---
Libby jumped out of her truck and dashed to the door of the rustic-looking, green two-story to pick up her niece from the babysitter. Barb Kellen’s big front yard was so littered with plastic playthings it could have been used as a Toys "R" Us ad.
“Knock-knock,” she called, opening the door.
A chime sounded somewhere inside the house. A required warning device for home child-care providers, Barb had once mentioned. “Gotta know when kids go out and people come in.”
“We’re back here,” a woman’s voice called.
“Libbeee,” came a high-pitched squeal.
“Wait. Your other shoe. Megan.”
The word came out gruff and impatient. Barb was a nice woman. Early fifties. Retired from a job in Rapid so she could care for her grandchildren. This had led to a new career. But Libby wasn’t convinced she had the right temperament for handling kids and she didn’t plan to let Barb babysit her child.
Her yet-to-be-discussed-much-less-conceived child.
She planned to sit down across the table from Cooper this evening and draft their contract. True, she’d said he could take a week to get a feeling for the town and be comfortable with her before making a decision, but after a horrible afternoon at work, she’d changed her mind.
Thankfully Mac had called to tell her that he was showing Cooper the mine, but even knowing that Coop wasn’t lost and wandering in the hills hadn’t been enough to get him off her mind. Much to the detriment of her job.
She’d filled several dozen boxes with the wrong mail and completely missed a stack of time-sensitive fliers that had to go out. And she may have even snapped at a customer or two when they interrupted her silly schoolgirl daydreams about the handsome movie star.
Nope. He needed to go back home. Sooner rather than later. Hopefully he’d agree to speed up the process if she found a way to put her request diplomatically.
“Libby,” Megan cried, throwing herself at her aunt.
Libby put one hand on the wall so she didn’t topple over. “Hey, sweets, did you miss me or what?”
“Where’s my daddy? He said he was going to pick me up today.”
Libby pried her niece’s hands apart and went down on one knee. “I know. He told me to tell you he’s sorry. He’s still at the mine.” With Cooper.
“Mac was supposed to pay me today,” Barb said, joining them, a pink and brown Keds in hand. “Is that why he had you come?”
Libby took the shoe from her and helped Megan into it. “He’s showing the mine to a friend of mine. Time got away from him. He’s had a lot on his mind lately. I’m sure he just forgot what day it is.”
“Humph,” Barbs snorted, crossing her pudgy arms over her white Child’s Play T-shirt. Her business logo was encircled by tiny, silk-screened handprints – purple, blue, red and yellow. “He and I have been having this conversation for months now. How come he’s always late?”
Libby looked around for Megan’s backpack, which she found hanging on a hook above a bench where children could change their shoes and boots in winter. “I don’t know, Barb. Maybe he’s still getting the hang of being a single father. Misty used to handle the checkbook. I do know that. But he’s certainly good for it. You’re not questioning that, are you?”
Barb frowned. “No. He always pays. Just never on time. I have my bills, too, you know.”
“Don’t we all.” She made herself smile diplomatically despite her desire to defend her brother. “I’ll talk to him. He’s juggling a lot right now, but you’re perfectly right about deserving to be paid on time.”
Barb reached out and ruffled Megan’s dark brown hair. “Excellent. I wouldn’t want to lose this one. She’s a good girl, aren’t you, Megan? A little too quiet some of the time, but one of the easiest ones I’ve got right now.”
Libby fought to keep from cringing. She hated it when people labeled children-–good or bad. Megan was a unique person who had been through an extraordinary time that was bound to have affected her. Mac said she refused to go to sleep without the light on, and Lord help everyone if she lost her “bankie”–-a scrap of baby blanket that went everywhere with her.
“I’ll remind him to bring a check with him tomorrow when he drops her off. Night.”
They were partway out the door–the chime ringing in the background–-when Barb asked, “So what’s this rumor about some movie star coming to town? Someone saw him at the post office. Why would Cooper Lindstrom be in Sentinel Pass, for heaven’s sake?”
