A gust of wind blew snow from the pines above their heads.
“It took him over an hour to find his way home. He knew his family had to have food, because as you know, folks can get snowed in for days up here in Second Chance.” The young man was Harlan, of course. But Mitch would deny it if she asked him.
The wind swirled, trying to throw him off balance.
Finally, she spoke. “My grandfather used to encourage me to reach for my dreams, wherever they might take me. It was nice to hear, but... I never had adequate time to explore my creativity.” Her words were soft, quickly carried away by the wind. “Last year, if you’d have asked me what my dream was, I’d have said to be a red-carpet dress designer. But I had no vision of what my dresses would look like. No unique style in the way I dressed that said I was different than some other designer. I wanted to sew and create and have others love it.” She glanced up at him and then away. “To have others love me.”
Mitch clasped her gloved hand with his own.
“Is that the right motivation to choose a career?” She closed her eyes, seeming to gather herself before looking up at him again. “My grandfather once told me I was more than Ashley’s twin. And I’ve gone through life wondering how to be more...me.” Her gloved fingers gripped his. “It’s hard to find yourself when you share a face with someone famous. When you have to wear another person’s persona and leave yours behind.”
“You’ve been very unselfish.”
“I’ve been hiding.” Laurel shook off his words. “Odette brings color to life. There’s a warmth in her work that makes you want to hug something, which contradicts the facade she presents to the world.” Laurel sniffed, but Mitch wasn’t sure if the cold had gotten to her nose or if her insight into Odette was choking her up. “And Flip... If I hadn’t seen her full collection of work, I’d never have believed there was such depth to her soul, such beauty.”
She was definitely choked up now. But she was also determined to keep moving forward, to push past adversity and unpleasantness the way she always did.
“I have so much to learn from them,” Laurel said in a distant voice. “So much to learn about myself. And when I’m in search of joy and inspiration, how can I shut out one of the people who gives me both?” She stared up at him and said simply, “You.”
Mitch’s heart was full. The future seemed less uncertain. Because Laurel would be in it.
They reached the narrow ribbon of two-lane highway at a bend in the road. Moonlight stroked over the wide, rolling valley, washing it in blue and making it look like a calm and gentle ocean.
“Oh. It’s stunning, like one of Flip’s paintings.” Laurel admired the view. “I’ve never seen the valley at night.”
Her window faced the western mountains.
“I had an intense day today,” Laurel continued. “And I have a lot to think about tomorrow. It’s rare moments of beauty like this when I understand why my grandfather loved this place. Besides—” she wore a teary smile “—I’m partial to blue.”
He stood next to her, resisting the impulse to take her into his arms again. “I’m partial to the blue of your eyes when you’re laughing.”
She gazed up at him, not laughing, wiping away a tear. “That’s kind of you to say.”
He wasn’t feeling kind enough. “I should have said I prefer the blue of your eyes. Period.” He rested his hands on her hips.
Mitch was in trouble. He could feel that trouble expanding in his chest, rising like a balloon, filling him with wonder. The trouble was love. And it was inescapable.
I love Laurel.
He loved her honesty. He loved her laughter. He loved her dogged need to negotiate peace. He loved her talent and tenacity. He loved how she wanted to protect her sister. He loved how she fitted into his arms and held on to his hand.
“We need to come to an agreement.” His voice was gruff from emotion. “A peace accord in the midst of all these Monroes.”
“What did you have in mind?” Her hands slid up his chest, giving him hope that she’d accept his terms for a truce.
But there wasn’t just peace at stake. There was love on the bargaining table. And as she’d said, love started with honesty. “Tell me what big secret is hanging over you.” He covered her hands with his, closing his fingers protectively around hers. “Let me help you and those babies.”
Her gloved hands fisted on his chest and her features stiffened, not in anger, but in anguish. “My life is tangled worse than a ball of half-unraveled yarn.” He wanted there to be no barriers between them. He wanted to help her. He wanted to admit to Laurel that he’d fallen in love with her. He wanted her to love him in return.
All his wants pressed down on his shoulders. He had to be patient. Everything in due time as if he was preparing to win a long court case.
“If I could just unravel one piece...” She lifted her gaze to his. “If I was standing on solid ground personally, with my sister. Or professionally... I’d let you help. But it’s all messy and I...I don’t think you’d like what you found if you looked at my knots.”
“You’re wrong.” He pressed her hands deeper into his jacket, over his heart. “I think you deserve to be happy, and maybe happiness is closer than you think.” When the contract expired, when her problems had sorted themselves out, they’d be okay.
“Do you really think so?”
Instead of answering, he wrapped his arms around Laurel and kissed her.
A few minutes later, when they were both cold on the outside and warm on the inside, she drew back and stared at him in wonder.
He couldn’t be sure because of the blustering wind whistling through the trees, but he thought she said, “You really think so,” before she chuckled and tugged him toward home.
* * *
“I’M GETTING BETTER with snowshoes.” Sophie passed Laurel going up the hill, singing her words instead of speaking them. “I’m so good, pretty soon we won’t need our chaperone.” She listed to one side, much as Laurel had done the other day. Only she righted herself with her poles and didn’t fall.
