Fiona sighed, pressed the elevator button. “I’ve done a lot over the years for my nephews and niece. Twelve nephews and one niece I have, and I don’t think any of them ever involved me in a shenanigan like this.”
“First time for everything. And I really appreciate you helping me out. I’m desperate to see my husband.” They stopped outside Jace’s room. “Don’t desert me, please.”
“I should think not! Make it snappy!” Fiona glanced around the hall. “I’ll have you know the Callahans put a wing on this hospital, and have flooded it with Christmas charity ball funds over the years. I’m an honorary chairman of some such. I can’t be seen disobeying hospital protocols and orders. Just lay eyes on him and get out!”
The guard who was parked outside the door straightened when he saw Fiona, obviously recognizing her. Then ever so slowly, he turned his head away, a signal that he didn’t see them enter Jace’s room.
“Cookies for you and a bonus at Christmas. You have my thanks for keeping an eye on one of my favorite nephews. Of course, they’re all my favorite, but you understand,” Fiona muttered to the guard, and Sawyer hurried inside the room, stunned by the sight of her husband lying so still. She’d never seen Jace motionless like this, almost lifeless. Even when they slept together, he seemed to have one eye open for danger—or on her.
“Jace,” she murmured, and his eyes opened.
He didn’t speak. She crept closer to the bed.
“Jace, I’m so sorry. I know you got shot because of me.” She bent close to him, kissed him on the lips. “Running Bear says I make you strong. If that’s true, then just know that I’m here.”
He closed his eyes. She wasn’t sure he’d even heard her.
“Sawyer, come on!” Fiona said, whispering urgently into the room.
She held Jace’s hand, put her head down on his shoulder. He lay on his side, probably because of the location of the shot he’d taken, and Sawyer’s heart bled. “Winning you was the best thing I ever did for myself,” she softly said, hoping he could hear her, “although probably not the best thing for you.”
“Sawyer!” Fiona called. “You’re about to be off my cookie list if you don’t come on!”
“I have to go,” she told her husband, kissing him again. “But you have to see our babies, Jace. They’re worth every penny I paid for you,” she said, meaning to be lighthearted, bring a little laughter to him in whatever dark place he was in. But she choked on the words. “From now on, it’s you and me and the babies. That’s our Team Callahan.”
She hated to leave him. Reluctantly, she released his hand and left the room. “Thank you,” she murmured to the guard, and let Fiona grab her hand to lead her away.
Fiona’s eyes were wide with apprehension. “Did he say anything?”
“No.” They made their way back past the nurses’ station, Sawyer walking as close to Fiona as she could in order to not attract attention. Her heart was melting inside her. “I’m not sure he heard me.”
Fiona made a murmur of distress. Sawyer felt suddenly weak, exhausted, and clutched the other woman’s arm.
“Don’t you dare fall,” Fiona said sternly. “I’ll never forgive you if you faint right here, when I told you this was a bad idea! You just lean on me and keep putting one foot in front of the other, young lady!”
Jace’s aunt was in drill sergeant mode. Her starchiness made Sawyer smile—and keep moving. When they made it back to her room, Sawyer gratefully returned to her bed, and Fiona collapsed into a chair.
“I’m not so sure that little adventure didn’t give me an attack of angina!” Fiona said dramatically, with a hand on her chest.
“Have you ever had an angina attack?” Sawyer asked, easing her sandals off with her toes and letting them fall to the floor.
“Goodness, no. Heartburn, yes.” Fiona sighed. “You remind me of me when I was your age. Did I ever tell you the story of the magic wedding dress and how it came to be in my possession?”
“No.” Sawyer looked at her through half-closed eyes. “I haven’t had the pleasure of hearing that tale from your grand collection of fairy tales.”
Fiona sniffed. “I detect a bit of irony in your voice.”
“Respect, more likely.”
“Glad to hear it. Because after what you just put me through, you and I are going to have a serious discussion about the fact that the magic wedding dress hasn’t been aired out in quite a while.”
