A Cold Creek Christmas Surprise. RaeAnne Thayne

      Chapter One

      The River Bow had never seemed so empty.

      Ridge Bowman stomped snow off on the mat as he walked into the mudroom of the ranch house after chores. The clomping thuds of his boots seemed to echo through the big rambling log home he had lived in most of his life, but that was the only sound.

      He was used to noise and laughter—to his sister Caidy clanging dishes or singing along to the radio in the kitchen, to his daughter watching television in the family room or talking on the phone to one of her friends, to barking dogs and conversation.

      But Caidy was on her honeymoon with Ben Caldwell and Destry had gone to stay with her cousin and best friend, Gabi.

      For the first time in longer than he could remember, he had the house completely to himself.

      He didn’t much like it.

      He slipped out of his boots and walked into the kitchen. A couple of barks reminded him he wasn’t completely alone. He was dogsitting for Ben’s cute little pooch, a three-legged Chihuahua mix aptly named Tripod. Most of the dogs at the River Bow slept in the barn and lived outside, even Luke now—Caidy’s border collie, who had been injured the Christmas before—but Tri was small and a bit too fragile to hang with the big boys.

      The dog cantered into the mudroom and planted his haunches by the door.

      “You need to go out? You know you’re going to disappear in all that snow out there, right? And by the way, next time let me know before I take off my boots, would you?”

      He opened the door and watched the dog hop out with his funny gait to the small area off the sidewalk that Ridge had cleared for him.

      Tri obviously didn’t like the cold, either. He quickly took care of business then hopped back to Ridge, who stood in the doorway. The dog immediately led the way back toward the kitchen. Ridge followed, his stomach rumbling, wondering what he could scrounge from the leftover wedding food for breakfast. Maybe a couple of Jenna McRaven’s spinach quiche bites he liked so much, and there were probably a few of those little ham-and-cheese sandwiches. Ham was close enough to bacon, right?

      He managed to add a yogurt and a banana, missing the big, hearty, delicious breakfasts his sister used to fix for him. Fluffy pancakes, crisp bacon, hash browns that were perfectly brown on the outside.

      Those days were over now that Caidy was married. From here out, he would just have to either fend for himself—and Destry—or hire a housekeeper to cook his breakfast. Too bad Ben’s housekeeper, Mrs. Michaels, wanted to move back to be near her grandchildren in California.

      He was happy for his little sister and the future she was building with Pine Gulch’s new veterinarian. She had put her life on hold too long to help Ridge out here at the ranch after Melinda left. At the time—saddled with a baby he didn’t know what to do with, right in the middle of trying to rebuild the ranch after his parents’ deaths—he had been desperately grateful for her help. Now he was ashamed that he had come to rely on her so much over the years and hadn’t tried harder to insist she move out on her own years ago.

      She had found her way, though. She and Ben were deeply in love, and Caidy would be a wonderful stepmother to his children, Ava and Jack.

      All his siblings were happily married now. He was the last Bowman standing, which was just the way he liked it.

      He nibbled on one of Jenna’s delicious potato puffs then had to stop for a huge yawn. The obligations of running a ranch didn’t mix very well with wedding receptions and dances that ran into the early hours of the morning.

      “Is it still a disaster out there, Tri?”

      The little dog, curled up in a patch of morning sunlight trickling in from the window, lifted his head and flapped his tail on the kitchen tile, then went back to sleep, oblivious.

      Ridge knew from his walk down the stairs that morning that the kitchen was just about the only clean part of the house right now. Jenna’s catering crew had done a good job in here and had wanted to go to work on the rest of the house, but he hadn’t let them. He had also had to shove his sisters-in-law out the door at 2:00 a.m. when they started wandering around with garbage bags. He loved Becca and Laura dearly, but by then he just wanted everybody to go before he fell over, knowing he had to get up in three hours to start his day.

      Given