Evergreen Springs

by RaeAnne Thayne

  “Yay!” Ty exclaimed. “I’m gonna get my boots on right now.”

  “What about you, Jazmyn?” she pressed. “We sure could use your help. I bet you know all about making snowmen.”

  Somehow she also knew just the right button to push with his daughter.

  “I am pretty good at rolling the balls,” Jaz said. “I’ll go get my coat.”

  She chased after her brother toward the mudroom, leaving him alone with Devin.

  “You’ll have to forgive me for being just a stupid cowboy here but...why?” He gestured to the box of food. “I don’t quite get it. You’re probably very busy with your patients and such. You don’t have time to go around making house calls to everyone in need, bearing casseroles and lasagna.”

  “Not everyone. No.”

  “So why us?”

  “Tricia is a friend,” she said simply. “She said you could use the help but that you would never ask. This is our small way of letting you know you don’t have to. Ask, I mean.”

  “I... Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. Now, I just need you to point me in the direction of your freezer.”

  “There’s a large chest in the garage that’s pretty empty except for some steaks and roasts.”

  A cattle ranch usually wasn’t scarce on beef. He could grill a steak just fine and had no problem with burgers but he didn’t know the first thing about how to cook a roast. One more thing he was going to have to figure out, he supposed.

  “There’s another box in the back of my SUV. I’ll go grab that one.”

  “No. I can do it. Just wait here.”

  He shoved on his boots left by the door and headed out to her vehicle. On his way, he caught movement out of the corner of his gaze and spotted a figure in a blue parka clearing the sidewalk at the foreman’s cottage fifty yards away.

  His jaw hardened just as Stan caught sight of him. His father lifted his hand in a wave and even from here, Cole could see the flash of his teeth as he smiled that damn hopeful smile.

  He ignored his father, as he had been doing since Stanford showed up so unexpectedly a few weeks ago, and turned back to Dr. Shaw’s SUV. The box was large, filled to the brim with more containers. This was at least a month’s worth of meals for him and the kids.

  Again, he was aware of that warmth seeping through him like the water from the hot spring above his ranch cutting through the frozen landscape.

  Amid all the stress with Tricia in the hospital and struggling so much to figure out things with the kids, it would be a relief beyond measure not to have to worry about what he would feed them each night.

  In another life, his pride might have pinched that people thought he needed this kind of help but he decided he couldn’t afford that kind of pride under the circumstances. He would take this for what it was, a kind gesture from people in town.

  He carried the box back up the steps but neither Devin nor the other box of food waited for him. He headed toward the garage and found her standing over the big chest freezer, trying to find room for things while Ty stood at her elbow, handing her packages.

  Jaz, he noted, was nowhere to be seen.

  “Thanks,” she said when he carried the box toward her—just as if he were doing her the huge favor.

  “Sure.”

  She pointed to a container she had left in the box. “That’s the pasta e fagioli soup from Serrano’s along with some of their famous breadsticks. It was made fresh this morning and isn’t frozen. You only need to heat up the soup and cook the pasta in it and warm the bread sticks, too, and you’ll be set for tonight. Instructions are on it. I’ll put that in your refrigerator. The rest of this is easily labeled with instructions so you should know what to do. If you can’t figure something out, you can call me and I’ll track down instructions for you. The trick is to toss one of these in your refrigerator the night before you want to eat it and it should thaw enough to cook the next day.”

  “Got it.”

  She bent over the chest freezer and he couldn’t help checking out her very shapely ass—then he felt like a jerk for ogling her when she was doing him such a huge favor.

  The freezer wasn’t as big as he thought—either that, or she had more food than just a few weeks’ worth. When the freezer was filled to the brim, she still had a couple of containers that wouldn’t fit.

  “What are the chances you might have room in your kitchen freezer for these?”

  “We can probably find a little space.”

  “Excellent. Lead the way.”

  He took her back to the kitchen, where the breakfast dishes waited in the sink.

  She didn’t say anything about it, just headed for the side-by-side refrigerator and moved a few things around until she found room.

  “Done,” she declared after the last plastic container had been stowed in the freezer. “That should at least keep you from having to eat McDonald’s for every meal.”

  “I like McDonald’s,” Ty protested.

  She smiled and placed a hand on his head. Something about the sight of that slender, pale hand on his son’s dark hair made his chest feel uncomfortably tight.

  “McDonald’s is a once-in-a-while treat, not for every day,” she said, then deftly changed the subject before he could argue. “So are we building the world’s greatest snowman or what?”

  “Yes! Jazmyn went to get her book that has a picture of a snowman in it. She wants to build one like that, she said. I’ll go tell her to hurry it up.”

  “You do that.”

  Once more, he was alone with Devin—not a good situation when he had suddenly become aware of a fierce urge to kiss that color from her cheeks.

  She was so pretty and soft and he had spent the past half decade forced to wade through everything ugly and hard in the world.

  “You don’t have to do this. The snowman thing, I mean,” he said. “They’ll live if I can’t get to it until tomorrow. Or they could always fumble through on their own.”

  “I want to,” she assured him. “As long as you don’t mind, that is.”

