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Taggart. When he loomed beside her, tall and broad and male, she grew tongue-tied and self-conscious.
    “Ready to go?” he asked.
    “Yes. Thank you.” She turned to Steff. “Will someone call? If there’s a change?”
    “Of course.”
    Bronte reached into her bag, digging around the flotsam of tissues, packets of moist towelettes, hand cream, sunblock, and fruit snacks that had slowly edged out the quaint bottles of perfume, embroidered handkerchiefs, designer lipsticks, and manicure supplies that had graced her pocketbook before she’d given birth. Toward the bottom, she found a scrap of paper—a receipt from a McDonald’s inCheyenne—and a pen. She scribbled her contact information and handed it to Steff.
    “That’s my cell phone if you need it.”
    “I’ll clip it to Mrs. Ellis’s chart.” She waved to Bronte’s daughter. “Bye, Lily.”
    Motioning to Kari, Bronte trailed Jace into the hall. Lily ran ahead, pushing the button to the elevator while Kari followed, her eyes still glued to her iPod and her thumbs frantically moving across the screen, sending one final text before she lost the Wi-Fi signal.
    As they waited for the doors to open, Bronte turned to Jace. “I really appreciate all you’ve done for us tonight.”
    “Glad to help,” he said, unconsciously slapping his hat against his thigh. “Annie is a good friend.”
    The doors slid open with a soft
ping.
After they’d stepped inside, Jace leaned against the railing, idly watching the lights march toward the ground floor.
    “While you were in the ICU unit, I stepped out to make a couple of calls,” he said, his voice rumbling in the close confines. “One of my hired hands is a decent mechanic, so I had him drop by Annie’s and check your van. He thinks the battery is to blame. You’ve been leaking acid. Tyson will pick up a new one at the auto parts store when it opens in the morning. He should be there after nine to install it. If that’s your only problem, it will save you an expensive trip to the shop.”
    The elevator opened, but her feet were rooted to the floor. She was stunned that a man she’d barely met had taken her so completely under his wing. “I . . . Thank you.”
    The girls ran ahead of them to the revolving front entrance to the hospital. Lily shuffled Morticia-like against the tight stricture of her blanket, and too late, Bronte realized she was about to run outside barefoot.
    Lily seemed to discover the same thing, because she came to a halt, stopping the revolving door in the process. Kari, who was trapped in one of the sections behind her, banged on the glass shouting, “Why did you stop, you little creep!”
    Jace sidestepped the revolving door, using one of the sideexits. Swinging Lily into his arms, he said something to her that made Lily smile and released Kari from her momentary prison.
    The rain had eased while they’d been inside, becoming a fine mist. Yards away from the truck, Jace touched a button on his key fob and the vehicle rumbled to life. By the time they climbed inside, the interior was warm and filled with a heavenly aroma. On the center console, there was a beverage holder with four cups and a stack of food containers.
    “I hope you don’t mind, but it’s been a while since I’ve eaten, so I got enough for everyone. There’s hot chocolate for the kids, coffee or chamomile tea for us. There’s also steak fingers and gravy for a snack, if you’re hungry.”
    Steak fingers and gravy?
    Before Bronte could warn Jace about the dangers of having kids and gravy in the same vehicle, her girls reached for the containers.
    Jace seemed to read her mind. “Don’t worry. It’s a ranch truck. They can’t do anything to hurt it.”
    Bronte seriously doubted that statement. She turned to offer a warning to the backseat. But when she found her girls talking and giggling with one another as they dunked bite-sized pieces of chicken-fried steak into white gravy, she turned to Jace instead. “Thank