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She dragged her gaze from the window and exhaled slowly. Today wasn’t the day to be hanging on to the ghosts of her past.
The snow had come fast, and it was staying, three feet deep from the looks of it on either side of the driveway. With a sigh, she reached for the long puffer coat hung by the door and slipped it on while angling into her Kodiak boots. She laced them up good and tight, pulled a hat over her hair and gloves on her hands, and headed out to shovel the porch. Treat Daniels had been by hours earlier and made a couple of passes of the driveway with his rig, so that was fine, but she had about forty-five minutes of elbow grease before the porch and walkway were cleared.
The sun was shining down on that million-dollar view. If it was any other day, Millie would be content. Happy. Whistling a tune and singing to the wilderness. But nothing about this day was normal or good or anything like the other three hundred and nineteen days before it.
And to think she’d had such high hopes for the year, way back in January when things were new and fresh and the only Bridgestones who mattered, Bent and Ryland, were in her life. Who knew that by mid-November, it would all be for nothing. Because even though she’d gotten good news the night before about Bent, the fact that in less than a few hours Cal would be home made her twitchy. Hell, twitchy wasn’t the right word for it, but she didn’t want to verbally give the ball of nerves in her stomach anything better.
It pissed her off that she felt anything after all this time.
Millie decided not to think about Cal or Ivy, or anyone connected to him, until she had to. And really, for all she knew, Millie was worrying over nothing. Once Cal found out that Bent would be okay eventually, that his brain was functioning like it should and all his limbs were intact, he’d probably hop back on that big old plane of his and disappear as quick as he’d come.
Cal was good at that. Disappearing into the night without a word. Without so much as a…
“Cut it out, Mills,” she muttered as she tossed the last shovel full of snow over the railing. She squinted into the distance at the mountain range that disappeared into snow-heavy clouds, at the forests that fell away from the mountains and all that was between there and her place, and then to a slow-moving vehicle coming up the hill, a large black Chevy. She recognized it and, with the first smile of the day touching the corners of her mouth, pulled off her hat and shook out her long, wavy hair. The air was cold, but not terrible, and she’d gotten warm with all that shoveling.
When the truck pulled into her driveway, she leaned against the railing and waited. Within moments, the door opened, and Mike Paul appeared, an easy grin on his face as he walked toward her. Long legs made quick work of the distance, and he paused at the bottom of her porch. His dark eyes glittered from beneath the brim of his faded Yankees ball cap, and the lower half of his face was covered in a thick, though neatly trimmed, beard. His hair, on the long side, peeked out from the hat and curled around his coat collar. He was a handsome guy, no doubt about it, and the fact of the matter was, Mike Paul knew it. The man had been born with movie-star looks, a smile that didn’t quit, and the kind of charm that could make a woman lose her clothes faster than a bottle of tequila. There was a trail of broken hearts in Big Bend to prove it.
“You had your coffee yet?” he asked.
“Three cups.”
“You got any more in there?”
“No, but I can put on a pot.”
“Sounds good.”
Mike Paul followed her into the big cabin and took a seat at the kitchen counter while she brewed up another pot. She’d known him her whole life, and, along with Cal and Ivy, they’d been inseparable. But over the last few years, after Cal left and took Ivy with him, she and Mike Paul had gotten closer. There was a time she thought he would come to mean more to her, but one night after closing time and too much Jack and Coke, a disastrous kiss had let them both know there were no romantic strings pulling them together. No, sir. Millie Sue was attracted to a different kind of poison.
Cal Bridgestone.
“They’re back.” His voice was low, and she froze, glancing over her shoulder. “About an hour ago. I saw the plane on the private runway outside of Bozeman.”
“There are lots of private planes coming into Bozeman every day.” She kept her voice light as she measured out the grinds.
“Yeah, but they don’t have a bull on the side.”
“A bull?”
Mike nodded and made a gesture with his hands. “Big one. Dangling a gold record from its……”
She turned around and raised an eyebrow.
“Horns,” Mike replied with a grin.
“God, he’s so…” Anger punched through her as she waited for the coffee to brew. Irritated with herself, Millie took a few seconds and then exhaled. She shouldn’t be mad about a damn bull on the side of a plane.I shouldn’t feel anything.
Which was why she was mad. When would the day come that she felt nothing? She crossed over to the cupboard and grabbed two new mugs.
“He’s so…?” Mike Paul prompted.
“So…so full of himself.” The words exploded like bullets erupting from her chest.
“I suppose if you sell as many records as Cal does, you’d have a bull on the side of your private plane too.”
“Downloads.”
“Huh?”
