He wasn’t so sure, nor did he know if she was as prepared as she thought for the pressure that would be put on them after she’d filled in the name, as she’d termed it. But she was probably right that the family wouldn’t react as radically as they had to Lori’s elopement. He would not be entirely surprised if other members of the family had already figured it out for themselves.
He took her hand and gave it a light squeeze. No matter how confident she tried to sound, he could see the nerves in her eyes. He was a little nervous himself actually. About what her family would say, and about how Hannah would deflect questions about their future intentions. As badly as he’d mishandled the mention of a possible marriage, he had been unable to sufficiently gauge her reaction. It had seemed that her first reaction had been immediate rejection—but had that been because of the awkward way he’d brought up the subject, or because she was completely opposed to the idea?
“I’ll back you up on whatever you want to tell them tonight,” he assured her. “But I still want a chance soon to have a long talk just between us.”
He thought he saw her swallow as she nodded. “I know.”
Still holding her hand, he began to turn with her toward the center of the room.
He heard the loud crash at the same time the window shattered inward behind him. He felt several sharp tingles on his cheek, the back of his neck and his left arm beneath the short sleeve of his shirt. Something heavy slammed to the floor at his feet amid the rain of glass. Without taking time to examine it, he threw himself at Hannah, wrapping himself around her and pushing her away from the object, bracing himself for a possible blast.
Chapter Nine
Her face almost smothered in Andrew’s chest, Hannah heard the shocked gasps and cries from around the room. Almost as if from a distance, she felt the sting of myriad cuts on her face, neck and arms, but there was no real pain. She was aware of someone dashing past her, throwing open the front door and bolting outside. Aaron? Followed by C.J., she realized, lifting her head in time to see her uncle disappear outside.
Loosening his grip on her, Andrew looked around cautiously. “A rock,” he said in disgust. “It’s a big damn rock.”
Shakily, she drew away from him, staring in confusion at the grapefruit-size rock sitting on her mother’s floor, surrounded by broken glass. “What did you think it was?”
“A grenade. A Molotov cocktail,” he admitted grimly. “I didn’t take time to pick it up and study it.”
No, he hadn’t taken that time, she realized in a daze. Instead, he’d put himself between her and the object, covering her with as much of his own body as possible, instinctively protecting her and their child. If she hadn’t already been hopelessly in love with him, she’d surely have tumbled then.
“Hannah? Baby, are you all right?” Her father hovered beside her, patting her shoulder, brushing a shard of glass from her hair.
“I’m fine, Dad.”
“You’re bleeding,” her mother fretted from her other side, touching her face. Her fingers came away smeared with red.
Hannah lifted her own hand tentatively, deciding the cuts were superficial. Andrew’s lightning-fast reaction might well have prevented her from being sliced by flying glass. She looked at him, seeing minor cuts scattered beneath the bandage from yesterday. None of them appeared deep, to her great relief.
She looked down at the rock and the larger shards of broken glass. Had she and Andrew not been walking away from the window, had they still been standing there in conversation, they could both have been badly injured. As it was, the large rock had missed them both by scant inches, and the larger pieces of glass had fallen just behind them.
“Who could have done this?” Mimi asked plaintively, drawing Hannah’s attention in that direction. She saw that her shaken grandmother had been urged into a seat and was being tended to by Sarah and Shelby, while Steven and Maggie stood on either side of their grandfather, who looked more angry than distressed.
“You’re okay?” Andrew asked her intently.
Flanked by her parents, she nodded, knowing what he wanted to do. “Go with your brother, but be careful.”
He was out the door almost before she finished speaking.
Maggie rushed to get a broom and dustpan to start cleaning up glass. Steven insisted on taking photos with his phone first, and warned Maggie not to touch the rock with her bare hands. “Fingerprints,” he explained. “By the way, did anyone notify the police about this?”
Saying he would take care of that, Hannah’s dad moved to a phone, while Steven examined the window damage. “We can tape a tarp over this tonight and replace the glass tomorrow,” he said. “You’ll have to notify your insurance agent of course, if you make a claim for it.”
Hannah’s mom insisted that Hannah should sit down. She rushed to get a damp washcloth to clean up the thankfully minor cuts Hannah had suffered.
“I really don’t understand what’s going on around here lately,” Mimi bemoaned, wringing her hands. “Shelby was kidnapped, Lori’s run off to get married and now someone does this. Has the whole world just gone crazy?”
“Sometimes it seems like it, Mimi,” Shelby said, her expression a bit worried as she watched the door for the men to return. “But everyone’s okay. We’ll face whatever it is together, just like we always do.”
Mimi sighed wistfully. “But still, Lori’s left, and Steven’s leaving soon. Things are changing.”
“Things always change in a family, Mimi,” Hannah’s mother replied, looking meaningfully toward Hannah and the soon-to-be next generation as she approached with the washcloth. “As Shelby said, we’ll handle it together. Those who leave will always come back, even if only to visit. And whoever did this will be caught and punished. Everything will be fine.”
Hannah figured her mother was trying to reassure herself as well as her mother-in-law. Like everyone else, her mom was still shaken, but staying busy and positive was her way of dealing with it.
The front door opened, and everyone turned quickly to look that way. C.J. entered first, his expression somber but satisfied. Andrew and Aaron entered with someone else gripped between them.