“Will they be staying here?” Lacy asked.
“Nope, we plan on camping. We asked Kara to camp, too, but she said she preferred having a bed and running water, go figure!” Eric said with a teasing smile.
“Honey, I feel you.” Lacy gave Kara a knowing grin. “My husband likes to hunt, fish, and camp. He’s always asking me to join him, and I’m always telling him that time apart makes a marriage stronger.” Both women laughed.
Lacy checked them in and showed them to their rooms. Kara immediately took her sketchbook and headed outdoors. It wasn’t until her stomach started growling that she looked at her phone and realized she had been outside sketching for five hours. She went back into the lodge and discovered that she had missed dinner. Lacy said she could help herself to anything in the refrigerator. Kara made herself a large ham sandwich and found her brothers on the back deck.
“You’re looking a little like a pretzel, sis,” Eric said as he tipped his beer bottle at her.
“Yeah, I might have stayed in one position too long while I was sketching,” she admitted.
“Come over here. I owe you a backrub from after the last softball game.” Eric moved his feet off the end of the lounge chair, to make room for Kara, and when she sat down, he pushed her long hair over her shoulder and started digging into the tight muscles of her neck.
“Oh, yeah, that feels great.” She sighed.
“Tony and Sid are going to make the trip. They’ll actually get here on Friday. So, we get to start earlier than we thought,” Dane told her excitedly.
“That’s great,” Kara said as she pushed back against Eric’s strong hands.
“But I thought Nate said he wouldn’t be available this weekend. That leaves you at loose ends, though, right? Are you sure you don’t want to come with us? You like to fish,” Dane coaxed.
“Yeah, but I don’t like camping,” she reminded her older brother.
“But what will you do? Read a book? Come with us. You’ll really like Tony and Sid, I promise.” This time Dale waggled his eyebrows.
“Quit trying to set me up. I’m more than capable of finding myself a man. Oww!” she turned to look at Eric. “What the hell? Ease up there, Viking Boy.”
“Yeah, if you’re so good at finding yourself a man, what the hell were you doing with Burt for so many years? He hardly qualified.” Eric scowled at his sister.
If Kara hadn’t heard the confusion and concern in her older brother’s voice she would have been hurt and lashed out. Instead, she tried to answer as honestly as possible. “Look, I was away at school, away from my family. Burt was shy. He was really talented and he needed me.”
“Yeah, he needed you. He needed you to make every damn decision for him,” Dane said in disgust.
“In hindsight, it wasn’t a good match,” Kara admitted. “I think it was because I was so far away from home, and I was so caught up in being an artist. I thought I needed someone who really got me, someone who really understood the art I was trying to create.”
“That was our fault. We shouldn’t have teased you so much. If we hadn’t, you wouldn’t have gone for such a namby-pamby wimp.” Dane had openly disliked Burt from the start.
“I think you chose someone who wasn’t like any of your family, because we didn’t show you the respect you deserved, and I, for one, deeply regret that. Kara, we were always proud of you, we just didn’t understand how you did what you did. It seemed like some kind of amazing mystery would occur and then you would present us with this beautiful creation. Not even Mom knew how you did it,” Eric explained.
“I should have had more faith in you all and recognized it as our normal family teasing. But I was really insecure in the beginning about my art,” she admitted. “And as for Burt, he wasn’t that bad,” Kara defended.
“Kara, he had to be. Otherwise, you would have dated someone in the three years since you broke up with him. You were twenty-two when you guys broke up, now you’re twenty-five. Have you had a date since then?” Eric asked kindly, his hands now gently kneading the muscles of her neck.
“No,” she admitted quietly.
“Why do you think that is?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
“I think because you don’t trust yourself. But, honey, you were nineteen when you chose that idiot. You’re so much smarter now. You know yourself, you know what you want. You know what you need. You deserve a man who will love you, someone you can lean on. Since Burt, all you’ve done is work. You’ve become an amazing artist, and now you have your own studio, you own your own house. You have galleries selling your work, and you live an independent life. You’ve proved yourself. You’ve shown you don’t need a man. But wouldn’t it be nice if you could find one that you could lean on if you wanted to?” Eric asked.
