He took a long swallow of soda. “Dad died seven years ago. His death scared me straight. I knew I had to save myself. Ma needed me to grow up and take responsibility. I did, Sara. I went to school for six years. I didn’t drink. Didn’t party. I’m a veterinarian now. I take care of the ranch. I take care of Ma.”
He reached across the table and took her hands in his. His gaze shot to her face. “Your fingers are icicles.”
“I know.” This year she felt winter’s chill so deeply. She didn’t know why she couldn’t get warm.
You were warm a minute ago, in this man’s arms. She ignored that sentiment.
“Before last summer,” Rem went on, “I’d been sober for six and a half years. That’s a long time.”
“Yes, it is, but you did drink again last summer.”
“And I don’t now. We’re going around in circles, Sara.”
She didn’t respond. What ruled her decisions about Rem were the times when he lost control, because those times destroyed her, devastated her, starting with her brother’s eleventh birthday party. Rem had sprayed Timm with foam streamers and the birthday candles had set the foam—and Timm—on fire. Rem’s questionable choices were terrifying.
“What about the car you crashed when you were sixteen? You were lucky to survive.”
He tapped one fist against his forehead. “I’m thirty-two years old. Why are you dwelling on ancient history?”
“Because it will always be there between us.”
“It doesn’t have to be. Life changes. Only your memories stay the same.”
“That’s true. My memories don’t change.”
As much as it hurt her to do so, she took her fingers out of his grasp.
“Nothing is going to happen between us, Rem. That’s final.” She moved to slide out of the booth, but he stopped her with a hand on her arm.
“If you leave now, it will be final. For me, too. I’m done with you, Sara.”
Rem sounded so strong, so determined, that Sara hesitated. He had hovered on the edges of her life for so many years. Had always been there, a constant, undeniable shadow. A man who’d loved her unceasingly. As of this moment, that all ended.
“I understand,” she said, and left the booth.
It was over. This time, for good.
She walked away, through the warm and festive restaurant and straight out the door into the quiet night, where falling snow coated the ground like a feather duvet, cloaking the world in a reverent hush. And all Sara felt as she trudged to her mother’s home was hollowness in the pit of her stomach and a bone-deep chill.
CHAPTER TWO
THE MOMENT HE HEARD THE CRASH, Rem shot out of his sweat-soaked bed and ran to the open window. Light-headed, he grasped the sill for support.
The June sun was too bright, already too high. Must be eight-thirty or nine o’clock. He’d slept in.
He’d been dreaming of Sara Franck again. And fire.
On the small highway that ran along his land, a patch of orange glimmered, so pretty it looked almost harmless. Was that actually fire or a remnant of his heat-wrought imagination?
He scrubbed his eyes and peered out the window to see a car nose-deep in the ancient oak beside his front gate.
The glow of orange grew.
Fire! Real, not dream-induced.
Lord, was there someone in that car?
With no time for a shirt, he scrambled into his jeans, almost falling when he hit the stairs.
His cell phone sat on the hall table where he’d left it beside his car keys.
As he ran out of the house, he tried to see whether anyone was up and walking around the car in the distance. Nothing moved.
Rem dove into his old SUV and sped down his long driveway toward the road that led to Ordinary, Montana.
He needed the fire department. Fast.
His hands shook and he dropped his phone.
Damn!
He wiped his eyes to clear them of sleep.
Wake up, already.
A too-long moment later, he pulled to a screeching stop at the end of the drive, scrabbled around under his seat for the phone and dialed 9-1-1.
“It’s Rem Caldwell. There’s been a car crash. Looks bad. I need the fire department and an ambulance.” He rattled off his address and jumped out of his vehicle.
Thick smoke obscured the compact car that had torn a gash into the oak, making it impossible to tell whether anyone was trapped inside.
Fire crackled in the front of the vehicle.
His heart in his throat, he rounded the car. A woman sat on the road holding her head and looking bewildered.
Thank God she’d gotten out.
“There’s a woman on the road,” he shouted to the emergency operator. “Alive, but hurt.” He shoved the phone into his pocket.
At least she wasn’t burning in that twisted wreckage, her flesh on fire and smelling of roasting meat.
Rem shook his head to rid his mind of old images.
“I’m coming!” he called to the woman. She didn’t react. Blood matted her hair and the asphalt around her.
On the far side of the road, in another pool of blood, lay a large stag. If he wasn’t dead already, then soon. The impact with the animal had crushed the front of the car right to the steering wheel.
The driver was lucky to be alive.
He squatted beside her. “Where are you hurt besides your head?” Judging by the way she held her ribs, she’d cracked or broken at least one. He guessed her arm was broken, too.
“What happened?” she whispered, the words slurred. Concussion, maybe?
“You hit a stag.”
She rubbed her ear, then turned to her side and vomited.
He supported her until she was finished.
“What happened?” she asked again and, with that evidence of confusion, he knew she had a concussion.
A high-pitched scream burst from the wreckage and the hair on Rem’s arms stood on end. Dear God.
Someone was inside that burning metal box.
“Who else was in the car with you?” Rem yelled over his shoulder as he ran toward the vehicle.
The driver didn’t respond.
He scanned the car. Too much fire. “Who’s in there?”
A young voice inside the car screamed, “Mom, help me!”
SARA FRANCK GLANCED at the cast on her son’s broken wrist, disappointed that Finn had been so foolish. He sat in the passenger seat staring out his window and avoiding talking to her, as was usual lately. If he was this moody at eleven, she dreaded his teen years.
She gripped the steering wheel. She’d hoped that moving back to Ordinary would settle him down.
“Are you sure you’re okay for your horseback riding lesson today?”
Finn shook his hair out of his eyes and mumbled, “Yeah.”
She