The Mountain Between Us Read Online Free PDF

positive.”
    â€œA pregnancy test?” He’d gone very white beneath the dark beard stubble.
    â€œA positive pregnancy test. I’m going to have a baby. Your baby. Well, our baby.”
    He didn’t say anything. He didn’t even look at her, just continued to stare at the box in her hand, his mouth slightly open.
    â€œDammit, say something,” she said.
    At last, he raised his gaze to hers. “I . . . I . . .”
    Then Jameso Clark, modern mountain man, ski instructor, rock climber, and all-around tough guy, sank to his knees and keeled over in a dead faint.
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    Olivia had the noon-to-happy hour shift by herself on Thursday. This late in the season it should have been slow, but three couples from Texas came in and all the women ordered dirty martinis, forcing Olivia to use the last of the olives. When lawyer Reggie Paxton came down from his law office next door in search of a Diet Coke, Olivia recruited him to man the bar while she went to the Last Dollar Café next door to borrow more olives.
    â€œDo you want garlic stuffed, pimento stuffed, Kalamata, black, or green?” one of the café owners, Danielle, asked, surveying the metal shelves in the pantry behind the kitchen. Petite and curvy, her dark hair in two ponytails worn high on either side of her head, she reminded Olivia of the heroine of one of the anime novels she’d been fond of a few years back.
    â€œPimento stuffed,” she answered. “One jar should be plenty. We don’t get that much call for martinis. I’ll pay you back when we get our next grocery order.”
    â€œNo problem.” Danielle handed over the jar of olives.
    â€œHey, Olivia. You’re just the woman we wanted to see.” Janelle, Danielle’s partner in business and in life, leaned around the door. Tall and willowy, her white-blond locks cut short and wound with a pink bandana, she resembled a Bond girl, complete with an alluring German accent.
    â€œMe?” Olivia clutched the jar of olives to her chest. Her high-school principal and more than one former boss used to say the same thing when they were about to chew her out, but Danielle and Janelle were both smiling.
    â€œWe’ve decided we want to paint a mural on the back wall of the dining room,” Danielle said. “Something depicting the history of Eureka.”
    â€œWe don’t want to paint it,” Janelle corrected. “We want to hire someone to paint it for us.”
    â€œThat’s a good idea,” Olivia said. Not that she’d ever given the décor of the restaurant much thought. And she didn’t care much about the history of the town, though Lucas was into that kind of thing. He’d spent much of the summer researching local Indian tribes and mining and stuff.
    â€œSo you’ll do it?” Danielle asked.
    â€œDo what?”
    â€œPaint the mural. We’ll pay you, of course.” The dimples on either side of Danielle’s mouth deepened along with her smile.
    â€œYou want me to paint a mural in the restaurant?” Olivia almost dropped the olives, she was so surprised.
    â€œSure,” Janelle said. “D. J. said he thought you’d be interested.”
    â€œD. J.?” Her head swam. Why had D. J. been talking to the café owners about her?
    â€œWe told him we were looking for an artist and he recommended you,” Danielle said. “He said you were really talented.”
    â€œI’ve always admired the jewelry you make and the T-shirts you paint and stuff,” Janelle added.
    Olivia fingered the dangling earrings she’d beaded, then smoothed the front of her T-shirt, a plain white T she’d decorated with a painting of a columbine. Just last week a tourist had asked where she could get one like it. But instead of thanking Janelle for the compliment, what came out was, “D. J. said I was talented?”
    â€œHe did,” Danielle said. “So, will you take the