Free A Fortune's Children's Christmas by Barbara Boswell, Lisa Jackson, Linda Turner Page A

they’re gone!” she reprimanded as if he could hear her, then hung up. She could just give up, she supposed, but that wasn’t her nature.
    Angela started making noises upstairs, and Lesley decided it was time for some exercise. She raced up the stairs and found her daughter lying on her back in her crib, small arms flailing, face beginning to turn red as she started to cry. “No reason to fuss,” Lesley said, feeling her breasts let-down and milk begin to flow. “I’m right here.”
    After feeding, changing and dressing the baby in a snug snowsuit, Lesley strapped Angela into her front pack and, with a card she’d picked up at the store—one with a funny message rather than the kind with a hearts and flowers message of undying love—she hiked the distance between the two ranches. It was cold as the dickens outside; the wind blew hard and snow still covered the ground; but the pale winter sun lingered in the Montana-blue sky and Lesley felt lighthearted as she walked up Chase’s lane.
    She hadn’t been back to the small cabin since her short, emotional stay with him over the Christmas holidays, and she felt ridiculously as if she were coming home. “Idiot,” she muttered under her breath, and sensed Angela stirring against her. “You know, don’t you, that your mother’s a bona fide fool?”
    Rambo, lying on the front porch, barked a greeting and stood slowly, his tail whipping behind him. “I missed you, too, boy,” she said as the front door opened and Chase in jeans and a flannel shirt stoodbehind the torn mesh of the screen door. He didn’t smile, and she had the uneasy sensation that she was interrupting him.
    Suddenly she was tongue-tied. “Hi,” she managed, wishing she hadn’t been so darned impulsive. What was she doing here? What possible excuse could she come up with? None. She had to go through with her plan.
    “Come in.” He held the door for her. “Is something wrong?”
    “No. Uh, I just wanted some exercise.” Good Lord, she sounded like a moron. “I came over here because…because it’s Valentine’s Day and I bought a card for you and…I’m rambling aren’t I?” She unstrapped the baby, and Chase took her pack in his big hands. As she unzipped her jacket, he retrieved Angela from the pack. “I sound like a complete and utter ninny.”
    “Not at all.” But he couldn’t quite swallow his sudden smile, and his eyes, a second before so serious, lit with amusement. “She’s growing,” he observed as if to change the awkward conversation.
    “All the time.”
    His expression was gentle as he looked at the baby. “Don’t you think it’s too cold to take her outside?”
    “If I did, I wouldn’t have taken the risk,” she replied. Chase’s concern for Angela touched her even if he was a little pushy about it.
    “They’re fragile.”
    “Of course they are. Believe me, I’m careful with her.”
    He nodded curtly. “I know you are.” She sensed he wanted to say something else, but bit his tongue.
    While he was paying attention to Angela, Lesley left the card on the table where she and he had shared so many meals. The drop leaf was covered with receipts, a general ledger book and calculator. “I thought I could repay you a little for all you’ve done for me,” she said. “I was hoping you might come to dinner.”
    His head snapped up. “Tonight?”
    “If it’s not a problem.”
    He hesitated, and Lesley’s heart plummeted as she realized he was trying to come up with an excuse, any excuse to decline. Oh, this was a stupid, impetuous idea. She should have asked him over any other night, but not tonight. Not on the night that was set aside each year for lovers.
    The phone rang before the silence had become too awkward, and balancing the baby, he plucked the receiver from its cradle and barked a cold, “Hello.” He managed a brief, soulless smile at Lesley while still holding Angela. “Oh, hi.” His shoulders relaxed. “Pretty good. Just tryin’ to turn