Evergreen Springs

“Those are fun ages at Christmastime. Still young enough to believe in the magic and old enough to appreciate the wonder of it all.”

“I guess. I’m not sure any of us is in the mood for Christmas this year,” he said, his tone rather bleak.

Why? What was the story here? She wanted to ask but decided it wasn’t her business. “You said you had a bag of your sister’s?”

“Yeah. I guess she’s had a hospital bag packed since before she came out to Idaho. She threw it in the truck before we left the house. Mother’s intuition or something. Apparently it contains a few necessities like magazines and slippers.”

“Handy.”

“I guess.” He looked around the empty waiting room, then back at her. “I’ve got to tell you, Doc, I’m still not convinced this is the best place for her and the twins. I can’t help thinking maybe the smartest thing would be to pack her up right now and take her to a bigger hospital in Boise.”

Devin ignored the little pinch to her pride. “I understand your concern. I told Tricia that’s a decision she can certainly make. I will tell you, we have a state-of-the-art facility here, brand-new in the last two years, with every possible advanced fetal and maternal monitoring capability and a couple of excellent specialists in the area who will be taking a look at her tomorrow. If at any time your sister feels uneasy about the care she’s receiving here, I would be the first to encourage her to transfer to a different facility. At this point, we’re dealing with a sprained ankle and contractions that currently appear to be under control. I would advise against moving to another facility far away from her family, but that’s, of course, her choice.”

“Yeah, she was quick to remind me of the same thing,” he said, his voice wry.

“Sisters. What can you do?”

He almost smiled but seemed to catch himself at the last minute as his daughter came out of the ladies’ room, wiping her just-washed hands on her coat.

He unpeeled from the wall. “Thanks for keeping an eye on them for me. Come on, kids. Let’s grab the bag for Aunt Tricia, then take off back to the ranch before that snow gets any deeper.”

Devin watched them walk outside, their faces colored by the blinking Christmas lights around the front door as snow swirled around them.

“I can’t believe how much snow has already fallen,” Brittney said, looking out after them.

Before Devin could answer, Callie appeared. “There you are. We just got a call from Dispatch. Paramedics are on their way to the scene of a three-car accident and they’re warning us to get ready for multiple injuries.”

So much for her relatively quiet evening.

She put the very sexy cowboy and his cute kids out of her mind so she could focus on the job at hand.

* * *

SHE DIDN’T HAVE the chance to check on Tricia again until several hours and two more weather-related accidents later.

Devin’s friend had been moved to a room on the obstetrics floor, the third floor of the hospital, where each room had big windows offering lovely views—in daylight, anyway—of the Redemption Mountains and the beautiful unearthly blue waters of Lake Haven.

On a quick break, Devin took the elevator up and headed to the obstetrics nurses’ desk. She found Tricia’s chart and saw that the contractions appeared to have stopped. Dr. Randall, the ob-gyn, had made a visit a short time ago and Devin sighed when she read his recommendation. As she had feared, Dr. Randall agreed with her and thought this was one of the rare cases when hospital bed rest was indicated.

That wouldn’t be easy for anyone—especially not Tricia.

Thinking she would just take a peek inside to see if her patient was sleeping, she cracked the door only a little. A light was on above the bed, she discovered. Tricia sat upright in the bed with her leg propped on a couple of pillows, hands clasped over her distended abdomen.

When she spied Devin, she gave a small smile and quickly tried to wipe away the tears on her cheeks.

Devin didn’t give another thought to the peanut butter and honey sandwich she had planned to eat during the break. Her patient was in distress and that was far more important.

She pushed the door open and walked inside. “Oh, honey. What’s wrong? Are you having pain? How’s the ankle?”

Tricia shrugged. “It hurts, mainly because I don’t want to take any heavy pain medication that might harm the babies. But at least it’s not broken. Mostly I’m upset because this isn’t the way I planned to spend the last few weeks of my pregnancy. Alone, on bed rest in a strange hospital.”

“I’m so sorry.”

Tricia sniffled and Devin handed her the box of tissues that was just out of reach on her bedside table. She grabbed one and wiped at her eyes. “So you heard?”

