Montana Mail-Order Wife Page 10

  “Not even a motorcycle is allowed,” Jordan said. “You have to use mountain bikes.”

  He cupped his hands to see through the wide windows of the cabin.

  Rachel’s neck ached from swiveling to appreciate the view. “What does the government do with all this land?”

  “Some’s set aside for campgrounds, wilderness hiking trails. Some is leased to logging companies that harvest the timber. Then the Forest Service replants. And it’s a sanctuary for wildlife.”

  “Like bears?” Rachel shuddered.

  “And deer, elk, moose, not to mention dozens of species of birds and small animals. See?” He pointed to a cluster of rocks directly below them. “Chipmunks.”

  “And over there, Dad.” Jordan pointed a few feet away. “Ground squirrels.”

  “It’s wonderful,” Rachel said. “I can understand why you wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.”

  “Want to see inside?” Wade asked.

  Jordan shook his head. “It’s padlocked.”

  Wade dug deep in his jeans pocket and pulled out a key. “The ranger from the Troy station dropped this off yesterday. Said we could spend the night in the cabin if we wanted.”

  “Wow, cool!” Jordan jumped up and down until Rachel could feel the tower swaying slightly beneath her feet.

  Wade must have read the alarm on her face. “It’s okay. The guy wires are rigged with some slack. Keeps the poles from snapping in a high wind.”

  He unlocked the padlock and opened the door. They stepped inside the fourteen-by-fourteen-foot room, but Rachel didn’t feel crowded in the small space. Not with wall-to-wall windows opening onto the panoramic view. A built-in bed filled one corner. Another held a table and chairs. Along one wall stood a tiny gas cookstove. Nothing obstructed the view. In the center of the room was a waist-high pedestal topped with a round metal circle.

  “What’s this?” Rachel asked.

  “A firefinder,” Wade explained. “See the map? The tower is in the exact center. If there’s a fire, the lookout can take an azimuth reading and call it in to the station. If another lookout gets a bead on the same fire, the ranger can pinpoint its exact location from where the readings cross.”

  Rachel looked around. “How could he call it in? There’s no phone.”

  “When the tower was manned,” Wade said, “the lookouts had two-way radios, their only connection with civilization for weeks at a time.”

  “Cool,” Jordan said.

  His father nodded. “But often lonely. Except for the occasional huckleberry pickers.”

  Rachel frowned. “But how did they live? There’s no running water. No electricity.”

  Wade laughed. “Conditions were rough, but tolerable. Water was stored in galvanized cans at the foot of the tower. Propane tanks fueled the stove and the lamps. And the Forest Service delivered groceries every few weeks.”

  “Dad said they took baths in a washtub,” Jordan said. He pointed toward a stand of trees near the road. “And the outhouse is down there.”

  Wade nodded. “My lookout friends called it ‘the hundred-yard dash.’”

  “Gosh,” Jordan said, “no TV. No computer. Bummer.”

  “What did they do for fun?” Rachel asked.

  Wade grinned. “Well, the lookouts I knew were honeymooners—”

  “Don’t go there,” Rachel said with a shake of her head and a glance at Jordan.

  Wade’s expression sobered. “The lookouts had to be on alert all day. They kept a constant vigil for any sign of smoke. The earlier a fire was detected, the easier it was to control.”

  “And at night?” Rachel asked.

  “If there were storms,” Wade explained, “they had to chart every lightning strike on the firefinder. Then they’d watch those spots for days to make sure a ‘sleeper’ didn’t flare up.”

  “Did they have to fight the fires?” Jordan asked.

  “Only if the fire was within hiking distance of the tower. Each lookout kept a smokechaser’s pack on hand with pick, shovel and rations, just in case.”

  Rachel sat cross-legged on the bed and gazed across to the snow-topped Cabinet Mountains. “Still, it must have been a wonderful way to spend the summer, being paid to live with this magnificent view.”

  “And an even better way to spend a honeymoon.” Wade’s gaze met hers, and she flushed, remembering their kiss on the mountainside.

