“Sorry! Sorry! That’s Sparkle! Are you seeing this?”
“I am.”
The camera panned to some home video of two little children bundled up in snowsuits—sledding down the hill behind the Ranch, then cut to them gazing, awestruck, at the reindeer, stars in their eyes.
“This place was so magical,” Paloma Rodriguez said with definite gush in her voice. “It’s truly wonderful, the most charming place I’ve seen in a long time. They have live reindeer for the children to pet and even their own little mascot.”
She made the stuffed toy do a little dance. “This is Sparkle and he has his own story that is absolutely adorable. Charming and sweet and heartwarming. Alicia and Julio begged me to read it to them at least a dozen times on the airplane ride home and I’m still not tired of it. It’s that cute. Sparkle and the Magic Snowball. If you’re in the area, you should visit. The Christmas Ranch, just outside Pine Gulch, Idaho. It’s less than an hour from Jackson Hole and well worth the trip, for the cinnamon hot chocolate alone.”
“Great travel tip, Paloma,” her cohost said with a practiced smile. “Linda and I are heading to Jackson Hole between Christmas and New Year’s. I’ll definitely have to try some of that hot chocolate. And speaking of hot. I hear we have some spicy news on the celebrity romance front.”
They started chatting about a picture that was apparently exploding all over the internet of a young starlet and her much older leading man in a heated off-screen embrace.
Hope paused the show and flopped back onto her bed.
“Oh. My. Word.”
She was still holding the phone to her ear, she realized when she heard Rafe’s low chuckle in her ear. It seemed only right that she share it with him since he had worked every bit as hard as she had this past week to get everything ready for the opening.
“That was amazing. You were just on national TV. Wow. I can say I knew you when.”
“We were on TV!” she exclaimed. “Sparkle was on TV! This is amazing. I have to call Celeste! Do you know what this means?”
“I hope only good things,” he answered.
Warmth trickled through her at the sincere happiness in his voice. He meant his words. He wanted only the best for her, from the very beginning.
How could she possibly go on without this man in her life?
She pushed away the dark thought, focusing instead on this incredible turn of events.
“I have to call the printer and order more books and make more toys and maybe hire more people.”
“Take a minute to breathe first,” he advised. “You should savor this. You worked hard and you deserve the success. Don’t rush past it looking at the tasks ahead of you until you’ve embraced this moment.”
“I’ve got to record this. How do I do that? I’ve got to figure out how to do that.” She spent a minute trying to work the controls on the DVR and finally got it right just as the door to her bedroom was shoved open and Celeste burst in, eyes wild and her cheeks flushed.
“You need to see the news! We were just on Hello, Nation! The national news!”
“I know! Rafe called me and I caught it just in time. Did you hear what Paloma Rodriguez said? Charming and sweet and heartwarming. That’s you she’s talking about! Your story. Isn’t it wonderful?”
She suddenly realized her sister didn’t look convinced of that. She sank down onto the bed, the color beginning to leach out of her cheeks.
“I’m not ready for this!”
She laughed—until she realized Celeste was completely serious. Her sister looked terrified.
“Rafe, I have to go,” she said into the phone.
“Okay.”
“Thank you for calling. Just...thank you.”
“Sure.”
He ended the connection and her heart gave a little spasm, wondering when—or even if—she would have the chance to talk to him again.
She sat down beside her sister on the bed and gripped Celeste’s icy fingers. “This is wonderful news, CeCe. Now everybody else will know how brilliant you are, too. You wrote a beautiful story and it’s only right that it has an audience beyond our family, don’t you think? What would Mom and Dad say about sharing our gifts, not hiding our light under a barrel? You have an amazing gift and it needs to be out there, glowing for all the world to see.”
“That’s easy for you to say. You’ve always been comfortable glowing in the world. To me, this is a terrifying thing.”
“It’s a wonderful thing,” she corrected. “Think of how many people you can touch with your words. Mom and Dad would have been so proud of you, honey.”
Celeste gave her a shaky smile, then her eyes filled with tears. “Until you came back, I was perfectly happy writing Sparkle stories for only Barrett and Louisa.”
“See? I knew there was a reason I needed to come home.”
A reason that had nothing to do with a certain gorgeous former navy SEAL, she reminded herself, and slid from the bed with one more hug for her sister.
“I guess I’d better get dressed. Ready or not, I have a feeling The Christmas Ranch is about to get much, much busier.”
Chapter Fourteen
“Are we almost there? I can’t believe we’re finally here. I finally get to sit on Santa’s lap and tell him what I want for Christmas. Do you think I’m too late?”
Rafe glanced in the rearview mirror at Joey, who was just about bouncing out of his seat with excitement. He didn’t begrudge the kid a little happiness, especially after the past rough three weeks. As sick as he had been, listless with fever, it was good to see him being excited about anything.
The week after Thanksgiving, Joey came down with what Rafe thought was just a virus but it had turned into a nasty bronchitis. Two visits to Dr. Jake Dalton’s clinic and a round of antibiotics later, he had ended up missing seven days of school and had only returned for the previous week.
