Buch lesen: «Twins For The Soldier»

Chapter One

Leland Wolfe Remington maneuvered off the county road and headed home to Wickham Falls, West Virginia. It had been a long time since he’d thought of The Falls as home. And it was the first time in twelve years that he had returned as a civilian.

Lee doubted whether he would’ve come back if his sister hadn’t called him to reveal that she’d had to close down the family-owned boardinghouse after her live-in boyfriend had swindled her out of her inheritance. Not only was she facing the possibility of the house being seized by the county because of delinquent property taxes, but she was also being sued for large purchases she’d never authorized. The latest love of her life had stolen her identity, and she was facing bankruptcy. It had been on the tip of his tongue to tell her she was too trusting, that she loved with her heart and not her head, but he’d nearly lost his composure as he heard his sister sobbing while she begged him to come back to The Falls to help her reopen the boardinghouse. It was all she had left of their mother’s family legacy.

Decelerating, he became a sightseer in a place of which he had good and bad memories. It was the bad ones that had sent him fleeing as soon as he graduated high school, vowing never to come back to live.

His foot hit the brake, and he came to a complete stop when he saw the tall, slender woman walking toward a minivan parked in front of the house where his best friend, Justin Mitchell, had grown up. Galvanized into action, Lee shut off the engine, exited his Jeep Grand Cherokee and waved to the woman shading her eyes with one hand as she held her son’s with the other.

“Have I changed that much that you don’t recognize me?” he teased as he closed the distance between them.

Angela Banks-Mitchell’s jaw dropped. “Lee Remington?”

“In the flesh,” he said, smiling.

Lee met the curious eyes of the small boy who was a mirror image of his late father. He had inherited Justin’s taupe-brown complexion, light brown eyes and curly hair. Malcolm and his twin sister weren’t born when Justin had lost his life while on patrol in Afghanistan. Lee had just graduated US Army Ranger School when Angela sent him a text message about Justin. He had gone to his commanding officer and requested bereavement leave to attend a fallen soldier’s funeral, and returned to Wickham Falls to stand in as a pallbearer for his friend. Since that time, he hadn’t been back to his hometown—until now.

“There were rumors that you were coming back last year. Apparently, you changed your mind,” Angela said.

Angela’s mellifluous voice shattered his reverie. Wide-set eyes in a round face the color of whipped mousse held him spellbound. Her delicate features, long legs that seemed to go on forever and waif-thin figure had made her a much-sought-after model even before she graduated high school. Fashion designers were falling over themselves to get her to wear their haute couture, and her agent, who was known to be as unscrupulous as he was skilled in negotiating Angela’s meteoric rise as a supermodel, had proved profitable for both of them. She had earned the sobriquet of “America’s Naomi Campbell.” Lee always felt as if he had lost her twice: once to Justin, and the other time to the glamorous world of high fashion modeling.

The years had been more than kind to Angela. Her face had remained as beautiful as ever, while her body had filled out with womanly curves.

He rested a hand on her shoulder. If the child hadn’t been there, Lee would have kissed her cheek. He noted that although her mouth was smiling it wasn’t the same with her eyes. There was sadness in the depths of those slanting, dark brown orbs that was a reminder of the loss of her husband and the father of her children.

He wanted to tell Angela he hadn’t changed his mind, but that at the time he had been deployed for three months. She waved her left hand and his gaze was drawn to her fingers. Although widowed, she had taken off her rings.

“Believe it now, because I am back.” Lee felt a modicum of guilt that he hadn’t kept in touch with her following Justin’s funeral.

“How long are you staying?” she asked.

Lee dropped his hand. “I’m not sure.” His sister had asked him to come back last spring, but he’d had to decline her request. He wasn’t able to tell her he’d been assigned to raids in the Middle East and then subsequently to a war-torn African country.

“One month? Two months?”

Lee stared down at the toes of his military-issued boots before his head popped up. “It’s indefinite.” He didn’t tell her he had given himself a timeline of a year to get the boardinghouse up and running again before reenlisting.

“You left the army?”

He angled his head. Angela had asked him a question he knew would be repeated over and over by those living in The Falls. “I have, for now.”

“But—but—I thought you were going to be a lifer,” Angela stuttered.

A wry smile twisted Lee’s mouth. “Life has a way of changing the best-laid plans,” he drawled. The instant the words were out he regretted them. “I’m sorry about that.”

Angela shook her head. “There’s no need to apologize, Lee. The plans we made when we were teenagers no longer apply.”