Kara was silent for long minutes, relaxing into the soothing neck rub, watching her other brother drink his beer. Finally, she broke the silence.
“Maybe you’re right, Eric. Do you really think I can make a good decision this time around?”
“I know it, sis. You’re the smartest woman, other than Mom, that I know.” She turned around and gave her big brother a hug.
“I’m going to turn in now. I’ll see you for breakfast, and I’ll join you for fishing in the morning, since Nate won’t be arriving until one o’clock.”
“Okay, but we’re going to be at breakfast at four-thirty and we intend to leave by five. You snooze, you lose!” Dane told her.
“I’ll be there,” Kara promised.
* * * *
Kara had fun that morning fishing with her brothers. Afterward, she took the truck back to the lodge to meet up with Nate. She left it with Lacy, who promised that one of her sons would go to pick up Dane and Eric before dinner.
Nate turned out to be just as Kara expected. She had been e-mailing and talking to him on the phone for months. They had been trading processes, as well as just sharing their enthusiasm for the craft with one another. Nate was in his mid-sixties. He was a big bull of a man, and Kara well knew that part of his bulk came from years of lifting the crucible and pouring the glass into molds. It was heavy, painstaking work. When she shook his hand, she saw many burn scars. She only had the one. She had diligently worn gloves when working with the molten glass, since the first time she had accidently burned herself.
“Oh, no, girl! No handshake for us, we know each other too well for that!” And Kara found herself enveloped in a huge bear hug. It was as if one of her fathers was hugging her, only he was eight inches shorter.
“So, how is Carmen?” Kara asked after his eight-year-old granddaughter, whom he was helping his daughter to raise.
“She’s doing great. She has decided that she wants to be a bull rider!” He laughed.
“I thought it was an astronaut,” Kara said.
“I think she’s going through the alphabet. Next week, I’m expecting cowgirl, then the week after that, it’ll be a diver.”
“She’s ambitious! I never made it past the A’s.” Nate raised his eyebrow. “Artist,” Kara explained.
“Well, Miss Artist, let’s get you to my studio so you can explain to me how you have been doing some of your molds. I’m really interested to learn how you’ve been able to get your glass so thin.”
“I want to see how you mix your chemicals. I must be doing something wrong, because even when I mix it like you tell me to, I don’t get your colors,” she griped.
“It’s the sand. It’s always the sand,” Nate said.
“Probably,” Kara agreed. Nate ushered her to his light-blue pickup that had obviously seen better days. She approved. She loved old vehicles, they had character. “How long does it take to get to your studio?” she asked.
“Not long,” he assured her as he put a cassette into the tape deck. Willie Nelson came crooning through the speakers and then they were off.
She loved his studio. It looked like a huge steel pipe cut in half and plopped down on the ground. “What are these called again?�
�� she asked.
“These are Quonset huts. The Army used them during the war. They’re really easy to build.” He ushered her inside. Both ends were open, so he had plenty of light.
“What about during the winter, doesn’t it get cold?” Kara asked.
“It only gets to about thirty-two degrees during the winter, here in the Sitka area. So, I can close the doors at each end. But most days, as long as it’s not windy, I keep ‘em open. The kiln and the furnace keep it warm enough. Heck, isn’t that the same temperature you have down there in Fate Harbor?” Kara realized he was right and nodded.
They ended up working until sunset, which was eight thirty. They stopped only for dinner, some chili that he had warming in a crockpot. His glass was stunning. Kara found that his measurements on the chemicals were a little different than what he had e-mailed her. He improvised with additional little pinches here and there, based on how he was feeling. Her obsessive-compulsive nature always had her following a formula exactly, which she now realized limited her when it came to the colors she wanted to create.
“Girl, experimentation is part of the fun,” he enthused.
