Home To Copper Mountain

What on earth?

Something had happened to her pillow.

Audra turned her head. It felt as if she was lying against someone’s shoulder.

Her eyelids flew open to discover a pair of gray eyes only inches away from hers. They were studying her features intently.

“Don’t scream and spoil the moment. It’s only 11:00 a.m. I’m not ready to get up yet.”

She swallowed hard. They were lying side by side. “I must have had a terrible nightmare.”

“Yes. You asked me not to leave you.”

“I’m sorry you had to come to my rescue again.”

“I’m not. When I told you I’d stay right here, you went back to sleep—and you’ve been peaceful ever since.”

Audra forced herself to sit up and reach for her crutches. Without looking at him, she said, “If I’m hungry, you must be starving.”

“Frankly, food’s the last thing on my mind. It would be nice just to lie here and talk.”

Too nice, Audra’s heart cried. I could make it a habit. A minute-by-minute, by hour, by week, by month, by year, by lifetime habit!

Dear Reader,

I went to school in Switzerland and France between the ages of seventeen and twenty-two. I remember one year in particular, when I returned home for Christmas. I walked into my family house in Salt Lake City, a place of love and familiarity. One of my favorite Christmas songs was playing on the stereo, the smell of cloves and cinnamon wafted through the air and the Christmas tree held the same ornaments I’d loved as a child. Mother looked so beautiful, and Dad so handsome. Everything was perfect.

It suddenly hit me how blessed I was to be able to return home year after year and find everything the same. I was thinking about this when the stories of the Hawkins brothers came to me.

Their dangerous careers have sent them around the world, yet (like me) they take for granted their wonderful, loving parents and their home in Colorado full of cherished memories. They assume that home and those people will always be there waiting. I wondered what would happen to them if tragedy struck at home while they were away. How would they handle it?

I searched my soul to write their stories. Home to Copper Mountain is Rick’s story; you’ll find Nate’s story in Another Man’s Wife, released in February 2003. Get inside their skins as they deal with their grief and find enduring love with the strong women who come into their lives at exactly the right time.

Enjoy!

Rebecca Winters

P.S. If you have access to the Internet, please check out my Web site at http://www.rebeccawinters-author.com.

Home to Copper Mountain
Rebecca Winters

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Home to Copper Mountain

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

“SHALL WE GO over to my desk and get the paperwork done so we can put you behind the wheel today?”

Until early this morning, Rick Hawkins hadn’t intended to buy a car. But an unexpected phone call from his father, who knew that Rick was on his way to Arizona to sign some racing contracts, had been the lifeline Rick was looking for. He had grabbed for it with both hands. It was decided—he would visit his father in Texas on his way west.

Loath to suffer through hours of airport lines, security checks, plane changes and rental cars, he decided to do himself a favor and arrive at the Jarrett Ranch outside Austin on his own power.

The black BMW M3 two-door coupe with the eighteen-inch wheels, 350-horsepower engine and six-speed manual transmission sitting in the middle of the showroom floor would do fine.

He turned to the young salesman. “If you can put me behind it in ten minutes, I’ll take it.”

“I think we could manage that. My name’s John Dunn, by the way.”

“John.” Rick shook his hand, then followed him inside his office to answer the inevitable series of questions about his finances.

“Who’s your employer?”

“I’m out of work at the moment, but don’t be alarmed. I plan to pay cash for the car. Check with my bank.”

The salesman blinked before getting up from the desk. He handed him a brochure from a pile sitting next to a desk calendar.

May eighth. Spring had been here for a while. Rick hadn’t noticed its arrival.

“While you’re waiting, you might want to look through it. I’ll be right back.”

Rick didn’t need to see any literature. If he hadn’t felt such a strong loyalty to Mayada for signing him at nineteen, he would have switched to BMW when they’d offered him a racing contract two years later. Their engineering was unequaled.

But his drive to Texas wouldn’t be like circling the track. This trip would be open-ended. And he would be driving his own car.

After another hellish night like last night, he decided to leave immediately and drive the whole distance in one shot. It would be a different race than any he’d run before.

