Daddy Christmas

by Cathy Gillen Thacker

  Daddy Christmas

  Cathy Gillen Thacker

  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 One

  Gretchen O’Malley knew she was in trouble the minute it started snowing. Sure enough, twenty miles and a patch of ice later, she began an out-of-control slide into the oncoming lane of the steep and winding Colorado road.

  Gripping the steering wheel with leather-gloved hands, she took her booted foot off the accelerator, ignored the brake and steered ever so gently in the direction of the skid. The defensive maneuver was supposed to steady her car. It didn’t. Her rented sedan kept right on going. Sliding first to the left and along the berm of the deserted rural highway. Then veering right as snow covered the ice and her tires regained some traction. Sideways as she hit yet another patch of solid ice.

  Gretchen gasped as her car spun into a wicked 360-degree turn. She felt as though she were inside a snow globe that had been given a hard shake. Trees flew by in a dizzying kaleidoscope. Snow pelted her windshield at a blinding rate. The next thing Gretchen knew the spin ended—with a jarring thud. Her sedan landed nose down in the ditch on the opposite side of the road. The back wheels spun. “Jingle Bells” played merrily on the car radio. Gretchen was shaken up, but unhurt.

  Breathing a sigh of relief, she pulled herself together and turned off the motor. It didn’t take her long to figure out there was no hope of getting the sedan out on her own, not when the car was sitting at a forty-five-degree angle. She would just have to go for help, she decided as she peered up at the sky. Damn, and in this weather....

  Drawing a deep breath, she made sure she turned off the car lights, too. Her course of action set, she slung her purse over her shoulder, released the catch on her safety belt and reached for the door handle. It wouldn’t budge. Gretchen knew a moment’s panic, then realized she hadn’t unlocked the door. Laughing at her foolishness, she released the lock and tried again.

  It still wouldn’t budge. Neither would the door behind her. I can do this. I just need to stay calm. Sliding across the front seat, she reached for the door on the passenger side. And the one behind it. Both were jammed, too.

  Heart pounding, Gretchen tried to roll down one of the windows. Then the next and the next and the next. All were manual and none was operational. And still the snow was coming down furiously, coating the hood of the car with white. Praying someone was close enough to hear, Gretchen hit the horn. Once, then again and again...

  * * *

  MATT HALE heard the sound as he rounded the bend. Someone was honking a horn. Not rudely, but in the short-long-short pattern of an SOS. He slowed the four-wheel-drive Rocking S Ranch Jeep to a snail’s crawl, just as he hit the ice. He skimmed over the surface, swaying dangerously, before his wheels once again found traction on the asphalt beneath the snow. The car in the ditch hadn’t been as lucky. Hoping the occupants were all right, Matt sounded his horn in return to let them know they were not alone, then steered his Jeep safely to the berm up ahead.

  He parked, then got out and started back, aware the panicky horn blowing had stopped. Whether it was because the car’s occupants had realized they were about to be rescued or they had passed out from injuries, he didn’t know.

  His pulse racing, he stamped to the car and brushed snow off the passenger-side window to peer inside. There was only one occupant, an incredibly beautiful woman.

  Matt rapped on the window. “Roll this down,” he shouted, aware that snow was already dusting his shoulders and the brim of his Stetson. It wouldn’t be much longer before the road was completely unmaneuverable, even for vehicles with tire chains and four-wheel drive.

  “I can’t!” the dark-haired woman shouted back, color flooding her cheeks. She grabbed the door handle with both hands and tugged ineffectually, then scowled and pounded on the door in fury. “Everything is jammed.”

  Matt brushed snow off the side of the car with one gloved hand and promptly understood why. The frame of the sedan was bent. “Hang on,” he reassured in a low voice. “I’ll get you out.”

  Face tucked into the collar of his shearling coat, he tugged the brim of his Stetson down over his brow and headed back to the Jeep. He returned with a crowbar. Short minutes later, he had done as promised and opened the stranded angel’s car door. She vaulted into his arms, shaking from head to foot.

