A Montana Christmas Reunion. Roz Fox Denny

been close to a hurricane.”

      The owner’s wife checked the weather on her cell phone and told Jewell the storm was spinning offshore. The couple assured her she’d have ample time to drive back to DC.

      Jewell didn’t volunteer that she was making a side trip about an hour away. Perhaps the storm warnings were telling her she should skip Saxon’s concert. But Leland had paid for her ticket.

      Stopped at a crossroad, Jewell studied the blustery sky. She didn’t know how much of the pewter color was due to the late hour and how much to an impending storm. She snapped on the radio. A woman said the hurricane had stalled. A man interrupted to say it had gathered strength. Nothing in their banter sounded so dire to Jewell that it would hurt her to swing by the town hosting the concert. If reports worsened, she could run in and give Leland’s letter to someone associated with Saxon and hurry back to her hotel.

      After meandering for another hour through horse country, Jewell spotted the rustic theater advertising Saxon’s concert on its marquee.

      Not detecting any change in the weather, she paid to park in a lot a block away but didn’t immediately get out. Her stomach churned at the prospect of seeing Saxon. Probably it was good that she’d skipped lunch.

      Even now she had trouble understanding how she and Saxon had gone from best friends to lovers to virtual strangers. She’d followed his career for a while, until she began to see him paired with a pretty blonde singer. Only then did she date. She had even briefly been engaged to the son of a local rancher. But there was no spark, so she’d returned his ring.

      Gripping the steering wheel, she hung on tight. From the time Saxon arrived in Snowy Owl Crossing, they’d been inseparable. She was his shoulder to lean on. He and his uncle constantly clashed. She always took Saxon’s side. And he had spent every minute he could at her home. It was where he developed a love of music. Her dad had owned a guitar. Saxon spotted it and spent hours teaching himself to play, often missing chores his uncle gave him.

      Jewell had always had a crush on Saxon. She’d been the one to first convince him to play and sing for friends. Later she found him gigs at county fairs and rodeos—anything to keep him in her sphere and give him a break from Leland’s nagging him to knuckle down on the ranch.

      Looking back with more clarity than she’d had when they’d split, Jewell realized it shouldn’t have shocked her to learn near college graduation that nothing on earth could entice Saxon to return to his uncle’s. Not even her.

      Maybe if she hadn’t been so single-minded, so deep in her own studies and plans for the future, she’d have anticipated how it’d end when he left agriculture and switched to a music track.

      The awful truth didn’t register until he announced that he was going to Nashville. He assumed she’d go along to support him. He even said once he signed with a label, she could enroll in vet school in Tennessee. But Nashville wasn’t Snowy Owl Crossing, and Tennessee wasn’t Montana. Looking back, she saw it was obvious their love hadn’t been strong enough.

      Rain began striking her windshield. Jewell released her death grip on the steering wheel and found a tissue to blot her tears.

      Assuming she wouldn’t get close enough to Saxon to hand him Leland’s letter, she figured she could ask someone on his staff to deliver it. She’d come this far. And a sick man back home counted on her. At least, Doreen Mercer, who owned the café and kept tabs on Leland, claimed he wasn’t well.

      Dashing to the theater, Jewell dug out her ticket. She was maneuvered into a line of noisy people filtered between two sets of velvet ropes.

      Making sure the letter hadn’t fallen out of her purse, she peered around two women directly in front of her and her breath stuck in her throat. Saxon stood up ahead cordoned off by the left rope. He appeared to be greeting concertgoers, thanking them for coming and handing out T-shirts bearing his likeness.

      Panic gripped Jewell. She should flee before she made a spectacle of herself and fainted or threw up. But she was hemmed in by the boisterous crowd. The line inched forward. Everyone wanted to speak to Saxon. Most wanted his autograph.

      Jewell forced herself to think. This could be her chance to hand over Leland’s letter, duck under the rope and escape. Except her feet wouldn’t move, and she pawed in her purse and couldn’t find the letter. Nor could she take her eyes off Saxon. He looked the same yet different. He’d shot up to six feet early in his teens, but he used to be runner thin. Now he had filled out nicely in his chest and shoulders. While his dark hair had always had a slight curl, tonight it looked wonderfully mussed. Probably styled.

      Admittedly, she’d viewed him online a few times. But, wow, he was way more potent in person. So darned good-looking it played havoc with her vow to see him in the trappings of his trade and once and for all...flush him from her system.

      The woman behind Jewell nudged her to close the gap between herself and the folks in front of her, who had reached Saxon. Paralyzed, she let herself be shoved.

      Because she hadn’t located the letter, she bent her head to find it and quickly scoot past Saxon to where helpers ushered ticket holders into the theater. The letter stubbornly evaded her search. Suddenly she had no time left. Should she rush by, let someone seat her and ask an usher to deliver the letter?

      “Jewell? Jewell Hyatt, my God!”

      Hearing her name breathed out quietly but reverently had her lifting her head. Her gaze locked with Saxon’s silvery-gray eyes. First disbelief spread over his handsome face; then something akin to joy made heat flood her belly. “Hello, Saxon.” Her greeting sounded high and strained but was all she could manage.

      “What are you doing here?” He ignored staffers who were trying to move Jewell and those behind her through the line faster.

      “I...ah...came on business. Uh...Leland asked me to bring you a letter.” She bent and fumbled again inside her purse in earnest.

      “Leland? Who cares?” Saxon said gruffly.

      Jewell glanced up in time to see a hefty man to Saxon’s right poke him and mutter, “Boss, we need to move folks along. Some are still stuck out in the rain.”

      Nodding, Saxon raised a hand and signaled a man standing at the end of the velvet ropes. “Donovan! Hey, Donovan!”

      That man rushed up.

      Saxon indicated Jewell. “She’s an old friend. Seat her in VIP.”

      Even though Jewell had the letter half out by then, the man in the dark blue Western-style suit propelled her briskly into the hall. She almost dropped her purse and the T-shirt Saxon had given her before he recognized her and set up a fuss she didn’t want or need.

      “Really, this isn’t necessary,” she said when they ended up standing by the first row, which was within spitting distance of the stage.

      “Saxon wants you here.” Leaning over, the man unhooked a gold rope, then pressed her into the first of six empty plush seats. He adeptly reattached the rope, straightened and stood at the end of the row with feet apart and hands tucked behind his back like a military guard.

      Jewell sensed eyes boring into her back. She felt on display because this short set of seats was separated from the longer row behind by eight or ten feet of empty space. This was too much. She felt imprisoned, and why? She yanked out Leland’s letter, zipped her purse and started to ask her apparent jailer to deliver it before insisting she had to leave. But as she rose from her seat, a younger guy pulled Donovan aside and began gesturing and whispering. Then he departed through a side door to the left of the stage.

      Waving the letter, Jewell attracted Donovan’s attention. “I came here primarily to give Saxon a letter from his uncle. I’m from Saxon’s hometown. Frankly, I don’t know why his uncle didn’t mail this. Maybe Saxon travels too much,” she offered lamely.

      “Keep it. I have orders to take you backstage after the performance. Lance just said it may be a short concert due to the hurricane landing sooner than expected.”