Taking Their Second Chance Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  About the Author

  Letter from Brenna

  Taking Their Second Chance

  A Greene Pastures Novella (#1)

  Brenna Welles

  © 2017 by Brenna Welles

  No part of this story may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the copywrite holder, except in the case of brief quotations embodied within critical reviews and articles.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination and have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  To you, dear reader. For give me a chance.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The bitter cold snaked its way beneath the collar of Jake's old leather jacket, chilling him to the bone. The rain had finally let up after three solid months. They, whoever they were, had named this winter the coldest and wettest one on record in the last thirty-two years. Jake couldn't wait for the corresponding summer drought that everyone was predicting.

  But first, calving season.

  Dr. Beckett, the local large animal vet, and Morris Rowland, owner and operator of Rowland Ranch, seemed to think the season was upon them already. They said it could be only a week or two out at the most before the first round of calves began to drop. Which meant Jake needed to make arrangements to have his mother cared for while he was too busy at the ranch.

  Esther Waller, Jake's mother, had been diagnosed with stage four throat cancer just after Jake's last semester at college began. He had quickly withdrawn from the university and headed straight home, ignoring his mother's protests. Though Esther had many friends in the community that would help her fight this battle, Jake couldn't leave her on her own.

  Shortly after coming home, Jake applied for a job back on Rowland Ranch, having worked there off and on throughout his summers as a teenager, up until he graduated. Most of that money had gone toward paying for college. Morris' father had been the owner and operator back then, but Morris and Jake had worked together often. He had been enthusiastic to have Jake back.

  Jake knew he owed Morris. Odds were he had heard the rumors and gave Jake the job without a second thought. Jake's mother had decent insurance, but she wasn't able to work. Having this job meant they would be able to eat and keep the lights on at home.

  Jake slid into his old but reliable truck and fired it up, more than ready to be home. But tonight, instead of making a quick dinner for the both of them and putting his feet up by the fire, Jake had interviews to conduct.

  Calving season was the busiest time for any ranch. The work hours were long and hard, many cowhands only heading home to sleep and grab quick meals in between shifts. The Rowlands had traditionally opened up their large farmhouse so the men could take naps when needed. There would be no time to take care of his mother, take her to her appointments, make her meals. It had taken a long time until his mother agreed to hire a temporary home-care nurse.

  Jake had never really appreciated how stubborn his mother could be until that moment.

  Pulling into the drive, Jake was surprised to see an unfamiliar car sitting in the driveway. It was an older model compact car, tiny and red with a bumper sticker reminding everyone to support the troops.

  A quick glance at the clock on the dash told Jake he was only two minutes late.

  Whoever this person is, they were certainly punctual. Which would be important with all the appointments his mother had.

  Jake had meant to be home a half-hour ago to do some last minute tidying up before the first applicant arrived. Just as he was about to leave, a couple of the guys asked him to help move some equipment and it had taken them longer than anticipated.

  Well, if Jake ended up hiring this one, at least they wouldn't be surprised by the state of the house.

  Jake slid out of the truck and jogged to the front door. Turning the knob, he pushed it open, looking down to wipe his feet on the worn welcome mat. He made a mental note to replace it soon.

  "I'm home," he called. He didn't expect his mother to call back. The treatment had been harsh, chewing up her throat and making it difficult to talk and eat. Even the skin around her neck looked sun-burnt.

  "Welcome home," a soft, lilting voice said.

  Jake jerked his head up at the familiar voice.

  She looked the same, and yet so very different. She stood by the door, her jacket unbuttoned as though she were in the process of removing it. Her pale, blond hair no longer framed her face in a cute bob, but had grown past her shoulders. Her face looked all at once older and more beautiful than ever, her light blue eyes twinkling the same as they always had before.

  "Letti?" Jake said, surprise coloring his tone. He narrowed his eyes. "What are you doing here?"

  "Jake," came the soft rasp from the other side of the living room. Immediately, Jake's attention turned to his mother, who managed to give him a stern look and a sharp shake of the head. She sat wrapped in a blanket, her thinning dark hair covered with a hat she had crocheted years ago. She lifted a piece of paper up, gesturing that he should take it. He strode over to her, his long legs eating up the distance.

  The name Colette Fletcher stood at the top of the page in bold print. It was her résumé.

  Jake's one concession to his mother about hiring a nurse was that she pick the applicants and invite them to an interview. She argued that if she were to let somebody take care of her, she better have the chance to figure out if she'd like them. Jake had agreed, finding himself more than willing to give up that tedious task.

