My Heart Finds Home: Love Finds a Home, #6

The O’Malley Family - Love Finds a Home

Pop (Tom) O’Malley – Zinnia O’Malley

Children, oldest to youngest: Henry, Alcea, Lil (Lilac), Mari (Marigold)

Daughter-in-Law: Patsy Lee

Featured in Sing Me Home (Book 1)

Robert Ryan (d)  -/- Lil (Lilac) – Jonathan Van Castle

Jon’s children: Michael and Melanie

Featured in Follow Me Home (Book 2)

Stan Addams -/- Alcea – Dakota Jones

Stan and Alcea’s child: Kathleen

Dak’s sister: Florida Jones

Featured in Home at Last (Book 3)

Mari (Marigold) – Andy Eppelwaite

Children: Charlie and Chris Introduced in My Heart Finds Home (Book 6)

Featured in Home by Starlight (Book 4)

Henry (d) -/- Patsy Lee – Zeke Townley

Henry and Patsy Lee’s Children: Daisy, Hank, Rose, Lily-Too

Introducing Daisy’s Boyfriend: Daniel Mastin

Featured in Take Me Home (Book 5)

Florida Jones – Stan Addams -/- Alcea O’Malley Addams

Florida and Stan’s child: Missouri

Featured in My Heart Finds Home (Book 6)

Daisy  – Daniel Mastin – Melanie Van Castle

Daisy’s son: Ashton

Also introducing Rand Barrington and Rachel Mindenhall

The Barringtons - Love on Blue Heron Bay

Elizabeth Barrington – Paul Barrington (d)

Children from oldest to youngest: Portia, Rand, Brinna

Featured in My Heart Finds Home (Book 6 of Love Finds a Home Series)

Rand Barrington – Rachel Mindenhall

Rand and Rachel’s son: Ethan

Featured in A Crazy Little Love (coming in 2016)

Brinna Barrington – Michael Van Castle (from Love Finds a Home Series)

PROLOGUE

BITING DOWN HARD on her lip, Daisy O’Malley Mastin steered her bright red Ford Escort faster and then faster again along the two-lane highway that wound through the thick woods of the Ozark Hills, unaware she’d never reach her destination.

What she did know was that the private message she’d sent winging through the internet the night before—in a fit of impulsive anger and to a complete stranger—was about to devastate everyone she loved. Her family. Her husband, Danny. Her eight-year-old son, Ashton.

Herself.

Behind her was the lake region, where she and Ash had been staying with her aunt Mari. Ahead, their hometown of Cordelia, Missouri. Beyond that, Rhinemann, where she hoped to undo the biggest mistake of her life.

And that was saying something, because she did mistakes better than most.

As she topped a rise, she could see dark clouds tumbling out of the west. Lightning flickered in their depths. With luck, she’d make her grandmother O’Malley’s house just outside Cordelia before the late May storm hit. The first drops hit the windshield. Or not.

She glanced over where she’d tossed her mother’s letter on the passenger seat. After a week of dodging her mom’s messages, she’d received the missive yesterday, postmarked from San Francisco and sent registered, undoubtedly so she couldn’t claim it’d been lost somewhere in the ether.

Your choice to leave Dan and your feud with your cousin are understandable, Daisy. But it’s been six months, dear. The rest of us have supported you and Ashton while you’ve hopscotched from one aunt’s house to another and from job to job. You’re no longer a child. But you do have a child you need to put first. Decide on a divorce or decide to reconcile, but make a decision. We’re all played out. It’s time to heal. To that end, this will be your last check from us . . .no more money.

That was a slap. No more money, even though she was some kind of heiress. Her stepfather had lots of funds and lots of love for her mother and no children of his own.

Her mom and siblings had moved to California after her mother and stepfather had married. Daisy, then pregnant with Ash, had stayed in Cordelia, dropped out of college, and wed Daniel Mastin. They’d both thought at the time Danny was Ashton’s father.

She’d known for some years he wasn’t. Danny had never suspected a thing.

She choked back a sob. Buck up, she told herself. It may be too late to turn back, but Gran will help you see the way to go forward. Whenever there was a family upheaval, Zinnia O’Malley held sway. If Gran had her back, everyone else would fall into line behind her. Please, God, let Gran have my back.

