“Your father picked a hell of a time to take a bride.”

Caroline winced. “I’m sorry. I understand you don’t want me here, but for the children’s sake, at least let me help for a day or two until you come up with another arrangement.”

Wade rubbed the ache in his temple again, the weight of his responsibilities cumbersome and heavy.

What would be the harm in letting her help for a day or two?

Like it or not, she was connected to him now by virtue of their parents’ hasty marriage. And this way he could at least keep an eye on her. If she and her father were cooking up some kind of scam together, then he might be wise to remember his brother’s favorite saying. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

What better way to keep her close than by having her right here in his own home?

Light the Stars
RaeAnne Thayne

www.millsandboon.co.uk

RAEANNE THAYNE

finds inspiration in the beautiful northern Utah mountains where she lives with her husband and three children. Her books have won numerous honors, including a RITA® Award nomination and several Romantic Times BOOKclub reviewer’s choice nominations. RaeAnne loves to hear from readers. She can be reached through her Web site at www.raeannethayne.com or at P.O. Box 6682 North Logan, UT 84341.

To Gail Chasan, for helping me reach my own dreams.

Many, many thanks.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter One

On his thirty-sixth birthday, Wade Dalton’s mother ran away.

She left him a German chocolate cake on the kitchen counter, two new paperback mysteries by a couple of his favorite authors and a short but succinct note in her loopy handwriting.

Honey,

Happy birthday. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there to celebrate with you but by the time you read this we’ll be in Reno and I’ll be the new Mrs. Quinn Montgomery. I know you’ll think I should have told you but my huggy bear thought it would be better this way. More romantic. Isn’t that sweet? You’ll love him, I promise! He’s handsome, funny, and makes me feel like I can touch my dreams again. Tell the children I love them and I’ll see them soon.

P.S. Nat’s book report is due today. Don’t let her forget it!

P.P.S. Sorry to leave you in the lurch like this but I figured you, Seth and Nat could handle things without me for a week. Especially you. You can handle anything.

Don’t take this wrong, son, but it doesn’t hurt for you to remember your children are more important than your blasted cattle.

Be back after the honeymoon.

Wade stared at the note for a full five minutes, the only sound in the Cold Creek Ranch kitchen the ticking of the pig-shaped clock Andi had loved above the stove and the refrigerator compressor kicking to life.

What the hell was he supposed to do now?

His mother and this huggy bear creature couldn’t have chosen a worse time to pull their little disappearing act. Marjorie knew it, too, blast her hide. He needed her help! He had six hundred head of cattle to get to market before the snow flew, a horse show and auction in Cheyenne in a few weeks, and a national TV news crew coming in less than a week to film a feature on the future of the American cattle ranch.

He was supposed to be showing off the groundbreaking innovations he’d made to the ranch in the last few years, showing the Cold Creek in the best possible light.

How was he supposed to make sure everything was ready and running smoothly while he changed Cody’s diapers and chased after Tanner and packed Nat’s lunch?

He read the note again, anger beginning to filter through the dismayed shock. Something about what she had written seemed to thrum through his consciousness like a distant, familiar guitar chord. He was trying to figure out what when he heard the back-porch door creak and a moment later his youngest brother stumbled into the kitchen, bleary-eyed and in need of a shave.

“Coffee. I need it hot and black and I just realized I’m out down at my place.”

Wade glared at him, seizing on the most readily available target for his frustration and anger. “You look like hell.”

Seth shrugged. “Got in late. It was ladies’ night down at the Bandito and I couldn’t leave all those sweet girls shooting pool by themselves. Where’s the coffee?”

“There isn’t any coffee. Or breakfast, either. I don’t suppose you happened to see Mom sneaking out at two in the morning when you were dragging yourself and, no doubt, one or two of those sweet girls back to the guesthouse?”

His brother blinked a couple of times to clear the remaining cobwebs from his brain. “What?”

Wade tossed the note at him and Seth scrubbed his bleary eyes before picking it up. A range of emotions flickered across his entirely too charming features—shock and confusion, then an odd pensiveness that raised Wade’s hackles.

“Did you know about this?” he asked.

Seth slumped into a kitchen chair, avoiding his gaze. “Not this, precisely.”

“What precisely did you know about what our dear mother’s been up to?” Wade bit out.

“I knew she was e-mailing some guy she met through that life coach she’s been talking to. I didn’t realize it was serious. At least not run-off-to-Reno serious.”

Suddenly this whole fiasco made a grim kind of sense and Wade realized what about Marjorie’s note had struck that odd, familiar chord. By the time you read this I’ll be the new Mrs. Quinn Montgomery, she had written.

Montgomery was the surname of the crackpot his mother had shelled out a small fortune to in the last six months, all in some crazy effort to better her life.

Caroline Montgomery.

He knew the name well since he’d chewed Marjorie out plenty the last time he’d balanced her checkbook for her and had found the name written on several hefty checks.

This was all this Caroline Montgomery’s fault. It had to be. She must have planted ideas in Marjorie’s head about how she wasn’t happy, about how she needed more out of life. Fun, excitement. Romance. Then she introduced some slick older man—a brother? An uncle?—to bring a little spice into a lonely widow’s world.

What had been so wrong with Marjorie’s life, anyway, that she’d needed to find some stranger to fix it?

Okay, his mother had a few odd quirks. Today was not only his birthday, it was exactly the eighteen-year anniversary of his father’s death and in those years, his mother had pursued one wacky thing after another. She did yoga, she balanced her chakras instead of her checkbook, she sponsored inflammatory little book-club meetings at the Pine Gulch library where she and her cronies read every controversial feminist, male-bashing self-help book they could find.

He had tried to be understanding about it all. Marjorie’s marriage to Hank Dalton hadn’t exactly been a happy one. His father had treated his mother with the same cold condescension he’d wielded like a club against his children. Once his father’s death had freed Marjorie from that oppressive influence, Wade couldn’t blame her for taking things a little too far in the opposite direction.

Besides, when he’d needed her in those terrible, wrenching days after Andrea’s death, Marjorie had come through. Without him even having to ask, she’d packed up her crystals and her yoga mat and had moved back to the ranch to help him with the kids. He would have been lost without her, a single dad with three kids under the age of six, one of them only a week old.

He knew she wasn’t completely happy with her life but he’d never thought she would go this far. She wouldn’t have, he thought, if it hadn’t been for this scheming Caroline Montgomery and whatever male relative she was in cahoots with.

He heard a belligerent yell coming from upstairs and wanted to pound his head on the table a few times. Six-thirty in the morning and it was already starting. How the hell was he going to do this?

“Want me to get Cody?” Seth asked as the cries rose in volume. Gramma, Gramma, Gramma.

Wade had to admit, the offer was a tempting one, but he forced himself to refuse. They were his children and he was the one who would have to deal with them.

He took off his denim jacket and hung his Stetson on the hook by the door.

“I’m on it. Just go take care of the stock and then we’ve all got to bring in the last hay crop we cut yesterday. The weather report says rain by afternoon so we’ve got to get it in fast. I’ll figure something out with the kids and get out there to help as soon as I can.”

Seth opened his mouth to say something then must have thought better of it. He nodded. “Right. Good luck.”

You’re going to need it. His brother left the words unspoken but Wade heard them anyway.

He couldn’t agree more.

Two hours later, Wade was rapidly coming to the grim realization that he was going to need a hell of a lot more than luck.

“Hold still,” he ordered a squirmy, giggling Cody as he tried to stick on a diaper. Through the open doorway into the kitchen, he could hear Tanner and Natalie bickering.

