Forever His Bride by LISA CHILDS Page B

apart. Nick and I were just teenagers at the time. He didn’t know how to help his brother, and then it was too late.”
    “He killed himself?”
    Josh pushed his hand through his hair. “Let’s say it was a deliberate accident.”
    Her green eyes widened. “Oh, my God. That’s awful…”
    Josh appreciated her reaction. Then he noticed the way she stared at him, as if wondering whether he might do the same.
    “I’m fine,” he assured her, although he was getting sick of having to make the claim. He thought about proving it to her, that he hadn’t loved her friend and that he wasn’t brokenhearted. He reached out, as he had last night, sliding his fingers across the silky skin of her cheek. He’d eaten more than one cinnamon roll, but still he was hungry—for her.
    Her breath audibly caught. “Josh…”
    She’d run from him last night, like every other woman he’d cared about or thought he might have cared about. It was better that she thought he was in love with Molly then maybe he wouldn’t fall in love with her. He pulled his hand away from her face and lifted his fingers to his lips as if licking away frosting. “The boys iced you, like the cinnamon rolls.”
    Brenna nodded, but Josh doubted she bought his claim about the icing—or about being fine.
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Chapter Six
    “He’s fine,” Brenna assured herself as she helped her mother carry brunch to the table. No matter that they’d had cinnamon rolls earlier that morning, Sunday brunch was mandatory. No one missed a meal at the Kelly house.
    “He is,” Mama agreed, pausing to press her cheek against her daughter’s head as she set out sausage gravy to go with the flaky buttermilk rolls that Brenna had just pulled from the oven. “I don’t understand what Molly was thinking,” the older woman said as she stared out the sliding doors. Like Brenna, her attention was focused on the backyard, where Josh wrestled with his boys.
    Brenna nodded, equally puzzled.
    “Mary McClintock called earlier today,” Mama said as she backed away from the table toward the island in the middle of the industrial-sized kitchen. While they’d kept the rest of the house true to the Victorian era, they’d modernized the kitchen, installing commercial-quality stainless-steel appliances, granite countertops and cherry cabinets.
    “Did she talk to Molly?” Brenna asked. If she were Molly, she would have called her mother—right after she called her best friend. But despite having known her longer and being college roommates, Molly wasn’t as close to Brenna as she was to Eric South. Probably especially now—physically, at least.
    “She didn’t say,” her mother replied, her gaze not quite meeting Brenna’s. “She called to check on her almost-son-in-law and the boys. She wanted to make sure everything was all right over here.”
    “She offered to put them up at her house, didn’t she?” Brenna deduced from her mother’s evasiveness.
    Mama waved a hand, dismissing the idea. “That would be silly. They’d be stacked on top of each other over there, with Abby and Lara staying, along with Mary’s own kids.”
    Just fourteen-year-old Rory and twenty-three-year-old Colleen. Clayton had his own place in town above his father’s old insurance agency, which was his now.
    “Abby’s staying in Cloverville?” Brenna asked after the friend who’d spent the past eight years between Detroit and Chicago. Like Brenna, Abby loved business. She’d started her own firm from the ground up—Temps To Go, a specialized employment agency. “She and Lara are moving home? Cloverville would be a great place for the next branch of Abby’s business.”
    Mama held up a hand to restrain Brenna’s enthusiasm. “Abby claims she’s just staying until she’s sure Molly’s okay. But if Mary has her way, Abby and that adorable daughter of hers will be home for good.”
    Brenna narrowed her eyes at her mother’s odd tone. Was she planning to play matchmaker, as