Snowbound in Sweetwater Ranch

by RaeAnne Thayne

  She couldn’t bear it.

  She was such a fool. His contempt shouldn’t have the power to wound her so viciously. She knew it shouldn’t and yet she couldn’t deny the ache in her heart.

  She sniffed and swiped at her eyes. She was coming to care for him entirely too much.

  How could she have let things get to this point?

  She had been halfway in love with him after that night and now she was afraid she had come too far to turn back.

  No. She couldn’t be in love with him. Just the thought horrified her. She would just use all her considerable powers of reason and intellect to convince herself otherwise. It was as simple as that.

  He would go back to Portland, probably as early as the next day, and she would stay here at Sweetwater until she worked this ridiculous infatuation out of her system.

  In her rush to put as much distance as possible between her and Peter, she was pushing Susan far too hard for conditions. She realized it suddenly and started to rein her in. But before the horse could slow her momentum, she stumbled over some thick brush hidden beneath the snow.

  If she had been concentrating as she should have been, Katie might have been able to stay in the saddle. It was only a little stumble, after all. But she was distracted by her emotions.

  Add to that her thick gloves that didn’t grip the reins as well as usual and the bulky snow boots she wore in place of ropers and that little stumble was all it took for her to go flying off.

  She came down hard on one leg, then lost her balance and collapsed face-first into the snow, and the breath left her in a whoosh.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  For several long seconds Katie tried frantically to suck oxygen into lungs that suddenly refused to function after the force of her fall. She lay in the snow, her chest pounding and her head spinning.

  Oh, she hurt. She started to take an inventory of what pained her the most but gave up the overwhelming task. Despite the snow that cushioned her fall, every inch of her body complained loudly.

  She wanted to curl up right here and just close her eyes for a moment, just long enough for the pain to subside and for her breathing to return to normal, but she knew she couldn’t.

  She had to force herself to move, not only because she didn’t particularly care to freeze to death out here in the middle of nowhere, but also because she wasn’t about to let Peter find her like this, bruised and shaken on the ground.

  Susan nudged at her, her breath warm and her big brown eyes concerned. “I’m not mad,” Katie murmured soothingly to the horse as soon as she could make her lungs work again. “It wasn’t your fault. I know it wasn’t. I never should have rushed you like that.”

  The horse whinnied softly as if to urge her to her feet. “I need to get up. I know. Give me a minute.”

  Susan stood placidly next to her, and after a moment Katie summoned the will to grab hold of a stirrup and try to pull herself up. She made it as far as her knees before blinding pain shot from her right ankle, the one she’d landed on.

  She cried out and collapsed onto the snow again.

  All she needed was a broken ankle. No, she thought when she realized she could still rotate it, it probably was just a sprain. It only seemed to hurt when she put weight on it.

  But how was she going to mount without putting weight on her ankle? She would just have to push through the pain, she thought. The alternative was waiting here for Peter to find her.

  She forced herself to her knees again. This time she didn’t even make it to her feet before a vicious cramp hit her low in the abdomen. Katie gasped as hot waves radiated through her.

  The baby!

  In the initial shock from her fall and pain from the sprained ankle, she had completely forgotten about the tiny life inside her.

  Another cramp hit her, stronger than the first, and she clutched at her abdomen and doubled over.

  Oh, please, God, no! Panic flashed through her. She couldn’t lose this baby. She couldn’t.

  She needed help. She needed to get out of this cold and find help right now!

  Her breath came in little sobbing gasps as she cried and prayed at the same time, all the while she struggled to make it into the saddle. By sheer stubbornness, she managed to climb to her feet and stood on one foot, clinging to the pommel. Another cramp racked her.

  Above her moan she heard dogs barking from behind her.

  She turned and saw Luke and Millie approaching, with Peter behind them leading the pack horse.

  “Oh, Peter. Help me!”

  His eyes widened with shock as he took in her dishevelment and the panic she knew must be abundantly clear on her features.

  He dismounted and rushed to her in one quick motion. “What happened? Are you all right?”

  “Susan stumbled and I fell off. I need a doctor, Peter. It’s urgent. You’re going to have to leave the ranch and go for help.”

  He grabbed her arm. “What is it? Sit down. You shouldn’t be moving around like that. You might have a spinal injury.”

  “I don’t have a spinal injury. I need a doctor. Right now!”

  Another wave of pain hit her and she clutched at her abdomen, moaning in distress. Oh, it hurt. Far, far worse than the physical pain was the guilt and self-loathing surging through her.

  How could she have been foolish enough to risk her baby’s life over hurt feelings and a stupid argument?

  She should have been more careful.

  She had no business even being up on a horse. Really, she shouldn’t be here in Wyoming. If she cared about her child’s safety, she would have been safe and warm in her quiet condo in Lake Oswego, not out here in the cold and snow and wind.

  She sobbed again and Peter pulled her close. “You’re scaring me, Katie. Tell me what’s wrong. Where do you hurt? Do you think you might have internal injuries?”

  She had to tell him. None of the reasons for keeping her pregnancy a secret mattered now, not when their child’s life was at stake.