Instead of outdriving the competition, he’d be facing his own worst enemy—an enemy chiseling away at his sense of self, his confidence, his happiness, his virtual raison d’être. Himself.

Many times in his racing career he’d been subjected to near-death experiences that had tested his grit and resilience.

This was different.

His mother, with her eternal spirit of optimism, was dead. The only home he’d ever known was gone. He had no woman to share his life. The thought of going back to racing didn’t set him on fire. For the first time ever, he could see no sure path before him. And this thought terrified him.

Preoccupied by his demons, he hadn’t noticed Mr. Dunn had already returned, accompanied by a smiling middle-aged manager. The manager carried a camera.

“Mr. Hawkins? I’m Lewis Karey. It’s a great honor to meet you, sir.”

“Thank you.” Rick stood up and shook hands with him.

“John didn’t realize he was dealing with the Lucky Hawkins, one of the world’s most famous sports celebrities.”

“Hardly.”

“Wait till I let Munich know the three-time winner of the Laguna Seca purchased an M3 from us.”

“This is a red-letter day for me, too,” Rick murmured. “I’ll tell you a little secret. I’ve never owned anything but a motorcycle to get around. This will be my first car.”

“You? One of the greatest Formula One drivers in racing today and you’ve never owned your own car?” The manager looked and sounded incredulous.

Rick chuckled. “That’s right, but when I decided I needed one, I knew exactly where to come.”

Lewis Karey beamed. “I hope this business of your being out of work is temporary. This is the first I’ve heard you’ve left the racing circuit.”

“Only time will tell what the future holds. Since no one outside of Mayada and my former sponsor knows the situation, I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t say anything.”

Mr. Karey looked at John. “Our lips are sealed. Before we move the car out of the showroom to get it ready for you, could I take a couple of pictures of you standing by it?”

He had been through this experience hundreds of times before, why not once more? No one owned him yet. He was still a free property.

“Sure.”

Until his father’s severe depression had caused him to retire early from Formula One racing, his motorcycle had accompanied him on the racing circuit and had been the only transportation he’d needed.

Before returning to his family home in Copper Mountain, Colorado, to help his grieving father run the family ski business, he’d given his bike to the college-age son of his crew chief, Wally Sykes. Rick saw no reason for keeping it when he knew he could rely on the company Blazer or his deceased mother’s car to get around.

But in a shocking turn of events, he’d arrived home to discover his father had overcome his grief enough to be married again. Furthermore, he was selling the ski shop and the Blazer, and was moving to Texas.

Believing his mom’s Nissan would still be available to him while he decided whether to try to get a new sponsor and return to the racing circuit, Rick underwent a second shock.

His older brother, Nate, a former F-16 fighter pilot who’d resigned his commission to fly home and help their father, too, suddenly decided to get married and become a flight instructor for the air force academy.

Nate, Laurel and the baby from her first marriage were now living in the Hawkins family home while they waited to move into their new house in Colorado Springs. Since they needed two cars, it was decided Laurel would keep the Nissan.

Everyone had somewhere to go, someone to be with. Except Rick, who felt totally displaced.

Since Nate’s wedding, Rick had been staying in Denver with Laurel’s sister, Julie, and her husband, Brent, just trying to hold on. But he couldn’t impose on the Marsdens any longer. It was time to go.

The question was, after Arizona, where?

He felt like a man without a country, a man who belonged nowhere. It was a lonely experience, foreign in ways he couldn’t describe. The nights were the worst, when he had no choice but to lie in a cold sweat and tough it out until morning.

“Okay,” the manager said. “Now let’s get a couple of pictures of you sitting in the car. I think we’ll leave the door open for the full effect.”

Rick obliged. Once he slid behind the wheel, he could smell the new tan leather upholstery. Nice.

By now every salesman, lot attendant, receptionist, cashier, mechanic and client in the building had materialized. There was quite a crowd assembled. Mr. Karey wasn’t the only one taking pictures.

Rick ended up signing autographs on brochure after brochure while dozens of questions were fired at him by those who followed the sport.

“Mr. Hawkins is here to buy a car,” the manager spoke above the questions. “He was kind enough to let us take pictures and sign autographs. Let’s not stampede him.”