  “Why would I mind?” he asked. “You’re doing something fun with my kids.”

  “Well, with one of them, anyway. We’ll see if Jazmyn will cooperate.”

  “If Ty is doing something fun,” he said drily, “you can bet Jazmyn will come out to show you all the ways you’re doing it wrong.”

  She smiled, a little lock of auburn hair slipping out of her beanie. He found his sudden urge to twist it around and around his finger quite appalling.

  The silence between them was suddenly thick and rich as his grandmother’s Christmas toffee. She gazed at him for a long moment, then swallowed hard and shifted her gaze away. If he wasn’t mistaken, the color rose a little higher over her cheekbones.

  He was almost relieved when his cell phone rang just then.

  “This is the call I’ve been waiting for. It’s going to take a few minutes, I’m afraid, and as soon as I’m done, I need to head down to the barn to check on a few things. When you’re done playing around in the snow, just send the kids down there. They know the way.”

  She swallowed again as she nodded. “I’ll do that. Thanks.”

  He grabbed his cell phone and headed to the ranch office just off the family room, cursing himself for a sex-starved idiot and vowing to put the lovely doctor out of his mind.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  AS SHE WATCHED Cole walk away with his phone at his ear, Devin took an unsteady breath and leaned against the countertop of his comfortable kitchen.

  Holy ever-living wow.

  Cole Barrett might just be the most gorgeous man she’d ever met in person, with all that sun-burnished skin, the firm jawline, that indefinable air of danger that seemed to stir and seethe around him. He had the sort of rough and rug
ged masculinity that made a woman want to whimper.

  Too bad he didn’t have the personality to match.

  He seemed cool, unapproachable and completely humorless. Maybe even a little arrogant.

  That wasn’t necessarily a fair assessment, she corrected herself. He had been grateful enough for the food she had delivered from the Helping Hands and had even cracked a joke or two during their conversation. Those moments seemed few and far between, though, and her overall impression was of a stiff, unfriendly man who didn’t like her much.

  He hadn’t smiled once. She had been watching for it.

  Was that his natural mien or did she bring out the worst in him somehow?

  “I’m ready,” Ty sang out. “Where are you?”

  Devin forced herself to move from the kitchen and followed the sound of the boy’s voice to the foyer. He wore a red-and-blue parka that looked a size too big and a pair of gloves that didn’t match each other.

  “He should wear a scarf,” Jazmyn said. “And you need to take another scarf out for the snowman. That’s what they wear, you know.”

  “Good idea.” Devin couldn’t help being amused by this girl with her strong opinions and her obstinate nature. She wanted to hug her but she had a feeling Jazmyn wouldn’t appreciate the gesture. “It sounds like you know all about snowpeople. It’s a good thing you’re coming with us to show us what to do.”

  “I can’t find my gloves so maybe I’ll just watch.”

  “I saw them in the mudroom behind the hamper,” Ty said, probably foiling his sister’s master plan to stand by and supervise.

  “We’ll start rolling and you can come out when you’re ready,” Devin said.

  “Okay.”

  As she and Ty headed for the door, the ancient-looking collie climbed slowly to her feet and followed after them.

  “Can Coco help us?”

  “Is this Coco? Hi there, sweetheart.” Devin scratched the dog’s head. She adored dogs and had always wanted one but her mother had claimed to be allergic when she was young and then she had become too busy with medical school to make it practical. Independent cats were a little more forgiving of the brutal schedules of medical residents and interns than a dog.

  Fortunately, her sister had a fabulous dog, a beautiful cinnamon standard poodle named Paprika, and she let Devin hang out with her and take her for a walk whenever she needed that exuberant canine affection.

  This dog had gray hairs around her mouth and moved with the slow care of many old creatures. She had kind eyes, though, and Devin fell for her as hard as she had for these two motherless children.

  “Coco is my dad’s dog. She was my dad’s grandpa’s dog before that. Dad says she’s about as old as the moon and the stars.”

  She smiled at the charming phrase, words she never would have expected from a man who seemed so stiff and somber.

  “Hello, Coco. Want to come help us?”

  The dog headed straight for the door. Outside, she walked gingerly down the three porch steps and curled up in a little patch of sunshine at the bottom.

  Devin wanted to lift her face to it, too, even though it was weak and pale.

  The view from up here was spectacular, she had to admit. The ranch house at Evergreen Springs was perched on a hillside overlooking town, with a view of the entire lake and the towns of Haven Point and Shelter Springs up at the northern end of the lake.

  She loved living right on the lakeshore. From her bedroom window she could watch geese peddle in for a landing and osprey dive for fish and sunrise over the Redemption Mountains reflected on the shimmering waters of Lake Haven. Even so, there was something to be said for stepping back—in this case up, into the foothills—to gain a fresh perspective. The lake looked stunningly blue against the new white snow around it, especially contrasted with the dark green of the firs and pines surrounding it.

  She drew in a deep breath of crisp air scented with pine and snow, with stray hints of hay and livestock.

  She had a million things to do on this, the first of a rare few days off, but right now she couldn’t imagine anywhere else she would rather be.

