Montana Dreaming

by Judy Duarte

  Emily didn’t answer, just continued making the noise and rocking for a few moments longer. Finally when Marissa was quiet, she smiled at the new parents.

  “I heard about this pediatrician who made a video. Anyway, babies are comfortable in the womb. Coming out into the world is overwhelming. So when you make that noise in their ear and you rock them, they think they’re back in the womb again.”

  “Why didn’t they tell me that at the hospital?” Juliet asked, shaking her head.

  “Maybe because they don’t know or they’ve never tried it. I doubt if it’s going to work every time, but it might work some of the time.”

  She bent down to the baby again and repeated the sound.

  Little Marissa’s eyes closed.

  “Well, I’ll be darned.” Mark’s face was a study in exasperation and appreciation.

  “Would you mind taking her back to her nursery and laying her in her crib?” Juliet asked. “I’m afraid if you transfer her to me she’ll wake up again.”

  “I don’t mind at all.” Emily checked with Brad. “Unless you need me?”

  “No. Mark and I’ll get started. Take your time.”

  As he watched Emily carry the baby down the hall with Juliet leading her, he knew she’d make a wonderful mother. She’d make a wonderful…wife? He didn’t know where that thought had come from. A wife was the last thing he wanted. His mother’s betrayal of his father had made him certain from an early age that marriage was a risky business. He’d been tempted to try it with Robin when he was too young and idealistic to know better, but she’d reinforced the idea that marriage wasn’t in the cards for him.

  “You have a beautiful daughter,” he said to Mark, envying the man.

  “I’m going to adopt her.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Mark motioned to the two easy chairs. Brad took off his jacket and settled in one.

  Looking not at all embarrassed, Mark explained, “Juliet was seven months pregnant when I met her. I sort of ended up taking care of her, and after the baby was born, I figured out we belonged together. In fact, we just got married by a justice of the peace yesterday and we’re planning a church wedding next month.”

  “You made that sound very easy.”

  Laughing, Mark shook his head. “Sure I did. Happily ever after is easy. It’s getting there that’s hard.”

  Getting there. A man had to want to get there to get there and had to believe there could be a happily ever after. Brad simply didn’t.

  That settled, he asked Mark, “So, what can you tell me about the Queen of Hearts gold mine?”

  Chapter Six

  As Emily stood at Marissa’s crib looking down at her, her heart hurt for the baby she’d lost. Someday she wanted lots of kids…with the right man.

  The little girl was sleeping now as Emily stepped away from the bed, glancing around the room. The walls were pale pink with a wallpaper border of dolls dressed in lavender, green and pink. The dresser and crib were a light wood, and there was a small, green, crocheted blanket hanging over the foot of the crib.

  “This is handmade,” she said in appreciation.

  “My abuelita crocheted that. It’s called a covijita. It’s one of the few things I have left from my family. They’re all gone now.” She pointed to a bookcase that was rustic and scarred. “My father made that.”

  There was loss and grief in Juliet’s voice but also joy in the sentimental value of the gifts her father and grandmother had given her. Emily liked this woman already.

  Glancing at the baby again, Emily said with a sigh, “I’d like to stay here all afternoon and watch her, but I’d better go in there. I’m supposed to be taking notes.”

  “Mark said Mr. Vaughn is a private investigator. Is that what you do, too?”

  She thought about what Brad had said, that she might make a good one. “No. Not yet, anyway. I’m his personal secretary and assistant.”

  “Mmm,” Juliet said.

  Emily felt as if she had to explain further. “He thought if I came along on this trip, it would go quicker and we could get back to Chicago sooner.”

  “You must have had quite an experience being stranded with Mr. Vaughn in Caleb Douglas’s cabin.”

  Staring at Juliet wide-eyed, Emily asked, “How do you know about that?”

  “Even though we’ve had an influx of tourists, Thunder Canyon is still a small town. Gossip travels fast. That helicopter created lots of questions.”

