by Jill Shalvis
Don’t you dare look back, she told herself firmly. There’s absolutely no reason to. Not a single one…
She totally looked back.
And there he was on his skis like they were an extension of his own body, as if the rugged badass mountains behind him had nothing on him.
He was watching her as well, or so she assumed since his dark lenses were aimed her way. She waved at him.
He didn’t wave back but the very corners of his mouth turned up. Then he planted his poles, executed a lithe jump to turn his skis in the other direction, and skied off with an effortless motion that Bailey knew she could never in a million years of lessons hope to replicate. It was… well, incredibly sexy.
But as Bailey also knew, the sexy ones weren’t the keepers. For the most part, they’d never been disappointed or hurt by love or life, and as a woman who’d faced it all at one time or another, she had no patience for the weak, shallow, or clueless.
And actually, she had no patience for this line of thinking at all. She had other things to concentrate on. Laughing a little at herself, she turned her head to take in the top of the peak as the lift carried her away from it. It had been the top, the very tippy top, and the stunning view suddenly made her glad for her map incident.
She’d never seen anything like it. Most anywhere you stood in Colorado, you were surrounded by mountains—towering, rugged, intimidating alpine peaks that you had to tip your head back to see and that always seemed to frame the entire world.
Not on Devil’s Face. For the first time, she’d been the highest point, and everything below her—the world—was at her feet. And as someone who until very recently had never been in control of her own destiny, it staggered her.
In a really great way.
The lift hit a snag and jerked. Bailey gasped and grabbed the steel bar in front of her for all she was worth. With nothing below her but thick pines and an endless blanket of snow, she could do nothing else. There wasn’t a building in sight, not even the comforting view of the base lodge.
When the lift jerked again, her hand ached from the tight grip, but she didn’t let go. If she was going down, she was going down holding the sissy bar all the way. And wouldn’t that be pretty effing ironic if after all she’d been through, she was about to expire right here, now, alone on a mountain?
And if by some miracle she didn’t die from the fall, her mother would kill her.
But miraculously the lift held firm and she lived to breathe another day. Ten minutes later she glided off without so much as a hitch. Perfect execution, she thought proudly and looked around, really wishing Mountain Hottie could see her now, that anyone she knew could see her.
But nope, just her.
She’d grown up in a tiny mountain town just south of Denver, about two hours from here and though just about everyone she knew was a big skier, she was not. She’d been concentrating on other things. Today, the wind hitting her face, the sun warming her cheeks, and the feeling of being in control—for once—had all given her a small taste of what she’d wanted for herself. And after her business meeting, she hoped for a bigger taste.
Beaming, she straightened on her skis and glanced over at the base lodge. She could see the entire north-facing wall. Unlike the rest of the building, which was sided with wood and glass, gorgeous and rustic looking, the north wall was smooth stucco. Easier to maintain than wood, but plain looking and, frankly, boring.
She’d been hired by the resort’s publicist to paint a mural there.
Painting was important to her, very important. She earned a living as a graphic designer, but painting reminded her of her grandma, whom she still missed so very much. One of her earliest memories was of sitting on a stool in her grandma’s studio with the sketch her grandma had given her to paint. Sort of a paint-by-numbers but personalized.
Don’t worry about staying inside the lines, Bailey darling… Just go for it.
That’s what Bailey intended to do.
Excited, she skied—okay, plowed—her way to the lodge. Luckily it was only a hundred yards or so and relatively flat, but that meant she had to use her poles. By the time she made it to the stairs of the lodge, she was sweating and shaky. When she finally managed to release her boots from her skis, she dropped to her knees to gasp in air. Probably she should add an exercise regime to her list.
Stat.
Hand to her pounding heart, she panted for air and changed her mind. Maybe she was grateful no one could see her right now. That’s when she lifted her head and… came face-to-face with Mountain Hottie. Of course, because heaven forbid she run into him two minutes ago when she’d been on her skis and looking good.
How he’d beaten her down the mountain, on his own power no less, she hadn’t the foggiest. “Hey,” she said, trying to act like she wasn’t breathing like a locomotive on its last legs. Or dripping sweat. Staggering to her feet, she casually leaned over her poles, surreptitiously trying to catch her breath.
“Hey,” he said. Not breathing like a locomotive. Not sweating. In fact, not out of breath or exerted at all, the bastard. “The binding held.”
“You wouldn’t have let me go if you’d thought it wouldn’t,” she managed.
“True.” He paused. “You going to yell at me again if I want to know if you’re okay?”
She managed a snort. “I didn’t yell at you.”
His mouth quirked a little as he stood there all wind-tousled perfection, clearly yanking her chain in his own oddly stoic way.
