He sat up and looked around. The sun-–had it ever shown so brightly?-–filled the room with a pure yellow-gold he’d never noticed before. He grabbed his watch from the bedside table and put it on, as he swung his legs over the side of the bed. He paused to run his hand across the slight impression still visible in the pillow Libby had used.
What a surprise she’d been. From not wearing a bra beneath her prudish flannel shirt to the breathless joy they’d shared when she realized she could not only control but prologue their pleasure by taking the top position.
He smiled a moment longer, then stood.
The rag rug had become lost under the bed, so the painted wood floor was darn chilly. His toes-–bandage-free and feeling no residual effects of the hike-–curled tight. He showered and dressed before cleaning up the mess from the foot massage. He was just dumping the brackish water on a rosebush near the front porch when the roar of a truck engine caught his ear.
“Libby?” he murmured, his smile growing.
No. Alas, the four-wheel-drive diesel belonged to her brother. Mac pulled to a stop and got out, then opened the back passenger door to help Megan out of her booster seat. The little girl jumped down excitedly and ran to greet him. “Hi, Mr. Coop. We’re back. We went to Denver. I played with Fayth and Mariya. They both have y's in the names. Daddy says that’s because their mommy and daddy have to be different.”
Coop set the plastic foot bath on the porch and gave his full attention to Libby’s niece. He’d never been around children outside the set, but this girl fascinated him. She seemed so articulate and bright-–like a miniature adult. Would his and Libby’s child be so gifted? The question startled him. Would he have any way of knowing if he or she were? The answer seemed pretty obvious, and he didn’t like the bad taste it left in his mouth.
He talked to her a minute longer, learning that Fayth was “sebben” and Mariya “three and a half.” She made it clear that those months between her birthday and the younger child’s were a gulf that only Megan’s superior patience and age were able to bridge.
“Did you get the part you were looking for?” he asked Mac once Megan’s attention had turned to picking flowers from the nearby bushes. “How’d you get back so early? Fly?”
Mac shook his head. “Naw, we drove. I bought the new bits I needed on Saturday, but the fittings for the drill are out of date. You can’t buy them from a regular manufacturer. Luckily, I have a miner friend who is also a machinist. He can tool just about anything. Unfortunately, he didn’t have it done until late last night.”
“You must have left awfully early this morning.”
Mac shrugged. “Megan was asleep. Made for a fast trip. Not so many stops.”
Coop could understand that. Sort of.
“Lib at work?” Mac asked.
“I assume so. I just got up.”
Mac’s dark eyebrow arched, but he didn’t say what Coop could clearly read in his expression: Lazy bastard.
The word echoed hauntingly in his mind. He didn’t know why. Some leftover stigma from childhood? He doubted it. His mother had been candid about the circumstances surrounding his birth. “Your father didn’t want to be a father, but I wanted to be a mother. Your mother. His loss was all the better for me because I didn’t have to share you with him or his family.”
People didn’t use those kinds of labels anymore. Did they? He didn’t have an answer. He wondered if Libby had thought about that question and had something planned to answer when their child asked why he or she didn’t have a father. Or had she assumed that his inclusion via the Internet would make that stigma a nonissue? He mentally added the question to the list of things they needed to discuss before he left.
“I have to drop Megan off at the sitter, then I’m headed to the mine to put the new drill bits in. Wanna come?”
The offer sounded friendly. “You won’t let me vegetate in the dark for a couple of hours, will you?”
Mac’s grin looked rueful but not apologetic in the least. “No reason to go into the mine. We’ll be working in the tool shed. But you might get dirty.”
“Cool. I’ve got a couple of calls to make to the West Coast, but I’ll be here whenever you’re ready.”
Mac whistled for Megan and pointed to the car. “We have to stop at home so you can brush your teeth.”
“I already did, Daddy. Yesterday.”
Mac looked skyward and shook his head. “Now. Pronto.”
Megan skipped past, flashing Coop a smile that reminded him a lot of her aunt. He waited where he was until the truck had backed up, then he returned Megan’s exuberant wave.
“Neat kid,” he murmured, walking inside for his phone. He knew it was too early to call Shane, but he wouldn’t have cell reception at the mine, so it was now or never.
The phone rang half a dozen times before a grouchy voice answered, “Go to hell and call back at a decent hour.”
“Wuss. It’s seven. Some people have been up for hours.”
“None that went to bed at four.”
“What were up doing up so late? Partying? You dog, you.”
Shane made a growling sound that reverberated over the line. “Damage control, you ass. Your bigmouthed ex-wife decided to share what little she knows about this project with the world.”
The world? “What could she say? I didn’t tell her anything.”
“Then she got it from your teenage assistant. The two have been seen all over town partying till the wee hours. They’re tight. Probably working on a tell-all book about what’s like to sleep with and work for Cooper Lindstrom.”
Coop’s stomach started to churn – and he hadn’t even had coffee yet. “Any mention of Mom’s gambling problem or my finances?”
“No. The focus seems to be trained on your new love interest-–the postmaster. Somebody snapped a shot of you poking your head out of some log cabin surrounded by evergreen trees. Secret Love Nest. Picture the bold print?”
