Chapter Two

      Ian hoped this wasn’t a mistake.

      He was who he was, and that was that. Appeasing Bri wasn’t a priority. Yet, here he was, trekking to her house with Tia.

      Coyotes howled in the dusky morning distance. Not distant enough for his liking. He put himself between the woodlands and Tia as they crossed a forest-flanked parking lot between the ritzy state-of-the-art trauma center and Bri’s humble log home. Another feral round of howls sounded. He reached for Tia.

      She jerked away, pink tutu fanning her jeans. “I don’t want to hold your hand and I don’t wanna go to her icky tree house.”

      Ian stopped. Eyed Bri’s place. Icky? Hardly. Tree house? He smiled. Tia had obviously never seen a log home before. It did look pioneerish under the effect of a purple twilight.

      “Tia, I have to be in surgery with my patient in twenty minutes.” He gritted his teeth and ignored the guilt.

      A newborn winter breeze rustled Tia’s curly brown hair and caused it to fall over her amber-eyed scowl. As they passed the luminous main lodge and approached Bri’s cabin, Tia got busy in bribe mode. “Please-don’t-make-me-go!” came out as one word. Her face brightened. “I’ll even clean my room.”

      Ian dipped his head to hide the snicker. Truth be told, her offer tempted, since this morning her room had turned into a disaster. How could one small person make that big a mess? “Tell you what, we’ll get Sully’s sherbet after work.”

      “I don’t like ice cream. And I don’t like you!” She shoved him away, looking like a fugitive pondering flight. He pinched the hem of the new coat he’d bought her in case she made good on the getaway brewing in her eyes. Bri must’ve heard the sidewalk scuffle, because she peeled her window curtain back.

      Ian knelt in front of Tia, who glared at him. “Clearly, you’re not happy about having to come here. But I need your cooperation. Please, mind Miss Bri, and be careful of her arm.”

      Bri stepped onto a rambling redwood deck that shone with a new coat of cherry lacquer she must’ve applied. Ian stood.

      Tia went ballistic, eyes darting around the tree-dotted yard as though seeking escape. Panic filled him that she might actually pull it off. His eyes veered to the deep lake. Images of last night’s river drowning victims flooded Ian’s imagination. He bent down, embarrassed he didn’t know this yet about his own daughter. “Tia, how well do you swim?”

      “I don’t know. I never tried it.” She eyed the sparkly sapphire lake, looking very much as though she wanted to, though. Fear like Ian had never known noosed his neck.

      Bri knelt. “I’ll make sure she doesn’t leave my sight,” she reassured as though seeing the stark fear swirling inside him. Ian had never known fire-red, dragon-breathing fear. Not even in combat.

      This was his daughter. His joy. His life.

      If something were to happen to her...

      Ian swept her up in his arms and hugged tight despite her wriggling and making gagging noises. A kiss planted on her forehead, he carried her inside Bri’s cabin and set her down at the farthest end from the lake and all its dangers. “I’ll be back at two. Sooner if I can. Later if traumas pour in.”

      Ian felt hope as Tia darted behind his legs, away from Bri. He knelt at eye level, bracing Tia’s arms. “Listen, Miss Bri is your new babysitter. She’s fun. You’ll like her.”

      She scowled at him, then Bri. “I’ll hate her.”

      “Not acceptable, Tia.” Beyond that, he didn’t know what to say. Make her apologize? He could crawl under a rock. As a dad, he was an epic failure. He studied Tia, hoping for a lightning bolt of wisdom.

      Bri knelt in front of Tia. “You mean to tell me you’d hate a babysitter who loves to fairy hunt?”

      Tia’s eyes widened. Anger fled. Flabbergasted, Ian blinked. What just happened here?

      “Fairy hunt?” Tia sucked in a heap of air. “For real?” She looked at Ian for confirmation.

      “Sure,” he answered Tia. “Bri’s a renowned fairy hunter.”

      Suspicion narrowed Tia’s eyes. She stepped over to Bri. Aimed a finger at her nose. “Prove it.”

      When Bri rose, extending her arm, Tia reached for her hand.

      And just like that, Bri won his daughter’s fragile trust.

      A little jealous, Ian bid them goodbye with his daughter’s demand ringing through his head and heart.

      Prove it.

      Those two words were the summation of his life right now, Ian thought as he strode a familiar path to the trauma center.

      He desperately needed to win Tia’s trust. Needed to prove he wasn’t the world’s biggest failure as a husband and a dad. Prove to a bank that Bri’s lodge was worth saving. Prove to financial backers that his trauma center expansion projects were worth their time and dime. And lastly, he needed to know, and needed Tia to know, that life would get better. That she’d be okay.

      Especially since the ink had dried on unpreventable papers. Ones on which Tia’s mom had too easily signed her away. Anger consumed him that Ava chose a sleazy boyfriend over a child. Now at EPTC’s side entrance for employees, he jerked open the heavy steel door, stormy gray like his mood. He stalked down the halls, not caring that staff had to scramble out of his way.

      He wanted to get these surgeries over with and end this too-long and terrible day. Get back to his daughter and try to earn the trust that would take all her pain away.

      The second Ian stepped into the operating room, he became all about the medicine. His focus fastened fully on the patient. A patient who deserved a better bedside manner than Ian had displayed walking in here.

      A teen girl with the same color hair as his daughter’s.

      He needed to apologize to his staff and resist making excuses for his bad behavior. Sure, he’d been up all night tending a never-ending stream of traumas. Hard ones. The kind he couldn’t save. But so had they. Friday nights were like that.

      At the operating table, he faced Mitch. “We need to come up with some positive activities for teens around here, bro.