Redeeming Rafe by Alicia Hunter Pace Read Free Book Online Page A

Kincaid, whom Rafe had met in passing.
    “And a good thing, too,” Missy said. “If I had to wait on information from anyone else in this family, I might not have known about my new nieces until they graduated from high school.”
    “You do know, don’t you, that they’re not so much your nieces as your second cousins?” Rafe nodded to Lucy. “Lucy. Appreciate you coming.”
    “Lucy,” Jackson said, “Rafe’s going to be moving into a new room. He might want it spiffed up a little to suit him.”
    “Oh?” Lucy looked at Rafe. “I’ll be happy to take a look while I’m here. Have you thought about the changes you’d like to make?”
    Quicksand. He’d fallen in face first and was sinking fast.
    “I don’t need any decorating done. I’m fine right where I am. Ask Abby. She’s moved in somewhere around here. She might need some new curtains or a bedspread or something.”
    Lucy looked confused. “Okay. But why don’t we start with the room we know we’re going to decorate. I need to get some measurements, and I’ll get out of the way. I can see there’s a big project going on in here.” Lucy looked at the assorted crib pieces.
    “Big mess going on in here, more like it.” Sammy tightened some screws.
    “Did y’all read the directions?” Missy asked.
    “We don’t need directions,” Jackson said. “It’s intuitive.”
    “I can see that,” Emory said.
    “I have to see those precious babies,” Missy said. “Where are they, Rafe?”
    His head snapped up. “Uh … I don’t know.”
    Missy narrowed her eyes and cocked her head to one side. “You don’t know?”
    “Somewhere …” He looked around.
    “They’re with Abby in her room,” Emory said. “Across the hall.”
    Rafe followed Missy out of the room only because she seemed to expect him to.
    “Brace yourself,” he said. “They scream. A lot.”
    “All children scream a lot. From my experience, girls more than boys. I thought Beau was loud, but Lulu Bragg can raise any roof put over her.” Missy said. “Get used to it.”
    Not likely.
“I don’t know if I can.”
    “You should have thought about that.”
    “I keep hearing that,” Rafe said.
    “Listen.” Missy reached up and cupped his cheek. “All children are a blessing. No matter how they got here. You know you’re my favorite. I’m here for you and those girls.”
    Do you want them?
He bit the words back, but it wasn’t a bad idea. Missy and her husband, Harris, were great parents, and they were family. They could keep the babies safe from him.
    Jackson would kill him.
    “I’ll do my best to instill in them what it takes to be Homecoming queen,” Missy rattled on.
    “I don’t think they can both be Homecoming queen, since they’re the same age,” Rafe said idly. And then it hit him. They would still be here when they were seventeen—and twenty, thirty, and after. If he could keep them alive. He steadied himself on the wall and fought the nausea.
    “An exception could be made,” Missy said. “I’ll talk to the powers that be about it when the time comes. Besides, even if they don’t win, my training will serve them well. If you want to be Homecoming queen, you have to be nice to everybody.”
    Rafe wasn’t sure if she was kidding or not, so he didn’t say anything.
    Missy opened the door without knocking. She wasn’t given to knocking; never had been.
    Rafe braced himself for bedlam, but walked into perfect, ordered tranquility—and quiet.
    Abby’s boy and Bella/Alice One were lying asleep on a blanket on the floor, and Abby sat rocking Bella/Alice Two.
    “Oh!” Missy stared down at Bella/Alice One. “She’s beautiful.” She reached for the child, but stopped and looked at Abby. “May I? I know how to pick up a sleeping baby without waking her.”
    “Of course.” Abby smiled around Bella/Alice Two’s blond head.
    Rafe didn’t want to look at the baby. It was too hard. So he concentrated on Abby, which wasn’t hard at all. She had