The Baby Bargain

By the time she’d served out dessert, he’d still not returned. So either the call was some tourist inquiring about vacancies at the Ribbon R, and for once Sean was handling it, or the caller had wanted her stepson in the first place.

Much as they needed to fill all the gaps in their summer schedule, Dana found herself hoping the call had been for Sean. At fourteen, he didn’t seem to get enough phone calls—didn’t seem to have any friends to speak of. Although, he confided in her so little, she supposed she’d be the last to know if he did. Still, a schoolmate calling Sean nights—she pictured a giggling thirteen-year-old charmer with a terrible crush and twice Sean’s social skills—now, that would be a welcome development. Dana ached for his loneliness, but so far she’d found no way to cure it. Peter would have known how—

Stop, she told herself firmly. After fourteen months, it was time she stopped calling on Peter.

Fourteen months or fourteen years or fourteen lifetimes, how could she not? She sat, smiling at her guests around the table, glad for the candlelight that turned tears in the eyes to sparkles.

WHEN ALL HER DUDES had left the table to wander sleepily from the main house and off up the hill to their cabins, Dana set to clearing away. A very long day, she mused as she entered the kitchen, arms loaded. “Sean?” she murmured to warn him, in case he was still engaged in conversation.

No Sean.

Dana frowned, staring at the phone on the wall beside the back door. Its receiver had been dropped on the counter. And—Her frown deepened. He’d left the door ajar.

Hand at her throat, she spun to the playpen—then breathed again at the sight of the small, blanket-draped lump in its center. At least the baby was still covered. The draft of cool mountain air would have done her no harm. Still…Does he ever think? She lifted the receiver to her ear, heard the dial tone, let out a tckk of irritation and hung it up.

What had caused him to bolt like that? The worst of it was, if she went after Sean and asked what was wrong, she knew exactly what he’d say. “Nothing,” she murmured, and grimaced.

Okay. So leave him alone, then. He’d be up in the loft of the barn, one of his hideouts when he wanted to escape her. Or else mooching along the Ribbon River—the snow-melt stream that stairstepped down the mountain, chuckling past the cabins, then the house, to spread out into glistening trout pools when it reached the valley meadows.

Dana turned back to her daughter. If I can’t help Sean, at least your wants are simple, my love. Gathering the sleeper into her arms, she buried her nose against Petra’s warm neck and, with eyes closed, simply breathed in her scent for a moment. Then she carried the baby softly up to bed.

HALF AN HOUR LATER she was rinsing the last pots and pans. Sean had yet to make an appearance, though a few moments ago she’d half thought she heard him thump through the front door. Had he returned that way to avoid her? But if that wasn’t him…Dana frowned out the window into the darkness. Go find him and coax him home? Or leave him be?

Something moved in the glass. She blinked, and then realized—a reflection from the room behind her; the dining room door swinging open. Sean stood in the doorway, one arm bracing the door wide, as silently he watched her.

The skin along her spine contracted in a rippling shudder. Not Sean, but someone much taller, wider, darker. Standing with the stillness of a predator.

Why didn’t I lock the door?

She hadn’t for the same reason she never did. Guests trooped in and out all day; Sean came and went; and this wasn’t Vermont, where she’d been raised, where everyone locked up. Out here in the West, you depended on distance to protect you. The guest ranch was four miles down a private road from the highway. No one came here by chance.

Behind her, the stranger moved at last, letting the door go and striding on into the kitchen. The blood thrummed in her ears. Dana chose her longest carving knife from the drainage rack, examined it for imaginary food specks, rinsed it, then, still holding it, let her right hand casually droop below the rinse water. She shut off the faucet and half turned.

“Oh!” She’d meant the word to deceive, but her shock was real. He was closer than she’d expected. Bigger.

And angrier—black, level brows drawn down over deep-set eyes.

“Wh-wh-what do you—” She stuttered to a stop. Did she really want to know what he wanted?

“Sean Kershaw. Where is he?” A low, gravelly voice, its steadiness somehow more deadly than any shout. No drama to this rage, but pure, cold intention.

