by Beverly Long
He shook his head. “Ankle is feeling pretty good this morning. Plus, I think they’d be more of a hindrance than a help.”
“Be careful,” she said. It was a full-blown winter wonderland outside. Snow clung to the limbs of the big tall pines, to the fence at the far end of the property and to the post of Rico’s mailbox. It was smooth and swirled and stacked—as if the wind had been dancing, sometimes in a waltz, sometimes in a cha-cha, across the mountain.
It smelled...delicious. Fresh and clean, and she understood why Lucky was rolling around in it.
And when she didn’t think it could be more perfect, two bald eagles swooped across the sky, wings spread wide, dipping in tandem, showing off, their white heads and yellow beaks a stark contrast to their dark bodies. “Oh, my God,” she said.
Rico laughed. “Spectacular, right?” he said. “Almost as common in Colorado as the wild turkey.”
“Snowman, snowman,” Hannah chanted.
Laura knelt down and showed her how to ball up the snow in her hands. And how to add to it to make a bigger ball. But as she expected, Hannah soon lost interest, preferring to simply roll around in the snow.
Lucky thought that was a trick done especially for him and he joined in. Child and dog were having the time of their lives.
Laura’s heart felt lighter than it had in days, maybe even months, since she’d made the decision to move to Nashville and get a job at Hannah’s daycare. Since she’d decided to lie her way into her niece’s life.
“Want some help?” Rico asked.
She had the base of the snowman done. “Can you do his middle and I’ll do the head?”
“Race ya,” Rico said, kneeling in the snow.
They finished their respective balls at about the same time, although his had better shape. They stacked them. “Look, Hannah, your snowman,” Laura said.
“He doesn’t have any eyes,” Hannah said. “How can he see?”
“She has a point,” Rico said. He found two pinecones and pushed them into the head. The round protruding ends made perfect eyes. “I’ll get a carrot from inside for the nose. And some radishes for the mouth.”
“I knew all those vegetables were going to come in handy,” Laura said.
In response, he threw a snowball at her.
Hannah saw it, realized it was a new game, shrieked and started flinging snow.
Lucky barked.
And Laura fired back, four years of high school softball kicking in. When she caught Rico square in the chest, his head jerked up.
“Didn’t see that coming,” he said, his smile broad.
“Third base. State champions my senior year.”
“Oh, yeah. Left field. Didn’t need no stinking third baseman to relay my throws to home plate.” He reached down to grab a handful of snow. But before he could get it off, Hannah sent a handful toward his face.
“Hey, I’m being double-teamed,” he yelled.
“We’re a team and you’re double,” Hannah said.
Laura laughed so hard that she fell down. Which Lucky took as an invitation to play and launched himself into the air. Laura saw the dog coming and rolled over into the snow. When his body connected, it knocked the air out of her.
She heard Rico’s sharp command to his dog and the weight lifted. Seconds later, a hand on her shoulder gently flipped her over. “Are you hurt?”
Rico was on his knees next to her, his face tight with concern. She motioned him close, as if she couldn’t speak loudly. He leaned forward.
Then she reached up, hooked an arm around his shoulders and pulled him down into the snow. She miscalculated a bit, or maybe he gave way too easily, but in any event, their combined weight sent them rolling down the snowy hill. Over and over. Rico’s hand at the back of her head, protecting her.
When they finally stopped, she was flat on her back and breathless. She was staring at the deep blue sky.
She could hear Lucky barking and Hannah laughing.
And thought it was a perfect sound.
She looked at Rico. He was propped on one elbow, staring at her. He had snow on his dark eyelashes, in his hair. His skin was ruddy from cold. He looked...too serious.
She moved her arms and legs in the familiar pattern. “Snow angel?” she asked.
He shook his head. “Snow devil,” he whispered. “Beautiful, beautiful, snow witch.” Then he leaned toward her and kissed her.
His lips should have been cold, but they were not.
And when she opened her mouth, he deepened the kiss. Dark heat. Sweet with an edge. Consuming.
“Laura!” Hannah yelled.
Rico lifted his head. Scanned the hill. “She’s fine,” he assured her.
Laura scrambled to sit up. Hannah was running down the hill, Lucky running in circles around her.
Laura still felt disoriented—not from the roll down the hill but from the kiss. But when Hannah got to her, Laura opened her arms and the little girl fell into them. Laura hugged her tight.
And she might have been content to remain outside in the snow forever, had she not heard the sound of an approaching engine. “Someone’s coming,” she said.
Her heart started racing. She awkwardly stood up, Hannah in her arms. Judged the distance to the house.
“Stay behind me,” Rico ordered, his calm voice penetrating her instant panic.
She saw his gun in his hand. Had he been expecting trouble?
Two snowmobiles came around the corner of the trees to their left. They were big loud machines, both with decals of an American flag across the front end.
She could hear the subtle change in his breathing. “It’s okay,” Rico said. “I know them.” He put his gun away.
