Christmas in Cold Creek. RaeAnne Thayne
have to pay a sitterâwhile Iâm working.â
They had been through this discussion before. Her arguments still didnât seem to convince Gabi.
âI can find her, you know.â
She gave a careful look around to make sure they werenât being overheard. âAnd then what? If sheâd wanted you with her, she wouldnât have left you with me.â
âShe was going to come back. How is she supposed to find us now, when you moved us clear across the country?â
Moving from Arizona to eastern Idaho wasnât exactly across the country, but she imagined it seemed far enough to a nine-year-old. She also wasnât sure what other choice sheâd been given because of the hand Monica had dealt her.
âLook, Gab, we donât have time to talk about this right now. You have to head to school and I have to return to my customers. I told you that if we havenât heard from her by the time the holidays are over, weâll try to track her down, right?â
âThatâs what you said.â
The girl didnât need to finish the sentence for Becca to clearly understand. Gabrielle had spent nine years full of disappointments and empty promises. How could Becca blame her for being slow to trust that her sister, at least, meant what she said?
âWeâre doing okay, arenât we? Schoolâs not so bad, right?â
Gabi slid out of the booth. âSure. Itâs perfect if you want me to be bored to death.â
âJust hide your book inside your textbook,â Becca advised. It had always worked for her, anyway, during her own slapdash education.
With a put-upon sigh, Gabi stashed her book into her backpack, slipped into her coat and then trudged out into the rain, lifting the flowered umbrella Becca had given her.
She would have liked to drive her sister the two blocks to school but she didnât feel she could ask for fifteen minutes off during the busiest time of the morning, especially when the Archuletas had basically done her a huge favor to hire her in the first place.
As she bused a table by the front window, she kept an eye on her sister. Between the umbrella and the red boots, the girl made a bright and incongruously cheerful sight in the gray muck.
She had no idea what she was doing with Gabi. Two months after sheâd first learned she had a sister after a dozen years of estrangement from her mother, she wasnât any closer to figuring out the girl. She was brash and bossy sometimes, introspective and moody at others. Instead of feeling hurt and betrayed after Monica had dumped her on Becca, the girl refused to give up hope that her mother would come back.
Becca was angry enough at Monica for both of them.
Two months ago sheâd thought she had her life completely figured out. She owned her own town house in Scottsdale. She had a job she loved as a real-estate attorney, she had a wide circle of friends, sheâd been dating another attorney for several months and thought they were heading toward a commitment. Through hard work and sacrifice, she had carved her own niche in life, with all the safety and security she had craved so desperately when she was Gabiâs age, being yanked hither and yon with a capricious, irresponsible con artist for a mother.
Then came that fateful September day when Monica had tumbled back into her life after a decade, like a noxious weed blown across the desert.
âOrder up,â Lou called from the kitchen. She jerked away from the window to the reality of her life now. No money, her career in tatters, just an inch or two away from being disbarred. The man sheâd been dating had decided her personal troubles were too much of a liability to his own career and had dumped her without a backward glance, she had been forced to sell her town house to clean up Monicaâs mess, and now she was stuck in a sleepy little town in southeastern Idaho, saddled with responsibilities she didnât want and a nine-year-old girl who wanted to be anywhere else but here.
Any minute now, somebody was probably going to write a crappy country music song about her life.
To make matters even more enjoyable, now sheâd raised the hackles of the local law enforcement. She sighed as she picked up the specials from Lou. Her life couldnât get much worse, right?
Even if Trace Bowman was the most gorgeous man sheâd seen in a long, long time, she was going to have to do her best to keep a polite distance from the man. For now, she and Gabi had a place to live and the tips and small paycheck she was earning from this job would be enough to cover the groceries and keep the electricity turned on.
They were hanging by a thread and Chief Bowman seemed just the sort to come along with a big old pair of scissors and snip that right in half.
Chapter Two
Trace leaned back in his chair and set his napkin beside his now-empty plate. âDelicious dinner, Caidy, as always. The roast was particularly fine.â
His younger sister smiled, her eyes a translucent blue in the late-afternoon November light streaming through the dining room windows. âThanks. I tried a new recipe for the spice rub. It uses sage and rosemary and a touch of paprika.â
âYou know sage in recipes doesnât really come from the sagebrushes out back, right?â
She made a face at the teasing comment from Traceâs twin brother, Taft. âOf course I know itâs not the same. Just for that, you get to wash and dry the dishes.â
âCome on. Have a little pity. Iâve been working all night.â
âYou were on duty,â Trace corrected. âBut did you go out on any actual calls or did you spend the night bunking at the firehouse?â
âThatâs not the point,â Taft said, a self-righteous note in his voice. âWhether I was sleeping or not, I was ready if my community needed me.â
The overnight demands of their respective jobs had long been a source of good-natured ribbing between the two of them. When Trace worked the night shift, he was out on patrol, responding to calls, taking care of paperwork at the police station. As chief of the Pine Gulch fire department and one of the few actual fulltime employees in the mostly volunteer department, Taftâs job could sometimes be quiet.
They might bicker about it, but Trace knew no other person would have his back like his twinâthough Caidy and their older brother, Ridge, would be close behind.
âCut it out, you two.â Ridge, the de facto patriarch of the family, gave them both a stern look that reminded Trace remarkably of their father. âYouâre going to ruin this delicious dessert Destry made.â
âItâs only boysenberry cobbler,â his daughter piped in. âIt wasnât hard at all.â
âWell, it tastes like it was hard,â Taft said with a grin. âThatâs the important thing.â
Dinner at the family ranch, the River Bow, was a heralded tradition. No matter how busy they might be during the week with their respective lives and careers, the Bowman siblings tried to at least gather on Sundays when they could.
If not for Caidy, these Sunday dinners would probably have died long ago, another victim of their parentsâ brutal murders. For a few years after that fateful time a decade ago, the tradition had faded as Trace and his siblings struggled in their own ways to cope with their overwhelming grief.
Right around the time Ridgeâs wife left him and Caidy graduated from high school and started taking over caring for the ranch house and for Destry, his sister had revived the traditional Sunday dinners. Over the years it had become a way for them all to stay connected despite the hectic pace of their lives. He cherished