The rain came harder now. She switched on the wipers and slowed the car through a small hamlet, bypassing a QuikTrip, its lights gleaming through the murky atmosphere, then pressed ahead again on the curving highway.

Choking back guilt, she reminded herself their separation was Danny’s fault. Danny’s and his law partner’s, the back-stabbing slut.

Six months ago, she’d been fired from Peg’s diner, her aunt Alcea (her aunt!) citing the burden it placed on her coworkers whenever she mixed up the times for her shifts. She’d gone home in tears and, amid the usual landmine of toys and piles of laundry, found Danny in their kitchen, locked in an embrace with Melanie Van Castle. Her cousin, her former best friend.

Her stomach roiling with shock, disbelief, anger, she stormed back out, lost her lunch in the bushes, and hadn’t said one word to either of them since. She and Ash had taken turns staying first at Aunt Alcea’s in Cordelia and then at Aunt Mari’s in Lake Kesibwi like vagabonds, like . . .

Like the charity case she was. Danny sent her what funds he could, but they weren’t enough. His law practice was small, although it had grown since Melanie joined it. To think Daisy had originally considered that a fantastic idea.

She steered around some brush the storm had blown onto the road and winced as thunder boomed overhead.

She refused to consider reconciling; she had her pride. But to divorce, she needed money. Without it, Dan could take Ashton. He’d be his own lawyer, backed by Melanie. She’d need to hire one.

With no more money staring her in the face last night, she’d downed a couple glasses of wine, convinced herself her options were few, her motives pure, her reasons sound, and channeled her emotions into a keyboard. This morning, she’d realized the cataclysm she’d unleashed.

She glanced in the rearview mirror. Scared blue eyes rimmed with periwinkle eyeliner looked back from under a tousle of flyaway curls. Her gaze grazed Ash’s backpack, resting in the backseat. He was a great kid. Adventurous, sensitive, curious . . .

She sucked back tears. What had she done? Gran couldn’t forgive this. Nobody could. They’d all hate her. All of them. Everyone she knew, and especially Ash. Her thoughts tumbled as wildly as the clouds, her mind cramped with fear. She’d be cast out of the circle of family she’d known all her life and never forgiven.

She grabbed a tissue and gave a big honk, but before she could launch into a seriously good cry, a gust hit the car and the skies opened up. She found herself in a sudden battle to keep the car on the road.

Seriously?

She flipped on the headlights, gripped the wheel hard. Yes, seriously.

Angst forgotten, she peered through the windshield, trying to see through the curtain of rain. Another squall slapped the side of the car, pushing it toward the ditch. Wrenching the wheel straight, she crept on, the Ford’s lights weak probes in the gloom. Lightning blanched the scenery. Ahead of her, a tree scissored. A branch, thick and long, skittered across the road as though it had no more weight than a stalk of corn. She braked hard to miss it.

With a whimper, she edged forward, steered onto the shoulder, and halted just short of a road sign. She peered up at it through the driving rain. Cordelia 4 Miles.

She turned off the ignition and sat huddled, the car tremoring. Dan had always said the shoulders were too narrow on this highway to be safe for more than a pause, but since she’d discovered him and Mel lip-locked, she’d lost faith in his wisdom. She’d wait right here till the storm blew past.

She slid down in the seat until she could see just over the dashboard. The trees whipped each other. She winced with every flash from the skies.

Another limb smacked the windshield, harder this time. She yipped and sat up. The car shuddered violently. Twigs and leaves peppered the roof. A rash of hail pounded the car. The skies yawed open and roared. She tasted grit and metal.

And then the sky turned green. An alien green.

Tornado.

Her breath shortened. Thoughts ricocheted in her brain: She should’ve headed another direction. There was no longer time. She shouldn’t stay in the car.

But she didn’t want to get out. Heart hammering, she glanced at the ditch, knowing it now provided her best refuge. It was overgrown with underbrush, swollen wet, and barely visible.

She glanced up again where the mileage sign shook like an arthritic finger. Four miles wasn’t far. She reached for the ignition.

The sign pole cracked. She yelped and snatched back her hand as if slapped. The sign whipped away. The car bucked a foot toward the roadway, then another. She felt a strange, sucking sensation. Her ears popped.

Frantic, she grabbed her purse and cell, scrabbled over the console to the passenger side, and wrestled the door. The wind grabbed it, snapped it wide open, and tried to yank her out.

