He thought of Mary Beth. The intoxication of courtship, the certainty that he'd found his match, the revelation that the woman he'd loved was not who he'd believed her to be. He'd been wrong about the most important decision of his life.What makes me think I can trust my judgment now?
Nothing. Nothing makes me think that.
Torin straightened, smoothed his hair, and composed his features into the pleasant, neutral expression he'd perfected over years of concealing his inner turmoil from his daughter.
Tonight, he would take Ivy to see the Northern Lights. Because she was a young woman from the city who had never seen the Montana sky in its full glory, and because showing her was a kindness.Nothing more.
He would sit beside her on the rock and keep a proper distance between them. He would point out the constellations and explain the science of the aurora as he understood it. He would be courteous, informative, and appropriate.
And he would not—could not—think about how her hazel eyes had looked in the lamplight last evening, or the way her laughter sounded when his daughter said something funny, or of the proud glances they exchanged when Jewel learned something new.
From where he stood, he could hear Ivy reading aloud to Jewel. “Jack and Jill” fromMother Goose—the gentle singsong of a nursery rhyme, punctuated by his child’s delighted repetitions and Brave's occasional meow of commentary.
Torin pressed a hand to his chest, where something ached that had nothing to do with illness or injury.
For Jewel's sake,he told himself.Only for Jewel's sake.
More than three-quarters full,the gibbous moon hung fat and luminous above the tree line. The light cast pale, silvery threads over the trail that wove through the dark evergreens and the skeleton branches of leafless deciduous trees.
Ivy walked carefully behind Torin on the narrow path. He carried a rolled bearskin over one shoulder and a folded wool blanket tucked under his other arm.
Before they left the house, Torin had bundled Ivy into one of his own coats atop hers—the bulk swallowed her slender figure,the sleeves hanging past her gloved hands. The heaviness of the double garments made maneuvering difficult. Still, the coat was warm and smelled of woodsmoke and pine resin and a masculine scent underneath that was simplyhim.
“Not much farther,” he said over his shoulder.
As they climbed, she felt the velvet night wrap around them. The crisp air bit at their cheeks and noses. Their breath puffed in small clouds. Except for the pad of their footsteps and the occasional crunch when one of them stepped on a twig, the silence, profound and heavy, weighed on one accustomed to the cacophony of New York’s streets.
In the distance, a low hoot made her jerk her head up. “What’s that sound?”
He paused and half turned. “An owl.”
“Sounded like a recorder, the instrument, I mean.” Wistfully, she wished to see an owl.Do they look as wise and interesting in reality as they do in illustrations?“I suppose owls only come out at night.”
“Actually, you can see them during the day. We’re lucky to have them around to curb the rodent population.” He faced forward and kept walking, glancing back from time to time to check up on her.
They emerged from the trees into a clearing surrounding an overlook. The lake gleamed beneath them, except for a path of moonlight across the dark surface that beckoned her to a fantasy world.Instead of Alice going through the looking glass, I’d be treading on magical moonlight.
Torin spread the bearskin rug across the wide, flat boulder.
With small rocks scattered around the clearing and dimly seen in the pale light, she watched her footing.The last thing I want is to make a fool of myself by tripping and sprawling at my employer’s feet.Relieved to reach the rock without a mishap, she sat. The fur was thick and dark, soft enough for a cushion.
He took a seat beside her—close enough that their shoulders nearly touched—and draped the wool blanket across both their laps. He tucked the edges around her with the absent care of a man accustomed to bundling his daughter against the cold.
Then Ivy looked up to the heavens to see an unbelievable sight.
The sky above Three Bend Lake possessed adepth—a vast, fathomless well of indigo darkness that went on and on and on, layered with stars beyond counting. Not dozens. Not hundreds.Thousands.
Gasping in awe, she pressed her crossed hands to her chest. The stars blazed and glittered in dense, luminous clouds, some diamond-white, others tinged with blue or gold or the faintest red. The galaxy swept across the center of the heavens in a great shimmering river, so thick with stars that it seemed almost solid, a band of milky light spilling from horizon to horizon.
“They call MontanaBig Sky Country,” Torin murmured, his tone reverent. “Most folks probably think the title comes from the vivid blue arch of our daytime sky. But I think it’s because of this.”
Beneath the stars, backlighting the mountain, the sky seemed to move. At first, Ivy thought it was a trick of her eyes—a shimmer, a suggestion of color where there should be only black.
“Ah, here come the Northern Lights.”
The shimmer deepened and spread. Curtains of light unfurled across the sky like silk banners, a pale, ethereal green, the color of new leaves held up to sunlight. They rippled and billowed with a slow, majestic grace.
“The aurora borealis.” Struck speechless, she lowered her arms.
