One Snowbound Weekend...

by Christy Lockhart

  After long seconds, when she thought he’d refuse, he finally nodded curtly.

  While he was gone, she wondered if she was making the right decision. Maybe it would make everything seem real, maybe her memory would flood back.

  It didn’t.

  She didn’t recognize the stationery. But there was no mistaking the word Shane in her handwriting.

  The edges of the paper were tattered and yellowed, the creases crisp, as if he’d dragged a thumbnail across them with finality.

  She paused before unfolding the page, meeting his gaze. It was as cold as the winter wind battering the cabin.

  Her hand trembled as she held the letter, and the words blurred from the tears gathering in her eyes.

  Shane strode away. His back to her, he tossed a log on the fire and stabbed the timber with a poker.

  Shane,

  I’m going home to my father. Don’t try and find me. I don’t want to see you again. Our marriage was a fling and a mistake.

  I never loved you.

  Angie.

  The brutal coldness of the words sliced into her heart. “It’s not true,” she whispered, her voice shaking with unshed emotion.

  How could she have done this to him? Why would she do this to him? It couldn’t have been that she’d fallen out of love with him, not with the emotion still swelling in her soul.

  “I loved you then,” she said. “I love you now.”

  Shane said nothing.

  There had to be an explanation, and now, more than ever, she was desperate to know what had happened to the five years erased by an accident.

  “Did we have a fight? Is that why I wrote this?” she asked softly, the words breaking on a sob.

  “No.” He turned to face her. “I went to work. We’d made love….”

  His gaze skimmed up and down her body, and she felt it like a caress. A blush colored her face as recognition flared into need.

  “Being with you made me late for work. I didn’t mind. You’d almost convinced me to call in sick and stay in bed with you.”

  “Did you wish you had?”

  “At first.”

  “And now?”

  “If you didn’t love me, I’d rather you left. Like cauterizing a wound. Hurts like hell in the beginning. Less painful in the end.”

  “Did you come after me?”

  “Yeah. But not at first. About a month after the divorce was final, I was out with Slade Birmingham.” Beside Shane, the fire devoured the dried wood, hissing and crackling.

  “I had a few to drink. Before that I’d refused to grab the bottle like my old man used to do.” He jammed his hands into his front pockets. His eyes, electrified by the fire, burned into hers. “That night, Angie, the pain caught up with me. It was my birthday, the anniversary of my mom walking out.”

  Oh, God, oh, God, why had she asked? His pain cut through her, and her abdomen constricted.

  “I drove all the way to Chicago, like a lovesick fool.”

  She winced.

  “Arrived just in time for your wedding reception.”

  Her jaw went slack. “My…”

  “Wedding reception. After your marriage to Jack Hague.” Shane’s eyes darkened like a storm in the forest.

  “No,” she protested, disbelief rocketing through her. She wouldn’t have married Jack, even if it was the only thing her father had ever expected of her.

  “Oh, yeah. In a long white gown, diamonds in your ears, huge vases of white flowers everywhere, a band, champagne, a sit-down meal…all the things I wanted to give you and couldn’t. The things that apparently mattered to you, even though you said they didn’t.”

  A headache threatened to split her skull.

  “Six months after you sneaked out of my life. The ink was barely dry on our divorce papers, Angie. It was as if we’d never happened.”

  Maybe he was right; maybe she would have been better off not knowing.

  “Your daddy figured out who I was and escorted me outside. He was kind enough to answer a few questions for me. He explained you really hadn’t come to live in Colorado, that spending the summer with your aunt was something to give you a taste of the real world, nothing more.”

  “No. That’s not true. I came to Colorado to get away, to be an independent woman.”

  “Your father said when you were done playing house with a man who wasn’t your social equal, you called him and begged him to bail you out. You were tired of being broke, tired of being a surrogate mother to my sister.”

  Her head swam. “No. I loved Sarah.”