She gripped the frame, strained back. When the wind glanced away, she fell back, then shoved her body forward and out. She plunged to her knees on the asphalt, then to her belly. She inched toward the ditch, fighting the howling gales and not daring to lift even her head, fingernails breaking, elbows and knees scraping.

Behind her, metal screamed. She glanced over her shoulder and froze. The Ford keeled up on rear tires, a pony pawing the air, and then the storm took it. Her little red car flipped end over end and out of sight. Mud slapped her face. Asphalt peeled up ahead.

Ducking her head and sobbing with panic, in one burst, she heaved herself into the ditch. She burrowed deep in the muck, smothered in thick, wet grass, her purse beneath her, her hands clasped over her head.

A train roared above, she felt her lungs expand, collapse, expand again. She struggled to breathe. Pressure built in her ears until she thought they’d burst. Thought became nothing but mindless terror.

And then it was over.

CHAPTER ONE

FOUR MILES AWAY, Rachel Mindenhall, RN, was preoccupied with keeping one eye on the storm clouds roiling outside the window of Meadow Acres Manor, the skilled nursing facility on the east side of Cordelia, and the other on the elderly woman in her charge.

I said, the pink one, dammit. Matches my lipstick. Resident Penny Brewster slapped the arm of her wheelchair for emphasis.

Rachel hooked a piece of her straight sandy hair behind her ear, raised her eyes to the ceiling as if she’d find patience there, then turned to look at Penny, who sat behind her. Penny looked back at her private nurse with an innocent smile.

They were readying her for an outing. Rachel had just paired, after much negotiation, a blue blouse with Penny’s outlandishly floral-printed pants.

We decided the blue went better with those pretty eyes of yours, Rachel cajoled. The assisted-transport van, scheduled because Rachel’s customized minivan was in the shop for regular maintenance, would arrive soon.

Kiss ass, Penny said. But okeydokey.

Okeydokey. Relieved, Rachel smiled and pulled out a matching blue sweater from Penny’s closet.

But what about the pink, dammit?

The pink-dammit one is in the laundry.

Penny chortled, then lowered her brows in mock sternness. No cussing. I will not have it, do you hear me?

Her mimicry sounded so much like her daughter, Rachel’s employer, Rachel couldn’t help but laugh, safe in the knowledge Meadow Acres was one of the last places on earth Elizabeth Brewster Barrington would deign to visit. While Penny got birthday and Christmas cards from her two granddaughters, the only family who seemed to really care about her was her grandson, Rand Barrington, who visited from his home in Kansas City.

Only infrequently, thank God.

Lightning flashed and thunder boomed.

Hell’s bells! Penny said.

Meadow Acres sat cattywampus on a property at the east end of Main. Rachel went to the big window of Penny’s private room. A rise in the road prevented her from seeing the town square, not too far distant, so instead she studied the sky.

Dark clouds laced with lightning twisted like dirty ropes just beyond the Rooster Bar and Grill and Beadler’s Feed, the facility’s neighbors. Normally she shrugged off the seasonal thunderstorms that pounded the region where she’d lived all her life; most severe weather like this, a mainstay of spring, moved rapidly by.

This time, though, seemed different. Hell may not be far from the truth, she muttered.

She pulled the drapes closed, like she should have done immediately at the onset of the tornado watch earlier today, as per nursing-home procedure. A tornado watch meant conditions were ripe for one of the ferocious storms; warnings meant take cover, that one had actually been spotted. So far, no sirens had sounded announcing a warning and likely none would.

A sudden deluge drummed on the roof, the curtain of rain so immediately thick both the bar and the store disappeared from her view.

She tossed Penny’s sweater on her bed, pulled out her cell, and punched buttons. Penny, I’m sorry, but we’re staying put. I’m cancelling the van and calling Rand. She had his number, and he hers, for situations just like this. She’d rarely had to use it.

But I want to see him!

I’m sure he’ll come visit you here instead. The plan, engineered by Rachel to avoid him, had been for grandmother and grandson to meet at a restaurant on the outskirts of town.

Sirens suddenly blasted outside. Rachel abandoned the call, dropped the phone back into the pocket of the smock she wore. Penny covered her ears.

