Snowbound (11 page)

Without another word, she returned to the
guestroom to pack her things, not bothering to emerge for dinner or
to say goodbye. Instead, she stayed in the room and spent some time
feeling sorry for herself too, because his stubbornness was costing
her a future with the man she loved.

By early the next afternoon, when she walked
out to meet the plane, Beth was certain she was leaving behind the
man she loved and taking his child with her. After a hasty greeting
from her dad, who didn’t seem to care that she was cutting her trip
short, she got on the plane, refusing to look back. She allowed
herself one brief glimpse of Reed on the runway, wished she’d had a
chance to tell Aika goodbye, and then pulled the shade.

As the plane took off a few minutes later,
she allowed her thoughts to turn to the baby inside her. She
wouldn’t have confirmation until she took a test, but she didn’t
really have any doubts, knowing her own body. She supposed she
should be terrified at the thought of having a baby at eighteen,
without the father in the picture. Instead, she was calm, and even
excited.

Finances weren’t a worry, and she already
knew her mother would offer emotional support, once she recovered
from the shock. No one whose opinion she valued would care about
her being single with a baby. She looked forward to having a piece
of Reed to take with her, to hold onto. It was all of him she would
ever get, so she was going to relish it. Already, she loved her
baby, all the more because she couldn’t love Reed, not the way she
wanted. He didn’t want her love, so she would lavish it on their
child instead.

Patting her stomach, she said, “We’ll be
okay, little one.” Somehow they would be, though she never would
have chosen to take this journey alone.

Chapter Eight

Reed stuffed the last of the supplies in the
trailer behind his SUV before walking back into the general store
in Endline. He’d brought the larger trailer to ensure he had room
for everything, since he was a couple months later making the
supply run than he should have been. It had just slipped his mind,
seeming not that important the times he’d remembered he needed to
make the trip. It wasn’t until he’d run out of milk for Aika—who
still enjoyed it as a treat in addition to her usual diet of meat,
fish, eggs, and berries—that he’d forced himself to contact the
store to arrange pick up of his standing order, plus some.

Hank, the old man who ran the general store,
gave him a big grin when he went back to the register to settle his
account, Aika his little shadow. “She’s a beauty, Reed. I got all
kinds of buyers for blue fox fur.”

He glowered, though he knew Hank was ribbing
him. “She’s still got her summer coat. Ain’t much value in
that.”

Hank laughed, shaking his head. “I’ll bet
she’ll still be following you when her coat goes blue or white
again.”

Reed avoided the old man’s eyes, feeling
self-conscious. It was a bit strange for her to follow him around,
but he couldn’t have left her home alone while he made the trip.
She could be mischievous and needed almost constant supervision.
Plus, she would have been lonely. Not him, of course. He was used
to Aika, but he wouldn’t have missed her if he’d left her behind
for a couple of days.

She rubbed against his calf, just like a
danged cat, and he knew he was full of it. “I imagine so,” he
conceded as Hank ran his credit card.

As he bent to pick up Aika, wanting to keep
her close in the parking lot, Hank said, “Oh, don’t forget your
mail, Reed.”

He scooped up the bag, finding it fuller than
usual—probably because he was two months late in collecting it,
meaning it was eight months of mail instead of the usual six.
“Guess I’m popular,” he joked, making a conscious effort not to be
so surly.

Hank nodded and waved him off. Reed jogged to
the SUV, depositing Aika in the seat. He’d brought her favorite
“blanket”—some soft sweater Beth had accidentally left in his
room—and she curled up on it as he drove down four streets to the
town’s only lodging. It was a modest motel with four rooms on the
bottom floor. The owners lived above. Since he stayed there twice a
year, the female half of the couple winked at Aika and ignored the
“No Pets” sign posted behind her.

After a quick meal in the café across the
street, Reed gathered up his mail and headed to his room on the
side of the building, Aika under his other arm. Carrying her
around, he was starting to feel like one of those celebrities with
their damned froufrou dogs. “The day you even think about askin’
for a rhinestone collar and a sweater is the day I trade you in for
a husky,” he muttered to the fox as he opened the door and
deposited her, along with the mailbag, on the bed.

