Back on Bittercreek Ranch

by RaeAnne Thayne

  She appeared disoriented by his abrupt change of subject but she looked out the windshield. Did she see the same wild, harsh beauty here that he did? he wondered. The rugged mountains spearing up in the distance, the columbines swaying by the road, the aspens with their pale silver-green leaves and ghostly white trunks.

  “No,” she said after a long moment. “I don’t recognize anything. Should I?”

  “You tell me. We’re coming on to the place where the kids and I found you Friday.”

  Had it only been three days? He almost couldn’t remember a time when this woman hadn’t been part of their lives.

  Jane was looking out the windshield again, this time with more interest. He could swear he saw a spark of recognition in her eyes and then a tiny rim of what almost looked like fear.

  Frustrated and out of sorts, he pulled the truck to a stop and set the parking brake at exactly the spot where he and the children had nearly run over her as she’d been lying in the dirt.

  “Is this it?”

  He nodded. “Still no idea what you might have been doing here?”

  She said nothing for several moments, then she lifted her gaze to his. “No. None.”

  As he looked at her, blue eyes so guileless and wide, he couldn’t shake the feeling she was lying.

  CHAPTER 12

  Even with her now-fully-functioning memory and all the worries that now simmered like a hot, thick soup in her brain, Jane couldn’t remember an afternoon she enjoyed more.

  On the ride up, as Mason had driven through wild and scenic mountains that seemed like something out of the cinema, she had pored through all her options now that her memory had returned.

  She wasn’t quite sure what to do. Should she come forward with what she knew? Who would she possibly tell—and what difference would it make, really? According to the radio report that morning, the men were in custody, the plot averted. The world was safe from the Vandelusian Liberation Front for now—or at least the U.S./Britain/Vandelusia trade agreement would be secure, unless Simon Djami had another plan up his sleeve.

  The name struck fear in her stomach and she remembered what the radio had said. Three men had been arrested, not the four who had been at that restaurant.

  What if Djami wasn’t in custody? Would the other men implicate him? She couldn’t be sure. She had learned enough traveling the world with Harry Withington to know terrorist cells like the VLF were fiercely loyal, especially to their leaders. The other men would probably rather die than turn against their leader.

  If he was still free, was it possible he might be looking for her? She was a loose end, someone who could implicate him even if his own men wouldn’t. She couldn’t imagine someone as ruthless as Djami leaving that loose end untied.

  She couldn’t let him find her, not when she had two innocent children to protect.

  On the other hand, why would he ever think to look for her on a small cattle ranch like the Bittercreek? She couldn’t imagine how he could ever possibly find her.

  Of course, she couldn’t stay at the ranch forever, the lost, pitiful head-injury victim who couldn’t remember her own name.

  She thought about going forward with what she knew but she had no idea who to tell, who she could trust. Mason had a friend in the FBI, she knew. But along with the return of her memory had come the chilling reminder that Djami had sources in American intelligence circles, too.

  That had been one of the most horrifying things about the plot she’d overheard, Djami’s complete confidence in the two FBI agents on the VLF payroll, that they would do whatever he asked.

  How could she possibly go to the FBI with what she knew when she couldn’t be sure which agents could be trusted and which were in bed with Djami and his cohorts?

  She desperately wanted to go back to the relative serenity she had enjoyed until that morning, before she had this cold knowledge in her chest, this heavy responsibility weighing down on her shoulders.

  She would have to do something with what she had remembered, she knew. Harry Withington’s daughter couldn’t let Djami go unpunished, if indeed he was the lone member of his group not in custody.

  However, she couldn’t do anything about it at the present. They were in the mountains, miles from anywhere. The rest of the world seemed far away here and Jane had resolved that she would take one last opportunity to enjoy the children.

  And she was enjoying herself. Somehow she managed to keep the dark clouds at bay and now she and Miriam were flat on their stomachs on the cool, mossy bank of a tiny creek, fishing lines stretched out like gossamer spider webs in the slow-moving water.