  Shaking her head, Emily was embarrassed. “So everyone knows Brad and I were in that cabin? Alone?”

  At that Juliet grinned. “Yes, and they’ve made assumptions about that.”

  “Oh, terrific! Just what I always wanted—a tarnished reputation. Brad and I are boss and secretary and…”

  “Friends?” Juliet filled in for her kindly.

  Feeling a blush steal into her cheeks, Emily couldn’t lie to Juliet. “I guess. Sometimes I’m not sure. We didn’t even know each other well before those few days in the cabin, but we got to know each other better there.”

  “I see sparks between the two of you,” Juliet said with certainty.

  About to deny it, Emily decided not to. “There might be sparks, but that’s it. We’re very different.”

  “Mark and I were very different, too. But we’re very happy now.”

  “A child is a wonderful bond.”

  “Yes, Marissa is a bond, and Mark thinks of her as his daughter. So do I, but she’s not. We were just married civilly yesterday and we’re having a church wedding in June.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “No. Our love is very new, but it’s going to last forever.”

  Although Emily wanted to believe in that kind of love, the kind her mother and father had had, she didn’t know if she could. It was true she was falling in love with Brad. She could admit that to herself now. She never could have made love with him otherwise. But she didn’t know if it had anywhere to go.

  “I’d really better see if he needs me.”

  When Emily reentered the living room, Mark and Brad were still talking about the tourists who had come into the area and all the business Caleb’s ski resort would bring in.

  “I hope it will generate tons of advertising for the newspaper,” Mark admitted. “That’s what a newspaper needs in order to be profitable.”

  As Emily sat on the sofa, Brad filled her in. “Mark can find no record of the Queen of Hearts property on the computer. If the title is recorded anywhere, it’s in a ledger in the archives.”

  “I just didn’t get around to digging further,” Mark explained. “Marissa was born, then Juliet and I moved in here and got married. With buying into the paper, I haven’t had time to pursue the story or worry about old records. I did find two other leads, though. And the truth is, I’d like an exclusive if anything comes of them.”

  “It’s a deal. What have you got?”

  “There’s an old prospector who lives out on Thunder Canyon Road. His shack looks as if it will fall down if you blow on it. He couldn’t tell me much, and I’m not sure his ramblings can be trusted, but he implied that a woman owned the deed to that mine.”

  “A woman?” Emily asked. “Wouldn’t that be unusual back then?”

  Mark shrugged. “I just can’t imagine how it’s true if Amos Douglas won the property in a card game.”

  “It might not have been that simple.” Brad told Mark about the promissory note.

  “Now that’s interesting.”

  “You said there were two possible leads,” Emily prompted.

  “Yes, the other is a woman named Tildy Matheson. Supposedly her grandmother was a friend of Catherine Douglas, Amos’s wife.”

  “Besides your leads, I can also poke around at the historical society,” Brad said.

  “We might find out more about Amos Douglas there,” Emily added.

  “Is this Tildy reliable?” Brad asked Mark.

  “Her memory’s fading and she probably has stories ha
nded down from her grandmother. But there’s no way to know how they’ve changed in the retelling. Chasing down history is sometimes like trying to catch a wisp of smoke.”

  When Juliet came into the room, she was smiling. “Marissa’s still sleeping.”

  “You might want to make a tape of shushing,” Emily advised her. “Your voice and the sound could lull her to sleep when she’s restless.”

  “You’ve got one smart assistant here,” Juliet said to Brad, and Emily felt herself blush.

  Whenever Brad focused his attention on her, it was as if she were the only person in the world—the only woman in the world. Now he did just that and she felt her whole body want to lean toward him, go to him, nestle in his arms.

  “She’s more than smart,” he murmured.

  His low voice led Emily to remember the husky sounds and erotic words they’d uttered to each other when they’d made love in his bedroll. From the sparks in his eyes, she wondered if he was thinking about that day, too.

  “How would you two like to stay for dinner? Nothing fancy, just some carne asada and rice with a tossed salad.”

