Rebel

She walked around the house, calling Birdie’s name. Then around the detached garage. Then ventured farther down a dirt road that seemed to connect the house and a looming structure that could only be the barn. Her throat grew sore from yelling. She should have thrown on a jacket. Some shoes. She was freezing. But she hadn’t thought she’d be searching as much as simply locating Birdie and coaxing her back into the house.

Fear wound its way into her chest and squeezed, pushing tears to her eyes. “Fuck, Birdie,” she finally yelled in supreme frustration. “Get your ass out here.”

A door slammed somewhere ahead. The squeal of metal and a hollow crack.“Birdie? Where are you?” A strange thought popped into her mind, and she called, “I found sugar in the pantry. You don’t need any from Mabel.”

“Well, now you tell me.” The words were soft but frustrated and coming from a distance.

Relief flooded her chest, creating a painful pressure. Her knees gave, and Rubi bent at the waist, bracing herself on her thighs to keep from going down. “Oh my God,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

Pushing up, she started toward the voice. “Come on, Birdie, it’s freezing out here.”

“Don’t you think I know that, little girl? I’m caught.”

This was the most perturbed Rubi had ever heard Birdie. Rubi had heard stories of Alzheimer’s or dementia patients becoming belligerent—though Wes had never named Birdie’s condition—but the way Rubi’s night was going, it wouldn’t surprise her at all if the old woman hauled off and decked her.

But Rubi rounded the barn until she found Birdie struggling. “Cotton-pickin’ rundown old shed,” she muttered, turning her body again and again. “Daryl’s gonna hear about this. I’ll love that man until the day I die, but sometimes…”

The “barn” was all metal and, from what she could see, brand-freaking-new, not a thing out of place. She panned the light across Birdie and found the arm of her sweater caught on a water faucet welded to the side of the barn. And blood stained the fabric.

“Birdie, stop.” Her stomach clenched, and she lunged forward to grab her arm. “Stop pulling.”

Rubi dragged up Birdie’s sleeve and shined the light on the cut to see how bad it was. But she couldn’t tell with all the blood.

“Oh dear…” Birdie tilted toward Rubi, and she caught the older woman before she hit the ground.

“Birdie, Christ, don’t you dare faint on me.” Her voice cracked, exposing her own off-balance state of mind. “I’ll take care of it. And don’t even think about arguing with me.” She pushed her anger forward to cover the fear, the weakness, the vulnerability. “I’ve had it. Susie put me in charge, and I’m the boss, dammit. Now go.”

Birdie was too woozy to argue. Rubi held her up with an arm around her waist and lighted their way back to the house.

By the time Rubi had gotten Birdie bandaged and changed for bed, she was exhausted. Luckily, so was Birdie, and the older woman fell asleep as soon as Rubi tucked her in.

One down, two to go.

“This oughta be fun,” she muttered as she closed the downstairs door to Birdie’s room.

Before she approached the girls, Rubi fastened the special locks Wes had shown her before he’d left—locks Birdie couldn’t reach. Rubi should have done that right after Wes walked out. This night wouldn’t have been nearly as trying. But then she returned to the kitchen. To flour covering every surface. To berries scattered over the floor. To dishes piled in the sink. And her shoulders sagged.

“How the hell did I get here?”

Rubi intercepted three more potential disasters involving Abby and Emma while cleaning the kitchen. She’d spent twenty minutes on the phone listening to Tori go through their bedtime routine and gleaned that Emma didn’t like the feel of brushing her teeth, which caused nightly drama. Emma didn’t like the feel of brushing her hair, which caused morning and nightly drama. Basically, the bottom line: Emma didn’t like the feel of anything, because she had a sensory issue which made all those normal things we did every day hurt for Emma. So anything involving changes to the senses typically caused—you guessed it—drama.

And Rubi was dead on her feet by the time she finally led the girls upstairs for bed. To keep all that drama to a minimum, Rubi asked Emma everything before touching her. That seemed to work well. She let Emma sleep in the clothes she had on, since those weren’t bothering her, and then settled them in her bed, under the covers.

“Okay,” Rubi said, sitting on the side of the bed. “Here’s the thing about flashlight shadows, Em. They don’t work unless the lights are out.” Tori had told Rubi that Emma slept with the lights on, which was fine by Rubi. She was so tired, she could have slept in a wind tunnel. “I can leave the bathroom light on. But if we leave the big light on, we won’t get the fun shadows. Want to give it a try?”

Emma was looking Rubi in the eye now, and God, but she was a beautiful girl. “Will you stay here?”

“Are you kidding? I’m going to be asleep before you are.”

Emma’s little mouth curved, and a warm knot tumbled to the bottom of Rubi’s belly.

“I’m going to change for bed. You two get comfy.”