As Aika jumped down to sniff around the queen
bed and simple furnishings, he sank into the chair closest to the
small round table, stretching to reach the mail and dump it out
before him. He stared at the pile, feeling the overwhelming urge to
shove it back in the bag and deal with it later. Only because he’d
felt like that for months, and had continually put off important
things when he wasn’t normally a procrastinator, did he force
himself to tackle the pile. Damned if he was going to turn into a
moping, whining loser with a broken heart who just faded away. He’d
done a good impression the past few months, but enough was enough.
Beth wasn’t coming back. He’d made sure of that, because it was for
the best, so he didn’t get to wallow in his own misery after doing
the right thing.

“
Man up, you little shit. You gonna cry?
Yeah, go ahead, and I’ll give you another’n.”

The phantom sound of his dad’s voice in his
head, repeating that oft-heard refrain from his childhood, made
Reed tense. His stomach twisted, and he forced down the surge of
nausea. “That crazy drunk can’t hurt me no more,” he said aloud.
He’d stood in front of the old man’s grave when he was just
twenty-two, having stopped by on leave to have the pleasure of
spitting on that hallowed ground that had held such filth. He
hadn’t bothered to attend the funeral that had taken place six
months before, and he’d never felt even a niggle of compulsion to
stop by his drug addict mother’s grave for a visit. Nor had he made
any effort to find his sister when he’d been in the area.

That was the only thing he regretted now,
looking back. At the time, he’d figured she was either as screwed
up as their parents, or she’d lucked out and found a good adoptive
family. He didn’t want the drama of the first scenario, and he’d
spared her having to acknowledge an ignorant redneck brother if
she’d gotten lucky.

Maybe he’d been too hard on himself and had
just decided she wouldn’t want anything to do with him because of
his past. Maybe she would have been pleased to see her little
brother, even if they just shared a meth-head mother as their only
connection. Perhaps he should look into finding her.

“Don’t want to die miserable and alone,” he
said with a harsh laugh. Aika looked at him, head titled, as she
always did when he spoke. She gave him a tentative tail wag before
returning to the far more interesting task of sniffing the
carpet.

With a sigh, he started sorting through his
mail, separating by business and personal. All his bills were on
auto-draft, so he didn’t owe anything, but he’d have to keep them
for his tax records. A few catalogs made the cut, since he knew
there were items he’d want to order. His Internet connection at
home was spotty. Controlled by satellite, it worked great on clear
days, but was nonexistent the rest of the time, so he still did
some old-fashioned mail ordering. He’d have to fill out his order
and drop it by the general store/post office before leaving
tomorrow if he wanted everything to arrive before his next trip
into Endline.

An unsolicited brochure for an all-inclusive
resort caught his eye, mainly because of the shapely blonde woman
running across the sand. Her hair was almost the right shade to be
Beth’s, but of course it wasn’t her. He wadded it into a ball and
tossed it straight into the can before returning to sorting. Reed
had almost reached the end of the pile when he discovered a stiff
envelope with feminine writing he didn’t recognize.

His heartbeat sped up when he read B. Wyndam
in the return address. The curly cursive seemed unlikely to belong
to Blair Wyndam, and why would the other man contact him anyway?
Their business had concluded, he’d been paid, and that was the end
of it.

Reed sat upright as he tore open the
light-pink envelope, his heart galloping in his ears. A folded
letter fell out, along with another, smaller envelope. On the front
of the letter, she’d written “Read Me First.” He unfolded it,
taking a moment to drink in the sight of her elegant handwriting
before allowing himself to start reading.

May 21
^st
,

Dear Reed,

It seems silly to start the letter that way,
but what else would I say? Anyway, I want you to know I never lied
to you. I hope you’ll believe that it was an honest miscalculation
on my part that led to this. I really thought it was safe the night
I told you to go ahead, and I didn’t figure out I was wrong until
several days later. I guess I should have mentioned it then, but I
was afraid of your reaction, and I wanted to make sure there was
something to actually worry about before I told you.

