Christmas Cookie Baby Read online

  She chased after him, stopping beside him where he lightly gripped the edge of the sink, staring out the window at the view that never failed to calm him. From this vantage point, a good twenty feet back and above a narrow portion of Kodiak Gorge, the jagged gray rock canyon looked impenetrable. But it wasn’t. A secret path led to the canyon floor. Took him a month to find. Just like that path, winding his way into Rose’s life might take a while, but eventually, he would, changing everything between them for the better.

  Hand on his shoulder, she gently turned him to face her. “Do you think your son would want to grow up in a strife-filled home?”

  He tensed.

  “Because face it, Colby, that’s what the two of us would share. If we can hardly get two words out of our mouths without bickering now, what happens when mutual resentment sets in? What kind of message would that send to a child? Trust me, I will love this child heart and soul. I promise he will never want for anything. Does that sound like such a horrible life?”

  He grunted. “Now, who sounds like she has it all worked out? All except for what you’re going to say when Nick gets old enough to ask about his dad. Where is he? he’ll ask. Why doesn’t he love me enough to be with me? You promise he’ll never want for anything, but you can trust me that our son will one day want that father-son bond.”

  “You make valid points, but for all you know,” Rose crossed her arms and turned away. “The issue of Talbot’s father may never even come up. Maybe he’ll never miss you at all.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure.”

  “Why not? How could you possibly know?”

  “How?” He gripped her shoulders, forcing her to face him. “I damn well know how, Rose, because I learned firsthand what it feels like growing up without a dad. As long as there’s breath in my body, you can be damned sure I’ll never bring my own son that kind of confusion and pain.”

  Chapter Seven

  BACK AT THE lodge, Rose stepped away from the window with its spellbinding view of the sun just now setting over the lake. She should have been enchanted by the postcard-perfect scene, but all she really felt was tired and cranky. How would she wrangle bullheaded Colby around to her way of thinking?

  Backing up to the bed, she grabbed a strand of strawberry licorice from the nightstand before falling onto the downy comforter and pillows. She closed her eyes, sighed, chewed.

  The last time she’d slept on down had been the sleeping bags in Colby’s crashed plane.

  False start. Time to think about something else.

  Anything else.

  Classic TV trivia. Who would’ve made a hotter couple? Greg and Marcia from the Brady Bunch? Or the Professor and Mary Ann?

  I’ll tell you who was way hotter than either one of those match-ups. Colby and Rose.

  Grr. She furiously chewed the rest of her licorice.

  How many times had she mentally rehashed that night in the plane? They’d believed themselves on the brink of death. What they’d shared ought to have been hot. Given a choice, who wanted to die in a flurry of lukewarm passion?

  But now, they were both very much alive.

  In a way, it had been like being on vacation, when everyday stresses seem nonexistent. But they somehow always manage to re-enter your life around the time you’re packing to go home—to remind you that your vacation really is over.

  That was how things were with her and Colby. Over.

  Excitement like that couldn’t last forever. It burns itself out. Kind of like her mom had burned out after all those bungled marriages. What marriage was she on now? Number seven? Or was it eight? Who could keep up?

  Her most recent spouse was Neil. He owned a used car lot in Berwyn. Made a truckload of money at it, and spent every dime on his hobby of collecting railroad memorabilia. Dining-car china, silver pieces, porters’ uniforms, monogrammed bed linens, signal lanterns. If it had to do with trains, he collected it. He even wore a conductor’s cap to work every day, and used an old Pullman car as his office. Eight of the fifteen rooms in his house were dedicated to his love of trains. So was every weekend.

  Rose had nothing against trains. If anything, she found the whole era of historic train travel fascinating and romantic. Her problem was with the way her mother had assimilated Neil’s love of trains. During their weekly mother-daughter calls, pretty much all she talked about was which new piece they’d picked up.

  If it’d only been this one case, Rose wouldn’t have been worried. But with Haywood, her mom had taken up sailing. Lyle did golf. Vincent had seemed more in tune with his four dachshunds than with her mother, who, on Rose’s last visit to their happy home, had lovingly trailed after the wriggling pack, scooping up dog biscuit crumbs and a trail of shredded socks.