  A cool, lovely breeze lifted the ends of Miriam’s short hair and the high mountain air was sweet with summer.

  Downstream a dozen yards, Mason and Charlie were in much the same position. She had to admit, she found them a priceless sight, the handsome, masculine ex-soldier and an energetic young boy, heads together as they peered into the water.

  Mason’s idea of fishing wasn’t at all what she might have expected. Not that she had any experience in piscatory pursuits, of course. Still, on the drive into the mountains she had envisioned some romantic scene of the four of them standing in a wide, gurgling river, fly rods dipping and swaying as she’d seen on the telly.

  This was stealth fishing, sneaky and sly. Mason had explained that the native trout species in this remote area were easily spooked so they had to be as quiet as possible, an impossible task for Charlie.

  The poor boy tried his best but chattering came as naturally to him as breathing, she was afraid.

  After an hour at it, she and Miriam had caught two tiny trout between them—both tossed back for being too small as quickly as Mason could help them unhook the slippery devils—while the males were having no luck whatsoever.

  “There is one,” Miriam whispered, pointing furtively into the crystal water. “You see it?”

  Jane followed the direction of her finger and found a plump silvery fish, much bigger than the others they had caught, darting through the swaying water plants.

  “Yes,” she whispered back. “See if you can move your line a little more toward it.”

  Miriam nibbled on her bottom lip, propping up on her elbows as she reeled her line so her hook with its juicy worm was closer to the fish. The two of them waited with giddy anticipation for the fish to take the bait.

  When it did, Miriam let out a gasp and pulled her fishing pole backward to set the hook. “We caught it!” she exclaimed, reeling the fish out of the water with a low exclamation of delight that drew the attention of Mason and Charlie.

  Mason picked up Charlie then made his way across a makeshift bridge made from a downed tree spanning the narrow creek.

  “Wow. Look at that! Good job!” he said when he reached them.

  “It is very big, yes?”

  “This one’s a keeper.” He grinned at Miriam then pulled her toward him in a quick, one-armed hug before releasing her so he could unhook the trout and place it in the wicker creel he’d already prepared with a bed of grass. “You can have it for dinner.”

  Miriam glowed with excitement at the prospect, though Jane had to admit to feeling a little squeamish to think about eating something that had been swimming and frolicking in the water just moments before. A silly way to look at things, she knew, but there it was.

  “Why do you catch all the fish?” Charlie asked his sister in Tagalog, his tone piqued. “I want to fish with Jane. She is better at catching the fish.”

  Mason gave a rueful laugh. “We might have half a chance if you could keep quiet for two seconds at a time, buster.”

  “You will see, Jane. I can be very quiet,” Charlie insisted, zipping his lip and tossing an imaginary key over his shoulder in a gesture Jane guessed he must have picked up from Pam.

  She smiled, reaching out to mess his dark hair. “I’m certain you can be still as a mouse, young man. But I didn’t have anything to do with catching this fish, I swear. Miriam did it all herself.”r />
  The girl beamed and Jane realized with a jolt this was the first time she had seen Miriam wear a full-on, joyful smile like that. The little girl was so solemn, so quietly sad most of the time. It was wonderful to see her glow with happiness.

  Emotion welled up in her throat and she did her best to blink back tears. She risked a look at Mason, hoping he had caught a glimpse of Miriam’s joy, as well. She needn’t have worried. He was gazing at the girl with such a stunned look on his features that Jane abruptly lost the battle with tears.

  A few strays slid down her cheeks and she wiped them with a hand that regrettably smelled like trout.

  Mason cleared his throat and pulled Miriam into another hug. “Good job,” he said gruffly.

  He loved these children, she realized. She didn’t know the full story as to how they came into his care, but she knew that Mason Keller loved Miriam and Charlie deeply and would do his best to be a good father to them.

