when she’d tripped in the equipment shed weeks ago, on the field trip, she hadn’t really gotten too rattled.
“What did you think?” he asked, finally turning to look at her.
“I thought you didn’t want to tell Hailey about us.”
“It’s not that I don’t want to,” he said, a sigh filling his whole soul. “It’s just that there’s been so much changing in our lives recently. I’d like to give the dust some time to settle.”
“Mm.”
He didn’t like the sound of that, and he looked away from his food to focus on the woman. “What does that mean?”
Etta had no problem meeting his gaze, steadiness and confidence in hers. She reminded him so much of Josie that he blinked, and his late wife’s image superimposed over Etta’s.
“Tell me what you’re thinking,” she said. “So I don’t make any erroneous assumptions.”
“What would those be?” he asked.
“That you’re not really interested in me,” she said, looking away as her eyes dropped to her lap. When she looked up again, it was with a deep breath. “That you liked what you saw in the beginning, but you’re not sure now. That you’re embarrassed to be seen with me. That my family is too big for you, what with your two brothers and all.”
August could not form a response to all she’d said. “Etta,” he said, liking the shape of her name in his mouth. Before he could continue, the door behind him slammed open, and many voices came out onto the front porch.
“Just back up,” a man said.
“You are all not coming,” another said.
“Good luck with that,” a woman said.
“Hold my hand, Dot.”
“She’s my wife. I’ve got her.”
“Go get the truck, Ward.”
More clamoring, and August leaned forward and peered around the corner while Etta got to her feet. She strode away from him, a sense of surety in her step that once again fanned the sparks of desire into flames.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
“Dot’s water broke.”
“Ward’s taking her to the hospital.”
“Take Bear’s truck,” someone called.
August felt like the best place to be was right where he currently was, and he stayed out of the way. He quietly gathered up the plates, noting Etta had eaten some of the beans and left most of the chips. He popped a couple of them—his favorite ridged kind—into his mouth as he moved to the corner of the house to take in the complete scene.
No less than the fifteen hundred cousins had come out onto the porch, and most were following the very pregnant Dot Glover down the steps, still rattling off advice and calling for Bear to get his keys already.
August smiled at their camaraderie, and a powerful sense of missing out on something he hadn’t even known he wanted moved through him.
Etta turned back toward him, a panicked look on her face.
“Go,” he said, because he knew she’d want to go down to the hospital to meet her new niece. The children in the Glover family seemed to have carved a place in Etta’s heart, and she loved each and every one of them in a way August had never seen before.
Could she love Hailey like that too?
The thought perched in his mind, and it would not fly away. He wasn’t sure he wanted it to. He needed more time to examine it from every angle, and he wanted more time with this family to see how they treated Mitch, Lincoln, and the three foster children Cactus and Willa had brought to the family recently.
He had never once thought that he’d be able to find a woman who would love Hailey as their own. But he’d watched Etta with Lincoln and Mitch, neither of whom shared any blood with her whatsoever, and it had been clear to him that she loved them.
Everyone in the house had loved them. Sammy had brought Lincoln to her marriage with Bear and Willa had brought Mitch.
If they can make it work, maybe you can too.
The thought started out as a whisper, hardly there at all. But every moment since August had asked Sammy about the two teen boys, it had gotten louder and more prevalent in his mind.
Can I, Lord? he asked. Can I actually find someone to love who will love me for me, and love my daughter too? Be a real mother to her?
As Etta came back toward him, he had the very strong feeling that if anyone could easily step into the role of Hailey’s mother with absolute authenticity, it would be Etta Glover.
You can’t like her