A Family Homecoming (8 page)

“Huh.” She started clearing the table.

“Sara and I'll do the dishes tonight,” he volunteered with a wink at their daughter.

Sara laughed out loud. Their dishes consisted of paper plates for the pizza slices and paper cups for the drinks.

“See that you do a good job,” Danielle told them sternly and left them alone. Going to the family room
and turning on the weather channel for a check on the snowstorm, she listened to Kyle's pleasant voice while he kept up a steady, one-sided conversation with Sara.

Having her father back in her life was making a difference in the child's recovery from the kidnapping. That was good.
She
wouldn't trust him, but it was okay for Sara to. Sara had never felt abandoned because she'd had her mother, so it was easier for the child to forgive.

Danielle was startled by the thought. She thought she'd forgiven Kyle long ago and had gotten over her grief. Maybe she'd been lying to herself this past year.

 

The storm came with a vengeance that night. It howled down from the Crazy Mountains and through the pine trees, dropping snow in a torrent of fury. Sometime during the night, Danielle woke and realized the room was icy.

She shivered as she climbed out of bed and pulled on her fleecy robe and socks. Just as she'd suspected—the furnace wasn't working. Its fuel was gas, but the controls were electric and controlled by a thermostat.

“Let's build a fire and move in the family room,” Kyle suggested, appearing in the hallway. “It's going to be colder than a well digger's…ah, as all outdoors by morning. No telling when the electricity will be on.”

“Yes. It was out a week last year due to heavy snow. Trees were down all over town.”

She padded after him as he went to the family room and built a fire in the grate there. She sat on the rug
in front of the fire while it caught. She'd wait until the room warmed up before bringing a sleeping bag in and moving Sara.

“Something I thought of one day this week,” she said, recalling the day at the school.

“Yes?” He settled beside her. He had dressed in jeans, shirt and a blue Nordic print sweater. He wore socks with a pair of moccasins on his long, narrow feet.

“If Willie Sparks was in on the kidnapping, then he would know Rafe isn't a janitor if he saw him at school.” She glanced worriedly at Kyle. “Are the police using Sara as a bait to catch the man?”

“She's the only lead,” he responded in noncommittal tones. “She's the only one who can identify them, so it's logical to assume they will be after her. A policeman has been parked down the street every night since you got home.”

“Oh.” She glanced at the window. “I hope he's not on duty out there tonight.”

“I told Sterling I could handle things on this end.”

She nodded. Pulling her knees up, she hooked her arms around them and rocked back and forth. “Even with this happening, I like it here. I think Sara and I will stay.”

“It's a decent town.”

“Where do you think you'll be sent after…after all this is resolved.” She waved a hand in a vague gesture. She didn't only refer to the case but to the future.

“After the divorce, you mean?” he asked on a lower note, like the deep-voiced warning of the bass violin in an opera when something bad is about to happen.

“Yes. You usually work out of Denver. Will you go back there?”

“No.” He looked her in the eye. “I'll stay close to wherever you and Sara are. I'm going to be part of my daughter's life from now on.”

Her doubts must have shown.

“I mean it, Dani,” he said in a tone that was almost menacing. “There will never be another two years like this last one. I'll quit the force and get a job here.”

Her heart started a sudden pounding. Could she stand seeing him in town all the time? What if he married? It would probably be someone she knew. A wave of heat rushed over her like a blast from a volcano.

She couldn't believe how jealous that thought made her!

“We need to do something about the windows in the house,” he said after adding another couple of pieces of wood to the fire. “The wind blows the curtain straight out in some rooms.”

“I know. But it takes money to replace them. Next year, when I have a full-time job at the middle school, I'll be able to afford it.”

“I can do it.”

She shook her head. “That wouldn't be right. I mean, you won't be living here. It's my house, bought in my name. You shouldn't put any money into it.”

His jaw set stubbornly. His mouth thinned to a straight line. “In other words, don't encroach on your life.” He stood. “I think the room is warm enough. I'll go get Sara.”

Danielle hurried after him to get the sleeping bag.
He was angry with her, but she was angry, too. He couldn't just come in and take over her life, not after two years of silence.

