Thorne Bay

by Jeanine Croft

  Ignoring her less than enthusiastic greeting, Tristan continued to introduce me to the rest of his friends. The two women standing next to Nicole, Leeann and Alex, greeted me reservedly.

  “This is Lydia,” he said, lifting his chin towards the fourth woman.

  Her smile, at least, was genuine as she shook my hand.

  “And that gorgeous bastard,” Tristan went on, nodding to the leonine man beside Lydia, “is James.”

  Inundated as I was by the symmetrical beauty they all possessed, I felt increasingly aware of my physical inferiority—the only donkey at The Royal Ascot. Lydia and James, I decided, had to be twins, they were both golden-haired and their eyes shared the exact same tawny hue.

  “Evan just arrived from Palm Beach yesterday. She’s gonna be working at the Bear and Beaver for a while.”

  “That so?” James transferred a curious smile from Tristan to me. “Well, it just so happens that that’s my favorite bar, Evan.”

  Nicole gave a derisory snort.

  “So what brings you here?” He asked, ignoring the peanut gallery.

  “I—”

  “Ugh, I’m leaving.” Nicole shot me an evil look as though it was my fault James was talking to me. If looks could transmit syphilis, hers would have done it that instant. I shouldn’t have given two peppered shits about her rudeness (after all, she didn’t know me from Adam), but I did. And later, when all the delayed comebacks would suddenly rush into my head, I’d be irritated for letting her make me feel two inches tall.

  Tristan spared her a curt nod. “Fine. Just don’t harass any more tourists on your way out.”

  Grimacing slightly, I tried not to resent being called a tourist.

  With a black look at me (as though I was holding Tristan hostage or something), she finally left the aisle. I for one could breathe easier now. Alex and Leeann followed swiftly in her wake.

  “So why Thorne Bay?” James tried again.

  “I was promised girly cocktails.” From the corner of my eye, I watched Tristan’s mouth twitch again.

  The twins peered curiously between us, but Lydia’s scrutiny seemed the more penetrative. “It’s a far cry from Florida. Hopefully, you’ll be happy here,” she said, her tone oddly grave and discordant considering her words.

  “As long as the Peeping Toms stay out of her bathroom,” Tristan remarked, “she might be.”

  “Peeping Toms?” This from James.

  “Of the eight-legged variety,” I answered helpfully. “I almost got a spider hickey this morning.”

  He gave an unaffected shudder. “Aside from spiders, I’m partial to all the beasts of the forest.”

  Lydia rolled her eyes.

  “Speaking of which,” I said, “I hear there are some very interesting species roaming the woods here in Thorne Bay.” I looked conspiratorially at Tristan, who’d as much as hinted at Sasquatch earlier. But this time my innuendo fell far short of the mark. All three of them seemed to tense up as though I’d said Lord Voldemort’s name. I felt instantly foolish. Man, these Alaskans had moods like their weather—capricious!

  “We better get going.” Lydia aimed a pointed look at Tristan and the shopping basket in his hand.

  “You still have to warm the engine up,” he answered dismissively. “Go on, I’ll be out in a minute.”

  They said their goodbyes and reluctantly left us. The bell over the entrance signaled their exit as it had done Nicole’s. Tristan and I were alone again.

  “Are you flying today?” I asked him, my hand closing over a carton of soy milk.

  “No, Lydia is, but James and I are catching a ride into Ketchikan to run some errands.”

  By now we’d finally migrated to the condiments aisle. Tristan was pretending not to notice the three nosy old ladies who were blatantly staring. Strangely, no matter which aisle we were in, we attracted the attention of whoever was loitering there. Animal magnetism, I told myself. He had it in spades. I was hyper-aware of him every second I was in his company. The small hairs on my skin seemed to stretch themselves out towards him, desperate for contact, his scent enveloping me with that dark tang of wildwood spice that was all his own.

  I’d have been in heaven if not for the intrusive gazes that were all narrowed warily at him. “What’s with the staring? I feel like I’m about to hear banjo music,” I muttered under my breath.

