He seemed like a good man. She should have asked him more questions about his life, but Dottie shooed them all off to bed so quickly after dinner, as if she wanted the night to hurry its way along.
But, by the looks of the storm, they weren’t headed out anywhere today.
She hoped her mother and sisters had figured out that she’d been stranded at Dottie’s. Weren’t worried sick for her, believing her stuck in a snowbank. But there was nothing she could do until the storm abated. Which meant that today, trapped in this house, she could be the kind of girl men wanted. A man like Jake might want. Needy and sweet. A girl worth taking a train to see, even to deliver bad news. He deserved it.
So, she’d dressed, then limped down to the hall as soon as she saw Dottie vacate the bathroom. Her leg ached, but the swelling had diminished, and she could hobble enough to get around.
Or maybe—maybe that was too independent? But she certainly couldn’t call Jake up here to carry her to the bathroom.
She hung onto the banister, finally hopping on one foot into the bathroom. She’d never been so thankful for a toothbrush in her life as she scrubbed away the night then finger-combed her dark hair. It hung long and loose, not a librarian style in sight.
She heard humming as she took the stairs to the kitchen, sitting on her backside to scoot down. She island-hopped from one piece of furniture to the next, finally putting weight on her ankle as she reached the door. The pain didn’t curl her over. She even took another step.
Dottie and Jake sat at the table.
“No, those aren’t the words… Good morning, Violet.” Dottie smiled up at her as if she actually belonged there.
Jake turned. “What are you doing walking around? You could injure yourself.”
I can take care of myself.
The words edged her mouth, but she bit them back. “I’m sorry, it just smelled so good down here.”
Jake got up, slipped his strong arm around her waist. He smelled good—freshly washed, with cinnamon on his skin. This wasn’t a terrible trade-off. She reached out, braced herself on the table, slid into the seat.
Okay, her leg did hurt.
“I’ll get you some breakfast.” Jake picked up a plate, slid a skinny pancake onto it. “This is called blini, it’s Russian.” He slathered it with apple butter—so that was the cinnamon smell—folded it twice, and handed her the plate.
“Did you make this?”
He grinned, and it could probably stop her heart. Oh, that Alex, why did he let her pine for him for so many years? “My Russian housekeeper taught us.”
“Alex told me he had a Russian housekeeper too.”
Jake looked at her, raised an eyebrow, like that news caught him unaware. Then, “Right. That’s right, he did.” He smiled at her, but it seemed polite.
She skewered the blini, tasted it. “This is good.”
“Of course,” Jake said, his real smile back. He stood at the sink, filling it with water.
Dottie rose from the table. “We need a fire. I’m heading out to the barn to get some wood.”
“I can do that—” Jake started.
“Heavens to Betsy, I’m not an invalid here.” She patted him on the shoulder, and Violet just stared at her as she headed out to the mudroom.
“What did you do to get adopted?” she asked when she heard the door outside close.
Jake looked at her. “What?”
“I haven’t seen her smile for…well, it’s been a few years.”
He frowned and turned back to his dishes. “Did you sleep okay?”
“Froze to death, thank you. I can’t wait to sit by a warm fire. Maybe play a game.”
“Chess?”
Oh, she could kill him in chess, and wouldn’t that be fetching? “How about checkers?”
“Ever play Monopoly?”
He might stand a fair shake. “If Dottie has the game, you’re on.” She got up, began to hop toward him, carrying her plate.
He frowned again as he met her and took the plate, her hand on his arm. “Listen, you need to stay put.”
“I’m not an invalid either.” Oops. Wait, should she be?
“I know that. But let’s pretend you are, just for today.”
I know that?
What was that supposed to mean?
“How about if I sit on the counter, dry the dishes? Would that make you happy?”
“Not as happy as letting me carry you to the sofa, but I know you wouldn’t go for that.”
He did? She frowned and for a second, his eyes widened.
“Alex used to say that you were pretty independent.”
Why, thank you, Alex. She knew it. No wonder he hadn’t rushed out to the train station to meet her. He considered her just one of his chums, just like every other fella she worked with in the motor pool. “Not that independent. I’ll let you carry me to the sofa after we finish the dishes.”