  What was it about all of those relationships that made her mother lose herself? Or for that matter, had her mother ever been on her own long enough to even recognize who she really was?

  “THERE YOU ARE, sugar biscuit.” Nugget smiled as Rose meandered into the lodge’s crowded, sun-flooded dining room at six a.m. “I wondered what’s been keeping you.”

  Keeping her? Did no one around here ever sleep? “Morning, Nugget.”

  “Have a good rest?”

  Practically dissolving into a chair at the table beside the one she’d shared with Colby, Rose groaned.

  “I’ll take that as a no?” He set a laminated menu on the table. “I’ll be right back with a nice glass of milk.”

  Blech. “Instead, could you please bring a cup of decaf?”

  “I would, honey bun, but I never have understood that whole business of how they take the caffeine out of coffee. Seems downright unnatural. Highly unsafe for the baby.”

  “My pediatrician understands the process fairly well, and she says it’s safe as long as I don’t overdo it.”

  Nugget shook his head. “Nope. I don’t think so.” He flashed Rose a wide smile before heading for the kitchen. “Be right back with that milk.”

  Crossing her arms on the table, Rose dropped her head into them and groaned.

  Great. Another fun day in paradise.

  “Good. I didn’t miss you.” Colby slid into the empty seat at her table, then snatched up her menu.

  Rose slowly raised her head. “Miss me? Where else would I be at this hellish hour than at the lodge? And where are your bandages?”

  “I’m all better—see?” He held out his hands, and the gashes that had made her queasy the previous night had faded into no big deal. Maybe they hadn’t been that big a deal to begin with—at least not in the real world.

  In her mind, though…

  She took a deep breath. The thought of his being hurt—no matter how small the injury—didn’t sit well.

  “And as for where else you might’ve been,” he said, “you could’ve been doing just about anything. Fishing, gold panning, hiking.”

  “Hiking. You honestly think I look ready to hike?”

  “Maybe. I’d get a kick out of watching you waddle down the trail.”

  “Oh no…” She slapped her palms on the table. “Did you just say I waddle?”

  “Babe,” he said with a too-charming grin. “I’ve seen it—and I think it’s adorable.”

  Talk about stealing her thunder. “Well…”

  “For that matter, the pretty head attached to your waddling body isn’t so bad, either.”

  “Um, thanks. I think.”

  “You’re welcome. Oh, before I forget…” He eased out of his chair and knelt beside her, “Good morning in there, Nick,” he said to her baby bump, molding his fingers against it. “This is your dad. Hopefully, you’re getting an all-right start to your day.” He shifted his hand lower, only to plant a quick kiss on the spot where his palm’s heat still lingered—just in time to feel his son’s response.

  Talbot gently rolled, easing his foot in a wide arc all the way across her stomach.

  Colby stared in wonder. “Was that…?”

  She nodded. For some crazy reason, tears lodged at
the back of her throat.

  “I’ll be damned…” His eyes were suspiciously shiny as he stumbled back into his seat. “My kid already likes me.”

  “He does that all the time.” Rose toyed with a plastic tub of grape jelly. “It doesn’t necessarily mean anything.”

  “Don’t.” Colby narrowed his former warm gaze.

  “What?”

  “Deliberately set out to downplay what was for me a big moment. Like it or not, Rose, I am your baby’s father. No matter how hard you try to reason that fact away, you can’t.”

  “I-I wasn’t trying to.” All I was doing was trying to make sense out of the inexplicable wonder that shot through me when you talked to our son.

  Our son.

  Was that the first time she’d thought of Baby Talbot as anything other than all her own?

  He said, “I’ve got to make a run up to the oil site.”

  “But you haven’t eaten.”

  His gaze brightened. “That mean you want me to stay?”

  She hesitated, then said, “Sure.”