Laurel had mixed feelings about their chaperone. For one thing, he was an excellent kisser. For another, he’d refused to let her out alone, worried Laurel would fall again, worried Laurel might develop a concussion or wander off through the lodgepole pines.
Laurel paused, glancing over her shoulder at him, the handsome, caring man she hoped would understand the Wyatt fiasco.
“First rule of snowshoeing, Miss Laurel. Don’t stop in the middle of the hill.” Mitch wore his kind smile, the one that brought back memories of warm kisses on cold nights. “Second rule of snowshoeing. Don’t go into the wilderness without your phone.”
Well, she was fairly certain no one was going to return her calls during the hour she was over here. “I’m right across the highway from help.” From Mitch. If he’d chosen to stay back at the inn.
“I have my phone,” Sophie reassured Mitch. “And we won’t be here long. The boys might wear out their welcome at the diner.” She’d left them with the schoolkids under the supervision of Eli Garland. Sophie reached the trading post porch and waited for Laurel, Mitch and his key. “Alexander and Andrew aren’t due to start kindergarten until the fall. Mr. Garland gave me an hour.” She checked her cell phone. “That was ten minutes ago.”
“Can you open up the mercantile, Mitch? I want to show it to Sophie.” Laurel reached the porch and stepped aside to allow him access to the door, bumping into a grinning Sophie.
“He’s a keeper,” Sophie whispered her favorite line.
“That I am.” Mitch unlocked the trading post door and turned, his gaze colliding with Laurel’s. He was doing his best not to grin and she was doing her best not to tangle up their snowshoes as they’d done last night when she’d kissed him.
Sophie laughed. “I’m such a third wheel.”
“Y
ou’re not.” Laurel’s cheeks heated. She gave Mitch a gentle shove. “Let’s go. I want to show you both something.”
Mitch’s brows quirked. He moved past Laurel and led them across the snowshoe trail they’d made the other day to the mercantile.
Laurel followed, hot on his heels, ridding herself of snowshoes and poles as soon as she reached the mercantile’s porch. “Wait until you see the light in here, Sophie.” She darted around Mitch to get inside.
Sophie peeked in while she removed her snow gear. “Why aren’t there piles and piles of stuff in here?”
“Because of Flip, I think.” Laurel peered into the glass case that held the bolts of faded fabric. “She had a painting of hers on display in here the other day. It was beautiful and angled to catch the light. She has so many paintings in her cabin and no room to paint or to step back and appreciate them.”
“What did you want me to see?” Glancing around, Sophie wasn’t as enthused as Laurel was. “It looks like it’s been picked clean.”
“No. It’s been cleaned, Sophie. There’s a difference.” Laurel ran her gloved hand over the glass. “This was where ladies in town shopped. Unlike the trading post, there aren’t any bear traps, for instance. No axes. No thermal wear. Look at this.” She scurried around the display counter to point at a framed picture on the wall. “This is a fashion plate from over one hundred years ago. Women came in here to buy things that gave them joy. Just look around. Can you see it?”
Mitch smiled at Laurel, but she was fairly certain it wasn’t because he saw her vision.
Sophie frowned. “See what?”
“What this could be.” Laurel moved into the middle of the room and spread her arms. “I see a display of Odette’s quilts here. And a few of Flip’s paintings hanging on the wall there. Everything I sell would be handmade locally. Scarves, mittens, caps.” A scarf or quilt with a bit of shine or sparkle. “Maybe some of that pottery and other rustic art pieces you rave about.” There had to be other artisans in the area.
“A boutique?” Sophie pushed her glasses up her nose. “In Second Chance?”
Laurel came to a stop in front of the window overlooking the Lodgepole Inn and the valley beyond it, remembering the moonlit meadow and strong arms around her. “Yes, a boutique in Second Chance. My boutique.” A joyous place. “All I have to do is convince Odette to let me sell some of her crafts.” And maybe someday she’d sell some of her own.
“Well, if you could make that happen, I could open an antiques store in the trading post.” Sophie stepped out onto the porch and looked at the log building. “It wouldn’t be your average, stuffy mom-and-pop shop with teacups, Tiffany lamps and old books. I’m finding unusual pieces and there are bound to be more in the other buildings if what Shane told me is true.”
“You can see it, can’t you?” Laurel beamed at her cousin. “You can feel it?” The rightness of it all. “Us. Here. In Second Chance.”
“Slow down.” Mitch stepped between them. No smile on his face. No tease in his voice. “I’m not sure if anyone’s told you, but we don’t get many people stopping here to shop. Mack can back me up on this.”
“Maybe that’s because there’s not much here to stop for,” Sophie pointed out. “The town is charming. People would want to stop, get out and stretch their legs if they saw something interesting to stop and shop for.”
“You’ve seen how little traffic goes through during winter.” Mitch extended an arm to Exhibit A: the empty highway.
“Lots of businesses are seasonal.” Laurel leaned against the brick window ledge and regarded him levelly trying to discern the root of his protest.