  Brad glanced at Emily, and she gave a little nod. She’d like to get to know this couple better.

  “Sure, we can stay. I’ll call Caleb and Adele so they don’t expect us.”

  The talk before dinner and during it took many different ferent roads. Mark had been everywhere and seen everything as he’d trotted the globe. His stories were engrossing. In the midst of the many topics of conversation, Emily pieced together that Juliet had come to Thunder Canyon alone. She’d only brought a few things and was waitressing at the Hitching Post, a local restaurant and saloon, when Mark had met her. Both of their lives had been changed drastically by that meeting. It was easy to see how happy they were. Mark was never far from his wife, encircling her with his arm, giving her a smile, touching her hand.

  Later Emily and Juliet were loading dishes into the dishwasher when Marissa began crying again.

  “This time she wants to be fed,” Juliet explained. I’ll do that in the nursery, then bring her out so she can join us. She’s usually a contented baby.”

  “Does Mark help you with her?”

  “Oh, yes. In fact, he’s insisting that I pump milk and try to give her a bottle some of the time so he can feed her, too. That way I can catch a few more hours of sleep and skip a feeding.”

  About fifteen minutes later, Emily and Brad were discussing visiting the prospector when Juliet brought Marissa into the room. Her terry playsuit, pink with little kitties printed all over it, was still too big for her.

  Instead of settling in a chair or taking Marissa to Mark, Juliet went over to Brad and sat beside him on the sofa. Time after time, as they chatted, Brad looked down at the little girl with a tender gleam in his eyes.

  Finally Juliet asked him, “Would you like to hold her?”

  “I’ve never held a baby before.” His voice was gruff, and Emily wondered what he was thinking about. Suzette’s baby, maybe? The possibility he could be a dad?

  “It’s never too late for a man to get used to babies. Here, try it.”

  At first Brad was all thumbs, not knowing exactly how to hold Marissa. But with Juliet’s gentle urging for him to support the baby’s head, he took the little girl into his arms.

  Emily wished she had her camera. The handsome man and the tiny baby would make quite a photograph. The expression on Brad’s face was one she’d never seen there before. It told her that holding Marissa touched his heart in some way nothing else had ever done.

  When he became comfortable with the infant, he ran his thumb across her chin and slipped one of his fingers into her tiny hand.

  Marissa grabbed on to it reflexively and held tight.

  Brad’s gaze caught Emily’s, and she felt herself in more turmoil at that moment than she had ever been in in her entire life.

  Neither Brad nor Emily spoke much on their return trip to Caleb’s. Emily knew the house would be empty except for the housekeeper. Caleb had told them he and Adele were going out after dinner.

  Brad parked the SUV in the driveway. After he and Emily had gone inside and removed their coats, she wasn’t sure what to do next. But Brad took her by the elbow and led her into the sitting room. “I’d like to talk to you about something.”

  She could feel his hand through the material of her blouse. The sexual buzz between them was exceedingly strong tonight.

  After Brad guided her to the love seat, she sat there beside him, curious as to what he wanted to discuss. Caleb’s case? A trip to the prospector? Mark and Juliet? The two of them?

  “I’ve been thinking about something,” he began. “I meant what I said—that you would be a good private investigator. When we get back, I think it would be a good idea for you to work with Jack McCormick.”

  Jack was a senior investigator, in his fifties and very good at what he did. “In addition to being your secretary?”

  “No, in place of being my personal assistant and secretary. It would be a promotion, Emily. Your salary would go up and you could possibly get into the investigative work itself.”

  A tiny voice inside her head screamed, I don’t want to leave you, but of course she wasn’t going to tell him that. It was obvious he regretted what had happened between them in the cabin and now he was trying to find a way out of it.

  “If that’s what you think is best.” Her voice came out stilted but she couldn’t help that. She’d thought they were getting closer. She’d thought they were really learning to know each other. But she guessed Brad could see their differences now even more glaringly than he had before.

