JACK MADE TRACKS TO THE guides’ cabin, where he rummaged frantically through his duffel for a pair of swimming trunks. He knew he’d packed them in the hopes of just such a scenario as this, but it seemed to take him at least five minutes to find them. Charlie paid him no heed, lying on his bunk absorbed in one of the admiral’s books. Jack could see from the pan on the stove that Charlie had opened a can of beans for supper. “You should’ve eaten with us up at the lodge,” Jack said. “It was damn good.”
He hurried back to the lodge, flannel shirt unbuttoned, jeans pulled over his swimming trunks, boots unlaced on bare feet. His heart was pounding. He had to find the champagne and have it ready before Senna arrived at the hot tub. Stupid! Should’ve done this before supper. There wouldn’t be enough time to chill it properly. He burst into the kitchen, where Gordina was cleaning up. “Gordina, you brought some of the stuff up from the plane yesterday, didn’t you?”
Gordina nodded, lips pursed as though clamping a cigarette.
“A pretty bag with handles, holding a bottle of champagne and some nice cheese. I need it. Where’d you stash it?”
Gordina’s expression became guarded. “I don’t remember a pretty bag with handles,” she said.
“It was right beside the pilot’s seat,” Jack prompted. “I didn’t see it in the plane when I unpacked this morning. You and Wavey brought some things up, where did you put them? There was a green bottle inside the bag with a pink flower painted on it.”
Gordina stared down at the pan she was scrubbing and made no response, but her entire body had gone rigid. Jack felt his own do the same. “Where’s the champagne, Gordina?” he asked bluntly.
“We didn’t know it was special,” she mumbled, not looking up.
Jack thought that if there were a moment in his life when he was going to go ballistic, this was it. “Tell me you didn’t drink my hundred-dollar bottle of champagne.”
Gordina kept her eyes down and made no response.
“I don’t believe this!” he roared. “You drank my hundred-dollar bottle of champagne?”
Gordina cringed away as he advanced. “We didn’t know.”
“Dammit all!” Jack whirled and kicked the door behind him, sending it crashing back on his hinges. “I don’t freaking believe it. That’s it. That’s it! Pack your things, you and Wavey both. Get all your gear together, you’re leaving first thing in the morning. You hear me? Where’s Wavey?”
Without waiting for an answer Jack burst out of the back door and charged toward Wavey and Gordina’s cabin. He entered without knocking, surprising Wavey, who was sitting on the edge of her bunk brushing her hair. She froze when he came into the cabin, but her initial smile of greeting faded instantly as Jack spied the green champagne bottle with the flower painted on it. He snatched it off the little table and upended it. Not a drop remained.
“Get your things together. I’m flying you and Gordina to Goose Bay first thing tomorrow,” he said, his voice remarkably calm after his initial outburst at Gordina. He turned and walked back up to the lodge, feeling weak and sick to his stomach. He climbed the porch steps one at a time with a weary, defeated tread, and came face to face with Senna. She was wrapped in a robe, bareheaded and barefoot, and looked like an angel descended from heaven in the midst of a holocaust.
“What’s wrong?” she said. “What was all that shouting about?”
Jack held up the empty bottle. “Wavey and Gordina drank our bottle of champagne,” he said. “They found it in the plane yesterday, while I was searching for you, and they drank it. Every last drop. Gone.”
Senna reached for the bottle. “My goodness,” she said softly. “You certainly picked out an expensive vintage.”
“It was for a very special occasion, a once-in-a-life-time moment. And for what it’s worth, I paid for it myself, I didn’t charge it to your account.” He slumped against a porch post and ran his fingers through his hair. “I fired both of them. I’ll fly them out of here in the morning.”
Senna’s gaze was sympathetic. “Jack, I realize you’re upset and I don’t blame you, but you can’t run this place all by yourself.”
He rallied at her words, pulling himself back together and putting a little swagger back into the moment. What the hell. A faint heart, and all that. “You’re absolutely right, but I got you, babe.”
