Christmas in Cowboy Country by Janet Dailey Page A

time and a few other details just in case he needed them.
    He texted back immediately. Can’t make it then. Some other time, okay? Thanks.
    She bit her lip. His terse reply could be interpreted in a lot of ways. Maybe he really was busy, because he’d replied to the text just a few seconds after he’d let her call go to voice mail.
    But why had he refused so quickly when she’d used the words how about so he wouldn’t have to commit to a specific date and time?
    And to think she had once been so inundated with male attention that she never analyzed phone calls or texts on a molecular level, she thought ruefully.
    The more she thought about it, the more his reply seemed like a brush-off, one she had never expected.
    And she’d been so sure, briefly, that she’d known how he felt about her. Maybe it was all in her imagination.
    Annie tapped the screen to make the text go away, silently chiding herself for trying to read between the lines of such a short message.
    She had arrived at the ranch and was parked in the driveway before she texted someone else. Darla would do.
    She could ski and Annie could—well, she could bird-watch from the top of the mountain. That was about it. She wasn’t much of a bird-watcher, but she did have binoculars somewhere. Then they could talk over coffee in the small lodge. Annie knew for sure that Lou wouldn’t be there. Her mother hated heights.

Chapter 9
    B undled up against the cold, Annie settled herself on the attached bench of an outdoor picnic table and took in the glorious view. The day was incredibly clear and the mountains seemed much closer at this elevation. The dark pines dominated now that the aspens were leafless, dusted with snow that also lay in deep drifts within ravines no longer hidden.
    She’d somehow forgotten that most birds went elsewhere in winter. The binoculars went back into her pocket once she’d watched Darla hurtle downhill a few times and wave from the ski lift on the way up again. Annie pulled the drawstring of her hood to tighten it around her chilly cheeks and lifted her sunglasses to see what the white world looked like without them.
    The intense sunlight made her squint. Annie put the sunglasses back in place and turned to look in a different direction.
    Velde had gotten at least two inches of snow overnight. Still, it wasn’t much for early December. Snow machines were providing an acceptable depth on the trail. But the town at the foot of the mountain sparkled.
    Annie played the game of identifying local landmarks for a while. There was Jelly Jam Café, her mother’s favorite hangout. And there was Albert’s Mercantile, where you could still buy everything from overalls to canned ravioli. And there was Nell’s saloon at the center of town.
    She took out the binoculars again to check out the decorations affixed to the old-fashioned lamp posts. There were tall candy canes tied with giant red bows on every one. She could just make out garlands of lights hanging high over the streets that would add a delicate touch of sparkle at night. Nice. It was beginning to look like Christmas. She just wished she were more in the mood for the holiday.
    With nothing to do, she peered through the binoculars. They weren’t that powerful and she was too high up to recognize any individual on the streets. But it was fun to watch everyone bustling about below.
    Her gaze moved to the outskirts of town, stopping on the new development she’d noticed before. The raw lots were visible under the light snow, rectangles of flat dirt and nothing more. No structures of any kind were in evidence, not even a construction-site trailer. Just the same winding street lined with lamp posts, which were, oddly, also adorned with candy canes and red bows, even though there wasn’t a stick of lumber in sight, let alone finished houses.
    But there was a truck parked out there. She adjusted the focus knob.
    It was a big black