Walk in Beauty by Barbara Samuel, Ruth Wind Page A

Jessie? Except—
    Except he did care. He tucked the knowledge away to examine later, and pulled smoothly into a leveled spot and parked. “We’re here.”
    Jessie leapt out of the truck eagerly. Luke climbed out from his side and helped Giselle down. Jessie, wearing jeans and one of his heavy, sheep-lined jean jackets, waited for them at the back of the truck.
    A wind swept off the mountain and tangled in Jessie’s hair, and Luke found himself mesmerized by the look of her against the trees and water. There was so much about her that hadn’t changed—her thick, long hair and the wide oval of her face—but time had made her a woman. Her hips were sturdier, her thighs and belly not so slim. As a girl, she’d been pretty, with an elusive sorrow in her eyes, but there had been a lack of definition about her then. Newly forged strength of character underlying the still-winsome features gave her a vivid, clear beauty.
    He went to stand beside her. In silence, they admired the view. Helen Hunt Falls poured in a rush of noisy silver over a wide shelf of rocks. Around the pool grew pines and aspens, and above rose the mountain, its summit buried in pearl gray mist.
    “What an honor to have something so beautiful named for you,” Jessie said, and he could tell by the quality of her voice that it still moved her deeply.
    Luke glanced at her from the corner of his eye and saw she was close to tears. He smiled to himself. Nothing made Jessie cry—except beauty. Her acute sensitivity to it was what made her such an extraordinary painter—and one of the things he’d found irresistible, once upon a time.
    To give her a chance to absorb and manage her reaction, he opened the truck bed and let Tasha out. The dog, excited beyond bearing at the plethora of new scents and the promise of adventure, moaned low in her throat and wiggled and bumped into Jessie’s leg, licked her hand, and then licked Giselle’s face.
    Giselle giggled, pulling back and yet holding on to Tasha’s fur.
    “Tasha!” Luke said sharply. “Settle down.” He managed to get her leash on, but again she wiggled and jumped and moaned in excitement, jumping up to put her enormous paws on Luke’s chest and lick his face.
    He laughed and scrubbed her neck. “Come on. We’ll freeze if we don’t keep moving.”
    At the edge of the pool, they paused to stare at the rush of water singing over the rocks. The falls moved too fast to freeze, but tiny silver icicles had grown on nearby rocks and trees.
    “Wow!” Giselle cried. “It looks like a fairy place.”
    Jessie laughed in delight. “It does!”
    A sharp wind gusted toward them from the road, cold as knives. “Let’s get walking,” Luke urged. “There won’t be so much wind higher.”
    The snow wasn’t deep, and the path was designed to accommodate the thousands of tourists who passed through the Pikes Peak Region every year. It climbed at a slow, steady rate, rising higher and higher above the creek. A streamer of cloud detached itself and dropped into the narrow valley, and Luke touched Giselle’s shoulder, pointing with his chin to the sight.
    “Oh!” she said in a breathy voice, and touched her chest in wonder. “We’re above the clouds! Mom!” She grabbed Jessie’s hand. “It
is
magic here!”
    Jessie smiled, and Luke saw the scene reflected in a pearlescent wash over her face. “It makes me think of Brigadoon,” she said to him. “As if some enchanted village will appear at any moment.”
    “Maybe an enchanted Indian village,” he amended, chuckling. “Nobody else around here two hundred years ago.”
    That seemed to give her pause and she looked around her, as if seeing the scene with new eyes. “I wonder what it was like then.”
    “Yeah, me, too,” Luke said, and grinning. “Course, it would have been enemy territory in those days.”
    Tasha tugged hard at the leash, straining to sniff some invisible marker on the trail, and Luke let himself be pulled upward. Giselle skipped