Montana Gift Page 7
BOOK #4: BLACK HILLS BACHELOR - A miner and a Hollywood princess? That sort of make-believe only happens in the movies.
Single by choice. That's what Mac McGannon tells himself. With both feet firmly on the ground--or in his family's gold mine beneath terra firma--Mac has no time for the "Hollywood types" that have invaded his hometown of Sentinel Pass. Even less for the beautiful TV "star" who needs his help. He fell for a pretty girl once and nearly lost everything—including his faith in the myth called love. Any attraction he feels is pure illusion. But try telling that to his little daughter who believes Morgana Carlyle is a real life princess.
Actors act. Morgana Carlyle doesn't let anyone peek beneath her glamorous, carefully crafted image--with good reason. She's a fraud. Her secret could derail the entire Sentinel Passtime production and—worse--break the hearts of a very special little girl and her father. The man she has no business loving. But try telling that to her heart.
BOOK #5: BLACK HILLS NATIVE SON - A journey of discovery brings him the son he never knew, and the woman he was meant to love.
Eli Robideaux’s vision quest takes him down a road he never wanted to walk—to the past. His mistakes—even the ones he made for the right reasons—have come back to haunt him. He doesn’t understand why, but stumbling across Char Jones feels like grabbing on to a lifeline that might keep him from falling into the bone-deep despair that had been his father’s ruin.
No one is more surprised than Char when the unrequited love of her life walks into her Black Hills store, looking for the missing pieces of himself. She holds the key to one of those pieces—the son Eli never knew they had, the baby she put up for adoption. Their journey could hold love and hope…or almost certain heartbreak.
BOOK #6: BLACK HILLS OUTCAST - Hiding out from life worked just fine…until he met Rachel.
Ask anyone in Sentinel Pass. They’ll confirm: Rufus Miller is an enigma. An outcast. A mystery man content to live and work in his Black Hills cabin with little or no contact with people. Where’d he come from? What’s his story? What’s a Dream House? Those answers are pure speculation...until marketing guru Rachel Grey shows up with plans to make Rufus’s art the next big thing.
Turning rustic artist Rufus Miller into a household name seems like a no-brainer—except for the fact the handsome recluse spurns the spotlight like…well, like a man with something to hide. Rachel isn’t sure what she’s gotten herself into but the chemistry between her and the Black Hills mountain man seems worth the gamble because the people of Sentinel Pass have overlooked one important fact completely: Rufus Miller is hot!
BOOK #7: BLACK HILLS WHITE KNIGHT - A white knight? Hardly. His suit is Armani--not armor.
A-list agent William Hughes leaves high drama to his Hollywood A-list friends and clients. There’s only room for one crusader in the family and that role falls to his saintly mother, a doctor who has devoted her life to the children of the world…seeming to forget she has a son of her own. But one tragic missed opportunity to help a friend still haunts him. So, when asked to fly Daria Fontina and her two daughters to a safe house in the Black Hills, William doesn’t hesitate.
When push comes to physical abuse, Daria Fontina knows she has no choice but to leave her powerful politician husband. Fear for her children’s safety makes escaping to her grandfather’s home the Black Hills her only option. But putting their lives and safety in the hands of a handsome Englishman with a jet seems like jumping from the frying pan into the fire. Her rescuer might not be riding a white horse, but he seems prepared to take on whatever army her estranged politician husband sends after her. A woman could fall for a man like that—even a woman who has no intention of falling in love again. Ever.
BOOK #8: BLACK HILLS RANCHER - Picking the right twin to be a role model for his daughter should be easy--not dangerous.
A stunt-woman? Cade Garrity’s new short-term tenant risks life and limb for a living? Oh, hell, no. The Black Hills rancher is a single dad with an impressionable young daughter who’s recently expressed an interest in bull riding. Cade married a woman who put her need for excitement ahead of her family and it killed her. He's not about to go down that road again. But when Jessie Bouchard drops out of the sky into his arms, he realizes he can’t let her go. Despite what people think, Jessie doesn't have a death wish. She knows the only way to handle fear is to face it head on. She's convinced herself that living in the moment is enough--until she meets Cade and his daughter, Shiloh. But even if she did believe she deserved the kind of love Cade has to offer, the stalker who’s trying to kill her might make sure she never gets the chance.