“Daaaad,” his eight-year-old daughter called out, “Tanner’s flicking Cheerios at me. Make him stop! He’s getting the new shirt Grandma bought me all wet and blotchy!”

“Tanner, cut it out,” he hollered. “Nat, if you don’t quit stalling over your breakfast, you’re going to miss the bus and I don’t have time to drive you today.”

“You never have time for anything,” he thought he heard her mutter but just then he felt an ominous warmth hit his chest. He looked down to the changing table to find Cody grinning up at him.

“Cody pee pee.”

Wade ground his back teeth, looking down at the wet stain spreading across his shirt. “Yeah, kid, I kind of figured that out.”

He quickly fastened the diaper and threw on the overalls and Spider-Man shirt Cody insisted on wearing, all the while aware of a gnawing sense of inadequacy in his gut.

He wasn’t any good at this. He loved his kids but it had been a whole lot easier being their father when Andrea was alive.

She’d been the one keeping their family together. The one who’d scheduled immunizations and fixed Nat’s hair into cute little ponytails and played Chutes and Ladders for hours at a time. His role had been the benevolent dad who showed up at bedtime and sometimes broke away from ranch chores for Sunday brunch.

The two years since her death had only reinforced how inept he was at the whole parenting gig. If it hadn’t been for Marjorie coming to his rescue, he didn’t know what he would have done.

Probably flounder around cluelessly, just like he was doing now, he thought.

He started to carry Cody back to the kitchen to finish his breakfast but the toddler was having none of it. “Down, Daddy. Down,” he ordered, bucking and wriggling worse than a calf on his way to an appointment with the castrator.

Wade set his feet on the ground and Cody raced toward the kitchen. “Nat, can you watch Cody for a minute?” he called. “I’ve got to go change my shirt.”

“Can’t,” she hollered back. “The bus is here.”

“Don’t forget your book report,” he remembered at the last minute, but the door slammed on his last word and he was pretty sure she hadn’t heard him.

With a quick order to Tanner to please behave himself for five minutes, he carried Cody upstairs with him and grabbed his last clean shirt out of the closet. The least his mother could have done was wait until after laundry day to pull her disappearing act, he thought wryly. Now he was going to have to do that, too.

He grabbed Cody and headed back down the stairs. They had nearly reached the bottom when the doorbell pealed.

“I’ll get it,” Tanner yelled and headed for the front door, still in his pajamas.

“No, me! Me!” Not to be outdone, Cody squirmed out of Wade’s arms and slid down the last few steps. Wade wasn’t sure how they did it, but both boys beat him to the door, even though he’d been closer.

Tanner opened it, then turned shy at the strange woman standing before him. Wade couldn’t blame him. Their visitor was lovely, he observed as he reached the door behind his sons, with warm, streaky brown hair pulled back into a smooth twisty thing, eyes the color of hot chocolate on a cold winter day and graceful, delicate features.

She wore a tailored russet jacket, tan slacks and a crisp white shirt, with a chunky bronze necklace and matching earrings, a charm bracelet on one arm and a slim gold watch on the other.

Wade had no idea who she was and she didn’t seem in any hurry to introduce herself. Probably some tourist who’d taken the wrong road out of Jackson, he thought, and needed help finding her way.

Finally he spoke.

“Can I help you?”

“Oh. Yes.” Color flared on those high cheekbones and she blinked a few times as if trying to compose herself. “The sign out front said the Cold Creek Ranch. Is this the right place?”

No. Not a lost tourist. As Tanner peeked around Wade’s legs and Cody held his chubby little arms out to be lifted again, Wade’s gaze traveled from the woman’s pretty, streaky hair to her expensive leather shoes, looking for some clue as to what she might be doing on his front porch.

If she was some kind of ranch supply salesperson, she was definitely a step above the usual. He had a lowering suspicion he’d buy whatever she was selling.

“You found us.”

Relief flickered across her expressive features. “Oh, I’m so glad. The directions weren’t exactly clear and I stopped at two other ranches before this one. I’d like to see Marjorie Dalton, please.”

Yeah, wouldn’t they all like to see her right about now? “There I’m afraid you’re out of luck. She’s not here.”

Right before his eyes, the lovely, self-assured woman on his porch seemed to fold into herself. Her shoulders sagged, her mouth drooped and she closed her eyes. When she opened them, he saw for the first time the weariness there and was uncomfortably aware of an odd urge to comfort her, to tuck her close and assure her everything would be all right.

“Can you tell me…that is, do you know where I might find her?”

He didn’t want to spill his mother’s whereabouts to some strange woman, no matter how she mysteriously plucked all his protective strings. “Why don’t you tell me your business with her and I’ll get her a message?”

“It’s complicated. And personal.”

“Then you’ll have to come back in a week or so.”

He had to hope by then Marjorie would come to her senses and be back where she belonged.

“A week?” His visitor blanched. “Oh no! I’m too late. She’s not here, is she?”

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

“No, I mean she’s really not here. She’s not just in town shopping or something. They’ve run off, haven’t they?”

He stared at her, wariness blooming in his gut. “Who are you and what do you want with my mother?”

The woman gave a weary sigh. “You must be Wade. I’ve heard a lot about you. My name is Caroline Montgomery. I’ve been in correspondence with Marjorie for the last six months. I don’t know how to tell you this, Mr. Dalton, but I think Marjorie has run off with my father.”

The big, gorgeous man standing in front of her with one cute little boy hanging off his belt loop and another in his arms didn’t look at all shocked by her bombshell. No, shock definitely wasn’t the emotion that hardened his mouth and tightened those stunning blue eyes into dime slots.

He brimmed with fury—toe-curling, hair-scorching anger. Caroline took an instinctive step back, until the weave of her jacket bumped against the peeled log of his porch.

“Your father!” he bit out. “I should have known. What is it they say about apples not falling far from the tree?”

Maybe if she wasn’t so blasted tired from traveling all night, she might have known what he was talking about. “I’m sorry?”

“What’s the matter, lady? You weren’t bilking Marjorie out of enough with your hefty life-coaching fees so you decided to go for the whole enchilada?”

She barely had time to draw a breath before he went on.

“Quite a racket you and your old man have. How many wealthy widows have you pulled this on? You drag them in, worm out all the details about their financial life, then your old man moves in for the kill.”

Caroline wanted to sway from the force of the blow that hit entirely too close to home. She felt sick, hideously sick, and bitterly angry that Quinn would once more put her in this position. How else was all this supposed to look, especially given her father’s shady past?

She wouldn’t give this arrogant man the satisfaction of knowing he’d drawn blood, though. Instead she forced her spine to straighten, vertebra by vertebra.

“You’re wrong.”

“Am I?”

“Yes! I was completely shocked by this sudden romance. My father said nothing about it to me—I didn’t know he and Marjorie had even met until he sent me an e-mail last night telling me he was flying out to meet her and they were heading straight from here to Reno.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“I don’t care if you believe me or not! It’s the truth.”

How much of her life had been spent defending herself because of something Quinn had done? She had vowed she was done with it but now she wondered grimly if she ever would be.

What was Quinn up to? Just once, she wished she knew. With all her heart, she wanted to believe his sudden romance was the love match he had intimated in his e-mail.

I never meant for this to happen. It took us both completely by surprise. But in just a few short months I’ve discovered I can’t live without her. Marjorie is my other half—the missing piece of my life’s puzzle. She knows all my mistakes, all my blemishes, but she loves me anyway. How lucky am I?

