Free Murphy's Law by Jennifer Lowery Page B

annihilated.
    “Please,” Sara added with a pretty smile
that made him curse beneath his breath.
    Walking away he said, “Don’t fall
behind.”
    Sara fell into step beside him and Abby
ran to keep up, but neither complained nor seemed to mind. Murphy glanced down
at the girl and received a sunny smile in return. The next thing he knew, he
had checked his stride and slowed down to a near crawl to accommodate her short
legs. They wouldn’t reach the road until dinnertime at this pace.
    They walked in silence down the two tracks
leading to his cabin. Once he had to latch onto the girl’s collar to prevent
her from falling on her bottom and getting all wet. Upright again, the girl
held tight to his hand. Murphy tried to shake her off, but she smiled up at him
and held tight. Scowling, he tried to think about something else. Impossible
with Sara smiling at him. She looked just as happy to be outdoors.
    Abby trotted happily between them, one
tiny hand in Sara’s and the other in Murphy’s. She didn’t seem to notice the
tension between them as they walked down the rough path.
    “Have you lived here long?” Sara asked
moments later.
    “No.”
    Her face fell. Damn, he’d disappointed
her, but he didn’t want to know this woman. He had a feeling once he crossed
that line there would be no going back. Sara Sheldon would leave her mark on
any man lucky enough to get close to her.
    “You were right,” she said quietly after
a long stretch of silence.
    Murphy remained silent, not wanting to
hear any more. He didn’t want to be right and he certainly didn’t want to know
the details.
    “I have a history of misjudging men and
I’m not proud of it.”
    “You misjudged Abby’s father,” he heard
himself say.
    Sara nodded, staring straight ahead. “I
was young and impressionable and naive. Broke, I dropped out of college to work
two lame jobs in order to make ends meet. I was paying tuition and trying to
keep my mom in the nursing home she insisted was the only decent one in
Chicago, and sinking fast. The nursing home bills were killing me, but I
managed to keep her there. Although I ate a lot of tuna and canned soup and
lived in a…well, let’s just say I wasn’t living in a mansion.
    “That’s when Kent walked into my life
and swept me off my feet. Literally. He whisked me away to a castle in the sky
and promised me the world. He paid my student loans and swore I’d never have to
work again. I believed him and we married a week later.” Sara let out a low,
harsh laugh. “Well, the white horse and carriage turned into a pumpkin after
midnight and Cinderella lost her glass slipper when the family found out about
their youngest son’s marriage to a girl from the wrong side of town.
    “Little did I know, Kent had a flair for
doing spontaneous things just to piss off his family. He’d really done it by
bringing me home, and I got caught in the crossfire. That family made my life
hell. It’s a mistake I’ll never rectify and I have to live with that.”
    Murphy heard the bitterness and regret
in her voice and knew he’d just been given the edited version of the story.
Much more had happened to Sara. Though he didn’t want to get involved, he
wanted to know.
    “Where is your husband?” he asked.
    Sara stared off into the trees, a
cynical twist to her lips. “He died six months ago. He and his mistress were
driving to their hotel of choice for the weekend and while she was…servicing
Kent, he got distracted and plowed into a parked car. The rate of speed he was
driving combined with no seatbelts and the elevated alcohol levels in his
bloodstream killed them both instantly. Even in death Kent managed to go out with
a bang. The Benchleys used their money and influence to keep it out of the
papers so no one knows how the prodigal son humiliated them. He died a martyr
and I was the widow who had to live the lie.”
    Abby looked up at them. Sara smiled down
at her, her features softening. “Abby is the only