Rick appreciated the man’s intervention before questions were posed that he couldn’t answer. It was better not to say anything that could be misquoted to the press.

A racing contract with everything he’d asked for and more had been drawn up by the attorneys of Trans T & T Communications. The megacorporation for whom Brent worked had shown a flattering eagerness to sponsor Rick.

Mayada, the Japanese manufacturer that designed the Formula One cars Rick had been driving for eight years, had also drafted a new contract. Both were in the hands of Neal Hasford, Rick’s attorney in Arizona, awaiting his signature.

According to Neal the terms of the contracts looked good, but Rick had yet to put his name on the dotted line.

He shook everyone’s hand, then turned to Mr. Karey. “I have to leave, but I’ll be back within a half hour to sign the papers.”

“Fine. We’ll have everything ready for you.”

After leaving the dealership, Rick headed for Aurora, a suburb of Denver where the Marsdens lived. His suitcases were already packed and waiting in the trunk of Julie’s car. All he had to do was honk and she’d come out of the house to run him back for his new BMW. Then he’d be off.

“It’s a good thing Brent isn’t here to see this!” she exclaimed as they drove into the parking lot of the service department thirty minutes later. The gleaming black car stood waiting. “We’re trying to save up for our dream home.”

Rick turned to the lovely raven-haired mother-to-be. She was kind and generous to a fault, just like his new sister-in-law, Laurel. “In the end it’s just a vehicle for transportation. What you and Brent have together can’t be bought. You’re the lucky ones.” She’d never know how lucky.

He jumped out of the car and she moved to take her place behind the wheel. He tapped on the window so she’d lower it.

“Tell Mike and Joey, the next time I come to Denver I’ll take them out to Pike’s Peak Raceway to watch the junior stock-car races. My friend Chip Warner, a former racer who works out there, will show them around.”

Her eyes filmed over. “You’d better keep your promise. We all wish you wouldn’t leave. Phone often, please. Brent’s really going to miss you.”

“I’m going to miss all of you, too.” More than you can imagine.

If it was this difficult to say goodbye to her, he didn’t dare put himself through the gut-wrenching experience of paying his brother one final visit in Colorado Springs on his way to Texas.

He kissed her cheek. “Give me a moment to get my bags out.”

Julie nodded.

After he’d put them on the ground and closed the trunk, he walked back to her. “Take care of yourself.”

“I will. I guess I don’t have to tell you. If we find out we’re having a boy, it’s unanimous—his name’s going to be Rick.”

She shouldn’t have told him that. “I’d be flattered and honored.”

With a wave of her hand, she took off. Her glistening blue eyes were the last thing he saw before Mr. Dunn approached. “If you want to step inside the building, someone will put your bags in the trunk.”

“Thanks.”

Rick followed him into another office where Mr. Karey was waiting. Once he’d written out a check and put his signature on everything, Rick glanced at the younger man standing by. “You’re a good salesman, John.”

His smile was sheepish. “I’m afraid I didn’t do a thing to sell this car, Mr. Hawkins.”

“That’s what I mean. You left me alone to make up my own mind. That’s the best kind of salesman.”

Both men looked pleased. It was the manager who said, “Well, you’re the dream customer.” He handed him the keys and the leather kit containing all the papers and instructions. “Dare we make the pitch you’ll never want to drive anything else again?”

“Dare away.” He flashed them a smile. “I’m sure you’re right.”

They shook hands again and walked out to the car with him. The driver’s door had been opened in invitation.

A flick of the ignition and the engine purred to life. He adjusted the seat and the mirrors. They’d filled the tank. All systems were go.

“We’ll look forward to seeing you when you come in for your first scheduled oil change.”

When that time came, Rick had no idea where he’d be, but they didn’t need to know that. “Thanks for the excellent service. I’ve appreciated it. So long.”

He drove out to the street and joined the stream of traffic. The car could travel from zero to sixty in four point eight seconds. He’d test it out as soon as he reached the freeway.

Later, when he came to those long, lonely stretches of road devoid of traffic, he’d find how well she traveled at a hundred and ten miles an hour.

What he needed right now was a map of Texas. Though he’d been around the world many times, he’d never raced there or had an inclination to visit.

