Her Mistletoe Cowboy (14 page)

Rhett sighed, kissed the tip of Ivy’s nose before straightening. “Tucker, one of these days you will stop being such a badass.”

Ivy smiled as she nudged Cherry forward.

After they reached the small log cabin, Rhett tied the horses in the adjacent lean-to while Ivy snapped photographs. He soon had a fire going in the rustic fireplace and they ate the contents of the saddlebags they’d packed for lunch.

He sipped on his coffee and took a second peppermint cookie before he voiced the question that refused to stay quiet.

“When the snow thaws there’s plenty more of the ranch to show you. Do you think you’ll be around come spring?”

She took a sip of her own coffee before answering. “To be honest, I have no idea.” She stared into the fire. “James called again.”

Rhett’s grip tightened on his tin mug. “Did he? Let me guess, he’s sorry and he wants you back?”

Rhett tried and failed to keep the tension from rasping in his words. Were his plans to show her that she could have a future here already too late?

Ivy’s eyes searched his. “Sort of. The truth is the more time that passes the more clients he loses. He’s finally worked out I was the company. But as I told him the day I walked out of the office and his life, I won’t be back.”

The tilt to her small chin filled him with relief.

“But you still don’t know what you’ll do?”

She shook her head. She’d braided her hair into a thick plait that now slid over her right shoulder. “He did offer to be my business partner in a new consultancy firm which is a huge gesture and opportunity. I said it was no guarantee of a ‘yes’ but I’d add such an option to my list.”

The tension that had receded, now returned.

“You have a list?”

She smiled. “Yes. I’m an analyst, remember? I love lists.”

He didn’t match her smile. “Is staying in Marietta … on your list?”

She hesitated. “Yes. It is. But Christmas is still weeks away and so I’m not even looking at my list till the New Year.”

He nodded. He hoped her wariness didn’t indicate she’d already made a choice from her list. His jaw ached. A choice that could involve her again being a part of James’ world.

Wind whistled under the roof eaves and rattled the tin on the lean-to. The small window of clear weather had shut. It was time to go.

But as they headed home and the weather closed in around them, Rhett couldn’t shake the feeling that the dropping temperature had become the least of their worries. Tucker’s usual restlessness was overlaid with a heightened vigilance. The buckskin’s ears constantly flickered and Rhett could feel the gelding’s muscles tense with any unexpected noise. While it was rare to see mountain lions, and they never attacked anything larger than themselves, it was shaping up to be a hard winter. Adolescent lions were also unpredictable.

He reined Tucker in so Cherry could draw abreast and he could talk to Ivy without the wind stealing his words.

“Tucker’s on edge.” Rhett smiled to reassure her. “So until I know why, stay close.”

“Okay.” She shortened Cherry’s reins and looked around. “What could be bothering him?”

“Not sure. Mountain lion, maybe?”

In silence they maintained a steady pace until the pine trees thinned and the creek skirting the tree line came into sight. Rhett slowed Tucker to a stop. The buckskin appeared more intent on snatching a bite of the pasture beneath the snow than on watching for any threat.

“All good?” Ivy asked, her cheeks rosy from the now bitter wind.

Rhett scanned the trees and boulders around them. “Yes, I think so. Whatever set Tucker off seems to have gone now.”

Ivy examined the creek that had a part layer of ice on the top. Around the edges of the ice water tumbled and flowed. “Is this where the wagon tracks are?”

“The right creek but the wrong spot. See where the creek narrows way over there, and the ground beyond the creek is flatter, that was the best place for the wagons to cross.”

Ivy nudged Cherry closer to the creek bank to take a better look at where he pointed.

Too late Rhett felt Tucker’s muscles bunch. The gelding swung around, his rump colliding with Cherry. Cream flashed in the trees as a young mountain lion fled but it was the blur of brown to his left and the crack of the ice that had him whip around.

Tucker’s knock had sent Cherry sliding toward the creek and had catapulted Ivy from her saddle into the glacial-cold water.

‡

T
he cold hit
Ivy like a sledge hammer.

One minute she was daydreaming of wagons and blue-eyed cowboys and the next she was falling from Cherry into what resembled a bath full of ice.

She gasped and struggled to her feet. The sodden weight of her woolen coat made it difficult to stand. Arctic water seeped through the warm thermal layers and dripped from her beanie into her eyes.

“Ivy.” Rhett called as he leapt off Tucker and raced to the creek edge.

“St … stay there. I’m fine. I’ll c …come over to you.”

Already shaking, she waded through the thigh-high water, ice cracking around her. With every step, the intense cold numbed her and she feared she’d freeze into position midstride.

Rhett bent to offer her a bare hand and she latched onto his strong hold. He pulled her out of the water and onto the creek bank.

“Are you hurt?” he asked even as he peeled off her gloves and sodden jacket.

She shook her head. The chattering of her teeth now audible. She wrapped her arms around her chest and attempted a smile through stiff lips. The care and concern in his worried blue eyes almost made it worth being frozen alive. He stripped the water from her braid, looked at the sky and grabbed her discarded jacket and gloves. As he strode to Cherry he wrung out Ivy’s gloves and jacket before stuffing the gloves in the coat pocket and hooking the jacket on the saddle horn. He quickly ran a hand down the mare’s legs checking she was okay before looping the reins over the saddle horn.