There were three people altogether, two on one snowmobile and one on the other. Now at closer range, she could see that there were two adults and one child. When they turned off the engines, the air seemed very quiet in comparison.
When the adults got off, they moved slowly. The child ran ahead of them.
All three of them wore black snowmobile suits and black helmets. When they got close and removed their helmets, Laura saw that it was an older man and woman, with a little girl, who looked to be a year or two older than Hannah.
The older woman made a point of looking up the hill, at the tracks left by her and Rico’s rolling down and the foot and paw prints left by Hannah and Lucky. “Some people use a sled,” she said.
Rico nodded. “I knew there was something I forgot,” he said. Then he leaned in for a quick hug from the woman and shook hands with the man. “What the hell are you two doing?”
“Checking on neighbors,” the woman said. She extended a hand in Laura’s direction. “I’m Jennie Jones and this is Paddie and my granddaughter, Ari. I own the grocery store, about halfway down the mountain.”
It had to be the store that Rico had mentioned before she’d left the house yesterday morning. “I’m Laura,” she said.
Jennie didn’t say anything, pausing as if she might be waiting for a last name. She was going to have to wait forever.
“Pleasure,” Jennie said finally, looking from Laura to Rico. “I thought you were traveling by yourself,” she said, resting her eyes on Rico.
“I was,” he said. “But ran into Laura and Hannah and we decided to ride out the storm together,” he said.
“Good thing, I guess,” Jennie said, her tone speculative.
Paddie clapped his gloved hands together. “Heck of a snow. Fourteen inches and more on the way later this afternoon.”
Hannah squirmed out of Laura’s arms and immediately approached the other child. Without exchanging a word, the two little girls got busy making snow angels.
“Ari is probably tired of being cooped up with two old people,” Paddie said. “I try to keep her busy but she’s got my number and can always weasel out
one more television program. We brought her with us this morning to get her some fresh air.”
“You can leave her here for a while,” Rico said.
He spoke quickly, maybe too quickly. Was he looking to ensure that the two of them would not have any private time together?
“She and Hannah can play together. We’ll get the sled out and they can put this hill to some use. Then we can feed them some lunch and you can pick her up midafternoon before the snow comes,” he added, looking at Laura.
She nodded. “Yes. Hannah would love the company.”
Paddie and Jennie shared a glance. “I think that will work,” Jennie said. She walked over to Ari, bent down, said a few words that Laura couldn’t hear and gave the child a hug. Then waved at Laura and Rico, before she and Paddie got back on their snowmobiles.
Once the engine noise faded, Laura turned to Rico. “Nice neighbors,” she said.
“Jennie Jones gave me my first job when I was twelve. Sweeping out her store and stocking shelves. Then she sent me to Paddie, who taught me how to invest twenty dollars and get a five percent return. When I got a little older, he taught me how to take a calculated risk and get a ten or fifteen percent return.”
“So they must have their own retirement fund. But yet she’s still working.”
“She loves her store. And her customers love her.”
“She’s probably going to pester you for details about me,” Laura said.
“That’s a given,” Rico said easily. “If she’d have come two minutes earlier and seen us kissing, we’d probably never have gotten her back on her snowmobile.”
“About that...” she said. “I’m not looking for...”
“It was a kiss, Laura. Not a marriage proposal,” he said, sounding irritated.
She hadn’t meant to make him mad. Just didn’t want him getting the wrong idea. He didn’t realize it but she was doing him a favor. Getting mixed up with her was in no one’s best interest. “Got that,” she said brightly. “So where’s that sled?”
He paused before answering. “In the basement. I’ll get it.”
“Okay. How about you stay at the top of the hill and get them started and I’ll stay down here,” she said. A little space between her and Rico right now might be for the best—before either of them said something that they regretted.
“Fine,” he said.
He started walking up the hill.
“How’s your ankle?” she called after him.
“Never better,” he said, not turning around.
* * *
Actually, his ankle did feel pretty good. It was probably the testosterone cursing through his veins, warming his blood. He’d been this close to hustling pretty Laura into the cabin and into his bed.
But a barking dog, a shrieking child and Jennie’s ill-timed arrival had other ideas. Even so, it had taken him a minute to pull it all together.
The look in Laura’s eyes—the absolute fear—had shaken him. The protective response that had roared through him had been immediate and he hadn’t questioned it. It was only now, as he traipsed up the hill, that he began to wonder just where the hell all this was going.
Wanted to blame the kiss on impulse—that he’d been swept away by the sheer splendor of a snowy day in the Rocky Mountains—or maybe just physics. After all, the adrenaline rush from rolling down the hill had to be expelled somehow.
But the truth of the matter was that he was almost never impulsive. He made quick decisions but not impulsive ones. He’d kissed her because he’d wanted to.
And he was pretty sure she’d liked it.
Now what the hell was he going to do about it?
Ignore it. At least for the foreseeable future. He had two little girls who were expecting him to rummage up a sled.