Caroline was romantic enough to hope Quinn’s hearts-and-flowers e-mail was genuine. Her mother had been dead for twenty-two years now and, as far as she knew, her father’s love life was as exciting as her own—i.e., about as thrilling as watching paint dry.

But how could she trust his word, after years of his schemes and swindles? Especially when the missing piece of his life’s puzzle was one of her clients? She couldn’t. She just couldn’t.

What if Quinn was spinning some new scam? Something involving Marjorie Dalton—and tangentially, Caroline’s reputation? She would be ruined. Everything she had worked so hard for these last five years, her safe, comfortable, respectable life, would crumble away like a sugar castle in a hurricane.

Caroline knew what was at stake: her reputation, which in the competitive world of life coaching was everything. As soon as she’d read his e-mail, she had been struck with a familiar cold dread and knew she would have to track him down to gauge his motives for herself—or to talk him out of this crazy scheme to marry a woman he had only corresponded with via e-mail.

Her first self-help book was being released in five months and if her publisher caught wind of this, they would not be happy. She’d be lucky if her book wasn’t yanked right off the schedule.

That’s why she had traveled all night to find herself here at nine in the morning, facing down a gorgeous rancher and his two cute little boys.

But she wasn’t going to accomplish anything by antagonizing Marjorie’s son, she realized. She took a deep, cleansing breath and forced her expression into a pleasant smile, her voice into the low, calming tones she used with her clients.

“Look, I’m sorry. It’s been a long night. I had two connector flights from Santa Cruz and an hour’s drive from Idaho Falls to get here and I’m afraid I’m not at my best. May I come in so we can discuss what’s to be done about our runaway parents?”

She wasn’t sure how he would have answered if the cell phone clipped to his belt hadn’t suddenly bleeped.

With a grim glare—at her or at the person waiting on the other end of the line or at the world in general, she didn’t know—then gestured for her to come inside.

“Yeah?” he growled into the phone as the toddler in his arms wiggled and bucked to get down. Wade Dalton let the boy down, busy on the phone discussing in increasingly heated tones what sounded like a major problem with some farm machinery. She caught a few familiar words like stalling out and alternator but the rest sounded like a foreign language.

“We don’t have a choice. The baler’s got to be fixed today. That hay has to come in,” he snapped.

While she listened to his end of the conversation about various options for fixing the recalcitrant machine, Caroline took the opportunity to study Wade Dalton’s home.

Though the ranch house had soaring ceilings and gorgeous views of the back side of the Tetons, it was anything but ostentatious. The furniture looked comfortable but worn, toys were jumbled together in one corner, and the nearest coffee table was covered in magazines. An odd assortment of circulations, too, she noticed. Everything from O—Marjorie’s, she assumed—to Nick Jr. to Farm & Ranch Living.

The room they stood in obviously served as the gathering place for the Dalton family. Cartoons flickered on a big-screen TV in one corner and that’s where the little blond toddler had headed after Wade had set him down. She watched him for a moment as he picked up a miniature John Deere and started plowing the carpet, one eye on the screen.

The older boy had vanished. She only had a moment to wonder where in the big house he’d gone when Wade Dalton hung up the phone.

“Sorry. Where were we?” he said.

“Discussing what’s to be done about our parents, I believe.”

“As I see it, we don’t have too many options. It’s too late to go after them. I’m assuming they left about midnight, which means they’ve got a nine-hour head start on us. They’d be married long before we even made it to the Nevada state line. Beyond the fact that I can’t leave the ranch right now, I wouldn’t know where the hell to even start looking for them in Reno since my mother’s not answering her cell phone.”

“Neither is Quinn,” Caroline said glumly.

“I can’t believe Marjorie would do something like this, just run off and leave the kids. This is your doing.”

So much for their thirty-second ceasefire. “Mine?”

“You’re the one who’s been telling her to reach for her dreams or whatever the hell other nonsense you spout in your sessions with her.”

“You don’t thinking reaching for dreams is important?”

“Sure I do. But not when it means walking away from your responsibilities.”

“Since when are your children your mother’s responsibility?” she snapped.

Again she had to force herself not to step back from the sudden fury in his eyes. She had to admit she deserved it this time.

“That was uncalled for. I’m sorry,” Caroline said quietly. “Marjorie has been caring for Nat and Cody and Tanner for two years. She doesn’t see it as a burden at all.”

“Right. That’s why she’s been paying a small fortune to some stranger so you can tell her all the things wrong with her life and how to fix them.”

“That’s not what I do at all,” she insisted. “I try to help my clients make their lives happier and more fulfilling by pointing out some of their own self-destructive behavior and giving them concrete steps toward changing what they’re unhappy about. Marjorie was never unhappy about you and your children.”

Before she could continue, his phone bleeped again. He ignored it for four rings, then muttered an oath and picked it up.

This conversation was similar to the first, only Wade Dalton seemed to grow increasingly frustrated with each passing second.

“Look,” he finally said angrily, “just call the tractor supply place in Rexburg and see if they’ve got a replacement, then you can send Drifty over to pick it up. I’ll be out as soon as I can. If we put the whole crew out there this afternoon, we might still be able to get the hay in before the rain.”

He hung up and then faced her again. “I don’t have time to get into this with you today, Ms. Montgomery. I’m sorry you came all this way for nothing but I think we’re too late to do anything about the two lovebirds. I’ll warn you, though, that if your father thinks he’s going to touch a penny of the income from this ranch, you’re both in for one hell of a fight.”

“Warning duly noted,” she said tightly, wondering how a woman as fun and bubbly as Marjorie could have such an arrogant jerk for a son, no matter how gorgeous he might be.

She should cut him some slack, Caroline thought as she headed for the door. He obviously had his hands full, a widower with three active children and a busy cattle ranch.

Just as she reached the door, an acrid scent drifted from the back of the house, stopping her in her tracks.

“Do you smell something?” she asked Wade Dalton.

“It’s a working ranch. We’ve got all kinds of smells.”

“No, this is different. It smells like something’s on fire.”

He sniffed the air for a second, then his eyes narrowed. He looked around the gathering room, his eyes on his youngest son still playing on the carpet and the notable absence of the older boy.

“Tanner!” he suddenly roared. “What are you doing?”

“Nothing!” came a small, frightened-sounding voice from the rear of the house. “I’m not doin’ anything. Anything at all. Don’t come in the kitchen, Daddy, okay?”

Wade closed his eyes for half a second then took off down a hallway at a fast run.

This wasn’t any of her business, she knew, but Caroline had no choice but to follow.

Chapter Two

Hot on Wade Dalton’s worn boots, Caroline had a quick impression of a large, old-fashioned kitchen painted a sunny yellow with a professional-looking six-burner stove, long breakfast bar and at least eight bow-backed chairs snugged up against a massive, scarred pine table.

She imagined under other circumstances it would be a pleasant, welcoming space, but just now the room was thick with black smoke and the acrid smell of scorched paper and something sickly sweet.

Flames shot up from the stove and she quickly realized why—a roll of paper towels was ablaze next to the gas burner and already flames were scorching up the cabinets.

Even more worrisome, the older of Wade Dalton’s sons was standing on a chair he must have pulled up to the stove and his SpongeBob SquarePants pajamas were perilously close to the small fire.

“I’m sorry, Daddy,” the boy sniffled.

“Get down right now!” Wade yelled in that no-argument parental tone reserved for situations like this.

Though she sensed the rancher’s harshness stemmed from fear for his son’s safety, his words and tone still seemed to devastate the boy into inaction. He froze on his precarious perch until his father had to lift him off the chair and set him on the floor so he could get close enough to assess the cabinets.

