For that moment, it was the most natural, the most right thing—to press her lips to his under the last pale and fading echoes of the aurora borealis.
And it was a beautiful kiss, as magical as the sight they had just witnessed together. She forgot everything—the bodyguard waiting close by, her duty to her lost friend, even the precious child she would soon have to surrender to him.
Finally, he lifted his head. He stared down at her, bemused. “Belle...” The way he said her name required no answer. He raised her hand to his mouth. She shivered at the touch of his lips. It wasn’t with cold. “Come on. Inside...” He still had his arm wrapped around her. She let him hold her, let him guide her. Together they turned for the warmth of the house.
In the foyer, he took her coat. She gave it reluctantly. She knew what came next and it was not going to graceful or pleasant.
She turned to Marcus, who had followed them in. “Will you wait in the car, please?”
Marcus frowned, but he did as she bade him. He went out the front door, closing it quietly behind him.
Preston said nothing. He’d grown watchful again.
“Could we perhaps...sit down?” she asked, the words carefully measured.
He gestured her ahead of him. They went into the living room. As before, she sat on the sofa, in the same spot she’d taken earlier.
He offered, “Coffee, maybe?”
Perhaps a little false courage. “I don’t suppose you have any brandy?”
He went to the cabinet in the corner, got out a crystal decanter and a proper brandy snifter. He poured her the drink and brought it to her.
She thanked him and took a larger sip than she should have. Brandy, after all, was meant to be savored. It burned going down. And when it spread its warmth in her belly, she felt no braver than she had before. She set the glass on the low table in front of her.
He settled into the easy chair. “All right, hit me with it. Why are you here in Elk Creek, Montana, at Christmastime, Belle?”
Where to start? “Do you...happen to remember a certain archaeology student named Anne Benton? She came to Elk Creek three summers ago.”
He frowned. “Why do you ask?”
“I’m getting there. I promise I am. But could you just...” She sighed, shook her head. “Do you remember Anne?”
He stiffened. And he looked at her steadily for several awful seconds. But then he shrugged. “Sure I remember her. I liked her. Why?”
* * *
Pres had no idea why they were suddenly talking about Anne Benton.
He’d hardly known the woman, though he had liked her. She’d told him she was getting a doctorate in anthropology. A couple of times he’d gone riding out near the caves where she and the others in her group were working, cataloging the artifacts and pictographs in the caves, they said. Pres would stop. Visit a little with them—and with Anne especially. He remembered she was friendly, with an easy, open way about her.
It hadn’t been anything romantic. He’d just liked her, that was all.
He’d rested his elbows on the chair arms, his hands folded between. He looked down at them. “I...spent an evening with her once, just before she left town.” He hadn’t realized he would say that out loud until he heard the words coming out of his mouth.
“Spent an evening?” Belle prompted softly.
Pres didn’t like this. Not one bit. He ought to be the one asking the questions—and she should be coming up with the answers.
But somehow, she brought out the truth in him. She made him want to open up to her, to tell her all the things he’d never told a living soul. “It was a bad time for me that summer. I was going to get married. My fiancée dumped me for another guy.”
Belle made a low sound, of sympathy. “Oh, Preston...”
He went on, “She married that other guy on the second Saturday in September, which was right at the end of Anne’s stay in Elk Creek. I ran into Anne that night, at a certain roadhouse not far from town.”
Belle drew in a slow, careful breath. “You were with Anne on the night your fiancée married another man?”
“That’s right. I was trying to drown my sorrows. Anne was with her scientist friends, celebrating the end of their dig. She was drinking, too. Almost as heavily as I was. I’m ashamed to say, I drank enough that my memory of that night is pretty much a blur. I didn’t go home. I wasn’t safe to drive. I got a room in the motel adjacent to the roadhouse. I think I remember Anne being there, in the motel room, with me. But maybe I just imagined that.”
“Imagined it?” Belle was frowning.
He raised both big hands, palms up. “I don’t know. I know that when I woke up in the morning, there was no sign of her and I was alone. I pulled myself together and came home.”
Belle studied his face. She seemed to be looking for answers there.
He had no answers. And what in the hell was this all about anyway? It was time—well past time—she came out with it. “I think I’ve said enough, a damn sight more than enough. And you’ve told me nothing. What’s Anne Benton got to do with anything? Are you telling me you know her? Did she mention me or something?”
“Oh, Preston. Yes. Yes....”
“What? Yes, you know her? Yes, she mentioned me?”
“I...both. Anne has been my dearest friend in all the world. We met at Duke University. She was getting her undergraduate degree and I was studying nursing. She had no extended family, but her parents had been wealthy. They adored her. She was their only child and she never wanted for anything. Her father died when she was eight. And her mother raised her alone—and then died the year Anne graduated from high school. She was on her own in life by the time I met her. And I was far from home. She and I...we became like sisters.”
He still didn’t get it. What did any of this have to do with him? “What are you saying? Anne wants to talk to me, is that it?”
“I...oh, I really am trying to explain. I’m not doing a very good job and I realize that...”
He felt that need again, the one he seemed to have around her—to go to her, to hold her, soothe her, tell her that everything was going to be all right.
How could he tell her that? He didn’t know that. He was the one in the dark here. “Just go ahead, okay? Just...continue.”
“Oh, sweet Lord...” She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth, steadied herself, lowered it. “I’m sorry to tell you, so sorry. Not long ago, Anne was diagnosed with ALL—acute lymphocytic leukemia. I went to her, took care of her, but she didn’t make it.”
He tried to wrap his mind around that one. “You’re telling me that Anne is dead?”
She swallowed, convulsively. Her
