Lisa Carter - The Bachelor's Unexpected Family

Her head throbbed. She rubbed her temples. Like father, like son? Her eyes flew open.

She refused to allow history to repeat itself. Not with her son. Not with the only person she had left.

Tucking the dog tags inside the collar of her pink shirt, she thrust open the screen door. The hinges screeched. She dashed down the concrete steps. The door slammed behind her. In dress flats for her morning meeting, she stalked across the grass toward the trees.

Sidestepping the bike, she followed a faded trail toward their very unwelcome neighbor. The overhanging tree canopy blocked most of the sunlight. She shivered and wrapped the open ends of her brown cardigan around herself.

February on the Eastern Shore of Virginia was much too cold to go outside without a coat. Knowing Gray, he was most likely in shirtsleeves.

She picked her way across the pine-needled footpath and emerged into a paved clearing to find the plane, wheels down, at the end of the runway. Engine roaring and propellers whirring, the pilot taxied the golden-yellow plane toward the terminal.

A metallic, tin-roofed hangar and a small brick building anchored the beginning of the runway. Beside the hangar, a sign—Wallace & Collier Crop Aviation Specialists.

Great. Just great. Somehow of all the houses for sale on the Delmarva Peninsula, she’d managed to buy the one next door to a barnstorming, daredevil crop duster.

Her teenage son waved at the plane as it rolled forward. But when he caught sight of her, his hand quickly dropped to his side.

“You got that right, buster. You’re in big trouble,” she muttered under her breath. And without stopping to think, she charged across the runway toward him. Gray’s eyes widened.

“Mom! Watch out. Get out of the way!”

Too late, she realized she’d stepped into the path of the oncoming plane. She froze. The sound of the propeller filled her ears.

Gray raced across the runway. Grabbing her arm, he yanked her out of the way. The pilot braked and swerved. The plane skidded as the wheels struggled for traction before finally shuddering to a stop.

Falling onto the grassy area, Gray took the brunt of the impact. But with the resilience of youth, he sprang to his feet.

She rose slowly, feeling every bit of her thirty-eight years. “Gray, honey, are you—”

“What were you thinking, Mom?” Hands on his skinny hips, he gestured to the plane. “Walking in front of a moving aircraft? Seriously?”

Shoving open the cockpit door, the pilot emerged. In jeans and work boots, his flannel shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows, he clambered out and dropped to the asphalt.

A baseball cap obscured the upper portion of his face. But there was no mistaking the taut anger whipstitching his mouth, nor his jutting jaw as he advanced. “What kind of idiot walks into the path of an airplane?” he yelled.

She bristled. Pilots, the same the world over. Civilian or military, lords of the universe. Or so they believed.

Gray’s mouth went mulish. “Thanks a lot, Mom. Now Canyon’s going to kick me out of here for good.”

“You have no business being here.” She wagged her finger in his face. “Not after we talked. We agreed.”

Why was Pax not here to help her parent Gray during the rebellious teen years?

Gray crossed his arms over his seen-better-days T-shirt. “You talked, Mom. I agreed to nothing.”

He widened his stance to hip width. An airman’s stance. Her breath hitched at the uncanny resemblance to his late father.

Kristina’s heart pounded at the memory of the last time she’d seen Pax—not knowing she’d never see him again. This couldn’t happen to Gray. Not to her only child.

“You don’t belong here, Gray.”

The infuriated pilot arrived at the tail end of her words. “You want to talk about having no business here, lady?”

She stiffened. “A mother has a right to keep her child out of harm’s way.”

“Only one in harm’s way today was me.” The pilot lifted the ball cap off his head and slapped it against his thigh. “After you almost crashed my plane.”

She took her first good look at her unwanted neighbor.

Late thirties. Classic, high cheekbones. A long Roman nose. His jaw dark with beard stubble. A strong brow. Curly brown hair.

His eyes flashed. An electric blue, in a face tanned by the sun and wind. Something fluttered like a swirl of butterfly wings in the pit of her stomach. Something she hadn’t experienced since meeting another brash young airman during a long-ago church softball game.

With a sense of betraying that now dead young man, remorse blanketed her. Her hand automatically drifted to the chain underneath her shirt collar. And she stuffed the unwelcome feelings into a dark corner of her heart. For good measure, she glowered at the Eastern Shore pilot.

At the motion of her hand, he narrowed his eyes. Lines crinkled the corners of his eyes. Lines that probably feathered when he smiled. Which he wasn’t doing now.

Handsome by anyone’s definition. And from his body language, as arrogant and cocky as they came. She ought to know.

Once upon a time, she’d married one.

* * *

Canyon didn’t miss the scorn on her face. Welcome to Kiptohanock to you, too, neighbor.

Not seeing a car in the office parking space, he figured she’d walked over through the woods from next door. Gray must take after his father. The boy’s dark features didn’t resemble the woman. She could’ve been a cover model for a Scandinavian travel brochure.

Or considering her frosty demeanor, Icelandic. Although, if he remembered rightly, Greenland was the one with most of the glaciers.

“Which one are you?” She flicked her hand toward the sign. “Wallace or Collier?”

“Collier.” He jerked his thumb in the direction of her house. “And which one are you?”

Her chin came up. “I’m the woman who would’ve never bought this property if I knew we were in the flight path of your crop duster.”

One of those genteel, upper-crust Southern voices. Not the nowhere accent of Northern Virginia. Nor the twang of the Blue Ridge. Probably from central Virginia or the Carolinas.

He tightened his jaw. “I’m an aerial application specialist. And I’ve been careful to not fly over your house.”

“Mom...” Gray tugged at her sleeve. “Stop embarrassing me. Canyon is my boss.”

She planted one hand on her jeans-clad hip. “As if I’d ever allow you to work for a sky jockey like him.”

Canyon’s eyebrows rose. Interesting turn of phrase. He hadn’t heard that one since his Coast Guard days.

“Especially after what happened to your father.”

Without meaning to, Canyon’s eyes cut to the bare space on her left hand. A widow? A silver chain half-hidden in the folds of her collar glinted. Had Gray’s father been an airline fatality?

As for his first impression of Gray’s mother? Tall, a willowy five foot eight, Canyon estimated, to his six-foot height. Long, wavy blond hair spilled over her thin shoulders. Classic oval features. Fair skinned. And her eyes?

Her eyes gave Canyon pause. His grandmother would’ve called her eyes china blue. Like the blue in a field of cornflowers.

Those eyes sent an inexplicable pang through his heart. A yearning for something to which he’d believed himself immune.

According to the real estate papers he’d signed at closing, this must be K. Montgomery. Since the attorney had handled everything, he’d assumed the new owner was a man and that Gray, who’d started hanging out at the airfield a few weeks ago, the man’s son. But the disturbing, angry woman was definitely not a man.

Canyon folded his arms across his chest. He’d sold his grandmother’s house to buy the Air Tractor 802 he just landed. Landed safely, no thanks to K. Montgomery. His misfortune to sell what little remained of his family heritage to an aircraft hater.