 

The storm dropped twenty inches of snow in fourteen hours. Two more feet fell during the next three days. Kyle moved the new mattress to the family room. Danielle and Sara slept on it in thick sleeping bags zipped together. He slept on the sofa in another sleeping bag.

Danielle found the enforced closeness electrifying, frustrating and fraught with danger. The tension seemed to mount hourly. The only way to handle it was by ignoring each other as much as possible and using Sara as a shield.

They didn't see or talk to another soul. The electric power and the phone were on and off intermittently, mostly off. Snowplows roared down the street at odd intervals, throwing a white plume fifteen feet in the air as they tried to keep the streets clear. It was a hopeless task.

A pristine blanket of pure white was laid softly over the rough surface of the earth as the lawn, the driveway, the lot next door and the field behind them were buried under five feet of new snow.

On Wednesday night, Danielle was fed up with eating sandwiches, heating soup on a camping stove and playing board games with Sara and Kyle for entertainment.

“Going stir-crazy?” Kyle asked with an amused lift of his black eyebrows as she paced from window to window.

“No,” she answered and gave him a scowl.

He laughed. So did Sara.

Danielle's heart softened. The sole attention of her parents for five days had made the child blossom. That she now trusted her father completely was evident. Danielle was grateful for that.

She sighed and wrapped her arms across her chest as a puff of icy air hit her from the ill-fitting window frame. She was going to replace some of the windows before next winter, she vowed. But the cold was the least of her problems. Living basically in two rooms with Kyle for nearly a week was the major one.

Every nerve in her body was aware of him. She knew when he slept, when he lay awake on the sofa, when he prowled the house like a restless bear woken from hibernation. When he paused and stared down at her at night, half his face in shadows, half limned by the firelight.

He knew when she eased out of bed and sat in front of the fire, her thoughts on happier times. He knew when she heated cocoa and took aspirin to ease the tension headaches that plagued her. He knew when once she had stood by the sofa and gazed at his sleeping form. He'd opened his eyes, and they had watched each other without speaking for the longest time….

She had developed a new respect for his seemingly endless patience. She understood this was part of what made him a good law enforcement officer, or Feeb, as she'd heard FBI agents referred to by the local police officers during the ordeal of the kidnapping.

He had played games and helped Sara build airplanes and boats from boxes and paper. They had challenged each other with paper clip tosses into a plastic tumbler or cards into his ten-gallon hat.

Kyle was a good father. When he was available, she reminded herself ruthlessly. He could take off any time and they might not see him again for weeks, months, years.

She laid her forehead against the cold pane. Her blood churned feverishly through her body. Her head hurt. This morning she'd woken with a sore throat. Just what she needed—a nasty cold to complicate things.

“Feel bad?” Kyle asked.

“Yes.” She felt his warmth at her back. “I think I'm coming down with a cold.”

“Why don't you try to nap? You didn't sleep well last night. Sara has already conked out.”

She glanced into the room. Sara was asleep on the sofa, an afghan tucked around her. Her cheeks were rosy, and she looked the picture of health and happiness. Danielle felt her throat tighten. “She's beautiful, isn't she?”

“Yes,” he murmured, his eyes on her. “She takes after her mother.”

Danielle shook her head. “Those eyes are her dad's. But her hair comes from my side of the family.” She smiled and felt her lips tremble.

His deeply drawn breath sighed over her as he exhaled. The barriers dropped, and she could see plain raw hunger in his gaze. She switched her gaze back out the window as tremors rushed through her. She understood the need, the burning inside, the longing to touch, to blend, to merge that aching despair into the sweet hunger of the flesh.

There would be bliss. For a few minutes, there would be bliss. And forgetfulness. Appeasement.

And then?

She shook her head slightly. She didn't know and she was afraid to find out. The emptiness afterward would be too devastating.

“Dani.”

His breath touched the side of her neck. She shivered as desire spiraled anew through her. “No,” she rasped.

The tension mounted. Heat gathered in those secret yearning places inside her. Moisture collected on her upper lip, between her breasts.

