Plain Jane & The Hotshot

by Meagan Mckinney

  Jo tried to return to fishing. But when her pole suddenly jerked with a hooked fish, she was caught off balance. She fell into the knee-deep icy water, her line almost towing her across the pool.

  Her cry of surprise and dismay triggered more laughter.

  But Nick wasn’t laughing. Instead, he was at her side, pulling her to her feet.

  Wet from the collar down, bone-cold from the glacial stream, she could barely utter a thanks between her chattering teeth.

  He met her gaze, his arm like a post, steadying her.

  “Men like me have their place in this world. You’d do well to remember it,” he said for her ears only.

  “I don’t need a rescuer,” she insisted breathlessly.

  He dropped his hold on her, and she wished he hadn’t. On her own in the shallow rock-bottom pool, she realized how unsteady she was.

  “This’d be yours, I think,” he said, holding out the huge trout on her fishing line.

  Wet, speechless, chagrined, she took the trout.

  His gaze flicked downward to her water-plastered red flannel shirt.

  She didn’t need to look herself. She could feel how cold and hard her nipples were. At the rate she was revealing herself to him, she’d be naked by their next meeting.

  “Yeah, maybe you’re right,” he said, his tone pensive and bitter. “Maybe I’m the one who needs rescuing.” He sounded as if he was admitting to some kind of deep, forlorn ache.

  He left her standing alone in the pool. But as he ordered his men to hit the trail again, a slyly smiling Hazel piped up.

  “Say, boys! Since the fires have sent us this bounty of fish, why don’t you stop by our camp this evening for a fish bake before you go on duty?”

  “We’ve got far more than we can eat,” Kayla added. “Shame to waste it, guys.”

  “That’s certainly gracious of you ladies,” Nick agreed. “Gives us a break from freeze-dried food. Thank you. We’ll be there.”

  He and Jo pointedly avoided looking at each other—a fact that made Hazel’s smile stretch even wider.

  She hadn’t come up here expecting to make another match. But then again, thought the matriarch, the essence of “luck” was merely the readiness to seize a good opportunity.

  Nick Kramer and Joanna Lofton were getting along like a cobra and a mongoose. So far.

  But nothing made Hazel more hopeful than seeing a young couple with deep wells of inner feeling—she had heard it just now, unmistakably, in both their voices.

  Either it would all blow up in Hazel’s face, or she would secure one more marriage and another fine family for Mystery’s dwindling population.

  No middle ground here, she predicted, watching Jo gather up her catch, still frowning.

  They’d either become passionate lovers or mortal enemies.

  Just which outcome, however, was still too hard to call.

  Five

  “There’s nothing to it,” Dottie McGratten called out. “You lop off the head, lop off the tail, then just split and scoop. Shouldn’t take you more than thirty seconds.”

  Jo, Bonnie and Kayla were all cleaning fish on tree stumps, getting a quick lesson from Dottie. Kayla covered her eyes as Dottie scooped out the insides of her demonstration trout.

  “That is so gross!” Kayla protested. “What’s next, we watch sausage being made?”

  Hazel, busy building a fire in the outside grill, laughed at Kayla’s squeamishness.

  “Good lands, city slicker! You think fish filet themselves? If you think this is gross, what if you were starving and had to butcher a cow?”

  “I’d buy a frozen entrée,” Kayla flung back, for by now she had evidently decided that Hazel was picking on her.

  “Better get to it,” Stella urged Kayla. “You want our guests to go hungry? Won’t be long, there’ll be a dozen hungry firefighters descending on this place.”

  “Yes,” Bonnie chimed in, “I’ll bet their ‘appetites’ are strong, all right.”

  “All you youngsters be careful around those guys,” Hazel warned. “They’re fine young men, I don’t doubt, but they all suffer from the Hawaiian Disease.”

  Jo frowned. “What’s Hawaiian Disease?”

  “Lackanooky,” Hazel replied, deadpan.

  Young and old, Kayla included, all six women burst out laughing.

  For a few moments, as they shared the simple pleasure of a silly joke, Jo again felt buoyed. Her misgivings about coming to the Bitterroot country receded, and she was glad she had accepted Hazel’s invitation.

  True, it wasn’t even four in the afternoon, and she felt bone-weary from their hike. However, it was a good, satisfying kind of weary. Tonight she would enjoy the deep sleep that exertion demanded. It was nice to fall asleep quickly without memories of Ned Wilson playing over and over in her mind like a videotape she couldn’t turn off.

  “Seriously,” Hazel qualified, crumbling bark to kindle her fire, “we dames of the ancient regime don’t mind providing you hot little numbers with some male recreation. Not to be confused with pro- creation.”

  “Besides,” Dottie put in, “we like ogling the hunks, too. Old women still think like young ones.”

  “But this is not a cruise,” Hazel warned. “It’s the Mountain Gals Rendezvous. Mainly you came up here to work on your confidence, not to expand your sex life.”

  Expand, Jo thought wryly. That implies I have one in the first place. Right now my cup runneth under.

  Despite her motherly warning, however, Hazel aimed a sly glance at Jo—or so it appeared to Jo.

  “On the other hand,” Hazel tacked on, “romance can bloom anywhere, even in the wild. In that case, go with the flow.”

  If she thinks Nick Kramer cares about romance, Jo thought, then Hazel definitely had a blind spot where male motives were involved. Maybe because the widow never got back into the romance game after her husband was killed in a car accident.

  Perhaps Hazel had simply forgotten, or never really learned, about predatory men like Ned Wilson. Nick Kramer, too, had “babe bagger” stamped all over his handsome, smoldering features. And she had no plans to end up as one more trophy on his crowded shelf.

