One Night with her Bachelor(49)

Take time to do things for yourself.

Dang it. Why couldn’t that be easy?

With about thirty seconds left before recess ended, she rushed down the hall and poked her head into Claudine’s classroom. A student teacher was leading a math lesson while Claudine unloaded the paints. Molly waved and got Claudine’s attention. When Claudine stepped into the hall, Molly asked, “Are you free tomorrow after school?”

“Yeah. Wanna do something?”

“Yeah, but it might sound kind of strange. I need your help with something. Oh, and do you have a ski suit in my size?”





Chapter Fourteen





?


Gabriel sat in the chair at his kitchen table and stared at the brochures and printed web pages spread out before him. He’d read half of them to see what grabbed him, and curious feelings simmered under his skin.

Excitement. Possibility. Anticipation.

Molly had given him the kick in the ass he’d desperately needed. That wasn’t to say the decisions facing him would be easy. None of this was. But he’d conquered the first hurdle by driving into town last week and borrowing his mom’s computer to do a little research.

His kettle screeched as it boiled. He dropped the brochure he was reading and refilled his coffee press, standing next to the window while the coffee brewed. Snow fell softly outside, and the benign conversations of the forest rangers over the radio kept him company. He’d heard his half brother Austin’s voice a few times. He’d been listening to the rangers more and more lately, trying to figure out whether the forestry service might be where his future lay. But he’d also picked up brochures about retraining to become a paramedic, an ER nurse or a flight nurse. He already had a lot of trauma training, but most of his experience was with military personnel—not the elderly or kids. He craved an exciting job that would let him use his skills and challenge his body. He didn’t know whether his body could hold up to the rigor of those jobs, but he was going to stop assuming it couldn’t. He’d trained his ass off at Lackland. He would do it again so nothing held him back.

“Gabriel? You there?”

His head shot up, and he spun so quickly hot coffee sloshed out of the press and burned his hand. Sucking in a breath, he let the press clatter to the countertop. His radio squawked, and he realized Austin’s voice had come from the speakers.

“Gabriel, if you’re there, we need your help, buddy. Molly Dekker’s snow-hiking from the Copper Mountain parking lot to your place, but she just let out a distress signal on her beacon. We’ve sent a team, but it’ll take us twenty minutes to get there.”

Gabriel grabbed the radio and shot out of the room. His snow pants and jacket hung next to his front door, but the fastest way to get them on was to remove his shoes. And the fastest way to remove his left shoe was to remove his prosthesis. He yanked his snow clothes off the hook, ran back to his living room, threw himself into the arm chair and got to work. Less than a minute later, he’d leaped from the chair, grabbed his emergency backpack and ran out the door.

Piles of fresh snow blanketed the forest around his cabin, and he fought to keep his panic at bay as he trudged through it. He had no way to contact her, no way to contact the rangers. He couldn’t tell them he was on his way or even ask where the signal had come from. Since there wasn’t a path straight from the parking lot to his door, there were endless possible routes she could’ve taken. All he could do was pray she’d taken the most direct route, the one he usually took.

But maybe she didn’t know that one. Or maybe she’d been disoriented by the snow and gotten lost once she left the main path. His cabin was two miles off that path, then another mile to the parking lot. She could’ve left the path at a dozen different places. She could be almost anywhere.

Jesus. Please let her be okay. I’ll do anything, anything…

His eyes scanned left to right, right to left as he crunched through the snow. “Molly! Molly, can you hear me?”

His prosthesis rubbed against his knee, never very comfortable walking through snow. But he ignored the irritation and tried to listen for any unusual sound.

All he heard was the thudding of his heart.

“Molly!”

A flash of red off to his right caught his eye. A movement. A hand lifting over a snowdrift.

He sprinted, jumping over a fallen log and landing on his knees a foot away from where Molly lay in the snow. She jerked, her eyes widening in shock. “Gabriel!”

“Where are you hurt?” He slid his backpack off and tugged it open, ready to yank out any instruments he needed.

“My foot got caught on something under the snow, and I twisted my ankle.”

He took a pair of scissors from his bag, but she threw her hands up to stop him. “No way! I borrowed these ski pants from my friend. You can’t cut them.”

“I have to look at your ankle.”

“No you don’t because I can tell you what’s wrong with it. I’ve sprained it before, and that’s what this feels like.”

“Even if it’s just a sprain, it could be swollen with blood. I need—”

“You need to listen to me.” Her voice vibrated with strength. He shut his mouth and lowered the scissors. “This is not a medical emergency. I set off my alarm because I’m not an idiot—there are bears and wolves around here, and I don’t want to become dinner. But I’m not gravely injured. I twisted my ankle, and when I tried to stand up I fell again. I was just crawling toward that log over there because one of the branches looks perfect for a crutch.”