  “Not only that, but in the generous spirit of the celebration, he wrote out a ten thousand dollar check to ensure I never contacted you again.” His words were short and bitter. “I tore it up and threw the pieces at his feet. Didn’t need money to stay the hell out of your life.” His tone dropped another octave. “It would have cost him more than that to make me speak to you again.”

  “And now I’m back.”

  “And when your memory returns, I’ll have a few questions for you.”

  “Like…?”

  He shoved his hands even deeper into his pockets. To keep them to himself?

  “For starters, are you still married? Are you Angie Hague? Oh, wait, maybe it’d be Angela Hague.”

  She pressed her hand to her temples. “Shane, please…”

  “Does he still have a claim on you? And if he does, why the hell are you sleeping in my bed?”

  Four

  The world reeled and she couldn’t even take a breath. She was in love with Shane, only Shane. The idea of another man touching her, holding her, making love to her…

  “No,” she whispered. Desperately she looked at her left hand. “I’m not wearing a ring.” And there was no indentation where one might have rested.

  “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  “No other man has any claim on me. I never wanted anyone but you.”

  “Stop, Angie. I’ve had enough of your lies.”

  She clutched the aspen leaf.

  “It wasn’t a lie.” He stared at her, long and deep. She scrambled to her unsteady feet, reaching for the couch for support. Blinded by tears, she headed for the door.

  “Where the hell are you going?”

  “I’ve got to know.” She reached the entryway before he did and yanked her jacket and purse from the hook where he’d hung them.

  Dropping to her knees, she jerked open her purse and dumped it upside down.

  In an instant, he was kneeling in front of her, grabbing her shoulders and forcing her to look at him. “Angie…”

  Shrugging off his grip, she dug through the cosmetics, gum wrappers and checkbook, then snatched up her wallet, desperately searching for pieces of her past.

  There were no pictures in her wallet, no snapshots of her and Jack.

  Her fingers trembled as she pulled out her Illinois driver’s license.

  Angela Burton.

  Her name was listed as Angela Burton…her maiden name.

  She let go of a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding, then studied her credit cards and checkbook.

  She looked at Shane.

  His eyes were narrowed, and a wary mixture of anger and concern played across green depths.

  “I’m Angela Burton.”

  He curved a hand around her wrist. “So it says.”

  A pain ripped through her and she reached her free hand toward him, tracing her finger down his familiar, yet so different, shadowed cheek.

  A thousand questions swamped her mind. Why was she in Colorado? Why was she at his house? Why did she think they were still in love? How could she have left him?

  She’d never met anyone like him. Tender, protective, arrogant, maddening, passionate, they’d shared dozens of emotions, each time growing a little closer.

  Grief, a sharp, stabbing pain, shot through her. She’d left him, walked out on him in the coldest, most callous way possible. She’d done what his mother and Delilah had done, after swearing s
he wouldn’t. Angie had betrayed their love, and she didn’t know why.

  No wonder he didn’t like her, didn’t want her. “I’m sorry, Shane, so, so sorry.”

  “For leaving or coming back?”

  “Both.”

  “It’s a little late for that, isn’t it?”

  He released her wrist, and she dropped her license. “I’m not married to him.”

  “No?”

  “I’d know it if I were.”

  “Would you? How? How do you know anything, Angie?”

  She looked at him with wide-eyed innocence, something he no longer believed in.

  Protectively, she curled her fingers around the dulled aspen leaf. “If I hadn’t loved you, why would I have kept the only gift you ever gave me?”

  “Good question, since you didn’t keep your wedding ring.”

  When she opened her eyes, they were wide, and the irises were ringed with a deep, haunted blue.

  Regret pulsed in Shane. He was under doctor’s orders to keep her calm, not badger her. Her face was pale, and her lower lip trembled.

  There was something about her…something that he instinctively responded to, making him want to care for her. That much had never changed.

