Low nodded but ignored the hand.
“You did good. Good thinking about the ladder and keeping it back with that stick, Low. Good job. You kept Bear safe.”
The older boy only gave Caleb another jerk of his head. He could tell Low was moments away from breaking down and Aaron still clung to him.
“Caleb?” He heard Cathy call from outside. “Are they okay?”
“They’re alright. Just shook up. Bear, can I hand you down to Grandma? Is that okay?” The little boy clutched at his neck for a moment before he pulled away and looked over the edge, wiping his eyes and nose with the back of his dirty hand.
“Hey, Grandma.”
“Hi, pumpkin. Can you come down to me? Let’s get you home.”
“Yeah.” Aaron started to climb over the edge of the cliff, but Caleb swooped him up and lowered him by his armpits, slowly lowering him into Cathy’s waiting arms as the boy began to wiggle.
“I have to go to the bathroom.”
“There’s lot of bushes around,” Cathy said as she held him. “Have at it.”
The danger passed, excitement started to creep into the little boy’s voice. “Did you see those lions, Grandma? They were really big and Low fought them off and Caleb was gonna wrestle one I think and then you came and he shot one! Did you see?”
Cathy said something unintelligible as Caleb turned back to Low.
“Hey,” he said quietly. “You okay?”
He felt more torn up inside than out when Low started to shake. “Did Grandma get one? With the gun?”
“No, she just scared them off.”
“So they’re gone?”
“Yeah.” He moved a little closer to the boy, worried about the still-frantic eyes he saw.
“Why didn’t you shoot one? You should have had your gun and stuff.”
“Sorry. I ran out here without thinking. It’s locked in my truck. I was kind of panicked, but you did great.”
“You’re the chief of police, you know. You should carry your gun all the time.” He started to sniff.
“You did good, Low.” The boy was seconds from tears. “You took care of your brother.”
“I have to. It’s my job.” His voice caught. “I yelled, but we’re pretty far away. And I thought… if they got Bear—”
“But they didn’t.” Caleb moved closer, putting a steady hand on Low’s shoulder as the boy’s face crumbled. “You kept him safe.”
“I was really scared,” he said as the tears began to fall.
Caleb put his arm around the little man who had turned back into a boy, and he pulled him close. Low shook with silent tears as the fear began to drain out of him.
“You did great. You kept your brother safe and you called for help.”
“I thought no one would hear us. And they’d kill us, too.”
“Not gonna happen.” Fear began to unfurl in his own chest as the adrenaline ebbed. He’d never felt more helpless in his life. “I’m gonna find out who they are, and you won’t have to be scared anymore.”
Low hiccuped and wiped at his eyes. “Yeah?”
“I promise.”
“Okay.”
“You gonna be okay?” Caleb asked cautiously, watching the boy compose himself under his arm.
“Yeah.”
“You ready to get out of here yet?”
He hesitated, then glanced toward the open mouth of the small cave. He wiped his eyes again and nodded. “Yeah, I’m good.”
Caleb patted his back and said, “You’re great, Low. You were really brave.”
The two of them slowly clambered down the rocks where Low was swept into Cathy’s waiting arms and Caleb took Aaron’s hand to walk back to the house. Just as the boys walked inside with Cathy, Caleb darted around the back of the house and emptied his stomach in the first bush he found.
Never in his life. Drug raids, domestic calls, even caught in an alley once with two armed gang members didn’t compare. He retched again, spitting out the acid that had filled his stomach and trying to calm the shaking in his hands.
The lion crouched on the rocks, muscles bunched to spring.
The pacing animal with the sweeping tail and the deep scar on its shoulder.
Low holding them off with a stick and Aaron, crying in the rocks, sobbing Caleb’s name…
The mere thought of what could have happened caused his heart to seize, and Caleb ran back to the side door where Cathy was leading the boys to Jena’s car, purse in hand. She took one look at him, then stepped back as he knelt down and grabbed both boys in a fierce hug. He clutched them to his chest, wondering how, exactly, this had happened. Did Jena live with this fear all the time? That something could happen to her kids and these little people would just be gone? They were so vulnerable. It was utterly and completely terrifying in a way he’d never, ever experienced before.
“Caleb,” Aaron squeaked. “You’re kind of hugging really hard.”
“Sorry.” He cleared his throat, but didn’t let go. He did loosen up a bit as he felt Low pat his shoulder awkwardly.
“It’s cool, man.”
Caleb pulled back and looked at them both. “Yeah?”
Low shrugged and rolled his eyes. “We’re cool. Really. Just stop kissing Mom in front of me, okay? It’s totally gross.”
Caleb broke into a relieved smile. “I’m not sure I can do that. She’s pretty cute.”
Aaron giggled while Low made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat and walked to the car.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Jena was out the door before the car came to a stop. She was off the porch before the doors opened. She grabbed Aaron and pulled him out of the car, fighting back the tears on her face and trying to calm her racing heart. She looked around desperately, seeking Low’s precious grubby face as she clutched her youngest son. Caleb was walking behind her oldest, one hand on Low’s shoulder, leading him back to her.