He could. All too well. He wondered if there was any way he could keep Libby from seeing it. He muttered a few choice epithets about the opportunistic delivery guy who probably sold the photo for more money than he made in a week.
“What are you going to do?” Shane asked. His voice was starting to sound less grouchy.
“I have no idea. Should I wait to see if Libby gets wind of this? Believe it or not, I’d planned to tell her about the show today. I figured if she really hated the idea, we could still back out. It’s not too late. We don’t have to pitch it until August.”
There was a stilted pause then Shane said, “Um…well, actually, I took a meeting with the network yesterday. One of the shows they had in production fell apart. The female lead just got busted on drug trafficking. They loved the concept, the name, everything.”
“The name? What name? We didn’t decide on a name.”
“I had to give them something, so I went with Sentinel Pass Time.”
“What? That sucks, man. I hate it. Who came up with that?”
“I did. What’s wrong with it?”
Libby was going to kill him. That was what was wrong with it. Bad enough he was using her story, but now her town was about to become a common household play on words, a potential tourist destination and at the very least a punch line in some late-night television host’s monologue. He was dead meat.
Chapter 15
“Calm down, Lib. This steely-eyed Valkyrie isn’t like you. You’re scaring me.”
Jenna’s voice barely penetrated the haze of fury that had been building inside Libby’s head all morning. She’d managed to get through four hours of torture by faking a sore throat. Whenever anyone came to her window asking about her “houseguest,” she coughed and pointed to her voice box. “Laryngitis,” she’d croak.
Luckily, no one had dropped in specifically to ask about the article. There’d been one call from the Rapid City Journal, the largest newspaper in the greater Hills area, but she’d played dumb. Not a stretch, considering how stupid, gullible an
d foolish she felt. Screwed, both literally and figuratively. And the worst part was she could almost see Coop’s side of things.
Almost.
He’d seen an opportunity and went for it. She’d invited him here. She was to blame for what happened next. But that didn’t mean she could ever trust him again. He’d destroyed any chance of that happening by not being up front with her from the start. He’d toyed with her dreams and her heart, and now he had to leave. And he could take his sperm with him. As much as she wanted a child, she couldn’t-–wouldn’t-–use his sperm, because staying connected to him in any way would only prolong the pain of remembering what they’d shared.
“You don’t get it, do you?” Libby said, pacing the diameter of the picnic area. “He stole my story, used me to scope out the town and will be laughing all the way to the bank while we’re left picking up the pieces after his stupid film crew and a multitude of lookie loos leave. Sentinel Pass will never be the same, Jenna.”
“Is that what you’re upset about, Lib? Or are you afraid you’re never going to be the same?”
She stopped pacing and faced her friend. “That’s a given. We were together last night, Jenna. Lust and heaving breathing. The whole nine yards. It was g--good.” Perfect. “For the first time in my life I experienced what all the women’s magazines are always raving about. Finally I get why sex is such a big deal. But one of the reasons last night worked was because I trusted him. Just like he trusted me to get us out of the forest. But after this, I could never trust him again. Ever.”
Jenna didn’t try to argue with her. Some truths were self-evident. “So you want me to take over for you this afternoon. You’re sure you don’t need more time to cool down? I don’t want you to make a mistake you’re going to regret later.”
Libby picked up her purse and started toward her car. “Believe me, I have a million regrets. The biggest is ever putting that ad online in the first place. Kicking Cooper Lindstrom out of Gran’s house is going to feel great. I might not be able to stop what’s coming, but I can get rid of some of the evidence.”
Jenna frowned. “You’re not talking about dumping his body down a mine shaft, are you?”
Libby could picture the image with some degree of pleasure, but she shook her head. “I’m going to make Mac drop him off at a motel in Rapid. If he can’t change his flight, he can rent a car and do whatever…as long as he never comes back here.”
“What about his sperm?”
Libby hopped in her SUV, then rolled down the window. “He and his sperm can go to hell. I’m stopping by the bank and withdrawing as much of Mom’s settlement money as I dare, then I’ll run by the lawyer’s office and get them to type up some kind of paper negating our earlier agreement. Maybe if I pay him, he’ll call off this television project and leave Sentinel Pass alone. Our original deal was based on a share of the mine over eighteen years. What I intend to offer will more than make up for that.”
Jenna rushed to the truck. “Oh, Lib, no. Not the trust. That money was going to be the baby’s college fund.”
“There isn’t going to be a baby, Jen. If I’m this stupid where men are concerned, what business do I have raising a kid? Maybe after I’m not so damn pissed off, I’ll even thank Coop for keeping me from making the biggest mistake of some poor kid’s life.”
Jenna started to say something, but Libby cut her off. “I’ve got to go. Thanks for coming into work. When the calls start coming-–and we both know they will given the way gossip travels in this town-–tell them I’ll explain everything at the next town counsel meeting.”
Then she backed up and headed toward the highway. Her bank was in Hill City. The money, which her father had always considered tainted, was a small price to pay for extricating herself from this mess. She hoped it would be enough to save her beloved town from certain disaster.