  “Don’t worry, it’s not quite Deliverance, USA,” he said, shrugging, “and clearly not backwater enough not to stock the fake hippy milk.” He shook his head with mock disappointment, easily deflecting my curiosity about the dodgy rumors, as he gestured to the soy milk in my basket.

  “It tastes pretty good, you should try it.” I had not missed the suspicious way in which he’d eyed my milk.

  “I’d rather just take your word for it.” He towered over me as he studied the other items on my list.

  Why hadn’t he left with Lydia and James? Or his girlfriend for that matter. Moreover, why was he still here talking to me?

  “The canned goods are over here.” He motioned for me to follow him. When we got to the right shelf he pulled a can down and chucked it inside the basket. “What’s after tomato sauce?”

  “Well, technically I wanted ketchup,” I said, grinning, and reached into the basket to retrieve the can so that I could deposit it back on the shelf. “Across the pond ketchup is referred to as tomato sauce.”

  His expression turned dubious as he considered that fact. “Yeah, they do a lot of things the wrong way around on that side of the world.”

  “Mmkay, well, we’re not the ones that misspell aluminium.” I made sure to enunciate the extra vowel as we left the canned goods aisle.

  “You mean aluminum, don’t you?”

  “Negative. Al-oom-in-ee-um. You left out the extra ‘i’ there.” My tone was smugly didactic. “Live it. Learn it. Love it.”

  Very slowly, deliberately, Tristan leaned in, his head slightly canted as though listening intently. “Hear that?”

  My brow furrowed bemusedly. My ears strained to hear above the sound of the blood rushing excitedly through my veins. “Hear what?”

  “The sound of how wrong you are.” He smirked, leaning away again. “It’s deafening.”

  I gave his arm a playful nudge. “No, that’s the sound of your feeble excuse dying a horrible death.”

  “Agree to disagree.”

  “Not a chance.”

  “Well, Miss Spencer, a wise man knows not to argue with a woman.”

  “That’s because,” I rejoined, “you know that all we women need to do is flash some boob and that puny, male logic crumbles.”

  “That doesn’t sound like much of a threat, Evan.” He was trying valiantly not to laugh. “I may start an argument after all…”

  The air grew instantly thick with delicious tension, his gaze lingering with male fascination. Though his eyes never strayed lower than my mouth, my female intuition was very aware of which area of my anatomy his imagination had wandered to. Unfortunately for him, I was not one to arbitrarily flash my bits.

  Without warning, though, like the jarring of a scratched record, the sounds around us suddenly obtruded the steamy haze that had enveloped us moments before.

  He widened the space between us, taking a cautious step back as his nostrils flared. “I better get going.” He promptly handed my nearly empty basket to me, my skin sparking at the touch of his fingers.

  He threw me a suave two-fingered wave and my chest deflated in bitter disappointment as I watched him turn away. This time the bell over the door chimed more like a lonely knell as he left the store.

  There was no denying Tristan’s effect on me. I could barely think rationally when under that intense gaze. I’d been so oblivious to my surroundings until the moment he’d left my side. As it turned out Thorne Bay Market did indeed have a condom aisle. And I was standing in it.

  * * *

  It was well after dinner before I returned to my neck of the woods, my circadian rhythm already disc
ombobulated by the sunlit ‘night’. Unlike yesterday, though, the lowering sky was cast in sullen shades that consequently deepened the shadows of the hinterland, imbuing it with an unnatural and feral twilight. Overhead, the ravens called stridently from their aeries, their cold voices the creepy pièce de résistance of an ominous darkling forest.

  The sound of the keys in my fumbling hand seemed discordant in the hush that followed after the ravens stilled. Unexpectedly, the leaves rustled sinisterly behind me. My blood froze instantly. Eyes wide and furtive over my shoulder, I scoured the darkened woods, blindly jamming the key at my door.

  “Who’s there?” I whispered.

  Of course, if Sasquatch had been hiding in the shade, I doubted I’d have gotten a friendly answer. Thankfully, there was no reply. Another panicked jab and the key slid home. The lock finally snicked open and I rushed into my room, hastily slamming the door shut and locking it behind me.

  Later, however, I convinced myself the sound had been nothing more than a scuttling mouse. Or my neighbor, the giant wolf spider. Even a spider was preferable to Sasquatch!