  “I’m pregnant and I’m cramping. I don’t want to lose this baby. Please, Peter. Help me!”

  * * *

  For several seconds Peter could only stare at her as her words seemed to echo in the cold, still air.

  Pregnant? Pregnant?

  He barely had time to register the concept before she was struggling frantically to mount her horse again.

  A million questions poured through him, but he knew the most important thing now was taking care of her.

  “Stop. You’re going to fall again, Katie. Let me help you. Are you sure you can ride?”

  “I don’t have any other choice. It would take me too long to walk through the snow to the ranch house. And I don’t think I could. I think I may have sprained my ankle.”

  He tried to figure out another way to get her back to the house but couldn’t, so he carefully lifted her into the saddle. She clutched the reins as he led the way back, her face set against the pain and her breathing ragged.

  The ride seemed to take forever and he couldn’t concentrate on anything but seeing her safely settled. By the time they reached the ranch house, she was pale and trembling and he knew she was in pain.

  “Hang on,” he said in what he hoped was a reassuring tone. “We’re almost there.”

  She didn’t answer. Her eyes were huge, frightened. He rode all the way to the front porch and jumped from his horse and quickly tied the reins to a hitching post there. He reached up and pulled her from the horse and into his arms, then carried her into the house.

  He carried her to the couch and lowered her gingerly. “What do you need me to do? Where can I go for help?”

  “Check the phone first. Maybe service has been restored.”

  He lifted the receiver and the dial tone in his ear was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard. “It works. Should I call an ambulance?”

  She appeared to think it over, then shook her head. “I doubt the roads out here in the rural areas have been plowed enough for one to make it through. Even with
four-wheel drive, I don’t know that we could make it to the clinic in Daniel.”

  “What can we do?”

  “My friend, Laura Harp, is a doctor. She lives just a few ranches over and could probably make it to Sweetwater by snowmobile. I’ll call her.”

  He handed the phone to Katie, who whipped off her gloves and punched in a number. While he stood by, hating his helplessness, she explained the situation to someone on the other end of the line.

  “Yes, I’m sure. Thirteen weeks gestation, eleven weeks since conception,” she murmured into the phone. He didn’t miss the furtive look she sent in his direction.

  He did a quick mental calculation back to their passionate night together before Christmas. The dates were definitely right, but he didn’t need that extra proof to convince him the unbelievable truth his heart was already telling him.

  The child she carried was his.

  He had no doubt in his mind whatsoever. So many things made sense now. How stunned she had been to see him when he showed up at the ranch, her on-again, off-again sickness, the light-headedness, the secrets he had glimpsed several time in her eyes.

  He wondered if she had had any intention at all of telling him. Somehow he didn’t think so. He drew in a sharp breath at the idea that if she hadn’t fallen and been forced to tell him, he might have spent his entire life never knowing he had fathered a child.

  Later. He could think about all that later. Now he needed to do everything he could to help that child survive.

  Katie hung up the phone. “She should be here within a half hour. Laura’s a wonderful doctor. If anyone can save my baby, she can.”

  Though the questions crowding his mind begged to be asked, he knew this wasn’t the time. “We need to get you into something dry.”

  “You’re right,” she said after a slight pause. “Would you mind helping me into my bedroom? I have a robe there I can put on.”

  “Of course,” he answered, frustrated at her obvious reluctance to ask him for help, even in something as minor as this.

  He scooped her from the couch and carried her down the hall to her bedroom. Through the tumult in his mind, he registered that her room was similar to his, decorated in mountain-lodge style with river rock and wood and natural colors.

  He set her on the edge of a low trunk at the foot of the bed and knelt to pull her boots off first, then helped her out of her heavy insulated coveralls. She was wet clear through, and guilt swamped him as he remembered dumping snow on her. She was pregnant and he had just spent fifteen minutes throwing snowballs at her, for hell’s sake.

  “Thank you,” she murmured. “If you’ll just hand me that robe over the chair there, I believe I can handle it from here.”

  He complied then went to work building a fire in the stone fireplace. By the time the kindling caught, she had changed into her robe and started to hop from the chest to the bed.

  “Damn it, Katie. Let me help.”

  Just as he moved to her side, she gasped again and clutched her stomach. He lifted her, struck by how fragile she felt in his arms, then tucked her into the bed.

  “I’m so scared, Peter.” Her voice sounded small, hollow.

  “I know. I wish I could make it better.”

  He didn’t know how to handle this powerless feeling. He wasn’t used to it. In his world, he thrived on challenges but this was a force he could do nothing against. He wanted to make everything all right again, to ease her fear and her pain, and he hated that he couldn’t.

  She gripped his hand tightly. “I should have told you. I’m sorry.”

  The words surprised him and he didn’t know how to respond. “We can talk about that later. Right now you just need to rest until the doctor gets here.”

  She nodded and even closed her eyes for a moment, her hand still gripping his. He watched her, not sure if she was sleeping.

  A strange warmth started low in his chest, then pulsed through him. It took him a few moments to identify what he was feeling. When he realized it was tenderness, he wanted to drop her hand and get the hell out of there as fast as he could run. He forced himself to gently set her fingers onto the quilt instead.