Wade picked up the burning mess of towels and dropped them into the sink then returned to survey the damage.

Still, the boy didn’t move, standing as if he didn’t quite know what was happening. He looked ill, almost shocky, and he stood directly in Wade Dalton’s path.

This wasn’t any of her business, Caroline reminded herself. Even as she thought it, she found herself moving toward the distraught little boy.

What was his name? Tucker? Taylor? Tanner. That was it. “Tanner, why don’t we get out of your daddy’s way and let him take care of things here, okay?”

He looked at her blankly for a moment, then slipped his hand in hers and let Caroline lead him from the room. She took him into the great room where his little brother was still busy with his trucks, unaffected by the drama playing out in the other room.

She was going to ask if he had a favorite television show she could find for him as a distraction when she noticed his left hand pressed tightly to his pajama top.

A grim suspicion seized her and she leaned down. “Tanner, can I take a look at your hand? Are you hurt?”

His chin wobbled for a moment, then he nodded slowly and pulled his hand away from his chest. He made a small sound of distress when he spread out his fingers—and no wonder.

Caroline gasped at the angry, blistering red splotch covering his palm, roughly twice the size of a quarter. “Oh, honey!”

Her reaction seemed to open the floodgates of emotion. Tears pooled in his huge blue eyes and rolled over pale cheeks. “I didn’t mean to start a fire. I didn’t mean to! I just wanted to roast marshmallows like me and Nat and Grandma did with Uncle Seth when we went campin’. Do you think my daddy will be mad at me?”

She thought that was a pretty good bet. Wade Dalton seemed mad at the entire world, as a matter of course. How would he treat his son, angry or not? That was the important thing.

“I’m sure he’ll just be worried about you,” she assured Tanner, though she wasn’t at all convinced of that herself.

“He’s gonna be so mad. I’m not supposed to be in the kitchen by myself.” His tears were coming faster now and she knew she had to do something quick to head them off or he would soon be in hysterics. Action seemed the best antidote.

“Let’s just get your hurt taken care of and then we’ll worry about your dad, okay?”

He nodded and Caroline thought quickly back to her thin and purely basic knowledge of first aid.

“We need to put some cold water on that,” she told Tanner, her mind trying to dredge old lessons she’d learned as a girl. “Do you think you can show me a bathroom?”

“Yeah. There’s one right through those doors.”

She led him there quickly and filled the sink with cold water, then grasped his wrist and immersed it in the sink, though he wasn’t keen on the idea.

“I don’t want to,” he said, sniffling. “It hurts.”

“I know, honey. I’m sorry to make you hurt more but this way we can be sure the burn stops.”

“Tannoh owie?”

Caroline looked down and found the youngest one had followed them into the small bathroom. Within fifteen seconds, she wasn’t sure what held more interest to him—his brother’s owie or the lid of the toilet, which he repeatedly flipped up and down with a nerve-racking clatter each time.

Her repertoire of distractions was severely limited but she thought maybe she could tell him a story or something, just to keep him away from the toilet and away from his brother.

“Hey, kiddo,” she began.

“His name is Cody,” Tanner informed her, his sniffles momentarily subsiding. “He’s two and I’m five. I just had a birthday.”

“Five is a fun age,” she started, but her words were cut off by a loud and angry voice from outside the room.

“Tanner Michael Dalton! Where are you? Get in here and help me clean up the mess you made!”

Caroline took an instinctive step closer to the boy. What a disagreeable man, she thought, until she remembered that he likely knew nothing about his son’s injuries.

“We’re in the bathroom,” she called down the hall. “Do you think you could come in here for a moment?”

Silence met her request for a full five seconds, then Wade spoke in an annoyed-sounding voice. “What is it? I’m kind of in the middle of something here.”

Suddenly there he was in the doorway, two hundred pounds of angry male looking extremely put-upon, as if she’d pulled him away from saving the world to ask his opinion on what shade of lipstick to use.

This was his own son and she wouldn’t let him make her feel guilty for her compassion toward the boy. Caroline tilted her chin up and faced him down.

“We’re in the middle of something, too. Something I think you’re going to want to see.”

He squeezed into a bathroom that had barely held Caroline and two young boys. Throw in a large, gorgeous, angry rancher and the room seemed to shrink to the size of a tissue box.

“What is it?” he asked.

She pointed to Tanner’s soaking hand, a vivid, angry red, and watched the boy’s father blanch.

He hissed an oath, something she gauged by Tanner’s surprised reaction wasn’t something the boy normally heard from his father.

She had to admit, the shock and concern on Wade’s features went a long way toward making her more sympathetic toward him.

“Tanner!” he exclaimed. “You burned yourself?”

“It was an accident, Daddy.”

“Why didn’t you say something?”

Tanner shrugged his narrow shoulders. “I was trying to be a big boy, not a b-baby.”

The sympathy from his father was apparently more than Tanner’s remarkable composure could withstand. The boy’s sniffles suddenly turned to wails.

“I’m sorry, Daddy. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I won’t, I promise. It hurts a lot.”

Wade picked up his son and held him against his broad, denim-covered chest. “Okay, honey. Okay. We’ll take care of it, I promise. We’ll find your Uncle Jake and he’ll fix you right up.”

Cody looked from his crying brother to their father’s obvious concern and started wailing, from fear or just sympathy, Caroline wasn’t sure. Soon the small bathroom echoed with loud sobs.

After a moment of that, Wade’s eyes started to look panicky, like he’d just found himself trapped in a cage of snakes—except she had the feeling he would have preferred the snakes to two bawling kids.

Finally Caroline took pity on him and picked up the crying toddler. He was heavier than she expected, a solid little person in a Spider-Man shirt. “You’re okay, sweetie. Your brother just has an owie.”

The curly blond cherub wiped his nose with his forefinger. “Tan-noh owie.”

“Yep. But he’ll be okay, I promise.”

“Uncle Jake will make it all better,” Wade said, a kind of desperate hope in his voice. “Come on, let’s go find him.”

He led the way out of the room. Once free of the bathroom’s confining space, Caroline could finally make her brain function again. She considered the ability to once more take a breath a nice bonus.

Wade carried Tanner toward the front door and she followed with the younger boy in her arms.

“Look, you’re going to have enough on your hands at the clinic,” she said. “Why don’t I stay here with Cody while you take care of Tanner?”

It took a second for Wade’s attention to shift from his injured son to her, something she found rather touching—until she saw suspicion bloom on his features.

“No. He can come with us to the clinic.”

“Are you sure? I don’t mind watching him for you.”

She didn’t need to hear his answer—the renewed animosity in his eyes was answer enough. “Lady, I don’t know you from Adam,” he snapped. “I’m not leaving my son here with you.”

“Would you like me to come with you and then watch him in the clinic while you’re occupied with Tanner’s hand?”

He frowned, obviously annoyed by her persistence. Good heavens, did he think she was going to kidnap the child?

“No. He’s fine with me. I’m sure there’s somebody in Jake’s office who could watch Cody while we’re in the exam room.”

With Tanner in one arm, he scooped up the toddler in the other and carried both boys out the door, toward a huge mud-covered silver pickup truck parked in the circular driveway.

Not sure what to do next, Caroline stood on the broad porch of the ranch house and watched as he strapped both boys into the truck. Wade seemed to have forgotten her very existence. In fact, a moment later he climbed into the driver’s seat and drove away without once looking back at the house.