He rubbed his eyes, trying to decipher her
letter. It was a bit jumbled, and he could see a couple of smeared
spots that looked like tearstains. He kept reading, his stomach
clenching with anxiety as he got an inkling of what he was about to
discover.

I was pretty sure the day I left you that I
was pregnant.

He groaned aloud, cringing when he recalled
their conversation about kids.

I didn’t say anything, because you made it
clear you don’t want children. Or a wife. At first, I hadn’t
planned to tell you at all, but I knew that was wrong. It’s not
fair to you or the baby. I owe you the chance to be included, if
you want. I don’t expect anything from you, and I’m not asking for
anything. It was my miscalculation that caused me to get pregnant,
and I release you from any obligation.

I’m writing this just after the twelfth-week
ultrasound. Again, I waited to make sure I didn’t miscarry, since
that would have negated any need to burden you with the situation.
I didn’t lose it, and the midwife said everything looks fine, so I
have no further reason to delay telling you. Like I said, you don’t
owe me or the baby a thing. I’m just trying to do the right thing
by telling you, not guilting you into anything.

Beth Wyndam

P.S. The other envelope is one of the
ultrasound pictures. You can’t see much, and you don’t have to look
at all if you don’t want to. I included in case you do, but it’s
only fair to warn you what’s in there if you don’t want to see
it.

Reed reread the letter twice more before the
information really sank in. Nausea churned in his gut, and he
closed his eyes for a long moment to keep the gorge from
rising.

A baby. Holy hell, he’d never expected that.
Even worse was her tone, and her explicit clarity about not holding
him responsible. “That’s a load of crap,” he said to the letter,
anger surging through him. Who else was responsible, if not him?
Beth couldn’t bear the brunt of a baby by herself. She was too
young to be a mother, let alone a single one.

His gaze fell on the other envelope, this one
plain white, and his hands shook when he picked it up. He tore it
open carefully, and the picture slid out easily. Reed lifted the
black and white image, squinting at the blobby thing in front of
him. The technician had helpfully labeled the head, arms, and legs,
which made it easier to determine what was where on his child.

His child. That was like a punch in the gut.
It was almost impossible to believe he was looking at the first
picture of his baby. A baby he’d made with Beth. Staring down at
the grainy image, an unfamiliar emotion soared through him—elation,
along with a touch of awe that something so beautiful had happened
without any planning on either of their parts.

Spurred on by his reaction, driven to see
Beth and the baby, he picked up his cell phone and found Mike’s
number in the address book. After making arrangements to fly to
Fairbanks the next morning, and imposing on his friend to watch
Aika for a bit, he booked the next stage of his trip. It didn’t
take long to book a flight from Fairbanks to New York City. As he
calculated the time it would take, he realized he would see Beth
again in a little less than three days. Impatience made it
difficult to settle down, even though he needed some sleep. He had
a feeling the next few days would be exhausting, both mentally and
physically.

Reed had refueled at the airport with a large
coffee, getting a disdainful look from the barista when he’d
declined any flavor, cream, or sweetener. “But that’s just coffee,”
she’d protested, much to his amusement. He was glad for the extra
energy, since it had been a longer walk than he’d expected. Not to
mention, it was hotter than blazes outside, and he wasn’t used to
hundred-plus weather anymore, despite his Georgia roots.

By the time he arrived at the high-rise
building that matched the address on the card Beth had sent, he was
feeling tired and looked rumpled. It wasn’t a surprise when the man
guarding the desk gave him a suspicious look. Trying to pretend as
though he belonged, and not betray his old insecurities, he said,
“I’m here to see Beth Wyndam. She’s on the top floor.” That was
just a guess on his part, but he couldn’t imagine her living
anywhere except the penthouse.

With narrowed eyes, the uniformed deskman
lifted his phone. “Name?”

“Reed Nixon.” His mouth was dry, making him
wish he’d opted for water instead of coffee.