“Why tell me?” Sawyer asked. “Ash is the one you should be spinning tales to.”
“Because,” Fiona said, “you’re the one whose marriage requires a complete makeover, as I said before. You married Jace under false pretenses, knowing all the while you were spying on our family for your uncle.” She waved a hand at Sawyer’s glare. “Don’t deny it. And the only way to make such a deception right is to wear the magic wedding dress and start the whole thing over. If you’re sincere about loving my nephew, and I’m sure you believe that you are.”
“What does that mean?” Sawyer demanded.
“Could be baby blues talking. Could be your sense of responsibility, because you don’t listen to anyone. You wouldn’t go into hiding, as Running Bear recommended. You wouldn’t move somewhere safe. You shouldn’t have visited Jace today, but you did, even though he’s not supposed to have visitors.”
“Running Bear told me I’d see him tonight.”
“That’s right.” Fiona nodded. “But it wasn’t for you to take into your own hands.”
Sawyer sighed. “You’re right.”
“Of course I am.” She nodded again, vigorously. “And I’m right about you getting married again—only this time, you have to do it for the correct reasons. In other words, it’s high time you proved yourself as something other than a double agent who accidentally got pregnant in the line of duty.”
“I most certainly didn’t get pregnant on purpose,” Sawyer said hotly.
“Oh, I know. And yet I believe there aren’t any true accidents. Remember the night you and Somer were shooting at each other at the Carstairs place in Tempest?”
“I wouldn’t have ever tried to harm my cousin! Galen hired me for that job, and I would have protected Rose and her babies with my life!” Sawyer was devastated that the Callahans might think differently.
“I know,” Fiona said gently, “but the fact remains that you have some growing to do. I know you’re an independent lass—that’s why you remind me of myself, and my stubborn Irish roots. But we all have to change, Sawyer, do what’s best, even if it’s counter to our natures.”
“And getting married again does that?” she asked skeptically.
“I’d wait until my nephew is himself once more to find out if he wants to marry you again.”
Fear jumped inside Sawyer. “Jace wouldn’t change his mind.”
“No. He wouldn’t want to not be married to you. He has two beautiful babies with you. But,” Fiona said, her eyes focused on Sawyer, “he nearly died. Who knows?”
“Running Bear says I make Jace strong,” Sawyer said, needing to believe that she was good for her husband.
“Of course you do. And you made him weak, vulnerable. You’ve kept him at arm’s length your entire marriage. He’s been sleeping in a sleeping bag, when you’d let him come around the duplex.” Fiona stood. “Running Bear is right, he always is. I’d have listened to his first advice, I’d listen to his advice today, and I’d listen to the next advice he gives you, should you ever be so fortunate to be on the receiving end of his wisdom again. Now,” Fiona said brightly, “I’m off to the Books’n’Bingo Society to see my friends Mavis Night, Corinne Abernathy and Nadine Waters. We’re planning the Christmas ball for next year—and guess who’s going to be the final Callahan on the block?”
“Ash. But that didn’t go over too well last Christmas, did it? Didn’t Ash have a secret bidder she hired to put in a top bid?”
Fiona gave her a wise look. “That’s the rumor. But Ash says she didn’t rig her own bid. No one knows the identity of the bidder who won her this past year except me. This year, I’m planning to flush that bidder out of the shadows.” Fiona grinned. “It’s fun chasing bidders out of the shadows. I fully anticipate this particular one will be as productive to our family as the last one was!”
She waved at Sawyer as she left. Sawyer lay back exhausted, her mind in turmoil. She needed to feed her babies, needed to think about everything she’d learned. And she was so overwhelmed by remembering how still Jace had been in his bed that she just wanted to cry.
It was several hours before she remembered Fiona’s glee about flushing bidders out of the shadows—and realized the most recent one she’d flushed out had been Sawyer herself, this past Christmas, with the full contents of her savings account.