  She opened her eyes. “Please don’t leave.”

  “I’m only going to see if the power has been restored along with the phone service. I’ll be back, I promise.”

  She seemed satisfied with that and closed her eyes again.

  A quick look at the power situation confirmed what he’d been hoping. They had electricity again. He shut off the generator and switched the household current back and was returning the bedroom when the doorbell rang.

  The doctor. Hallelujah!

  Laura Harp was at least sixty, petite and with short steel-gray hair and incongruously trendy tiny dark-rimmed glasses. She looked more like a librarian than a country doctor, until he looked into her vivid blue eyes and saw a mixture of warmth and concern and aeons of wisdom and experience he couldn’t even begin to comprehend.

  “That was quick.”

  “I’ve got a wicked-fast Polaris. Comes in real handy during weeks like this. It’s the only way I’ve been able to get into the clinic since Thursday. You must be a friend of Katherine’s.”

  He wouldn’t go that far. But since he didn’t know how else to characterize their relationship, he merely nodded. “Peter Logan.”

  Behind those glasses, her eyes widened with recognition. He could tell from her expression that she must be familiar with his name. He could only guess by her surprise that she must have heard about the infamous Logan-Crosby feud.

  “Katie is lying down back here.”

  He led the way down the hall to the bedroom. Katie’s eyelids fluttered open when he opened the door and her gaze immediately went to the small woman at his side.

  “You’re here,” she breathed, with such palpable relief in her eyes that he felt large and male and out of place.

  “I need to go take care of the horses and stable them. I’ll, um, just get out of your way.”

  He escaped without giving either of them the chance to argue—not that he thought they would.

  Outside, he filled his lungs with icy air, then let it out in a rush. At last he could come to terms with the stunning events of the last hour.

  Pregnant.

  If this Dr. Harp succeeded in saving the baby, he would be a father in a little over six months.

  This was huge. Gigantic. So staggering, he couldn’t manage to work his mind around it. How could this have happened? Despite the fire and heat of that incredible night together, they had been scrupulously careful. He had used a condom every time.

  Except one, he suddenly remembered. He had awakened sometime during the night, already aroused, and had been inside her before he was really conscious of it. He thought he had pulled out in time but obviously at least one little swimmer had hit the jackpot.

  A baby.

  A baby with Katherine Crosby!

  What the hell was he supposed to do now? He stood there in the cold Wyoming air, gazing at the raw, snow-covered mountains, overwhelmed by the reality that his entire life was about to change.

  Another man would probably think it best all around if Katie lost the baby.

  He blew out a breath that clouded in the cold. Yeah, his life might be far less complicated if she miscarried but just the possibility filled him with a hard, spiny knot under his breastbone.

  Kate already loved their unborn child. He had seen it in the hand she splayed protectively over her abdomen, in the fear in her eyes, in her frantic call for help.

  Losing the baby would devastate her.

  Despite everything—her deception that night and, really, in the weeks since when she should have told him about the baby—he didn’t want to see her hurt.

  What if he hadn’t been here? If he hadn’t been so determined to find her after he learned who she was and hadn’t flown out from Portland despite the storm warning?

  His blood ran cold thinking about it.

  She wou
ld have been trapped out here for days, pregnant and alone, having to take care of all the stock by herself.

  The horses, still hitched to the rail out front, stamped in the snow, and the little one, Susan, whinnied impatiently, dragging him from his thoughts.

  “I’m coming, I’m coming.” He grabbed their reins and started walking toward the barn, struck by how surreal this all seemed. His whole world had just shifted and he wasn’t quite sure how to deal with it.

  Three days earlier—hell, an hour earlier—he knew just who he was, what he wanted out of life.

  He was Peter Logan, oldest child of Leslie and Terrence, brother to Eric and David and Jillian and Bridget. He was the young CEO of the Logan Corporation and brimmed over with vibrant, ambitious plans for moving the company forward.

  Now, God willing, he was going to be a father.

  And everything had changed.

  * * *

  “Isn’t there something you can give me?” Katie asked after Laura had examined her. “Some pill that could stop the cramps?”

  Laura squeezed her hand. “Not this early in the game, I’m afraid. I wish I had more to offer but the only thing I can prescribe at this point is plenty of rest. And don’t discount the power of hope and prayers.”

  If hope and prayers were enough, she had more than enough of both to make all the difference. But Katie knew sometimes all the faith in the world couldn’t defeat nature.

  Still, she had to cling to that calm assurance in her friend’s wise eyes.

  “You’re strong and healthy. I have high hopes you can keep the pregnancy if all goes well.”

  “Thank you.” Katie tried to smile, but she had a feeling it was a little watery. Laura pressed a cool hand to her cheek, and the tears burning behind her eyes trickled out.

  “Hey, now. What’s this?” the doctor asked.

  “I’m in such a mess, Laura.”

  “Ordinarily my policy is to mind my own business and stick to doctoring in matters like this, but we’ve been friends for a long time.”

  Despite the fear still heavy in her chest, Katie smiled at the memory. “Ever since you gave me six stitches in my hand after my ill-fated attempt at helping Clint string some barbed wire. I must have been all of, what, seventeen?”