Caribou Crossing

By Susan Fox

"You can't go wrong picking up a Susan Fox book." —Romance Reviews Today

Author Susan Fox begins an exciting new series with this heartwarming introduction to the rugged Western town of Caribou Crossing—where a starry-eyed young couple sow the seeds of the life they've always wanted. . .

Wade Bly is certain of his destiny: He'll marry his high school sweetheart, Miriam, work at his father's ranch, and eventually inherit the place and make it his own. And of course, they'll have a few kids once they've had time to enjoy married life and save some money. But when an unexpected pregnancy speeds up their plans, Wade can only hope he's up for the challenge. . .

Miriam always knew she and Wade would be happy together. He's a good provider and a doting father to their spirited daughter, Jess. And when the lights go out, he's the passionate cowboy of her wildest dreams. But when a string of disappointments leaves them both feeling doubtful about their future, they'll have to rediscover themselves and their love—to see that the life they fear is over is really just beginning. . .

Advance Praise

"Smart, sexy, funny and touching. I loved this book!" --Susan Wiggs on Home on the Range

42,816 Words

• Language: English
• Publisher: Zebra Books
• Release date: Jul 1, 2013
• ISBN: 9781420133363

Susan Fox

Susan Fox grew up with her sister, Janet, and her brother, Steven, on an acreage near Des Moines, Iowa where besides a jillion stray cats and dogs, two horses, and a pony, her favourite pet and confidant was Rex, her brown and white pinto gelding. She has raised two sons, Jeffrey and Patrick, and currently lives in a house that she laughingly refers to as the Landfill and Book Repository. She writes with the help and hindrance of five mischievous shorthair felines: Gabby (a talkative tortoiseshell calico), Buster (a solid lion-yellow with white legs and facial markings) and his sister Pixie (a tri-colour calico), Toonses (a plump black and white), and the cheerily diabolical naughty black tiger Eddie, aka Eduardo de Lover. She is a bookaholic and movie fan who loves cowboys, rodeos, and the American West past and present, and has an intense interest in storytelling of all kinds and politics, which she claims are often interchangeable. Susan loves writing complex characters in emotionally intense situations, and hopes her readers enjoy her ranch stories and are uplifted by their happy endings.

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Chapter 1

Late February 1995

Miriam Bly lay in darkness, her eyelids heavy, shuttering her from the world. Dimly, she was aware of an ache in her belly, another in her heart, but the sensations were dull, muffled. A cocoon wrapped her, protecting her from . . . From what?

This wasn’t normal not-quite-awake-yet sleep. She felt almost like she’d been drugged. What could have . . . But the thought faded before she could follow it through.

She wanted to open her eyes.

No, maybe she didn’t. Instinct told her there was something she didn’t want to face.

A male voice prodded the border of her safe cocoon. Honey, I’m here.

Wade. It was Wade.

A sense of peace filled her. She was with Wade, safe and loved.

I’m with you, Miriam, he said softly. Now and forever.

She smiled. No need to open her eyes, because his beloved face was crystal clear in her mind’s eye.

Heaven, Miriam thought as she swayed in the arms of her brand-new husband to The Yellow Rose of Texas. This was sheer heaven.

The male singer’s voice sang the last line, vowing that the yellow rose of Texas was the only girl for him, and a fiddle echoed the plaintive melody.

That’s how I feel, Wade said, his chocolate eyes warm and sparkly as he smiled down at her. She’d shed her high-heeled sandals when he’d taken off the jacket of his rented tux, so he was a good six inches taller, making her feel feminine and protected. You’re the only girl for me. Now and forever, Miriam.

Oh, Wade. Her heart skipped. He could always make her heart skip. That’s exactly the way I feel.

Two hours ago, she and her high school sweetheart, Wade Bly, had been joined in marriage just across the street in the historic church that dated back to Caribou Crossing’s gold rush days. Now, after a buffet dinner set up in white tents in the town square, the reception was in full swing to tunes played by The Lonesome Cowboys, a local country and western band.

