Chapter 15

Cole put the last of the luggage into the back of his SUV and closed the door. It had been three weeks since the incident in the hunting cabin. True to his word, Jonas stuck with the story they concocted. Ray had snatched Scout, leaving him, his agents and Jimmy Moss drugged and tied up.

Upon arriving at his cabin, Moss shot and wounded a lion that ran off. He was holding Scout hostage. Before Jonas and Cole arrived, Scout tried to escape. Moss chased her outside and both of them encountered several lions. They ran back inside, and the lions pursued them. Ray was attacked and killed. Scout made it into the bedroom, where she was hiding when Jonas and Cole arrived. By then Moss was dead and the lions had vanished, except for the one Ray had shot and it was dead.

Scout and Cole both had to give statements and stuck to the story. Jimmy Moss was awaiting trial for conducting an illegal hunt and poaching. He confessed that Ray had killed Jed and was being charged as an accomplice.

Cole was relieved it was finally over. It’d taken Scout several weeks to recover emotionally from the ordeal. Even now she seemed unusually emotional and would burst into tears at the drop of a hat. When he told her he wanted to take her to meet his family she had wept. When he asked her to marry him, she wept, and when it was time to say goodbye to the mother lion and her half-grown cubs, she cried again.

He didn’t know what to make of it but chalked it up to stress. She had been through quite an ordeal. He headed back to the house and stopped to watch her.

Scout was sitting on the front porch, playing with the cubs who were no longer babies. Their spots had disappeared, and their chubby limbs had stretched out to give them the look of gangly teenagers. The mother lion lay on the porch watching.

“That’s the last of it,” Cole announced as he approached them.

“Then I guess it’s time to go,” she said and turned to the lion. “I’m going to miss you. But I’ll be back. We’re only going to be gone a couple of weeks.”

Then we shall meet upon your return, the lion replied. And compare notes on the experience of having life growing inside you.

“What?” Scout exclaimed.

The lion roared her equivalent of a laugh. A life grows within you.

“Oh my…” Scout looked at Cole, tears spilling from her eyes.

“Baby, what’s wrong?” He hurried to pull her into his arms.

“She…we…” She hugged him tightly for a moment, then broke away and spun around the yard, laughing and crying at the same time as she danced.

“Scout?” Cole went after her. “What the hell’s—”

“We’re having a baby!” she exclaimed and threw herself on him, wrapped her arms tightly around his neck.

“A baby?”

“A baby,” she sighed and melted into him.

Cole froze dead in his tracks. After a moment she pulled away and looked at him. “You’re…oh god, you don’t want—”

He suddenly grinned, threw back his head and yelled at the top of his lungs. “Woo hoo! We’re having a baby!” He snatched his cell phone from the clip on his belt and dialed.

“Dad? It’s Cole. There’s been a change of plans. Tell the gals to get busy and round up a preacher. There’s going to be a wedding at the Circle R…yeah, I’m dead sure…yep, we’ll be hitting the road—in the morning. See you soon.”

“In the morning?” Scout asked with a twinkle in her eye. “I thought the car was packed and ready to roll.”

“It’ll still be there in the morning,” he said with a sexy smile that started a fire burning in her belly. “Right now, we got some celebrating to do.”

She laughed. “Yeah, and just what kind of celebrating you have in mind, cowboy?”

“The best kind there is,” he said and extended his hand. “Scout ‘n’ Cole and a big hot tub.”

“Woo hoo!” she crowed and grabbed his hand. “My kind of party.”

Cole smiled down at her. “I love you, Scout. With all my heart. And I’ll be a good father to our child.”

“Children,” she corrected him. “This is just the beginning, cowboy.”

“You got that right, baby. It’s just the beginning.”