Attention all staff. Tornado-warning procedures, the home’s young receptionist announced through the speakers. To the woman’s credit, her voice was calm, her fear betrayed by only a slight tremor.

Rachel motioned to Penny’s wheelchair controls. C’mon. Full speed ahead.

Away we go! Penny said. Dropping her hands from her ears, her eyes wide with excitement, she pushed a lever and directed the chair into the hall. Once she was through, Rachel pulled the door shut behind them, making sure an edge of the bedside curtain stuck out to indicate the room was empty.

The one-story nursing facility had three long wings. The halls had been emptied of nonessential items in preparation for moving residents to emergency-assembly areas.

With each now stuffed with residents and their equipment, they were no more than obstacle courses. The babble of voices, some crying, some fearful—and some boisterously excited like Penny’s—added to the confusion. These procedures looked as if they’d protect basically, well, nobody.

Someone jarred her elbow. Sorry, Rachel, my dear.

She glanced around. Not a problem, Mr. O’Malley. Mr. O’Malley—Pop O’Malley—came to read to the residents a couple times a week. Usually he was accompanied by his wife, Zinnia, kind, friendly, and somewhat a gossip, although Rachel hadn’t seen her today.

She’d grown up in Rhinemann, sixty miles distant, but she knew most of the O’Malley family by name or acquaintance. She’d even been a lab assistant in their granddaughter Daisy’s biology class in college. She remembered the coed confiding her surprise pregnancy over a frog dissection while her lab partners tried to prevent her from turning the frog into hash. Daisy was a bit of a ditz. Rachel had grown friendly with her husband, Dan, here frequently for directives and wills, sharing coffee with him on occasion. He’d mentioned a separation, and she’d not been surprised; the two were oil and water.

She helped Penny wedge herself into a space near the wall.

Penny looked up at Pop O’Malley, her eyes dancing. Love the shirt! With his usual panache, Pop wore an eye-popping orange-and-purple-plaid shirt and a canvas hat, a fishing lure pinned on its brim.

Do you now? He leaned down to talk to Penny. He was a tall man, well over six feet, his sturdy frame showing only a hint of his advanced age. Doin’ okay, my best gal?

Best gal? Ha! Don’t try to bulldoze an old bulldozer. You’re still stuck on that wife of yours. Although whenever you’ve a yen to throw her over . . . Then, away we go!

She wiggled the lever, making her wheelchair rock back and forth. She meant none of it. Zinnia O’Malley and Penny had been friends for Lord love a duck, Zinnia had said when Rachel once asked, far more years than I can count. She was a wild one and had her share of sadness, but she was always ready for a laugh and has a purely good heart.

Pop chuckled and the fishing lure bobbed. He turned to Rachel, Let me get this gentleman to a chair. He nodded to the elderly man whose arm he was holding. Then maybe I can help with—

Whatever he’d planned to say was lost in the sudden, deafening pound of hail on the roof. The lights flickered and went out. Thunder cracked again. Rachel jumped, and Mr. O’Malley patted her arm, his smile reassuring although his eyes had lost their humor.

An aide, pupils dilated like a spooked bird, threaded her way toward them with a push chair. Mr. O’Malley helped the old man to it and settled him next to Penny. The aide skittered off, and Rachel glanced up and down the hall, now bathed in the eerie glow of emergency lights. Dim daylight spilled from one room, its door still open.

D’you mind? She nodded toward it. I’ll go secure it. It’d help keep broken glass, if there was broken glass, out of the hallway. The little act seemed so insignificant in the face of the fury overhead.

Mr. O’Malley motioned her on.

Penny fumbled until she held the old gentleman’s hand. I’ll keep you safe, she yelled at him over the din. She looked at Pop O’Malley. He has a crush on me, don’t you know? Indeed, the man’s expression was blissful.

Rachel worked her way to the wash of light and reached in to close the door. Expecting an empty room, she abruptly halted. Inside, Penny’s grandson, Rand, was attempting to help an elderly woman from her bed, but the confused resident was having none of it.

Let me go! she yelled, pushing at him.

Rand was a tall man with an athletic frame. She could tell he was trying to be gentle, and so was no match for the wildly slapping hands of the woman. Flushed from his efforts, Rand looked around, the expression in his uniquely colored blue-violet eyes growing relieved. Thank God.

There was no unusual recognition in his gaze, no awareness of their oh-so-brief entanglement. There never was. She’d only been one of many. A whole lot of many.