He knew the outside door to the basement would be completely snow covered. So he went inside, pulled back the living room rug and opened the trapdoor in the floor. A ladder, on a release mechanism, folded out. He heard it click into place. Then went down the steps and found the four-foot piece of plastic hanging on the wall. He remembered buying it when Nathan and Aleja had stayed one weekend years before. It would be plenty big for Hannah and Ari to double up and slide down the hill.
When he carried it outside, the little girls came running with Lucky on their heels. He got them situated, with Hannah in the front and Ari behind her, and then sent the sled down the hill. It went fast enough to delight them but not so fast that they were going to fall off. Lucky raced alongside them.
Laura was clapping and laughing and he stood at the top of the hill and watched her. She was a match to the beautiful day—so crisp and clear and fresh.
The girls were at the bottom and their conversation carried up the hill. Can we do it again? Please?
Laura showed them how to drag the sled behind them and up they came. “How was it, girls?” he asked. He bent down and patted Lucky, who was so excited that he was turning circles in the snow.
“Fun,” Ari said.
“Super fun,” Hannah said, her fanny already on the sled. She was ready to go.
And so it went. Twelve more times. Kids and dog down. Kids and dog up.
Finally, he heard Laura say, “I think that’s enough. I’m getting tired just watching you walk up that hill. How about we go inside and get some hot chocolate and a cookie?”
The three of them walked up, a little girl on each side of Laura with Lucky racing ahead. He joined them and they walked into the cabin. As soon as they cleared the entrance, he said, “I’ll take care of getting them out of their snowsuits if you want to start the hot chocolate.”
“Do you want some?” she asked.
“Sure,” he said.
She raised an eyebrow. “You know it comes out of a packet and I’m going to add water to it. There’s probably sugar and preservatives and who knows what else?”
“That’s okay,” he said. “Suddenly, I feel like living dangerously.” He deliberately stared at her mouth.
“Really?”
She sounded breathless. Was it from walking up the hill? Or the idea of what his living dangerously might mean for her?
“Yeah,” he said. “What do you think about that?”
She stared at him. Her cheeks were red and her hair was flying around her face, full of static electricity from her cap. “Living dangerously. I’ve spent a lifetime doing just the opposite, being very careful to do just the right thing.”
“And now?”
“And now, I think I might be done with that.”
What was she saying? There could be no room for misinterpretation here. He leaned close, whispered in her ear so the little girls could not hear. “I want you in my bed, Laura.”
“I’m not in a place where I can make any commitments, Rico.”
“I’m not asking for any. Or expecting any,” he added. Hoping, yeah, but he didn’t need to say that.
“Then I say yes.”
He wanted to freakin’ pound on his chest, to take her right then and there in the kitchen. But little hands pulling at his coat had other ideas.
“Can you help me get my boots off?” Ari asked.
“Me, too,” piped in Hannah.
“Later,” he mouthed, and turned his attention to the little girls.
Chapter 9
Laura put hot chocolate mix into four cups and watched the flame under the teakettle. Rico wanted her in his bed.
She and her boyfriend had broken up six months before she’d moved to Nashville three months ago. That meant it had been almost nine months since she’d had any sort of physical relationship with a man.
Hadn’t had any interest.
But now, it was as if a switch had been thrown. She felt energy pulsing through her. Need. Want. Hope that it would be as good as she thought it might be.
S
he wanted to go stick her head in the snow. She wanted to get naked and dance on the tables. That was the pendulum of emotions coursing through her body.
And she was making hot chocolate, as if that was the only thing on her mind. She carried three mugs into the living room where Rico was setting up a board game on the coffee table—the girls were lying on the floor petting Lucky, who was on his back, showing the world his stomach.
It looked so normal. Or at least what her suburban-sensitized mind thought of as normal. The kind of environment that she and Joe had grown up in. A mom and dad. Kids hanging out with them. Damn, they’d even had a dog that looked a little like Lucky.
What would Joe think of what she was doing now? He’d been so angry with her. Would he now pull her tight and say thank you? Thank you for looking out for my daughter. Thank you for persisting, for not giving up when Ariel made it tough on you. Thank you for seeing through Ariel’s thin excuses for not letting her see Hannah.
Thank you for being here.
A stark contrast to his last words to her: I don’t want you here.
Words said in anger and grief. She could forgive them. It was harder to forgive that he’d kept Hannah’s existence from her, that it had simply been chance that Laura had stumbled upon her.
A fluke that she’d been there to save her.
She would not jeopardize that opportunity today. Rico would have to know, have to understand, that this was simply a hookup. For his safety, for her own. Especially for Hannah’s.
She set the three mugs on the big coffee table. Then she went back to the kitchen and put the store-bought cookies on a plate. She carried that in, as well.
“Here you go, girls,” she said.
They scrambled toward the treat.
“Careful,” Laura said. “It’s hot.”
She brought her own cup in and sat on the couch. When Rico reached for his cup and snagged a cookie, she smiled. “If it helps you maintain your reputation, I’ll look the other way.”
“Not worried about my reputation,” he said slowly. “Maybe I’ll get lucky and create one.”