by Dianne Drake
“Just thinking what tonight would have been like if we’d gone back to town.” “Are you glad we didn’t?”
“Very glad,” she whispered, words murmured as his lips claimed hers full and hard.
The kiss was so hard and full of long-held passion that she feared her lips would bruise, or that she would bruise Eric’s lips. But as what couldn’t possibly intensify did just that, and as she felt the deep probing of his tongue, and returned it, she kicked off that single blanket and rolled over until they were side to side. Then she pulled back enough so she could see his face. His beautiful face.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Just looking.”
“But it’s dark, there’s not really much to see.”
He was wrong, though. There was everything to see, and it made no matter that there wasn’t sufficient light. For she saw it in her heart. And it frightened her, because she wanted it so badly.
But this wasn’t love. Wasn’t love. Couldn’t be love.
Could it?
“There’s always something to see.” Sliding her leg across his hip, she wiggled closer, pressed her lips to his ear. “If you know what you’re looking for.”
What she was doing to him, in the explicit moves, in the subtleties. As he rolled on top of her, so ready to take her again, it was clear that this second time would be as fast as the first. There was no subtlety in what he needed or what she wanted. “Do you know what you’re looking for?” he practically groaned.
“I think I do.” In the perfect spot underneath him, finding the perfect rhythm with him…“I think I really do.” Though knowing and truly having were so far apart.
“Eric, do you read me?”
The crackling noise from the walkie-talkie startled her awake, and at first blink Dinah was surprised to find that she was totally naked underneath the blanket. At second blink, she was surprised to find she was totally alone.
“Come in, Eric.”
It was Neil’s voice. She recognized it.
“Come in, Eric. Can you hear me?”
Rolling over on her belly, suddenly very self-conscious about her condition, she grabbed the walkie-talkie from atop her backpack. “Eric’s not here right now,” she said, struggling to sit up and keep the blanket wrapped tight.
“Tell him that the Dawsons are all stable. Everything’s fine here, and we were wondering when the two of you were going to head back. We don’t need to send a rescue team out to find you, do we?”
Even though Neil was chuckling at the suggestion, Dinah felt totally humiliated.
“We can have a helicopter out there to get you in the next ten minutes. Unless you care to camp out there a little longer.”
“Ten minutes is fine,” she said, trying not to sound as despondent as she felt. Had it been that bad for Eric? Was he having morning-after regrets? Was he still battling over his feelings about his wife, and now feeling guilty about what they’d done? She felt horrible about that. Didn’t want to cause him any pain. But she was afraid that’s what she’d done.
“Seriously?”
“Seriously. I’m not sure Eric will want the ride, but I do.” He’d said he had rules. She’d known her own rules. And broken them. Another case of her emotions ruling her head. “And I’ll be ready.”
“Then ten minutes it is.”
Well, it was something she couldn’t fight. Something she wouldn’t fight. And maybe it was good to find out now, before they…what? Got too serious?
Dinah sighed, tugging on her clothes. Eric had to be in the throes of complete emotional regret. “But I knew,” she said, slinging her backpack over her shoulder, getting ready to hike on down the trail to the pick-up point. If she met up with Eric somewhere along the way, she’d simply pretend that last night hadn’t happened. That would make it easier for him. Ignore the deed and soon the fact of it would be forgotten.
Except she wouldn’t forget. She’d expected…well, it didn’t matter what she’d expected, did it? It was what it was. She should have known better. Nothing was going to change.
As it turned out, Eric wasn’t too far off from the campsite, which surprised her. He hadn’t gone off and left her at all, which was what she’d thought he’d done. In fact, he was sitting on a rock, staring out over the river, mere yards from where they’d slept. In sight all along. Yet so far away in the things that mattered.
He had to get back to her. She’d be waking up soon, wondering where he was. Then she’d be jumping to the wrong conclusion. Well, not exactly the wrong conclusion because when he’d opened his eyes that morning, he’d wanted to feel guilty, wanted to feel disloyal. But all he’d felt was good…good in a way he hadn’t felt in such a long time. That’s what had sent him off to be alone, to think. Because his feelings scared him. The fact that he had feelings after so many years scared him even more.
Oh, he’d been accused of hiding—behind his job, behind his daughters, behind his sister. Too many times one woman or another had approached him, shown interest, tried being friendly only to have him brush them off when their overtures proved more than he’d wanted from them. But that’s what had always made it easier for him, what had always made it better. He had excuses. Places to hide. Safety in a life he really didn’t belong in.
But Patricia wouldn’t have wanted this. She would have wanted him to be happy, to get on with his life, find someone else, be normal again. In theory, it sounded easy. In practice, it was so damned hard because it wasn’t in the plan. His life had been set the way he’d wanted it, everything laid out. Perfect. Then she’d died and left him floundering. What to do without her? What to do with the girls?
Honestly, it had been easier just sticking to the original plan—the original plan minus Patricia. Except easier was getting so frustrating lately because he wanted…needed a new life. Being with Dinah made him see what he wanted in that life and, logically, he should have been feeling guilty. But he wasn’t. And it hurt, letting Patricia slip away. He wasn’t guilty, though. Just reconciling. And sad.