  The first hint of dawn washed into my room at four AM. I was already awake, being as I was still on east coast time, nervously listening to whatever was now snuffling loudly outside my door, but I was too chicken shit to look.

  Sunlight, though, was always a good counterpoise to creepy sounds in the dark. When the sun was up in full force, albeit still cloaked behind a benign layer of grey stratus, I finally deemed it safe enough to venture outside again. Dew still clung to the porch and the steps, and the air was like nothing I’d ever smelled before. My lungs were filled with the cleansing taste of the glaciers, the woodland, and incoming rain. A light drizzle began to fall seconds later, hardly even rain at all. It was as if the heavens had descended from the mountains and I was walking through suspended specks of sweet spring water.

  The sight of the odd spoors beside my bottom step, however, quickly dispelled the diurnal magic. Instantly wary, I lifted my gaze to the silent trees. Nothing. Just a lonely owl and the sound of the wind soughing whisper-soft through the boughs and needles.

  Satisfied that there was no mythical beast glaring at me through shadowed boles, I knelt carefully beside the baffling spoor. The prints were neither canine or ursine, seemingly too large and protracted to be the former—clearly some plantigrade beast—and yet not quite the right shape to be the latter either. So what then? Bigfoot? Impossible!

  A chill of agitation fluttered up along my spine, throwing fine hairs up in its wake. If this had been made by a grizzly, which I still doubted, it was no beast I cared to encounter. It was monstrous.

  Resolved to identify the culprit, I positioned my foot beside one clearly defined print for a size reference and snapped a picture of it with my iPhone. My shoe size was likely average for a girl my height, but the paw prints were a lot larger than my meager size eight. The drizzle, meantime, began to fall harder, which meant that the prints were already rapidly disappearing.

  “Damn.” Reluctantly, I yanked my attention away from the strange impressions fading in the mud and continued on towards the main building. Melissa, one of the bartenders I’d briefly met when Owen had given me a tour of the place, was supposed to be training me today and I didn’t want to be late.

  Maybe someone up at the lodge would be able to identify the odd spoor.

  7

  Nuts

  “Heads up,” Melissa whispered to me, filling a glass with ice. “Mr. Eisen just walked in.”

  I looked up to see the old curmudgeon approaching the bar as his heavily-botoxed wife seated herself at their usual table by the flat screen to watch the U.S. Open. He was a decent enough tipper, but not much else endeared him to me.

  His wine had to be served at a certain temperature, had to be decanted a particular way, and left to breathe a specific amount of time before he’d drink it. Even then he’d wipe fastidiously at the clean wine glass despite that I’d polished it under his watchful gaze. Mr. Eisen would have probably whinged about how the damn grape pickers had handled the fruit before extraction and barreling if he could have. Asinine was what he was.

  As if his fussiness wasn’t heinous enough, he had a wandering eye too. This was only my third shift, but I’d pegged him for a perv on day one when he’d lowered his small eyes to my meager chest, staring so hard I feared he’d burn holes through my shirt. More often than not he’d lurk at the bar each night eating all the peanuts from the bowl, messing half of each handful onto the floor because he was too busy staring at Melissa’s breasts to worry about his aim. I only hoped, for housekeeping’s sake, his poor aim didn’t extend to his bathroom habits as well.

  “You serve him please!” I entreated as I poured myself a club soda, turning my back to the approaching perv. “I’ll do anything.”

  “No way,” she smirked, “it’s your turn.”

  “C’mon, I’m still the FNG.” The frigging new guy. That surely counted for something?

  She waited for me to take a long gulp from my glass and then, with deadpan precision, said, “Fine, but you’re picking up his nuts.”

  “Whoa!” I choked, wiping my mouth as Mr. Eisen loomed closer, “there’s no need to bring his nuts into this.”

  Melissa, like Tristan, had been completely unexpected—I’d never imagined I’d meet any quality people in God’s Nowhere, let alone anyone quick-witted, young, and fun. She was a lithesome six foot twenty-seven year old with shoulder-length honey-wheat hair, cobalt eyes that lightened to green at the center, and had a wacky sense of humor that was strangely reminiscent of my mother’s. It was no wonder I loved her already. I didn’t normally love so quickly or too easily.

