Christmas alone,” Lilly said firmly.
Right about then Rosemary suggested they call their father again.
Pepper grabbed the cell phone from Lilly—they only had one cell phone between them, which apparently caused arguments several times a day. This time their dad promptly answered, and Pepper went on a long rendition of the walk, the bear, the bear chase, the house, Rosemary, the cream puffs.
“Can you come and get us, Dad? We really got lost when we started running. And now it’s already dark, even though it’s so early.... I told you, we’re at Rosemary’s. Oh. Well, no, I...” Pepper lifted the phone and arched her brows to Rosemary. “Could you tell my dad where we are?”
Rosemary was almost laughing as she pressed the cell to her ear. Pepper had a ditsy side, for sure. She’d sounded as if she assumed her dad had some magical ability to automatically know where she was.
“Hi— I’m Rosemary MacKinnon,” she said immediately.
“And I’m Whit Cochran.”
She took a quick breath. He just had one of those unique guy voices, a clear tenor, that put a shiver in her pulse. It didn’t matter if he was ugly as sin or plain as a sloth—she had no way to know, and didn’t care. It was just that his voice made her think of sex and danger. Preferably together.
“Just tell me quick,” he started with. “Are the girls hurt in any way? And are they okay now?”
“They’re fine—except for conning me out of ice cream probably before they’ve had dinner.”
“There really was a bear?”
“I didn’t see it myself, but black bears regularly wander around here. Normally they don’t bother humans, but they’ll venture close when they’re scrounging for food. At this time of year, it’s pretty rare to come across one.”
“I like your voice, Rosemary MacKinnon.”
The comment was so unexpected, she got an inexcusable warm fuzzy feeling in her tummy...but obviously, she’d relieved his mind about his girls and he was just getting his breath back, not thinking clearly. “I’m guessing you’d like my address,” she said quickly.
“Yes, of course.”
“You’re not far. There aren’t that many places near the top of Whisper Mountain. I’m on the east side, and most of the land up here is MacKinnon property. I’d guess you’re either in the Landers place or the Stewarts...they often rent out at Christmas. The Stewarts’ place is brick, double kitchen, double deck—”
“That’s the one.”
“So. If you’re driving a car, you’re going to have to go down the mountain road—there’s only one, as you probably know. Where it ends in a Y shape, turn left. Give or take a half mile, you’ll see a wood sign for MacKinnons—that’ll lead to the house here. Take you ten, fifteen minutes. On the other hand, if you have some way to go cross-country—”
“A Gator.”
“Okay, so it’s your choice...with the Gator, you go up that same mountain road...you’ll run into a gravel road, turn right, then zip along that way until you run into a battered old MacKinnon sign, turn in.”
“So the girls really weren’t far.”
“I don’t know...they could have circled and backtracked a zillion times if they were trying to outrun a bear. Speaking of which...until you get here, I’ll be talking bear defense with your girls.”
“Maybe you’d better have that talk with me, too.”
She laughed, so did he...but when she clicked off the phone, she found both girls sitting side by side on the leather couch, staring at her.
“Your dad’ll be here in two shakes.” When they kept up with the stare, she cocked her head. “What?”
“You laughed. And we thought we heard Dad laughing.”
Rosemary didn’t understand. “He did laugh. But not because he thought your bear was funny. He had to hear that you two were safe. So he was relieved, and naturally he got in a happier mood.”
Lilly said, “Our dad hasn’t done a whole lot of laughing since Mom died.”
She didn’t know what to say. The girls had already spilled a lot of information about their personal circumstances that was none of her business. She didn’t want to pry—but actually, she was relieved to understand their circumstances. She could have said something painful or insensitive accidentally, if she’d never known the girls had lost their mom, and that they were trying to have a different kind of Christmas to keep the grieving memories at bay.
“Hey. Should we call you Mrs. MacKinnon? Or Miss MacKinnon? Or Rosemary? Or what?” Lilly was clearly the one who wanted to know the rules.
“You can call me Rosemary. And I’m a Miss, not a Mrs.”
“How come?” That was definitely Pepper. No boundaries on Pepper’s tongue.
“Because I was happy being single.”
“Oh. Okay. Can we look around, while we’re waiting for my dad? It’s about the most beautiful house I can remember.”
“Yes, you can look around...except in the first room down that hall. For a long time it was a utility room, but I turned it into a dark room to develop photographs. When that door’s closed, you’ll see a red light next to the knob, and that means you shouldn’t open the door.”
“You really develop pictures? Yourself? Right here?”
It had been a while since she’d “awestruck” anyone...much less had anyone treat her like a goddess. Her family—at least her parents—rarely had a pleasant word to say to her. Since June, whenever they called, it was invariably to make sure she knew her Terrible Mistake hadn’t been forgotten, and probably never would be. Her two brothers would have defended her against the world—and always had—but even they skirted around the question of why she’d done such a “damn fool thing.”
The girls talked her ears off—and asked more questions than a teacher on a test. But after being raised with two brothers—and working alone all these months since June—Rosemary didn’t mind. She inhaled all the girl talk.
She never heard a knock on the door, never heard anything until the girls both squealed, “Dad!”
They’d ended up in the kitchen—both girls had chosen to ignore the table, and instead sat on the counter with their legs swinging—some body part always seemed to be in motion with them. They’d somehow conned her into wrapping up three more cream puffs to take home with them. Possibly she’d been easily conned. Besides, she’d made the full recipe, and even sugar-greedy as she was, couldn’t possibly eat a dozen.
“Dad! We’re having so much fun! Can we stay a little longer?”
And then, “Dad, this is Rosemary. Rosemary, this is Dad—”
“He’s not Dad when you’re introducing him, dummy. He’s Whit. Dad, this is Rosemary. Rosemary,