Fiona had known all along that she was crazy about Jace. She’d also known Sawyer had a conflict of interest where her uncle was concerned. There had been a lot of beautiful women at the ball that night who were just as eager as she was to win Jace.
But Sawyer had been top bidder.
Every word Fiona had said was true. She hadn’t acted like a woman who’d won the man of her dreams. Had she felt she hadn’t deserved Jace, after all?
She waited until the night shift came on, and her room finally darkened by the nurse. When it sounded quiet in the hall, she slipped on her sandals, and shortly after that Running Bear came to her room, as somehow she’d known he would.
“You have seen Jace,” the chief murmured.
“Yes, I have. I’m not sure he knew me, Running Bear.”
He nodded. “He did. But he doubts what he knows.”
Her heart nearly stopped. “Jace is going to be all right, isn’t he?”
Running Bear didn’t answer. “You must leave Diablo. When the hospital says you may go, you must take the children and go away.”
She gasped. “Go into hiding?”
He looked at her. “Would you have him in further danger?”
“No. Of course not. Nor the children!”
“Then that is what you will do.”
Sawyer hesitated. “Fiona thinks Wolf shot my husband because he felt I’d betrayed him. I was supposed to get information for him, through my uncle, apparently. And since I didn’t do that, because I married a Callahan instead, this is the price I’m going to have to pay.”
Running Bear’s expression was inscrutable. “One never tries to discern the mind of someone who does not think with wisdom and understanding. What is known is that Wolf nearly killed Jace.”
Sawyer felt herself grow weak with fear. She told herself to not give in to the gnawing panic thundering in her ears. “So you want us to go.”
“You and the children. Yes.”
“And Jace?”
“Only time will tell.”
Running Bear left. Sawyer got back in bed and made herself close her eyes.
Pictures of Jace danced in her head, including the many times he’d made love to her, in the open, wherever, before they’d ever had a bed. Stolen moments she’d known weren’t really hers to steal. He was a Callahan, the man she’d fallen for despite knowing that a Callahan would probably never marry a Cash. Couldn’t marry a Cash.
She’d set her heart on the moon, and hoped somehow it would come back down to earth, wherever Jace was. She’d gone away for many months, trying to keep her head together about her feelings for him—and still, when she came back, they’d found each other.
They’d made two adorable babies.
But there was a price to pay for love that was stolen.
Chapter Fifteen
Jace opened his eyes to find his worried sister staring at him, almost as if she was looking into his brain through his pupils. “Ash, please take yourself out of my face.”
“Oh, Jace!” She flung herself against his chest, and then sat up. “God, I’m sorry! Did I hurt you?”
“No. Of course not. Don’t be weird. Where am I?” He glanced around, mystified.
“You’re in the hospital,” she answered.
“I can see that,” he said, feeling a bit crusty. “I mean, where am I? What happened?”
“You’re in Diablo,” Ash said carefully, as if he was a bit thick, “and you had a small incident. But now you’re much better!”
She was too bright and cheerful all of a sudden, when a moment ago she’d been trying to peer inside his skull, her pixie face tight with concern. “So what was this accident?”
“You and I were on the way to the hospital to see the babies and Sawyer. Oh, they’re so cute, Jace, so very precious!” His sister perked up considerably. “Little Ashley’s going to be just like me when she grows up.” Ash leaned close. “I can already tell she has a strong personality. Her aura is very powerful. And I think she may have the wisdom.”
He sighed. “How long have I been here?”
She looked confused. “Four days. Don’t you want to hear about Jason? And Sawyer?”
Jace sat up. “Yes, I do. And what I also want is out of here. Can you do that for me? Call our brothers for an extract.”
Ash shook her head. “I can’t do that. The doctors won’t release you.”
“I’m releasing myself.” He went to get out of the bed, was startled by the grogginess that washed over him.
“Whoa, brother.” Ash put a hand on his chest, pressing him backward. “Let’s not be hasty.”
“I want out.”