BOOK #9: BLACK HILLS STRANGER - He’s no stranger to her. He’s her dream lover and worst nightmare combined.
His child is missing.
Jonas Galloway has a lot of nerve asking for help from Remy Bouchard—his high school sweetheart whose heart he broke after a terrible lie destroyed their hopes for a future together. But his seven-year old daughter, Birdie, has disappeared and Remy is the only one he trusts to find her—after all, Remy’s unique abilities saved his life when he was a child.
Remy’s in Louisiana to tie up loose ends before going back to her new life in the Black Hills—a fresh start that doesn’t include the baggage of her so-called “gift.” She hasn’t seen Jonas in years, but the man she finds on her porch begging for help still has a spot in her heart—one filled with pain and regret. She’d never let the past stop her from helping him find his daughter, but what Jonas is asking is too much. He wants her to embrace the very thing that’s made her different—too different to love.
BOOK #10: BLACK HILLS LEGACY: THE INHERITANCE -
Are you a “Christmas any time of the year” sort of reader? If so, please check out CALEB’S CHRISTMAS WISH.
How far would you go for the sake of a child?
The lines in Miami financier Jake Westin’s world are crisp and easy to delineate: black and red, profit and loss. On paper. Until the day after Thanksgiving when Allison Jeffries—a woman he’s heard about for four and a half years but never met—calls to tell him the world they’ve shared from opposite sides of the country will never be the same. Pam and Kenny Rydell–Jake’s best friend and only link to the “bad ol’ days” of his youth—died in a car accident on the way to a Sierra ski resort, leaving their son, Caleb, with his grandmother, who upon hearing the news of her only daughter’s death went into cardiac arrest. In an instant, Caleb’s godparents–two grieving strangers who never imagined the worst-case scenario becoming a reality—must decide how to best care for the little boy they both love.
Jake is determined to do the right thing for Caleb–even if that means facing demons from his own loss-filled childhood and dealing with the woman Kenny called “a sweetheart but wound too tight for her own good.” Allison suffers no illusion that she’d make a good mother. After all, hasn’t she let her computer business fill the gap left by a failed marriage and aborted pregnancy? But she’ll do anything in her power to give her godson the life Pam intended for her son–even if that means sharing a house with the charismatic stranger Pam teasingly called “Jake the Rake–a broken heart waiting to happen.”
Like you, I love romance. Please celebrate romance with me and four other wonderful authors for FREE. Consider CELEBRATE ROMANCE II our “thank you” for reading.
We so appreciate your kind reviews that can help other readers find new authors.
CELEBRATE ROMANCE features five heartwarming stories celebrating romance from these five acclaimed authors:
Man of the House by Linda Barrett
One Star-Spangled Night by Rogenna Brewer
Love And All The Trimmings by Barbara McMahon
My Christmas Angel by Debra Salonen
Head Over Heels by Chris Keniston
Start reading MONTANA MAVERICK for FREE
CHAPTER ONE
* * *
"It was a dark and stormy night."
The seven words taunted Meg from the blank, white page of he
r new document. The curser flashed. Flashed. Flashed.
"Type more inanities," it silently mocked.
Meg Zabrinski shook her head and laughed.
"If I can't do better than that, I might as well not even start," she muttered.
She used the delete key to erase the words, and then set her laptop on the low table beside her recliner and got up. She'd been sitting for fifteen minutes trying to find the right opening to the young-adult novel she wanted to write. The one she'd told everyone she planned to write while on sabbatical from her job as a tenured professor of science and ecology at the University of Montana.
She paced back and forth in front of the fireplace, rubbing her chilly hands to keep the blood moving.
So maybe hiding out in a snowbound cabin high on a mountain in western Montana wasn't the best idea, but she had to do something before her entire life passed her by.
