Snowfall on Haven Point(75)

“Lucky. I’d be happy to keep anything on him,” Samantha said with a little sigh. “I’ve had a crush on the man forever. With those blue, blue eyes, he’s always reminded me of Paul Newman in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. If Paul Newman had dark hair, anyway. But don’t you dare tell Katrina, okay? She would freak if she had any idea I’m seriously in lust with her big brother.”

“I won’t tell. I promise.”

“You two would make a great couple,” Megan said. “He’s always been so serious. He needs to laugh more and those adorable kids of yours would melt even the hardest heart.”

“Yes, they would. But we’re not a couple,” she stressed.

“But look how cute they are together,” Megan said. She pointed to Marshall, who was bent over on his crutches listening to her kids as they appeared to be arguing the merits of certain ornaments over others.

Her heart gave a little twist. They were cute together. Despite their rocky beginnings, both Will and Chloe obviously adored him.

She was coming to, as well. Entirely too much.

“It looks like the note cards Louise painted are almost sold out,” she said, trying to change the subject.

“They’ve been really popular this year.”

“Because she’s wonderful. I’ll buy the last box.”

By the time they paid for their purchases, Andie could see Marshall had overdone things—just as she knew he would never admit to it, even if tortured. He kept shifting on his crutches, mouth tight and his expression remote.

She resolved to usher them all to her vehicle quickly and get him home, where he could elevate his leg.

The crowd seemed to be even heavier as they made their way out of the warm tent and the unnaturally mild temperatures had begun to drop with the cold front forecasters said would be moving down from Canada later that night.

The going was tough for him on the crutches and he had to stop several times when people moved in front of him without paying any attention.

“Sorry about this. I thought the crowd would thin by now.”

“I’m doing fine. We’re almost to the end of the row.”

Just before they reached the last few tents, she spotted Charlene and Mike coming the other direction. They saw them at the same time and made their way through the mass of people.

“Oh, you’re still here!” Charlene exclaimed. “I thought for sure you would have left for Snow Angel Cove by now.”

“We’re heading to the car now,” she started to say.

Before she could squeeze out the last word, she heard a grunt at the same moment she became aware of movement out of the corner of her eye.

She turned instinctively and reached out a hand, an instant too late to help Marshall, who seemed to have lost his balance and was toppling forward—directly onto his broken leg in the protective boot.





CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

HE MANAGED TO keep most of his weight off the leg as he toppled, but it still banged into the frozen ground and pain growled through him, hot and vicious.

He rolled to his back and started to curse, then caught himself when he saw Chloe and Will looking down at him with big, frightened eyes.

His mother looked just as frightened. “Somebody call an ambulance!” Charlene shrieked.

“On it,” Uncle Mike said, reaching for his cell phone.

Marshall managed to breathe through the pain and held up a hand. “Stop. Don’t call an ambulance. I’m okay. Honest.”

“You are not okay,” Andie said, kneeling on the concrete beside him. Though her eyes were a deep, concerned green and he didn’t miss the flickers of panic in them, her voice sounded remarkably calm.

“I will be, as soon as we both get up from the cold ground.”

“I don’t think we should move you until the paramedics come!” Charlene said. “Mike, call 911.”

His uncle looked like he was in an impossible position, forced to choose between two conflicting orders.

“Don’t call the ambulance, Mike,” he said firmly, hoping common sense would overrule the man’s desire to please his new bride. “I’m fine, I promise. Just stabilize the crutch so I can pull myself up. Andie, he might need help.”

Though in his sixties, Mike was strong as a plow horse from his years of manual labor at the body shop. As he hoped, though, Andie quickly rose from the cold concrete to grip the crutches.

This was so humiliating, finding himself on the ground like that, but he had a bigger concern and couldn’t stay here like a turtle that had landed on its shell.

He grabbed the crutches as high as he could reach and pulled himself up, cursing the awkwardness of the heavy brace that he was already so damn sick of. He supposed it beat a plaster cast, but not by much.