  “There was a warm welcome if I’ve ever heard one.” Pushing his chair back from the table, he stood, pressed another quick kiss to her stomach, then sauntered out the lodge’s front door.

  With all eyes in the room on her, Rose’s cheeks flamed. What did these people want from her? She’d done the right thing in coming up here to tell Colby about his son. She hadn’t had to. She could have kept Talbot a secret, and Colby never would have known.

  No, you couldn’t. Not for a second could you have kept that man from knowing he had a son. It wouldn’t have been right.

  Lips pressed tight, Rose reached for the menu and snapped it open. Who cared what these people thought? It wasn’t as if she’d ever be back.

  If those adrenaline-junkie pictures she’d seen at Colby’s house were any indication of the kind of father he’d be, she was right to keep Talbot far away. Colby would probably celebrate their son’s first birthday with a baby bungee jump off the rim of Kodiak Gorge!

  “Ready to order?” Nugget set a full glass of milk on the table.

  Rose looked up at him. “I don’t suppose you’ve reconsidered bringing me a decaf?”

  “Nope. But how about some nice eggs scrambled with ham, spinach, tomatoes and cheese?”

  “I was thinking pizza sounded good. Or maybe powdered sugar donuts.”

  Nugget grinned. “Ham-egg scramble it is. I’ll have it right out.”

  Rose sighed.

  It was going to be a long week. Why had she chosen now to be frugal over the cost of an airline ticket?

  COLBY SAT AT one of the six round tables in Global Oil’s newly decorated mess hall, then frowned. A couple of months back he remembered hauling a lot of paint over here, but yellow? Who the hell had heard of painting an all-male mess hall yellow?

  Of course, Dot lived there, too. But she fit in so well with the guys, no one even thought about her being a woman.

  “Hey, Colby,” Todd Fulmore said. The master welder set his tray on the table before easing into a seat. He winced.

  “Back still giving you trouble?”

  “Yep. Though I gotta say, those new mattresses help—and the recliners in the game room. Heaven. That little woman you brought up here did one helluva a job in making our lives a whole lot nicer.”

  “You mean Rose?” Colby took a bite of his roast beef sandwich, trying his best to look uninterested.

  “Yeah, that was her name. At the time, we didn’t have a clue what she was doing, but now I want her back—getting us some improvements to this food.” He eyed his grayish slab of meat loaf. “Heard the two of you were an item. Seen her lately?”

  Colby nearly choked on his latest bite. “Uh, yeah, you might say that.”

  “I smell a story.” Dan Dascoll, a geologist with more facial hair than a grizzly, joined them. “It’s been a slow week. Spill.”

  “Absolutely,” Todd said. “Because, believe me, you sure don’t want to hear what old Dan here’s been up to.”

  Rolling his eyes, Colby said, “I already know. Word travels fast when it involves a five-foot-six, stacked, blue-eyed blonde.”

  Dan leaned back in his chair, rubbing his hairy jaw. “Yep. Last weekend was undoubtedly one of the happiest of Heather’s life.”

  Todd pitched his roll at Dan’s wide grin, but Dan just caught it midair, taking a big bite before flinging it back.

  Todd made a face before shooting the roll from three-point range into the trash.

  “Out with it, Davis,” Todd said. “If I have to hear about his wild nights with Heather one more time, I might just have to—”

  “Take a cold shower?” Dan winked.

  “All right.” Colby finished off his chocolate milk. “Dan, you remember that dark-haired looker who spent a couple of months up here last winter?”

  “Shoot, yeah. I made a play for her, but she was all business. Real cold, even though I heard rumors ’bout you and her getting real hot that night in your downed plane.”

  “Can it, Dascoll. She now happens to be the mother of my son.”

  In unison, Todd and Dan whistled.

  “Damn,” Todd said. “That was fast work. Congratulations.”

  “Thanks.” Colby sat a little straighter.

  “So?” Dan asked. “She call you wanting child support?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Wait—let me guess. She wants you to get your ass down to the lower forty-eight and marry her ASAP.”

  Colby had to laugh at that. “I wish—except for the lower forty-eight part.”