He jogged to Ivy and whistled over his shoulder. Tucker flung his head up from where he was grazing and lopped over. By now Ivy was shaking so much she wasn’t sure her knees would support her. Rhett flicked open his sheepskin coat. He picked her up and, talking softly to Tucker, lifted her into the buckskin’s saddle. He swung up behind her and pulled her onto his lap.

“Put your arms around me under my coat.”

She hesitated, not wanting to saturate his clothes, when he pulled his open jacket around her giving her no choice. She wound her arms around his torso and burrowed her head against his warm chest.

Tucker moved forward and settled into a steady canter. To her left, Cherry’s hoof beats pounded as they headed across the open field to home.

Ivy pressed closer to Rhett’s heat. She bit her lip to quell the violence of her teeth chattering. Just like Rhett’s great-grandfather taking Ivy’s own great-grandfather to Rose Crown when he’d fallen from his horse, generations later the kindness was repeated. It didn’t matter if she could no longer feel her feet or that her fingers tingled with pins and needles, she was in safe hands. Just like Rhett looking after her family’s land he also would make sure she would soon be warm.

Emotion forced hot tears to well. From the very first day when he’d offered her his coat, he’d cared for her, he’d looked out for her and he’d made her feel special and cherished. Was it any wonder she’d given him her heart?

Her teeth stopped chattering for a brief moment.

Her blood thrummed with the simple truth.

She loved Rhett.

She’d come to Marietta to heal her broken heart only to discover her heart hadn’t been broken. What she felt for the cowboy holding her like he’d never let her go couldn’t be compared to the lukewarm affection she’d felt for James. When Rhett had asked her if staying in Marietta had been on her options list she’d hesitated. She hadn’t wanted him to know it was at the top.

Her gut said Rhett felt something for her but she wasn’t quite ready to risk offering up her heart to now really be broken. Taking risks, and going off-list, wasn’t something that came easily. Trinity had flagged that Rhett was both grieving and a workaholic and wouldn’t be interested in either a fling or a relationship. A fierce shudder shook her. She could only pray he’d somehow come to feel something for her too and that she was more than a convenient distraction.

Rhett’s arms tightened. “Hang in there, Ivy, we’re almost home.”

Tucker’s hooves clattered on the gravel that paved the way from the barn to the main ranch. The buckskin stopped and Rhett’s arms loosened their hold. The winter chill replaced the heat of his touch.

“I’m going to have to lower you to the ground. Can you stand?”

She didn’t know if she nodded or not, but he seemed to know she’d try.

She thought she heard the words, “That’s my girl.” But then Rhett carefully set her on the ground and all she could focus on was her frozen feet taking her weight. She bit back a moan and held onto the stirrup leather. Rhett was soon beside her and she was in his arms as he carried her inside.

He strode into the living room and sat her on the rug before the fire.

“You need more furniture,” he said with a grin, his dimples flicking as he headed toward the kitchen door. She watched him go, appreciating his attempt to make her smile but still feeling like there wasn’t a single part of her body not shaking.

He returned with a wooden kitchen chair that he sat before the fire and helped her onto. He eased off her sodden boots and two pairs of socks. She stretched her feet out toward the fire. He disappeared again and came back with an armful of blankets from off her bed. He took hold of her hands and pulled her to her bare feet.

“Thankfully Milly is over with Rusty at my house because I don’t need her playing tug-o-war with your clothes while I’m trying to get them off.” Even as he spoke he peeled off her teal-colored turtleneck.

For a second he stilled, his eyes on her chest.

“Red?” Huskiness edged his voice.

She attempted a smile as she looked down. The water had rendered Kendall’s white thermal top transparent leaving the red lace of her bra visible.

“It’s Christm …mas.”

Appreciation glinted in his eyes. “Maybe it should be Christmas every day of the year?”

He bent to collect a blanket and draped it around her. He reached for her belt buckle. She trembled as he worked the leather free, flicked open her jeans button and fly.

“Is it okay if I slide your jeans down a little so you can then slip them off?”

“Yes.” The tremors shaking her now had little to do with the cold and more to do with the feel of his large hands on her hips.

“Okay. You should be right to undress yourself now.” He briefly kissed her mouth, his lips warm.

“I’ll go run you a shower.”

*

Gallons of warm
water later, Ivy again sat on the wooden chair in front of the fire. Dressed in her thickest pajamas she also wore sweatpants and a sweat shirt over the top and two pairs of socks. A thick fluffy white towel was wrapped around her hair. The smell of chicken soup wafted from the kitchen. Rhett had found the fresh soup she’d made yesterday.

He entered carrying the second wooden kitchen chair and a soup mug.

He set the chair beside her and passed her the soup. “The shower helped. Your lips aren’t blue anymore.”

She smiled as he took a seat beside her. “I’m still shaking but at least I can talk without my teeth having a life of their own.”

She took a sip of rich soup and noticed his shower-damp hair, fresh jeans and blue western shirt. “I hope you didn’t get too cold. Or Tucker. I would have dripped water all over you both.”

“No, I’m good and I rubbed down Tucker so he’s fine.”

“So why did he spin around? Was it a mountain lion?”

“Yes. But Tucker eyeballed him and he ran.”

“Good on Tucker. See, his bad attitude does come in handy.”

Rhett chuckled and she stared at her soup. “I’m having a feeling of déjà vu with you bringing me hot soup. I don’t think I’ve ever been as cold as I’ve been here in Marietta.”

The smile in his eyes ebbed. “Don’t write us off just yet. We do have beautiful warm summers.”