The clear, velvety September sky showcased a dazzling array of stars, but Miriam was sure they couldn’t rival the ones in her eyes as she gazed up at her nineteen-year-old husband. He had rolled up the sleeves of the slim-fitting white pleated shirt, and unbuttoned it at the neck, so she had ample opportunity to admire his strong muscles and the tan he’d acquired working on his parents’ ranch. His rich chestnut hair was freshly cut in a style that complimented his rugged features.

She nestled as close as the puffy white skirt of her wedding dress allowed, and followed his lead as the band started to play Stand by Your Man.

As they circled slowly, she gazed around the square. Surrounded by friends and family—had they invited half the town to their wedding?—she felt loved, blessed, blissful.

One of her best friends, Connie, who was dancing nearby with her steady guy, caught Miriam’s eye and gave her a thumbs-up.

Miriam smiled at her, grateful to Connie and the rest of the gang who’d decorated the town square, making it magical and romantic. They’d threaded the trees with strings of sparkly lights, set out big urns of roses in all shades of pink, and weaved flowers through the lattice of the band shell. Even the statue of gold-panning Richard Morgan, one of the town’s founders, had a wreath of roses decorating his miner’s hat, and the wire-framed caribou set out by the chamber of commerce to promote tourism wore rosy headdresses on their antlers.

The square was the heart of the small town of Caribou Crossing, which itself was near the center of British Columbia’s Cariboo, a ruggedly scenic patchwork of rolling hills and grasslands adorned with indigo lakes, sparkling rivers, and patches of forest.

A gold rush town in the 1860s, Caribou Crossing could easily have turned into a ghost town as many had, but an enterprising minister and a handful of miners saw the potential for ranching, and the town entered a new era. Now, more than a century later, there was a growing tourist industry as well, with the locals playing up the gold rush history and the country and western theme.

Miriam had moved here at age ten when her dad’s bank transferred him from Edmonton, and she’d fallen in love with everything: the magnificent scenery, horses and riding, the small-town sense of community, even the Western attire.

She glanced over to see Wade’s parents heading onto the dance floor. His rancher dad was stocky and handsome in a Western-cut suit and shirt. His mom, whose health was a little fragile, looked vibrant today in a full-skirted blue dress. It took our wedding to get your dad out of his Stetson.

And me out of my boots, Wade said. In these dress shoes, I’m as tottery as a new foal finding its feet.

Seems to me you’re doing just fine.

A number of their guests, including some of the females, were wearing cowboy boots and hats. Others, like her mom and Wade’s had taken the opportunity to wear fancier clothes. Miriam loved how folks here were so easygoing and, though they were nosy as all get-out, they weren’t judgmental.

Warm enough? Wade asked.

As long as you keep holding me. She’d have preferred to get married in the summer, but in Caribou Crossing life was controlled by the seasons. An early September wedding meant that haying was finished at Bly Ranch, and it would be another month before the calves had to be weaned. Oh yes, she was a country girl, for sure. No, make that a country wife!

The song ended and the singer said, This next tune’s a special request.

Miriam’s eyes widened and she gazed up at her husband. Oh, Wade, did you—

Not me. He tipped his head toward the band shell and rotated their bodies so she could see. It’s your dad.

Her suit-clad father, Henry Torrance, who was more at home in his office at the bank than on a public stage, looked uncomfortable but determined as he mounted the band shell steps and took the microphone. This song is for the two ladies in my life. Rosie, my beloved wife of twenty-five years, and with any luck another twenty-five and more to come. This is her favorite song, and I think it’s the right one for my other special girl tonight. He swallowed and the lights on the band shell revealed a gleam of moisture in his eyes as he gazed across at Miriam.

You’re my oldest child but you’re also my little girl, he said, his voice gruff. I hate to see you grow up and leave my house, but you couldn’t be doing it with a better man. So here’s a song for you and Wade, to start off your new life together.

Touched, Miriam blinked back tears of her own as she blew him a kiss and mouthed, Thank you, Daddy.

