A Cold Creek Secret, page 12
He was entirely too drawn to this Mimi and for the first time he could remember, he wasn't looking forward to returning to duty. If he could have dragged this time out longer, he would have tried to figure out a way, but he knew he only had three days left here before he flew out.
He only needed a little perspective, he thought. He had spent just about every waking moment of the last two days with Mimi. Once he was away from her, he would be able to shift his priorities where they should be. The Army had been his life since he was eighteen years old, and a few magical days with a beautiful woman couldn't shake that.
Through the glass door of the woodstove, he watched the flames lick at the log and Brant decided this would be a good time to escape, while the opening credits of the next movie had just started to roll.
"Go ahead and watch this one without me. I'm going to go feed the animals and check on Gwen's place, then I'll come back inside and fix some dinner for us."
Mimi didn't answer him and he turned around to find she was asleep, her long dark lashes fanning those high cheekbones and one arm tucked around Simone, who was curled up beside her on the sofa.
The little white bichon frise opened one black eye when she felt Brant's scrutiny and he could swear she grinned at him.
Yeah, he figured he'd be grinning, too, if he were snuggled up against all that warmth and softness.
One of Mimi's dark curls had drifted across her cheek and he reached a hand to push it out of the way, then froze, his hand extended.
He had to get out of here. Now, before he did something inordinately stupid like sit down beside her, pull her against him and wake her by kissing that delectable mouth. He had to go, even if that only meant escaping to the barn for a while.
Leaving the television buzzing softly, he moved with as much stealth as he could muster to the mudroom off the kitchen, where his winter gear hung.
A few moments later, he was outside in the icy air. The sun was setting in a blaze of orange and purple and the ranch glowed with that particularly beautiful slant of winter light that turned everything rosy and soft.
When he reached the barn, he turned back to look at the ranch house, sprawling and unpretentious in the sunset.
Even in the worst years, when his family life had been in tatters, he had loved the house and the ranch, with the creek running just a short distance away and the mountains a solid, reassuring presence in the background.
He had dreaded coming home during those years when his father had turned cruel and bitter but he had never blamed the ranch for that. Even in the worst of it, he still hadn't wanted to leave. Guff Winder practically had to drag him away and those first few months at Winder Ranch he had cried himself to sleep just about every night after Quinn was asleep in the room they'd shared.
Eventually he had settled into the routine of life with the Winders and having an instant older brother and then Cisco a few months later. The six years he spent at Winder Ranch were the most peaceful of his life.
Peace.
He remembered Mimi saying she felt peace and serenity at the ranch. As he gazed at his home, he realized that was the indefinable emotion that seeped through him when he was with her.
She soothed him, in a way he couldn't explain. He let out a long breath. That made absolutely no sense but here in the pure clarity of dusk, he didn't see how he could deny it.
He had come home for leave with an aching heart, guilty and grieving at his own failures that had cost good men their lives. He knew he would always regret the ambush, that he hadn't trusted his instincts that something was wrong, but these days with Mimi had distracted him from brooding over it. When he was with her, he could release the pain of regret for a little while and focus on the gift of the moment.
He sighed. What good was it to get away from her physically by coming outside if he couldn't shake her from his mind? With renewed determination, he headed into the barn, resolved to focus on the mundane for a while.
An hour later, he had finished the regular chores and was busy at the woodpile, replenishing Gwen's supply of split logs, when he heard the sound of a vehicle approaching the house.
Easton had said she would stop by sometime tonight or tomorrow. Assuming it was her, he set the split log carefully on the stack, then headed around the corner of the house just in time to find Jake Dalton holding open the passenger door of an SUV and reaching inside to help his wife climb out.
The tenderness of Jake's concern for Maggie warmed Brant. She deserved a safe haven after the hell she'd been through and it looked as if she had found it.
He reached them just before they headed up the stairs. "Hey, Doc. Maggie," he said with a smile.
"Hey, you." Maggie smiled back. "How's our patient?"
"She's had a pretty calm time the last few days. No more cramps. She was sleeping when I came outside an hour ago."
"Just what she needs to be doing," Jake said. "I'll go check on her, if you don't mind."
"Go ahead," Brant said.
Before Jake went inside, he sent Maggie a look loaded with meaning that flew right past Brant.
"Come on inside," he said. "Do you need help up the stairs?"
She shook her head. "I get around pretty well these days. Stairs don't bug me nearly as much as they used to."
To prove the truth of her words, she moved up the porch steps with smooth, easy movements.
Inside, he expected her to follow her husband immediately to Mimi, but she grabbed his arm in the entryway.
"So Mimi's doing better. How about you?"
He flashed her a searching look, wondering at the concern in her eyes. "Fine. I'm not the patient here."
"Easton told me you've had a rough time in Afghanistan in the last month. That you lost some friends."
He sighed. He hadn't intended to say anything to anyone about the failed mission, but Easton had cornered him the night before the wedding and wiggled it out of him.
"Easton's got a big mouth."