  She was only moonlighting as a bartender because her day job didn't quite pay the bills yet. Photography, she'd told me, was her first love, aside from her husband, Matt. He was the Bear Lodge floatplane pilot that I'd been expecting that first day in Ketchikan when Tristan had turned up instead.

  Mr. Eisen had, by now, reached the bar counter. We greeted him dutifully as he planted himself on a stool, Melissa with her usual peppy cheer and I with my signature diffidence, holding a tray guardedly across my shirtfront. Melissa chuckled at his stale jokes, pretending to listen intently as though his nasally voice wasn’t tearing at her eardrums. I gave a spiritless roll of my eyes as he began intoning his usual instructions to her, like the self-proclaimed sommelier that he was.

  Eventually, he slunk off back to his perpetually surprised-looking wife. I bent my narrowed eyes over the counter to inspect the mess he’d wreaked on the floor. “Fair is fair,” I mumbled with a sigh. It was my job to clean his nuts tonight. I sniggered at the thought, taking the brush and dustpan from the kitchen before heading off to sweep up the tainted nuts.

  “So Melissa…” I said once I’d done cleaning up.

  “So Evan…?” She was steaming and polishing glasses, watching as some of the lodge guests and two Forest Service guys trickled out into the night.

  “I need to start jogging again.” I hadn’t jogged since I’d left home and I could already feel the effects of my lack of exercise. I was tall and when I didn’t workout, my back inevitably began to ache. “Is it safe to jog here? I don't wanna run into a pack of ravenous wolves.” Then I thought about the simian-like print I'd found outside my door a few days ago. “Or Sasquatch,” I subjoined.

  “I’d worry more about the bears.” She bent down to grab more vinegar for the steam water. “Have you got bear spray?”

  Unable to help myself, I quickly rolled a tea towel and then flicked it across her backside as though we were a couple of teenage boys in a locker room. “That’s for the ice you dropped down my bra earlier!”

  She eyed the towel suspiciously and held up her hands. “Truce!”

  I flung my damp weapon to the side as proof of our ceasefire. “And yes,” I finally answered her question, “I have my trusty bear spray back in the room.” The same can that Alison had insisted I buy.

&n
bsp; “Good, and make sure you get someone to go jogging with you. Also,” she went on, beginning to number these caveats on each finger, “don’t wear headphones or run during dusk. Or dawn for that matter.”

  “So basically don't go running at all.” I sighed loudly, my shoulders sagging a bit.

  “Such a fatalist.” She shook her head. “You can go running, just be smart about it. And make a lot of noise, you don’t wanna scare a brown bear during hyperphagia.”

  “Hyper-what?”

  “It’s like a feeding frenzy. Most of the hiking trails tend to keep clear of the known food sources, like salmon streams. But you just never know.”

  “God, I love when you get your nerd on! It’s so sexy!”

  “Right? You should see me do an oil change on the Chevy.” She wiggled her brows.

  “Not sure I could handle that much sexy. So—” batting my lashes sweetly “—d’you wanna come running with me tomorrow morning?”

  “Can’t,” Melissa said with an apologetic grimace, “I’m heading to Coffman Cove. I’ve been commissioned to do a school photoshoot.”

  “Oh.” Even if my crestfallen expression didn't evince as much, I was happy for her. “Guess I’ll go on my own then.”

  “Strength in numbers, Ev. Try and find a running partner.” She then pursed her lips mischievously. “What about Chris? He needs the exercise.” She was convinced that one of the Bear Lodge servers had the hots for me. Love hearts practically bled from his eyes every time he looked at me, she’d said.

  “I’d rather cuddle that damn spider than run with Chris,” I replied with a shudder. He was a nice enough guy, but I was not interested in anything beyond friendship with him. And he seemed the type to misinterpret any platonic overtures a girl might make. “Anyway, his idea of getting sweaty probably entails exercising his bicep with beer curls.”

  “I bet that's not the only way he'd like to get sweaty with you…” Her smirk was heavy with innuendo.

  “Ew!” I covered my ears like one of the three wise monkeys. “Please stop talking.”