He nodded. She was right. He, Angela and Justin had written down one wish for what they wanted for their futures the year they’d celebrated their sixteenth birthdays, put the lists in a sealed envelope with the proviso they would open it a day before their high school graduation. Lee had fulfilled his wish to join the military and Angela had had her wish to have a successful modeling career. But it was Justin who had deviated from his goal of becoming a doctor by dropping out of medical school after a year to enlist in the Marines.

His gaze went to the little boy staring up at him. “Hello, buddy.”

A slight frown appeared between the child’s clear brown eyes. “I’m no buddy. My name is Malcolm.”

A wide grin parted Lee’s lips. “I guess he told me,” he said sotto voce.

Angela stared at her son. Her children were quite outspoken, a trait that annoyed her old-school mother-in-law who believed that children should be seen and not heard. “Malcolm, please say hello to Mr. Lee.”

Malcolm blinked slowly. “Hello, Mr. Lee.”

Lee hunkered down to Malcolm’s height and extended his hand. “It’s nice meeting you, Malcolm.” The child took his hand.

“Me, too,” the child said, as a hint of a smile played at the corners of his mouth.

Angela glanced at Lee. The last time she saw him was at her husband’s funeral, and the first thing she’d noticed was his gaunt appearance. When she’d asked him if he had been sick he’d admitted he’d just completed the requirements to become an army ranger, and had lost nearly forty pounds during the extremely intense sixty-one-day combat leadership course. It was apparent he had not only regained the weight but had also developed a lot of muscle, as evidenced by the bulging biceps in the rolled-up sleeves of his fatigues.

Lee was tall, standing six-three, and his striking good looks turned heads whenever he entered a room. The genes he had inherited from his mixed-race African American-and-Cherokee father and white mother had given him a light brown complexion, raven-black wavy hair and blue-gray eyes. The girls at their high school had labeled him tall, dark and dangerous—his good looks, combined with his father’s criminal reputation, made him seem particularly lethal in the eyes of their parents, who warned them to stay away from him. Like father, like son, she’d heard people say.

But she’d known firsthand that Lee would never dabble in drugs—he’d witnessed how it had nearly destroyed his family. Even when a lot of boys were smoking marijuana, drinking or popping pills, Lee was always an outsider, and she didn’t know if it had something to do with his father’s drug addiction.

He now stood straight, and her eyes met his as she recalled his question if he’d changed much. At first glance Angela would’ve said he hadn’t. But upon a closer look she saw things that hadn’t been apparent during their last encounter. There was a network of fine lines around his eyes, and the stubble on his lean face, with its high cheekbones and sharp features, enhanced his overt masculinity. His hair grazed his jawline, and at the age of thirty, there was no hint of boyishness left in her friend.

“Where’s your daughter?” Lee asked.

“Zoe is inside with Lee’s mother. Malcolm and I have a dental appointment.”

Lee inclined his head. “I’m not going to keep you. Whenever you’re free, give me a call so we can catch up.”

Angela nodded. There was so much she wanted to tell Lee about the things that had happened since they last saw each other. The year before she’d been hired as the receptionist at a local medical clinic and then promoted to office manager. “Once you’re settled in, I’d like you and your sister to come by for Sunday dinner one of these days. I don’t know if Vivi told you, but I sold my house and moved in with my mother-in-law a couple of months before the twins were born.”

He shook his head and smiled. “No, she didn’t. I’m not going anywhere for a while, so I’m really looking forward to getting together.”

Angela returned his smile with a bright one of her own. “I’d love to stay and chat, but I have to get going or I’ll be late for our appointment.” She paused. “I’m glad you’re home.”

A beat passed before Lee said, “Me, too.”

Lee watched as Angela settled Malcolm in a car seat in the second row of the late-model minivan. It may have been years since their last encounter, but time hadn’t changed how he felt about his best friend’s widow. He’d just celebrated his fifteenth birthday when he first entertained romantic feelings about the girl who told him she loved him like a brother. However, his thoughts about her were anything but brotherly, and he made certain never to cross the line to act on his fantasies. Now, fast-forward more than a decade, Lee realized his feelings for Angela hadn’t changed. He still liked her for more than friendship. There were countless times when he cursed his reticence to let her know how he felt, once Justin confessed that he and Angela had slept together two weeks before their high school graduation. And this revelation told him she was lost to him forever. Although they’d promised to stay in touch with one another, he, Justin and Angela took different paths. Lee had immersed himself in all things military. Justin had concentrated on a pre-med curriculum at college, while Angela had taken the world of high fashion modeling by storm.

