A Bride Before Dawn. Sandra Steffen

checked online a little while ago. Kits are available at drugstores everywhere. The test looks pretty straightforward and simple to perform, but it can take up to six weeks to get the results.”

      “I don’t want to wait six weeks,” Marsh said firmly.

      “Neither do I,” Reed said with the same amount of force. “Our only alternative is to hire a private investigator.”

      Reed reached across the table for his laptop. Marsh went to the cupboard and dragged out an old phone book.

      Before either of them went a step further, Noah stopped them. “You can’t pluck some name off the internet or from the phone book for something this important.”

      “Do you have a better idea?” Reed asked.

      As a matter of fact, Noah did. For once in their lives, having a hellion for a brother was going to come in handy. “A few years ago I tested an airplane for a guy calling in a favor. He’s a P.I. over in Grand Rapids and flies a blue biplane called Viper. I don’t have a business card but I know somebody who does. I’ll make a few phone calls first thing in the morning.”

      “Is this investigator any good?” Marsh asked.

      Noah said, “He’s found runaways and exes and bail jumpers and just about everything in between.”

      His stomach growled audibly. Trying to remember how long it had been since he’d eaten, he went to the refrigerator and opened the door. He saw various cartons, bags and containers of leftover takeout, one of which was starting to resemble a science experiment. This was why he always cooked when he was home.

      “When are you leaving?” Marsh asked.

      “I’m not,” Noah said, cautiously sniffing a carton before tossing it into the trash. The science experiment went in next.

      “You don’t have another flying engagement lined up?” Reed asked.

      “It’ll keep.” Unlike the leftovers on the top shelf. “I’m not going anywhere until this is resolved. I figure we can use a couple of extra hands around here.”

      While Noah threw out everything except eggs, butter, condiments and cans of soda and beer, Marsh and Reed talked about what they might expect on Joey’s first night here. According to the information Reed had gotten from the 83,000 Google hits, children this age generally required a feeding every two to six hours.

      “You’re saying we could be in for a long night,” Noah said, closing the refrigerator.

      Reed was fast at work on a preliminary schedule. Following a little discussion, Noah was assigned the third watch.

      He ate a peanut-butter sandwich standing up. After chasing it down with a cold beer, he strode to the stairway on the other side of the room. “I’m going to get some sleep. Wake me up when you need me. I mean it. We’re in this together.”

      “Noah?” Marsh said quietly.

      With one hand on the doorknob, Noah looked back at his oldest brother.

      “I’m glad you’re here,” Marsh said.

      “Glad barely scrapes the surface,” Reed said, closing his laptop.

      Something constricted deep in Noah’s chest. “I’m glad to be here.” It was the honest-to-God truth.

      He could have left it at that, but opportunities like this didn’t come along every day, so of course he cocked his head slightly and said, “Sex on the beach, and big hair and big—” He cleared his throat. “Who knew you two had it in you?”

      He dodged the roll of paper towels Marsh threw at him, and took the steps two at a time. In his room at the end of the hall, he emptied his pockets of his keys and change and put the check from Tom Bender on his dresser, then quickly stripped down. Heading for the only bathroom on the second floor, he thought about the apology he owed Lacey.

      He turned on the shower. While he waited for the water to get hot, he considered possible ways he might say he was sorry. Red roses, he thought as he lathered a washcloth and scrubbed the day’s grime from his arms, chest and shoulders. In his mind’s eye he saw a dozen red roses upside down in Lacey’s trash can. A box of chocolates would meet with the same fate.

      By the time he dried off, he knew what he had to do. It wasn’t going to be easy.

      Begging forgiveness never was.

       Chapter Three

      Sure, the rusty thermometer on the light pole in the alley behind Bell’s Tavern registered eighty-one degrees, but the bright afternoon sunshine wasn’t the only reason Ralph Jacobs was sweating.

      “You’re getting a bargain,” Lacey said patiently as her dad’s former customer placed another bill in her outstretched hand.

      “Six hundred’s a little steep, doncha think?” he groused, mopping his forehead with a folded handkerchief. “That old Chevy is close to twenty years old, you know.”

      She glanced at the pickup truck now sitting on Ralph’s flatbed trailer. She could have gotten more for her dad’s pickup if she’d had time to advertise, and they both knew it.

      Turning her attention back to the transaction, she watched as Ralph wet his finger and reluctantly added another hundred spot to the others in her hand. “Dad always took good care of that truck,” she said. “It was ten years old when he bought it. Remember how proud he was that day? It still has low mileage and started just now the first time you turned the key. You and I agreed on $600.”

      “It has four flat tires,” he insisted.

      “I threw those in at no extra charge.”

      Ralph made a sound she would have been hard-pressed to replicate. When he finally parted with the sixth hundred-dollar bill, she handed him the signed title and tucked the money into the pocket of her faded cutoffs for safekeeping.

      Just then Lacey’s best friend came hurrying down the steps, her light brown curls bouncing and her white blouse nearly as bright as the sunshine. “It was good of you to offer to drop these boxes at Good Neighbors on your way home, Mr. Jacobs,” April Avery called as she secured the last carton on the trailer with the others.

      Ralph made that sound again, because it hadn’t been his idea.

      April was one of those savvy, quirky women nobody could say no to. She’d moved to Orchard Hill after she married into the large Avery brood seven years ago. She and Lacey had clicked the first time they met and had become the best of friends in almost no time.

      Together they watched as the trailer carrying many of the things Harlan Bell could no longer use rattled away. The moment they were alone again, April pushed her curly hair behind her ears and exclaimed, “I thought he would never leave. Now, finish your story.”

      “Where was I?” Lacey asked. As if she didn’t know.

      “You were just getting to the good part,” April said. “Noah threatened to break your door down if you didn’t open it, and the instant you did, he took you in his arms and kissed you so thoroughly you swooned. That is so romantic.”

      There was never much activity in the alley at this time of the afternoon in the middle of the week. Two boys had taken a shortcut through here on their bikes a few minutes ago. A panel truck was making a delivery to the appliance store at the other end of the alley, but the deliverymen were too far away to hear Lacey say, “I did not swoon. And it wasn’t romantic.”

      “Then your heart didn’t race and your knees didn’t weaken and butterflies didn’t flutter their naughty little wings in unmentionable places?” April asked.

      Lacey held up a hand in a halting gesture. Just thinking about Noah’s kiss was stirring up those butterflies again.

      “That’s what I thought,” April said, nudging her with one shoulder. “You’re