  She wished she could remember more—remember her past. Then maybe she could make sense of the feelings tumbling inside her. She’d been enchanted by the Montana mountains. She couldn’t love Jordan more if he were her own flesh and blood. And Wade? She wanted to love him, but every time he seemed to open up to her, he slammed a door shut in her face. If she allowed her feelings for him to flourish, would she end up with a broken heart? He’d warned her from the first that love wasn’t part of the bargain he offered. But without love, how much of a bargain was it?

  “Wow! Look at that!”

  Jordan’s exclamation interrupted her thoughts. The boy pointed to the southwest horizon. Dark anvil-shaped clouds dwarfed the mountains and glided closer, like battleships in formation.

  “We’re in for a storm,” Wade said. “We’d better sit it out in the truck.”

  Jordan barely contained his excitement. “Aw, Dad, can’t we watch from here? We can track the lightning strikes, just like the lookouts did.”

  Wade raised his eyebrows and looked at Rachel. “You afraid of lightning?”

  Rachel had no past references to fall back on. “I don’t know…”

  “Please, Rachel,” Jordan begged. “It won’t hurt you. There’s a lightning rod on the roof. And you can stand on the special stool.”

  The boy dragged a small stool with glass insulators on its feet from beneath the table. In spite of the ominous clouds and the rumble of distant thunder, Rachel couldn’t deny Jordan his adventure. His eyes shone with excitement, and his slender body shivered with anticipation. Standing on tiptoe, at Wade’s instruction he aimed the firefinder at the foremost cloud. A gigantic bolt of lightning zigzagged from the sky and struck a distant ridge.

  “The ranch is gettin’ blasted,” Jordan said.

  “Make a note of the strikes.” Wade handed Jordan a pencil and notepad from his pocket. “We’ll check those areas for sleepers in a few days.”

  Jordan aimed the firefinder toward the ranch and scrawled azimuth readings. “Wow, that one wasn’t far from the barn.”

  Wade’s gaze met Rachel’s over the boy’s head. She couldn’t tell whether the light in his eyes was a glimmer of yearning or a flicker of light reflected from the lightning. Whatever the look had been, it disappeared as Wade bent over the map with his son and plotted lightning strikes. She was sure she hadn’t imagined it. More than electricity had crackled in the air between them during that brief moment, but Wade seemed determined to ignore it.

  Disappointed, she focused her attention on the weather raging outside and tried to ignore the whirlwind of emotions Wade triggered inside her.

  The storm swept up the mountain and engulfed the tower in pounding rain, obscuring the view.

  “Wow,” Jordan said, “I counted twenty-three strikes.”

  “Will they all start fires?” Rachel asked, glad for a neutral topic.

  “The rain will douse any surface fires,” Wade explained. “It’s the sleepers, the fires that burn in the hearts of trees for days until the wood dries out and the whole tree explodes, that will cause problems.”

  Unable now to track the lightning through the heavy downpour, Jordan sat on the bed and bounced a few times on the mattress, sending up a cloud of dust. “Can we sleep up here tonight, Dad?”

  Rachel glanced at Wade in alarm. The tiny cabin had appeared spacious until the storm shrouded the view. Now, in the darkness, it seemed small. And intimate. With her emotions shifting faster than the winds that buffeted the tower, sleeping in such close proximity to the man at the center of her turmoil didn’t seem such a good idea.


  “What about your camping project?” Wade said. “Don’t you have to sleep outdoors?”

  “Yeah,” Jordan said with a sheepish grin. “I forgot.”

  Rachel breathed a sigh of relief. Until her memory returned and she could sort out her feelings against that backdrop, she wanted to keep both physical and emotional distance from the all-too-enticing Wade Garrett.

  Once the storm cleared, they descended the tower stairs. Wade and Jordan searched for firewood while Rachel unpacked the provisions Ursula had supplied for their supper. Wade returned with an armload of only slightly damp wood and soon had a fire roaring in a circle of stones on the mountaintop. Rachel helped Jordan dice carrots and potatoes and add them to chunks of beef they had simmering in an iron pot.

  Near the fire was a large flat stone. Rachel covered it with a red-checkered cloth, and Jordan set out the plates. Wade disappeared for a few minutes, and when he returned, thrust a bouquet of colorful wildflowers he’d picked into her hands.

  Rachel flushed with pleasure. “Thank—”

  “Don’t go getting the wrong idea,” he said with a sharpness that made her wince.

  “The wrong idea?”