Now that the first adrenaline surge from the fire and dealing with Tanner’s burn had passed, Caroline was aware of a bone-deep exhaustion. She had almost forgotten her long night of traveling and the worry over Quinn’s whirlwind romance with one of her clients. Now, as she stood alone on the ranch house porch with a cool October wind teasing the ends of her hair, everything came rushing back.

Since she was apparently too late to stop her father from eloping with Marjorie, she should probably just drive her rental back to the airport and catch the quickest flight to California.

On the other hand, that kitchen was still a mess, she was sure. She could scrub down the smoke-damaged kitchen while Wade was gone, perhaps even fix a warm meal for their return.

It was the least she could do, really. None of this would have happened if her father hadn’t run off with Marjorie.

She wasn’t breaking her vow, Caroline told herself as she walked back into the house and shut the cool fall air behind her. She wasn’t cleaning up after her father’s messes, something she had sworn never to do again. She was only helping out a man who had his hands full.

She tried to tell herself she wasn’t splitting hairs, but even as she went back into the smoke-damaged kitchen and rolled up her sleeves, she wasn’t quite convinced.

“There you go, partner. Now you’ve got the mummy claw of death to scare Nat with when she comes home from school.”

Tanner giggled at his uncle Jake and moved his gauze-wrapped hand experimentally. “It still hurts,” he complained.

“Sorry, kid.” Jake squeezed his shoulder. “I can give you some medicine so it won’t hurt quite so bad. But when you try to put out a fire all by yourself, sometimes you get battle scars. Next time call your dad right away.”

“There won’t be a next time. Right, Tanner?” Wade said sternly. “You’ve learned your lesson about roasting marshmallows—or anything else—by yourself.”

Tanner sighed. “I guess. I don’t like havin’ a burn.”

Jake straightened. “You were really brave while I was looking at it. I was proud of you, bud. Now you have to be a big kid and make sure you take care of it right. You can’t get the bandage wet and you have to try to keep it as clean as you can, okay? Listen to your dad and do what he says.”

“Okay.” Tanner wiggled off the exam bench. “Can I go ask Carol for my sucker now?”

“Sure. Tell her a big brave kid like you deserves two suckers.”

“And a sticker?”

Jake hammed a put-upon sigh. “I guess.”

Tanner raised his bandaged hand into the air with delight then rushed out of the exam room, leaving Wade alone with his younger brother.

Unlike old Doc Jorgensen who had run the clinic when they were kids—with his gnarled hands and breath that always smelled of the spearmint toothpicks he chewed—Jake didn’t wear a white lab coat in the office. The stethoscope around his neck and the shirt pocket full of tongue depressors gave him away, though.

Wade watched his brother type a few things onto a slender laptop computer—notes for Tanner’s chart—and wondered how the little pest in hand-me-down boots and a too-big cowboy hat who used to follow him around the ranch when they were kids had grown into this confident, competent physician.

This wasn’t a life Wade would have chosen, either for himself or for his brother, but he had always known Jake hadn’t been destined to stay on the ranch. His middle brother was three years younger than he was and, as long as Wade could remember, Jake had carried big dreams inside himself.

He had always read everything he could find and had rarely been without a book in his hand. Whether they’d been waiting at the end of the long drive for the school bus or taking a five minute break from fixing fence lines, Jake had filled every spare moment with learning.

Wade had powerful memories of going on roundup more than once with Jake when his brother would look for strays with one eye and keep the other on the book he’d held.

He loved him. He just never claimed to understand him.

But there was not one second when he’d been anything less than proud of Jake for his drive and determination, for the compassion and caring he showed to the people of Pine Gulch, and for coming home instead of putting his medical skills to work somewhere more lucrative.

After another few seconds of pounding the keys, Jake closed his laptop.

“Well, I’d tell you happy birthday but it sounds like it’s a little too late for that.”

Wade made a face. “You can say that again. It’s been a hell of a day.”

“And just think, it’s only noon. Who knows what other fun might be in store.”

Wade sighed heavily. Noon already and he hadn’t done a damn thing all day. He had a million things to do and now he had a little wounded firefighter who couldn’t get his bandage dirty to think about.

His mother ought to be here, blast her. He was no good at the nurturing, sympathy thing. Did she ever stop to consider one of the kids might need her to shower kisses and sympathy?

“So what do you suggest we do about Mom?” he asked.

Jake leaned a hip against the exam table, and Wade thought again how he seemed to fit here in this medical clinic, in a way he’d never managed at the Cold Creek.

“What can we do? Sounds like the deed is done.”

“We don’t have to like it, though.”

“I don’t know. She’s been alone a long time. It’s been eighteen years since Hank died and even before that, her life with our dear departed father couldn’t have been all roses. If this Montgomery guy makes her happy, I think we should stand behind her.”

He stared at his brother. The finest education didn’t do a man much good if he lost all common sense. “What do you mean, stand behind her? She doesn’t even know the guy! How can we possibly support her eloping with a man she’s only corresponded with through e-mail and clandestine phone calls? And what kind of slimy bastard runs off with a woman he’s never seen in person? He’s got to be working some kind of scam. He and the daughter are in it together.”

“You don’t know that.”

“They’ve got to be. She trolls for unhappy older women through this life-coaching baloney, finds a vulnerable target like Mom, and then he steps in and charms them out of everything they’ve got.”

“You’re such a romantic,” Jake said dryly.

“I don’t have time to be a romantic, damn it. I’ve got a national television crew coming to the ranch in six days. How can I possibly get ready for this video shoot when I’ve got three kids underfoot every second?”

“You could always cancel it.”

He glowered at Jake. “You’re not helping.”

“Why not? It’s just a video shoot.”

“Just a video shoot I’ve been working toward for almost a year! This is huge publicity for the ranch. We’re one of only a handful of cattle operations in the country using this high-tech data-collection chip on our stock. You know how much of an investment it was for us but it’s all part of our strategy of moving the ranch onto the industry’s cutting edge. To be recognized for that right now is a big step for the Cold Creek. I don’t know why Mom couldn’t have scheduled her big rendezvous after the news crew finished.”

“So what will you do with the kids?”

“I’m still trying to figure that out. You’re the smart one. Any suggestions?”

“You could hire a temporary nanny, just until after the video shoot is over. Didn’t Mom’s note say she’d be back in a week?”

He started to answer but stopped when he heard Cody wailing from the reception area, something about a “stick-oh.”

Wade sighed and headed toward the sound, Jake right behind him.

“Right. A week. Let’s hope I’m still sane by then.”

Cody fell asleep on the six-mile drive from Jake’s clinic in Pine Gulch to Cold Creek Ranch. Tanner, jacked up by the excitement of the morning and probably still running on adrenaline, kept up a steady stream of conversation that didn’t give Wade a minute to think about what he was going to do.

Tanner didn’t even stop his running commentary during the phone call Wade took on his cell from Seth, who informed him glumly that the shop in Rexburg wouldn’t have the part they needed for the baler until the next day. Without it, they wouldn’t be able to bring the hay in, which meant they might lose the whole damn crop to the rain.

“I’m almost home. I’ll get the boys some lunch and then try to come down and see if we can jury-rig something until tomorrow.”

The clouds continued to boil and churn overhead as he drove under the arch that read Cold Creek Land and Cattle Company, and Wade could feel bony fingers of tension dig into his shoulders.

Sometimes he hated the responsibility that came from being the one in charge. He hated knowing he held the livelihood of his own family and those of three other men in his hands, that his every decision could make or break the ranch.

He couldn’t just take a week off and play Mr. Mom. Too much depended on him meeting his responsibilities, especially right now.

But who could he ask for help? His mind went through everyone he could think of among their neighbors and friends.