Had she really said that? The words just spiraled out, nearly on their own. But, she liked that smile—would trace her finger up it, get caught in his whiskers, if she could. “Let me help with the dishes.”
He considered her a moment before he put his hands to her waist and lifted her to the counter. Then he walked over to the table, lifting a napkin and settling it over the remaining blini.
“What were you and Dottie arguing about this morning?”
“We were trying to figure out the words to that new Dinah Shore and Buddy Clark song, ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside.’”
She’d heard it on the radio. She found the tune. “ ‘I’ve gotta get home…’”
He laughed, “ ‘But baby, you’d freeze out there…’”
“It’s a little…naughty.”
“It’s funny,” he said, his blue eyes too full of trouble.
“The song is all about seduction. He wants her to stay. He even makes her a drink,” she said, liking how Jake looked with his hands in sudsy water. She wanted to pick up some suds, blow them at him.
The thought startled her.
“He’s a red-blooded male. Of course he wants her to stay.”
“But he’s a bad boy. He’s just trying to finagle a kiss from her.”
“It’s about desire. And the games men and women play. Listen to her words, to the tone. She’s
hoping
he’ll talk her into it. A gal is supposed to play hard to get, it’s part of the game.”
It is? Oh, she just didn’t know any of these games. “My mother would most definitely not approve of that song.”
He handed her a plate. “Your mother isn’t here. And besides, you don’t live for the approval of your mother, do you?”
She slowed her drying. “Why would you say that?”
He made a face, shook his head, returned to his washing. “You just seem…more independent than that.”
There he went with that independent word again.
“Well, I guess you win, because you’re right, it’s a blizzard out there.” She put the plate on the counter.
He handed her another plate. “ ‘Oh the weather outside is frightful…’”
She grinned, adding onto his song.
He had a nice voice, a rich tenor, and she had to like a man unafraid to sing, with his hands in dishwater. His strong arms rippled the edges of his white undershirt, stretching along his back, his slender waist and hips.
The memory of being in his arms, her arms around his strong neck, made her nearly lose her place in the song.
Steps fell on the stairs and the song died as Jake turned. “Good morning.”
Gordy stood in the kitchen in his bare feet, his hair poorly combed, as if he’d just towel-dried it. He was a handsome man, with a farmer’s build, hazel eyes with flecks of gold. He must have been a catch back in his day, before the stern look set in.
“We saved you some breakfast,” Jake said, gesturing to the table with his sudsy hand.
“Where’s Dottie?” Gordy said.
“She’s out in the barn getting more wood.”
Something flashed in Gordy’s eyes, and even Violet flinched.
“It’s a whiteout—why did you let her go alone?”
Ow, his tone could take off a layer of skin.
Beside her, Jake jerked, and something that looked like guilt, or even shame, hued his face.
“I—” Jake started, but Gordy had already pushed past him.
“What kind of man are you?”
The kind of man who made you breakfast,
Violet wanted to snap. But instead she looked down, at her swollen ankle, willing herself not to make a scene. Jake could fight his own battles, right?
But he said nothing as Gordy banged out of the house, slamming the door.
Jake washed the dishes in silence.
“You offered to help. Why didn’t you tell him that?”
“It doesn’t matter.” He handed her another plate. “He’s right. I should have insisted.”
“I believe her exact words were, ‘I’m not an invalid.’ Were you supposed to argue with her?”
“Yes. Probably. I don’t know.” He took the stack of plates, walked over to the hutch, and loaded them in. “Maybe Gordy’s right. A real man would have.”
“I think a real man accepts that a woman can carry in wood if she says so. Letting her doesn’t make you less of a man…or her, less of a woman.”
“Well, you would say that, wouldn’t you?” he said, stalking back to the sink.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Help!” The door to the mudroom banged open, and a second later, Dottie flew into the kitchen, running through the house. “Get a blanket, and start a warm bath running!”
Behind her, in his arms, Gordy carried a body, limp and crusted with snow. “We found a kid in the barn,” he said, running behind her. “He looks dead.”
CHAPTER SIX
“Don’t put him in the bath!” Jake followed Gordy through the house, catching up to him. He laid his finger against the boy’s neck. Yes, a pulse, but bare. “Give him to me.”
Gordy had the boy in a death clench, his eyes fierce with the horror of finding him. “Why?”