And in her own not stoic way, she kind of liked it. She straightened. “For the future, I’m always okay,” she said. “So you don’t have to ask me that question again.”
“It’s my job.”
Oh. Right. Ski patrol.
“Want to tell me why you’re so touchy about being asked if you’re okay?”
Nope. She really didn’t. It was a trigger for her, not surprising given how many times over the past ten years those three simple words—are you okay—had been asked of her. Now when someone brought it up, what she really heard was all the pity the words usually conveyed.
And she hated pity with the same level of loathing she saved for all creepy-crawlies, kale, and men in open-toed shoes of any kind. “Let’s just say it annoys the crap out of me.”
“Duly noted,” he said. “Next time I’ll query you about the weather. Or if you’ve had a real ski lesson yet.”
Look at that, Man of Few Words did have a sense of humor. And she liked that. A lot. She liked him for some odd reason, not that that was going anywhere. “You have a name?”
“Hudson Kincaid. You?”
“Bailey Moore,” she said as his radio went off. Without taking his eyes from her, he cocked his head and listened, then turned down the volume. “I’ve got to go.”
Good. Maybe when he was gone she could stop making a fool of herself.
He started to turn away but then stopped and gave her one more long look. “Stay off the top.”
“Sir, yes sir,” she said, and saluted him.
Another smile threatened the corners of his mouth. “If only I thought you meant that,” he said, and then he was gone.
Bailey let out a slow, shaky breath. What had just happened? It’d been so long since she’d had any sort of interaction she wasn’t exactly sure.
Liar. That was flirtation and you started it.
And she’d liked it.
But man, she was rusty. Sir, yes sir? Seriously, she needed some practice being normal.
She struggled a few minutes to gather up her skis and poles into one of the long lines of ski stands.
It took a few more minutes to pull off her helmet and figure out how to lock it to her skis. Man, this sport looked so much easier on TV. Everyone always appeared to glide so effortlessly down the mountain and then carried their skis on their shoulders like it was no big deal. It really was deceiving. Still, she was challenging herself and that felt… well, amazing. She glanced at her phone to check the time and was gratified
to see she was half an hour early for her meeting. She’d use it to feed the beast, which had been grumbling loudly all morning.
The cafeteria wasn’t crowded, most likely due to it being a weekday. Bailey loaded a tray and sat down in a secluded corner of the place, cozied between a half wall and a huge wall of windows where she could see the incredible view.
You almost, nearly, sort of skied down that, she thought with pride. She could also see that huge blank wall, as it was one of the walls designating the outside eating area. It was protected from the elements by being half dug into the hill behind it and also a huge extended patio roof. She stared at that wall, trying to envision her mural on it.
It was going to be amazing.
She was stuffing her face, nearly moaning with pleasure because the food was incredibly good, when her phone buzzed an incoming text. Her meeting place had been changed to another address in town.
Damn.
It took her nearly half an hour just to turn in her rental skis and get to her car. By the time she drove into Cedar Ridge from the ski resort, she was already ten minutes late, but even that didn’t dampen her excitement.
Hud jerked awake when his phone buzzed in his pocket. He blinked the boardroom into focus and also his siblings’ faces, ranging from amused to pissed off. “Shit,” he muttered.
“Yep,” his sister Kenna agreed from her place across the table where, if he went by the jelly beans layered all over him, she’d been tossing them at him as he snoozed. “You fell asleep,” she said. “When you opened your mouth and started snoring, I wanted to go for a bull’s-eye but Gray wouldn’t let me. He was afraid you’d choke.”
Gray, the oldest Kincaid sibling and ruler of their universe—at least in his own mind—shrugged at Hud. “No one here wanted to take over ski patrol,” he said, “so your premature death would’ve been annoying. We boring you?”
“Shit,” Hud said again, and straightened in his chair. Hell yes, they’d bored him, right to sleep, not that he could say so and keep his teeth. But the truth was, he had two speeds—ninety miles an hour and fast asleep. “And I don’t sleep with my mouth open or snore.” He looked to Gray for confirmation.
Gray backed him and shook his head. Nope, Hud didn’t sleep with his mouth open or snore.
Hud nodded. That’s right, he didn’t. He stood and… sent a waterfall of jelly beans cascading to the floor.
Kenna chortled, pleased with herself.
Realizing his phone was still buzzing, Hud pulled it from his pocket, saw the number for his mom’s nurse, and immediately answered. “Is she okay?”
At the question, his siblings’ easy, relaxed attitude vanished. Everyone sat straight up and watched Hud’s face carefully, good humor gone.
“She’s fine,” Jenny, the head nurse, told Hud. “But I really think you need to take away that credit card you gave her. Carrie isn’t so good with credit, as you well know.”