“I'm sorry,” he said in a whisper. “For leaving without talking to you first. For the hurt…for everything.”

She couldn't help but respond to the agony she heard. “It's all right. It doesn't matter now. I…I've gotten past all that.”

Ten seconds slipped by. He stepped back, and she felt the loss of heat at once. She stifled an impulse to turn to him and snuggle into his embrace.

“What the hell?” he muttered.

He leaned against her as he pressed close to the window. There, nearly hidden next to the bushes that lined that side of the house, were footprints in the snow.

Someone had crept up to the house—it had to have been in the night as the prints were nearly filled in with newly fallen snow—and stood outside the family room window and peered in at them. Only the distance of the porch had separated the person from them.

Fear shook her from head to toe.

W
illie Sparks put another log in the ancient wood-burning stove. The miner's hut, left over from a minor gold and silver strike in the early part of the century, was hard to keep warm. It could have been worse, he supposed. At least the roof didn't leak.

He glanced out the window. The wind still howled, bowing over the trees and whistling in through every chink in the tiny shack.

Across the room, Dillon Pierce snored softly from the lower level of the bunk bed. He was wrapped in a sleeping bag that covered all but the top of his head.

Willie wished he'd never gotten mixed up in this mess. What had started out as reclaiming an easy million bucks from some stupid woman had changed into kidnapping—Dillon's idea, not his—and now, maybe more….

He wasn't sure what Dillon's plans were. He didn't want to know. He just wanted out. He wanted to go home to his shabby but warm apartment in Whitehorn instead of camping out in the old mining town here in the ridges and hollows of the Crazy Mountains.

The mountains reminded him of his predicament. The Crazies were part of the Beartooth range, which were part of the Rockies—one thing within another thing, which was within another. Dillon had said his partner had bilked him out of the million dollars. So the quest for a million had expanded into kidnapping to get another million and now might expand into murder, and it had all started because of money.

He cursed to himself. The stupid woman hadn't known anything about any money. Willie wasn't sure if it even existed. Maybe Dillon had dreamed the whole thing up. Hell, who knew?

He just wanted to go home. Or over to the Kincaid spread where a fellow could get a hot meal just by dropping in, didn't even have to work there. That's the way ranching was—a cowboy was welcome to a meal at any time.

But now, with this kidnapping and all, he was afraid to show his face in town. Sara could identify him. She was a smart kid. After she'd surprised them without their cover while they were outside the cabin talking, they had quit wearing the ski masks.

Dillon sneered at his worries, but a man could go to the pen for a long time for kidnapping. He didn't even want to think about anything else his partner might do.

Take last night. That crazy Dillon had made him drive to the Mitchell woman's place during the bliz
zard. Said the snow and wind would wipe out their tracks. They'd used a snowmobile, which Dillon had suddenly acquired—Willie hadn't asked how—to get close enough to walk to the house when they had reached the outskirts of town.

Willie poured another cup of coffee and wrapped his hands around the cup to warm them. Sara had been inside with her mother. A man had been there, too. That had made Dillon madder'n a spring rattler.

Cute kid, that Sara. They had played cards while sitting in the drafty old cabin and waiting for word on the money. Dillon had scared her pretty bad, though, threatening to kill her folks and all if she ever said their names. No call for that kind of business. Willie was glad she'd gotten away while the two of them were out in the woods trying to shoot a rabbit for dinner.

He cursed long and silently. He hadn't bargained for murder. No, sir, that hadn't been part of the deal. He wished he could go home or over to the Kincaid place….

 

“They used a snowmobile,” Kyle reported, returning to the house after several hours of tramping through the snow. “They crossed the field behind the house on it. They had parked a pickup on the other road, down behind a boulder pile in the pine trees.”

“Did they go anywhere but here?” Danielle asked.

“No.”

A heaviness settled in her soul. “Won't this ever be over?” she said aloud, not expecting an answer.

“Not until the kidnappers feel safe.” He hung up
his coat and removed his boots before entering the kitchen.

“And they won't as long as they think Sara can identify them, according to Shane. Why can't they accept that they've failed and leave the area?”

“I don't know.”