She went to help him, wishing she could do anything but, and leaned in to whisper calming words to the resident. This was closer than she’d been to Rand since they were in high school. A time when she, along with every other girl she knew, had fancied she was in love with him. He, though, had been a philandering hummingbird, and with about the same amount of intelligence. But wow, he’d been boy-band good-looking. Still was.

He apparently carried no recollections of her. Never the brightest bulb in the pack, he’d forgotten—there’d not been much to remember—and she planned to keep things that way. There was nothing to be gained by pursuing him, even if he’d have her. (And he wouldn’t.) And everything to lose.

Stirring his memories could jeopardize her son, Ethan.

Their son, Ethan.

Hers and Rand’s.

Rand captured the woman’s hands as her flailing subsided. Figured the storm would hold us up, so I drove on in. I was on my way to Gram’s room when—

What meager daylight there was suddenly darkened. A thousand banshees set up a scream outside the walls. Pressure stabbed her ears.

The next moments were a blur. Gentleness gone, Rand pushed the women down on the bed and leapt on top. The window shattered. Mindless with panic, Rachel groped for purchase.

Hands—hers, Rand’s, the old woman’s—gripped the bars of the heavy hospital bed and each other. Rachel might have heard screams above the hideous roaring, the thunk and knock and crack of destruction, or it may have been the screech of the violent wind, of metal rending, of rooftops tearing.

The tornado sucked at them, the world shook. She held on with all her might, every muscle straining, unutterably glad for Rand’s weight holding her down.

CHAPTER TWO

DAISY COULDN’T be dead. He’d know if she was dead.

Daniel Mastin stood on wet pavement on the west edge of Cordelia’s square on Oak Haven Road, outside a narrow brick building that housed a tax-accounting office and, upstairs, the three-room suite that served the Mastin–Van Castle law firm.

His partner and Daisy’s cousin, Melanie Van Castle, stood beside him. She had a small frame, which now looked smaller, all folded in on herself as she hugged her arms, shivering despite the humidity still hanging in the air. Her dark bangs nearly hid her eyes, round with fear and confusion.

Overhead, clouds still roiled but were now interspersed with hints of blue.

They’d just emerged from the building’s basement, where they’d headed when the sirens had sounded, some thirty minutes ago. Under the stairs, they’d huddled with their secretary, Mira, and two accountants and their staff, gripping each other while the lights blacked out and the storm roared above them. Once the noise subsided, they’d cautiously crept upstairs.

He’d never been scared so spitless before. Not ever.

Looking at Melanie’s white face, he knew she hadn’t, either.

St. Andrews is okay, she finally warbled in a high voice unlike her own, gazing where the church stood solid and untouched at the center of the square.

He knew she was thinking of her brother, the young interim minister there. I’m sure Michael’s fine. He glanced behind them. Their offices likewise appeared undamaged, as did the bank next door, city hall, and others along their street.

The rest of old downtown was another matter.

The sodden landscape had been transformed from the sunny, storybook scene he’d left behind when he’d entered his law firm this morning. As far as he could see, the area was littered with rubble, trash, timber, and tree limbs.

Thinking of his wife and son, anxiety rolled over him again. He and Daisy had been linked since they were kids, their relationship always tumultuous, on-again, off-again. Mostly on-again. I’d know, he reassured himself. Somehow, I’d know.

The poor flowers, Melanie said, as if that small feature was the only one of the whole her mind was willing to handle.

Normally, the church lawns were an oasis, crisscrossed by paths lined with abundant summer gardens, all carefully tended by the Ladies’ Auxiliary. Now the green looked as if a herd of cattle had stampeded through and flattened the lot of them. Trees were damaged, some gone, yanked up by their roots as if they’d never existed, and some stripped of limbs, now looking like giant pencils plunged into the ground. Vehicles had been tossed into piles. Several car alarms sounded. There were screams.

Not caring who saw, he put his arm around Mel and drew her against his side, feeling her quake but taking comfort in her nearness. She didn’t protest.

Odd details registered. Near them, the cigar-store Indian that usually stood next to the doorway of O’Neill’s Emporium now stared down at them from a roof, its stoic expression unchanged.

The old delivery pickup from Beadler’s Feed balanced on its grill like a metallic acrobat.

