Marisa had help, of course. When he’d gone to the pseudo-Spanish Beverly Hills monstrosity Victor Latimore had built for his new bride, intent on offering Marisa a chance to say her piece about the Morris matter, Mac had met Gwen Olsen, Marisa’s nanny-housekeeper. Pulling the truth out of Gwen that Marisa had vanished without leaving so much as a note behind had produced a powerful feeling of déjà vu, launching Mac into the chase that had led him here, straight to a damned bowl of oatmeal!
Grimacing, he shoveled in the first mouthful. To his surprise, it wasn’t half-bad. She’d laced it with brown sugar and a touch of cinnamon.
Nicky grinned up at him. “Good, huh?”
Mac tried another bite, decided the kid was right and dug in. Maybe if his own mother had possessed the imagination to draw faces in his cereal bowl, he wouldn’t have grown up so wild and rebellious.
But Vivian Mahoney, abandoned by her husband and beaten down by life and the two menial jobs she worked merely to keep herself and her son fed, hadn’t had the time for such niceties or the energy to cope with her street-smart son. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the coach down at the local Boys’ Club and a stint in the Golden Gloves boxing circuit, no telling what kind of turn—for the worse—Mac’s life might have taken. His mother had died when he was seventeen, and he’d always thought she had not so much given up on life as simply been worn out. But growing up on the mean streets had given Mac his drive, propelling him through Princeton on a scholarship while he worked double shifts and weekends at a foundry. When you’d never had much of anything, you took nothing for granted.
Especially not a woman’s love.
Marisa was finishing her own bowl of hot cereal, her gaze abstracted as she poked into cupboards and a pantry, pulling out various cans. Face bare and hair scraped back, she hardly looked like a glamorous actress, but her classic Ingrid Bergman-type bone structure gave her a compelling beauty that would remain ageless. Mac wondered what millionaire Victor Latimore had seen when he looked at his wife.
“I think I’ll put together a stew to simmer over the fireplace for our lunch. How’s that sound, Nicky?” she asked.
“Can I help pour things into the pot?”
“Sure, honey.” She was already pulling a hefty cast-iron kettle from the cupboard.
Mac pushed back his empty bowl. “Where’d you learn to cook? I didn’t think that was something you ‘Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous’ types did.”
Her look was level. “I guess there’s a lot of things you don’t know.”
Annoyance hardened his mouth. If there was one thing Mac didn’t stand for, it was being accused of not having his facts down cold. “What I don’t know, I find out. That’s a promise.” He slid off the kitchen stool, gratified by the shimmer of apprehension clouding her blue eyes. “I’ll go get that wood.”
Sometime later, Mac finished stacking firewood from the backyard pile onto the porch near the back door, then gratefully carried a final armload inside to the hearth in the den. Visibility was nearly zero, and even the short trek between the lodge and its various outbuildings and sheds was an arduous one given the grueling wind-driven snow. Paul had a considerable stockpile of firewood, but if the storm kept up as predicted and power remained out, Mac thought he might eventually have to take the ax he’d found in the toolshed to a couple of the trees surrounding the place. Not a prospect he relished, considering the weather.
“Hold it right there, you varmint!” A pint-size bandito brandishing twin cap pistols and wearing a bandanna over his nose leapt out from behind a fort of pillows and blankets draped over chair backs.
“Don’t shoot, Tex. I’m one of the good guys.”
“That’s what they all say, partner. Now reach for the sky.”
Mac’s lips twitched as he dumped the wood on the hearth. “Bloodthirsty galoot, aren’t you?”
“I ain’t no galoot—I’m a cowboy!” Pulling down his kerchief, Nicky gave Mac an indignant look.
Unfastening his parka, Mac added sticks to the fire and punched it up. “I’d never have guessed.”
“Well...well, shoot!” Disgusted, Nicky plopped down on the sofa arm. “Bet if I had a horse you could tell. I hope Santa brings me one. Think he will?”
That stopped Mac. “Uh, hard to say. Where’s your mother? Upstairs?”
“Nah.” Nicky rolled onto his back and began to drum his heels on the sofa. “Outside. She made me stay here. What does ‘hold down the fort’ mean, anyway?”
“What the hell!” An image of Marisa frozen in a snowbank flashed through Mac’s head. The vision was at once ludicrous, startling and scary. “Outside? Where?”
“Checking the gen-gena—”
“Generator?”
“Yeah. And you’d better not let Mommy hear that bad word. She’ll make you sit in the time-out chair.”
“She won’t be able to sit when I get through with her!” Muttering darkly, Mac jerked at his parka zipper. “Damn fool woman—what’s she thinking?”
Halfway across the den, he turned abruptly and pointed a finger at Nicky. “You stay put until I get back. Sheriff’s orders. Okay, Tex?”
Nicky’s eyes were wide. “Yes, sir. Can I be your deputy?”
“You got it, kid.”
The boy’s awed and triumphant voice followed Mac out the door. “I knew he was a cowboy.”
The wind hit Mac smack in the face and took his breath away. Leaning against it, he came down the porch steps, ducked his head and slogged through the growing drifts toward the small lean-to attached to the combination barn and garage set behind the lodge proper. From the power lines strung from it, he guessed it was the location of the generator. On a clear day, there would be a commanding view of the snow-topped Sierra Nevada peaks in the distance, but now everything was just a gray white blankness, the silhouettes of the buildings barely visible and the outline of Marisa’s tracks already disappearing.
The wind buffeted Mac’s shoulders, and ice particles stung his cheeks. Marisa was so slender, just a puff at this force could send her tumbling down the mountainside—and then what? That she would be stupid enough to place herself—and therefore the kid—in danger incensed him. He burst through the door of the lean-to in a rage. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Marisa jumped and dropped the flashlight with which she’d been inspecting the gasoline-powered generator. The beam went out when it hit the concrete floor, and the little room was plunged into almost total gloom. “Now look what you’ve made me do!” Falling to her hands and knees, she groped for the flashlight. Clad in a puffy down jacket, knitted cap and gloves, she looked as young and delectable as any ski-resort snow bunny. Then she found the flashlight, flicked it on and speared him right in the eyes with the bright beam. “At least close the damn door.”
He kicked it shut, but the violence did little to relieve the pressure that was building up inside. “Just what the devil are you doing?” he roared.
Her chin came up. “Giving this thing another look. You got a problem with that?”
“You’re damn right I do!” He stepped closer, grabbed her arm and shook her, making the flashlight beam bounce. “From now on, don’t you poke that pretty nose of yours outside without telling me first. Is that clear?”
“I don’t take orders from you, Mahoney.”
“Don’t let that ridiculous stiff-necked pride