Danielle poured him a cup of hot coffee, then set about making sandwiches for their supper. The soup was already heated, thanks to the return of electricity about an hour ago. No telling how long it would be on.

She glanced at the clouds still lining the sky and wondered if more snow was coming. The weatherman said the worst of it was over, but what did he know?

From the family room came the sounds of Sara dancing with Barney and his gang. Danielle wished she could hear her daughter singing the way she used to. She wished she could turn time back to December and make all this fear and danger go away.

The reassuring hardness of the gun pushed against her back. She'd stopped wearing it all the time since Kyle had returned. Now she had it securely in her waistband again. She had noticed that he'd worn his gun and holster when he'd gone outside to check the footprints.

“Did you check with Shane to make sure the sheriff's department hadn't been out checking on us?”

“Yes. It wasn't the police.”

He came and stood behind her as she faced the window and peered at the snowy landscape. A few more snow flurries had fallen during the day, but they had been light.

“The plows have just about cleared all the streets,”
Kyle said, breaking through her introspection. “We should be able to get to town in the morning for groceries. I'm going to check out windows at the hardware store. I want new ones in here and the kitchen. And in your bedroom.”

“No—”

“This is for Sara,” he said harshly. “I'm also going to put in some infrared motion detectors in the rooms we don't use. Just in case. Anyone could break the locks and get in these old windows easily. New ones will be more secure.”

“I'll pay for the windows,” she insisted, giving him a stubborn glare to let him know he wasn't totally in charge of her life and home.

His lips thinned, but he nodded.

Fear settled along her backbone like an alien presence, one she should be used to by now. “I hate those men,” she whispered.

“Just those?” he inquired mockingly.

She dropped her gaze from his. “There have been times when I hated you, too,” she admitted.

“I know.” He shook his head slightly as if saying it didn't matter. “I won't let anyone hurt you and Sara,” he promised, surprising her with the vow and the intensity in his tone.

“Except yourself?” she heard herself ask softly.

His eyes went dark, bleak. She wished she hadn't voiced the accusation.

“You'll always hate me for leaving, won't you?” he asked just as softly, so their voices didn't carry.

“I don't know. Until this mess is sorted out and Sara is safe again, I can't think beyond the next minute.”

“Didn't it ever occur to you that maybe the reason I didn't come home was because seeing you, I might not have been able to let you go?” he demanded.

She shook her head, unable to believe that was the reason.

“When you get time, think on that,” he suggested and stalked into the other room.

They spent a stilted evening, using Sara as a shield between them as they played one more round of Monopoly. Sara bought every property she landed on, the bank, that being her father, lending her the money if she didn't have it. She won hands down over the two mostly silent adults.

 

The next day dawned fair. The roads had been cleared of all but an inch of snow. At nine, after seeing Sara safely in school and Danielle ensconced in her office checking the seemingly endless inventory lists, Kyle went to the home improvement store down in Billings and picked up the four sets of triple-pane insulated windows from stock. He ordered enough to replace every window downstairs and put it all on the joint credit card he and Danielle shared.

Spotting the pink insulating fiberglass stacked to the ceiling in one corner, he also bought as many rolls as would fit in the pickup. When the insulation was piled higher than the cab of the truck and tied on securely—it looked like he was hauling a giant wad of cotton candy—he headed back to Whitehorn.

Passing the FBI field office, he stopped there and picked up the motion detectors he'd requested and talked to the guy in charge.

“I'm retiring at the end of the first quarter,” the
district field agent told Kyle, giving him an assessing perusal. “We could use a guy of your experience here. I could put in a word for you. Luke Mason said he would, too.”

“Sounds as if you and Luke have discussed it,” Kyle stated, frowning over the fact that his business was being discussed without his knowledge.

“Don't get your tail to twitching,” the older man advised. “We're looking out for the agency. You just happen to be in the right spot at the right time. Think about it.”

“All right. Give me another month before you say anything.”

On the way home, he mulled over the offer. He would be close to Sara. And Dani. If she married someone else…

Hell, he might have to shoot the guy right between the eyes. He couldn't maintain the brittle smile that formed at the thought. It bit too deeply.