“I was just reading your chart.”

“Dr. Randall thinks I should stay here on hospital bed rest for the next week so they can continue monitoring things. I’m dilated to a three and twenty percent effaced, which makes the risk of premature labor high, and now I can’t even walk to the bathroom on my own. The stupid ankle is complicating everything.”

“I know it’s hard but this might be the best thing for all of you. You want to keep those little ones inside there as long as possible, trust me. In just a few weeks, they’ll be considered full-term and the risks of neonatal complications drop considerably.”

“I know. But I don’t have to like it. It stinks.”

“You won’t get an argument from me. I get it, believe me.”

She didn’t, really. She could understand and empathize on a clinical level but she didn’t really know what it was to be pregnant and frightened. That was something she would never be able to appreciate, except theoretically.

The ache in her chest was as familiar as it was unwelcome.

“I’m sorry I bothered you,” she said quietly. “Sleep is really the best thing for you and those kidlets.”

“I was sleeping until a short time ago, but then I had a bad dream that woke me.”

Devin tried to lighten the mood. “I hate that. A few nights ago, I dreamed I was the grand marshal of the Lake Haven Days parade but instead of riding on a float, I had to do cartwheels the entire parade route, all the way down Lake Street in front of everyone in town. My hands were killing me, even in the dream.”

As she hoped, Tricia smiled a little at the ridiculousness of Devin’s subconscious. “The mind is such a strange thing, isn’t it?”

“You said it, sister.” Devin slipped into the visitor’s chair next to the bed.

She felt a comfortable kinship with the other woman, though they had been separated for years and hadn’t stayed in touch. Some friendships were like that. Despite time and distance, coming together again was like slipping on a favorite shirt you misplaced for a while in the back of your closet.

“Is it still snowing out there?” Tricia asked. “I spoke with my brother before I fell asleep and he said they passed a couple of slide-offs on the way home. He said they already had four or five inches on the road up to Evergreen Springs.”

“We’ve had weather-related accidents all night. This is the first chance I’ve had to slip away to check on you. Your brother and the children made it home safely, though?”

“Yes. He said it was slick and they slid a little, especially going up the driveway, but nothing serious.”

“That’s a relief.”

Tricia was silent, her fingers tangled in the edge of the nubby hospital blanket. “I hate that I’ve complicated everything for him. As if everything wasn’t tough enough already—now he has to worry about me, too.”

“Why are things tough?”

Tricia made a rough sound. “I could paper the walls with all the reasons, starting with the kids. Jazmyn and Ty have only been with him a few months and they’re all still trying to find their way together.”

“Is that right?” She didn’t want to be nosy but she couldn’t deny she was curious about the situation.

Tricia sighed. “Their mom, Cole’s ex, was killed in a car accident just after her third marriage.”

“Oh, no. Those poor children.” Perhaps that explained some of Jazmyn’s surliness and the shadows in poor little Ty’s gaze.

“I know the kids miss her. My heart breaks for them. I don’t think Ty, at least, really gets what’s going on, but Jaz was super close to her mother and she’s devastated. It’s been so tough for all of them. I’m sad for the kids but I can’t honestly say I’m sorry Sharla is dead.”

Devin blinked a little, surprised by the other woman’s rancor. “Okay.”

“I know that makes me sound like a terrible person but I don’t care. She was a vindictive witch who did her best to keep Jaz and Ty away from Cole as much as possible, unless it was convenient for her to dump them off on him. She hopped from man to man, town to town, and put him and those kids through hell.”

“That doesn’t sound like a good situation for anybody.”

“It wasn’t. I hope things will be a little easier for all of them now. Maybe they can have some kind of stable home life for the first time, at least after Cole finds a housekeeper who will stick around for longer than a few weeks. You don’t know anybody looking for a job, do you?”

“As a housekeeper?” Devin asked. “I don’t, but I can certainly ask around.”

“He needs a nanny more than a housekeeper, really. He just can’t keep up with the ranch and the house and the kids by himself. He’s hired a couple of people to help but neither of them really clicked with the kids. Jaz can be...moody and difficult sometimes. As for Ty, he’s the sweetest thing, but he can be energetic when he’s in a mood. Neither of them has ever had any kind of structure or discipline. I’ve been helping him out these past weeks since the last housekeeper left before Thanksgiving. I don’t know how he’s going to juggle everything on his own without me.”