  She studied him standing by the mountain stream, tall and gorgeous and choked up by a little girl holding a fish, and suddenly made an even more stunning discovery.

  She was in love with him.

  The truth of her feelings nearly buckled her knees and sent her toppling into the stream. She was in love with him, with a hardened, mistrustful ex-soldier she barely knew.

  How could this have happened in only a few days?

  No, not a few days. Part of her had always been a little in love with that handsome soldier who had rescued her thirteen years ago and shown her such kindness, who had held her and forced her to drink and tried to comfort her.

  He had been the stuff of a girl’s dreams, a white knight who had played a part in rescuing her from a horrible ordeal.

  Since he’d found her in these mountains three days ago, she had come to know him as much more than just some action-movie sort of hero.

  Mason Keller was honorable, loyal. While he hadn’t exactly welcomed her into his home, he had treated her with dignity and respect and traces of that kindness he had first demonstrated after her father was killed.

  Oh, what a disaster this was turning into. As if she didn’t have enough to worry about! Now she had the added complication of knowing her heart was doomed to be broken.

  How could the outcome be anything else? Yes, he might have kissed her, but he didn’t even know her. Not the real her—Jane Withington, prim and boring and a yellow-livered coward to boot.

  He didn’t know her, but if he did, she had no doubt he wouldn’t like her very much. How could he possibly, when she had come to remember in the last few hours that she wasn’t all that crazy about herself?

  Harry Withington would have been disappointed in his child. It was a bitter pill. Instead of relishing the life he had sacrificed his own to save, instead of making something worthwhile out of it, she had hidden herself away in her tiny London flat.

  She rarely went out, her only friends were superficial ones, and she did her best to fade into the woodwork. She had even done her best to avoid this trip to the States for this historic trade summit but she had been the only translator in the diplomatic pool who spoke Vandish.

  If she hadn’t come here, none of this would have happened. She wouldn’t have been sitting in that restaurant, she wouldn’t have been kidnapped by Djami’s minions, she wouldn’t have met Mason again and these beautiful children.

  Her life would have been unbearably dreary—and the sad truth was, if someone had told her a week ago what was in store for her, she probably would have locked herself into her flat rather than get on that airplane.

  “You all right, Jane? You’re looking a little green around the gills.”

  She jerked her mind from her grim thoughts and found Mason and the children watching her, wariness in three sets of eyes.

  “Yes. Fine, thanks.” She manufactured a smile and an explanation that wasn’t wholly a lie. “I’ve a sudden feeling I’m not particularly fond of trout after all.”

  “That’s okay. We’ll eat your share, won’t we kids?”

  Charlie and Miriam both giggled.

  “So what do you say we switch fishing buddies for a while?” Mason asked. “I’ll take Madame Trout-slayer here and you can try your luck with the chatterbox.”

  “Fine,” she murmured, already grieving at the thought of leaving the three of them, of returning to that pitiful excuse for a life.

  * * *

  He had missed these mountains, Mason acknowledged a few hours later. Missed the purity and the peace, the quiet and the vastness.

  Sitting here by a mountain stream with his hands around a fishing rod and his lungs filled with sweet mountain air, he could almost forget about the scars and burns on his soul. They were there, always there, but for the first time he started to wonder if maybe some of the worst of those wounds might start to heal.

  With a sigh, he cast out again, not far but enough that his line landed just upstream of an oxbow in the stream where the water ran deep and slow. If he wasn’t mistaken, that looked like the perfect place for a nice big trout to lurk and enjoy a summer afternoon.

  He had to admit, he’d had better luck the last hour without the kids.

  The children had proved to have short attention spans when it came to the ancient art of angling. They had fished for a while but had grown bored with it.

  After their lunch of cold cut sandwiches and potato salad packed by the redoubtable Pam, Charlie had moved upstream where the stream was wider and more shallow. He had waded into the icy mountain water and tried his luck catching fish with his bare hands—without much success but to everyone’s great amusement.