The deep pool of despair shifted restlessly within. He'd known he could lose her two years ago when he'd cut her out of his life, his conscience reminded him. So there was no need to feel sorry for himself that it had come to pass.

But seeing her every day also reminded him of all the things he'd given up so that she and Sara would be out of harm's way as far as his job was concerned.

The kidnapping had shown him a person couldn't always order life to suit himself, that things could happen totally outside his sphere of control. The fact that he'd given his family up and they had run into danger anyway seemed unfair.

The fates must have really had a belly laugh over
that one—him being so damned noble in dropping out of sight without a trace while they plotted against his big sacrifice by setting up a kidnapping.

Last night, watching clouds drift across the room, he'd thought of those months when they'd been apart. Then, too, he'd spent sleepless nights, watching the moon and thinking of Dani. She'd been the light that had guided his soul through that valley of dark evil.

He muttered a curse as a rabbit cut across the road, nearly invisible against the snow. He finished the drive home in a dire mood.

Danielle and Sara were baking cookies when he arrived. The house smelled wonderful, like cookies and lemon cleanser—Danielle had cleaned the house, he noted—and shampoo and the faint scent of cologne. His women were all fresh and spruced up. Beautiful, they were.

Hunger stirred. He ignored it. “Hey, ladies,” he said lightly in greeting. “I need some help to bring in the stuff I got.”

“Let me get this last batch out,” Danielle told him.

She was dressed in stretchy black slacks and a sweater that stopped midthigh, showing off her gorgeous legs. The hunger more than stirred. It sat up and begged.

“Come on, Sara, I'll help you with your boots,” he said and got out of the kitchen fast.

Thirty minutes later, the three of them had the windows and insulation sitting in the middle of the living room floor. He showed them how the motion detectors worked with a remote control device. He explained that he would set them at night when they went to bed. If they got up, they were to come to him
so he could turn the machine off before the alarm sounded.

“They will also be on during the day when I'm out of the house.” He gave Dani the code to turn off and reset the machine if she went into the hall. “Anyone who gets in the hallway will cut the beam and cause an alarm. Call the police if that happens. Sara, can you dial 911?”

She nodded.

He set off the alarm so they would know what it sounded like. Then he had Sara practice dialing the emergency number under several different scenarios in which the alarm sounded or strangers appeared in the house, whether the alarm went off or not. They explored the house for hiding places. It had several that were good.

Satisfied Dani and Sara both knew what to do, he went to work on the windows. By nightfall, he had one new window installed in the family room. His hands were aching from the cold when he finally went inside.

Danielle examined the window. “Wow, no gale blowing in around the edges.”

“The frame is insulated and the windows are low-e-radiant panes. That will cut the loss of heat, too.”

“Now that's technology. Good job,” Danielle exclaimed.

Pride rushed over him in a wave of warmth at her praise. Dani had always been able to make him feel worth a million bucks even if he only had ten cents in his pocket. She didn't judge a man by his money. She required other traits—truth and integrity, loyalty….

His disappearance could have been seen as betrayal and abandonment by her, although he'd never meant it to be that way. Looking back, he knew he would still do the same to protect them from the crime boss. But maybe he would explain his reasons next time.

Next time? Yeah, right.

“I'll get the other windows installed in here tomorrow if the weather stays clear. Let's have a fire and warm this room up again,” he suggested. “Then after dinner, I'm ready for a hot game of Go Fish. Anybody want to take me on?”

Sara nodded vigorously. Danielle smiled but didn't agree to join in. Later, she opened a book and read while he and Sara played cards. It didn't take a genius to know she had effectively closed him out.

 

Kyle surveyed the attic. A good job, if he did say so. He'd had enough insulation to put in a single layer over the entire space, plus enough extra to put another row around the perimeter of the eaves. He would get more and finish the second row next time he went to town. He had also filled between the joists of the upstairs loft and bedrooms, so they should be warmer in the future, too.

When Sara got a bit older, she would probably like her own private quarters upstairs. With a bathroom installed, it would make a nice space for a kid.