“You’d make great buzzard feed.” The piebald looked at him with bored eyes. A wave of dizziness washed over Gavin, and he stepped backward, leaning his back against the wall as he waited for it to pass. He wondered how long he’d been unconscious. Seconds? Minutes? Hours? Taking a deep breath to steady himself, he started toward the stall gate. His steps were uncertain and wobbly, and there seemed to be a curtain of darkness just beyond his vision, waiting to drop over him at any moment. Just outside the stall, he stopped to rest again. He felt weak and foolish. It should take more than a wallop from Patch to knock the stuffing out of him. Lord knew, it wasn’t the first time he’d been kicked by the cantankerous beast. Yet weak and foolish was exactly how he felt. He wondered if he could make it back to the house. He felt an overwhelming need to lie down until the weakness passed once and for all. Cautiously, he moved forward again, using his hand to balance himself as he grabbed whatever was in reach. The floor seemed to swell and drop beneath his feet, like the rise and fall of the ocean beneath a ship. Unexpectedly, it rose up in a giant wave to meet his face. Rachel tightened the rope around her waist.

“Do you understand the signal then?” she asked as she turned to meet Dru’s anxious gaze.

“Two tugs means to pull me back. That’s only if I can’t find the barn or if I get into some sort of trouble. Four tugs means I’m in the barn. If you get four tugs, just tie off the rope. We’ll use it to find our way back if Gavin thinks we should. Otherwise, we’ll just wait in the barn until the storm’s over.” Dru touched Rachel’s coat sleeve.

“He isn’t going to like it that I let you do this. I’m sure he’s just working in the barn until the weather clears.”

“Probably.” She offered the woman a reassuring smile.

“I’m sure he’ll scold me soundly, and then I’ll be stuck with a man in ill temper until the sun comes out. And it’ll serve me right for being so silly.” Rachel wished she believed what she was saying. It made perfectly good sense, and both she and Dru had used the same logical excuse for Gavin’s tardy return to the house a number of times over the past couple of hours. If she had been the only anxious one, she would have dismissed the nagging feeling that something was wrong. But she wasn’t the only one. Dru felt it too, although she’d tried to hide it for a long time. With a deep breath for courage, Rachel tightened the scarf around her head and pulled open the door. The wind blasted against her. Shards of snow stung her cheeks. She leaned forward and stepped outside.

“I’ll be all right,” she hollered over the wind as she headed in the general direction of the barn. In seconds, the house had disappeared from sight. She was surrounded by nothing but white. She touched the rope around her waist, reassuring herself that she wasn’t alone and lost, then struggled forward, her feet sinking into drifts of snow, not knowing where she was headed. She could have been moving in tiny circles for all she knew. She had no sense of direction left to guide her. There was no up or down, right or left, forward or back, night or day. There was only snow. Snow, snow, and more snow. It was a terrifying feeling.

She was cold. The blowing snow stung her face, and she bent her head forward to avoid the tiny missiles. Already she felt as if she’d been walking for ages. She paused and looked down at the rope. Two tugs and they would pull her back to the house. Just two tugs and she could be warm again, safe within the walls of the sturdy log house. But I still wouldn’t know about Gavin. She pressed forward into the storm. is it really so far from the house to the barn? It hadn’t seemed so before. Perhaps she should turn and try another direction. Perhaps she was headed the wrong way. And then, it was there before her. She reached out and touched the board siding of the barn, working her way along until she found the door. With a hammering heart, she lifted the latch and tugged at the door. Drifting snow had piled up against it, making it impossible to open. She kicked at the snowdrift, then leaned down to dig with her hands. For every inch she swept away, two more seemed to land in its place. Finally, her fingers numb with cold, she was able to clear enough snow to pry open the door and wedge her way through. As she stepped inside the barn, she gave the rope four distinct tugs, then let the door blow closed behind her. She saw him almost immediately, lying face down in the straw.

“Gavin!” With fumbling hands, she loosened the knot on the rope at her waist. Breaking free, she hurried toward the quiet form on the barn floor.

“Gavin? Gavin, what’s wrong?” Rachel knelt in the straw and grasped his shoulders, rolling him onto his back and pulling his head into her lap.

“Gavin?” she said again, whispering this time.