"You know East. She worries about you. But she's not talking around town about you, I promise. She wouldn't have even mentioned it to me, I think, except we bumped into each other at the grocery store. I think she thought I might have some insight into the situation because of, well, my past. She was worried about you since you seemed more stoic than usual. Which is saying something, by the way."
He didn't want to talk about this right now, but he didn't know how to avoid it. He could understand why Easton would think Maggie had a special perspective on the situation after her own military experience and losing her leg in Afghanistan.
"I'm doing okay. Things have been…better the last few days." That was as close as he would come to admitting that Mimi had helped him, without even knowing it.
"What happened? She didn't know details."
"Ambush in a little village in the Paktika Province. I was supposed to meet a high-level contact who insisted on giving his information only to a high-ranking officer. We had intel that the village where the meet was supposed to take place was safe, so I picked twelve of my best men to come with me. The intel was wrong."
He had a memory flash of shouts and screams, civilians caught in the middle of what turned into an intense fight for their lives. "We drove straight into it. My team fought back but in the firefight, three good men died."
"Did you do anything wrong?" she finally asked.
He sighed. Trust Maggie to hit the heart of the matter. "Strategically and militarily, no. I followed protocol to the letter and we had duplicate intelligence that said the area had been cleared of insurgents and any IEDs. But I should have listened to my gut. My instincts were telling me the situation was off, that the contact wasn't trustworthy, and I ignored them."
Her features were soft with a compassion he didn't want to see right now. "And of course you're blaming yourself for the deaths of your men."
His throat felt tight but he ruthlessly crammed the emotions down. "Of course. Wouldn't you?"
She was silent for a long moment and then she reached between them and squeezed his hand. "My first month in Kabul, I cried myself to sleep every night, until you and Nate came to visit me. Do you remember that?"
"I do." He somehow managed a smile, though it wasn't easy. He and Nate Cavazos, a fellow Ranger and Pine Gulch native, hadn't been in the same company but both happened to be deployed in Afghanistan at the same time as Maggie and they'd been able to coordinate leave so they could all meet up a few times.
"Do you remember what you said to me? 'Mag, if being here doesn't scare the hell out of you, then something's wrong with your head.' And you told me only an idiot would be too afraid to talk to somebody when they were hurting or scared. I finally confessed to my commanding officer how terrified I was and he was able to say all the right things to help me through it. I never would have gone to him if you hadn't nudged me in that direction. So I'm going to throw your words back at you. Don't be an idiot, okay? I know you only have a few days before you head back, but if you need to talk, you know where I am."
"Right."
"Nate's here, too, you know. You could talk to him if you'd rather."
"Yeah, I drove past him the other day while he was shoveling snow out at the old Hirschi place but it was the day I brought Mimi to the clinic so I didn't have a chance to talk. How's he doing?"
Brant knew Nate's world had changed radically six months earlier when his sister and her husband had died, leaving him guardian of his two nieces. He'd left the military to take up his responsibilities and Brant had been meaning to catch up with him ever since.
"Did you know he's getting married?" Maggie asked.
"Really?"
"Yes, to a woman from Virginia who stayed at his guest ranch over Christmas."
"No kidding? I hadn't heard."
She grinned, looking very much like the girl he remembered from school. "Then you also don't know the truly juicy gossip."
"Do tell," he said dryly.
"Turns out his guest—and now his fiancée—is actually Hank Dalton's illegitimate daughter."
"Poor thing."
Just about everybody in Pine Gulch had hated Hank Dalton, Jake's father—Maggie most of all.
But instead of agreeing with him, she only smacked his shoulder. "Since Hank's been dead for years, Emery gets all the benefits of being a Dalton without having to ever deal with him. Wade, Jake and Seth are over the moon to have a sister after all these years. You should have seen them all yelling and carrying on when she and Nate came over with the girls on New Year's Eve to tell everyone."
"I'm sorry I missed that."
Instead of spending New Year's surrounded by neighbors and the scents of home, he had been in Afghanistan planning a mission that would end up taking his friends' lives.
Unexpectedly, as if sensing his train of thought, Maggie reached to give him a hug and he felt those emotions jumble together inside him all over again. "You'll be okay, Brant. Just give it time."
"Thanks, Mag."
"Anytime, Major." She stepped away. "Enough of that. Let's go see how your patient's doing."
As she walked toward the family room with barely a limp, he thought he would like to have even a small portion of Maggie's courage and strength to face his own battles.
* * *
Dr. Dalton removed his stethoscope from her abdomen and pulled Mimi's sweater back down to cover her skin. "A strong and healthy heartbeat. I can't make any promises, but so far everything looks normal. Perfect, even. I have high hopes that you'll have an uneventful pregnancy from here on out."
A weight she hadn't realized had been pressing down on her heart for two days seemed to lift at his words.
"Oh, thank you. Thank you so much," she exclaimed just as the doctor's lovely dark-haired wife walked in with Brant.
Mimi wasn't really aware of doing it but she must have reached for Major Western's hand. He was at her side in an instant.
"Brant, Dr. Dalton says the baby still has a healthy heartbeat," she said. "For now, everything is okay with the pregnancy. Since I've had no more cramping, he thinks we might be past the immediate danger."