“For another day…”
“You could call your aunt, get an extension. Tell her you got lost in Labrador and can’t seem to find your way back to Maine. Two more weeks, Senna. Just give this place two more weeks. I know we can get the lodge up and running, just the two of us, if we have to, and that will give me time to hire more help. Better help.”
She hesitated and he braced himself for the head shake and the negative words. “All right,” she said.
He stared in disbelief. “You mean you’ll stay?”
“I can’t say that I blame you for firing Gordina and Wavey, and I’m sure in two weeks time we’ll be able to find help somewhere, even if it’s just some high-school kids looking for an adventurous summer. I’ll stay. I owe you that much, Jack. Of course I’ll stay.”
SENNA WAS FLOATING IN A euphoric daze. It was a delicious sensation to be immersed chin-deep in a tub of hot water, in the middle of a big wilderness, right next to a man who was like no other man she’d ever known. She was sitting so close to him, in fact, that she could reach out and touch the rounded muscle of his shoulder with her fingertips. His skin was smooth, his shoulder as hard as iron. She was amazed at her own temerity, but smiled at the look he gave her. For once he wasn’t studying her as if she were a scientific specimen, and for once he was speechless.
“You know something, John William Hanson? I happen to think you’re pretty damn wonderful,” she said, dizzy from the wine, the heat of the water, and the cumulative exhaustion of the past two weeks. Everything conspired to make the words flow easily. “I think you’re a wonderful man, and that’s exactly why my grandfather made you his business partner, but I still don’t understand why he left his half of the business to me.”
Jack refilled her glass from the wine he’d fetched to replace the champagne and set the bottle back on the tub’s edge. “Because he wanted you to have it.”
It was nearly dark enough that she could almost see the stars, but she wasn’t searching for them. She could only look at Jack. She wondered if this was what true love felt like, this strange, scary heart-sick longing, this lonely, empty pang deep down inside that only that one person could ever fill. Was she in love with John Hanson? She’d never felt this way about Tim.
“Tell me about Tim,” Jack said suddenly, as if reading her thoughts.
Senna took another sip of wine and frowned. “He wondered why you called me sweetings.”
“I call all my girls sweetings when I summons them to supper.”
“Liar.”
“He left a message for you at the lake house,” Jack said.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It didn’t seem all that important. He just wanted you to call him when you got a chance. He was worried about you.”
Senna eased her sore muscles in the soothing water, leaned back and closed her eyes.
“Are you in love with him?”
Jack’s abrupt question put a damper on Senna’s floating euphoria. She opened her eyes, sat up straight, and drew a deep breath. “Tim’s a very dear friend. He’s only trying to help me settle my grandfather’s estate.”
“Who’s this buyer he found?”
“You were eavesdropping on my phone conversation?”
“Damn straight.”
“He’s found a potential buyer,” Senna said. “His name is Earl Hammel and he wants to stay here when he comes to look at the place, so I told Tim our first vacancy wasn’t until the beginning of September. If he wants to come sooner, he’ll have to stay in Goose Bay.”
“And I’m supposed to ferry him back and forth on your behalf?” Jack prodded.
Senna felt a
wild tumble of emotions assail her. “I can’t see bumping a paying guest just because someone wants a tour of the property,” she said.
“No, that would hurt occupancy, hurt the numbers, hurt the bottom line.” His voice had become flinty and Senna wished she could steer the conversation away from selling the lodge.
“That’s right, and I’m not anxious to do that. If he wants to come when we’re fully booked, he’ll just have to stay elsewhere. He can hire Thunder Air to fly him back and forth. I’m sorry I volunteered you. Tim says that Mr. Hammel wants to buy the lodge for his own personal use, and I made him aware that you don’t want to sell your share of the business.” There, that should calm him.
“And he still wants to come? Does he think he can talk me into selling my half? And by the way, if you don’t mind my asking, what’s the price you’re asking for your grandfather’s dream? Or were you planning to withhold that information from me, as well?”
She heard the caustic barb in his words and winced inwardly. “I haven’t named a price. I wanted to talk to you first.”
“That’s mighty white of you, pard. When were you going to do that?”