“Gavin?”

Chapter Twelve

“Gonna kill that horse,” he mumbled. Rachel leaned forward.

“What, Gavin? What did you say?” His eyes opened slowly. He looked up at her with a glazed, unfocused expression. But when he spoke, his voice was clear this time.

“I said I’m gonna kill that horse.” And then he grinned, followed by a wince and a groan.

“What happened, Gavin? How are you hurt?”

“Patch tried to knock some sense into me. Caught me in the back of the head with a swift kick.”

“Let me see.” Rachel pulled him into an upright position, then leaned to one side and carefully probed the back of his head. Gavin grunted but didn’t flinch. He reached up behind him to follow her hand over the lump on the back of his head.

“I’ve Never been knocked stone cold before.” Their fingers met, his sliding over the top of hers. Both hands stilled.


Neither tried to pull away. Rachel felt the touch throughout her body. It spread through her veins, hot and churning, warming away the chill of the snowstorm and leaving her feeling as if a new kind of storm was battering her from the inside. Gavin turned his head. His gray eyes met hers, the force of his gaze strong enough to chase the wind from her lungs. He moved his hand away and rose to his feet.

“I guess the storm’s over. How long was I out here?” he asked as he steadied himself by holding onto the top railing of a stall. Rachel dragged in a breath of air and fought down the tide of emotions that raged within.

“You were gone over two hours,” she was finally able to respond.

“We were afraid something must be wrong, so I came looking for you. The storm hasn’t let up at all.” She stood and brushed the straw from her skirt, not daring to look at him again.

“You came out here through that blizzard?” He scolded her as if she was a child.

“Someone had to. We were afraid something was wrong.” Now she looked at him, her chin thrust up in indignation.

“And we were right.” Gavin grunted his displeasure as he turned to walk across the barn to the door. Reaching it, he picked up the length of rope hanging through it, then looked back at Rachel.

“I had it tied around my waist so I wouldn’t get lost. I told Dru to tie it off to the house once I signaled that I’d found the barn. That way we could follow the rope back to the house from here.” He tipped his head to one side. It seemed to be a silent acknowledgement that she’d done something right. But it didn’t last long. He looked away almost immediately. Placing his shoulder against the door and still holding onto the rope, he lifted the latch and tried to open the door. It barely budged, opening only far enough to let in a gust of icy wind and a flurry of snowflakes. Rachel moved forward.

“I cleared a pathway so I could open the door. It couldn’t be covered over already.” She stopped as he turned around.

“We’ll just have to wait it out. If we can’t get the door open when the storm stops, we can always get out through the loft window.”

“Through the loft?” Her voice came out in a small squeak.

“The snow won’t get that deep, will it?” Gavin gave a short laugh.

“Not this time of year, no. I’ll just lower you down with a rope and then follow after you. Nothing to it.” Rachel sat down on a nearby storage bin, her frantic heart causing the blood to pound in her ears. She turned her head so she could see the long ladder leading up to the loft and imagined an even longer drop down to the ground afterward. She swallowed hard as her hands clenched tightly in her lap. Outside, the storm raged on. Gavin closed the loft window. He’d never seen a snowstorm like this one, at least not so early in the year. You could expect them in January, but never in October. He headed toward the ladder, stopping on the edge to look down. Rachel was still seated on the storage bin, her arms hugging her body. Even from up here he could see her shivering. He knew she had to be plenty cold. Her dress had gotten soaked with snow as she’d fought her way through the drifts to get to the barn, and there was no fire to help dry her out once she got here. But she hadn’t complained once. He turned and lowered himself down the ladder. As his feet touched the floor, he looked toward her.

“No sign of it stopping yet.” She nodded, misery written on every inch of her pretty face.

“Come here,” Gavin said, motioning with his hand. She gave him a puzzled look.

“We need to warm you up. Come on.” She rose from the bin and moved toward him, her arms still folded tightly across her chest. When she reached him, he placed an arm around her shoulders and guided her toward the stall holding Sabrina’s calf. He opened the gate, allowing them entry.

“Wait here,” he told her, then walked away. From the small tack room at the back of the barn, he grabbed several saddle blankets. On his return trip, he took the lantern from its usual high hook and carried it with him to the stall.