blame for this,” Noah whispered as he passed the sign welcoming him to Fairfield, Texas, population 2,951. “You were rooted in the army, but the only roots you gave me was Miss Janie’s place. In my mind, that was going home. I’ve had wings but no roots, Dad. At thirty-one, I’m ready to stop chasing my passion and settle down to it.”
You will join the army when you finish college. His father’s last words when he and Noah’s mother left him at the university came back to haunt him. Maybe if he had done what the General wanted him to do, he would have put down roots in the army and this feeling of dread wouldn’t be getting heavier with every mile.
He pretended he was in court and had to defend the feeling in his heart. The dread was not because he was going back to Birthright, but it had to do with the fact he would be watching the only living relative he had left die by degrees. She might not even know him by the time she’d drawn her last breath. That was the sorry culprit taking away his happiness over going home.
You always were too soft for your own good. The General’s words popped into his head again. I’ve been gone too much to make a man out of you, but the army will take care of that, and then I can be proud of you.
“The only person ever proud of me was Miss Janie,” he muttered. “She came to my college graduation, encouraged me to get my law degree, stood by me through bad times as well as the good ones. She’s told me more than once to follow my dreams, even if they changed by the week.”
The chains holding back his happiness began to loosen as he got closer to Birthright, and by the time he’d pulled into the driveway, he was whistling. Miss Janie was sitting on the porch swing, and she got up, shuffled over to the top of the stairs, and held out her arms for a hug.
Noah was home.
He walked into her arms, and peace filled his whole being when she hugged him. No matter what happened in the next few months, he could face it, because this was where he belonged.
“I’m so glad you are home. I can rest easy now,” she said. “Your first job is to find Teresa and Kayla. I need to see them before I die.”
“I’ll do my best,” Noah promised, but he sure didn’t look forward to bringing Miss Janie’s two foster daughters back into the house after the way they had left and never even returned for a short visit.
“I have faith in you.” She rolled up on her toes and kissed him on the cheek.
Yawning as she left a patient’s room, Teresa Mendoza started down the hall to make sure Opal Cunningham hadn’t kicked her covers off. The poor old dear’s feet got cold in the night, so Teresa always looked in on her right before she clocked out.
She would be off from the nursing home for two whole days, stuck in her boring, tiny one-bedroom apartment unless they called her to work overtime—better to take any shift they offered her.
She had reached the end of the hallway and was in the lobby when she heard someone knocking on the glass entry door. When she turned around to see who in the world wanted to come visit patients at almost eleven o’clock at night, she froze. Exhaustion had her seeing things. That could not be Noah Jackson.
Evidently, he knew she was staring at him because he kept pointing at the door. She blinked several times and then rubbed her eyes, but he didn’t disappear. He had grown from a lanky boy into a tall, broad-shouldered man with the same piercing blue eyes and jet-black hair. She felt like she was in one of those dreams that move in slow motion as she crossed the floor and punched in the code so he could come in out of the hot Texas air.
“Teresa, I found you.” He grinned.
“What are you doing here?” Her voice sounded flat even to her own ears. “Why were you looking for me?”
“I need you to come back to Birthright and work for me,” he answered.
“Doing what? Working at the huge hospital or the fancy nursing home?” she smarted off.
Birthright had been nothing more than a rural community when she’d lived there with Miss Janie Jackson. The town couldn’t have grown