  “They’re for a centerpiece. That’s all. Don’t be reading any more into it.”

  Confused, Rachel pondered the uncomfortable expression that failed to dull the handsomeness of Wade’s rugged face. The man was a walking paradox. How could she determine how he felt about her when he didn’t appear to know himself?

  Jordan approached and eyed the flowers with disgust. “For Pete’s sake, Dad, this is a campout, not some fancy dinner.”

  “They’re wild flowers, so that makes them okay,” Rachel assured the boy with a smile. She turned her back on Wade, placed the flowers in a large plastic cup, filled it with water and placed it in the center of the rock.

  When she glanced at Wade again, he had gathered his composure and stopped looking like an awkward teenager at his first prom. “That’s right, son. Part of camping is learning the fauna and flora. This pink flower here, for instance, is a wild rose. And these berries are chokecherries.”

  Still smarting from Wade’s strange behavior, Rachel stirred the stew and watched as Wade and Jordan wandered down the ridge, identifying and discussing various plants. They were so alike, the boy a miniature version of the man, and she wondered fleetingly if she’d be around long enough to see Jordan grow as tall as his father. She’d have to make her mind up soon whether or not to accept Wade’s unorthodox proposal. She couldn’t remain forever in “houseguest” limbo at the ranch.

  AFTER SUPPER, to Jordan’s delight, Rachel declared the meal a success, the best stew she’d ever eaten.

  “When did you last eat stew?” Wade teased.

  “I can’t remem—” She returned his grin. “But I can guarantee no stew was ever as good as Jordan’s.”

  Wade winked at his son. “At least none of us has a bellyache. Not yet, anyway.”

  With his face lit up like Christmas, Jordan glowed with pleasure at his father’s teasing.

  After clearing away the plates, and pouring coffee for the grown-ups, they settled back against rocks near the fire and looked to the north, scanning the sky for signs of the aurora borealis.

  “Sometimes the northern lights can be spotted even this far south,” Wade said. “See those rose-colored streaks? They’ll show there after dark.”

  Rachel gazed at the black peaks silhouetted against the crimson sky, and sipped her coffee contentedly. She could choose a worse life, she thought, than spending the next ten years with Wade and Jordan Garrett. But could she choose a better one? And without her memory, how was she to tell?

  “Anybody know a story?” Wade asked.

  “Not stories,” Jordan begged. “Tell Rachel your jokes, Dad.”

  Wade’s dark eyes twinkled, and Rachel couldn’t help noticing that his shoulders were as broad and sturdy at the boulder he leaned against. “There was this traveling salesman and a farmer’s daughter—” he began.

  “Wade!” Rachel lifted her eyebrows and glanced at Jordan in alarm.

  “Just kidding,” Wade said with a slow grin that weakened her knees and made her glad she was sitting down. “What kind of jokes do you want, half-pint?”

  “Elephant jokes,” Jordan insisted.

  “Okay.” Wade looked to Rachel. “Stop me if you’ve heard these.”

  She snuggled back against the rock, enjoying herself. “Now I know you’re kidding. How would I remember?”

  Wade laughed, a hearty sound, if somewhat rusty from disuse. “One of the benefits of your amnesia. All jokes are fresh.”

  “Tell the joke, Dad.”

  “Do you know why elephants have flat feet?” Wade looked at Rachel expectantly.

  She shook her head. “I have no idea.”

  “From jumping out of palm trees,” Jordan answered with a giggle.

  His laughter was infectious, and Rachel joined in.

  “I have one,” Jordan said. “How can you tell if elephants have been in your refrigerator?”

  Wade looked puzzled, but from the glimmer in his eye, Rachel was certain he knew the answer. “Give up?” Jordan asked.

  Wade and Rachel nodded.

  “They leave footprints in the Jell-O.”

  The boy’s silliness was contagious. Rachel laughed in spite of herself.

  “I have another one,” Wade said. “Not an elephant joke, but a riddle. What’s big and purple and goes slam-slam-slam-slam?”

  Jordan’s forehead creased in thought. “What?”

  “A four-door grape.” Wade was warming to his role as jokemeister. For the first time since Rachel had met him, a burden seemed to have lifted from his shoulders.

  “Tell another,” Jordan begged when his giggles stopped.