Their paths did not cross whenever he returned to The Falls for family business. The only contact was an occasional email or instant message with a cursory update as to what was going on in their lives. Lee was shocked when Justin told him he’d dropped out of med school to join the Corps. When he questioned his friend about not following his dream to become a doctor, Justin had said going into medicine had been his mother’s wish.

Lee pulled his thoughts back to the present as he clamped his teeth together and watched the taillights of Angela’s vehicle turn the corner and disappear. He silently berated himself for not staying more closely connected to the two people who hadn’t judged him because he was Emory Remington’s boy.

To the men in his unit he was known as Sergeant Remington or “Wolf,” but to those in Wickham Falls he was a descendant of the infamous Wolfes who at one time owned most of the coal mines in Johnson County and were notorious for the exploitation of their workers. Although many of the mines had been closed for more than thirty years, Lee could not escape the stigma attached to his family’s name. And despite having married a Remington, his mother had continued the family tradition that male descendants who did not carry Wolfe as their surname would have it as a middle name.

Lee exhaled an audible breath. Well, he was back in Wickham Falls, not for a few days or even a week, but close to a year. He would take the time allowed him before reenlisting to rejoin his fellow rangers.

Five minutes later, Lee turned into the driveway leading to The Falls House. For years it had been known as Wolfe Hall, but when it went from being a family residence to a boardinghouse his Aunt Babs changed the name. The century-old structure, designed in the architectural style of the antebellum South, bore noticeable signs of disrepair. Several shutters had come loose from their fastenings, and what had been touted as the finest residence in Johnson County appeared to be an eyesore to Lee. Although the ten-bedroom, twelve-bath mansion was constructed during the Victorian period, Hiram Wolfe’s new bride had insisted it resemble her ancestral home in Beaufort, South Carolina.

Lee parked near two carriage houses turned guesthouses that also needed fresh coats of white paint. Repairs weren’t at the top of his to-do list, though sitting down with his sister—to ascertain how much money she needed to hold on to the property—was.

Getting out of the car and walking around to the front of the three-story dwelling, Lee rang the doorbell. The keys to the house were in his backpack. He didn’t have to wait long for the door to open. The smile parting his lips faded quickly when he saw firsthand the effects of the strain of his sister’s current ordeal. There were dark circles under large toffee-colored eyes, and her tawny face was a lot slimmer, almost emaciated, surrounded by a cloud of black curls falling to narrow shoulders.

He extended his arms and wasn’t disappointed when she came into his embrace. Lee rested his chin on the top of her head as she cried without making a sound; he massaged her back in a comforting gesture and waited for her to compose herself.

“You came.” Viviana sniffled against his chest.

Lee smiled. “I promised you I’d come.”

Leaning back, she stared up at him. Looking at his sister brought back memories of when they’d stood outside their mother’s bedroom comforting each other after the doctor informed them that Annette Remington had passed away in her sleep. Even though he had been told that his mother was terminally ill, Lee at nine had not understood or believed she wouldn’t be there for him and Viviana. The reality of losing one parent was compounded by the absence of his father. Emory Remington had been arrested, convicted and sentenced to five years in jail for the robbery of a convenience store to get the money he needed to pay his drug dealer. Lee would never forget the shame of his father being escorted to his mother’s funeral in handcuffs and shackles by US marshals. Although it was a private service, with only family and close friends in attendance, word had still got out that the deceased’s husband wasn’t permitted to sit with his children, but was sandwiched between two federal police officers at the back of the church.

“I’m so sorry I put you through this,” Viviana said, as a new wave of tears filled her eyes.

Reaching into the pocket of his fatigues, Lee took out a handkerchief and dabbed her face. He had promised his mother he would always take care of his younger sister, and he would. “Stop beating yourself up, Vivi. I’ll pay the back taxes, and once that’s done we’ll sit down together and figure out whatever else you have to pay off.”

Viviana took the handkerchief and blew her nose. “That scammer stole my identity and ran up thousands of dollars of debt, which has ruined my credit. I barely have enough money to keep the lights on.”

Lee stared over his sister’s head. Seeing a woman cry was his Achilles’ heel. There were times when he’d snuck into his mother’s bedroom to find her in tears. The sight had rendered him motionless when she cried without making a sound. He didn’t know if it was because she was in pain, or because she was rapidly facing mortality and knew she wouldn’t live long enough to see her children grow to adulthood.