“I’m sure he’ll figure it out.” Cole Barrett struck her as a man used to taking care of business. She ignored the ridiculous little flutter in her stomach as she thought of the man. “You need to let your brother worry about his home life. That can’t be your concern.”

“I can’t help it. I stress about him and the children. If he wasn’t so darn stubborn, the solution to the whole problem is right there at the ranch, staring him in the face. But that would be too easy and require my inflexible brother to bend a little. I mean, Dad is right there on the ranch, living fifty yards away, but Cole will gnaw off his own leg before he asks Stanford to lift a finger.”

“I take it your brother and father don’t get along.” The man really did have a tangled mess of a home life.

Tricia sighed heavily. “That’s an understatement. I’m not saying Cole doesn’t have his reasons for being angry, but people can change, right? Dad is trying.”

Devin didn’t quite know how to answer that, since she didn’t know any of the particulars, so she remained silent.

After a moment, Tricia winced. “Sorry. You didn’t come in here to be bored by my family drama.”

“I’m not bored. I just wish I could help somehow.”

“The housekeeper is the critical need, especially with me stuck here. They’re going to be eating frozen pizzas and cold cereals until I have these babies. He’s the kind of man who will never ask for help. He’ll just muddle through as best he can.”

She knew more than a few of those. “I’ll put the word out. It might be tough to hire someone right before Christmas but I’ll ask my sister if she can think of anybody. McKenzie is the mayor of Haven Point and she seems to know everything that goes on.”

“Thank you. Seriously, Devin. Thank you. I’m so glad you were here when Cole made me come.”

She smiled and rose. “I need to head back downstairs. Is there anything else I can do for you?”

“You’ve done so much already.” Tears welled up in the other woman’s eyes again and Devin squeezed her fingers. This was a tough situation for anyone, especially when she was pregnant with twins and appeared to be alone.

Tricia hadn’t said anything about her husband, though she still wore a wedding ring. Devin took a chance and though it wasn’t her business as a physician, she wanted to think their old and dear friendship gave her a little more leeway.

“Have you been in contact with the babies’ father? Does he know what’s going on?”

Tricia reached for another tissue. “No. He won’t care, anyway.”

“Ah. I’m sorry I brought it up.”

“Sean and I are...estranged, I guess you could say. It’s such a mess.”

“I didn’t mean to distress you, honey. Forget about it.”

“No. You should know what’s going on. It’s a long story but the core problem is he’s angry about the pregnancy. We have always been that couple who told everyone who would listen that they didn’t want children. We were both adamant about it. This was an oopsie of epic proportions...and wouldn’t you know, I’d get pregnant with twins?”

Devin forced a smile, though she felt that familiar little ache in her chest again.

“As soon as I found out I was pregnant, my whole mind-set shifted,” Tricia said, “and suddenly I loved and wanted Jack and Emma desperately, but Sean never came around. I thought he might eventually, but we had another big fight just before Thanksgiving. He couldn’t come to the last ultrasound. This is after weeks of him being too busy to come to other appointments. He was supposed to come out here with me, too, for the holiday, but at the last minute he volunteered for a business trip. It was the last straw, you know?”

She didn’t, but again, she nodded.

“It was plain to me things would never change. I decided I couldn’t raise my children in an atmosphere where they felt unwanted, even for a moment. I know what that’s like and I couldn’t put my children through that, so I decided to stay with Cole and the children, to have the babies here and stay at Evergreen Springs until I figure out what to do now.”

She sniffled a little and wiped at her eyes. “Now here I am in the hospital with a sprained ankle. I’ve made such a mess of things.”

Devin rubbed her arm. “You’re in very good hands here, my dear. We will take great care of you and your babies. I promise.”

“What about Cole and the kids? While I’m in here resting on my butt, he’ll be scrambling to do everything on his own. He’s a dear, dear man but he’s in way over his head with those kids of his. He can barely boil water. They’ll be eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for every meal.”

