Mountain Ice (David Dean Mysteries)

Illness plagues me each morning, causing me difficulty in accomplishing my chores, as simple as they may be, though failing Mrs. Cummings hardly seems to notice. I am sure now that I carry my beloved Joshua's child in my womb. At times my heart soars like an angel at the gates of paradise at the mere thought that a part of him is now a part of me. At other moments, I am as distressed as the sinner that I am, being dragged to hell's fire beyond. There is a woman who would scrape this life from my body if I don't tarry much longer. She has done this deed for so many others, but I can't bear to heap more sin on my blackened soul and kill unborn this result of my Joshua's love.

I long to share my secret with the one I so love, but then fear and doubt overtake me before the words will leave my lips. I plan well what I will say when we are together, but dread of so burdening this dear and gentle man with the troubled future before us causes me to only hold him close and retain my silence.

He has spoken to me in whispers, in the dark of the night, how waves of guilt over our relationship are with him every waking moment, and yet he loves me so as to risk all for my embrace. He prays for an answer and I cry for his pain. But all too soon my condition will be displayed for all to see, and then, only dear God can help me!

The snow continued to fall as Dean pulled in front of Bird Song, angled his Jeep as best he could in the drifts, and climbed to the porch. In spite of the lateness of the hour, he turned and stretched the stiffness from his limbs. There was a lingering smell of wood smoke in the night air and all earlier efforts at shoveling the walkway and stairs were lost in the smooth swirls of new fallen whiteness. It had now been snowing steadily since after dinner yesterday-no, the day before, now that it was long after midnight. From the very beginning there had been an intensity, a seriousness to the falling flakes that spoke of accumulations far in excess of anything the Deans had seen to date. A true introduction to Colorado mountain winters, the ones you read about in the books and think are the exaggeration of some faulty memory. The flakes were not large, but unlike most gentle Ouray snow storms, they didn't drift to the ground like tiny dust motes. Instead they swirled, at first slowly, then with a vengeance, churned by an uncommon wind that drove down from the mountains with an increasing fury. By now, more than two feet was packed against the door, though the exact depth was difficult to determine in the wind-driven drifts. Dean stomped his feet and entered his home, for the first time absent his wife.