Cradling Viviana’s face in his hands, he angled his head. “Haven’t I always promised to take care of you?” She nodded and smiled through her tears. “Then I want you to believe me when I say you’re not going to lose the house or walk around in the dark. Give me a few days to get acclimated and then we’re going to sit together to figure how to get you back on your feet. And even though the house is yours, I’m going to make a few suggestions about not reopening it as a boardinghouse again.”

Viviana smiled through her tears. “What are you talking about?”

Lee pressed a kiss to her forehead. “No hints. We’ll discuss it after we straighten out our financial dilemma.”

She blinked slowly. “Our dilemma, Lee?” she questioned. “It’s not about your or ours, but my dilemma. It was me who let some slimeball sweet-talk me to where I trusted him so much that I believed everything that came out of his corrupted mouth until it was too late. I—”

“Enough!” Lee said gently. The single word, although spoken quietly, had the same impact as if he’d shouted. “We’re not going to talk about your so-called friend ever again. He’s your past and will remain that. I’m back to help you look ahead and rebuild what you feel you’ve lost. The house is still standing and with a few repairs it will be back in business, good as new.”

“That’s what I told her.”

Lee went completely still when he heard a voice he’d almost forgotten. Turning slowly, he stared at the person he hadn’t thought he would ever see again. It had been at least twenty years since he and Emory Remington had come face-to-face, and those encounters were branded in his mind like a tattoo.

Even before and after serving his sentence for armed robbery and finishing his parole, Emory would show up without warning and stay for a week or two. Whenever he came, Viviana was like a kid in a toy shop, laughing with delight that her father was back, but for Lee it was different. They barely exchanged more than a dozen words, and it always was as if he was waiting for the other shoe to drop and he’d wake up to find his father gone. And only when his father left had he allowed himself to relax. It was if Emory had a restless spirit that wouldn’t permit him to stay in one place too long. There were so many things he wanted to say to Emory and most of them weren’t good, but his upbringing wouldn’t permit him to openly verbalize those thoughts.

Emory was only fifty-one, but appeared much older. It wasn’t just the snow-white ponytail or the lines around his brown eyes, but the obvious weariness in his nut-brown face that was probably the result of years of drug use coupled with incarceration. What hadn’t changed was his slender physique and the ramrod-straight posture of a former marine.

A muscle twitched in Lee’s jaw. “What are you doing here?”

Viviana reached for Lee’s hand, her fingernails biting into his palm. “Please, Lee, don’t start with him. If you want I’ll have Daddy move into one of the guesthouses.”

Lee glared at his sister. If she had told him Emory was staying with her he would’ve been more than prepared to see the man again. “Don’t. It looks as if I’m the intruder here. I’ll check in to the Heritage House extended-stay motel off the interstate.”

“Lee, please stay,” Viviana pleaded.

He forced a smile he didn’t feel. “It’s okay, Vivi. I need some time alone to get used to civilian life again. Call me when you get all of your paperwork together. Check every place in the house where your ex-boyfriend could’ve hidden receipts from you.”

That said, he turned on his heel and walked out. He returned to his jeep and backed out of the driveway. It took every ounce of self-control not to say all of the things he’d wanted to say to the man who was his father. For years he’d rehearsed the words he would tell Emory Remington to let him know just how he felt about him. However, time and maturity had changed him to a point where he now rarely thought of the man or how his absence had emotionally scarred him. He had lost his mother, while his father had abandoned his wife, son and daughter.

Lee had discussed his fears and apprehensions with the army psychiatrist, and those sessions had helped him see things in a whole new light. The doctor had pointed out that if his father had been killed in combat the result would’ve been the same: Emory would not have been there for his wife or his children. It took a number of sessions for him to realize there were different forms of loss and abandonment.

As much as he wanted to come home to help his sister, something had him dreading his decision. There were things about his hometown that wouldn’t permit him to feel completely comfortable living there again. It had been people with long memories dredging up stories about how immoral the Wolfes had been to their employees, how they’d preferred shutting down the mines and putting people out of work rather than improving safety conditions. Then there was the gossip about his mother breaking her engagement to a boy from a good family to elope with Emory, an aspiring artist, who got a job as a sign maker while he painted in his spare time.

Lee drove onto the county road leading to the interstate. He had wanted to yell at Viviana for not warning him that Emory was back and living with her, but that wouldn’t have solved anything. His sister was already emotionally drained, having allowed a man to take advantage of her kindness and generosity, and arguing with her would only acerbate her more about her predicament.

A wry smile twisted Lee’s mouth when he thought of how his sister’s life had paralleled their mother’s. Both had fallen in love with men who had not only disappointed them, but had also broken their hearts.