  “Why aren’t we building the snowman?” Ty asked, a little frown furrowed between his brows.

  Devin snapped herself back to the moment. “Sorry. I was just enjoying the view you’ve got here. It’s beautiful, don’t you think?”

  He looked down at the lake and the towns. “I guess. I like it here but Jazmyn said she’d rather live by the ocean than a dumb lake that’s too cold to swim in most of the time.”

  “Did she?”

  He nodded. “But Dad said he’s traveled all over the country when he used to be in rodeos and he’s never seen anything, anywhere, as pretty as our ranch.”

  Cole was turning out to be full of surprises. Maybe there was more to him than the taciturn rancher who couldn’t be bothered to crack a smile.

  “Dr. Shaw, how do we build a snowman?”

  “First of all, you don’t have to call me Dr. Shaw. Call me Devin, okay? People who build snowmen together ought to be on a first-name basis. Second of all, you really haven’t done this before?”

  He shrugged. “We never lived in a place with snow before. That I can remember, anyway.”

  She found that rather sad, as she loved each changing season. But then, people in warm climates didn’t have to shovel snow or scrape windows. Everything in life had trade-offs.

  “Should we get started?”

  “Yes!”

  Jazmyn bounced down the steps as Devin was demonstrating to Ty how to craft the perfect snowball, the start of every snowman.

  The snow was the ideal consistency, wet enough to stick together, but not so heavy it was hard to work. She crafted the first large snowball until it was too big to hold in her hands, then set it down on the ground.

  “Okay. This is the fun part. Start rolling it around and around.”

  Cole took up the challenge and in just a moment, the snowball had doubled in size.

  “How’s that?”

  “It’s still not big enough for the bottom ball,” Jazmyn declared. “I’m stronger than you are. Maybe I better do it.”

  “If we all three work together, we can make it even bigger,” Devin told her. “We have to figure out where we want to end up. Where do you want the snowman to stand?”

  Ty stopped, his cheeks flushed pink from the cold and the exertion. “How about right there, by the front porch, where we can see it from the window?”

  “No. that won’t work,” Jazmyn said.

  “Why?” he demanded.

  “Because that’s where we’re going to put our Christmas tree, remember? Aunt Tricia promised we could put one up this weekend.”

  “Oh, yeah. I forgot.”

  Devin didn’t have the heart to tell either of these children their aunt wasn’t coming home this weekend to put up a Christmas tree. She wondered if Cole had told them yet that Tricia would probably have to stay in the hospital until she delivered her twins.

  “We’re going to cut down our very own tree,” Ty informed Devin. “We were going to do it last weekend except Dad didn’t have time. He had a horse ’mergency.”

  “Our mom liked a fake Christmas tree. It was white with pink lights and it was soooo pretty,” Jazmyn said.

  “Aunt Tricia said we can’t put up an artificial Christmas tree here,” Ty said.

  Jazmyn sniffed. “I don’t know why not. I want a white tree with pink lights but Aunt Tricia said Evergreen Springs always has to have a real tree. It’s even in the name. Christmas trees are evergreens—did you know that?”

  “I did.” Devin smiled, her heart aching a little at the sad note in Jazmyn’s voice when she talked about her mother. Deep compassion seeped through her for these children whose world had been tossed around
as if they were pinecones floating in the fast current of the Hell’s Fury.

  Personally, she thought a white tree with pink lights didn’t sound appealing, but she supposed it was like the difference between living somewhere like Haven Point or choosing a warmer climate. Everybody had personal preferences, which was what made the world such a crazy, jumbled place of both beauty and tragedy.

  “Well, there are tons of evergreens at Evergreen Springs,” Jazmyn informed her. “Just look around.”

  “There’s a whole forest of them,” Ty added, grunting a little as he tried to keep rolling the ball that was now up to his chest.

  “I wish we had a tree already but Dad hasn’t had time,” Jazmyn said with a little note of disgust in her voice.

  “He got four new horses to train this week and maybe two more coming next week,” Ty answered.

  So they didn’t only raise cattle here at the ranch, apparently. Cole Barrett sounded like a busy man. Still, that was no excuse for not giving two grieving children as happy a Christmas as possible.

  That was the missing element at the house, Devin suddenly realized. She had seen no sign of Christmas anywhere. No stockings hanging over that beautiful hewn-log mantel over the river-rock fireplace in the great room, no evergreen garlands twining down the staircase, no candles or bells or wreaths.

  And no Christmas tree.

  The holiday was now a little less than two weeks away. Busy or not, Cole would have to find time to give this to his children.

  What would he do now, without his sister here to help? She could only imagine how overwhelming he must be finding this, suddenly having custody of two needy, emotionally fragile children.

  Had he even bought gifts for Jazmyn and Ty?

  Tricia probably would have done a few things to bring a holiday mood to the house but considering her marriage was in trouble and she was pregnant with twins, perhaps she hadn’t quite had the energy.

  Not her business, Devin reminded herself. She had done her kind deed for the day, gathering freezer meals for him in an effort to take one thing off his plate until he could hire a housekeeper. She couldn’t jump in and start decorating his house.