Already her arms felt achy and empty, but she managed to hold on to her emotions as she began loading up the rented SUV. She left the food she'd purchased and the boxes of their parents' clothing she hadn't used in the quilts, but took everything else that belonged to her.
Finally the only thing she had left to load into the SUV was her largest suitcase. After one final sweep of the cabin, she rolled it out to the porch then bumped it down the steps. At the SUV, she reached to lift it with both hands, but it seemed as heavy as her heart. She wrestled it for a moment, pouring every ounce of her remaining strength into getting it off the snow-packed ground.
"Let me get that for you."
She froze at Nate's voice and prayed that the tears burning behind her eyes would just hang on for a few more moments.
"I've got it," she said stiffly.
"Do you?"
In that moment as he stood watching her trying to lift the heavy suitcase with that blasted unreadable expression, she hated him more than she had ever hated anyone or anything.
She hated him almost as much as she loved him.
"Go away, Nate. I can handle this."
He ignored her and reached for the suitcase with one hand. But instead of placing it in the cargo area of the SUV, he lifted it back up the steps and set it on the porch.
"Hey! What are you doing? I need that!" she exclaimed, following after him.
"I'll load it in a minute."
He made no move to explain himself, only stood on the porch looking down at her.
"Where are the girls?" she asked. Better that she could get this all out of the way now instead of having to drag out the goodbyes.
"They're still busy with Noël."
She was beginning to squirm under the intensity of that look, especially when he didn't say anything else. Could he see the desolation ripping through her when she thought about driving under the Hope Springs arch and leaving this place forever?
"If you will load up my suitcase," she finally said, hating that he was forcing her to ask, "I'll be on my way, out of your hair. You won't have to tolerate one of the terrible Daltons on your ranch another moment."
"Em."
She had been doing her best to avoid his gaze, but at the single word, she couldn't help it. She looked up and caught her breath at the expression in his eyes, dark and almost tortured.
"Don't," he murmured. Just that, nothing else.
Her heart gave one hard thump, then another and another. "Don't what?"
"Don't go. The girls want you to stay for Christmas dinner. I already put a ham in."
She curled her gloved hands into fists, furious suddenly that he was putting her through this. She couldn't keep up with him. One moment he looked at her with disgust, the next with that heat in his eyes she was helpless to resist.
"This is hard enough. Can't you see that? Please just give me my suitcase so I can go." She hated the small, distressed note in her voice, but couldn't seem to clear it away.
"Is that what you want?"
"You hate me because my father was Hank Dalton. I can understand that."
He shook his head. "I don't hate you. How could I?"
Finally, after far too much effort trying to contain them, one of the tears slipped through her defenses. In horror, she felt it slide down the side of her nose and she wiped at it with a violent gesture.
She heard Nate give a muffled groan and then an instant later, before she could even take a breath, he crossed the space between them and wrenched her into his arms.
"I don't hate you, Em," he repeated with stunning ferocity. "Far, far from it."
While she was still reeling from that, he kissed her with a softness and a sweetness that belied the intensity of his words and she didn't know what to do, what to say. She could only hold tight to his sweater with all her strength, afraid her knees would give out if she dared let go.
"Don't leave, Em. Stay, please. I'm sorry about earlier. About the way I acted. I was surprised, that's all. Will you stay? The girls would love it if you'd stay for Christmas."
A fledgling hope began to unfurl its tiny wings inside her, but she was afraid to give it room to soar yet. She could feel Nate's heartbeat under her fingertips and as she met his gaze again, she caught her breath at the emotions there.
"Wh-what about you?"
He was silent for a long moment, and then he smiled, something he did entirely too rarely. "I would love it if you'd stay much, much longer."
A wary sort of joy burst through her, but she was afraid to believe, after the misery of the past night and then this morning, and despite her best efforts to contain them, she could feel another tear slip through.
At the sight of it, Nate lifted his thumb and wiped it away and then he cupped her face in both hands.
"This is harder for me than anything I ever had to do in the army, and I've had to do some pretty tough things. But I'm going to come right out and say it. I'm in love with you, Em."
She stared, certain she must not have heard him right. "You're…what?"
"I think I fell hard for you the moment you walked in from the storm with your perky little hats and your complicated scarves and all the secrets in those Dalton eyes."
He kissed her again, his mouth warm in the cold Christmas air, and finally, finally, she let that hope begin to spread its wings.
"I know things are a mess here," he said. "But they're getting better, Em. I promise. I'm learning my way and figuring it all out. I don't have much to offer you, except a couple of girls who adore you and need you and a man who's crazy in love with you."
He paused, his gaze locked on hers. "The one thing I know for sure is that everything seems easier—better—when you're here, and it will kill me if you walk away. Please don't go."
