The Cottage Next Door Read Free Page B

hair and dark green eyes that appeared to be flecked with brown, and reminded her of the boys she’d grown up with in Kansas who worked on their family cattle ranches. Their bodies were hard and lean, their physical abilities exhibited in a quiet confidence and in the self-­assured way they moved. Wearing low-­slung jeans and a blue tee shirt with a whale fading into oblivion, Michael had an enigmatic look about him that said he’d be as comfortable straddling a Harley as sitting behind the wheel of a Ferrari.
    It was tempting to think Peter wouldn’t leave his business in the hands of someone incompetent, but it wasn’t unheard of for family ties to trump good sense. More than one son had run his father’s business into bankruptcy.
    Jeremy took the white bag and pointed to the box. “What’s this?”
    M ICHAEL W ILLIAMS ST RAIGHTENED from petting Coconut, who immediately moved to sit on his foot and look up at him adoringly. “You should have known I couldn’t pick up your lunch without getting Shiloh one of her favorite chocolate cookies. Because I was feeling generous, there’s a macaroon in there for you.”
    “You spoil her, Michael.” Jeremy took the box and put it on a plastic-­covered dining room table. “And me. I’ll make sure she gets this tonight.”
    “Is she with Rosa?” The question was a form of code between them, and didn’t require an answer. Rosa was the visiting nurse who stayed with Shiloh when she wasn’t doing well.
    Michael had known Jeremy and Shiloh for almost ten years, starting the summer his mother married Peter Wylie, and Peter hired Jeremy to add a bedroom to his house.
    The bonds he’d formed with Shiloh when she was two years old and he was nineteen were accidental. The only toddler he’d had anything to do with up to then was his uncle’s little girl. She was a holy terror who’d poured a soda over the keyboard of his laptop when the sound wouldn’t work on her favorite movie, Finding Nemo .
    Figuring all kids that age were alike, Michael did everything possible to stay away from Shiloh, even questioning his mother’s sanity for taking on her care when she and Peter had just come home from their honeymoon.
    But Shiloh had a way about her that shattered his defenses. He became her favorite, the one she went to with outstretched arms when she needed comforting, the one whose hand she reached for when they went to the beach to look for seashells, the one she clung to at the doctor’s office whenever her lupus came back like a ferocious wounded lion and left her in excruciating pain.
    She became the sister he’d never had. He became her defender, fiercely protective and at times insanely angry at a mother who had decided she wasn’t cut out to be the parent of a child with a life-­threatening illness.
    After a year of withdrawing both emotionally and physically, Shiloh’s mother had abandoned her adopted daughter and Jeremy, leaving Jeremy with a critically ill two-­year-­old who just weeks earlier had been diagnosed with systemic lupus erythematosus, an incurable, complicated, and multifaceted disease. Without help to care for her, Jeremy told his clients that he was not going to be able to finish the jobs he’d started, and promised he would put them in touch with other contractors and reimburse them for their losses as soon as he was able.
    That was when Michael’s mother stepped in, becoming a surrogate mother to Shiloh and a layman expert on children with SLE for Jeremy.
    Jeremy ran his hand through his hair, dislodging bits of sawdust. “It’s her knees again. She said she was feeling great, but that Rosa needed company because the rest of her family was in Mexico.”
    It was all Jeremy needed to say. Michael had gone through years of Shiloh’s bouts of severe joint pain, making a game out of carrying her on his back when it hurt too much for her to walk by herself. He’d never told anyone, but Shiloh was instrumental in his decision to attend the