  “Thank God,” she said again and again, clinging to him as if her life depended on him. “I th-th-thought I was going to have to spend the night out h-h-here.”

  Matt checked her over for injuries and saw no bruises or bleeding. Nor were there any signs of shock or hypothermia. “How long were you stuck?” he asked, wrapping an arm tightly around her slender shoulders and holding her close.

  The woman tilted back her head and looked up into his face. Her shoulder-length mahogany hair spilled across her shoulders in silky disarray.

  “I don’t know. At least half an hour. There wasn’t another car.”

  Tears welled in her deep blue eyes and clung to the thick fringe of lashes. Her hand curled around the edges of his coat as her lower lip trembled.

  “I d-d-don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t stopped.”

  “I’m glad I found you, too. There’s not much traffic on the highway, even when the weather is great. It’s mostly ranches out this way.”

  Matt glanced up at the opaque pearl gray sky. Snow was still coming down in sheets. “Where are you headed?” He wasn’t altogether sure he could get her there in this weather, but figured he might as well ask.

  “The Stewarts’ Rocking S Ranch. You know the place?”

  Matt grinned. Maybe this Christmas wasn’t going to be as bad as he’d thought. In answer to her question, he pointed toward the battered yellow Jeep with the Rocking S Ranch insignia on the side. “Sure do. I was headed there myself with a load of groceries for the Stewarts.”

  She looked at his truck in relief. Anxious to get a move on, he slid his arm down and firmly encircled her waist. “What do you say we gather up your gear and drive to the ranch? We can call the auto club and the highway patrol from there—although from the looks of things, it’s doubtful we’ll get anyone out here to pull the car out of the ditch until the weather clears.”

  “Sounds good.”

  The woman took another look at the wrecked car, then released a strangled moan and buried her face in her hands.

  “You feeling okay?” Frowning in concern, Matt pressed a hand to her cheek and found her skin silky and warm, not burning up with fever, not clammy from shock.

  She buried her face in his shoulder, and he was surprised at how natural and right her impulsive action felt.

  “Actually, now that I’ve seen the car, no,” she lamented with another heartfelt groan. “When my insurance company learns of this my premiums are going to go sky-high.”

  Matt chuckled as even more healthy color flowed into her sculpted cheeks. If insurance premiums were all that concerned her, she was more all right than she knew. “You a bad driver?” he teased with a grin, wondering when she was going to get around to giving him her name instead of just her life story in that lilting Texas drawl of hers.

  She shook her head as she reached into the car to remove the keys from the ignition. “Actually, I’m an excellent driver. Just unlucky,” she informed him, her eyes lasering in on his.

  “So how come you headed out in a storm?”
And was she who he thought she might be?

  She offered a shrug as she unlocked the truck and began handing out a stack of ribbon-wrapped packages. “It wasn’t snowing when I left the Denver airport. There was only a twenty percent chance we would even see flurries, according to the weather report.”

  Matt carted the gifts over to his truck, then returned swiftly to her side. “Snows come in fast in the mountains. Weather can turn on a dime.” Seeing that her trunk was empty, he reached past her and shut it.

  “I’m sure there are some who would say my being in a wreck was probably my penance,” she muttered, reaching back into the car to grab a Pullman case and a small leather carryon.

  Matt tore his eyes from the graceful lines of her long legs. He had never realized loose wool slacks could drape like that. Struggling to keep his mind on their conversation and not on the slim, supple body beneath her navy blue parka, he said, “Penance for what?”

  She straightened to her full five feet six inches and squared off with him amicably. “For telling a little white lie.”

  He laid a hand across his chest. “I’m shocked,” he announced.

  “Yes, well...” She rolled her eyes at the sky. Snow coated the tip of her nose and her cheeks. “I didn’t want to hurt Marissa’s or Cal’s feelings. I know they mean well, even when they do the wrong thing.”