Libby had fielded several similar queries today. “He’s just passing through. Like most people who come here.”
“Isn’t that the truth? Flatlanders never last for long in the mountains. Just ask Mac,” Barb said cryptically. Everyone in town knew Misty had been from Valentine, Nebraska. She’d made a point of putting heart-shaped bumper stickers on her car.
They also knew that she’d been killed on her way back to the flatlands. Leaving Mac for her former boyfriend. “She loved the mountains at first. Maybe if she’d lived, she would have come back,” Libby said.
Barb snorted again. A sound that amplified the pounding in Libby’s head. “I doubt it. That type’s never happy for long.”
That type? Young? Pretty? Blonde?
“Gotta go.” Libby took Megan's hand. “Nice talking to you. Bye.”
The door closed behind them but not for several seconds. Libby sensed Barb watching. No doubt she was asking herself what a plain-Jane postmaster would know about love.
Not a darn thing, if the asker was referring to personal experience. But she knew quite a bit from observation. From her brother and sister-in-law she'd learned that oil and water didn’t stay mixed for long. From Jenna’s mother she saw that years of obligation could rob you of the will to be healthy. Her father had proven that a broken heart often never healed. And her grandmother had taught her never to settle for anything less than an honest, mutually respectful relationship.
“Are we going to my house?” Megan asked as Libby helped her into her booster seat. The smaller unit had been a milestone Megan had been proud of, and Libby liked the less-cumbersome seat, too.
“No. Mine. Then I’ll walk you home. First, I need to put on some water for supper.”
“You’re only eating water?”
Libby laughed. “The water is to cook the spaghetti.”
“I like spaghetti.”
“I know you do, but I already have a guest.”
“The man from the TV?”
“You met him?”
Megan shook her head. “I heard Daddy talking to someone about him. Probably Gene.” Eugene Turner. Mac’s boss at the gravel pit. A veritable font of negativity.
“Oh,” Libby said, poking around with the seatbelt until she heard the click. “Well, yes, he’s staying in Gran’s house and I promised to feed him.”
“I could come. Daddy won’t have anything fixed.”
Poor kid. No hot meal waiting for her. “Well…maybe you and your dad can join us. I’ll see.”
“See what?”
“See if he lost Cooper.”
“On purpose?” Megan asked, her eyes going wide.
Libby kissed her forehead. “Just kidding. I’m sure they’ll be there when we get home. Move your foot. Good g…job.”
When she arrived home a few minutes later, there was no sign of Mac’s truck in either McGannon driveway. Libby helped Megan out and was debating about driving out to the mine when she heard the familiar clatter of Mac’s half-ton.
He pulled in behind her.
She was holding Megan’s hand, and neither moved as the two men got out and walked toward them. Both looked somber. She wondered what had transpired between them. Had Mac tried to intimidate Cooper? Or had he simply gone into more detail about the mining industry?
She’d already made up her mind to lay her cards on the table with Cooper. Instead of bothering with mine ownership, she’d offer him a fixed sum for a one-shot sperm-donor thing-–no strings attached
. If he turned her down, she’d pick someone from the donor list at the fertility clinic and deal with her abandonment issues some other way. Maybe she’d even meet some nice guy and fall in love someday. It wasn’t impossible for a single mother to wind up with a happily ever after. Right?
Megan’s intense pressure on her hand finally broke Libby’s reverie. She squeezed back, reassuringly, then called out, “Spaghetti at my house. Forty minutes. Megan’s going to help.”
Stalling, she thought, glancing at Cooper. His handsome face was streaked with the kind of grime that only came from the mines. “You both have time to shower.”
Cooper looked at Mac a second, then nodded and turned toward the cabin.
Again, she wondered what had transpired. Megan started to pull her toward the house, but she resisted. “Just a second, honey. I want to ask your daddy something.”
Mac’s step seemed to drag. When he was about a foot away, he pushed back the brim of his Orton Lumber cap and looked her in the eye. “He’s here in one piece, isn’t he?”
“Did I say anything?”