Senna sat up so abruptly that water sloshed out of the hot tub and onto the deck. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about this right away. I know I should have, but I…” Suddenly she felt as if she’d hit a brick wall. She slumped back, overcome by a wave of dizziness so strong she was afraid she was about to pass out. Lights flashed and stars exploded. She felt Jack take the wineglass from her hand. “I started to tell you, but I just…” she began again, trying to gather the threads of what she wanted to say, but the words she wanted so desperately to speak aloud whirled silently inside her head, a mish-mash of scrambled gibberish.
“It doesn’t matter,” she heard him say as he rose to his feet. “I was sure you’d fall in the love with the place and change your mind about selling, but I was wrong.”
She wanted to tell him that he wasn’t wrong, he was right, that she had fallen in love with the place but even more than that, she’d fallen in love with him. She wanted to tell him, but she could only lean helplessly against him as he lifted her out of the tub, wrapped her in the robe she’d worn over her bathing suit and carried her as if she weighed no more than a child. She curled her arms around his neck, rested her head against his chest and heaved a tormented sigh. She was very tired, no doubt moderately drunk, incredibly confused, and oh, so grateful that he was taking care of her.
Tomorrow. She would tell him how she felt about him first thing in the morning….
CHAPTER TWELVE
AT 6:00 A.M. SENNA WOKE with a start, unsure of where she was. For a moment she thought she was in Jack’s cabin, lying in his bunk, but then she realized she was in her own room at the lodge, with Chilkat curled at the foot of her bed, and disappointment washed over her. She vowed that the next time she and Jack treated themselves to long soak in the hot tub, there would be no talk of work or of selling the lodge, and with any luck she wouldn’t pass out from a potent combination of hot water, wine and exhaustion.
The next time?
Senna sat up, not surprised by the dull headache at her temples, but very surprised to see a mug of coffee on her bedside table, holding down a note in Jack’s unruly scrawl. “Left for Goose Bay with G. and W. at five o’clock. Should be back by nine or ten. Enjoy a lazy morning all to yourself. Charlie’s at the cabin if you need anything. Jack.”
She threw back the coverlet and swung her legs over the edge of the bed. Lazy morning? Was he out of his mind? Now that there were only the three of them, there would be even less time to sleep. Three of them to open up a lodge at full capacity in just one more day. Twelve guests to cook for, clean up after, entertain and guide. Impossible! Even more impossible was the idea of enjoying a lazy morning.
Her mind raced as she dressed. Without Wavey or Gordina, she would have to revise the menu plan. She’d set up the meals buffet style on the sideboard, and the guests could help themselves. Daily room service would be minimal and would include fresh towels and making up the bed. Forget turn-down service in the evening and chocolates on the pillows. She’d barely be able to keep up with the cooking and cleaning. Maybe she could teach Charlie to do the laundry? Senna stifled a laugh at the thought. If Charlie could just keep the woodbox filled and help Jack with the guiding, he’d be doing all right.
Chilkat raised his head, regarded her steadily for a moment, then yawned hugely and flopped back onto his side. “Yeah, me too,” Senna agreed, “but unfortunately I’m not a dog. I just work like one.” She was still sore, but the long soak in the hot tub had helped enormously. Oh, if only the night had ended differently. If only she’d said what she wanted to say to Jack instead of mumbling incoherently. If only she hadn’t been so exhausted, hadn’t drunk that third glass of wine.
If only…
She pulled on a pair of jeans, clean wool socks, a T-shirt for when the day warmed up and a thick fleece pullover to thwart the early-morning chill. She tasted the coffee from the mug Jack had set beside her bed. Still vaguely warm. Bless him. Bless his enduring strength, his sense of humor, and his patience with her.
In the kitchen she reheated the coffee and poured herself another cup, sitting down at the work station to make out the list of things to do. She still had to create and print up a mission statement to put into each guest room, a welcoming and informative one-page introduction to the lodge, including some rules regarding the fishing. Jack strongly believed that catch-and-release fishing was paramount, and the guests should be limited to one kill a week, a philosophy that Senna shared. The Wolf was an Atlantic salmon river, and the wild salmon fishery was in jeopardy. According to the lodge’s rules, no salmon at all could be kept, only brook trout and pike.
