Free Brave the Storm, Season 2, Episode 3 (Rising Storm) by Lisa Mondello Page A

she’d felt as a young woman were still alive inside her. If she didn’t deal with it now, it would only crush her again when Chase left Storm.
    The kitten was still climbing around Chase’s shoulders. Seeing the strong, sexy man and the adorable kitten made it hard for her to hang on to any of the anger that still lingered.
    “The water was for you. I thought you were going to shrivel up and die in this heat. You know, this isn’t Nashville. It’s still as hot as hell down here. People die of heat stroke.”
    “I thank you for the water and so does Patsy.”
    “Patsy? You mean you’ve already named her?”
    “Sure. Why not?”
    He picked up the kitten and gazed at her face. The light in his blue eyes burned as bright as it did when they’d been lovers. There was a time Chase held her as lovingly and gently as he was holding that kitten. It was more than Anna Mae could take.
    “She’s going to pee on you.”
    The sound of his chuckle was low and rough. “I’ve had worse.”
    “Gross.”
    “I meant that metaphorically.”
    “Oh. Well, I’ll leave you to her.”
    Anna Mae started up the walkway toward the house. She did what she’d come out there to do. She’d given Chase Johnson a bottle of cold water and made sure he wasn’t dead. She didn’t have any more time to waste on nostalgia.
    “Anna Mae?”
    Don’t turn around again!
    “What now?”
    “Do you have a box?”
    She turned to look at Chase then and saw that Patsy was climbing up his arm. Sighing, she waved for him to come into the house.
    A few minutes later they were in the utility room going through different sized boxes that were left over from deliveries that had recently been made to the bed and breakfast. Chase wrestled with the kitten, who was a bundle of energy now that she was hydrated and out of the heat.
    “This one is a good size. It’ll fit in the passenger’s seat so you can drive home.” Anna Mae brought the box out into the kitchen and put it on the floor. “Why don’t you let her try it?”
    Chase gently placed the kitten in the box. She was none too happy with suddenly being confined and started to meow.
    “Maybe she’s hungry,” Anna Mae said, going to the cabinet and then rummaging through it to see what she had. “We’ve never had a cat so I don’t have anything to give her.”
    “Do you have a can of tuna?”
    “Ah, of course. I just happen to have a few.”
    She pulled out two cans of tuna from the cabinet, opened one of them with a can opener, and scooped a small portion into a small red plastic bowl that had been drying in the sink. She handed the bowl to Chase, who gave it to the kitten. Then she grabbed another red bowl and and filled it with water.
    Patsy tackled the tuna first, going to town as if she hadn’t eaten in days.
    Anna Mae reached in and ran her fingers over the kitten’s soft fur as she ate. The kitten’s purring sounded like a motor reverberating inside the box.
    “It’s a good thing you found her,” she said.
    “I guess Patsy and I found each other.”
    Anna Mae stood up straight and looked at Chase. In all the years she’d convinced herself that she hated him, she never imagined this sweet and vulnerable side of him. She’d convinced herself Chase had been selfish and unfeeling. She’d even convinced herself that he’d never loved her. Certainly not as much as she’d loved him.
    But looking at him now, she wondered if she’d sold Chase short. She wasn’t a perfect woman by any stretch of the imagination. But perhaps Chase wasn’t deserving of the hate she’d laid on him all these years.
    When she’d been standing at the truck, she told herself she wouldn’t ask him. But curiosity was getting the better of her. “You were awfully quick to name her. Where does Patsy come from?”
    “You’re kidding, right?”
    She shook her head.
    “Patsy Cline?”
    Anna Mae frowned. “You…you named the kitten after Patsy Cline?”
    He nodded. “Don’t you remember that night down