Free Restless Hearts by Marta Perry

face whitened, her gray eyes looking very dark. “It wasn’t my fault.” It was a whisper.
    â€œNo, it wasn’t.” Sympathy for her flooded him. “I’m not saying it to hurt you, Fiona. I’m not blaming you for anything that happened to Emma and me. It was for the best. She has a happy marriage, and I have the career I want. We’re friends. But the family—well, now you know how they were hurt when your mother left.”
    â€œNow I know,” she repeated, looking as if the words were acid in her mouth.
    â€œJust tread carefully where the family is concerned. For your sake, as well as theirs.”
    He touched her then, gripping her shoulder in what he meant to be an encouraging gesture. He wasn’t ready for the warmth that surged through him from that touch.It was as if they were connected by a current that flowed back and forth between them, binding them together.
    He let go, his mind scrambling for something coherent to say. There wasn’t anything. But it was very clear that Fiona wasn’t the only one who’d better be careful.
    Â 
    â€œAunt Siobhan, that sandwich tray is beautiful.” Fiona shook her head at the array of food that her Flanagan relatives were piling on her kitchen table and counters. “This is too much. I didn’t expect you to do all this.”
    Her aunt paused in the act of sorting cookies onto a serving tray, glancing at her with something like surprise in the deep-blue eyes that were so like Gabe’s. “Well, of course we want to help, Fiona. That’s what family is for.”
    Something grabbed Fiona’s heart, making her momentarily speechless. Maybe Aunt Siobhan realized it, because she left the cookies and came to give Fiona a quick hug, her movements as light and supple as a girl’s.
    â€œWe love being part of your open house, dear.” She pressed her cheek against Fiona’s. “You wouldn’t take that away from us, would you?”
    â€œJust be happy the men aren’t here.” Mary Kate, Aunt Siobhan’s older daughter, pushed her way through the screen door, balancing a large white box filled with cupcakes. “You don’t know how they can eat. There’d be nothing left for your prospective mothers.”
    â€œIt won’t just be moms,” Fiona said. She took the box, sliding it onto the counter. “Although I’m hoping for agood turnout of possible clients.” And praying. “I’ve invited the whole township, it seems. You never know who might be in a position to refer a pregnant woman.”
    â€œGood business,” Mary Kate said approvingly, running a hand through curls so deep a red they were almost mahogany. Those came from the Flanagan side of the family, and Mary Kate’s two kids had inherited the red curls, too.
    â€œIt was nice of you to come. I hope you didn’t have to hire a sitter.” She said the words tentatively, knowing Mary Kate’s husband had died about a year earlier, not sure how she managed with two young children, and a burgeoning career as a physical therapist.
    â€œThe kids are busy pestering Grandpa this afternoon.” Mary Kate smiled. “And I’m happy to have some girl-time, even if I’m not a prospective client.”
    Something seemed to shadow Mary Kate’s face at that. Regret, perhaps? She was still young, still capable of falling in love again, having more children.
    The door swung again, and Nolie came in with Terry, the younger Flanagan daughter who’d followed her father and brothers into firefighting but had gone on to become a paramedic. The kitchen was suddenly filled with laughter and female voices, and a warmth she hadn’t known she was missing flooded Fiona.
    This was how a kitchen should be. Filled with the pleasure that came of working together with family—of having people who accepted her and shared her aims just because they were hers.
    Even if they