Did that sound desperate? Probably.
Was she?
Yes. Yes, she was. Desperate to do the one thing she couldn't do alone. Have a baby.
And she knew herself well enough to know that if she'd been in Missoula right now, she'd have dumped the writing project by the wayside to begin the IVF--In Vitro Fertilization process. She'd done the research. She had the money. She wouldn't be forty for another year. If she started soon enough, she could have a baby before her next birthday in November. But...
Did she really, truly, honestly want to be a single mom? That was the question she planned to answer while she wrote her book.
Am I cut out to raise a child alone? That was the other question she had to answer.
Not that she wouldn't have the support of her family. The Zabrinskis rallied like few others when one of their own needed help. But at the end of the day, she'd be the one who had to handle all the demands--especially the emotional side of child rearing--without a mate.
Her sister was a single mom now. And Mia would be the first to admit motherhood was tough and parenting alone sucked at times.
Both Mia and their younger brother, Paul, who also was divorced, had had partners when their children were babies. What Meg was considering involved purchasing sperm from an anonymous donor. If the procedure worked, she'd be alone from the conception to delivery...and everything that came later.
A fierce gust of wind hit the thick, extremely well insulated walls of her log home, drawing her attention away from her dilemma. She walked toward the picture window, now hidden behind heavy, lined drapes. She felt the temperature drop just by reaching between the folds of material to peek outside.
A blast of white hit the glass making her blink. "Oh," she said, shivering. "One of those."
Montana came by its reputation for fierce winter storms honestly. This storm first arrived as shaved ice pellets--the kind that burn when it touched unprotected skin. Meg knew because she'd been topping off her firewood when the first ice crystals hit.
She stepped closer to the glass and pulled the curtains tight behind her so she could see into the night without the reflection of the light obscuring her view. Thirty-foot pines encircled her home site. Smaller babies, some already ten feet tall, bowed to the weight of the snow like peasants stooped with heavy loads on their backs. The dusk-to-dawn light at the peak of her garage roof shown like a pale white strobe.
"What a terrible night," she murmured, hurrying back to the warmth of the fire. No one in his or her right mind would go into that tempest on purpose.
Suddenly, an idea for the opening of her story began to take shape in her mind. She added another log on the fire and closed the door of the energy-efficient stove then walked to her chair.
As she reached for her laptop, she heard a peculiar, unnatural, high-pitched whine that made the hair on the back of her neck stand up.
The wind?
She opened her laptop to the blank page of her word processing program. She knew what she wanted to write but getting started was driving her mad.
Maybe all those people who told me I couldn't write a novel were right, she thought.
"Maybe I should stick to teaching," she murmured.
But her characters--children based on the Big Sky Mavericks--were so alive in her imagination. The four main protagonists may have been founded on Meg and her siblings, but somewhere along the way, they'd become unique individuals with important stories to tell.
Some nights their chatter kept her awake. She'd filled a notebook with handwritten notes and scenes and descriptions. She'd ignored them as long as she could. Now was her time.
She rested her fingers on exactly the right place on the keyboard and started to type:
Jonah had a message to deliver.
Death was coming. Not the single act of the cold steely Grim Reaper. No. A massive fireball as loud and fierce as a small bomb. It would take out everyone in its path.
If the children he'd been sent to protect were going to survive, they needed to run.
Now.
Suddenly, a boom, louder and scarier than the explosion in her imagination, made her house shiver. Added to the cry of the wind came a horrible screech of metal, like the hands of God twisting a bridge above her head.
Meg pressed backward into her chair, hands clenching the armrests.
Avalanche?
Her heart beat so loudly in her ears she couldn't distinguish between the natural fierceness of the story and whatever else was going on in the skies above her.
She bolted from the chair to race to the door off the kitchen. Bracing for the worst, she stepped into the unheated mudroom. The outer door handle burned with cold, but she wrenched it open and looked outside.
No distant rumble of ice and death shaking the ground. Whatever triggered that sound, it wasn't an avalanche.