Dinah made things better. Made them good. Changed everything. Yet she was running away from him as hard and fast as she could. She’d take a few steps closer then bolt. One night brought them closer, but didn’t bring them together. The thing was, being together scared him, too. So maybe he was running away as hard as she was, and hadn’t even realized it. Or why wasn’t he waking up with her right now, making sweet morning love to her the way he should have been?
Sitting on a boulder jutting out over the river, with the early sun beginning to shine down on his shoulders, Eric watched the water flow by. It moved along no matter what happened, the way his life should have. But his life had been stagnant for so long, sitting in a little dammed-up pool off to the side, flowing nowhere. Until Dinah. “Dinah…” he murmured. He didn’t want to hurt her. If ever there was a woman he could love again, she was the one. So unlike Patricia in just about every way, she attracted him like he’d never expected anyone could again. And it was a different feeling of attraction, something so unexpected. With Patricia it had been calm, steady, all about a sense of well-being. With Dinah it was wild, crazy, off balance. And, God help him, he wanted that in his life. But was it fair to Dinah when he wasn’t sure if he could get to the place where it was truly good with him…good without all these doubts in himself? She deserved more.
Eric stood, stretched, and looked around him. In the distance he could hear the sound of an approaching helicopter, and wondered if Neil had sent someone to get them. A brisk morning hike would have been good. Very cathartic, and very long. Almost three hours from here. So maybe a short ride was best. Time to get back to reality and see what happened next. Maybe he needed some distance from Dinah…just until he was sure he wouldn’t hurt her, just until he was sure about…himself.
Dinah…Thinking about her brought a smile to his face, and quickened his step as he hiked back to the spot where they’d spent the night. But halfway there, he met up with her, and even though he�
�d expected her to come at him with a vengeance for leaving her alone, even though she had never really been out of his sight, she simply looked up at him. “Our ride’s here,” she said. “I decided I didn’t want to hike out this morning.”
She was avoiding the obvious, but he saw it in her eyes. The questions, the doubts. She couldn’t hide it. She couldn’t hide anything from him, and it unnerved him, being so aware of her. “It’s not easy yet, Dinah. Whatever this is going on between us…it’s not going to be easy. We’re both still fighting against it and I needed a few minutes to think. That’s the only reason I went off by myself.”
“I understand,” she said.
But she didn’t. She doubted him, and he saw that in her, too. It killed him that such a little thing had hurt her because he didn’t want Dinah hurt by anything, most of all by him. “I didn’t leave you, Dinah. I don’t want you thinking that I did.”
“People leave. It’s not a big deal. They leave, you move on.”
“But I didn’t leave.”
“And I said I understand. So let’s just get in the helicopter and get back, OK? I have a shift at the hospital this morning, and I have to cook this evening.”
Well, she’d shut the door. Shut it and locked it up tight and he didn’t know how to open it. He wanted to be optimistic about their future together, but he wasn’t sure he knew how to be optimistic anymore. For Dinah, though, he really did want to be.
“I’m glad you saved all of them,” Janice said, then immediately turned Eric’s daughters loose on him.
“I called the hospital in Salt Lake on the way in and they told me that Shawn is in surgery, his father is in Intensive Care and Troy is waking up, doing better than expected. I wish all our rescues could turn out that well.”
Now that he was back, Pippa and Paige were going wild, holding on to him, trying to out-talk each other, telling him all the little details of their night without him. “They don’t know what he does, do they?” Dinah asked Janice.
“They know he’s a doctor, and that he helps make people feel better.”
“But they don’t know about the rescues?”
“He thinks they’re too young to understand. He’s afraid they’d be worried, especially as they don’t have a mother.”
Dinah dropped to her knees in the grass then sprawled out. She wasn’t physically tired so much as she was emotionally worn out. Too much had happened, too much to think about, and she just wanted to stay there in the grass for a while, empty her mind and stare up at the sky.
“By the way, I have a message from Angela,” Janice said, standing over her, looking down.
Dinah opened her eyes. “She’s OK, isn’t she?”
“Fine. Perfect.”
“Not in labor?”
Janice shook her head. Then smiled. “But she said to tell you that she named her new daughter after your grandmother.”
Dinah bolted straight to her feet. “She had her baby? When? Why didn’t someone call me? Is she in the hospital? Is the baby OK? Who delivered the baby? Did Gabby get here, or did—?”
“Whoa,” Janice said, thrusting out her hand to stop the outpouring of questions. “Everybody’s fine. Angela is in the hospital, and she wouldn’t let anybody tell you because she knew you’d come back to her in the middle of the night, and she thought that was too dangerous. So everyone here had to promise…”
“Neil knew?”
Janice nodded. “That’s why he offered the helicopter to get you back here.”
“And Eric?”
“Not Eric. He’d have tried getting you back here in the middle of the night, and we decided it was better for him to rest.”
“I can’t believe no one said a word to me.”
“Your sister’s request.”
“But she’s OK? You wouldn’t be keeping something from me, would you?”
“Other than the fact that it’s a girl, her name is Sarah, she weighs seven pounds, and she’s beautiful, there’s really nothing else to tell you except that Angela wants to see you as soon as you can get there.”