His wife’s family had sold their ranch a year ago and her parents were serving in South America as missionaries for their church.

Viviana Cruz was the next logical choice. She owned the small ranch that adjoined the Cold Creek to the west and was his mother’s best friend as well as a sort of surrogate grandmother to his kids. Unfortunately, she had left the week before to spend some time with her daughter in Arizona before Maggie’s national guard unit shipped off to Afghanistan.

He couldn’t think of anyone else, off the top of his head. Everyone who came to mind was either busy with their own ranch or their own kids or already had a job.

Seth knew every female with a pulse in a fifty-mile radius. Maybe his brother could think of somebody in his vast network who might be suitable to help with the kids for a week. Though it didn’t really have to be a woman, he supposed as he pulled up to the back door of the ranch house.

“Can I watch TV?” Tanner asked when Wade unhooked him from his booster seat.

“Sure. Just no soap operas.”

He grinned at the wrinkled-up face Tanner made. “Yuck,” the boy exclaimed. “I hate those shows. Grandma watches them sometimes but they’re so boring!”

By that, Wade assumed he didn’t have to worry about Tanner developing a deep and abiding love for drama in the afternoons.

His injury apparently forgotten for now, Tanner skipped up the steps and into the house, leaving Wade to carefully unhook the sleeping Cody and heft him to his shoulder, holding his breath that he could keep the boy sleep. Cody murmured something unintelligible then burrowed closer.

So far so good, Wade thought as he went inside and headed straight up the back stairs to Cody’s bedroom.

This was always the tricky part, putting him into his bed without disturbing him enough to wake him. He held his breath and lowered him to the crib mattress.

Cody arched a little and slid toward the top edge, where he liked to sleep, but didn’t open his eyes. After a breathless moment, Wade covered him with his Bob the Builder quilt, then returned downstairs to find Tanner and figure something out for lunch.

He found Tanner in the great room with the TV on, the volume turned low.

“Can you even hear that?” Wade asked.

Tanner answered by putting a finger to his mouth. “Quiet, Daddy. You’ll wake up the lady.”

Wade frowned. “What lady?”

Tanner pointed to the other couch, just out of his field of vision. Wade moved forward for a better view and stared at the sight of Caroline Montgomery curled up on his couch, her shoes off and her lovely features still and peaceful.

Looked like she had made herself right at home in his absence.

He wasn’t sure why the discovery should send this hot beam of fury through him, but he couldn’t stop it any more than he could control those clouds gathering outside.

Chapter Three

“Hey lady! Wake up!”

Caroline barely registered the voice, completely caught up in a perfectly lovely dream. She was riding a little paint mare up a mountain trail, the air sweet and clear, and their way shaded by fringy pines and pale quaking aspen. She’d never been on a horse in her life and might have expected the experience to be frightening, bumpy and precarious, but it wasn’t. It was smooth, relaxing, moving in rhythm with a huge, powerful creature.

The mountains promised peace, a warm embrace of balance and serenity she realized she had been seeking forever.

“Lady!” the voice said louder, jerking her off the horse’s back and out of the dream. “You want to tell me what you’re still doing here?”

Jarred, disoriented, Caroline blinked her hazy way back to awareness. Instead of the beautiful alpine setting and the horse’s smooth gait beneath her, she was in a large, open room gazing directly at a painting of a horse and rider climbing a mountain trail.

Beneath the painting stood an angry man glowering at her from beneath a black cowboy hat, and it took her sleep-numbed brain a moment to figure out who he was.

Wade Dalton.

Marjorie Dalton’s oldest son. In a flash, she remembered everything—Quinn’s gushing e-mail about his lady love, her shocked reaction to find his lady love was her client, then that frenzied trip to eastern Idaho in a mad effort to stop him from doing anything rash.

She’d been too late, she remembered. Instead of Marjorie and Quinn, she had found only a surly, suspicious Wade Dalton and his two darling, troublemaking boys.

Striving desperately for composure, she drew in a deep, cleansing breath to clear the rest of the cobwebs from her brain, then sat up, aware she must look an absolute mess.

She pushed a hank of hair out of her eyes, feeling at a distinct disadvantage that he had caught her this way.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I sat down to wait for you and must have drifted off.”

“Why?”

“Probably because I traveled all night to get here.” To her embarrassment, her words ended in a giant yawn, but the man didn’t seem to notice.

“I wasn’t asking why you fell asleep. I was asking why in the …” He looked over at his son and lowered his voice. “Why in the heck would you think you had to wait for us? As far as I’m concerned, we’ve said everything we needed to say.”

She followed his gaze to the boy, noting the bandage on his hand. “I wanted to make sure Tanner was all right.”

“He’s fine,” he answered. “Second-degree burn but it could have been a lot worse.”

“Uncle Jake put lots of stinky stuff on it,” Tanner piped up from the other couch, “and said I have to keep it wrapped up for a week ’cept at bedtime, to keep out the ’fection. This is my mummy claw of death.”

He made a menacing lunge toward her with his wrapped hand and Caroline laughed, charmed by him.

“You’ll have to make sure you do everything your uncle told you. You don’t want to get an infection.”

“I know.” His sigh sounded heartfelt and put-upon. “And I can’t ever roast marshmallows by myself again or Daddy will drag me behind Jupiter until my skin falls off.”

“Jupiter?”

“My dad’s horse. He’s really big and mean, too.”

Caroline winced at the image and Wade frowned at his son. “I was just kidding about the horse, kid. You know that, right? I just wanted to make sure you know your punishment for playing on the stove again will be swift and severe.”

“I know. I told you I wouldn’t do it again ever, ever, ever.”

“Good decision,” Caroline said. “Because you’d look pretty gross without all your skin.”

Tanner giggled, then turned back to his television show.

Caroline shifted her attention back to the boy’s father and found him watching her closely, a strange look on his features—an expression that for some reason made her wish her hair wasn’t so sleep-messed.

Silence stretched between them, awkward and uncomfortable, until she finally broke it.

“I made some soup for you and the boys. It’s on the stove.”

He scowled. “You what?”

“I figured you would be ready for lunch when you returned from the clinic so I found some potatoes in the pantry and threw together a nice cheesy potato soup.”

She wasn’t quite sure why, but her announcement turned that odd expression in his eyes into one she recognized all too well. She watched stormclouds gather in those blue depths and saw his mouth tighten with irritation.

“Funny, but I don’t remember saying anything about making yourself right at home.” Though his voice was low to prevent Tanner from paying them any attention, it was still hot.

“You didn’t. I was only trying to help.”

“My mother has apparently been stupid enough to marry your father, but that sure as hell doesn’t give you free rein of the Cold Creek, lady.”

She inhaled deeply, working hard to keep her emotions under control. No good would come of losing her temper with him, she reminded herself. As far as he was concerned, she had invaded his territory, and his reaction was natural and not unexpected.

At the same time, she couldn’t let him minimize her, not when she had only been trying to help.

“My name is Caroline,” she said calmly.

“I don’t care if you’re the frigging queen of England. This is my ranch and right now you’re trespassing.”

She raised an eyebrow, trying to hang onto her temper. “Are you going to have me thrown in jail because I had the temerity to make you and your boys some soup?”

“The idea holds considerable appeal right about now, believe me!”

Though she knew he was only posturing, dread curled through her just at the possibility of going to jail again. She had a flashing image of concrete walls, hopelessness and a humiliating lack of privacy.

She couldn’t bear contemplating that brief time in her life—and couldn’t even begin to imagine having to go back.

