Close Range Christmas by Nicole Helm (best free ebook reader .txt) 📕

her head, staring hard at the horizon. Cash hadn’t reappeared with the ball. He’d bark occasionally, so Sarah assumed he was off chasing a squirrel or maybe Duke or Rachel coming in from the fields.

“We’d be really good parents to more than just Gigi. It isn’t fair we can’t give some kids what Duke and Eva gave us.” Sarah was the only child Duke and Eva had adopted, but they’d fostered Sarah’s four other sisters, and then had Rachel biologically. And Liza was right, they’d always given the girls—biological, adopted or fostered, a loving home. Even after Eva had died.

Sarah placed her hands on her own belly. So much of why she wanted to be a mother was because of Duke and Eva. She’d wanted to be like them—give like them, love like them.

Briefly she thought of Dev saying he actually wanted to be a father, and how much that gave Sarah the hope she could really be like Duke and Eva—a partnership raising kids together.

But Jamison being specifically targeted was a much bigger issue at hand. “We’re going to survive this. All of us intact. When we do, you’ll have your chance to adopt. I know it’s an awful thing to have to put it off, but—”

“But what if this is the time we don’t win, Sarah? Even if we do, how many times are we going to think it’s over when it’s not?” Liza’s eyes were getting shiny again.

Cash’s barking was growing incessant, but Sarah focused on Liza. “As many times as it takes, because... Well, you love Jamison. You always have.”

“Of course I do.”

“So, you can be mad at the circumstance. You can think it’s unfair, because it is, but it’s Jamison. So we’ll all suck it up and keep him safe, whether we should have to or not. You can be mad as hell about that, Liza. No one’s stopping you.”

“You’re trying to stop me with all this wisdom.”

“It’s not wisdom. It’s just common sense. You can feel what you feel and still suck it up and do what you have to.”

“Sarah sense. Life’s a crapshoot so suck it up and do what you can.”

Sarah lifted her hands. “Hard to argue with that kind of sense, isn’t it?”

Liza stepped forward and pulled Sarah into a hug—which was notable since neither of them were particularly touchy-feely. Still, Sarah could tell Liza needed some kind of comfort. Jamison would comfort her too, but Liza would convince herself it was only to make her feel better—not because he actually believed that they could beat the threats against him.

“I do think they’re right. The letter is a warning,” Sarah said, hoping to soothe Liza more. “For whatever reason, this Anth wants us to know he’s coming. Which gives us a much better chance to win.”

“A man who can wait like this one has isn’t stupid. If he’s giving us a warning...” Liza shook her head. “That could be just to mess with our heads. After all, he accuses Jamison of killing his own kin and we know he hasn’t and never would. I was with him all those years in the Sons, so I know. He didn’t kill anyone.”

“He’s been responsible for the death of Sons members since leaving, though,” Sarah pointed out, pulling away from Liza’s arms. “Jailed some too, which may have led to their deaths, including Ace. If we look at it from their perspective, maybe Anth really does believe Jamison is responsible for killing his brethren. Maybe Ace made sure he believed it.”

Liza grimaced. “I don’t know how any of them could think the Sons were ever Jamison’s kin, even when he was stuck in there. Even Ace.”

“But you said it yourself. Another son of Ace’s was never mentioned. No one named Anth was around when you were stuck in there. Maybe this guy only knows what Ace has told him about the Sons and the Wyatt brothers.”

“Maybe. The horrible part is it’s all possible. We at least knew Ace was our enemy before. Even knowing he was a dangerous psychopath gave us something to go on. We don’t know anything about Anth Wyatt.”

Sarah thought about the fact that she did. She knew that she shared blood with the man. That her mother had been afraid enough of her own son to ask someone else to take her brand-new baby with another man.

Technically, she herself was Anth’s kin and brethren too. Did he know that? Did he consider the Wyatt brothers his kin? And why had he used those two words? Repeatedly?

Cash’s barking had stopped, but he hadn’t run back with the ball. A little flutter of panic started in her chest, but Sarah pushed it away. There were a million things Cash could be out there chasing.

Including bad men.

Sarah whistled for him, called his name, but he didn’t reappear.

Dread skittered up her spine. Wouldn’t Anth expect Jamison to come right here after that letter—to his real brethren? Wouldn’t he be able to plan some kind of ambush?

Sarah grabbed Liza’s arm. “We have to get inside.”

Liza’s eyes widened, but she didn’t argue. Clearly she understood Sarah’s train of thought. She reached for the storm door, pulling it open. An explosion sounded and the glass shattered as they hurried through it. Sarah dropped to her knees. She tried to wriggle away from Liza, who was using her body to shield Sarah from the falling glass.

“You’re going to get hurt,” Sarah said, giving another ineffective push on Liza’s body.

“That’s the point. Better me than you and your baby. Can you crawl forward? Get to the main door?”

There was another gunshot, but no shattering glass this time.

“That came from inside,” Liza said, pushing Sarah toward the door that led into the kitchen. “They’re shooting back.”

Sarah crawled over the concrete floor of the mudroom. It was awkward and painful in her current state, and the panicking beat of her heart didn’t exactly help her arms stay steady as she tried to crawl without cutting herself on the glass.

She reached up