She cocked her head and closed her eyes to listen beyond the wind. An engine. An engine in trouble. Whatever the engine propelled--an airplane or helicopter, she assumed, was falling from the sky.
Death was coming. And it wasn't the death of her imagination.
She cupped the sides of her eyes and strained to squint into the dark gray of the storm. Although she couldn't see a single thing, the hair on the back of her neck rose, as the horrible grind of an engine seizing grew closer.
The mechanical scream of rotors frozen told her the aircraft was a helicopter.
"Dear God, please let whoever is on board be safe. If it's their time, take them swiftly. Don't make them suffer."
The chance of a direct hit wasn't high, but she grabbed the wood railing with her bare hands and hung on tight. Seconds later the crippled chopper reached the trees.
The crashing sounds continued for longer than Meg thought possible. When the worst of the sounds had diminished, she tried her other senses to get a bead on the crash site. If she had to guess, she'd put it at a mile or more to the north. Smell revealed nothing--hopefully, it was too wet to burn.
She hurried inside and raced for her phone. Her hands were too cold to function at first. She blew on them impatiently then, finally, managed to tap out: 911.
Luckily, the installation of two cell towers, one on her side of the mountain and the other on a peak directly across from her provided remarkably good cellular reception.
"Hello? This is Dr. Mary Margaret Zabrinski. I'm wintering in my cabin at seven thousand feet. There's just now been a crash nearby. Helicopter, I think. I couldn't see anything, but I heard it coming through the trees. There may be fatalities. Are you aware of an aircraft in this area?"
The dispatcher was calm, dispassionate, as she was no doubt trained to be. She was also honest. "Yes, ma'am, we had a distress signal from a helicopter in your area and lost communication a few minutes ago."
"I’m guessing the bird went down a mile or two north and west of me. Will a recovery team be on its way soon?"
The pause that followed made Meg look at her phone to see if she still had a connection. "Um...ma'am, I don't know how bad this storm is where you're at, but we got hit with ice like you wouldn't believe two hours b
efore the snow started. Everything here is grounded. Even some of our plows are in trouble."
"But you have to do something. If they're alive, they'll freeze to death. "
"Ma'am, I'm sorry. There's nothing we can do."
"Well, there's something I can do."
"No." A man's voice came on the line, forceful and authoritative. "This is SAR Commander Kenneth Morrison. I am ordering you to stand down. Stay where you are. The last thing we need to do is recover another victim tomorrow, which will be the soonest anybody can get there. If there are survivors, they'll be sheltered from the storm tonight and we will get to them at first light."
Kenneth Morrison. Ken. How long had it been since she heard that voice? Twenty years? Her stomach flipped and a cold chill raced down her spine. He'd led a six-student wilderness survival course the summer after Meg's freshman year of college. He'd singled her out almost from the start. And she'd fallen for his line like the inexperienced, vulnerable nineteen-year-old she was.
She found out later that "Meg Z" had made his Summer Survival Hot Babes list--Ken's brag sheet that he posted for everyone to see. At the time, humiliation and embarrassment had added to the sense of disconnect she'd felt with her peers.
But she wasn't a nineteen-year-old virgin any longer. And she sure as hell wasn't taking orders from a minor despot like Ken Morrison. "You'll be too late," she said, hurrying to her bedroom.
"Oh, come on, Meg. What can you possibly do, except make matters worse?"
"Maybe nothing. But I sure as hell can't sit here twiddling my thumbs, Ken." Too snide? Not possible.
The man groaned. Loudly. "I know how pig-headed you are when it comes to wolves, Meg, but don't throw away your life on another hopeless cause."
That fall when she returned to classes, the realization that she'd let Ken Morrison make a fool out of her prompted her to get involved with a new cause: the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone National Park. In part, because she'd always felt an affinity for the wolf -- she must have read Julie of the Wolves a dozen times -- but, the other reason for her newfound passion was remembering how Ken had gone on and on about how detrimental wolves would be to his part of south-western Montana.