As soon as she could get to the hospital turned into about fifteen minutes, as Dinah bypassed her room, a shower and a good meal at the lodge. She hopped in her car, drove straight to the hospital, parked in the no-parking zone at the front and ran in the door, fully aware that she looked like she’d spent a night on the mountain.
On the way to the maternity ward, she paused to look at the babies in the nursery. Three of them. All beautiful, all of them causing a lump to form in her throat. The one on the left was her niece, as it turned out. Naturally, that was the baby she’d already picked as the prettiest. Of course, she’d never met a baby that wasn’t beautiful but as it so happened, little Sarah was the one who brought tears to her eyes.
As the nurse held her up for Dinah to get a better look, a lifetime of possibilities for Sarah passed before her eyes…dance lessons, school plays, girlfriends, pretty dresses, boyfriends, first date, first kiss…First longing, and it was hers. To have a baby of her own. She’d subjugated that desire for so long then with Charles she’d thought about it again. Except after he’d given her the diamond ring he’d also given her the news that he’d had a vasectomy years ago to avoid the possibility of children. He would treat them as patients but he didn’t want them interfering in his real life.
She’d been disappointed. Told him so, and asked him to reconsider. Maybe they could adopt? Or he could have a vasectomy reversal. He did reconsider, but not about having children. That’s when he’d started to reconsider whether or not he wanted her. And she’d started to reconsider whether or not she wanted him.
But now…this was what she wanted. It was like her biological clock had reserved all its ticking for this very moment, and now it was ticking like crazy. She wanted a baby of her own. Wanted that joy Angela had. Wanted that feeling of complete fulfillment. It’s what made sense to her more than anything else.
“She’s a real looker,” Eric said, stepping up behind her. “Even though she hasn’t got any hair yet, I think she’s going to be a redhead like her aunt.” He slipped his arm around Dinah’s waist and she melted against him. Quite a pair they were, dirty, tired, bruised and scratched, and standing in the hall smiling at the babies. “I remember the first time I saw the twins…I couldn’t believe how perfect they were. Perfect fingers and toes, perfect little eyes and noses…”
“It puts everything into proper perspective, doesn’t it? Makes you truly believe all’s right with the world.”
“All is right with the world…their world. And that’s the way it should be.”
“And then they have to grow up,” she said on a wistful sigh.
“Like I said before, you’ll be a good mother, Dinah.”
“My life is too up and down to drag a baby into it right now.” But in the future? Admittedly, she could almost see that happening, with Eric. Thinking with her heart again.
“Only if you want it to be up and down.”
“That’s not what I want, but so far it hasn’t been under my control.” Spinning away, Dinah headed off in the direction of her sister’s room, half expecting Eric to follow, but when she didn’t hear the clicking of his heels on the tile floor, she decided it was for the best. Being around him almost made her believe she could have it all. Almost.
“Well, I see you fixed yourself up for the occasion,” Angela said. She was sitting up in bed, looking happier than Dinah had ever seen her look. Positively glowing.
“I slept on pine needles,” she said, plucking one from her hair. “Climbed down a rock. Waded in an icy cold river.” And made love like she’d never known it could be. But that didn’t show on her, and she was going to take care that it wouldn’t.
“And you look radiant. I heard the father and both the boys are going to make it.”
“Why didn’t you let somebody call me?” Dinah asked, pulling up a chair and sitting down next to her sister.
“Because you were needed out there, and I w
as fine here. Brad’s mother and sister flew in. And Gabby got here in time to do the delivery, so I had a veritable force of strong women here to help me through, when you take into account that half the women in White Elk stopped by because they knew you were out on the rescue and thought I might need a birth coach.”
“She’s beautiful, Angela. Sarah is so beautiful, and amazing.
“Then you’ve seen her?”
“We came to an understanding about her first date, and her first kiss, and her wedding dress.”
Angela laughed. “Sounds to me like you might have a few mommy dreams going on of your own. So, did something happen out there in the woods you want to tell me about?”
“Nothing that matters,” Dinah said, trying to sound less wistful than she felt. “It was…difficult.”
“The rescue, or what came after?”
“Both. Eric and I, we…we got closer, I think. But it scares me. I know I trust him, with all my heart. But I get too emotional, make bad decisions…”
“And you think Eric might be a bad decision?”
“No. But I think he might be a wrong decision, at least right now. He’s still got…”
“Patricia?”
Dinah nodded. “And it feels like I’m pushing him away from her.”
“Is he ready to be pushed?”
“That’s the thing. He might be. But maybe he’s just responding to, well…you know.”
Angela grinned. “So it was a nice night in the forest after all?”
Dinah grinned back. “It was, and that’s what scared me. I think we should have waited. I mean, it wasn’t that long ago that he took off his wedding ring, and now…” She shrugged. “I don’t want to make a mess of this, and I don’t want to hurt him. But I think I’m doing both.”
“Then maybe he’s the one you should be talking to.”
Sighing, Dinah pulled another pine needle from her hair. “Maybe I will. Anyway, let’s talk about you now. Like, if Brad’s mother is here, what about Brad? Have you talked to him?”