“I know what you were thinking. That I was going to drop him in some hole and claim he went missing. Even if the thought had crossed my mind--which it didn’t--I wouldn’t have done it. He’s not so bad, for one thing. And Meggie and I don’t need any more trouble, for another. I still don’t like your plan, but I’m going to butt out and let you make your own mistakes.”
“Like you did?”
In two steps he closed the distance between them and scooped his daughter up in his arms, surprising both her and Libby. He spun around in a circle, making Megan squeal with delight.
Libby smiled. This was more how he’d been before. Intense, always. Serious. But with a playful side-–especially around his daughter.
“I’ve made plenty in my life, but sometimes something great comes along to shine a light into that deep, dark hole you’ve dug for yourself.”
She knew he didn’t mean gold.
“I don’t know if you laid out everything about the mine, but I’m going to offer him some of the money in my trust instead of dragging you into this. That’s what I should have done from the beginning.”
Mac stopped spinning. Megan’s ear-to-ear grin faltered. “There’s more to the guy than I first thought.”
How much more? She wanted to ask but was afraid to hear the answer.
“For one thing, he’s smarter than he lets on. He never seemed to run out of questions, and they weren’t just about money and the price of gold.” He looked at her. “He wanted to know if I ever got claustrophobic.”
He set Megan down and said, “I do, you know. Sometimes. When I picture Dad dying under a wall of rock. I think I must be crazy to be doing this.” He smoothed down his daughter’s thick brown locks and sighed. A second later, he said, “I’m gonna clean up. I’ll be back with the flashlight so Meggie and I can walk home after dinner.”
Then he returned to his truck and backed up with a noisy roar.
Libby shook her head and took her niece’s hand again. “One thing you should know about men, Megan. They’re a mystery.”
“Like the Mystery Spot?” Megan asked.
Libby thought a moment. Jenna’s family’s tourist trap was a contrivance of optical illusions, but even when you knew you were being fooled, you still couldn’t quite figure out how. Pretty much the way she felt about the men she’d dated in the past.
“Exactly,” she said. “Come on. Let’s start cooking. Men like to eat. That’s one thing I do know for sure.”
Chapter 8
“Daddy, when can we get a dog?”
Mac looked up from his plate so fast a long strand of spaghetti dangled from the corner of his mouth.
Cooper blew a raspberry, which made Mac go scarlet.
Libby shook her head. “Boys,” she said. “Could we please use our polite table manners?”
“My apologies, Miss Elizabeth,” Cooper said with a perfect southern drawl.
Megan’s eyes went wide. “You sound funny.”
“Ach, m’fair lassie, that’s nuthin’ compared to me Irish brogue.”
Megan giggled. “More. More.”
Libby liked the sound of his voice–-voices--too much. They’d appeared in her dreams ever since the first time she and Coop had talked on the phone. Live and in person was much worse. Now she was starting to see him in her dreams, too. “But then we won’t hear about your dog, Meggie.”
Megan turned her attention just that quickly to her father. “Daddy, you said in the spring. Remember? Is it spring now, Libby? Miz Barb said it was.”
Mac gave Libby a dark look.
She shrugged. “Hey, she’s a four-year-old with a steel-trap memory. Don’t blame me. You shouldn’t make promises you’re not prepared to keep.”
From the corner of her eye, she saw Cooper’s fork pause midbite. The neatly twirled spaghetti started to slip back to the plate, but he quickly recovered.
“She’s too young. And we’re both gone all day. I notice you don’t have a pet. You haven’t even replaced old Thimble.”
Libby’s late cat--so named because she was so tiny when Gran found her abandoned and starving in the woodpile--had passed away from an untreatable tumor right before Christmas. Libby had been afraid some well-meaning friend might try to give her another kitten as a gift, so she’d spread the word that she needed time to grieve. But in truth, she’d already started researching IVF and had decided to hold off getting a pet until her child was older.
“Don’t try to change the subject. I think a dog would be good for Megan. She might sleep better at night if she had a watchdog at her feet.”