Hud rubbed his temple at the truth of this statement. The card was for emergencies because he knew what it was like to feel stuck and helpless. But he and his mom had different ideas on the definition of “emergency.” Last month she’d ordered two matching kid bikes, the exact bikes he and his identical twin Jacob had once begged her for—when they’d been eight years old. And then a week ago she’d ordered the drum set Hud had wanted for his birthday. His tenth birthday.
Kenna had commandeered the damn thing and now used it late at night to drive him crazy.
“What did she order now?” he asked Jenny.
The nurse hesitated.
Not good. Hud’s mom loved the Internet and the nurses let her have Wi-Fi access because it was a great babysitter. “Jenny,” he said a little tightly. “What did she buy?”
“A woman.”
Following her GPS, Bailey parked in front of a building adjacent to the hospital.
A nursing/support facility.
Checking in at the front desk, she found that she was expected and was given a guest pass.
She was guided to a room where people in wheelchairs were exercising. Their instructor at the front of the room was in a wheelchair too. She wore a headband, leotard, and leg warmers and had her class rocking out to “Hit Me with Your Best Shot” by Pat Benatar.
When she caught sight of Bailey, she waved and ended the class. “That’s enough for our seated Jazzercising class today, gang,” she called out. “Same place tomorrow. I’m bringing Sting and Queen.”
“In person?” one of the other elderly women asked hopefully.
“Unfortunately, Sting didn’t return my calls and Freddie’s dead, but hey, we all gotta go sometime.” The teacher rolled toward Bailey and then shocked the hell out of her by standing up. “Hiya, I’m Carrie. Great to meet you.”
“You’re not…?” Bailey gestured to the wheelchair.
“Oh no. I just teach in the chair because they’re elderly. Plus they’re all—” She broke off to look around and make sure no one was looking at them. “A little…” She circled a finger around her ear, the universal sign for crazy. “But very sweet, each of them. Well, except Tony. Don’t turn your back on him, because he’s got octopus hands. Anyway, they don’t all need the chairs but I insist because sometimes they fall asleep and it’s less disruptive to the class to have them just nod off rather than fall over. The domino effect isn’t pretty. Follow me.”
Bailey followed her to a room at the end of the hall—a patient room. There, Carrie kicked off her shoes and climbed into the bed.
She was a patient here.
“Whew,” Carrie said. “Nap time. But this first. You’re my first choice for the Cedar Ridge project.”
Bailey looked around, more than a little confused. “You’re the publicist for Cedar Ridge Resort?”
“Actually…” Carrie paused. “‘Publicist’ might not be the exact right word.”
Oh boy. Knees weak, Bailey sank into the guest chair facing the bed. “And what would be the right word exactly?”
“Mom,” Carrie said.
“I don’t understand.”
“Cedar Ridge is family owned. It’s been a rough few years for the resort and the Kincaids. We need a boost.”
“Rough?” Bailey asked.
“Yes.” Carrie rubbed her temple. “The details don’t matter. What does matter is family. Memories. And what better way to preserve both of those things than a big picture to share with the world.”
“The mural,” Bailey said.
“The mural.” Carrie beamed. “One big pic to depict our favorite memories to share with everyone.”
“Okay,” Bailey said, thinking of her own personal favorite pic, one she kept as her wallpaper on her phone. It was herself, her mom, and her grandma in her grandma’s studio, all covered in paint and laughing together. “I get that. It’s a memory that can’t be erased with time.”
“Or a brain that has a hard time locating all its files.” Eyes suddenly suspiciously shiny, she knocked on the side of her own head. “Like mine.”
Bailey met her gaze and felt her heart squeeze.
“And I think the people who ski at Cedar Ridge would love it,” Carrie said. “A family-run resort like this one needs a centerpiece that people can talk about. Something other than the fact that the man who started the place was a deadbeat dad who mortgaged the resort to its eyeballs, couldn’t keep it in his pants, and vanished on his kids.”
Bailey felt her eyebrows raise. She hadn’t heard this story.
Carrie reached for a small framed picture on her bed tray and handed it to Bailey.
It was of two boys, maybe eight years old. Identical twins. “My boys,” Carrie said with clear adoration. “Hud just gave this to me for my birthday. You can’t tell but they’re actually mirror images of each other. Hud’s right-handed and Jacob’s left-handed. Hud’s cowlick swirl on his head is clockwise, Jacob’s counterclockwise. You ever hear of such a thing?”
Bailey shook her head. She knew next to nothing about being a mom, much less twins.<
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Carrie smiled but it faded quickly. “For all their similarities, my boys couldn’t be more different. Hud always wanted to travel the world and experience new things. Jacob’s a homebody. But they’re two peas in a pod in so many ways. They never even had to use words with each other.”
Past tense, Bailey thought.