In all her life, no one had ever said anything like that to her, had made her feel so very much wanted and needed. This was what she had been looking for when she came to Pine Gulch, she realized. Not her birth father's family. But this place.
This man.
This was good. It was right. It was every Christmas joy she had ever dreamed about magnified a million times.
She drew in a shuddering breath and then another one and then she flung her arms tightly around his neck and kissed him, laughing and crying at the same time, pouring everything she never thought she would have the chance to say into the embrace.
He made a rough, jubilant sort of sound and returned the kiss. When he pulled away several moments later, his eyes were dazed.
"I love you. Oh, Nate. I've been so miserable. It was devastating me to leave. I kept thinking this is the only place in my entire life that I've ever truly felt I belonged."
With that sexy groaning sound, he kissed her again, pushing her back into the cabin where it was a little warmer. And soon she was much warmer as he pulled her against his hard strength and deepened the kiss, his mouth hot and hungry on hers.
"Ewww."
Those girls and their impeccable timing again. Nate whispered an oath at the sound of Tallie's disgusted exclamation, but Emery only laughed against his mouth. She turned to find both girls standing in the doorway. Tallie's nose wrinkled at their embrace, but Claire's attention was fixed on the suitcase, her expression dark and troubled.
"You're leaving," she said in a betrayed sort of tone.
Emery opened her mouth to answer, but Nate beat her to it.
"She was going to. But I talked her out of it," he assured her niece. She looked as if she didn't believe him for a moment, then she tilted her head, taking in their embrace with first surprise and then a cautious hope.
"Is that true?" she demanded of Emery. "Are you staying?"
"I thought I would stick around for a while. Do you mind very much?"
Tallie squealed her approval and rushed to wrap her arms around both of them, but Claire still held back.
"How long is a while?" she asked.
Emery met Nate's gaze and smiled then turned back to his oldest niece. "I don't
know. If it's okay with you all, I was thinking maybe forever."
Claire let out a small relieved laugh then joined them all in the embrace, and this time, as she was wrapped in the arms of their love, Emery didn't bother to hold back her tears.
* * *
Later that night when the girls were finally in bed after an exhausting day of board games, horseback rides and happiness, Nate sat on the couch in the great room with the Christmas tree lights sparkling and a fire in the grate and the woman he loved in his arms.
All day, he hadn't been able to stop touching her, to make sure she was real and that she was really his. Now, finally, she was in his arms and he felt truly at peace for the first time since he was ten years old.
"You're going to have to tell them, you know. Your brothers."
She lifted her head from his chest to stare at him and he wanted to smack his head with his open palm for bringing up the damn Daltons, when what he really wanted to do was continue making out on the couch.
"What about Marjorie?" she asked. "I don't want to hurt her."
He gave a rueful laugh. "I think that woman is long past being hurt by anything Hank Dalton might have done twenty-seven years ago. She's a tough old bird. If you want my opinion, I think she'll be thrilled to find you and so will her boys. They're going to welcome you into their family quicker than a cricket in the chicken yard."
He thought of it, having the Daltons for brothers-in-law. Not that he was jumping his horses too early here, but he already knew what he wanted—this woman in his arms forever. He was willing to take her any way he could get her, even if that meant having three interfering older half brothers with the package.
He framed her face in his hands, still not quite believing that he had his own Christmas angel right here beside him. "The Daltons will love you almost as much as I do," he said. "How can they not?"
She gave him one of those soft, tender smiles that never failed to take his breath away and then she kissed him back.
Nate thought about life at the ranch before she came, how he and the girls had just been going through the motions, trying to make it from one day to the next. She had done the impossible. With her smile and her quilts and her sugar cookies, she had brought joy and laughter back into their lives.
He held her in his arms as the fire burned low in the grate and the lights of the Christmas tree flickered in the window.
Once more, there was hope at Hope Springs.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-4464-5
A COLD CREEK HOLIDAY
Copyright © 2009 by RaeAnne Thayne
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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††The Cowboys of Cold Creek
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††The Cowboys of Cold Creek
return
††The Cowboys of Cold Creek
return
*Outlaw Hartes
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*Outlaw Hartes
return
*Outlaw Hartes
return
†The Searchers
return
†The Searchers
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††The Cowboys of Cold Creek
return
††The Cowboys of Cold Creek
return
**The Women of Brambleberry House
return
**The Women of Brambleberry House
return
§The Wilder Family
return
**The Women of Brambleberry House
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††The Cowboys of Cold Creek
return
‡Fortunes of Texas: Return to Red Rock
return
Table of Contents
RAEANNE THAYNE
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
A Cold Creek Holiday Page 18