At the next full-service station he bought the map, a six-pack of cold cola and a large bag of potato chips. That would hold him for a while.

Once back in the car, he opened the map and began estimating distances. Denver to Austin was approximately nine hundred miles. En route he’d phone his father for details to reach the ranch.

He glanced at his watch. Eleven-thirty. If he averaged a hundred miles an hour, plus or minus, he’d be in Austin by eight or eight-thirty that night.

FOURTEEN HOURS LATER, after stopping and starting for near-constant road construction, he turned on US 290, leaving Austin behind him.

The salespeople at the dealership wouldn’t recognize his bug-spattered, mud-splattered car. He needed a shower and a shave, but that wasn’t going to happen until he arrived at his destination.

According to his father’s directions he needed to continue west a half hour or so until he came to Highway 16 where he would turn south. At exactly one point six-tenths of a mile, he’d see the entrance to the Jarrett Ranch on his right.

How in the hell did people live in a place where there was no sign of a mountain? After driving through this endless state, surrounded by a flat world of dust and heat, he couldn’t comprehend how his father was surviving.

Clint Hawkins was a remarkable athlete who’d skied to many victories, including an Olympic gold medal. How did a man who loved winter and had spent his whole married life in the Colorado Rockies at ten thousand feet stand it?

No wonder so many Texans flocked to the towns of Copper Mountain and Breckenridge during ski season. Anything to get away from this miserable wilderness they called home.

Rick and Nate used to laugh over their visitors’ funny accents and inability to stop talking for a single second to let someone else get a word in. Today he’d met the same type on the road when he’d stopped for gas and food.

As far as he was concerned, the Texans could keep Texas. He’d come to see his father, then he was out of here!

For the dozenth time he flicked on the radio hoping to find a station that played something besides rock or country. After leaving Colorado, he’d been hearing the same songs over and over as he drove through New Mexico and Texas. Was there no such thing as a classical-music station beyond the Rockies?

Before he’d left Denver he should have stopped at a CD store and bought some symphonic recordings to keep him company. Rick’s mother had taught him to enjoy everything from baroque and classical to modern.

On the morning of a race, there was nothing he loved better than to listen to Vivaldi or Brahms or Mahler while he ate a big breakfast. Any of them brought structure and order to his mind, helping him to focus on the task ahead.

Aware his nerves were frayed from a combination of fatigue and a growing inner anxiety he couldn’t throw off, he pressed the scan button to tune out the heavy-metal music blaring from some rock station out of Austin.

The next couple of stations were phone-in talk shows about politics or UFOs. He was about to shut off the radio for good when he came across a station where he heard a female vocalist backed by a terrific guitarist. It sounded like country music, but she sang with such a great voice he pressed the button to keep the tuner there.

You invade our space,

You drink our beer,

You pollute the place,

You shoot our deer,

You build your castles,

You do as you please,

If it’s worth the battle you change the course of streams,

You grow Bermuda grass,

You even plant hay,

Then you can’t figure out why the wildlife went away.

You fly down for weekends

To your twenty-acre spread,

Then you wonder why,

Your cattle all lie dead.

You’re the dreaded windshield rancher invading the Hill Country,

You wanted a part of Texas,

And by golly,

You destroyed habitat and birthright during a bad economy.

You came, you saw, you conquered,

You took my legacy.

Because of you, you, you, you,

This happened to me, me, me, me.

I’m an uprooted bluebonnet,

I no longer have a home,

Do you hear me, windshield rancher? Thanks to you I’m alone.

The light has now gone out,

I can’t see in front of me,

There’s no home to go back to,

Fear is my destiny.

The past is gone forever,

It walked out the door.

What once excited, excites no more,

The song ended, jerking Rick back to cognizance of his surroundings.

Damn. He’d been so mesmerized by what he’d heard, he’d overshot the turnoff to the ranch by four miles. Since no one was around, he made a tire-squealing U-turn in the middle of the road and flew back down the highway.

“And now for all you night creatures like me who can’t sleep because your demons won’t let you—oh yes, I’ve got them, too—shall we have a change of pace? I’ve had a lot of requests for Gounod’s Ave Maria for voice and harp. Enjoy this last number before we say good-night.”