She took another deep breath, focusing on pushing all the tension out of her body.

“I was only trying to help. I thought perhaps Tanner might need something comforting and warm after his ordeal.”

“I don’t need your help, Ms. Montgomery. I don’t need anything from you. It was the help you gave my mother that led to this whole mess in the first place.”

Oh, this man knew how to hit her where she lived. First he threatened her with her worst nightmare, then he dredged up all the guilt she’d been trying so hard to sublimate.

Before she could summon an answer, two noises started up simultaneously—his cell phone rang and strident cries started to float down the stairs as Cody awoke.

Wade let out a heavy sigh and rubbed two fingers on his temple. Deep frustration showed on his features and she reminded herself she didn’t want to be fighting with him. While she had worked to clean up the sticky, smoky mess in the kitchen, her mind had been busy trying to do the same to the mess her father had created in Wade Dalton’s life.

She wanted to think she had arrived at a viable solution.

“I disagree,” she said. “I think you do need help. And if you can swallow your anger at me—justified or not—and listen to me, I have a proposal for you.”

His glare indicated that the only kind of proposal he wanted to hear from her concerned her plans to leave his ranch, but she refused to let him intimidate her.

He answered his phone just as he headed out of the room to get Cody, now crying in earnest.

When he returned five minutes later, she had Tanner settled at the kitchen table, eating soup with his unbandaged hand and talking her ear off about his trip to the doctor and the stickers he got from his Uncle Jake and how he heard Amber, one of his Uncle Jake’s nurses, talking about how his Uncle Seth was the sexiest man in the county.

This Seth person sounded like an interesting character, she thought, then she forgot all about him when Wade walked into the kitchen with Cody on his hip. The rancher looked big and powerful and intimidating, and she thought his brother would have to be something indeed if he could possibly be more gorgeous than Wade Dalton.

Not that she noticed, she reminded herself. As far as she was concerned, he was grouchy and unreasonable and determined that everything in life had to go his way or else.

Still, there was something about seeing the sleepy-eyed toddler in his arms, one little hand flung around his father’s neck and the other thumb planted firmly in his mouth, that tugged at her heart.

The boy studied her warily until she smiled, then his reserve melted and he gave her a chubby smile in return, which only seemed to deepen his father’s scowl.

“Would you and Cody like some soup?” she asked.

Wade would have told her no but his stomach growled at just that moment and he had to admit the soup smelled delicious—rich and creamy, with a hint of some kind of spice he didn’t quite recognize.

“I didn’t put rat poison in it, I promise.”

He didn’t like this suspicion he had that she found him amusing somehow. He plain didn’t like her. Caroline Montgomery was everything that turned him off in a woman. She was opinionated and bossy, and he didn’t trust her motives one iota.

Trouble was, he couldn’t figure out what she could be after. What kind of woman travels eight hundred miles to find her father, then, when she doesn’t find him, sticks around to make soup in a stranger’s house?

She took the decision out of his hands by setting a steaming bowl on the table and setting another smaller bowl on the counter to cool for Cody.

He could eat, he thought grudgingly. Breakfast had been a long time ago and he’d been too shocked over that letter from his mother to pay much attention to what he’d been eating.

He set Cody in his high chair and pulled him up to the table next to Tanner, then noticed something else about the kitchen. It gleamed in the afternoon sunlight shining in through the big windows.

The place had been a mess when he’d left to take Cody to the clinic, with scorch marks on the walls and a sticky marshmallow goo on the stove. All that was gone.

“You cleaned up.” The statement came out more like an accusation than he’d intended but she only smiled in response. He noticed as she smiled that one of her eyeteeth overlapped the tooth next to it just a bit. It was a silly thing but he felt a little of his irritation with her ease at the discovery of that small imperfection.

“I figured you had enough on your hands right now. It was the least I could do anyway. If you hadn’t been distracted yelling at me…” her voice trailed off and she flashed that crooked little smile again. “Excuse me, if you hadn’t been talking to me in a loud and forceful voice, you probably would have been able to keep a closer eye on Tanner and he might not have had the opportunity to injure himself.”

“He would have found a way,” Wade muttered. “That kid could find trouble in his sleep. He’s a genius at it.”

“He does have a lot of energy but he seems very sweet. They both do.”

“Sure, while they’re busy eating,” Wade muttered, then felt like a heel complaining about his own kids.

“Which you should be doing,” she pointed out.

Right. He didn’t like bossy women, he reminded himself. Even if they had cute smiles and smelled like vanilla ice cream.

Still, he obediently tasted the potato soup his boys were enjoying with such relish, then had to swallow his moan of sheer pleasure. It was absolutely divine, thick and creamy, and flavored with an elusive spice he thought might be tarragon.

Tanner and Cody were carrying on one of their conversations, with Tanner yakking away about whatever he could think of and Cody responding with giggles and the occasional mimicry of whatever his brother said, and Wade listened to them while he savored the soup.

After he had eaten half the bowl in about a minute and a half, Caroline spoke up. “I know Marjorie helped you take care of your children. Do you have someone else to turn to now that she’s gone?”

He swallowed a spoonful of soup that suddenly didn’t taste as delectable. “Not yet. I’ll figure something out.”

Before she could answer, Tanner burped loudly and he and Cody erupted into hysterical laughter.

“Hey, that wasn’t very polite,” Wade chided, even as he saw that Caroline was hiding a smile behind her hand. “Apologize to Ms. Montgomery.”

“Nat says that’s how people in some places say thank you when their food is real good.”

“Well, we’re not in one of those places. On the Cold Creek, it’s considered bad manners.”

Cody suddenly burped, too, something Tanner apparently thought was the funniest thing in the world.

“See? Now look what you’re teaching your little brother. Apologize to Ms. Montgomery.”

“Sorry,” Tanner said obediently, even though he didn’t look the slightest bit sincere.

“Sowwy,” Cody repeated.

“Can we go play now? We’re all done.”

Wade washed their faces and hands—well, Cody’s hands and Tanner’s unbandaged one-— then pulled Cody down from his high chair and set him on the floor.

“Remember to be careful,” he told Tanner, who nodded absently and headed out of the kitchen after his brother.

“It doesn’t look like his injury is slowing him down much,” Caroline observed.

He sighed. “Not much slows that kid down.”

“So what will you do with them while you work?” she asked again.

“I’ll figure something out,” he repeated.

She folded her hands together on the table and he noticed her nails weren’t very long but they were manicured and she wore a pale pink nail polish. He wasn’t sure why he picked up on that detail—and the fact that he did annoyed him, for some reason.

“I’d like to volunteer,” she said after a moment.

He stared at her. “Volunteer for what?”

“To help you with your children.” She smiled that crooked smile again. “I’m self-employed and my schedule is very flexible. I happen to have some free time right now and I’d like to help.”

What the hell was her game? he wondered. “Let me get this straight. You’re offering to babysit my kids while your father and my mother are off honeymooning in Reno.”

“Yes.”

“Why would you possibly think I’d take you up on it?”

She slanted him a look. “Why not?”

“Because you’re a stranger. Because I don’t know you and I don’t trust you.”

“I can understand your hesitation. I wouldn’t want a stranger caring for my children, if I had any. But I can give you references. I was a nanny in Boston for two years while I finished college. I’ve had plenty of experience with children of all ages and with cooking and cleaning a house.”

Did she actually think he would consider it? “Absolutely not.”

“Just like that? You won’t even think about it?”

“What’s to think about? If you were the parent here, would you leave your kids in the care of a total stranger?”