The stool that normally sat behind the cash register at Peg O’ My Heart Café and Bakery rested squarely on the street in front of them. A sign had landed upright on its seat. Special Today: Tropical Blend Banana Muffins.

Melanie’s gaze went from the sign to the diner. On, no, she whispered. Aunt Alcea’s place.

He squeezed her shoulders. Her aunt Alcea owned Peg O’ My Heart, which anchored the corner of Oak Haven and Main, opposite their building. It had lost not only its windows but chunks of its cornices and a slice of its roof. The fanciful iron tables and chairs that had graced a small courtyard out front had flown away.

He fervently hoped Alcea and her patrons hadn’t met a similar fate.

His gaze continued past the diner, down Main, mind absorbing minute details . . . Window ledges sheared of their flower boxes. Streetlamps tilted. Glass shattered. Roofs gone. Transformers arced, sending sprays of sparks into the sky. What was left of the cheerful green-and-white awnings outside Sin-Sational Ice Cream were shredded.

A sporty blue car, horn blaring, had buried itself face-first in the front of Rusty’s Hardware. Recognizing it, he swallowed hard. It was the pride and joy of Rosemary Butz, owner of Up in the Hair Salon and a neighbor.

My God. Had she been in it? Was she still? The sight, like nothing else, drove home reality. Not everyone would emerge as unscathed as they had.

He was only a half block away from Rosemary’s car. He started forward. Melanie, her gasp betraying that her eyes had followed his, gripped his arm hard to hold him back as emergency vehicles wormed past them in staccato bursts through the destruction. One veered up to the sports car and slammed to a stop. Two EMTs spilled out. One scrambled toward the sports car; the other unlatched a gurney and followed.

Feeling hopeless, he halted, watching as they lifted a form from the wreckage. He swallowed the thickness in his throat.

Oh, Dan, oh, God. Melanie pointed to the other side of the square, past St. Andrews. The Stationery Stop, Parson’s, the hobby shop . . . The row of buildings that had outlined Maple Woods Drive was gone. Just . . . gone. Erased with only a jumble of construction materials to show for the more than the century they’d existed. A short distance away on the same street was his home.

Her gaze traveled up to him, her eyes liquid with fear and sadness. Your house . . .?

I can’t. I can’t think of that now. But he could thank God that Daisy and Ashton weren’t there.

Farther down Main, he could no longer see the rooftops of Beadler’s Feed and the Rooster Bar and Grill, which must have been eradicated, too. Beyond them would be—used to be?—Meadow Acres Manor and the tall, narrow home that belonged to Alcea and her husband. Had Mel and Daisy’s aunt lost both business and home? Had Alcea lost . . .? His mind refused to go there. Her husband was an author and worked from home while also attending to his mother and an elderly friend, who lived with them.

He focused on the church steeple and sent up silent entreaties. For Alcea and Dak. For Rosemary. For the inhabitants of the buildings. For them all.

Daisy.

Ashton.

Mel turned a panicked face to him, her thoughts now fully running along similar lines as his, as they often did and not just in moments of crisis. It was something that made them a good legal team. And something that six months ago had led them in directions they shouldn’t have wandered.

What about Aunt Alcea? Tears rolled down her cheeks. What about the rest of the family?

She started forward, but this time it was his turn to hold her back. Wait. Let’s try calling, then we’ll go together.

She drew a shaky breath. You’re right. I’ll go get my purse. Her phone would be inside it. His was in the jacket he’d left hanging on the hall tree in their office.

I’ll go.

No. I need to do something.

Watch yourself, then, he said. Could be there’s damage we’re not seeing.

She nodded and disappeared inside.

While he waited, the synapses firing in his brain came in frazzled bursts. Panic nipped at the edge of reason. The ambulance with Rosemary had taken off. He focused on others, slowly emerging from their refuges or picking their way carefully through the ruin or tearing at it with their bare hands. He refused to think of what might lie underneath to cause their frenzy.

Most of those on their feet, though, had aimed themselves toward the church, probably seeking the comfort of numbers more than looking for Pastor Michael, or even God. God seemed to have deserted this scene. He heard cries of injury, of fear, of grief. The cacophony of sirens, alarms, honking didn’t obliterate wails of horror, sorrow, and pain.

Daisy.

Ashton.

They were safe,