Rick almost missed the entrance again because the female disc jockey had started to play the next recording. The second he heard the voice, he realized it was the same vocalist who’d performed the amazing country song. This time she was singing to an exquisite harp accompaniment.

Why didn’t the disc jockey give out the name of the singer?

Whoever she was, she had extraordinary talent to be able to perform such diametrically opposed pieces of music with equal ability. He wanted her name so he could look for some of her records.

Parts of the first song resonated with him.

The light has now gone out,

I can’t see in front of me,

There’s no home to go back to,

Fear is my destiny.

The past is gone forever,

It walked out the door,

What once excited, excites no more.

Rick could have written those lines himself. Whoever the composer was had to be a native Texan, considering the subject matter. It sounded like life had dealt them a hard blow.

Realizing someone else out there in the cosmos was going through the same disquieting experience helped him to understand he wasn’t the only person who felt as if they were losing their mind.

Absorbed in his painful thoughts, he was slow to process the fact that the white three-quarter-ton pickup truck moving toward him came to a stop as Rick passed it. He blinked, then reversed.

His father’s familiar half smile had never been more welcome than in this back of beyond. They both put down their windows at the same time. The air still held the earth’s warmth. He could smell skunk.

“Dad—” His throat swelled with unexpected emotion.

“It’s good to see you, too, son. You told me you’d be driving a new M3. For a moment I thought I’d come upon James Bond. So…how did your first car handle?”

Rick’s lips twitched. “A lot better than my first homemade go-cart.”

“That’s reassuring. I’ll turn around so you can follow me the rest of the way.”

Beyond tired, he was grateful to be led down the dark, dusty road. When they reached the ranch house three miles from the entrance, Rick regretted having to turn off the beautiful voice with the harp accompaniment. He wished her music could have kept him company all the way from Colorado.

He got out of the car eager to feel Clint Hawkins’s famous bear hug.

Silhouetted against a night sky partly obscured by clouds, the Queen Anne–style house loomed behind his parent. The two-story structure had many gables and a tower with a conical roof. For a ranch house it looked totally out of place and unlike anything Rick had been imagining.

“IT’S THAT TIME AGAIN, ladies and gentlemen. We’re coming up on three in the morning. I’ll be taking your requests Friday at midnight on KHLB, the Hill Country station out of Austin at 580 on the AM dial. Thank you for listening to the Red Jarrett Show, where I aim to bring you a little bit of the best of everything.”

The line-board operator back at the station in Austin turned the switch, and Audra Jarrett was off the air. Her boss had arranged for her to do her program from the ranch while she was recuperating from her accident. Several technicians from the studio had come out to the house to set up the mixing board, stands, plug-in mike and Telos digital sound system. So far everything had worked perfectly, but it seemed she had a ways to go before she was fully recovered.

She let out a groan of exhaustion and ran her fingers through her hair, which was damp at the roots from exertion.

After eyeing the short distance from her table to the bedroom doorway, she felt for her crutches and with superhuman effort, grabbed them from where they’d been leaning against the wall. She stopped long enough to turn out the lights, then moved out into the hallway and into the bedroom next door and lay down on the bed. The night was warm enough that she didn’t need a blanket to cover her.

There was no way she’d be getting up again any time soon to brush her teeth or change out of her top and cutoffs. They were the only shorts loose enough around the legs to slide up and down over her cast.

The strain of perching on the stool with her left leg in a full cast had been too draining. Whatever had possessed her to think she could transfer from her guitar to her harp between commercials while operating her own mixing board at the same time? Tonight she should have relied solely on recorded music.

She’d been home from the hospital almost a month. By now she assumed it wouldn’t be a problem to perform some of her own music live during her radio show, broadcast from the bungalow on her uncle David’s property.

It was a small three-bedroom home. With a few steps, everything was in easy reach. No stairs, no basement. But Audra hadn’t counted on the weakness that assailed her body through the simple act of singing into the microphone again. It may have just been her leg that was broken, but this seemed to affect her whole body.

The car accident that had taken Pete Walker’s life could have done a lot more damage. But it hadn’t been her time to go.