  Now, he began to regret that decision.

  Jake leveled a stare at his mother before taking a breath and turning back to Colette. "I apologize. I didn't know Mom had invited you. Please, have a seat."

  Letti lifted an eyebrow at him before sitting in one of the armchairs. As though only minutes had passed instead of years, he could read her thoughts as clearly as if she had said them aloud.

  He doesn't know who he's interviewing?

  "Um," Jake began, clearing his throat. "Can I get you any water? Tea?"

  "Water would be fine," Letti said, giving him a small smile.

  So, that's what their relationship had been reduced to. An offer of water and a smile.

  It was his own fault. No point in dwelling on it. The past was in the past.

  Jake retreated to the kitchen, washing his hands before grabbing a clean glass and filling it with water. Then he groaned. In his flustered state, he hadn't thought to check on his mother and see if she needed any more water.

  "Mom?" Jake called, peering around the corner into the living room. "Need water?"

  She shook her head, lifting her water bottle and then pointing to Letti.

  Which meant that Letti had gone ahead and refilled her water. Score one for Letti.

  Jake ducked back into the kitchen, though the glass of water was already filled. He pulled down another glass and filled it for himself, if for no other reason than to give himself a quick lecture.

  This wasn't a competition, nor a continued lover's spat. This was about his mother's well-being. Letti wasn't here to prove anything. She was probably just looking for a job. Nothing personal.

  Jake took two big g
ulps of water before leaving the kitchen. He gave Letti what no doubt amounted to a tight smile and handed a glass to her.

  "Thanks for coming. I apologize I'm late," he said, taking a seat beside his mother on the couch.

  "Thanks for the invitation," Letti said calmly, taking a sip. "Prepping for calving season?"

  Of course Letti would know that Jake was back at Rowland Ranch. This town was small enough that she probably knew the day he decided to come back home.

  Swallowing his irritation with another gulp of water, Jake nodded. "It should be starting in the next week or so. If we decide to hire you, you'd need to start immediately. There won't be any issues with that, will there?"

  Letti shook her head. "I'm available whenever you need."

  "Good." Jake looked at his mother, who sat with a soft smile on her face. Looking at her, he knew she had already decided on Letti. But he needed to make sure, too.

  "Tell me about yourself," Jake said. As though he didn't know everything about her.

  To her credit, Letti kept the answer professional, no doubt seeing right through Jake's poor attempt at rattling her cage. He learned that soon after Jake had left for Western Washington University, Letti had enrolled at a local community college and earned her certification as a nursing assistant. She explained that she wanted to gain more experience before jumping back in to nursing school.

  Another glance at her resume told Jake that Letti worked hard. She had had several home-care positions in the last few months alone, on top of volunteering with the local hospital and hospice care. She had always had a big heart and he was glad to see her put it to good use since he'd been gone.

  Jake asked her a couple more questions, mostly pertaining to his mother's needs. He also asked her a few questions Esther had prepared for him to ask, to which his mother grinned in excitement at Letti's answers.

  Well. If that didn't just seal the deal.

  "Thank you, Letti," Jake said, standing and offering a hand to her. As awkward as it was, he didn't want to appear rude. She shook it, her hand small and light as a feather in his grip, then also offered her hand to Esther, which solidified his own decision. Though he didn't like it.

  He was going to hire her.

  The rest of the interviews paled by comparison. Two of them showed up late, which automatically disqualified them in Jake's mind. He needed to be sure his mother would make it to her appointments on time and being a few minutes late was unacceptable. The last candidate was nice enough but incredibly boring. And while he knew his mother didn't need any entertaining, he couldn't imagine sticking her with someone she wouldn't find any common ground with.

  Jake closed the door on the last person, then rested his forehead against the door.

  "You planned that, didn't you?" Jake mumbled.

  His mother didn't answer, but when he turned back to look at her, he saw the too-innocent look on her face.

  With a heavy sigh, Jake pushed himself away from the door and back to his mother.

  "Fine, we'll hire Letti. But I feel like I need to warn you, she is only ever going to be your nurse. What happened between us years ago is over."

  Esther rolled her eyes but nodded. Then she yawned.

  Looking at the time, Jake sighed again. "Let me heat up some leftovers for you, then you can go to bed, alright?"