Rubi spent her time in the bathroom bent over the sink, splashing water on her face. She was exhausted and edgy. Jumpy. Like she expected to hear Emma scream at any moment. Felt as if she’d given everything she had to Birdie and the kids for the last five hours and felt wrung out, like her nerves were on fire. And now she had to play shadow games on the wall and hope the flashlight beam didn’t hurt Emma’s eyes.

“You’ve just committed yourself to taking care of family the way only another family member can. An intensely noble effort.”

Wes might rethink that when he got home and saw Birdie’s cut and torn sweater. Susie might disagree when she saw the stain Rubi couldn’t get completely out of her carpet.

Twin giggles came from the bedroom. Rubi turned off the water and changed.

“You braid your hair too?” Emma asked—the first time she’d spoken to Rubi first, and a strange sense of accomplishment Rubi didn’t understand spread through her chest.

“Every night. I don’t like brushes much either.” She walked over to the light and checked in with Emma. “Ready?”

She nodded.

“Turn on your flashlights first. Abby, make sure to keep the light out of Emma’s eyes. Emma, don’t look directly at the beam.”

Once the light was off, their flashlight beams aimed at the far wall, and no one was screaming, Rubi exhaled in relief. She climbed into the spot they’d left open for her between them and picked up her own flashlight. “Okay, now the fun begins.”

Wes eased himself into the chair alongside Rubi’s bed, praying he didn’t wake her or either of the girls. They were curled up like puppies on either side of Rubi, cuddled so close she couldn’t have moved if she’d wanted to. Though, by the way she had an arm around each one, her head tilted with her forehead pressed against Emma’s blonde hair, Wes had to admit she didn’t look like she wanted to go anywhere, but he wished the girls were in their own beds so Wes could strip down, climb in next to Rubi, and feel body the length of his.

Since no way on earth would that wish come true, he kicked his feet up on the ottoman and melted back into the cushy chair with a long exhale. What a freaking long, terrifying night. He glanced at his watch—almost nine a.m. He closed his eyes and laid his head back, unable to keep the last twelve hours from spiraling behind his closed lids.

Wyatt had come too close to death too many times—the first before he’d even reached the VA, and Wyatt’s doctor had rerouted them to St. Mary’s first. The damn blood clot had shot to his lungs, and he’d been gasping for air when Wes had thrown his brother over his shoulder and trotted him into the ER. When the nurses and doctors crowded around him and whisked him off to one of the rooms, both his mother and sister-in-law had been bawling. And Wes had been damn close. Luckily, his father had met them there, but he hadn’t looked much better. Christ, that had been the longest couple of hours of Wes’s life—waiting to hear whether or not Wyatt could be stabilized.

Then he’d been transferred by ambulance to the VA for more tests and further treatment during several bad episodes when they hadn’t known whether Wyatt would live or die. But by morning, he’d found even ground. After another few days in the hospital under careful watch, Wyatt would return home and continue his recovery. With anticoagulation therapy, this wouldn’t…shouldn’t…happen again.

This wasn’t Wyatt’s first death scare. Wes’s brother had “seen the light,” as Wyatt called it, several times—a few of those in Afghanistan before ever returning home. But this was the first one Wes had witnessed. And it had shaken him.

He opened his eyes to rid his mind of the memories, and the sight of Rubi and the girls released the pressure in his chest again. Seeing her curled up with two little kids gave Wes crazy-exciting glimpses into the future. Before this moment, he’d never been able to envision Rubi with a family—not that it had even been on his mind. But now… Yeah, it was on his mind. Not tomorrow. Not even next year. But someday.

And that someday had solidified into a real possibility with Rubi here. After seeing her with his family, watching her step up to the plate with his grandmother and nieces, her generosity toward Wyatt and his father… Yeah, he knew for sure—Rubi was the one.

Rubi stirred, and her eyes opened. She glanced to either side of her, checking on the girls, then stretched.

He whispered, “Hey, beautiful.”

“Is he okay?” she asked in an urgent whisper.

“He is now.”

Abby woke first, sitting up and rubbing her eyes with her fists. “Uncle Wes, is Daddy home?”

He couldn’t begin to describe the relief that her daddy would be coming home. Wyatt’s death would have devastated his family. “Not yet, but he will be in a few days.”

Emma covered her eyes, which meant she was letting her eyes adjust to the morning light. “Daddy’s okay?”

“Yes, baby. Your daddy’s okay.”

“Where’s Mommy?” Abby asked, sliding out of bed and skipping to Wes.

He pulled her into his lap. She was warm and soft, cuddling against him. Wes couldn’t say he was eager to be a father. The grave responsibility of the role sometimes felt too heavy for him. But that perspective shifted when he thought of having a child with Rubi. “Mommy’s downstairs. She’s going to take you girls home, and you can go to the hospital later to see your dad.”

Abby pushed from Wes’s lap and ran out the door. “Mommy!”

“Down here, baby.” Tori’s voice drifted up the stairs.

Emma climbed from bed, slower than Abby. She reached up and ran a hand over her braid, then looked over her shoulder at Rubi. “Will you take it out?”