“But how can you recreate what you did, if you don’t use the exact same formula every time?” Kara lamented.
“Who wants to recreate the same old thing?” Nate asked. “I want everything to be new each time, don’t you? I like to be surprised!” It was a totally foreign concept to Kara, and she was going to have to consider it. Nate drove her back to the lodge after sunset.
“Why isn’t it dark?” she asked.
“Twilight lasts nearly all night this time of year. It takes people a long time to get used to it. They have blackout curtains in your room, but your body still knows that it’s light outside and won’t want to rest. You’ll find that you won’t sleep as much. Probably between the fourth or sixth day you’ll sleep twelve or thirteen hours to make up for all the sleep you’ve lost.”
“Good to know.” Kara smiled. When Nate dropped her off, she found that he was right. Although it was ten o’clock and she had put in a hard day of labor, and had gotten up at four thirty to go fishing with her brothers, she wasn’t tired.
“I’ll pick you up tomorrow at ten. Try to sleep in.”
“Thanks, Nate, I had fun.” Kara waved and headed into the lodge, making a beeline for the fridge. She got a big glass of milk and found a plate of chocolate chip cookies.
The next morning she made it to the lobby in time for the early breakfast. Her brothers asked if she wanted to go fishing again, but she said she wanted to get some sketching done instead. She headed down to the beach and found a tide pool, where she sat down on a large piece of driftwood and got lost in sketching.
“Whatcha doing?” She looked up to see the prettiest brown eyes gazing at her. The young girl had the look of a Native American, so Kara guessed she was one of the local Tlingit people, since they were the predominate tribe in Sitka. The girl looked to be about four years old, and she was a much better subject then the starfish and sand dollars Kara had been sketching. Kara felt her fingers aching to sketch her. That was when the child’s question registered.
“I’m drawing pictures. Do you want to see?” she asked.
“Yes, please.” The little girl sidled up next to her and sat down on the log, peering at the sketchbook. Kara started flipping through the pages, pausing to answer the child’s questions.
“Why did you draw five different perspectives of that one?” a deep voice behind her asked, causing Kara to jerk around in surprise. The man was down on one knee, silent as a sentinel, looking over her shoulder. How could she not have felt his presence, now that she saw him? It was as if he filled up her entire field of vision, and everything else dropped away. He had the same eyes as the child, only deeper. He had seen more, lived more, knew more, saw more…saw her.
He cleared his throat and then asked again, “Why the five perspectives?”
“I’m going to sculpt this one, so I can make a model,” Kara explained.
“What’s sculp?” the little girl asked.
Kara pulled her gaze away from the man and smiled down at the girl.
“Have you ever made a sand castle?” At the little girl’s enthusiastic nod, Kara said, “Well, then, you’ve sculpted. Your sand castle is a sculpture. Instead of just drawing a picture of something you make it more real, by sculpting it,” Kara explained.
“I sculped Unca Ben’s face in the sand, too. Didn’t I, Unca Ben?” The girl looked to the big man for affirmation.
“You sure did, button. You did a great job!” Kara watched as the child glowed under the praise of her uncle. Kara was relieved to hear that he was her uncle and not her father. She glanced at his hands and saw no ring on his finger. When she looked up again, she found him grinning. She’d been caught, and then her damn Nordic skin gave her away as she turned beet red.
“Hey, don’t feel so bad, that was one of the first things I looked for, too,” he admitted, tipping his hand at her bare ring finger. “You are single, right?” Oh God, he is blunt! Kara thought she liked it. She slowly nodded her head.
“What’s single?” the little girl asked.
“That means I’m going to ask this woman her name and see if she wants to go to dinner with me,” the man explained, still kneeling in the moist, gravelly sand of the Alaskan beaches.
“My name is Alice Shotbrook,” the little girl piped up. Kara turned to her and held out her hand.
“Hello, Alice Shotbrook. My name is Kara Johansen. It is very nice to meet you.” The girl pumped her hand twice and then gave a big grin.
