Valerie Hansen - Family In Hiding

TILL DEATH DO US PART?

When her estranged husband Dylan’s inadvertent dealings with a crime ring bring danger to her doorstep, Grace McIntyre has no choice but to follow him into the witness protection program. To safeguard her children, they must all go into hiding as one big happy family. Grace doesn’t know what’s worse—having to pretend she’s in love with the man who betrayed her trust or keeping ahead of the killers. In hiding, Dylan is all that stands between their safety and certain death. Now more than ever, he wants to be the man that Grace once loved. Keeping his family alive is his only hope—to be a hero and a husband.

“You can either come with me and listen to what I have to say or get ready to be a widow.”

It took only minutes for Grace to get the entire family into the SUV. “Where are we going?” she asked.

“Someplace unusual. And public. Preferably with a crowd.”

“You’re scaring me, Dylan.”

“Good. That makes two of us.”

The Botanical Gardens, he thought. There were enough people to provide anonymity. And plenty of places to hide. Dylan sincerely hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

He looked over at his wife. Watching her, he could barely breathe. Look what he’d had—and let slip away. Grace was one of a kind. Of all the mistakes he’d made, losing her had been the worst.

Grace was a sensible woman. She’d see why his future—and hers—depended on the choices he was about to make.

Now wasn’t the time to reveal how much danger he was preparing to face. The less she knew about that, the safer she’d be.

* * *

VALERIE HANSEN

was thirty when she awoke to the presence of the Lord in her life and turned to Jesus. In the years that followed, she worked with young children, both in church and secular environments. She also raised a family of her own and played foster mother to a wide assortment of furred and feathered critters.

Married to her high school sweetheart, she now lives in an old farmhouse she and her husband renovated with their own hands. She loves to hike the wooded hills behind the house and reflect on the marvelous turn her life has taken. Not only is she privileged to reside among the loving, accepting folks in the breathtakingly beautiful Ozark mountains of Arkansas, she also gets to share her personal faith by telling the stories of her heart for all the Love Inspired Books lines.

Life doesn’t get much better than that!

Family in Hiding

Valerie Hansen

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.

—Mark 10:14

To my Joe, who will always be looking over my shoulder as I write.

He was an extraordinary gift from God.

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

EPILOGUE

DEAR READER

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

EXCERPT

ONE

“Hello? Hello?”

Disgusted, Grace McIntyre slammed down the receiver. “Not funny, Dylan.”

The annoying phone calls had been so prevalent lately she was thinking of changing her home number. If she hadn’t figured that the harassment was coming from her soon-to-be ex-husband, she might have already done so.

She stared out the kitchen window, wistfully watching their children playing in the sunny backyard. At ten, Kyle was the eldest and had clearly been asserting more dominance over his three-year-old brother, Brandon, since Dylan had packed his personal belongings and moved out of the family home for good.

“It wasn’t my fault,” Grace murmured, desperately yearning to convince herself she’d had no choice but to file for divorce once she’d discovered Dylan’s sinister character.

Her gaze rested on seven-year-old Beth, their middle child. The pretty little red-haired girl had grown so moody and weepy Grace was at a loss. Not that Beth was the only one shedding tears over the breakup of the McIntyre marriage. The difference was Grace had done her grieving in private, hoping to protect the children’s tender emotions.

“Apparently, I haven’t done a very good job,” she told herself with a sigh.

The estrangement had not been sudden. She and Dylan had been drifting apart for a long time before she’d felt the undeniable need to act. If the problem had been another woman in her husband’s life, Grace believed she could have coped. But it wasn’t. Dylan worshipped the god of money, of privilege, and would do anything to succeed, even if his actions meant others had to suffer—as she had sadly learned.

She dried her hands on a tea towel and turned from the window. Being personally neglected was nothing compared to facing the painful truth about her husband’s underhanded business practices. His lack of remorse over what he had done had revealed Dylan’s true colors and had broken her heart. The man was bright. Clever. There was no way he could have been handling the paperwork for shady adoptions and pushed through falsified documents without realizing exactly what was going on.

The aspect that had really thrown her was his easy admission of involvement. He’d acted as if he’d expected her to accept his actions as necessary and to be proud of him for bringing home hefty bonuses for bending the law. How could she have lived with that man for twelve years and have so totally misjudged him?

She blinked back tears and whirled as the back door slammed.

“Mom! Brandon’s eating dirt!” Kyle shouted. “Beth told him it was a cookie.”

“I did not.” Muddy hands fisted on her hips, the little girl stomped her foot. “I was just playing house. I didn’t know Brandon was going to eat anything I made.”

If Grace hadn’t been so downhearted to begin with, the scene of her two carrot-topped kids standing nose to freckled nose and trying to stare each other down would have made her laugh out loud. They had her stubborn streak, all right. And the twinkling blue eyes of many of their Irish ancestors. Add the McIntyre genes to that and you had a volatile genetic mixture.

Grace held up both hands. “Okay. Simmer down. Is Brandon still eating the dirt cookie?”

Beth shook her head. “No. I took it away from him.” She glared at her older brother.

The smirk on Kyle’s face reminded Grace of Dylan. Then again, pretty much everything did. The house they had spent a fortune remodeling was wonderful, yet not a day went by that she didn’t rue her failure to ask him how they could possibly afford all the expensive improvements.

“You two go wash your hands while I get the baby and clean him up. It’s almost lunchtime.”

“I want peanut butter and jelly,” Kyle said.

His sister made a face. “Ugh. That’s all you ever eat. No wonder your face looks like a peanut.”

“Does not!”

“Does so,” Beth countered.