  Wade thought a moment. “What’s big and black and dangerous and sits in a tree?”

  “A bear?” Rachel guessed. With a shiver, she glanced around uneasily and drew closer to the fire.

  “Good guess, but not the answer,” Wade said. “What’s big and black and dangerous? A crow with a machine gun.”

  With dizzying effect, a remembered joke burst into her consciousness, but she couldn’t recall its source. “I know one!”

  Wade looked at her, puzzled. “You remember?”

  “Uh-huh. It just popped into my head out of nowhere.”

  “Remember anything else?” Anxiety flickered in Wade’s eyes.

  Odd, Rachel thought. He looked as if he were afraid of her remembering. “What’s your joke?” Jordan asked, still chuckling over the crow with the machine gun.

  Rachel grinned at the boy. “What’s big and green and dangerous?”

  Wade and Jordan looked at each other and shrugged.

  “A thundering herd of pickles!” She joined in their laughter, and the sound reverberated off the rocks across the valley. A full moon had risen over Snowshoe Peak and bathed the mountain meadow where they sat in cool, silver light.

  “You’re neat, Rachel,” Jordan said when he’d caught his breath. “Are you going to be my mother?”

  Wade grew still. Rachel held her own breath, waiting for him to speak, afraid of saying the wrong thing. Jordan, sensing he’d stepped over a forbidden line, tensed and gazed anxiously at his father.

  “Rachel’s just visiting with us for now, Jordan. You shouldn’t ask personal questions.” The disapproval in Wade’s voice banished the warmth they had experienced with their ridiculous jokes. Jordan looked crushed, and Rachel had to restrain herself from reaching to hug him.

  “Tell me about my mama,” Jordan said to his father. He stuck his chin in the air, as if bracing for a blow. “How come you never talk about her?”

  Realizing the boy was treading on even more dangerous ground, Rachel stiffened. Ursula had warned that nobody at the ranch spoke of Maggie. Yet here was Jordan, blundering through a potential mine field with his questions.

  Pain etched Wade’s face, and for a moment, Rachel feared he
wouldn’t answer the boy. With his gaze fixed on the eastern mountains, he said in a voice strangely devoid of emotion, “You know we don’t talk about her.”

  Jordan’s tight shoulders tensed a notch, but he plowed ahead bravely. “I’ve never even seen her picture. Did she look like me?”

  A vein in Wade’s temple throbbed as if in agony. He pushed himself quickly to his feet and ground out words between his teeth. “Don’t ask anymore. I’m not answering.”

  He kicked a half-burned log deeper into the fire and stomped off into the darkness.

  Jordan’s face contorted with grief, and tears rolled down his cheeks. This time Rachel didn’t resist the urge to pull him into her arms.

  “He thinks I’m a sissy when I cry.”

  “Everybody needs a good cry now and then.”

  “He hates me,” Jordan sobbed.

  “No, he doesn’t.” She smoothed back the boy’s hair and wiped his tears with her shirtsleeve. “When someone you love dies, sometimes the pain of that loss is so bad, it hurts to talk about it. Someday your dad will tell you what you want to know. When he’s ready. Your father loves you.”

  “Yeah,” Jordan said with a sniff. “How come he never says so?”

  Rachel’s heart wrenched for the boy, and she drew him closer. “Maybe he just doesn’t know how.”

  Jordan pulled away and looked up at her with red-rimmed eyes. “It’s only three words. How hard can it be?”

  The knot in her throat kept her from answering. She hugged him again until she regained her voice. “It’s late, and you’ve had a busy day. Better turn in.”

  With head bowed and shoulders slumped, Jordan unrolled his sleeping bag and pulled off his boots. As he climbed between the down-filled covers, Rachel sat cross-legged beside him. “I’ll stay here until you fall asleep.”

  “Rachel,” he murmured in a voice still raspy with tears, “I wish you were my mom.”

  “Any woman would be proud to have you for a son, Jordan Garrett.” She kissed his tear-streaked cheek and pulled the sleeping bag up under his chin. “Sleep tight.”

  She sat with him until his even breathing signaled a deep sleep. Rising to her feet on stiff legs, she dusted off her jeans and headed toward the ridge where Wade had disappeared. She found him sitting on a rock, staring at the stars.