  Wrapping her pride around herself, she added, “I know Mr. McCormick’s well respected and he can teach me a lot.”

  “Is it what you want, Emily?”

  She couldn’t tell Brad what she wanted because it was a dream she could never attain. He was a dream she could never attain.

  Maybe holding Marissa had made him realize he didn’t want to deny being the father of Suzette Brouchard’s baby. Maybe he’d realized fatherhood wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe he was thinking about her becoming pregnant and how that would affect them working together. Even if she wasn’t pregnant, nothing would ever be the same as it had been before this trip.

  As if he’d read her thoughts, he assured her, “I haven’t forgotten what happened between us in the cabin. If you are pregnant, I’ll stand behind you and support you however I can. I don’t want you to be afraid of that.”

  “I’m not afraid, Brad,” she said quietly. “I’ve been managing my own life for a long time now. I’ll manage no matter what happens.”

  Then, because she couldn’t continue this conversation, because she couldn’t look at him without wanting to kiss him, she stood to leave. “I’m going to go up to my room now and type up notes on what Mark told us. Afterward I’m going to turn in. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Trying not to run away from Brad Vaughn, she walked slowly out of the room and up the stairs. Although her feelings for him were growing stronger, she realized that she was just going to have to get over them.

  Brad raked his hand through his hair and leaned back against the sofa cushion. That hadn’t gone well. Emily usually voiced her opinion. If she’d wanted to continue to work with him, she would have said so, wouldn’t she?

  Ever since they’d arrived in Thunder Canyon, everything about Emily Stanton had gotten under his skin. It wasn’t just her natural beauty that made him react to her. It was the essence of who she was—her down-to-earth nature, her compassion, her caring. When she’d held Marissa today and lulled her to sleep—

  Brad had entertained visions of her carrying his child!

  What if Emily was pregnant?

  He didn’t have an opportunity to answer the question as Tess came into the sitting room. “Mr. Vaughn, would you like something to eat or drink?”

  “No, thank you, Tess. I might go out for a walk.”

  “Before you do, sir, can I spea
k to you?”

  “Sure.”

  Tess came over to the sofa, looking anxious. “Since you’re a private investigator, do you ever find missing persons?”

  “Once in a while we’ll take on a client like that. Why?”

  After she seemed to debate with herself, she answered, “I have a daughter who’s missing. She was fifteen when she ran away. She’d be eighteen now. The year she left, I found this job with the Douglases, hoping to make more money so I could search for her. And I have. But traveling is so expensive and…I don’t know where to go. But you…you probably have ways to find her. I have saved up some money and I wondered if you’d take on my case.”

  Without even asking how much money Tess had saved, Brad knew she could never pay what his agency expected. Somehow right now that didn’t matter, but Caleb Douglas did. “I don’t know how much the present case is going to tie me up in Thunder Canyon. Let me think about it and get back to you.”

  She looked happy he’d even consider taking her on. “I’d appreciate that. Are you sure you don’t want something to eat or drink?”

  “No, I’m going out for that walk.”

  Hopefully the Montana air would clear his head.

  When Brad and Emily went looking for the prospector at his cabin on Saturday, to Brad’s frustration, they couldn’t find him. The conversation the night before with Emily had caused a strain between them that was palpable, and they talked little. On Sunday morning, Brad had intended to try to reach Tildy Matheson instead of searching again for the prospector.

  However, after breakfast Emily requested the keys to the SUV.

  “Where are you going?” he asked.

  “To church.”

  After he was silent for a few moments, he said, “I’ll drive you.”

  Before they left he phoned the number Mark had given him for Tildy Matheson, but no one seemed to be home and he turned off his cell phone. No answer…They were batting zero.

  Dressing for church, Brad realized it had been years since he’d attended a service. He found peace settling around him as he drove into town. The steeple of the pretty white church reached high into the blue sky as clouds puffed around it. The building was located on north Main Street and although it wasn’t as old as the structures around the town hall, the cornerstone noted that it had been built in 1910.