“Probably not,” she admitted. “But if I were in great need, I might consider it after I checked out the stranger’s references.”

His cell phone rang again before he could answer. One of these days he was going to throw the blasted thing out the window.

He saw Seth’s number on the caller ID and sighed. “Yeah?” he answered.

“Where the hell are you? You said you’d be down.” Seth sounded as frustrated as Wade felt.

“I’m working on it.”

“Those clouds aren’t moving on. In another hour we’re going to be drenched and lose the whole crop. I was thinking I ought to call Guillermo Cruz and see if we can borrow the Luna’s baler.”

The Rancho de la Luna was the owned by their closest neighbor, Viviana Cruz. Though a much smaller operation than the Cold Creek, Guillermo Cruz kept his sister-in-law’s equipment in tip-top shape.

It was a good solution, one he would have thought of if he wasn’t so distracted with the kids. “Yeah, do that,” he told Seth. “I’ll be down as soon as I can. Maybe I can throw together something to fix the other one temporarily. If we can get two machines running out there, we might have a chance.”

He hung up to find Caroline Montgomery watching him carefully.

“As I see it, you don’t have too many other choices, Mr. Dalton,” she said quietly. “Tanner is going to need pampering with that burn of his, at least for a few days, and it needs to be kept free of infection. You can’t just lug him and Cody around the ranch with you where the two of them could get into all kinds of things without proper supervision. And by the sounds of it, your plate is pretty full right now.”

“Overflowing,” he agreed tersely. “Your father picked a hell of a time to take a bride.”

She winced and for a moment there he thought she almost looked guilty before her features became serene once more. “I’m sorry. I understand you don’t want me here but for the children’s sake, at least let me help for a day or two until you come up with another arrangement. I’ve come all this way for nothing, I might as well make myself useful.”

He rubbed the ache in his temple again, the weight of his responsibilities cumbersome and heavy.

What would be the harm in letting her help for a day or two? Her presence would take considerable pressure off him and it would be better for the boys to have more diligent supervision than he could provide.

She was a virtual stranger but, like it or not, she was connected to him now by virtue of their parents’ hasty marriage.

Anyway, the work he had to do the next few days was close enough to the ranch house that he could keep an eye on her.

That might not be such a bad thing, he thought. If she and her father were cooking some kind of scam together, he might have some advantage in the long run by keeping his eyes open and knowing just who he was dealing with.

Hank Dalton had had an axiom for cases just like this. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

What better way to keep her close than by having her right here in his own home?

A stiff gust suddenly rattled the kitchen windows and he watched the clouds dance across the sky as he tried to calculate how much more they would have to pay for feed during the winter if they didn’t get the hay in before that storm hit.

“You’re right. I don’t have too many options right now. I, uh, appreciate the offer.”

The words rasped out of his throat as if they were covered in burrs, and she gave him an amused look, as if she sensed how hard they were for him to say.

He really didn’t like being such a ready source of amusement for her, he decided.

“Where are your reference phone numbers?” he growled.

She looked at him for a moment, then scribbled some names and phone numbers on a memo sheet off a pad by the phone. Wondering if he was crazy, he grabbed them and stalked to his ranch office off the kitchen.

Ten minutes later he returned. He’d only been able to reach someone at one of the numbers, a woman by the name of Nancy Saunders. He knew it could be a setup, that she could be part of the con, but at this point he didn’t have any choice but to trust her words. She had raved about Caroline’s care for her two children a dozen years earlier, about how they’d stayed in touch over the years and she considered Caroline one of the most responsible people she’d ever met.

He didn’t want to hear any of this, he thought. He wasn’t buying half of it but decided he would be close enough to the house that he could keep an eye on her.

He returned to the kitchen and found her cleaning up the few lunch dishes.

“Did I pass?”

“For now,” he muttered. He grabbed his hat off the hook by the back door and shrugged back into his denim work coat.

“Natalie comes home on the bus about three-thirty and she can help you with the boys and with dinner. The freezer’s full of food. I don’t know what time I’ll be in—probably after dark. You and the kids should go ahead and eat, but my mother usually leaves a couple of plates in the fridge for me and for Seth.”

“Your brother.”

“Right. He’s second in command on the ranch and lives in the guesthouse out back, though he usually takes his meals here at the house with the family.”

“What kind of food do you like?”

“Anything edible.” He headed for the door, anxious to be gone. He stopped only long enough to scribble his cell number on the pad by the phone. “You can reach me at that number if you need anything.”

He hurried for his truck, trying his best to ignore the little voice in his head warning him he would regret letting Caroline Montgomery into their lives.

Through the kitchen window, Caroline watched Wade hurry to his truck as if he were being chased by an angry herd of bison.

She still couldn’t quite believe he had actually agreed to her offer. She hadn’t really expected him to take her up on it, not with the animosity that had crackled and hissed between them since she’d arrived at the Cold Creek.

He must, indeed, be desperate. That’s the only reason he would have agreed to leave his children in her care.

The man wasn’t at all what she had expected, and she wasn’t sure what to think of him. So far, he had been surly and bad tempered, but she couldn’t really blame him under the circumstances.

He intrigued her, she had to admit. She couldn’t help wondering what he was like when he wasn’t coping with an injured child, a runaway mother and various ranch crises.

She was intrigued by him and attracted to him, though she couldn’t quite understand why. Something about his intense blue eyes and that palpable aura of power and strength thrummed some heretofore hidden chord inside her.

Big, angry men weren’t at all her cup of tea. Not that she really knew what that cup of tea might be—and heaven knew, she’d been thirsty for a long time. But her few previous relationships had been with thoughtful, introspective men. An assistant professor in the history department at the university in Santa Cruz had been the last man she’d dated and she couldn’t imagine any two men more different.

Still, there was something about Wade Montgomery….

What had she gotten herself into? she wondered as she set the few dishes from lunch in a sink full of soapy water and went in search of the boys. Or more precisely, what had Quinn dragged her into?

Here she was falling back into old patterns, just hours after she’d sworn that self-destructive behavior was behind her.

She had vowed she was done trying to clean up after Quinn. The only thing she’d ever gotten for her troubles was more heartache. The worst had been those four months she’d spent in jail in Washington state after Quinn had embroiled her in one of his schemes.

Even though she’d had nothing to do with any of it, had known nothing about it until she’d been arrested, she had been the one to pay the price until she had been cleared of the charges.

Even then she couldn’t bring herself to sever all ties with her father. Ironic, that, since she frequently counseled her clients to let go of harmful, destructive relationships.

Quinn wasn’t really destructive, at least not on purpose. He loved her and had done his best to raise her alone after her mother had died when she was eight. But she was weak when it came to him and she felt like she had spent her entire life trailing behind him with a broom and dustpan.

This time was different, she told herself. This time, three innocent children had been affected by Quinn’s heedless behavior. His impulsive elopement with Marjorie had totally upset the balance and rhythm of life here at 11 Cold Creek.

She knew from her coaching sessions with Marjorie that the older woman had been the primary caregiver to her three grandchildren since Wade’s wife had died two years earlier.

Marjorie hadn’t minded that part of her life and had loved the children, but she’d been lonely here at the ranch and hungered to find meaning beyond her duties caring for her son’s children.

Though intellectually Caroline knew she wasn’t responsible for Marjorie’s loneliness, for Quinn’s apparent flirtation that had deepened and become serious, she still felt guilty.

If not for her connection to Marjorie, the two would never have met, and Marjorie would have been home right now caring for her grandchildren.

Caroline had no choice but to help Wade in his mother’s absence. It was the decent, responsible thing to do.

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