Now, the night before Christmas Eve, this was the first chance they’d had to come to The Christmas Ranch.
Rafe didn’t want to endure another few weeks like they’d just passed through. He had a whole new appreciation for the challenges parents faced on a regular basis. Nothing could break a parent’s heart like a sick kid.
“The dude in red is pretty good at last-minute orders,” he finally answered, “but I can’t make any promises. Anyway, we wrote him a letter while you were sick, remember? I’m sure he got that, so you’re probably golden.”
He was pretty sure he had covered all the Christmas bases, at least from a gift standpoint. The kid’s wish list had been short enough, actually, that Rafe had double-checked to make sure Joey had included everything he wanted.
His nephew only asked for a couple of LEGO sets—that Rafe had actually ordered online just after Thanksgiving when they were first mentioned—and a Marvel superhero backpack he had managed to pick up in Idaho Falls the week before, after Joey finally went back to school.
He had found a few other things on that shopping trip—probably too many, actually. He didn’t have a good handle yet on appropriate Santa gift quantities. He had even managed to wrap everything over the weekend after Joey went to bed, though none of it would win any prizes in the gift-wrap department.
“I can’t wait!” Joey said, then coughed a little with the lingering bronchial spasms he hadn’t quite shaken. “What should we do first? The sledding hill or the sleigh rides?”
“Why don’t we get the Santa thing out of the way, since that’s your first priority, and then you can decide the rest?”
“That’s a good idea. Look! There it is!”
Sure enough, the bright and welcoming lights of The Christmas Ranch beat away the dark December gloom. A light snow fell, adding an even more picturesque quality to a scene that already looked warm and festive. He drove beneath the sign he had tacked up for Hope that first day he
had come here and was aware of a little bubble of nerves coursing through him.
He was looking forward to this, probably more than he should, given the way things had ended with Hope.
Joey’s sickness had been tough enough to cope with this month. Throw in Cami’s sentencing the day before and he was definitely in need of a little holiday spirit.
He hadn’t seen Hope in more than three weeks, since the Ranch opened. True to his word, he had stayed away as she had asked him. It was just about the hardest thing he had ever done and he was honest enough to admit that he might have caved and gone to see her anyway, if not for Joey’s illness.
How many times had he wanted to drive up here, just to talk this out and tell her she was being crazy? He had even turned up the canyon twice after Joey went back to school the week before but had ended up driving past and turning around, feeling like a stupid kid riding his bike past the house of his elementary school crush in hopes of catching a glimpse of her.
He had to drive through the parking lot twice before he found a parking space. The place was hopping, as he had fully expected. That little bit on the national news had spawned all kinds of other publicity. The weekly newspaper in town had done a big spread on The Christmas Ranch and on the runaway success of Sparkle and The Magic Snowball, which was racing up bestseller lists after she had digitized it and put it online as an ebook.
He had read every word of the article and had held the newspaper in front of him for far too long, gazing at the photograph of Hope. It was lovely and sweet, a picture in the snow and sunshine with Sparkle all decked out in his holiday jingle bell gear. Even so, he was aware the image had captured none of her vitality and spirit, the energy and enthusiasm and creativity that made her so amazing.
He parked the SUV and helped Joey out of the backseat. His nephew slipped his hand in Rafe’s as they walked toward the lodge, which sent a little shaft of warmth settling in his chest.
The illness had at least served one good purpose—he and Joey finally seemed to have bonded over coughing fits and sniffles and nebulizer treatments. His nephew at last seemed to have accepted that Rafe wasn’t going anywhere. The night before, he had even told Rafe he thought he was pretty cool. High praise, indeed, from a seven-year-old. It made him feel almost as good as surviving BUD/S.
When they walked inside, they were met with noise and laughter and a jazzy Christmas trio playing in the corner. The scent of pine and cinnamon filled the air.
They made their way through the crowd inside toward the ticket counter, though it wasn’t easy. The place was packed as this was the last night the St. Nicholas Lodge was open—though he had read in that article he had all but memorized in the local newspaper that the Nichols family apparently kept the Christmas village open on Christmas Eve with free admission, their gift to the community.
The sleigh rides and sledding hill would continue to operate until after New Year’s Eve.
He bought all-access tickets for him and Joey, which would allow them to enjoy all The Christmas Ranch activities. Just as he was hooking the green-and-red-striped wristband on his nephew, Barrett Dustin rushed up to them.
“You’re here! Finally!”
“I told you I might be coming tonight,” Joey said to the boy who had become his best friend.
“Have you seen Santa yet?”
“Not yet. We just got here.”
“I’ve already sat on his lap like a hundred times but I’ll stand in line with you again if you want. Tonight you get M&M’s bags instead of just candy canes after you talk to him! I already had one but I want another one.”
“Can I, Uncle Rafe?”
“Sure. Go ahead. I’ll catch up.”
The boys raced off, giggling together. Rafe was fastening his own wrist brace when he became aware of some subtle shift in the atmosphere in the room. Joey—who adored all things Star Wars and had made him watch far too many Clone Wars cartoon episodes while he was sick—would have called it a disturbance in the Force.
