“He’s been such a good boy,” Ellen said, tucking Baby’s blanket up onto his shoulders as Grace held him. “Any time you need a sitter, Grace, you call me. It’s been a pleasure.”

“I will. Thank you.”

A low, rumbling moan suddenly trembled the ground beneath their feet, traveling toward them from the direction of TarStone Mountain. The moan slowly rose in pitch and volume until it sounded like the hum of a tuning fork moving closer.

“Dammit. The ski lift!” Grey shouted, grabbing Grace and pushing her and Baby to one of the carport pillars, wrapping himself around them in a protective embrace. Grace only had time to see Michael hug Ellen and John together and use his body to shield them from the direction of the lift before Grey pushed her face onto his chest, over Baby, and covered their heads with his arms.

A sudden detonation, like a sonic boom, shook the ground and rattled the windows of the hotel. Grace lifted her head just enough to see past Grey’s shoulder. She watched, horrified, as the cable of the ski lift finally snapped and whipped angrily through the air, backlashing against the lift shed. The shed collapsed under the force of the blow.

The tower arms broke then, each one sounding like a succession of gunshots that trailed off in beating echoes up the mountain. Gondolas smashed to the ground in a hail of shattering ice and glass. Trees near the lift trail bowed and broke from the indiscriminate whip of the cable.

Grey moved to his right, protecting them from the spectacle. Grace squeezed Baby’s ears between her chest and Grey’s to protect him from the percussion of the unbelievably loud cannonade that rumbled on and on, slowly decreasing in volume as the destruction traveled up the mountain.

The sudden silence was almost as shocking as the noise had been. It was broken only by occasional thumps and cracks high up on TarStone. Grey stepped back and turned, looking into the mist toward the remains of his ski lift, his expression awed.

It came then, the sound Grace had been waiting for and dreading. High up, far out of sight, the thunder of the summit house collapsing slowly rumbled back down the mountain toward them. The top tower had snapped under the strain of two miles of cable breaking free, and everything in the cable’s path was destroyed. All that was left were naked towers, still vibrating with an energy that had finally stripped them clean of the ice entombing them.

“Holy Mother of God,” Ian whispered, his eyes huge and his face pale.

And that, Grace thought as she looked down to check on Baby, was about all that needed saying.

She noticed a drop of water on Baby’s hat and wiped it away. Another one immediately replaced it. She wiped it away also. A large finger suddenly lifted her chin, and a warm thumb brushed across her damp cheek. She looked up through blurry eyes at Grey.

“It’s only metal and cable, Grace. Don’t weep for the loss of something as unimportant as a ski lift.”

“I promised to save it for you.”

“Nay, lass. You promised only to try. And you were going to win. The destruction is on my shoulders, Grace, not yours.”

The people of Pine Creek came pouring out of the hotel then, milling around and staring at the destroyed ski lift. Michael stood with Ellen and John, one of his big hands on each of their shoulders. Grace didn’t know if he was steadying them or holding himself up.

She wiped her eyes clean of tears and stared up at Grey. She took a deep, painful breath, steeling herself for what she was about to do. She cupped Baby’s head with her hand, then stood on her tiptoes and kissed Grey on the chin. “I love you,” she whispered just before she turned and walked away from him.

Every step she took hurt. Her breathing became labored. The blood rushing through her body pumped with the violence of an erupting volcano, and her vision narrowed until everything—the resort, the people standing in stunned silence, the stark remains of the chair lift—all of it faded into the background and ceased to exist.

Clutching Baby against her chest, Grace fought to keep herself focused on the man in front of her now, fought to keep herself from giving into the voice screaming in her head, telling her to run as fast and as far as she could before she opened her mouth and broke her own heart.

She stood there in front of Michael MacBain and fought back the tidal wave of emotion that threatened her courage as nothing else ever had.

“Michael,” she said in a shuddering whisper, drawing his attention. He turned away from Ellen and John, his face showing concern for what he must have seen in her eyes.

“I’d…I’d like to introduce you to your son.” She turned Baby to face him. “Mary gave birth to him just a day before she died. He’s yours and Mary’s, Michael,” she told him, holding Baby out for him to take.

A myriad of emotions crossed Michael’s face in rapid succession—confusion, disbelief, pain, and finally wonder—as he turned his gaze from her to the child she was handing to him.

He slowly, carefully, took Baby and held him up until they were face to face, staring into young eyes the mirror image of his own. Baby shot him a sudden, spontaneous smile.

Michael looked stunned. He brought Baby to his chest and pulled off his cap and covered his head with his large hand, smoothing down the length of spiky, dark auburn hair. He looked back at Grace in silent question.

“He—he doesn’t have a real name yet,” she told him, wiping another tear from her cheek. “Mary said that was your duty.”

Pain clouded his expression, and his hand trembled as he looked back at his son and ran one large finger over his face, much the same way Mary had done on her deathbed.

Both of Grace’s eyes flooded then, and there was no stopping the flow of tears she finally allowed to run freely down her cheeks. She was shaking with the force of her mixed emotions.

“Sh-she said you would love him as no one else on this earth can,” she continued hoarsely, determined to say her piece before she broke down completely. “I promised Mary I would bring him to you, and I have. Now I want your promise that you’ll love him and raise him to manhood in a way Mary would want for her son.”

“Aye,” he said fiercely, nodding at her, then looking back at his child with a new glint of passion lighting his eyes. Baby shot him another smile, and Michael MacBain held the infant’s cheek against his.

“Good,” Grace said, a sob catching in her throat. She turned in the direction of the driveway and began walking home.

“Grace.”

She stopped at the sound of Grey’s voice and turned and lifted her chin, more to keep her tears from spilling down her face than to challenge him.

“Home is that way,” Grey said, pointing toward Gu Bràth.

“Not today it isn’t,” she whispered. “Not yet.”

She turned again, holding her breath as she once more began walking home. No one stopped her this time. No one said another word. Grace concentrated on setting one creeper-covered boot in front of the other, careful not to trip over her broken heart.

Chapter Twenty-two

Daar sat in front of the fire of his cozy little cabin and whittled on the new cherrywood cane. He carefully stripped the bark off it in long pieces of curling string, the aroma of cherry oil wafting pleasantly through the air. The young sapling felt awkward in his age-bent hands, its smooth, straight, unflawed surface hard to hold on to. It was much more delicate than his old cane and smaller. But then, it was meant for a much smaller hand.

This new staff would belong to a woman.

To Winter, Grey and Grace’s seventh daughter.

He’d been dragging out this chore for too long, and now that his own staff was sitting in pieces at the bottom of the mountain pond, it was necessary that he begin carving and training this new one immediately.