Harlequin Love Inspired March 2021--Box Set 2 of 2 by Patrice Lewis (best large ereader .txt) 📕

“Aw, bummer,” the twins voices blended.

He turned back to face Stacia. “Just so you know, you’re not hurting me. You’re hurting them.” He stalked to his truck.

* * *

“Spin us, Aunt Stacia,” Madison called.

“I’ll be there in a minute.” Even with Ross long gone, Stacia was still steaming and needed to calm down before she could play.

“If you treat him that way, he’s liable to take you to court.” Daddy stood, started toward the merry-go-round.

A chill went down her spine. “I can’t play nice and twiddle my thumbs while he steals them right from under us.”

“I can spin it.” Jayda hopped off, grabbed a rail and ran in circles.

“Just be careful,” Stacia said.

“I will.”

Daddy reclaimed his seat. “Ross is a Christian, Stace. And even if he wasn’t, I was watching the whole time. He couldn’t have gotten far.”

“I can just see you hobbling after him.”

“I do not hobble, thank you very much.” Daddy’s tone turned highly insulted.

“You do if you step in a hole and this place is full of them.”

“Sweetheart, Ross is not your aunt Eleanor. He’s not scheming, manipulative and obsessed.”

“How would you know? You’ve known him for like a whole five minutes.” She closed her eyes, trying hard to tamp down her frustration. “You always trust too fast.”

“At least I trust. I knew what your aunt was up to. Within a week of her coming to live with us. I didn’t know how she’d go about it, but I knew she wanted my girls.”

“How?”

He shrugged. “I’ve always been good at reading people. Ross reads honest, caring and on the up-and-up.”

“We’ll see.”

“We can’t live constantly on guard. We can’t anticipate everything in this life. You need to stop thinking you’re in control. Trust God to keep the kids safe.”

“I can’t.” She blinked tears away. She’d trusted God to keep Mama and Calli safe. She still trusted Him. With her life and eternity. Just not with the ones she loved most.

“I hope you’ll pray about that. And in the meantime, if you’re hostile toward Ross, the kids may take his side. He’s the new exciting thing in their world and they knew you were mad at him just now. It’s amazing what they pick up on.”

“I’m aware.” She bolted toward the merry-go-round, eager to escape the conversation.

“Ready for a spin?” She grabbed the bar as the rotation slowed.

“How come you made Uncle Ross leave?” Mason frowned.

Her breath caught. “I didn’t.”

“Yes you did.” Madison scrutinized her. “You were mad at him.”

“Not really mad.” She tried to cover. “We just disagreed over a project in the workshop, so Ross left to fix it.”

“Why don’t you like him?” Mason persisted.

“I don’t really know him very well yet.”

“We do and we love him. We want you to love him too.” Madison’s voice held a lilt of sadness, as if Stacia had let her down.

Putting a hitch in her chest. “He’s not my uncle, so I’m not really supposed to love him like y’all do.” This conversation was worse than the one she’d fled from with Daddy.

“But you said Jesus wants us to love everybody, right?”

“You’re right, Mad. I’ll work on that.” And for their sakes, she would. But she’d still be like a guard dog on patrol whenever he was with the twins.

“Spin us some more,” Mason pleaded.

Stacia poured all her anger into the merry-go-round. She’d kill Ross with kindness. But no one would ever take them away from her, no matter what she had to do to stop them.

* * *

“That’s fifteen coffee bars and fourteen completed bathtubs almost ready to be shipped.” Stacia tucked a stray, russet tendril behind her ear.

Matter-of-fact, as if nothing had transpired between them at the park.

“I’m confused,” Ross admitted. “Weren’t we at each other’s throats just last night?”

“About that. I thought about things, and we need to get along. For Mason’s and Madison’s sakes.”

“Agreed.”

“They knew we were arguing yesterday and that’s not good. My bad and it won’t happen again. At least not in front of the twins.” She turned a withering glare on him. “But rabid Stacia will show up again if you try anything funny with them.”

“Trust me, I’m well aware, but I don’t have any devious plans.”

“Good. We need to focus on production. If we stay on track with five of each per day, we’ll make the deadline with no problem. And we get ahead of our quota when Daddy’s here.”

Working with her for the last few days, he’d solved the mystery of her now you see ’em, now you don’t smattering of coppery freckles across her fair nose and cheeks. As each day wore on, she wiped dust or sweat away, until they appeared. It always made him wonder why she tried to cover them up.

His fingertips itched with the urge to count them. Stop staring. “How do you ship them?”

“Sometimes the salvage guys from Daddy’s business make deliveries for us. But most of the time, we employ kids from the community college in Kerrville or the Bible college in Comfort to deliver for us on Saturdays. By the time they get their degree or find something else, word of mouth gets us a fresh crew.”

“This place runs like a well-oiled machine.”

“We’ve spent years working out the kinks.”

“Oh, I almost forgot. I gave your dad my job application.”

“If you’ve got any skeletons, they’re about to come out.”

“I’m not worried.”

They’d fallen into a routine. In the mornings Ross tended the cattle and helped Maverick with the task in the evenings. During the day he worked in the workshop with Stacia. When the kids got home from school, Stacia or her dad watched them until the store closed. On slow days or when both clerks were there, Maverick helped in the workshop too.

Once the store was closed and the cattle was tended, he got to spend time with the twins at the ranch with Stacia’s supervision while her dad went back to the workshop for a few more hours. Determined the B and B order wouldn’t cut into family time, Stacia was careful