With a choked cry, she grabbed both her sons and held them tight.
They’re really all right. All right. All right.
She felt the tears in her eyes leak down her face as she remembered her mother’s call from the car.
“They’re fine, Jena. They’re both fine. Just shaken up.”
Everything was all right. Just a few scrapes and bruises. Her boys were fine. Still, she couldn’t let go.
“Mom, we’re okay,” Low said.
She fell to her knees in the dusty driveway, holding them and rocking them, trying to banish the terror of the last ten minutes from her mind. Never in her life… She couldn’t find the words. They were still caught on the lump of fear in her throat.
“Caleb and Grandma scared the lions away,” Aaron said cheerfully. “And then he climbed up and got us. He’s really strong, Mom.”
Jena felt her father’s hand on her shoulder and she tried to relax.
“Hey, guys,” he said. “You just gave your mom and me a scare. Let’s go in the house and get a snack. Sound good to anyone else?”
With a deep breath, Jena loosened the iron grip on her two boys and stood. They were okay. She was probably just freaking them out more with her reaction. She let her dad throw Aaron onto his back and walk up the porch while Low waited next to her.
She finally found some words. “You’re really okay?” She ran her hands through his hair, sandy from climbing down from the cliffs. She could see tear marks on his dusty face, but no trace of them remained in his eyes.
“I’m cool.” He sounded a little choked up. “And Caleb’s going to find out who it was. So… yeah, we’re cool.”
She felt the tears well up again, but she tried to remain calm to match her oldest son’s forced ease. She could tell he’d been shaken, but he was a tough kid. In fact, he might have stood just a little taller as he walked over to Caleb, held out a hand, and bumped knuckles with the man leaning casually against the old car, sipping a bottle of water.
“I’m going in for a snack. Caleb, you want one?”
He shrugg
ed. “Let me talk to your mom for a sec.”
“Just remember what we talked about.”
“I told you, I’m not making any promises.”
Low muttered something she couldn’t hear before he walked in the house. Then Jena walked over to Caleb.
“Jena…” He was shaking his head. “I never in a million years would have let them go out there alone, except your mom said they were fine and knew the way, and… She said there’s never been an animal attack out there in all the years she—”
“Shhh.” She put a finger over his lips before she wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him. She felt it then, the slow release of tension. The burning in her eyes. Her shoulders started shaking a second before he crushed her to his chest.
“I’m sorry!” he whispered. “I’m so sorry. I’d never put them at risk. Ever. Not if I could help it.”
“It’s not—” She cleared her throat and blinked back tears. “It’s not your fault.”
“What?”
Did he actually think she blamed him? That she would be angry? She shook her head and pulled back so she could meet his eyes. They were panicked.
“Oh,” she breathed out, reaching a hand up to smooth the lines between his eyebrows. “No, baby, I’m not mad.” She felt his shoulders relax, so she lifted up on her toes and kissed him gently. “How could I be mad?”
“I should’ve killed them,” he said. “I left my gun in the car ‘cause I didn’t want to alarm the boys, but then they—”
“You scared them off. You protected my boys.” She uncurled her arms from his waist and wrapped them around his neck, pulling his lips to hers. “Thank you.” She kissed him again, ignoring the tears that ran down her cheeks, then pressed his bloody knuckles to her lips. “There are not enough ‘thank yous’ in the world—”
“Stop.” Caleb grabbed her hands and pulled her into another embrace. “Don’t thank me. Don’t—don’t, you know?” He paused for a moment, lost for words. Then he captured her mouth with his.
Desperate. Scared. Relieved. He said it all without saying a word. And in that moment, Jena knew the man who held her would walk through fire for her children. For her. It was exactly what she needed to know. She loved him.
He ran his hands down her shoulders, her hips, brushing his fingers along her jaw until one hand rested against her racing pulse and his other pressed into the small of her back. She held him just as close, grasping on to the sudden realization of how hard she’d fallen.
“Caleb.” She finally pulled away. He was having none of it as he buried his face in her neck and scraped his teeth along her skin. “We’ve got to stop.”
“Why?” he asked with a grunt.
“Look at the windows. We have an audience?” Caleb may have been keeping his hands PG, but what was beginning to press into her belly was definitely R-rated.
“Damn.” He sighed. “Nosey kids. You’re going to have to clean Aaron’s nose print off that window.”
“That’s what I thought.” She pulled his face back down to hers for one more kiss, brushing the sand from his hair and dusting off his torn shirt. “Thank you for taking care of my boys,” she whispered.
He put one finger on her chin to tilt her face up to his. “Don’t thank me for that, Jena. I’d do anything to keep them safe.”
She felt the smile take over her face. “I know.” Then she turned and walked up to the porch, pausing when she didn’t hear him follow. Jena turned around to see him still leaning against the dusty car with his hands in his pockets, watching the house with a curious expression.
She put her hands on her hips and said, “Well? You coming inside, or what?”
His boyish grin made her heart flip as he walked up the steps.