  She’d always dragged deep emotion from him, even when he’d tried to bury it, like he’d buried his past. Not satisfied with that, with his promises of love and trust, Angie had asked for even more. They’d argued about the part of his heart that he’d tried to hold back. She’d wanted all of him, even the parts that he despised. And that made it all the more difficult when he learned she’d never even cared.

  And now, even though the doctor gave him instructions, Shane had a hard time following them. When he’d gone to the bedroom to get her Dear John letter and seen their wedding rings beside it, her smaller one nestled in his much larger one, the past and the pain he’d stuffed away had gusted through him.

  No other woman possessed that power over him.

  And he didn’t like it. It’d be easier if he was indifferent. But damn it all, he wasn’t.

  Guilt gnawed at him, making him wish he’d kept his mouth shut. He should have kept her calm, waited for the roads to clear, then sent her on her way. He might have saved himself a hell of a lot of irritation.

  Instead, they knelt near each other, close, but no longer touching, Hardhat looking at them with his head cocked to one side and wind hammering at the door.

  “Look,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  “You’re sorry?” she echoed.

  “How about a truce?”

  “So you can stop worrying about me?”

  He shook his head. “We can’t change the past. We can’t go anywhere until the roads are cleared, and the phone is dead. We might as well accept it.”

  “Be polite strangers.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I don’t know if I can do that, Shane. My past is a blur and I can’t believe I would have walked out on you, no matter what. And marrying Jack Hague? I barely liked the man. I know my daddy wanted me to marry Jack because of the merger, but I married you instead.”

  When he started to say something, she plowed on.

  “I don’t even have a present, let alone a future. I don’t know why I’m here, if I live in Chicago.” She exhaled. “Maybe I came to see my aunt Emma. Maybe she’s expecting me?”

  “I doubt it. Miss Starr’s last gossip column said Emma Kelsey’s spending the winter in Florida.”

  She squeezed her eyes shut. “I should have known that.”

  “Angie, getting worked up isn’t going to help your memory come back. You owe it to yourself to relax.”

  “I’m not sure I know how.”

  “That hasn’t changed, then, either.” He smiled, then held up a hand. “I don’t mean anything by that, honest. Truce?”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  “You can fight…”

  “But I’d never win?”

  He stood and offered his hand. She took it, and her fingers were icy cold, despite the cabin’s warmth. He didn’t want to feel sympathy for her, but there it was. She needed him.

  He led her back to his bedroom. “You take my bed.”

  “That’s not right. I’ll sleep in Sarah’s room.”

  “She took all her bedding to college. I never got around to shopping for new stuff.”

  “Another thing that hasn’t changed,” she said. “Do you remember looking for towels at the general store? You grabbed the first pile you saw.”

  “Didn’t figure there was any sense in reading labels when you were just going to use it for ten seconds a day.”

  Something pulsed between them. She’d bought a couple of nice-quality towels, telling him there was a difference in the absorbency and the way it felt against skin. Later, he’d experimented on her bare back, then dragged the cotton lower, working it on her thighs and making her squirm…. “Take the bedroom. I’ll sleep on the couch. I’ll hear you if you need anything.”

  “I don’t like being an unwanted responsibility.”

  “Take the bedroom, Ang.”

  “But—”

  “You can’t win.”

  “I’ll pay you back for this. Somehow.”

  “Forget it. Call it western hospitality. I’d do the same for any neighbor.”

  “But you did it for me.”

  Her words played in his head long after she’d closed the door behind her.

  After feeding Hardhat and turning the thermostat up a couple of degrees, Shane grabbed a pillow and blanket from the linen closet.

  The couch was too short, the fireplace crackled too loudly, the wind drove sheets of snow against the cabin, all making it impossible for Shane to sleep.

  Or that’s what he told himself.