The members of the band took up their instruments again. Before the first note sounded, she knew what they’d play: We’ve Only Just Begun, a song made famous in the 1970s by The Carpenters. Hokey and sentimental, sweet and romantic, it was a perfect wedding song.

Wade gathered her close as she watched her mom, beautiful and elegant in a rose-colored sheath, step into her dad’s arms as if there was no other possible place to be. That’s going to be us one day, she told Wade.

He glanced at the older couple. Twenty-five years married, with lots more to come? Same as my parents. He nodded to where his mom and dad swayed in each other’s arms. Yeah, for sure.

Still as in love as we are today.

More in love.

If that’s possible. He filled her heart so completely, he’d given her his love and pledged his future, how could her feelings be any stronger and truer? Imagining the future, she said, One day, you’ll be requesting that very same song when our daughter gets married.

You think I’m going to let our daughter get married? What guy could possibly deserve her? he teased.

She sighed contentedly. Four kids, right? Two boys, two girls.

Yeah, but not for a while. I want time alone with you first.

Time. She gave a happy shiver. We have so much time. Time to do it all. Our honeymoon, our first apartment. Living together, Wade. It’s going to be so much fun.

Being able to make love whenever, wherever, we want. He kissed her, sweet and warm with a touch of tongue to fire her blood. Starting with the honeymoon. In an hour or two, they’d drive to a neighboring town to spend their wedding night in the bridal suite of a historic inn. Then they’d head down to Vancouver to explore the big city for a few days.

It’ll be different, Miriam said. Making love when we’re married. Knowing that we’re really, truly, totally joined together. Forever. It’ll be better than ever before.

Tough to imagine. He tugged her closer. But I know what you mean.

Glancing around the open-air dance floor, crowded with kids they’d gone to school with, the parental generation, even a few grandparents, Miriam’s gaze lit again on Wade’s parents.

That was so sweet of your folks, she said, giving us their old ranch truck when they bought a new one. That truck had carried her and Wade on many, many dates and been the site of loads of make-out sessions—a fact that she hoped his parents had never guessed.

Pa needs me to show up on time for work, now that I won’t be living at the ranch anymore.

His folks had a big cattle ranch and Wade had been helping out since he was a toddler. Now he was a full-time paid employee. Bly Ranch was a family business, started by Wade’s granddad, and one day he’d inherit it.

Though Miriam’s parents—her banker dad and high school teacher mom—were town folk, she’d fallen in love with Bly Ranch the first time Wade invited her out to ride. There was nothing she enjoyed more than galloping side by side across the open grassland, then spreading a blanket by the creek under the shade of the cottonwoods for a picnic and a little fooling around.

You do know, Miriam teased, nestling against his strong, sexy body, I just married you for the ranch?

Oh, was that the reason? He gave his hips a subtle pump against her belly.

Well, there might have been one or two other things.

They laughed softly together and she thought how amazingly compatible they were. They had the same values, the same interests, the same joy in life. They had all the same dreams.

She could see the future ahead of them, clear as day. Those four children. Living together in town, close to her parents, her and Wade’s friends, and the kids’ schools. Going out to the ranch on weekends to ride and have Sunday dinner. Then eventually, many years from now, she and Wade would be the Blys of Bly Ranch, owning that incredible piece of property and taking care of it so they could pass it down to their own children.

All those beautiful dreams—and they were coming true, starting today.

It’s all going to be so perfect, she sighed, going up on her toes to kiss her husband as he held her in the circle of his arms, safe and loved.

Chapter 2

Wade Bly walked down the hospital corridor, running a hand over his stubbly jaw, and swallowed a yawn. The wall clock said five past ten. Outside the window, blustery snow whirled down from a slate-gray sky. February at its nastiest.

He’d had only a couple hours’ sleep during the last thirty. Though he was used to staying up all night when there was a problem with the livestock, this was a whole different thing. He had never, in his entire twenty-seven years, felt so exhausted, drained, and downright shitty. His eyes ached from holding back tears, and his throat burned with unuttered curses and screams.

He fed change into the coffee machine and bought