Devin took her friend’s hands. “Your concern right now has to be keeping those babies safe and healthy and doing what you can to heal that ankle. I need you to promise me you won’t worry. It’s not good for any of you. We’ll find someone to help your brother.”

“You know, I believe you.” Tricia rested back on the pillows, some of the strain easing from her features. “That was always one of the things I loved best about you, Dev. If you said you would do something, you did it. You always kept your word.”

“You have to believe me about this. Your brother will be fine. We’ll make sure of it.”

She wasn’t sure how, she thought as she bid Tricia good-night and left the room. She didn’t even know the man, but she had promised her friend.

Cole Barrett would receive help, whether he wanted it or not.

CHAPTER THREE

WHEN DEVIN FINALLY parked her SUV in the garage and let herself into her house on the lakeshore, it was nearly midnight and most Haven Point residents lay tucked in their beds while the snow continued to fall and the winds blew.

She flipped on the lights of the kitchen, a little light-headed with exhaustion. Her day had started with clinic hours at her practice beginning before 9:00 a.m. Barring those few moments of knitting with Greta, she hadn’t had time to take a breath all day.

Why, again, had she ever wanted to be a doctor?

Oh, yes. Because she wanted to think that some days she was actually making a difference, helping others as she had been helped by so many caring professionals.

Seamus, the friendlier of her two cats, wandered in and rubbed against her leg in greeting.

Devin picked him up. “Hello there, handsome. Anything exciting happen around here? What kind of trouble did you and Simone get into without me?”

He let out a long meow, the tattletale. Both of her cats were rescues from the shelter but Simone had been with her only a few months, a replacement for her dearest and oldest friend, Trina, who had been with Devin since she was a kitten.

The newcomer and Seamus adored each other, which was great, but so far the other cat hadn’t warmed up to Devin.

She was working on it, though. She pulled the kibble out of the pantry and shook the container. A moment later, Simone peeked shyly around the corner. She was still trying to persuade the cat to come closer when her phone rang.

To Devin’s great relief, it was her sister, not an emergency call tugging her back to the hospital.

“Hey, Kenz,” she answered. “What are you doing up so late?”

“I could say the same for you, Dr. Shaw. I was letting Rika and Hondo back inside after their last trip out for the night and saw you drive past. Tell me you’ve been on a hot date.”

She snorted. When was her last hot date? Nothing came immediately to mind. She really needed to do something about that but the dating pool in Haven Point wasn’t very deep at the moment. The town was changing, though, especially now that Caine Tech was developing a new facility on the edge of town at the site of the old boatworks, which had once been owned by the family of McKenzie’s fiancé.

“You know me. I have to fight them off with a scalpel.”

McKenzie laughed. “You would, if you stood still long enough. Have you been working all day?”

“I covered Pat Lander’s shift in the emergency department after work. His grandson had a Christmas concert over in Star and he didn’t want to miss it. Nobody else was available. What are you doing up so late?”

“Ben flew in for the weekend,” she answered. “We went to dinner at Lydia’s place in Shelter Springs and stayed later than we planned. I just checked my email and saw you sent me something about calling out the troops. What’s up?”

Devin slipped off her shoes and sank into her favorite chair in the family room, with wide windows looking out on the lake. Right now she saw only snow drifting past the window but she could imagine it on a summer afternoon with the water gently lapping the dock and clouds rippling past the mountains.

“I wanted to take a couple of quick freezer meals—soups, casseroles, whatever—to a single dad in the area who apparently isn’t very skilled in the kitchen.”

“Oh? Anybody I know?”

This was always a tricky situation. Privacy rules demanded she not discuss her patients, not even when that patient had been a friend to both of them. But how did she let McKenzie know what was needed when she couldn’t give specifics?

“Cole Barrett,” she finally said. “Do you know him?”

“Are you kidding? Yum. Tricia’s brother, right? The sexy rodeo cowboy who lives up at Evergreen Springs. I’ve bumped into him a few times having breakfast when I’m grabbing coffee at Serrano’s. Not a big talker, by the way, but he was one of those on the front lines of the sandbagging during the big flood.”