Senna also wanted to give each of the guest rooms the name of a popular salmon fly to distinguish between them. She took a swallow of hot coffee and frowned. Forget all the frills for now. Rework the menu with a slant toward the sideboard buffet. Streamline the laundry. Get everything ready from the housekeeping perspective. Six guest rooms a day would take her about three hours to clean properly, prepping for and preparing three meals would take another five or six. The lodge itself, the grounds and gardens, doing the laundry, socializing with the guests…there would be little time for a luxury like sleep for the next two weeks, but in spite of the prospect of more grueling work, Senna was excited and glad she was staying.
Start-ups were hell, but they were the best kind of hell when the shake-down run went smoothly from the guest’s perspective, even if the back of the house was involved in multiple crises. There was soul-deep satisfaction in pulling it all together and having the guest say, upon departure, “We had a wonderful time! Couldn’t have been better. See you next year.”
That’s what she was hoping for.
Only time would tell what she and Jack would achieve in the next two weeks. Meanwhile, she’d move out of the main lodge and into the cabin Gordina and Wavey had vacated, clean the room she’d been staying in, and put the finishing touches on all the guest rooms and public areas. Then she had to start prepping the food. Jack would be picking the first guests up tomorrow afternoon. She could do a lot of baking today. Sweets, mostly. Cookies and brownies. Get the sourdough starter working for the breads and pancakes. One of the guests was a diabetic with special dietary needs.
But the very first thing on the agenda was to call her aunt and tell her she wouldn’t be back for another two weeks, something she wasn’t looking forward to doing. The inn was in its busy season. Being short-staffed in the sales department would create a hardship for everyone else. But they’d get along. It was only for two more weeks. She took another sip of coffee and gazed down at the wild, lonely river tumbling over the rapids before dropping down into the pool in front of the lodge and felt a pang deep inside at the beauty of this place…and an even deeper pang at the thought of leaving it.
JACK WAS NOT HAVING a good morning. Gordina and Wavey defin
itely had something to do with it, making him feel like the lowest creature in the universe when he deposited them back in Goose Bay. “I’ll drive you home in Goody’s car,” he said to Gordina.
“I’ll walk. It ain’t far and I don’t want to put you out any. I suppose me and my poor sick sister will starve now, with you to thank,” Gordina said, starting up the dock with her little suitcase in hand. She stopped for one last parting shot over her shoulder. “And all because we drank a bit of your bubbly, as if we didn’t deserve it after all the work you made us do!”
“No, Gordina, that’s not the entire reason, although you drank all of the bubbly, not just a bit of it, and it cost me dear. The real reason is because you stole that bottle of champagne and then you lied about it. I’m sorry it didn’t work out, and I’m sorry if you and your sister starve, but what you did was wrong.”
Gordina dropped her suitcase, pulled a pack of cigarettes out of her coat pocket, and lit up. Her eyes glittered through the blue smoke. “The hell with you, mister,” she said, then picked up her suitcase and stalked off.
Wavey was weeping quietly and had been all morning. “I don’t know what I’ll do, with Goody gone and no job,” she said, clinging to his arm as he walked her up the dock to the gravel path that led to Goody’s house. “Me, all alone in that house.”
“You’ll figure something out,” Jack said. “You can always go stay with Granville if you get too lonely. He’s your grandfather. He’ll take you in.”
“What’ll I tell Goody when she asks why I left the lodge?”
“Tell her the truth,” Jack said, unlocking the door and handing Wavey the key, setting her suitcase just inside. He left immediately, ignoring Wavey’s pleas for him to stay for a cup of tea, at least, and instead nabbing Goody’s car for one last ride to the hospital to check on George Pilgrim.
George had been moved to a ward and was looking less than enchanted with hospital life. He was sitting up in bed and staring blankly at the television mounted high on the wall when Jack arrived. “Good to see you, bye,” he said, his face brightening. “Have you ever seen the likes of what comes out of that box?” he said, indicating the television. “No wonder the world’s gone crazy. If I watched for another day or two, I’d go crazy myself. Never seen such sorry, shameful trash.”
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