She was staring at the slow turn of the ceiling fan that night as she lay on her bed, Low curled up on the opposite side with Aaron smooshed between them. It had been Aaron’s request that night because he didn’t want to sleep alone, but Jena was glad for it. It reminded her of the mornings when the boys were little. She’d be exhausted from a late night at the restaurant, Lowell would be heading into work, so the boys would come and crowd on her bed, watching quiet cartoons while she slowly woke.
She didn’t doze that night. Both boys had bathed and fallen into bed early, the excitement of the day finally catching up with them. She’d called Ted to let her know what had happened and her friend had called everyone else. Caleb had spoken in quietly urgent tones with his deputy before he kissed her goodnight and taken off to the station, and Tom and Cathy were sleeping in Low’s room.
Jena’s house felt like a miniature bunker and she couldn’t have been happier. There was safety in numbers. She only wished there were one more resident sleeping in the house. Still, despite the ever-deepening ease between Caleb and her family, it would have been awkward for him to stay.
She sat bolt upright when she heard a rustling in the bushes outside her window. She looked over to the boys, who were still snoring, before she went to the closet and pulled out the shotgun on the top shelf. She cracked it and loaded two shells from the top drawer of her dresser before she snuck back to the bedroom, moving quietly toward the window.
Then, she heard the tap.
“Jena?” She rolled her eyes when she heard Caleb’s whisper. She propped the shotgun on her hip and pulled back the curtain.
His grin fell when he saw her. “Hey! Whoa. Uh… probably sneaking around the house of the scared mom isn’t such a great idea, huh?”
Shaking her head, she slid the window up. “Ya think? And what are you doing here? It’s the middle of the night.”
“Were you sleeping?”
She silently shook her head.
“Neither was I. So, I was thinking…” He held up a grocery bag with a smile. “Midnight picnic?”
“What?”
“I still haven’t taken you out on a date, woman. And I feel like I need to at this point, considering… stuff. You’re awake—probably pacing the house with that gun—I’m resisting the urge to stalk the perimeter of your house with mine. I say we put down the firearms and have a drink.”
It was a tempting idea, but she glanced over her shoulder.
As if reading her mind, Caleb said, “I brought a blanket. We can sit right here on the grass outside the window and if they get up, you’ll hear them, right?”
“I’m not sure.”
“You know, I chased off mountain lions today. Two of them. Big ones. Mean.”
Jena narrowed her eyes. “Are you taking advantage of my earlier gratitude for saving my children’s lives by trying to guilt me into going on a date with you?”
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
She burst into quiet laughter and leaned out the window. “You’re really, really shameless.”
“It’s worked before. Date?”
“The boys…”
“Are your parents in the house?”
Jena heard a window crack open and her father’s voice call out in a loud whisper. “Her parents are trying to sleep! Jena, just go have a drink with the man. We’ll watch the boys.”
Caleb turned back to her with a grin. “Well?”
She hesitated for only a minute before she said, “Your trailer.” Then she ducked back in the window, unloaded the gun and put it high in the closet before she made her way out the front door and jogged back to the Airstream. When she arrived, Caleb was spreading an old blanket out on the front porch and unpacking a brown paper bag.
“You were serious about the picnic thing.”
“I didn’t have a basket, but if this is going to count for a real date, I figured I’d need a blanket. With all the sand, we can pretend we’re at the beach or something.”
She smothered a grin and sat on the edge while he unpacked the feast he’d brought.
“Beer.” He presented the six-pack to her with a flourish. “Bottles, not cans.”
“Classy.”
“I try.”
He pulled out a box of cracker
s.
“Ritz!” She smiled. “You’ve really gone all out.”
He wiggled his eyebrows. “Hey, when I aim to impress…” He trailed off, suddenly looking nervous. “Now, keep in mind that the Quick Stop does not have the finest cheese selection available and it’s the only thing that was open at this hour.”
Jena frowned. “What…” She let out a loud groan when he pulled the can from behind his back. “You’re not calling that cheese.”
“It’s… cheese product.”
She started giggling, then grabbed for the can he was clutching. “You can’t call this cheese.”
“It’s kind of like cheese. It’s cheese-ish.”
Her giggles turned to snorts. “You brought a chef ‘cheese in a can’ for your first date?”
“Listen, Chef Snobby”—he was laughing along now—“it was this, Velveeta, or the scary-looking pimiento cheese spread that Norman had in the deli case in back.”
She couldn’t stop laughing. Her stomach was actually starting to ache. “It’s cheese product! In an aerosol can.”
“You know, if you’re going to continue to mock my efforts—”
She stopped his protest with a kiss, which he enthusiastically returned. Soon, all thoughts of cheese, crackers, and beer were gone from her mind as she pulled him next to her and stretched out on the blanket, reveling in the press of his weight against her and the soft lips that claimed her own.
“Good,” he muttered. “We’ve skipped to my favorite part of the date.”
“It’s going well so far. Mostly.”
“I still think you’re being awfully judgmental about the cheese.”
“Favorite color?”
“Guys don’t have favorite colors.”
“The boys do.”
“Boys have favorite colors,” Caleb said. “Men don’t.”
“You do, too. You just haven’t thought about it. What’s the first one that sprang to mind when I asked?”
“Red.”