Earlier in the summer, a dam upriver from Haven Point on the Hell’s Fury had become unstable. The town avoided significant damage, mostly because the town’s mayor—who just happened to be her sister—had quickly mobilized everyone to evacuate and put protective measures around homes in the flood zone.

“Wait a minute,” McKenzie said after a moment. “Cole Barrett is a single father? You’re kidding. I had no idea the guy had a family. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him with kids.”

“Apparently his ex-wife had custody of their son and daughter but she died a few months ago so the kids have come to live with him.”

“Oh, the poor kids. This is a terrible season to lose a parent.”

If they had been together in person, Devin would have given her sister a tight hug, suddenly remembering her sister had personal experience in that department. She and McKenzie were half sisters, actually, and McKenzie had come to live with their family when she was ten, after her own mother died. That had been around the holidays, too, she remembered, more determined than ever to help Cole and his children through this rough time.

“He needs a housekeeper. Do you know anybody in town who might be looking for a job?”

“I think everybody who’s in the market is applying at the new Caine Tech facility. I can check with a few people. Anita knows everything,” she said, referring to her assistant at city hall. “She might have some ideas.”

“Thank you. Meanwhile, Tricia has been in town helping him out but she can’t right now.” Devin chose her words carefully, mindful again of patient privacy. “I was thinking it would be very neighborly if we called out the Helping Hands to fill up his freezer with a few things he could fix in a pinch while he’s handling things on his own.”

McKenzie spearheaded a loosely organized group of women who gathered regularly to provide service to Haven Point residents who might be struggling.

“That’s a fabulous idea. I’ll send out an email right now. When would you like me to have people drop off their meals?”

She hadn’t thought that far ahead, to actually delivering the meals. That would necessitate seeing Cole again, something that suddenly gave her ridiculous butterflies.

Her tired brain took a moment to scan through her schedule for the next day. “Why don’t we say midmorning tomorrow? That way everybody can see the email first thing and check their freezer inventory. I’ve got yoga class at the senior citizen’s center that won’t be done until ten. Let’s use the store as a central drop-off place, if you don’t mind. I can pick everything up after yoga and take it up to Evergreen Springs. I thought I would make up a spinach lasagna, a chicken and rice casserole and the Gruyère mac and cheese everybody seemed to like at the last potluck.”

“Ooh. That sounds delicious. I wish I had a big bowl of it right now.”

“I’ll save you some,” she promised.

“I was already thinking about throwing together a big batch of burgundy beef stew in the slow cooker tomorrow. Ben loves it and I’ll have plenty of extras for Cole. I’ll just cook it on the stove instead. It’s always better reheated anyway, once the flavors have time to meld.”

“Thanks, Kenz.”

“I’m actually glad to have the chance to do something for Cole. He worked nonstop last summer when the Hell’s Fury flooded and then disappeared before I ever had the chance to say thanks. I don’t think I saw him even take a break for a sandwich. It will be nice to feel like we’re paying him back a little for all his help.”

“That works.”

“And maybe if we’re nice enough to him,” McKenzie went on in a voice that was growing in enthusiasm, “he won’t feel like he has to be such a hermit up there on the mountain. Sexy cowboys hanging around downtown for the tourists to see can only be good for our reputation, right?”

Devin laughed. “You can be the one to tell the man you want to pimp him out for the good of Haven Point.”

“He wouldn’t have to go bare-chested or anything. I would be happy if he just walked up and down Lake Street in his Stetson, tipping it every now and then to the tourists with a random ‘ma’am’ or ‘howdy.’”

She heard a deep voice on the other end—Ben, she assumed. McKenzie said something to him Devin couldn’t hear, then came back laughing.

“Okay, apparently Ben thinks that’s not one of my better ideas. We’ll keep it on the back burner for now.”

“That’s a good place for it. Way, way back,” Devin said with a laugh. “I’ll be by tomorrow to pick up the food.”

She ended the connection, deeply grateful for her sister. McKenzie had come into the family through difficult circumstances but Devin couldn’t imagine her world without her sister’s quirky sense of humor, her creative mind and her deep sense of compassion and loyalty.