Change of Heart p.8 Read online

  “A mile at most.” His face was serious. “If you falter I could get behind you and push.” He gave such a lecherous lift to his brows that she laughed.

  “I think I’ll manage. Lead on, oh fearless leader.”

  “Sounds good. I think I’ll put that title on my office door.”

  They reached the old cabin in the late afternoon. It was a three-sided shed, with the flat side of a giant boulder as the back wall. Inside was a crude fireplace and to one side was a little fenced area. “For his donkey friend,” Frank said. There was a little cabinet with a chipped porcelain bowl and an old, crude bed frame in the far corner.

  Miranda saw that repairs had been made to the roof and one wall. “You keep it from falling down?”

  “I do,” he said. “I carried all the wood up here and I reset the stone for the fireplace. One year I got caught in an early snowstorm and spent a week up here. I was glad my dad taught me about hunting or I might have starved.”

  “Spoken like a man who has never dieted. Trust me on this, but a week without food will only make you feel like you’re going to starve.”

  Again, Frank looked serious. “As a man who spent half a day walking behind you, I can swear that you don’t need to lose an ounce.”

  Miranda laughed but she also blushed.

  “Come on,” he said, “I’ll show you why the old guy built his cabin here.”

  They put down their packs and she followed him outside into the soft light. She could feel autumn in the air. He led her down a well-worn trail, around the big boulder, then up again. At one point, he put his hands on her waist and swung her over a place where the trail had washed out. For a moment they stared at each other, but then Frank turned away and they kept going up.

  At last they came to a very pretty little freshwater pool. Water trickled down the mountain into the pool, then flowed out at the far side. Since the water was always moving, the pond never became stagnant.

  Frank pointed at the far end. “I found the remnants of some hollowed-out logs. I think he made a viaduct.”

  “So he had running water all year,” Miranda said. “How ingenious.”

  “It froze in winter, but by then he had piles of snow outside his door.” When Frank sat down and began to try to untie a bootlace, Miranda took over. She removed his boots and socks, then her own. They sat side by side, pants rolled up, their feet soaking in the cool, clean water.

  “This is wonderful,” she said. “Thank you for bringing me here.”

  Turning, Frank looked at her. Right now he was feeling the best he had in years. But Julian’s mention of Gwyn had thrown him somewhat, and had made him think of her seriously. She belonged to his real world, the one of money and board meetings. Even what social life he had with her dealt with money, as every function they attended was a charity fund-raiser.

  Gwyn fit into that world perfectly. She was charming to everyone. She had an ability to coax people into opening their wallets in support of whatever cause she was working with. Orphaned children, homeless people, literacy groups were all better off because of Gwyn.

  But there was no way she’d travel up a mountain to dangle her bare feet in an icy mountain pond. Frank had once joked that he thought her feet were like a Barbie doll’s, permanently bent upward for high heels. Gwyn hadn’t laughed.

  “You’re looking at me very hard,” Miranda said.

  “I was thinking how you fit here.”

  “You can see me in a pair of overalls? Maybe with a pickax?” She was teasing, but when he didn’t answer and turned away to look at the pond, Miranda frowned. Obviously, something had upset him. “Did the prospector find any gold?”

  “Not that anyone knew about, but there were rumors. He’s a chapter in a few books and they said that people believed he found gold and buried it in a cave near his cabin.”

  “Have you looked?”

  “A little,” he said, “but no luck. My nieces and nephews are getting old enough that I thought I might bring them up here and let them scrounge the area. Nobody can find things like a kid can.”

  “You seem to know so much about children. You don’t have any of your own?”

  “Not that I know of,” he said as he stood up. “How about if I build a fire and we cook some of that food you brought?”

  “Sure,” Miranda said. As she pulled on her boots, she thought, Something has changed. He had gone from laughing to serious in seconds.

  They sat outside with their dinner, the stars bright above them. The air was quite cool, but they had on layers of clothes.

  “Are you all right?” Miranda asked, her voice full of concern.

  “Sure. I come up here to think and . . .”

  “And I’m hindering you?” She started to get up.

  “No, please, I didn’t mean that.” He turned to her. “I asked you about your ex-husband, but you didn’t answer. What’s he like?”

  She took a moment before replying, “Leslie likes to win. It’s everything to him. He doesn’t care about the cost or future consequences. He just has to win right now. You know how I got custody of our son?”

  “I can’t imagine.”

  She took a breath. “It still terrifies me to remember what I did, and I pray that Eli will never find out. At the divorce, I told his father I didn’t want the child. I said that his extraordinary intelligence made him a freak and I didn’t want to have to spend my life with the kid.”

  Frank looked at her in astonishment. “I agree that no child should hear that.”

  Miranda had to swallow back tears in memory. “Eli thinks that I’m blind to Leslie’s selfishness, but I know my ex very well. When he comes over and does his little whining act about how no one’s ever given him anything, I hand him money. I don’t give very much, but he knows I’m poor so even a little is a lot.”

  “I see,” Frank said. “And that lets him feel that he’s won.”

  “Right,” she said. “And if he feels that he’s winning, I don’t have to fear that he’ll do something bigger.”

  “Like fight you for custody of Eli,” Frank said softly.

  “Exactly.”

  “In your circumstances, I think that’s a very clever way to handle it all. In fact, I think what you did was a brilliant business move. You used your opponent’s weakness to your advantage. I wish the men who worked for me could be that insightful.”

  She laughed, but she was pleased by what he’d said.

  When it grew too cool to stay outside, they went into the cabin. Like the cave the day before, the soft firelight made the tiny cabin cozy and, well, romantic.

  Miranda glanced at the single bed in the corner. How were they to handle this awkward situation? “How about if we arm wrestle for the bed?”

  Frank was kneeling by the stove, poking the inside of it. He’d had an idea that she’d come up with a reason for why he should take the bed and her the floor. He stood up. “Let’s toss for it.” He pulled a coin from his pocket. “Call it.”

  “Heads.”

  He flipped the coin and caught it on the back of his hand. “Heads it is. You win.”

  “I didn’t see the coin,” she said.

  “Next time.” He was pulling sleeping bags from the packs, but struggling with the cast. “Damn thing!”

  Miranda moved beside him to help, their shoulders together, the warmth of their bodies shared.

  He turned to look at her and, smiling, Miranda faced him. He kissed her. It was a sweet, gentle kiss, tentative, but it was very nice.

  He pulled away. “Sorry. I’m overstepping my bounds.” Abruptly, he stood up, but he didn’t look at her. “I’m . . .” He didn’t seem to know what else to say. He left the cabin.

  With a sigh, Miranda unfurled the two sleeping bags, putting one on the hard floor and one on the narrow bed.

  So much for being seducti