No. Destiny’s plan had been to kill her off in increments. She figured when her uncle found a buyer for the ranch, that would be the final blow.

Her eyelids fluttered closed from sorrow and fatigue.

What would she do without her music? Thanks to Pam, who’d started her on the piano in grade school, Audra had found her muse. Not even Boris, the talented French conductor she’d fallen in love with at the Paris Conservatory of Music, had been able to stamp out the solace when he’d rejected her.

As she settled back against the pillows her cell phone rang. That would be her cousin calling from the main ranch house three miles away to make sure Audra was okay.

Pam…the wonderful woman who’d been mother, sister and best friend rolled into one since Audra was a little girl.

She reached for her phone. After checking the caller ID to make sure, she clicked on to talk to her cousin. “It’s 3:15 a.m., Mrs. Hawkins.”

Audra loved calling her that. Clint Hawkins was the best thing that had ever happened to Pam. Audra was half in love with him herself.

“Your new husband is going to resent me if you keep this up. I’ve been out of the hospital for some time now, yet you’re still hovering!”

“That’s because I listened to your broadcast tonight. You were fabulous, but you overdid it.”

Audra couldn’t hide anything from her. “I found that out as soon as I was switched off the air.”

“I’m mad at you, honey. The doctor warned you to be careful.”

“I wanted to start performing again. It’ll be easier next time.”

“Why not wait till the cast comes off before you go back on the air, period?” Pam urged.

Because I can’t stand the nights.

Memories of the crash wouldn’t leave Audra alone. Her guilt—that she’d escaped death and Pete hadn’t—continued to haunt her.

“I’d die of boredom, but I appreciate your phoning. I’m in bed, so stop worrying about me. Now, hurry and hang up before Clint discovers you’re awake and talking to me again.”

“My husband isn’t here.”

She frowned. “Has he flown to Colorado on another family emergency?” Audra hoped everything was fine with his recently married son, Nate. That marriage almost hadn’t come off.

It didn’t seem as if Clint and Pam were ever going to get the time alone they deserved, no thanks to Audra, whose accident had ruined their honeymoon.

“He’s out in the truck looking for his son who should have arrived by now.”

Audra blinked. “I didn’t know you were expecting his family.”

“He didn’t either until earlier in the day.”

“Which one is it?”

“Rick.”

Ah yes, the famous race-car driver, Lucky Hawkins. The speed-loving son he’d secretly worried about for years. The one Clint feared would end up a statistic.

Audra refused to entertain the thought that he might have been in a collision on the highway driving down here. She didn’t want Pam thinking bad thoughts either.

“It would be a hoot if he’s lost.”

“Now, Audra…”

She chuckled. “Well, it would. Can’t you see this living sports legend whizzing around to the various ranches asking, ‘Does my daddy live here?’”

“Be nice,” her cousin murmured, but Audra could tell she was on the verge of laughter. “It’s easy to get lost in the Hill Country after dark, and lest you forget, he’s no boy.”

Her cousin was right about that. An image of the good-looking male with black hair she’d seen in some of Pam’s wedding pictures filled Audra’s mind. Clint and his sons were more attractive than any three men had a right to be.

“Is this to be a quick visit?”

“Yes. Clint’s so thrilled Rick agreed to come here on his way to Arizona, he’s been restless all day waiting for him. I put him to work helping me cook. We’re going to have a big lunch at noon. Sleep now and I’ll be by for you about quarter to twelve.”

“No, no. This is your first chance to show his son around your turf for a change. There’s no way I’m going to interfere with that!”

“Audra—Uncle David wants everyone to meet. The cousins and their families are coming from Austin. He insisted.”

“Oh, no.”

“I’m not too excited about that myself.”

Their uncle probably had to threaten leaving them out of the will for them to agree, but Audra didn’t say the words out loud. Their bitterness over his handling of the Jarrett family finances since their parents’ deaths years before had turned them into angry men.

After the loving care Pam had always shown their cousins growing up, Audra couldn’t believe how mean-spirited and ungrateful they were. When they’d heard she was marrying what they considered to be some old geezer from Colorado, they’d mocked her and laid bets the relationship wouldn’t last.