He shifted and there she was, just a few feet away from him, speaking with a couple he had met in Jake Dalton’s waiting room. Cisco and Easton Del Norte, he remembered, along with their little girl who looked to be about five, chubby-cheeked and adorable, and a very cute toddler little boy.
She must have felt that disturbance in the Force, too—or maybe just the weight of his gaze. Her attention shifted from the couple and for just a split second when she first saw him, he saw a world of emotions in her beautiful blue eyes—shock, discomposure and a wild, unexpected joy.
She blinked away everything and said something to the couple then approached him a moment later. “Rafe. Hello.”
He wanted to stand there staring at her all night, absorb every detail he had missed so much. These past three weeks, without her smile and her laughter and that sweet, lovely face, nothing had felt right.
“Hi.”
After an awkward moment, she reached out and hugged him in the way of friends who haven’t seen each other in too long. He closed his eyes for just a moment, soaking in the scent of her, cinnamon and almonds, and the rightness of having her in his arms, even for this quick, meaningless hug.
Too soon, she stepped away, her expression guarded.
“How have you been? How’s Joey? I’ve been worried sick about him.”
“He’s doing better. Thanks. He’s so relieved to finally have a chance to see Santa that I think he would have walked here if I hadn’t finally agreed to bring him tonight.”
He wanted to make perfectly clear that was the reason he was there, not because he couldn’t go another hour without seeing her—though that was probably closer to the truth.
“Oh, and I need to give you a belated thank-you for the care package you sent over with Faith and Barrett when they stopped by. It helped.”
She had sent drawing paper and colored pencils as well as a copy of her and Celeste’s book and one of her little handmade stuffed Sparkle toys, which he had been afraid his Transformers/IronMan/Anakin Skywalker loving nephew might think too girlish. On the contrary, Joey had been delighted with it, especially because Hope had made it. His nephew had come a long way since calling her mean that day he broke her window.
She smiled softly. “You’re welcome.”
Before he could respond, a tired-looking woman holding hands with a child on either side of her jostled Hope, who stumbled and would have fallen if he hadn’t reached out to catch her.
“Sorry. I’m sorry,” the woman said, with a frazzled look. He wanted to tell her not to apologize. In fact, he would have paid her twenty bucks to do it over and over if it would give him the chance to hold Hope in his arms again.
She remained there for a fraction of a moment, gazing up at him with a startled look in her eyes before she swallowed and eased away again.
“Wow,” he said. “This place is packed.”
She smiled, looking heartbreakingly beautiful. “If I could ever meet Paloma Rodriguez in person, I would smooch her all over her face. Seriously. We’ve been hopping ever since she featured us on Hello, Nation. I’ve had to hire a dozen temporary workers to keep up with the crowds and I’ve got eight women in the local quilting guild sewing Sparkle toys for us—and we still can’t keep up with the orders.”
“That’s terrific.”
He was so happy for her success, mostly because he knew how important it was to her.
“What’s going on with Cami?” she asked. “I’ve been wondering. Was she sentenced this week?”
He nodded grimly. “Yesterday. She got three to five, which was a little longer than her attorney expected, and she won’t be eligible for parole for twenty-four months. She was transferred from the county jail to the state penitentiary right after her sentencing, though she got to see Joey for a few minutes before they took her.”
“Oh, Rafe
. I’m sorry.”
He shrugged. “She made a long string of poor choices and they had consequences—one of which is, I guess, that I get to be a father figure for at least the next two years.”
“Not a father figure. A father.”
“Right.”
The magnitude of the task somehow seemed less overwhelming than it had a month ago. He figured they would get through it as they had this month—one moment at a time.
“Looks like Joey and Barrett are almost to the front of the line,” she said. “You’d better go if you want to get any pictures for his scrapbook.”
“I don’t expect I’ll have time for much scrapbooking the next few years, but you’re right. I should at least take a picture or two to capture the moment.”
“Find me before you leave tonight,” she said. “I have something for you. I was actually going to bring it over to your house tomorrow but if it’s okay, I’ll give it to you tonight instead.”
That shocked him enough that he wasn’t quick enough to come up with a response before she slipped away through the crowd. He watched her for a moment, then turned to freeze Joey’s moment with Santa for posterity.
It was too noisy inside the lodge for him to hear what the boy requested from Santa. As soon as his nephew hopped down, he asked him, just to make sure he wasn’t missing a big-ticket item on the wish list.
Joey gave him a solemn look. “That’s between me and Santa.”
He suddenly had fears of the boy coming up with something entirely new, something Rafe wouldn’t be able to deliver since he had no idea what it might be. The way he figured it, this was probably the last year the kid would believe in Santa. He was already beginning to express a few qualms about the physical logistics of one man making it all around the world in one night.
Rafe wanted to hold on to the magic as long as he could. He would hate to disappoint the kid in their first Christmas together, especially given all Joey had been through the past few months and the fact that it would be tough enough this first year without his mom.
“Want to give me a hint?” he asked, a little desperately, as they stood in line for the horse-drawn sleigh rides that made up the next thing on Joey’s list.
The Christmas Ranch (The Cowboys of Cold Creek) Page 16
