Special Delivery (Mountain Meadow Homecoming 1) Read Online Free PDF

toward him. He was busy, that was what mattered. Family would come. He just had to be patient. A vision of a pale face with vivid green eyes popped into his mind.
    Holly. She was just as thorny as her namesake. She was an attractive woman, even if it did look like pregnancy was draining her. What was she doing on her own? Where was the baby’s father? He’d like to ask her, but how the hell did you do that? Hey, Holly, I don’t see a ring on your finger. Are you divorced, or did you just walk out on the father-to-be? Worse still. What if she was a widow? Jake shuddered. Way too awkward. Besides, a ready-made family was hardly what he’d had in mind when he pictured kids running around his house, filling the bedrooms on the second and third floors.
    No use even going there. She’d made it plain she wanted nothing to do with him. Even as polite as she’d forced herself to be, he knew when he was being hustled out a door. It might be the uniform, but he doubted her wariness was all due to it. A world of hurt had lurked in those eyes.
    * * * *
    How could you end up on hold just trying to check your bank balance? Holly sighed as she switched the phone receiver to her other ear. She hadn’t even talked to a real person yet. Was the computer that busy? When the automated voice spit out her balance, she saw it matched the pittance recorded in her checkbook and disconnected.
    Where was the Holly who normally cheered people? She blamed it on the pregnancy hormones, but more factored into it. The insurance money her parents left behind was never intended to cover the costs of her pregnancy. After she’d paid funeral expenses, Tyler’s medical bills, and settled her parents’ debts, there wasn’t much left anyway. What remained disappeared between leaving Lynchburg and getting set in Mountain Meadow. Without selling the house or finding a renter, she was in a bind.
    Renting this place had drained her money even more. She had always lived at home until she and Tyler left Lynchburg, so she never had to deal with deposits for utilities and a house. All of those extras had eaten into her meager reserves.
    She stared out the window next to the kitchen table. Damn you, Spence. He had burst her fairy-tale bubble of what a romance should be. Then his drinking and rambling threats had forced her to pick up and run. Nothing was more important than making sure Tyler and her baby were safe.
    Could Spence have done anything? Probably not. But she couldn’t take the chance with her baby or her brother. She’d already proven her judgment was way off base when it came to men. She wouldn’t make that mistake again.
    Now she was confined to the house, working part-time—thanks only to Mr. Crawford’s generosity. He’d set her up with a satellite Internet link and a laptop so she could keep doing his books and get paid. But with so little left, remaining upbeat was harder and harder.
    A disconnection notice from the power company stared her in the face. If she paid their minimum, she wasn’t sure they would have enough for food, but if she didn’t pay, the power would be cut off and then not only could she not afford to reconnect it, she would also not be able to get her bookkeeping done. She could ask Mr. Crawford, but she hated to do so if there was some other way to work it. He was already being kind enough. If a solution was out there, she sure would like to know. She glanced up, hoping for a little divine intervention, or at the very least inspiration, but of late even faith—in God or man—was in short supply.
    Holly pressed a hand to her back and stood, hoping it would relieve the ache. She just couldn’t seem to find any comfortable position. And the bed-rest part? Forget it. Every time she lay down she felt like she couldn’t breathe. Between working on the computer and a lack of sleep, Holly’s eyes were gritty. She was sure they must be bloodshot. Doc Owens had warned her the last month would be uncomfortable, but it