  Marissa and Cal... Matt tensed as he realized she had to be talking about lying to the Stewarts. Maybe he’d better find out more. Just because this woman looked angelic didn’t mean she was. “What kind of fib did you tell?” he asked casually, following her back around to the Jeep.

  “We were supposed to all fly out together from Texas. But I pretended there was a glitch in my reservation that bumped me onto an earlier flight, and I switched my flight from Austin so I’d arrive in Denver much earlier. Then I told them that instead of killing time at the Denver airport all day, waiting around for them, or checking into a hotel for a few hours, I’d just rent a car on my own and come on out to the ranch. Maybe even get a head start on making some pies for Christmas dinner. I mean, I knew their hired man—you—was going to be here. So it wasn’t like I was putting anyone out. Just the opposite. Still—” she sighed, regaining her composure at a rapid rate “—it was a lousy thing to do.”

  Yes, Matt thought, it was, more than she knew. And that in turn made him wonder if he should correct her misimpression or just let her continue chatting away, to find out everything he could. Then he would decide how to deal with the situation. And her, too.

  “Especially since I think they went to a great deal of trouble to try to fix me up with someone for the Christmas holiday,” she added.

  “And this fix-up doesn’t interest you?” he said carefully, wondering why in hell it wouldn’t. He watched as she thrust out a pouty lower lip that looked every bit as soft as it did kissable, before she answered.

  “No way.”

  Matt rankled at her tone. She was presuming a lot on very little information. Deliberately he tamped down his reaction to her attitude. What she did or did not feel toward the guy Marissa and Cal were fixing her up with was nothing to him. “Nevertheless you feel guilty about what you did,” he stated, trying to figure out how often she pulled stunts like this.

  “To a point. I don’t like being dishonest. Then again...” Her lips curved wryly as she folded her arms in front of her and admitted, “Neither do I like being backed into a corner and forced into a situation against my will.”

  She tilted her chin up, and Matt realized she was waiting for his reaction to her confession. Determined to play his cards close to his chest, he shrugged offhandedly as he hauled her luggage to the Jeep and tossed the bags in beside her presents and his holiday groceries. “A person’s got to do what he or she’s got to do,” he said. He already had an idea what he was going to do next.

  He snapped the rear cargo door shut. “Though I don’t understand why you didn’t want to drive out from Denver with the Stewarts,” Matt continued conversationally as they stamped through the snow toward the front of the Jeep. Unless...”

  “It’s a long story.” She watched as he opened the passenger door, then accepted the hand up he offered her and climbed into the Jeep. “Hadn’t we better get a move on?”

  “Of course, Miss—” Matt prompted, realizing he still didn’t know her name.

  She smiled at him winningly. “O’Malley. Gretchen O’Malley.”

  * * *

  GRETCHEN WASN’T SURE what she’d said. But he looked as if she’d just sucker-punched him in the gut, instead of stated her own name. “And you must be... Mr. Roper, isn’t it?” she guessed lightly, having already concluded as much for herself right from the start. The Stewarts had only one hired man at their Colorado ranch-vacation home these days.

  He shook his head, then said, “My friends call me ‘Matt.’”

  “But you are the man who takes care of the ranch in the Stewarts’ absence?” Gretchen asked, just to be sure, as he circled swiftly around the front of the Jeep and climbed in behind the steering wheel.

  “I’m doing the chores around the Rocking S for the time being,” he said flatly, looking slightly irritated as he fitted his key in the ignition. “But I’m not an employee per se,” he replied as he glanced out the windshield. “More a friend of the family,” he added as he started the Jeep and turned on the heater full blast.

  “Oh, I know,” Gretchen said quickly, wanting to save him further embarrassment before he could continue explaining. “I heard about the accident that forced you to retire from the rodeo.” The Stewarts had generously offered him a place to recover. “Your leg seems to be okay now, though.” At least, he wasn’t limping.

  Matt followed her gaze and glanced down at his worn Levi’s. He rubbed his thigh contemplatively. “Most days it doesn’t trouble me a bit,” he agreed sagely.