“You don’t get everything you want. Don’t be a baby.”
He snorted. “There’s nothing wrong with me. No reason at all why I can’t go home.”
“You nearly died, Jace. You’ll be moved out of ICU today, but I have a feeling it’ll be a good few days before you’re released.”
“What happened?” he asked, disturbed that he couldn’t remember.
“You had babies,” Ash said. “You and Sawyer had two precious babies. Don’t you want to hear about Jason? Sawyer named him after you, you know. Ashley’s my namesake, and—”
“Ash,” he said, interrupting her, “I don’t want to talk about babies.”
“Your babies,” she said, and he nodded.
“That’s right. I don’t want to hear about my babies.”
“What’s the matter with you?” she demanded. “The babies were practically all you talked about for the past two months.”
“Yeah, well. I’m just not ready right now, is all.”
Ash blinked. Got up and paced a few steps. Turned to face him. “Sawyer wants to go,” she said.
“Probably a good idea.”
“You mean that?”
He shrugged. “Yeah. Ash, look. I already know all this. Everything is fine. I saw it in a dream.”
“Saw it in a dream? Saw what?”
“Sawyer. The babies. It’s all coming back to me now. We were riding the Diablos. Sawyer wasn’t—she was watching us from atop a cliff. We were all together. It’s fine. I just need to get out of here.”
“You and the children were riding, and Sawyer was atop a cliff watching you?” Ash asked curiously, sounding startled.
“Yes. That was the dream.” He wasn’t certain why his sister looked so strange. It was his dream, nothing that mattered to anyone else.
“But the Diablos haven’t been around in months,” she murmured.
“I know. I think Wolf’s done something to them. I believe the tunnels were a way for the cartel to begin to infiltrate from Loco Diablo—”
“Sister Wind Ranch.”
“—to our ranch. That was their plan, to conquer us from below. Really smart plan, too. But Wolf wants the wealth of Rancho Diablo. And the Diablos are the true wealth.”
“He doesn’t know that,” Ash said, her voice full of passion. “Wolf doesn’t understand the spirits, or the ways.”
Jace considered that. His brain was foggy; every fiber of his body seemed to be drifting. Maybe it was the medication messing with him.
“None of this matters, Jace. What matters is you and Sawyer and your family.”
He knew that. Deep inside him, he knew it. But he also knew that the shot that had hit him could just as easily have been intended for Sawyer—or his children. Sawyer had stunned Wolf with her Taser—and Wolf had been looking for revenge, a reminder that he called the shots. Had he ordered that Jace be killed, or just badly wounded? It didn’t matter, because whatever the intention, he’d nearly died. If that same shot had been aimed at Sawyer, it might have killed her, and that would devastate him. He wasn’t certain he could survive something happening to his wife. Whatever else had gone on between them, Sawyer was the only woman who could ever hold his heart.
Until she left, she wasn’t safe—as Wolf’s bullet had so plainly indicated.
“Tell Sawyer I want her to leave. Take the babies and go.”
“Why? Because you got shot?”
He thought about the dream of riding in the canyons with his children and the Diablos, and Sawyer watching from afar. “We’re not meant to be together,” he said, knowing he was speaking a certain truth he’d only just realized in his soul. But the facts had been staring at him for a long time; he just hadn’t wanted to acknowledge them. “Tell her what you have to, but convince her she has to leave.”
“I’m not telling her that,” Ash said hotly. “You tell her. Because I think you’re crazy. What about my niece and nephew? You’re just going to shuttle them off into hiding?”
What else could he do? “You have a better idea?”
Ash glared at him. “No, I don’t!”
He heard a commotion outside his room, laughter, some chatting, a few quick whispered words, and Sawyer walked in, a breath of fresh air in his very dark world. “Hi, Ash.” She came over, saw that he was awake, and smiled at him. “You’re starting to look like your old self. Yesterday you looked like you’d seen better days.”
