The Kidnapped Christmas Bride (Taming of the Sheenans Book 3) by Jane Porter Page A

not bad …not really.”
    “I heard you say that he’s going back to jail and he’ll be there forever.”
    Of course TJ was listening to everything. TJ was her little silent sponge. “I don’t know what’s going to happen to your daddy, but let’s not talk this way. It makes me sad.”
    “But you hate him. I heard you say that in the truck. Two times.”
    “I shouldn’t have said it. It wasn’t nice of me. It wasn’t kind.”
    “But you do hate him.”
    “TJ, he’s your daddy. He loves you a lot. And we’re here right now because he loves you so much, so let’s go have dinner with him and not worry so much, okay?”
    He stared at her a long time, expression brooding.
    “TJ?” she prompted.
    “I just don’t understand,” he said.
    “Understand what?”
    “If he loves me so much, why do you hate him?”
    “It’s complicated.” She hesitated. “And I don’t hate him.”
    “Then why did you say it? It was mean. It hurt his feelings.”
    They exited the bathroom to find Trey was waiting for them by the hostess stand, a red flannel shirt bundled under his arm. “I remembered I had this tucked behind the seat. It’s been sitting there for a long time, but it should keep you warm.” Trey gave the large cherry red flannel shirt a shake, and held it out to her.
    She opened her mouth to say she was fine, but she wasn’t fine. She was cold and tired and sad, worried about Lawrence and TJ and how everything had changed so fast that she couldn’t get her head around it.
    Right now she should be at the wedding reception at the Graff, finishing dinner, or perhaps having the first dance. Instead she was here, at a rustic diner outside White Sulphur Springs, a town with a population of less than a thousand.
    She was definitely over dressed and over exposed for a Montana diner that was pretty much in the middle of nowhere.
    “I’ll take the shirt, even if dusty.” She slipped the soft flannel over her shoulders, pushing her arms through the sleeves, buttoning the front and tying the long shirt tails around her waist to keep her warmer. And she was warmer, and she did feel better. “Thank you.”
    “By the way,” Trey said, “there is only one waitress on tonight and the regular cook didn’t show so service will be slow and the meal questionable.”
    “Do you want to go somewhere else?” she asked.
    “I was wondering about that.”
    “I just want to eat now,” TJ said. “I’m hungry.”
    McKenna glanced around the mostly empty restaurant. Just a half dozen tables were filled. It couldn’t be that much of a wait here. And then she spotted the phone by the cash register. She could call from that. As soon as they ordered, she’d ask if she could borrow it. Lawrence and her family must be frantic. She didn’t want them sending out search parties. “Let’s just stay.”
    The waitress, an older woman in a red checked apron, emerged from the kitchen’s swinging doors, flushed but smiling. “Sorry to keep you waiting. A bit hectic in the kitchen but everything is good. Homestyle cooking at its finest.”
    McKenna smiled. “Sounds great.”
    “And it looks like congratulations are in order,” the waitress added. “We don’t get many wedding parties here. You all look so nice.” But she frowned for a moment at the ill-fitting red flannel shirt. Reaching for menus from the hostess stand, she chucked TJ under the chin. “Especially you, little fellow. You look very sharp.”
    “My mom was going to marry Lawrence but then my dad came so now we’re here.”
    “Sounds like a great day,” she answered, obviously not understanding anything TJ was saying.
    McKenna managed a faint, weak smile. “It’s certainly been a day of surprises.”
    The waitress grinned back. “Aren’t those the best kind?”
    *
    Trey took a seat on one side of the burgundy booth tucked along the wall, and McKenna and TJ sat on the other. Trey barely glanced at the plastic coated menu but TJ wanted to have all his