  Gretchen paused. Matt was wearing a thick shearling coat and a bone-colored Stetson. Button-fly Levi’s clung to his long, muscular legs. His feet were clad in sturdy leather winter hiking boots and thick Ragg socks.

  But it wasn’t just his clothing that made him look like a Marlboro Man extraordinaire. It was everything about him, from the thick, unruly, jet black hair escaping from beneath the brim of his hat to lie against his brown corduroy shirt collar, to his deeply suntanned skin, ruggedly handsome profile and intent silver gray eyes.

  “Then you knew I was coming?” she asked, not sure why her heart was pounding, only knowing that it was.

  Matt nodded. “Marissa mentioned the family had invited some guests when I talked to her long distance this morning, which was why I was rushing to get groceries in before the storm hit.”

  “So no one else is at the Rocking S Ranch right now?” Gretchen wasn’t sure how she felt about that. She didn’t want to be alone with Matt. The temptation was too great.

  “Except me, no. But don’t worry.” He reached back into the middle seat of the Jeep and picked up the folded wool blanket he kept there for emergencies. He wrapped it around her shoulders, then tucked it in at her waist and down over her legs. “We’re all ready for company. I spent the morning doing all the usual precompany stuff—putting sheets on all the beds and getting towels out and so on.”

  Somehow she couldn’t quite see Matt dusting, sweeping and changing sheets. He was a man’s man in every sense. “In addition to taking care of the horses?” she asked in astonishment as Matt adjusted the controls on the heater and waited for the windshield to clear of the fog their breaths had generated.

  He shrugged his broad shoulders and tugged off his worn leather gloves, to reveal strong, square hands with thick, capable fingers and clean, neatly trimmed nails.

  “Someone’s got to do it. Even a small ranch like the Rocking S, which is kept mainly for pleasure, doesn’t run itself. What about you?”

  He paused to search her eyes, as if her reply were of utmost importance.

  “Do you mind routine chores?”

  “Only when they�
�re expected just because a person happens to be wearing a wedding ring,” Gretchen replied primly as she snuggled under the blanket.

  Matt digested the answer. “Do you object to spending time with someone who doesn’t mind getting his hands dirty to make a living?”

  “Of course not!” Gretchen replied, incensed as he pulled a thermos out from under the seat and uncapped it. Steam rose from the lip of it as he poured her a cup of black coffee. “Why would you ask such a thing?”

  He rummaged around in a restaurant sack and produced individual packets of sugar and powdered creamer. “Some women don’t like men who labor physically for a living,” he said, waiting while she removed her gloves before handing her the cup.

  “Well, I’m not one of them,” Gretchen responded staunchly, as she balanced the cup of fragrant coffee on her blanket-covered knees.

  He looked skeptical as she tore open a packet of creamer and sprinkled it into her coffee.

  “Sure about that?”

  She resented being thought a snob, even as she stirred her drink with unnecessary vigor. “My father supported us by working in a peach orchard outside Fredericksburg. I have never been, nor will I ever be, ashamed of that,” she stated calmly, lifting the cup to her lips.

  He grinned approvingly. “Good for you.”

  Gretchen didn’t know why, but she felt elated, as though she had just passed some major test as far as Matt was concerned.

  “So, back to the story of how you happened to be driving out to the ranch alone...?” he prodded. Having no cup for himself, he drank his coffee straight from the thermos.

  “I was supposed to drive out from Denver with this friend of the Stewarts, not with them,” Gretchen said, noting the windshield had almost cleared.

  “That’s a problem?” Matt asked as he took another swig of coffee, then recapped the thermos with the silver top.

  Gretchen savored the warmth of the cup between her hands. “It is if I’m going to be stuck in a car for several hours with him.”

  Matt grimaced as he set the thermos on the floor, between their two seats, then reached for his safety belt and pulled it across his chest. “You’ve met this guy, I take it?”