Sophie nodded and put on her snowshoes. “I have lots of unique items to sell in the trading post. Some are worth a lot to the right collector.”
Mitch shook his head. “I don’t want to sound pessimistic, but since I’ve been here I’ve seen five or six businesses close, just in this part of town. Even with your grandfather’s low leases.”
“Well, they weren’t Monroes running those businesses, were they?” Laurel raised her chin. “We Monroes have a saying—”
“To make money, you have to be passionate about what you do,” Sophie finished for her.
“Because a passion for a business is like a rich cake with a cherry on top.” Grandpa Harlan used to say that. “You have to eat cake when it’s fresh.”
“Because there’s more to life than eating your greens.” Sophie grinned. She was in. She was definitely in.
“Is this the right time to think about this?” Mitch tried to sound reasonable, but it was clear he had strong opinions about what they were doing. He wasn’t convinced this was right for either of them. “Sophie has two young boys. You’re pregnant and have things to unravel.”
Laurel wanted to move closer, brush Mitch’s dark, wind-tossed hair from his eyes, and press a reassuring kiss to his lips. “I’m going to do this.”
“Me, too.” Sophie looked just as determined as Laurel felt.
“I’m not going to be hurt.” Laurel succumbed to the need to soothe. She stepped into Mitch’s space and held on to his forearms. “The worst that could happen is we go out of business. And the best that could happen is our efforts entice more travelers to stop, eat at the diner, buy snacks and gasoline at the general store, maybe even stay the night at the inn.”
He bent to press a tender kiss on her forehead.
Laurel wasn’t fooled. He was worried.
She was worried, too. But not about the boutique succeeding. She was worried about her ability to convince Odette to sell her work.
And without both sisters, Laurel would only have a scarf or two of her own to sell.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“DR. CARLISLE?” SHANE stood outside the clinic door in Ketchum with a twitchy Roy. They’d been waiting forty-five minutes in the cold for Laurel’s doctor to emerge.
Forty-five minutes was enough time to get cold feet, literally and figuratively. Shane hoped he wouldn’t be arrested tomorrow for kidnapping.
“Yes?” The woman blinked tired eyes at the two of them.
Shane swallowed his fears and introduced himself and Roy. “We had an appointment to talk about the job opening in Second Chance.”
The doctor was tall, blonde and in her midthirties. She would’ve been a stunner had she been rested, bothered with some makeup, not been wearing black nerd glasses and not have a figure hidden behind a navy blue stadium jacket. She seemed a trifle bewildered as if she didn’t remember agreeing to meet.
“We want to take you to dinner.” Roy hooked his arm through hers and steered her toward Mitch’s black Hummer parked at the curb.
“Coffee.” Dr. Carlisle checked her phone. “I agreed to coffee.”
“I know you’ve just finished a long shift,” Shane said smoothly, falling into step beside her. “I bet you could use a good meal. Salad. Steak. Vegetables. A decadent dessert.” A slam dunk unless she was a vegetarian or gluten-free.
There were so many ways this could go wrong.
Why did I let Roy talk me into this?
“Coffee.” Dr. Carlisle freed her arm. She had big blue eyes, but she wasn’t naive. “I’m going to be honest. I’m not looking for a new job. I like my work and... Frankly, I don’t think Second Chance could afford me.”
Shane named a figure that gave Dr. Carlisle pause.
“That can’t be right.” Her forehead creased. “Could you repeat that?”
Shane did, rocking back on his heels and staring down at his leather loafers, trying to look the epitome of innocence. Inside, his stomach lurched.
Roy propelled the doctor toward the Hummer again, which in typical kidnapper fashion had the motor running. “We have top-of-the-line facilities in Second Chance.”
“We have facilities,” Shane said under his breath, adding in a much louder voice, “and the las
t physician we employed treated about one person a day.”
She glanced at Shane over her shoulder. “What did he do with the rest of his time?”
“Noah read a lot of books and enjoyed the view.” Roy opened the back door, revealing Zeke in the backseat.
Dr. Carlisle’s brow furrowed.
Not that Shane blamed her. She’d been expecting one man. Now she had three. “We brought Zeke in for his checkup.”
“I graduated to a walking brace today.” Zeke patted the seat next to him. He had the kind of features people tended to trust—ginger hair, lightly freckled, friendly smile. At first glance, no one would take him for a kidnapper.
“Achilles injury?” the doctor guessed, not budging from the sidewalk. She wasn’t gullible. She’d gone to med school in New York City after all.
Shane had checked her credentials. He should have checked his own sanity.
“Tibia fracture. Broke through the skin and hurt like... Doc—” Zeke flashed his I’m-a-cowboy-you-can-trust-me grin. “Doc was our last physician in Second Chance. Anyway...he saved my life.”
Dr. Carlisle grinned back at him. “I don’t doubt it.”
“So, you’ll go to dinner with us?” Roy crowded behind her, trying to herd the poor woman into the vehicle.
Once more, Dr. Carlisle didn’t budge.
Shane gritted his teeth. Roy was going to blow the whole thing with his strange vibe. Shane dragged the town handyman back a foot and repeated the salary figure.
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