He studied his beautiful wife. His heart ached when he gazed at her, he wanted so badly to hold her, kiss her. But that would just prolong the agony. “You were here yesterday?”
She nodded.
“I don’t remember.”
Sawyer sat on the edge of the bed. “They’re going to put you in a regular room today. You’re out of the woods.”
“I’m going,” Ash said, with another glare for him. “I don’t think you’re allowed to have multiple visitors, so I’m going to make myself scarce.”
“You’re never really scarce,” Jace said, “so don’t go far. I have a job for you.”
“I’m not doing it!” she snapped, and disappeared.
Sawyer pushed his hair back from his forehead. “What are you two up to? You’re supposed to be resting.”
“Says the pot, who’s calling the kettle black.” He felt himself relaxing, giving in to her ministrations. He’d missed her so much. “Why aren’t you in bed?”
“I just came by to see if you wanted to come with me,” she teased, kissing him on the lips.
Of course he wanted to go home with her. He wanted that more than anything. “No,” Jace said, “I’m not going home with you.”
“Keep getting strong, cowboy, and I’ll bring you home maybe this week. And then the babies. We’ll be a family at last.”
He grimaced.
“Are you in pain?” Sawyer asked, immediately concerned.
“No.” He was in all kinds of pain, and it wasn’t from the bullet they’d had to remove from his lung. His heart felt as if it was on fire. “You need to go.”
“I know. But I had to see you.” She ran a gentle hand along his face. “I can’t wait for you to see the babies. They’re amazing. And the nurses have been wonderful.”
“Sawyer, you have to go into hiding. With the children.”
“I know. Running Bear told me. My heart breaks, Jace. I wanted the babies to grow up with your family, the way you had in the tribe. I wanted them to get to know Fiona and Burke and their aunt and all their wonderful uncles and cousins. But I understand.”
She didn’t entirely understand what was coming, and he felt his heart turn to stone. “We always knew it wasn’t destined to work out.”
“What wasn’t destined to work out?”
“Us.” He shrugged. “It’s probably a Cash-Callahan curse kind of thing.”
“You can put whatever you’re thinking out of your head, Jace Callahan. You married me, and we have two wonderful babies. You’re going to be a family with us. So if that’s the meds talking, then just close your mouth for now, because I’m not listening.”
He wanted to smile at her fire, but the situation was far too serious. “Running Bear’s words are wise.”
“I agree, but he never said we couldn’t be a family.”
“This is the right thing to do.”
“Separating our family will never be the right thing.”
Jace thought Sawyer was beginning to sound doubtful, as if she was starting to think he didn’t want to be with her. Somehow he had to make her believe that, to get her and the children out of danger. Sawyer wasn’t afraid of anything, and that bravery kept her from recognizing the true danger she and the children were in.
“In fact, Fiona thinks we should remarry, renew our vows at Rancho Diablo.” Sawyer bent down to kiss him again. He tried not to lean forward, tried not to lengthen the kiss—but it was oh, so hard, like ripping his heart out not to reach for her. “She wants the magic wedding dress to get an airing for the final Callahan bachelor.”
He shook his head. “That’s not going to happen.”
Sawyer pulled away. “You get strong. In the meantime, I’ll go take the children to a safe harbor. But I’ll be waiting for you, Jace. And I know you’ll come. Because if there’s anything I know in my heart, it’s that I may have won you, but deep inside, you always wanted it that way. No cowboy chases a woman around and makes love to her under the stars for almost two years and then lets her go. So get over whatever it is you’ve suddenly decided you’re afraid of. Because I’m not afraid at all. I know I belong with you, and our children belong with you, too. We’re Callahans.”
She left with a swirl of Sawyer energy. Jace closed his eyes. Of course she was right; that was one of the things he loved about Sawyer. She was headstrong, spirit-strong and determined. She was brave and fierce, and he was proud of her. There’d never been a woman more suited for him. Sawyer felt like the other half of his whole world, the better half.
But he had to let her go.