Barb Han - Cornered At Christmas

The one-hour drive into Fort Worth had been smooth and the twins had slept most of the way. But the two were wide-awake now and taking in the scenery as he pushed their stroller onto the center of the medical plaza. A maze of buildings surrounded them and there was a memorial fountain that was catching the twins’ attention in the center of the complex. Mitch stopped in front of the three-story glass-walled structure attached to the hospital in the state-of-the-art building that contained the doctor his wife had handpicked for their babies.

“She’s going to be okay, Mitch. You know that, right?” Amber said, and he could hear the concern in her voice even though she tried to mask it.

“There’s every reason to hope based on the last couple of appointments,” he responded. The last eleven months without Kimberly had been hell. Mitch Kent missed his wife. He missed the way her hair smelled like freshly cut lilies when she would curl into the crook of his arm every night in bed. He missed the feel of her warm body pressed to his, long into the night. The easy way they had with each other, talking until the sun came up. And he missed coming home to her smile every night after a long day of working his family’s cattle ranch. Losing her had damn near shattered him.

First his mother, followed by his father. Then his wife. He’d lost so much.

Mitch realized he was still tightly gripping the stroller with his left hand. He flexed and released his fingers to get the blood flowing again.

“Those babies couldn’t have asked for a better father.” With five rough-and-tumble brothers, Amber was the emotional voice of the Kent brood.

“They need their mother.” There were more times than Mitch could count that he’d wished his wife was still alive. They might have dated only a few months before tying the knot, but he’d fallen hard. When a man met the woman he was supposed to spend the rest of his life with, he knew it. Hers had been cut way too short. “I’m glad they have you.”

“Good. Because I’m not going anywhere. Call me Super Aunt.” He could tell she was getting emotional based on the change in her tone and the lame attempt at humor.

“Sounds like a plan.” He went with it.

“And don’t forget Amy.” She was referring to their cousin. Amber and Amy were close in age, and both were mostly sweet with wild streaks that got them in trouble from time to time. Both had hearts of gold, and he couldn’t have asked for better women to be in his twins’ lives.

“Call or text the minute you get word.” Amber made him promise.

“I will,” he said before ending the call.

Mitch would learn today if his daughter, born two minutes after his son and almost two pounds lighter, was in the clear. In the best-case scenario, the small hole in the wall that separated the two lower chambers of Rea’s heart was still too small to cause any serious damage, like overworking her heart and lungs or sending blood flowing in the wrong direction. Mitch blocked out another possibility. The one that involved a lot of medical jargon, some kind of fabric patch and cracking open the center of his baby girl’s chest.

The appointment last month had gone off without a hitch. The doctor had said he was encouraged by what he heard when he listened to her chest. All signs were pointing toward good news. But doing any of this without his Kimberly seemed wrong. Then again everything that had happened in the past eleven months since her devastating car crash had been all wrong.

An all-consuming fist of guilt took another punch at him for not stopping her from walking out the door that day with her car keys in hand. For the sake of his children, he pushed the unproductive emotion aside. Reliving hell didn’t ease the burns.

His courtship with Kimberly might’ve been a whirlwind but his feelings for his wife were anything but a passing storm. He’d known her barely two months before popping the question, which had surprised him even more than his siblings. They’d gone along with the wedding without protest after meeting Kimberly and seeing the two of them together. And they’d stood by his side on that cold rainy day when he’d first heard about the crash.

Mitch rubbed the scruff on his chin and blinked his blurry eyes, forcing back the barrage of thoughts racing through him. Letting his mind run wild wouldn’t bring his wife back.

Exhaustion had thrown him off today. He gave himself a mental slap to shake off the bad mood.

He needed more caffeine.

Sleep and twins went together about as well as hot sauce and ice cream, and Mitch was beginning to feel the effects of being up for most of the night with the kiddos. Both were teething, which pretty much meant drippy chins.

The sounds of his daughter’s babbling floated on top of the heavy fall air. He’d insisted on naming their little girl after her mother, but Kimberly had argued against it. They’d finally agreed on Andrea if she could go by Rea instead—Aaron and Andrea. Of course, he’d take back every disagreement if he could get back that last day with her and tell her to stay home instead of walking her out the door, handing her the car keys and telling her how much she needed a break.

Rea was growing into a talker. Mitch had no idea what the little tyke was saying, but that didn’t stop his daughter from prattling on and on. Both he and Kimberly were quiet people, so he wasn’t sure how his daughter had gotten the trait. Aaron was the silent one. He’d pick something up and examine it rather than chuck it across the room. Mitch had a babbler and a thinker.

Mitch thought about the labels he’d picked up in the past two years. Ranch owner. Husband. Father. Widower.

The worst part about being the latter—aside from the sobering fact that he’d lost the only woman he could ever love—was the cursed feeling that Kimberly was somehow still alive.

Granted, her body was never found. But Mitch’s other cousin, Sheriff Zachary McWilliams, had assured him that there was no way she’d survived the accident. The car, her car, had been pulled out of the ravine with barely half a windshield. Based on estimates, she’d shot out of the driver’s side like a cannon and ejected some twenty-five feet across the water before sinking. The official search had lasted six days. Flash floods and more severe storms had complicated the effort, and her body had most likely been swept away. Extra divers had volunteered to work on their days off once word had gotten around that Mitch Kent’s wife had been involved in a terrible accident. But getting a late start because of worsening conditions had meant recovering a body was less likely.

He’d requested privacy from the media, which was something he was certain his wife would’ve wanted. Zach had also assured him that it would minimize the number of crackpots coming out of the woodwork, trying to get a piece of the Kent fortune. Mostly he’d done it for his wife. She’d insisted on staying out of the spotlight. The family attorney, Harley Durant, had kept the entire story limited to a blurb on the last page of the Fort Worth Star Telegram . Harley knew how to move mountains. He also knew how to keep a secret, and he had enough connections to back it up.

Since losing Dad and inheriting the cattle ranch with his five siblings two years ago, Mitch had been getting a good feel for running the place, and that was in large part due to Harley. So far Mitch was the only one living on the land full-time, but construction was planned or in process for the others to join him on the property with homes of their own.

It had been him and his wife living on the ranch up until now. Mitch still half expected her to walk through the front door.

He’d been told by a well-meaning aunt that he couldn’t expect closure because her body had never been found. The same person had encouraged him to join a support group and find a way to move on. Mitch didn’t especially believe in that mumbo jumbo. It was most likely the fact that Rea’s eyes and thick black hair made her look more like her mother every day. Both twins reminded him of Kimberly. And maybe that was the reason he saw her everywhere.