  Jake heated up some of the leftover casserole from yesterday's dinner, making sure the pieces were small and soft enough that his mother could swallow them. Thoughts of Letti raced through his mind. He wanted to dig deeper than the cautious interview questions he had asked her today. He wanted to know why she went into nursing. Last he knew, she had wanted to be a teacher. He wanted to ask after her big brother, who last he knew had been deployed to Iraq.

  His thoughts ran in circles as he ate with his mother on the couch, both of them too tired to relocate to the dining room. Jake had built up a fire in the time before the first late applicant showed up and added a couple of logs to it now. His mother was always cold, not only from the weather, but from the treatment.

  "I'll call Letti in the morning," Jake said as he helped his mother into bed. "Ask her to come over tomorrow to go over everything."

  "Dinner," Esther rasped. Jake winced.

  "Alright. I'll invite her to dinner. What are you making?"

  Esther gave Jake a wide grin before she picked up her notebook and pen on the nightstand. This was their game. Too weak to be in the kitchen now, Esther wrote down what she would make if she could. It made Jake's chest warm to see the happiness in his mother's eyes when Jake played along. After all, she had taught him how to cook at a very young age, telling him that one day his future wife would be happier for it.

  Once her menu was complete, Esther passed the notebook to Jake, then settled down in the bed, pulling the sheets up close around her.

  "Goodnight, Mom," Jake said, leaning over and giving her forehead a kiss. Then he switched off her light and left the room.

  Jake kicked off his shoes in his room and grabbed the latest mystery thriller he was slowly working his way through before returning to the living room. He stretched out on the couch, feet toward the fireplace. Then he looked down at his mother's dinner request and let out a loud groan, loud enough for his mother to hear it down the hall.

  Chicken parmesan.

  Letti's favorite.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Letti's phone rang just as she was saying her goodbyes to then on-duty nurses. Worried that it might be her brother, Letti rushed out of the hospital doors and answered her phone without looking at the caller ID.

  "Hello?" she answered, slightly out of breath.

  "Hi, Letti. It's Jake."

  Letti froze in the middle of the sidewalk, earning a narrowed look from a couple as they split up to walk her. Then she shook herself back into action.

  Be a professional!

  "Jake, hi," Letti said in a rush, then winced. "Um. Thanks for giving me a call. How can I help you?"

  Better.

  "We would like to offer you the job, if you're still willing," Jake said. Letti could hear the hesitant tone in his voice. Meaning he didn't actually want to hire her, but he would. For his mother.

  Did she want to work for them?

  She hadn't known who she sent her résumé to when she had applied for the job posting online. The job board didn't provide any personal information, which she understood and appreciated because that would compromise the patient's privacy. But when Esther had replied and given them her address and phone number, Letti had fretted over going through with it.

  She had fretted long enough that she had to show up or offend Esther by not showing. It had been nice to see Esther after all this time, though her heart broke at Esther's thin frame, her pale skin, the burns on her neck due to the radiation treatments.

  She had known then that she would take the job. For Esther. Jake would be busy with calving season. It would be easy enough to avoid him.

  "Letti?" Jake's voice sounded distant over the phone.

  "Sorry," Letti said quickly. "Yes, I'm still willing. When can I start?"

  Lord, please help me.

  "Would you be able to come over tonight and I'll walk you through everything? Paid, of course. And Mom insisted I feed you."

  Letti smiled before she could stop herself. That was just like Esther. "Sure. I can do that. Six o'clock okay for you?"

  "Yeah, as long as you don't mind me cooking while you're there."

  "I'll see you then."

  They hung up and Letti did a little two-step right there on the sidewalk. Sure, her new employer was her ex-boyfriend, but she had a job. A job that would not only make her résumé look better, but it would also help a dear friend of hers.

  She couldn't wait to start.

  Finding a job had proven difficult since she graduated with her certification. She had been in the final running for a job at OHSU Hospital down in Portland, but the job had gone to another candidate, as they had more experience on their résum
é. The HR recruiter had suggested Letti gain more experience in the meantime and promised she would call if they had another opening. Letti had taken her advice to heart and loaded up her free hours with as much volunteer experience as she could, though she couldn't allow herself to hope that the HR recruiter would call.

  She would have to shift her volunteer hours around for this new job. The hospital desperately needed volunteers during the night shifts, as they didn't have enough volunteers willing to work so late. Letti would volunteer through the night, then she went straight to her volunteer shift at the hospice care center off of Main. She had started to volunteer there years ago, right after Jake had left, feeling the need to answer a call she didn't know she had been missing.