  Miriam had spent a long time gathering an armload of brilliantly colored wildflowers, then fashioned a makeshift vase for them from her juice bottle. That task done, she curled up on a blanket Mason had spread out in the shade while Jane read aloud to her from a Harry Potter book Pam must have tucked in the picnic basket.

  He was too far away to hear the story but he didn’t need to. Just imagining her sexy voice reading the words was enough to send heat sizzling through him and he wished he dared stretch out in the shade along with them.

  After a while, Charlie joined them on the blanket, his head cuddled on Jane’s lap. The sight did funny things to Mason’s insides and he had to look away.

  He needed to do more of that with the children, Mason had thought. It would help their English if he set aside a regular reading time each day. The only trick was trying to fit it into their hectic schedule, but he would have to make time, he decided.

  The next time he risked a look at the children, he saw that the afternoon warmth and the day’s excitement had been too much for them. They were both sound asleep.

  A moment later, Jane rose quietly and came over to join him by the water’s edge. He handed her the other fishing rod, but she seemed content just to sit and watch him, her arms wrapped around her knees and her features pensive.

  Just now, she looked like she ought to be back on the blanket curled up with Charlie and Miriam.

  “You can stretch out if you’d like,” he murmured. “There’s another blanket in the truck.”

  She blinked a few times and he was fascinated by the hint of color crawling across those lovely, elegant cheekbones. “I’m sorry,” she murmured with a hastily covered yawn. “It’s been an…eventful day.”

  “Go ahead. I don’t mind. I’m about fished out myself. I figured we’d start heading home when the kids wake up.”

  “I don’t want to sleep.” Her smile was sheepish. “I’m enjoying this too much.”

  Her admission surprised and pleased him. He would have felt the loss if she decided to nap with the children, he acknowledged. Just having her near him had an odd, calming effect on him. He wasn’t sure he cared for it.

  He hadn’t made much progress figuring out why she seemed so different today. He was just about to push the matter when she smiled suddenly, unexpectedly, and he had to ask why.

  “I was just remembering something Charlie t
old me while we were fishing together. A joke he learned from Pam.”

  “The one about the fish and the ice-cream cone?”

  She giggled. It was the only word he could use to describe her delighted gurgle. “I guess you’ve heard it, then.”

  “Yeah. I have a feeling I’ll be hearing more than my share of bad jokes the next few years.”

  Her eyes softened as she studied him. “You’re crazy about them, aren’t you?”

  He thought of how his world had changed in the past four months, how the things that had always seemed of life-or-death importance to him had faded in significance.

  It was a completely novel experience. Was this what all parents went through? He wondered. This subjugating of their own wants to make sure their children had what they needed?

  “Yeah,” he said gruffly. “Pretty crazy.”

  “They love you, too. Whatever you might think, you’re doing a good job of parenting them. I know it can’t be easy for you.”

  “I’m learning. I’ll never be the parents Samuel and Lianne were, but despite my shortcomings, I have to believe they’re better off here than in some orphanage.”

  “Samuel and Lianne. Those were their parents?”

  She had asked him before about the Betrans and he had avoided the subject. Here in the solitude and peace of the mountains, he thought perhaps the time had come to talk about them. He couldn’t help wondering if, by opening up to her about this part of his life, he might inspire her to do the same.

  “Yeah. They were great people. Samuel was a lawyer in the Mindanao region. A good one. And Lianne taught school.”

  “How did you meet them?”

  Ah, here the ground turned a little soggier. “He represented me when I had a little legal trouble.”

  “Nothing serious, I hope?”

  “No. Just some minor infractions.” That had been his cover, anyway. In his role as a disreputable tavern owner, he had run afoul of the local cabal that passed for law enforcement in the area. He and Samuel had used legal consults as their excuse to pass information.

  “You cared about them, too,” she said softly. “That’s why you’ve taken their children.”