Renegade: A Taggart Brothers Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

have them sleep in a chilly house or trip on those loose boards.”
    “I’ve got about an hour before I have to meet with one of my cow-cutting sponsors, so I’ll do what I can. We’d be better off tearing the whole stoop down and building her a new one before she gets back. But I’ll see it holds together for a day or two.”
    “Thanks, Bode.”
    As soon as he’d terminated the call, Jace punched in the number of one of his hired hands. The door to the elevator opened and he stepped into the hall just as the boy answered.
    “Jace! What’s up?”
    “Hey, Tyson. I know you worked with a mechanic for a couple of years. Do you have any experience with minivans? It’s a Buick or a Chrysler, I think.”
    “A bit.”
    “Before you hit the fields tomorrow, drop by Annie’s and have a look at the van parked out front. Annie has visitors and their vehicle died at the door.”
    “I’m in the area. I’ll take a look at it right now and call you back.”
    “I appreciate it.”
    “No problem.”
    Now that the most important details had been seen to, Jace strode in the direction of the cafeteria. He wasn’t sure when Bronte and her kids had last eaten, but he could grab them something to drink and a snack. Sodas and coffee. No, tea. Bronte Cupacek looked like the sort who would drink tea. An herbal tea. Especially this late at night. Maybe after a visit with her grandmother and a sip or two of something warm and soothing, some of the tension would ease from her frame.
    Jace didn’t bother to examine why it was so important to him to provide that tiny gesture of comfort—or why he found himself so affected by the shadows in her eyes.
    He was being neighborly, that was all.

T HREE

    B RONTE had never liked hospitals—probably due to an emergency appendectomy when she was six. The scents of antiseptic and misery seemed to hang over her like the thunderclouds outside, but she pushed the sensation away. This wasn’t about her. It was about Grandma Annie being hurt and alone without any of her family even knowing what had occurred.
    Why hadn’t Annie arranged to call one of them after her fall?
    But then, Bronte realized Annie had probably been frightened and in pain, unable to notify anyone. Even if she’d been coherent enough, that wasn’t Grandma Annie’s style. She was fiercely independent; any show of weakness was a cardinal sin. Only once had Bronte’s father suggested to Annie that she should move to a retirement home. Drawing herself up to full height, she’d demanded that James Ellis stay out of her affairs. She could take care of the farm herself, and if she couldn’t . . . well, she could always “hire a boy to do it.”
    Bronte couldn’t help smiling as Grandma’s familiarmotto rang in her ear. But the smile faded when Bronte realized that Annie had found a “boy” to help her. Jace Taggart. And there was nothing “boyish” about him.
    The nurse stopped in front of a striped curtain. Perhaps the designer had believed the muted shades of orange, gray, and beige would be soothing. To Bronte, they were simply a reflection of the storm outside and her own muddy fears.
    “Remember, fifteen minutes at the most. She’s being kept sedated, so she might not even realize that you’re here.”
    Bronte nodded. Gripping her shoulder bag more tightly, she ducked through the curtain.
    Once on the other side, she stutter-stepped to a halt, her eyes clinging to the tiny figure that barely managed to fill out the blankets.
    Her grandmother was thin, so thin. It had been a good five years since Bronte had seen her last, and in that time, Annie seemed to have shrunk to a miniature version of the robust woman she’d once been. Her hair had turned white and wispy, so baby fine that the pink of her scalp showed through. An arm wrapped heavily in bandages was propped up on a pillow. The other lay across her chest, and fingers twisted with arthritis gripped the blankets with bird-like digits draped in wrinkled