  In reality, every time he closed his eyes, he pictured Angie. He saw her struggling through the blizzard to reach him, trust and love etched in her features. He saw the way her face fell when he’d told her their relationship couldn’t be saved. And he saw the way she’d reached for him with womanly desire when she’d woken from her nap. All the images had something in common: Angie’s innocence. That was all an act, a lie, he reminded himself.

  Funny, he’d never thought she was that good an actress.

  Hardhat made funny doggy noises as he made himself more comfortable in front of the fire. Shane hadn’t known it was possible to be envious of a dog. Hardhat just accepted people for who they were, expected to be loved, then slept contentedly.

  Shane should be so lucky.

  What was that old saying? No rest for the wicked? Maybe that’s why she’d been in bed half the night without sleeping a wink.

  She sat up and pulled Shane’s pillow to her chest. That was as close as she was ever going to get to him again.

  Was she wicked? Had she done something so unspeakably horrible to Shane without any reason? Was that why she’d blocked out the past five years?

  Five years.

  She felt like a whole person but knew she wasn’t. Anything could happen in five years. Obviously a lot had.

  Breath hitched in her throat. If what Shane said was true, she’d left him and walked straight into the dictatorial arms of a man she didn’t even like, a man determined to run his life the same way he’d run his company.

  But she wasn’t wearing a ring. And her maiden name was listed on all her cards and identification.

  For reassurance, she touched the aspen leaf, something she swore she’d wear always to remember Shane’s love. Her wedding ring had meant the world to her, but the inexpensive trinket had meant more.

  He’d invited her to the county fair and she’d pretended not to notice how buying the piece of jewelry had wiped out his last dollar. She’d never meant that much to a man. Her father, while he loved her and raised her after her mother’s death, had seen her as an asset to his company and goals. Before she’d met Shane, Jack had seen her as a mean to his ends, as well. Shane, though, had seen her simply as a woman.

  She wasn’t
blind to his faults, knowing he was as demanding in his own way as her father had always been, but she’d admired Shane. Most of the men she went to college with were obsessed with partying and accumulating possessions.

  In his early twenties, Shane was running his own business, trusting his gut instinct and working his behind off. His father had died when Shane was nineteen and Sarah was only eleven. Rather than letting the state take his sister away, Shane fought for her, supported her, raised her.

  Shane hadn’t been a thing like any other man she knew. He didn’t own a suit, let alone a tux. He wore blue jeans and boots and bought his sunglasses at the discount department store in Durango. He drove a seen-better-days pickup truck and didn’t lust after a fancy sports car.

  Knowing Shane had illuminated her life, and she’d seen how shallow other men were.

  Working that summer more than five years ago had taught Angie a lot about life. She didn’t want to be a woman who was spoiled and pampered. She wanted to make a difference.

  Could she truly have changed that much? Could she have become one of the people who had seemed so shallow?

  The holes in her memory making her restless, she tossed aside Shane’s pillow and burrowed beneath the blankets only to push them back when thoughts of Shane shamelessly snuggled alongside her.

  Being in this room, in his bed, reminded her of the first time they’d made love, his shock at finding her a virgin and the way he’d gently eased into her.

  Now, as vividly as if it were yesterday, she heard his softly encouraging words, recalled the feel of him entering, stretching her, the sharp pain, then later, the thrill as he’d brought her to the edge.

  Tossing the blanket and comforter aside, she jumped from the bed.

  Her feet touched the cool hardwood flooring and the world tipped the wrong way, a nasty reminder of her accident. She couldn’t stay in this room, between his sheets. Deciding a cup of tea might help settle her nerves, she found a flannel shirt, but paused before putting it on. At one time she wouldn’t have thought twice about wearing his clothes, but now…

  Still, he was asleep, she hoped. But in case he woke up, she didn’t want to be caught in only a T-shirt and panties.

  She cracked the door and peeked out, her heart hammering. By the firelight, she saw the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest. Hardhat roused, and she froze near the couch. With a yawn and a stretch, the dog followed her.