An Aspen Creek Christmas. Roxanne Rustand

      She had the kids bundled up and the whole lot of them—exuberant puppies and kids—outside in minutes. He’d watched every move and still didn’t know quite how she’d done it with puppies running everywhere and Cole too excited to stand still.

      Cole ran around the yard with the pups, though Molly perched on a picnic table and chewed her fingernails, doing her best to look bored.

      Despite the awkward history between them and his determination to take the kids back to Texas, Ethan couldn’t help feeling a newfound appreciation for Hannah as they stood on the back deck to watch the melee. “You’re good with them.”

      “Never had any of my own, of course, but one learns.” She shrugged. “Corralling kids when armed with vaccination syringes does take some practice.”

      “You mentioned the clinic earlier. Are you a nurse?”

      “I’m a PA—physician’s assistant.”

      He blinked, surprised. “Where did you go to school?”

      “I’ve got a Masters from UW-Lacrosse. My clinical phase was at Mayo.”

      He whistled softly. “When we first met, you had a part-time job at a burger place and didn’t have a clue about your future.”

      “I always planned on college,” she said simply, keeping a close eye on Cole. “I just needed to save money first.”

      “You never married?” The question escaped before he thought it through and he’d have done anything to snatch it back.

      A long, awkward silence stretched between them.

      “No,” she said finally, angling a glance at him that could have sliced through steel. “Though I understand you did—your brother was more than happy to let me know that you’d gone on to far better things. Rapidly, in fact.”

      He felt heat crawl up his neck. After the hard life he’d led and the things he’d done for his country, he wouldn’t have imagined that he was capable of such a reaction, yet here it was—heart-stopping regret, awash with embarrassment over what a fool he’d been. But he’d paid for it, in spades.

      Janet had been one of the biggest mistakes of his life.

      “I regret a lot of things in my life. That’s one of them.”

      “I never asked Dee or Rob about you over the years. The subject was strictly off limits, and they knew it,” she said. “But since no one is here with you, I assume the marriage didn’t last.”

      “Never guess that every twenty-one-year-old guy is actually mature.” He gave a humorless laugh. “I was lonely and impetuous. Janet worked on the base and was on the rebound. Let’s just say it was not a match made in heaven. The ink was barely dry on the certificate when Janet’s ex turned up and she left me.”

      Her gaze fixed on forest beyond the backyard, Hannah didn’t answer for a long moment. “And that’s what I was, too. Just a brief fling.”

      “No.” His heart wrenched at what she believed and what had been the truth. He’d dreamed of her for years afterward, regretting what he’d done. “You were the one who stole my heart and never gave it back.”

      She raised an incredulous eyebrow and snorted. “That’s not how I remember things, but it’s all in the past and I’m pretty sure we both dodged the proverbial bullet. All for the best.”

      Hannah descended the deck stairs. “Hey, kids, can you help round up these guys? C’mon, puppies—dinnertime!”

      Some of the little critters followed, others went the opposite way. One black-and-white pup industriously tugged at Cole’s shoelace, trying to wrestle it free. But in a few minutes they all disappeared into the garage with Cole and Hannah, where metal food dishes rattled and Cole’s laughter rose above the din.

      After Hannah retrieved the mixed-breed mom from a separate outside enclosure and took her to her brood, she stepped outside and started for a weathered-wood shed at the far end of the yard.

      It looked like a classic, hip-roofed barn the size of a double garage, with a walk door on the side and two big, sliding barn doors at one end. A wood-fenced corral enclosed a small pasture behind it and to one side there was some sort of pen surrounded with a high chain-link fence.

      “I don’t suppose anyone wants to see what I’ve got in here?” she called over her shoulder.

      Cole followed at her heels as Hannah disappeared into the shed, while Molly just hunched over her folded arms on the picnic table and made no move to follow.

      Ethan strolled over to her and sat at the opposite end of the table. “So...what do you think about all of this?” he ventured after a few minutes of silence.

      She lifted her gaze to the surrounding forest and scowled. “It’s not Texas. And it’s cold.”

      “True.”

      A thin whinny echoed from inside the barn. One of the sliding doors opened and Hannah emerged leading a woolly Shetland pony with Cole on top. She led the little buckskin in a slow circle then toward the picnic table.

      Cole beamed. “This is Penelope. She’s really old.”

      “She’s a rescue, as well. It’s probably time to hop off, but she should gain some weight in a few months and feel stronger, and after that maybe you can ride her a bit longer.” Hannah reached up and helped Cole dismount before pulling a small brush from her jacket pocket. “In the meantime, you can lead her if you want and bring her carrots. She also needs to be brushed every day. Anyone here interested in doing that?”

      Cole nodded, accepting the brush. He began brushing Penelope’s neck. “She’s pretty.”

      “I heard you talking to Cole in the house,” Molly said to Ethan after watching her brother for a while. “And I don’t get it, either.”

      “What’s that?”

      “How you could be our uncle—our only uncle, but we never met you. Not ever.” Her mouth flattened. “Maybe we shouldn’t believe you.”

      He considered that. “But it’s true. Your dad and I were brothers. He was three years older than me. Let’s see... He had a great sense of humor, he could charm his way out of trouble and he was great at every sport he tried. He had a long scar on his left inner arm from when we were playing in your great-grandfather’s workshop. Did he ever tell you how it happened?”

      Her lower lip trembled. “He said his brother snapped a piece of wire at him.”

      Typical Rob. “No. He stretched out a coiled length of wire, planning to snap it at me. But he lost his grip on one end and it zinged back. He actually had to have eight stitches.”

      Her brows drew together. “He had a collie. What was its name?”

      “Radar.” Ethan smiled. “I’m glad to see you’re such a smart girl. It’s good to be cautious with someone you don’t know.”

      She turned to give him a long look. “You don’t look like my dad. And—” The moment her gaze dropped to his right hand, her eyes filled with horror and she recoiled. “What is that?”

      Cole stopped brushing the pony and craned his neck for a better view. His mouth dropped open. “Wow.”

      Ethan had just gotten out of Ward 57—Amputee Alley—at Walter Reed a week ago, a place where the loss of his hand and damaged leg were minor compared to so many who had lost a great deal more. Compared to the three men in his platoon who had paid the ultimate price the day of the explosion.

      But seeing the kids gawk at his missing hand reminded him that he would always be different in this civilian world. And to them, he might even seem scary.

      “I was in Iraq. An insurgent lobbed a grenade into the back of our transport vehicle. I lost my hand.” He flexed the fingers, demonstrating the dexterity