---
Coop perched on a fairly clean surface-–a stool that had been the repository of a towering stack of dust-coated mining magazines. After being given permission to set the outdated periodicals on the floor of the shop, he’d pulled the wobbly wooden hunk of furniture closer to where Mac was working.
Everything in the cramped workshop appeared both old and greasy. The smell was something totally foreign to Coop’s experience, but he liked it. There was a certain element of manliness to it. One got a sense that real men had sweated and toiled in this place and, in the process, talked about the issues of the day and the problems confronting them. Maybe. Or they might have been like Mac–-silent to the point of consternation.
“What are you doing?”
“First, I’m rebuilding the starter.”
“For your truck?”
“For the motor that runs the pump that takes water out of the mine.”
“How does the water get into the mine?”
Mac took a deep breath as if drawing on his reserve of patience. “Seeps through the strata of rock. The Black Hills was formed by an uplifting of igneous and metamorphic rock covered by a thick marine layer that has been eroded away over some sixty-five million years or so.”
“You know a lot about geology.”
“Helps to avoid wasting time and money looking in the wrong spot for gold. If you know where to expect it, you have a better chance of finding it.”
“Do you really think the Little Poke has gold left?”
“Hell, yes. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t. All I need is a promising-looking vein to interest one of the big outfits. I’ve held off selling partly out of respect for my dad–-this was his dream--and partly because of Lib. She doesn’t want to do anything that will result in drastic changes to Sentinel Pass.”
Coop swallowed hard. Maybe if he revealed the true reason he was here, Mac could help him figure out a way to tell Libby.
“Um, Mac, what would you say if I told you I had an ulterior reason for coming here?”
Mac stood up straight, a very large wrench in hand. “What kind of reason? Publicity?”
“No,” Coop answered honestly. “I was hoping nobody would find out about this trip until…much later. After I had time to develop a television program loosely based on Libby’s online ad. You know, selling a share of a mine in return for sperm.”
Mac’s eyes narrowed. “Did you tell her this?”
Coop felt his cheeks heat up. “I plan to. Today. I hope to make her see that the story has universal appeal. A lot of viewers will be able to identify with her situation.”
“But you’d set it somewhere totally different. Like Beverly Hills or something. Right?” The look in Mac’s eyes seemed to suggest that Coop should slither off the stool and disappear under any nearby rock.
“I can see how that might have been a good idea, but from what she told me about Sentinel Pass in our emails…well, the place emotes setting. This could be good for the town. Lots of new money coming in. I don’t have any figures in front of me, but I’m sure Northern Exposure threw a hell of a lot of business Alaska’s way when it was running. What town doesn’t want money?”
Mac put a gloved hand to his face and rubbed his brow, leaving a black streak behind. “Oh, God,” he groaned. “You really blew it, man. Lib’s gonna take you to the most remote tunnel she can find and bury you to your eye balls. What were you thinking?”
A chill passed down his back. “It was just an idea when I left L.A., but my friend talked to a few people who are interested. I didn’t break any laws. By publishing her story online she sort of made it public domain.”
Mac shook his head. “All that means is you’ve covered your ass enough to ease the pain when she kicks it back to Hollywood.”
Coop slumped over, put his elbow on his knee, then plopped his chin in the palm of his hand. “You’re right. I know you are. I blew it. Especially after last night.”
Mac dropped the wrench and slowly turned to look at Coop. “What happened last night?”
Coop slid off the stool. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up and his breathing quickened. He
’d never been in a fight–-a real fight–-in his life. “Uh…nothing. I mean, whatever happened is between your sister and me. I better go.”
“Good idea. There’s a plane leaving for Denver at four. That should give Mac plenty of time to get you to the airport.”
Mac looked past Coop’s shoulder. Coop didn’t need to look to know who had just spoken. He recognized her voice. A softer, loving version of it had whispered sweet nothings in his ear all night. He spun around. “Libby. I’m glad you’re here. We need to talk.”
She looked different. Cold. Distant. A female version of her brother. “I read about your plan to make a sitcom out of my story--my life. I don’t know why I’m surprised. Someone like you would probably find my situation amusing, and I’m sure our town presented ample opportunities for caricature. Naïve buffoons that we are.”
She lifted one arm and pointed. “How did you plan to portray Mac? Lonely, rough-hewn widower with a dark cloud hanging over his head? Did he murder his wife or somehow arrange for her to drive off a cliff just hours after deciding to file for divorce?”
Coop looked at Mac, whose ruddy complex had turned a deep burgundy. “I never even heard that rumor.”
“But he fits a stereotype. Single dad. Workaholic. Going nowhere fast.”
Coop held up his hand. “She said that, not me.” To Libby, he said, “I like Mac. He’d make an interesting three-dimensional character. And your niece is charming, delightful.”
She advanced on him without warning, her index finger landing squarely on his chest. “Leave Megan out of this. She’s been through enough, you conniving dog.”
He tried to reach for her hand, but she jerked it back. “I’m not here to beg you to cease and desist. My lawyer says the constitution allows you to do whatever you want with an idea you picked up on the Internet. I can’t stop you from doing this. But I can try to buy my way out of this mess.”
Black Hills Baby Page 18
