Michael was looking at her as if she’d lost her mind. John was shaking his head. “That takes specialized equipment, Grace,” John said. “And there’s nothing like that around here.”

“Yes, there is,” she countered. “On TarStone Mountain. I saw it two days ago, when I came down the mountain in the snowcat. There was enough piping and guns to do your twelve-acre field.”

A very colorful, very blue curse suddenly scorched the air in the kitchen. Grace looked at Michael and saw his entire face redden and his eyes narrow to pinpricks.

“We’re better off with the smudge pots,” he said through his teeth, his jaw clenched so tightly Grace thought he was in danger of hurting himself. “That equipment on TarStone will never lie in my fields.”

Grace set her hands on her hips. “And why not?”

“MacKeage will never agree, and if he does, I won’t allow it. I have no wish to be beholden to the bastard.”

Grace ignored Michael’s anger and spoke to John. “Will it work?” she asked. “If we can make snow and cover the trees, will it protect them?”

John was scratching his two-day growth of peppered white whiskers. “It might,” he said, nodding his head. “It really might work. The snow would support them.”

“Dammit. MacKeage won’t do it,” Michael said, pulling off his jacket and boots, stomping, sock-footed out of the kitchen, and disappearing up the stairs. All three of the adults and even Baby flinched when a door suddenly slammed shut over their heads with enough force to rattle the windows.

Grace looked at Ellen. “Can you keep Baby for me for a few hours?” she asked. “I want to go to TarStone.”

But it wasn’t until she was halfway to the ski resort that Grace remembered she’d just left a twelve-toed child in the same house as his father.

Chapter Eleven

Grace turned onto the well-marked road that led to TarStone Mountain Resort and drove down it a mile before she came to a stop at the far corner of the massive parking lot. She had seen a bit of the resort on her ride back to her home two days ago, but that was nothing compared with what was in front of her now.

The resort was huge. There was one massive structure just to the left that was obviously the ski lodge. Its three-story-high floor-to-ceiling windows faced the mountain. There were several more outbuildings and a long, two-story hotel on the right. And everything, right down to the ski-lift shed, was built from granite and black stone and large hand-hewn logs.

If she had to describe it, Grace would say that the lodge and hotel looked like a cross between a Scottish castle and a Swiss chalet. The roofs were bulged out like medieval barns and covered with cedar shingles that had been left to weather to a natural gray. Eaves overshot the buildings by a good three feet and swept into a graceful arch just at the ends, further amplifying the architecture of the roofline.

The MacKeages hadn’t skimped on the glass. Windows running from floor to ceiling marked every room of the hotel, and a large carport had been added to the front, held up by massive pillars that looked to be whole trees.

Black stone formed the foundations and lower walls of both the lodge and the hotel, topped by rows of rough-hewed horizontal logs. Only the trim had been painted a deep forest green, while the logs had been left to weather naturally.

It was beautiful. A fairy-tale world. And every square inch of it was covered with ice, which added to its magical aura.

She was very impressed. When the MacKeages did things, they obviously did them well.

She couldn’t see their home, though, which Grey had called Gu Bràth. She remembered he had mentioned that it was several hundred yards away, probably tucked up the mountain a bit, back in the woods. She looked around for a driveway leading out of the parking lot but saw none. She did see a light coming from the ski-lift shed. She drove her truck up to it and shut off the ignition.

Morgan popped his head out the door of the shed. Grace got out of her truck and slipped and slid her way toward him.

“Take a care, lass, before you break your beautiful neck,” Morgan said, holding the door open for her and grabbing her arm as she stumbled inside.

“Thank you. I’ve got to find Dad’s old ice creepers.”

“Grace,” Grey said, surprise in his voice. She looked up to see him smiling as he came toward her. His hair was soaked, with little icicles hanging from the ends of it.

“Didn’t you get enough weather two nights ago?” she asked, reaching up and brushing some of the melting ice off his shoulder.

“What are you doing here?” He looked out the door toward her truck, then took her by the shoulders.

“And where’s Baby? Is everything okay? Is he sick?”

“No,” she told him quickly. “He’s fine. I left him with Ellen Bigelow.”

Grey suddenly stiffened and took a step back from her, dropping his hands to his sides. “Why?” he asked curtly.

Grace shrugged. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

His expression said he didn’t like her answer. Grace wiped the dripping rain from her own hair and sighed. What was it with this man, his mood blowing back and forth like a wind-whipped sheet on the line? “Look, I left him there so that I could come check on you. I wanted to see how your ski lift is standing the strain of the ice. When you left yesterday, you said you were worried about it.”

“You’re here to check on us?” Morgan asked, sounding as if he couldn’t believe what he’d heard. “You’

ve got it backward, lass. We’re supposed to be looking after you.”

Grace couldn’t help but smile at the absurdity of his thinking. “I’m not the one with the imperiled ski lift. I live in a sturdy old house that will still be standing long after we’re dead.” She looked out the open mountain side of the shed, at the sagging cables that appeared to be stressed to their limits. She nodded in the lift’s direction. “That doesn’t look good.”

“And what would you know about it looking good or bad?” Ian asked, walking out from behind a gondola, rolling up sheets of paper.

Grace spun around to face him. She wasn’t insulted by the man’s skepticism. She’d run into his kind often enough.

“I know that if those cables break, the arms on every one of your towers will snap like matchsticks. Not to mention the damage it will do to both this shed and the one at the summit. Your last couple of towers will probably be compromised beyond redemption if they don’t break off completely, and whatever gondolas you have out there,” she added for good measure, “will be destroyed as well.”

Ian’s eyes widened in alarm as he looked up the mountain to where the towers disappeared into the rain.

He looked back at her, his expression darkened with suspicion.

“You’re a woman,” he said, only to scowl suddenly at his own words.

“Thank you for noticing,” she drawled. “Are those the schematics for the lift?” she asked, nodding at the roll of papers in his hands.

Ian looked at Grey, silently asking for help out of the hole he’d dug for himself.

With a chuckle, Grey walked over and took the papers from him. “You’re right, Ian,” he said. “She is a woman. And she’s a damn sight smarter than you. Try to remember that in the future, okay?”

Ian was now flushed to the roots of his graying red hair. He looked at her out of the corner of his eye, then nodded slightly. “Sorry,” he murmured. “That was uncalled for.”

Grace waved his apology away. “It’s okay. I get it all the time.”

“Ya do? From who?” Ian wanted to know, appearing ready to run out and defend her.

“From most males,” she told him truthfully, walking over to Grey and taking the drawings out of his hands. “But that’s the fun part. I always get the last laugh.”

Ian nodded. “Good,” he said. “Now, lass. Do you think you can read those damnable papers? I’ve been trying, but I can’t make heads or tails of what they mean.”