Free The Best Man in Texas by Tanya Michaels Page A

aspiration, she’d doggedly clung to her resolve never to deny herself as an adult the way she’d been “deprived” as a child. Unfortunately her compulsive shopping issues did not mesh well with her husband’s tendency to be between jobs.
    This is all I need. Brooke tried to avoid makingsituations all about her—that trait frequently got Didi and Meg into trouble—but the day after tomorrow, her parents were due to meet Grace for the first time. Brooke would prefer that the Nichols be on their best behavior. Luckily Meg had been able to get the night off for the party, so maybe she could help run interference—assuming she didn’t get distracted by handsome partygoers.
    “So Mom’s coming to stay with you tonight?” Brooke clarified.
    “Yeah, but like I said, I’ll be at work.”
    “Do you mind if I stop by and talk with her?” Was there a diplomatic way to ask Didi to quit being a diva and avoid screwing up her youngest child’s engagement party? Probably not.
    “Be my guest.” Meg’s tone was tinged with apology. “I’d do it myself if I thought I could make her see reason, but that’s always been more your specialty than mine. I’m sorry, Brooke. Just because you couldn’t pay me to marry a businessman like Giff—no offense—doesn’t mean I would try to sabotage any of this for you. I want your party and your wedding to be perfect.”
    Brooke was genuinely touched. “Thanks, sis. I’m sure that between the two of us we can get our parents to behave. And like you said, half of their fights blow over as quickly as they start.” Which didn’t stop Brooke from writing her parents’ names on the notepad she kept handy for phone interviews, followed by a large argh! in Sharpie marker underneath.
    No sooner had she hung up the phone than Kresley stuck her head through the doorway of the office.
    “Hey.” Brooke smiled. “Is there any chance your parents would want to adopt another adult daughter? They’ve always seemed like such lovely, well-adjusted people.” At least my future mother-in-law is organized and emotionally stable.
    Kresley, her expression concerned, didn’t bother to address the facetious question. “Isn’t Jake McBride the name of Giff’s friend, the one you’ve been telling me about?”
    “Yeah. Why?” Brooke studied her friend’s troubled gaze and thought about the 911 scanner they kept in the newsroom. “Oh, God, was he in some kind of accident? Did—”
    “No, he came across an accident this afternoon and jumped in to help. A little girl walking home from school had just been hit by an SUV.” Kresley stopped, taking a shuddery breath. “Sorry. Any time a child is hurt is horrible, of course, but ever since I got pregnant, these things…”
    “Is the girl okay?” Brooke asked hesitantly.
    “She’s in critical condition, but they credit Jake with keeping her alive until the ambulance arrived. We’re running a story tomorrow, and I hope to God we have good news to report on her recovery. Apparently he was doing some kind of career day visit or something at the school and was coming from that direction, just like she was. She was unconscious and not breathing when he happened on the scene. He inserted an artificial airway, then helped the EMS team stabilize her on a spinal board.”
    Brooke’s heart squeezed. Suddenly her ongoingdifficulty with mercurial parents seemed like the most trivial problem in the world. She couldn’t imagine what that poor girl’s family was going through.
    “Anyway.” Kresley leaned against the doorjamb, trying to steady herself with another deep breath. “I thought I recognized Jake’s name. From what the ambulance driver said, Jake was the hero of the day.”
    “Then it’s a blessing he was in the area.” What kind of resilience did it take to weather a job where witnessing other people’s trauma was the norm? Brooke suspected that the lives one was able to save made it worth it, but still…
    As she started her short