  “She wants to marry you and move lock, stock and barrel into your place?”

  “Since you’re never going to guess, I might as well tell you. Her sole reason for returning is to officially inform me I’m going to be a father.”

  “And…” Dan stared, apparently dumbfounded.

  “That’s it. She just wanted to tell me, then plans on leaving town. But I’m not having it. There’s no way in hell my son’s growing up without his father.”

  “I see your point, man, but she’s a cool customer. One of those career women with no time for guys like us.”

  Nodding, Colby said, “You hit the nail on the head with that assessment.”

  “So?” Todd forked a bite of mystery meat. “What’s your plan to make her stay?”

  Colby shrugged. “I’d like to think there’s an amicable way to settle this. Hell, I offered to marry her last night.”

  “But she turned you down?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Dan shook his head. “All I can say is good luck, man. Sounds like you’re gonna need it.”

  COLBY HAD ALMOST finished the preflight check on his plane for the return trip to Kodiak Gorge when his friend Dot sauntered up Global’s dock. She wore pink overalls, a white long-john top and had covered her buzz cut with her lucky orange OSU Cowboys hat. She was renowned for the best dirty jokes in a five-hundred-mile radius. Today, though, Dot wasn’t smiling.

  “Heard you were up our way,” she said.

  “Yep, brought Pitkins a box of gaskets.”

  “Heard that’s not all you brought.”

  “S’cuse me?” Colby wasn’t sure he liked her tone.

  “You heard me.”

  “Got a beef with me?”

  “In a manner of speaking.”

  “Well then, spell it out.” Colby stuck his head back under the cowling to check the oil.

  “Heard you’re gonna be a father.”

  “Yep.”

  “You gonna do right by that little gal?”

  “Gonna try.”

  “You’d better do a damned sight better ‘n that.”

  “Dot…” Colby stepped out from under the cowling, wiping his hands on a rag. “We’ve been friends for years. I would hope in all that time you’ve come to know me as an honorable man.”

  “I used to think so.”

  Colby grit his teeth. He’d had just about enough of being labeled th
e bad guy where he and Rose were concerned.

  “See, one snowy night a while back,” Dot said, “I talked Rose into knockin’ back a few root beers, and she opened up like a bloomin’ flower. Told me how she thought she might be pregnant, and how the only person who could be her baby’s daddy was you, but how she didn’t see the two of you ever getting much further along in a real relationship than you already had.”

  “Uh-huh. And that’s pretty much the way she still feels.”

  “You tried changing her mind?”

  Colby laughed.

  “Treat her with kid gloves. The little girl’s been hurt.”

  “She’s hardly a little girl. But a full-grown woman with a head full of progressive ideas that’d scare off a grouchy polar bear.”

  “That’s my girl.” For the first time since his arrival, the woman cracked a smile, but far from being her usual guffaw, it was more of a wistful chuckle. “Got enough big-city notions to scare off a whole pack of bears, but that’s just it, Colby. It’s all show. Inside, that girl’s feelings are tangled like snagged fishing line.”

  Colby shrugged before pulling down the cowling and fastening it closed. “I’m real sorry to hear it, but since she’s not exactly opening up to me, there’s not much I can do.”

  Hands on her hips, Dot said, “I’ll tell you what you can do—make her marry you. After the troubles she’s had, that’s the only way she’ll do it.”

  “Again,” Colby said, “seeing how she hasn’t mentioned any trouble to me, I fail to see that her past—good or bad—is any of my business.”

  “It’s your business because her baby is yours, and I’m assuming you want to keep that child right here in God’s country where he or she belongs. Am I right?”

  Colby’s heart pounded. “It’s a boy. Her baby—our son. And yes, I’d very much like to keep him in Kodiak Gorge, but his momma’s stubborn. Short of kidnapping her, nothing else will make her stay.”

  “I know. I heard all about her crazy notions on raising this baby alone. Even back before she knew for sure she was pregnant, the one thing she did know was that she wasn’t ever getting hitched.”