Upstairs, Jake heard the water running in the tub.
“He needs his body core heated first. If you warm his extremities, the cool blood will rush to his heart, cause a cardiac arrest.” He reached for the boy. “Give him to me.”
Gordy might have been more shocked than willing, but he handed over his bundle to Jake.
Jake set the boy on the velvet divan in the family room. “Stoke the fire.”
He looked about ten years old, caught in the pallor of death, his skin gray, his rabbit shopka encrusted with ice, his wool scarf frozen to his cheeks. Curled tight into a fetal position, his frozen posture made it nearly impossible for Jake to start shucking off his snowy boots, his icy pants.
“What are you doing?” Violet had hobbled into the room behind them—now crouched beside him.
“Get his jacket off him.” Jake tugged off the boy’s stiff pants. His legs appeared nearly white. Violet worked on the buttons of his coat, frozen solid to the cloth.
“Dottie, we need scissors!” He pressed his warm hands to the boy’s cheeks. “Where’s the blanket!”
Dottie appeared, shoving the blanket at him. He tucked it over the boy’s legs, for now, and, because Violet still hadn’t wrestled free the buttons, he grabbed the jacket, took a breath, and ripped it open.
Buttons popped off as he yanked the jacket down, off the frail body. The boy wore a wool sweater under the jacket. Violet was unwinding the scarf from his neck.
“How did you find him?” Violet said, tugging it free.
Dottie had returned with scissors. “I went to the barn for wood and saw that the door was ajar. I thought maybe an animal had gotten in—and then I saw the door to the truck was open. I couldn’t believe it when I saw him, lying there on the seat, all balled up. Why didn’t he come to the house?”
“Maybe he didn’t see it. Or couldn’t make it,” Violet said.
“Do you know him?” Jake asked as he took the scissors and began to cut off the sweater. He did the same to the frozen undershirt.
Dottie shook her head. “I don’t know. He looks familiar.”
“What are you doing?” Violet said. “He’s going to freeze.”
“He’s already frozen. He needs warmth, right now. Get another hat for him.”
“I ran a bath,” Dottie said as she ran toward the mudroom. Gordy bumped past her, carrying wood.
“No—it’s not fast enough.” Jake stood up and only hesitated a moment before he shucked off his undershirt. He didn’t look at the rumple of scar tissue across his chest as he reached out and picked up the boy. He pulled him against his chest, the chill of the child’s body shuddering through him, raising gooseflesh. Then he lay back on the sofa, cradling the boy against him. “Tuck the blanket around us, Violet. Then get more. We have to warm his core.”
“Is he alive?” Gordy said, stirring the coals in the hearth to life.
“For now. We need more blankets.”
Jake had been thirteen that day when they’d fallen through the ice. He remembered the trick Svetlana used to keep Alex alive.
He wrapped his arms tighter, willing his heat into the child. Coaxing each breath from him.
Please God, don’t let this little one die.
Alex had been colder—and underwater—and he’d lived. Although, after that, just like Jake, he’d become even more prone to bronchitis and pneumonia.
Dottie returned with a hat and shoved it on the boy’s head. When she met Jake’s eyes, he saw the mother in them.
“Pray, Dottie,” he said softly.
She pressed a hand to her mouth, her eyes wet.
“Dottie, where do you keep your blankets?” Violet said, gripping her arm.
Dottie met her eyes. “Yes, blankets. They’re upstairs in the closet.”
Violet limped toward the stairs, but Dottie stopped her. “Put on some tea.” She took the stairs up, two at a time.
Violet glanced back at Jake. The boy seemed no warmer, but the chill of his body had begun to shiver through Jake, making him shake. “Yes, we need tea.
I
need tea, to keep warm.”
He watched Violet hobble to the kitchen, getting stronger, it seemed, with each step.
Gordy’s fire crackled to life, and he fed it to a robust blaze. Then, slapping off his hands, he left for another armful of wood.
Just Jake and the boy remained, cocooned in blankets on the sofa.
“Where did you come from, kid?” Jake said into the boy’s hat. He closed his eyes, found himself back at Lake Calhoun.
The sky a crisp, pristine blue, it had coaxed his attention away from his lessons, and when he returned home from school, he found Alex in the back room, behind the kitchen, holding their skates.