.
” I smile at her, trying to give her some encouragement.
“I don’t want to be an imposition. I just thought I might be able to see Rebekah. I went to our childhood home. She left a note, telling me she was here.”
“She is, sunshine. You can reunite with her in just a few minutes.”
Hannah sniffles. “Thank you. Why do you keep calling me sunshine? I’m more like a dark cloud.”
I gasp dramatically. “Hannah, you could never be a dark cloud. I’ve always thought of you as a ray of sunshine.
” I lift a lock of her limp blond hair. “It was your hair. Every time I saw you as a kid, your hair caught my attention. It would fly around like rays of sunshine. It still does.” Or it will after a good shampooing.
She almost smiles. “That’s sweet, Aaric. I didn’t know you noticed me.”
“Of course I noticed you. How could anyone not?” I certainly didn’t know Hannah as well as I knew her sister, Rebekah.
Rebekah snuck over to our property a few times a week.
She was more outgoing, but mostly, I think she came by hoping my mother would feed her, and my mom always made sure Rebekah had food to eat.
Hannah was shier as a child. She was also not as much of a tomboy as Rebekah. Traipsing through the woods to snoop around at the adjacent homestead wasn’t her style.
That doesn’t mean we didn’t see her from time to time. Sometimes, she followed Rebekah and then hid in the trees, watching. We knew it. She was probably jealous. My mother would send Rebekah home with a wrapped piece of banana bread or a sandwich for her sister.
It wasn’t that we thought Rebekah would actually take the food all the way home.
We all knew she would deliver it as soon as she got to the tree line.
The girls’ father forbade them from setting foot on our property, so they had to pretend they were simply playing in the woods.
They certainly didn’t take food back to their house.
I stand and gently lift Hannah, setting her sideways on the ATV as close to the handlebars as possible. It’s not an ideal position, but with all the layers of skirts she’s wearing, it would be hard for her to straddle the seat, plus it might not be comfortable in her pregnant condition.
Keeping one hand on her thighs, I swing my leg over, start the engine, and wrap my arm around her. “I’ll go slow so you don’t get jostled too much, sunshine.”
She leans against me, giving me her whole weight. I suspect she’s a very proud person who can’t stand to ask for help, so it’s huge that she came here. She’s about to learn that she’s safe now. She’s home.
Home?
What am I thinking?
Of course she’s welcome to stay with us for as long as she wants or forever, but that doesn’t mean she will be staying with me .
Why am I picturing Hannah in my own cabin? I should take her to the main house or even to Adam’s. She could stay in his cabin. After all, he’s married to her sister.
Hannah doesn’t know that yet, though. There are a lot of things she doesn’t know. I don’t want to burden her with a ton of information. I just want to get her home.
I drive slowly, wincing at every bump. I’m not sure how far along she is, but I’m positive it would be best for pregnant women not to ride on ATVs.
We don’t have a better choice right now.
She’s too exhausted to walk another step, and this is the only vehicle that could get down the path to where I found her.
Soon, I pull up in front of my cabin, turn off the engine, and fling my leg over the side. Next, I lift Hannah off the seat. The second I set her on her feet, she nearly falls, so I scoop her up and cradle her. “Let’s get you inside.”
She’s looking around. “How long have you been back on the mountain? You’ve done a lot of work.”
She’s right. We’ve been rebuilding for months.
Each of us six brothers has our own cabin.
They’re scattered around the main house, which we’re also working on.
Five of the cabins are close enough to easily get to one another’s houses, but not so close that we can hear or see each other inside our homes. Asher has built his farther away.
“About eight months,” I tell her as I carry her inside.
She glances around the open-concept great room. “Wow. Do you all live in this house?” She must have been so focused on hanging on to the ATV that she didn’t notice the main house or any of the other cabins or outbuildings.
“No, sunshine. Just me. This is my cabin. Let me set you down, and I’ll call Adam and get him to bring Rebekah over.” I gently lower her to the couch.
She immediately stiffens and rises to her feet, spinning around to look at the sofa.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m filthy. I don’t want to touch anything.”
I stroke her white-blond hair, even though I probably shouldn’t. She might be married. I have no right to take any liberties with her. “Don’t you worry about the couch, Hannah. It’s leather. If a little dirt gets on it, I’ll just wipe it off. Sit.”
I pull out my phone and text Adam.
I found Hannah wandering toward our homestead. She’s in my cabin. Can you bring Rebekah over?”
I don’t wait for a response. Adam will have his wife here in seconds.