“Sean?” Whatever this invasion was, it wasn’t what she’d thought. Still, it was bad—trouble. Teacher? she asked herself, and rejected the hope immediately. This was no indoor man. His face was tanned to the color of buckskin. The lines fanning out from the corners of his blue eyes spoke of years squinting in the harsh sun. “Wh-why do you want Sean?”

“That’s between him and me.”

The intruder turned a slow circle on his heels, scanning the kitchen as if Sean might be cowering in a corner. He wore boots, Dana realized, which was why he seemed so enormous. Though even in his socks he’d still top her five-three by nearly a foot.

Nevertheless, she let go of her weapon. She could no more imagine herself stopping this man with a knife than she could imagine stopping a train. “I’m afraid it isn’t,” she said coolly—to his back. He was striding back the way he’d come.

Hey! She goggled after him, then felt rage awaken as he retreated. “It’s considered polite to knock, you know!” she cried, hurrying to catch up.

“I knocked. You didn’t hear me.” He was already past the dining room, heading for the front door.

Good riddance, whoever he was! But no—her mouth dropped as he turned toward the stairs.

“He’s up there?”

“Don’t you dare—”

“Good.” He took the stairs two at a time without a backward glance.

Her baby! The hair bristled on her arms, at her nape. Dana flew up the steps, a primal humming sound in her throat. You stay away from my baby!

The door to Petra’s room stood wide. Dana flung herself through it and slammed into his back—“Ooof!”

“Huh?” he muttered absently. He’d stopped short just inside the room to flick on the light. She grabbed his elbows from behind and, with a little growl of despair—might as well try to uproot the oak banister!—she attempted to wheel him around and out. He glanced over his shoulder with a startled frown, then simply shrugged, breaking her hold. “Who’s this?” He nodded at the sleeping child.

“Mine,” Dana said flatly. She caught a fistful of the back of his shirt and tugged, and, lucky for him, he allowed himself to be towed backward out of the room. He hit the light switch as he passed it, then pulled the door quietly shut.

Dana let him go and swung around to put herself between him and Petra’s door. Chin up, she stared at him, breathing hard. “Get out of my house this…minute.”

Startling white against the tan, a reluctant smile flickered across his hard face. “Good for you,” he said simply, then turned away…

To open the next door down the hall—Sean’s room! Dana pressed a hand to her throat, swallowed, then charged after him. But—thank you, God—Sean hadn’t returned.

The stranger stood in the center of Sean’s bedroom, surveying the posters pinned to the wall—surly rock groups and a surfer shooting a blue-green pipeline at Maui. The desk piled high with books and camera accessories. Discarded shirts and jeans draped over the chair and the top of the closet door.

“Get out.” Dana bared her teeth. She supposed she could run uphill and ask her wrangler, Tim, for help, if by any miracle he was home on a Saturday night. Or run downstairs and phone the sheriff. But no way would she leave Petra to do either.

“You’re his sister, I reckon?” the man murmured, without turning.

“His stepmother.”

His dark head snapped around, and the blue eyes reassessed her, a quick head-to-toe appraisal. She crossed her arms over her breasts and glared back at him. Why the surprise? “And who the hell are you?”

“Rafe Montana.” He brushed past her and stalked out the door, headed for her bedroom.

“He’s not here,” she hissed, bracing her hands against the doorjamb and leaning after him. “Can’t you see?”

He stood there, looking down at the big brass bed that she’d shared with no man for fourteen months and thirteen days. The soft, rumpled down comforter that was no substitute for Peter’s living warmth.

“So where is he?” Montana turned to take in the rest of her room.

She felt his eyes touch the books stacked on her bedside table, testimony to all the nights she could not sleep; the vase of blue columbines on the wide windowsill; the bottles of perfume on her dresser, which she hadn’t uncapped for more than a year—and she felt as if he’d run his hands across her body. You trespasser. She stamped her foot to reclaim his attention. “I’m not about to tell you, when I don’t know what you want. When you barge in here like a—a maniac!”

“That’s about how I feel,” he said, swinging to face her. Two long strides and he towered above her. “I’m Zoe’s father.”

“Who’s Zoe?”