Snowed in at the Ranch

Startled?

It was his house.

Cute. Just like the car. She had a light dusting of freckles across a delicate nose, curly hair the color of liquid honey in a jar. At first, he thought she had a boyish build, but Ty quickly saw her curves were just disguised in a masculine plaid shirt.

She didn’t have on a speck of makeup and was one of those rare women who didn’t need it, either.

“Who are you?” she demanded, a tiny tremor in her voice.

What kind of question was that to be asked in his own house? He could tell, from the way her eyes skittered around—looking for something to hit him with if he moved on the baby or her—that she was not just startled, she was scared. Any remaining thought that this might be a prank disappeared.

Her pulse beat frantically in the hollow of her slender neck.

Ty had to fight, again, the notion that he was somehow dreaming, and that he was going to wake up very soon. He didn’t like it one little bit that exhaustion would make it way too easy to appreciate this scene.

That exhaustion was making some childhood wish try to push out of a dark corner of his mind.

Annoyed with himself—a man who believed in his strength and his determination, a man who put no faith at all in wishes—Ty planted his legs firmly apart, folded his arms over his chest.

She darted out from behind the tree, dropped the tangle of Christmas tree lights that were in her hand and grabbed a lamp. She yanked it off the side table and stood there holding it like a baseball bat.

Ty squinted at her. “Now, what are you going to do with that?” he asked mildly.

“If you touch my baby or me, you’ll find out!”

The lamp was constructed out of an elk antler. It was big and heavy and it was already costing her to hold it up. It made him very aware of how small she was.

He had to fight to get beyond the exhaustion and the irritation that came with the weariness, to the same calm energy he tapped into to tame a nervous colt. He thought of the locked car and the locked back door.

He said, “I’m way more scared of a baby than that lamp. Especially one who calls me Papa.”

He thought maybe her hold on the lamp relaxed marginally.

“How did you get into my house?” she demanded. “I locked the door.”

“I used a key,” he said, his voice deliberately quiet, firm, calm. “I happen to have one. I’m Ty Halliday. And last time I looked, this was my place.”

The lamp wavered. Doubt played across her features for a second. Then she brought her weapon back up to batting position, glaring at him.

“Why don’t you put that down?” he suggested. “Your arms are starting to shake. We both know I could take it from you if I had a mind to.”

“Just try it,” she warned him.

It was a little bit like an ant challenging an aardvark, but somehow he didn’t think pointing that out to her was going to help the situation, and he reluctantly admired her spunk.

Something yanked on the hem of his coat. He looked down. The baby had crawled over and had grabbed a fistful of the wet oilskin of Ty’s jacket. He was pulling himself up on it.

“Papa!” he crowed.

“Don’t touch him!”

“Believe me, I’m not going to.”

In a flash, she had set down the lamp, crossed the room, pried her baby’s fist loose of his jacket and scooped him up into her arms.

This close he could smell them both. Her scent was subtle. Some flower. Lilac? No. Lavendar. It was mingled with baby powder. He wasn’t sure how he recognized either of those scents, not common to his world, but he did, and it felt as if they were enveloping him.

She took a step back, eyeing him warily.

“You’re in the wrong place,” he said. “This really is my house. I’m cold and I’m wet and I’m dead tired, so let’s get this sorted out so you can move on and I can go to bed.”

Apparently the fact that he wanted to get rid of her rather than steal either her baby or her virtue reassured her in some way.

She pondered him. “If this is really your house, what’s in the top drawer in the kitchen?”

“Knives and spoons and forks.”

“That’s in the top drawer of every kitchen!”

“You asked the question,” he reminded her.

“Okay, second drawer.”

He closed his eyes. “I’m losing patience,” he warned her, but then gave in. The sooner he got that scared look off her face, the sooner she would realize her error and get on her way.

“Tea towels, once white, now the color of weak tea. One red oven glove with a hole burned right through it. Next drawer—potato masher, soup ladle, rolling pin, hammer for beating the tough out of rough cuts of beef.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh, God,” she whispered.

“How long have you been here that you know what’s in my drawers?”

Her eyes shifted guiltily and made him wonder exactly what other drawers she had been investigating.

He swore softly. “Have you made it as far as my bedroom?”

“Oh, God,” she said again.

The fear drained out of her, leaving her looking pale and shaky. She actually wobbled on her feet.

“Don’t faint,” he said. “I don’t want to have to catch the kid.”

“Oh,” she said sharply, drawing herself up, annoyed, “I am not going to faint. What kind of weak ninny do you take me for?”

“Weak ninny? How about the kind that reads Jane Eyre? How about the kind who is lost in the country, setting up housekeeping in someone else’s house?” he said smoothly.

The truth was he liked her annoyance better than the pale, shaky look. He decided it would be good, from a tactical standpoint, to encourage annoyance.

“You don’t look like you would know the first thing about Jane Eyre,” she said.