“He’s Unca Ben, like the rice.” Kara turned to the handsome man with the twinkling chocolate eyes, broad forehead, high cheekbones, razor-sharp nose, and black flowing hair. Now there is the perfect model for me to sketch!
“Hello, Uncle Ben. It’s nice to meet you, too,” she said, holding out her hand. He was gorgeous and he wanted to take her out!
“Why don’t you just call me Ben, and I’ll call you Kara?” That deep bass voice echoed along her nerve endings, only allowing her the ability to nod. He smiled at her. “So how about it, can I take you to dinner tonight?” Kara’s face fell.
“I have plans. In fact I have plans all week.” She watched the disappointment flit across Ben’s face. “But, I’m available all day Saturday and Sunday,” Kara declared. She was gratified to see his face light up. It seemed he was as smitten as she was.
“What hotel are you staying at?” he asked.
“I’m staying at the lodge,” Kara explained.
“How’s Lacy treating you?
“She’s been wonderful! She doesn’t mind the odd hours I keep, nor the fact that I keep missing meal times. She even lets me raid the refrigerator.” Kara smiled.
“How about I take you to breakfast on Saturday? What time can I pick you up?” Ben asked.
“I’ve been getting up early, is that good for you?”
“How about six thirty, then?” he proposed.
“Perfect.”
“Unca Ben, I hafta go to the bafroom,” Alice said.
“And I have to get back to the lodge. Nate’s going to be picking me up soon,” Kara said.
“Nate Lussun? So you make glass sculpture like he does?” Ben asked.
“Yep.”
“That’s an amazing medium,” Ben enthused as he picked up his niece from the log and she snuggled into his arms. She looked tiny against the big man. Kara was suddenly aware that Ben was the size of her fathers and brothers. She hadn’t realized that when he had been kneeling behind her. Burt had been more her size. She didn’t know how she felt about possibly dating such a large man. Maybe Eric was right. Maybe she’d been shying away from men who reminded her of her family because she didn’t think they would accept her for being an artist, and wasn’t that some screwed-up logic?
“Unca Ben, I’ve really gotta go,” Alice said again. Ben grinned and said his good-byes, promising to see her on Saturday morning.
Chapter 2
The rest of the week flew by. Kara worked with Nate and showed him some of her techniques, and she was gratified with his praise. When she wasn’t working with Nate, she scratched on her sketchpad, sometimes at the tide pools. But what really caught her interest were the huge trees and the tree fungi, otherwise known as tree oysters, which grew out of the sides of the old conifers. She was fascinated by the shapes and colors and sizes of the odd growths. They would make for beautiful sculptures and glass molds. Kara found that her best inspirations always came from nature.
Finally Saturday morning rolled around. She changed clothes three times. Considering she only had jeans, T-shirts, and long-sleeved shirts to choose from, it was surprising that she could find that many outfits to obsess over. Let’s face it, she was excited. Three things stood out about Ben. He was fine, with a capital F, she loved the way he had taken care of his niece, and he had actually noticed pertinent things about what she was sketching!
She was on the steps of the lodge at six twenty, and he was leaning against a restored, sixties, black Chevy truck. She quickly jumped into the passenger seat, and he got in the driver’s seat. He handed her a sleeve of CDs and asked her to choose some music. She chose an older country artist and they headed toward the marina.
“I’m going to warn you now, I want to impress you with the best breakfast in town, but you’re going to be inundated with my family. My aunt Dot owns the restaurant, and it is Shotbrook central.” Kara gave a laugh, and Ben slid her a sideways grin. “What?” he asked.
“I come from a very small town, where everybody gathers at a small diner. It’s where all the gossip is exchanged, and I can always count on seeing family, so I understand.”
“How big is your family?” Ben asked.
“Well, it’s kind of complicated,” Kara demurred. “I have three older brothers. Two of them are here with me, but they’re camping with friends and fishing near Starrigavan Creek,” she said. “What do you do for a living?” she asked.
Claiming Kara [Fate Harbor 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Page 2