Mac’s mouth dropped open. “Dogs in the house? Are you nuts? You know the rules.”
“Dad’s rules. He’s been gone for how many years? Don’t you think you’re entitled to start making your own rules?”
“Is that what this is about?” he asked, waving his index finger between Libby and Coop, who was sitting in a place of honor opposite her end of the table. “Some belated stab at rebellion? Gran’s the only one left to hold you to some higher standard, and she’s not herself anymore. If Dad were here, he’d be appalled. You know that.”
Libby pushed away her plate, her appetite gone. “I like to think he’d want me to be happy.”
Mac made a puffing sound. “Our dad? He didn’t care about stuff like that.”
“He used to laugh. I know he did.”
“Maybe before Mom died, but when she got sick…well, you remember what he was like. Tell me one time when he smiled.”
She couldn’t. And she’d blamed herself for that. No matter how hard she’d tried to grow up and fill her mother’s shoes, she’d never been able to coax any of the joy she’d once seen in her father’s eyes to return.
Cooper cleared his throat. “I don’t mean to butt in, but if you decide to get a dog, you should look for a full-grown one, not a puppy. I bought my first ex-wife a pick-of-the-litter standard poodle for her birthday. Unfortunately, I thought standard meant ordinary.” He paused, looking thoughtful. “The dog now weighs eighty pounds and has ruined three leather sofas. I know because she sends me the bill every time.”
Libby stared in amazement as Mac’s initial chuckle spilled over to a laugh. “We’re not getting a poodle-–big or little,” he said, shaking his head. “You’re one weird dude. But in case I didn’t tell you earlier, you did okay today in the mine. Most first-timers freak out in the dark.”
“Thanks. I never went to college, but I played a preppy WASP in one of my soaps. We had a story line devoted to hazing during sweeps week. My character accidentally--” he emphasized the word, “--got locked in a basement room with one of the female leads.” He looked to the ceiling and blew out a sigh. “It was supposed to be sexy, but, believe me, I would have preferred to be alone.”
“Why?” Libby had to ask.
“Bad chemistry and a broken engagement. She never really forgave me.” He shrugged as if such things
were the norm in his world.
Maybe they were. Libby had never been engaged, let alone married and divorced. Twice. She took the idea of falling in love and committing her heart and soul to a relationship very seriously.
Cooper and Mac continued to talk. The topic had moved on to sports. Libby wasn’t surprised that Cooper could hold his own on that field, too. He was chameleonlike. Charming. Resourceful. Even her brother seemed to have accepted him.
Which made it all the more ironic that Libby was starting to have second thoughts. Partly because she liked him, too. Partly because she knew she shouldn’t believe a word he said.
“Can I get up?” Megan asked.
Libby stood. “Sure, honey. Let me help you. I’m sorry I didn’t make any dessert, but there might be an Oreo or two in the pantry.”
She pulled back Megan’s chair, then held out her arms. The child was almost too big to carry, but Libby loved cuddling the warm little body in her arms. She nuzzled her niece’s neck and inhaled the dry, slightly musty scent of her hair. Her heart swelled with a longing so sharp she had to blink back tears as she hurried into the kitchen.
Her goal was in reach. She could almost taste it. But could she trust Cooper to help her get there?
---
“You’re not sterile, are you?”
Coop almost dropped the china plate he’d been in the process of drying. Who in this day and age didn’t have a dishwasher, for God’s sake? “I’m sorry. What?”
“You’re in your late thirties and you haven’t fathered any children despite two ex-wives. Is there a chance you can’t, um…seal the deal, if we go through with this?”
He carefully set the plate on the counter with the others then whipped the damp towel over his shoulder with a crisp snap. “Mid thirties, if you don't mind. And the reason I don’t have any offspring to date is because I’m very careful. Despite what the gossip magazines say, I don’t sleep around. Neither of my exes wanted kids, although I lobbied hard when we were first married. Then, as things changed between us, it was a relief that we weren’t going to screw up a kid with our divorce.”
Black Hills Baby Page 10