Relief washed across his clean-cut, handsome features. "That's wonderful news."
To her surprise, he hugged her and she returned the embrace, giddy joy bursting through her.
As she lifted her head, she caught a raised-eyebrow sort of look pass between Dr. Dalton and his wife. With considerable chagrin, she realized she and Brant were acting like more like a happy couple than the casual acquaintances they should have been.
Her heart ached with the knowledge that she didn't want to be only casual acquaintances with him, especially after these magical few days. She wanted so much more from him, even though she knew the dream was impossible.
She eased away from the embrace and forced herself to turn back to the physician. "I can't thank you enough for coming out to check on things. I thought house calls went the way of rotary phones and beehive hairdos."
"We're still a little old-fashioned here in Pine Gulch when necessary," Dr. Dalton said.
"Well, I'm very indebted to you both."
She didn't know how she would repay them but she would figure out a way. Perhaps a generous donation to their clinic so they could continue the practice Brant told her about of providing free or reduced care twice a month to patients without health insurance.
"Thank you," she repeated, though the words seemed woefully inadequate.
"I was just about to heat up some lasagna from the freezer for dinner if you two have time to stick around," Brant said.
"We can't," Maggie said regretfully. "The kids have been at Caroline and Wade's all afternoon playing with their cousins and we need to get them home. Thank you for the offer, though."
"You're welcome. Thanks for stopping by. I owe you," Brant said.
"Remember what I said," Maggie murmured to Brant, piquing Mimi's curiosity. "Don't be an idiot."
His mouth lifted in a small smile. "More than usual, you mean? I appreciate the advice, Mag."
She hugged him tightly then kissed his cheek. "If we don't see you again before you ship out, take care of yourself over there, Major."
"I'll do my best," he answered, then shook Dr. Dalton's hand before walking them to the door.
Everyone liked Brant, she realized. There was something so reassuring about him and that air of competence and quiet integrity about him. She wanted to just curl up against him and let him take care of all her troubles. Did others sense it, too?
"What was Maggie talking to you about so seriously?" she asked when he returned to the living room. "What did she think you were being an idiot about?"
That muscle worked in his jaw. "She thinks I'm on edge because of what happened to my men."
"Are you?"
"I'm fine," he said abruptly. "I'm going to go heat up the lasagna. I think I've got some rolls in the freezer. I'll grab some of those, too."
She didn't like the shuttered look on his features or the way he seemed so careful about avoiding her gaze, but if he preferred to confide in Maggie Dalton, Mimi couldn't do anything about it.
* * *
Dinner turned out to be an awkward affair, something she wouldn't have expected at all after the easy camaraderie they'd slipped into the past two days.
Brant was mostly silent, though he ate with the single-minded energy she had come to realize was probably characteristic of a battlefield warrior who wasn't certain when he would find his next meal.
After dinner, she played with Simone for a while, running through the little dog's limited bag of tricks. The dog seemed to have picked up on the tension between the two of them. She was restless, sniffing in all the corners of the room and insisting on going out three or four times until Brant finally picked her up and stood by the window, petting her and looking out into the night.
"Want to watch something?" Mimi asked. "Or you could give me a chance to win back my fortune in toothpicks."
He shook his head and returned to his window-gazing. When he finally turned back, his features were tight, his mouth a hard, implacable line.
She thought he was angry at something, until she saw his eyes and she had to catch her breath at the anguish there.
"I told you that a month ago three of my men were killed in a botched operation."
"Yes."
He let out a long breath, as if all the air in his lungs had turned sour. "I didn't tell you it was my fault they were killed."
"Oh, Brant. I'm sure that's not true. You were doing your job."
"I was. But I put them in that village. I ordered them there as my security detail. I should have sensed we were heading straight into an ambush."
She didn't know what to say, how to comfort him. What did she know about warriors and their demons? But she sensed he needed to talk and she could provide that, if nothing else.
"Maggie told me I should talk to someone about what I've been going through. She thinks that will help me work it out in my head. I want to just forget everything but…somehow it seems important that you know."
She held her breath as she heard the emotion behind his words. He was not a man who leaned on others willingly. She sensed it without any real evidence to back it up, yet he wanted to share his grief and sorrow with her.
Why? She was flighty Mimi Van Hoyt, jumping from scandal to scandal and crisis to crisis. What would he possibly think she could offer that might help him?
But he was trusting her with this. She was important enough to him that he wanted her to know the things that were troubling him.
The weight of that trust burned inside her. She mattered to him and she couldn't bear the idea of letting him down.
"I haven't been sleeping well since the ambush. Things have been…rough." He gave her a long look she couldn't quite interpret. "Until you came along."
"What do you mean?"
"I don't know why. There's no logical explanation. But since you've been here, everything seems…easier."
She stared at him, heat fluttering through her. How was she supposed to respond to that? She didn't have the first idea what to say. Acting purely on instinct, she crossed the room to where he stood by the window, looking out at the black winter night. She took Simone from his arms and set the dog on the carpet, where she sniffed her disapproval but trotted to the rug by the fire as Mimi took her place, wrapping her arms around him.