  Jo had no problem with men exuding confidence, even a little aggression at times. But Nick’s manner struck her as threatening. Maybe guys who put out fires for a living sometimes believed they were therefore experts at starting them, too. No doubt he’d had plenty of practice at kindling heat.

  For a moment, without her conscious permission, the screen of her mind flashed torrid images of Nick and her, and heat stirred in her loins.

  “…you don’t cook it in the open flames,” Hazel was explaining when Jo refocussed. “No flames, you bake it on the coals, wrapped in a layer of green leaves.”

  “Squeeze some wild onion juice on it first,” Stella advised. “They grow all around this area.”

  While Dottie finished her demonstration, Stella went into the older women’s cabin. She emerged moments later flourishing a few bottles of white Zinfandel wine.

  “Rustic doesn’t mean barbaric,” she announced. “These will be chilling nearby in the brook.”

  Jo, drifting in and out of her own thoughts, finished cleaning her pile of fish, finding the task unpleasant but hardly the ordeal Kayla made it out to be. As she wrapped the trout in leaves and carried them to Hazel, she couldn’t shake the memory of her earlier encounter with Nick down at the river.

  Maybe you should see a shrink to deal with this man-hating thing of yours.

  At the memory of his taunt, anger knotted her insides. Not only was he in love with himself, he obviously liked playing the expert in female psychology.

  “Something biting at you, hon?” Hazel inquired innocently as Jo deposited her catch near the crackling fire.

  Jo glanced into Hazel’s Prussian-blue eyes. Despite the woman’s grandmotherly chignon and petite frame, however, Jo was not fooled. This old gal could follow you into a revolving door and come out ahead.

  “Nothi
ng biting but flies,” Jo fibbed.

  But in truth, anticipation of Nick Kramer’s arrival made her feel as if she was descending too fast on a long elevator ride. He was putting the moves on her, no question, and the physical hunger within her was sharpened, for he was undeniably attractive. At an animal level.

  The same hunger she had felt when Professor Ned Wilson first stroked her arm during a conference in his office.

  The same, she repeated mentally. This isn’t just déjà vu. You’re in danger of splitting on the same hard rock you hit before. Mess around with this smoke jumper and you will get burned.

  She could not prove he was just a moral copy of Ned. But her every instinct told her both of them were born to take their pleasure, then cut and run.

  She knew women who felt and acted that way, too, and she didn’t condemn such an attitude when both partners were up-front about it. But better loneliness, she decided, than to repeat the laceration of her heart, the long, agonizing nights of tears and despair, the numbing sense of betrayal and worthlessness.

  “Pardon me?” Jo said, for Hazel had just said something to her.

  “I said if you looked any lower, you’d be walking on your bottom lip. You were having fun a few minutes ago. S’matter? Thinking about that sleazebag professor again?”

  “It’s that obvious, huh?”

  “Plain as bedbugs on a clean sheet. Look, just forget that jerk. And be dang glad you are not his wife. She’s the real victim of his philandering. And so are his kids.”

  Jo nodded, swiping some loose strands of hair from her eyes. She managed a genuine smile. “You’re right.”

  “I usually am,” Hazel observed drolly. “How could I be so smart and so damn good-looking? The total package, babycakes.”

  The two women laughed. Just then, however, Dottie called, “Here comes the invasion!”

  Jo glanced across the camp clearing and felt her pulse quicken when she spotted Nick Kramer.

  “All those fish crowding the river today,” Dottie remarked to Nick. “Is that a bad sign as to the fire danger?”

  Nick, like Jo, had finished eating. The two of them sat in the grass cross-legged, not exactly together but uncomfortably close, in Jo’s opinion, sipping wine from paper cups.

  “Right now,” Nick replied to Dottie’s question, “all area fires are reported under control if not fully contained. But so far the conditions haven’t improved as we thought they would. I’m not predicting any trouble for Crying Horse Canyon. Things could get a little hairy around here, though, if we get airborne sparks.”

  Jo had noticed how all the other firefighters acted as if Nick had dibs on her. They had formed little groups around all of them, with Kayla the biggest draw of all.

  But Kayla only toyed with her admirers, flitting from male to male like a bee sampling different nectars, her eyes ever fixed on Nick. Jo steeled herself when Kayla, making a show of brushing leaves off the taut seat of her blue jeans, crossed to join her and Nick.

  “Jo’s momma was Miss Montana, you know that, Nick?” Kayla greeted them.

  Her tone, Jo thought, was saying, Can you believe that? How could a kennel-registered breed produce such a common mutt?

  “Well, then, the odds are good her mother’s not a blonde,” Nick said, not a hint of malice in his tone.

  “Huh?” Kayla, thrown off her game, was suddenly wary.

  Nick shrugged, looking at Jo and not Kayla. “What I mean is, society gives blondes all the publicity, they have more fun, all that. But I’ve read that it’s brunettes who actually win most beauty pageants.”

  “All right. They might win the pageants, but we have all the fun,” Kayla conceded, fluffing her hair.

  Nick laughed. “Just the facts, ma’am, just the facts.”

  “How ’bout you?” Kayla pressed the issue. “Personal preference, I mean. Blondes or brunettes?”

  “Definitely brunettes,” he replied, which left Kayla deflated but not defeated.

  It startled Jo, too.

  She had steeled herself for more unfair comparisons with her mother. But Nick’s surprise comment had thrown Kayla over a fence.

  It doesn’t mean Nick’s taking my side, Jo mused. He’s just getting a dig in at Kayla. He didn’t seem nearly as captivated by her as some of his crew did. Maybe I’ve sold him a little short.

  Unless, warned a cautious, protective inner voice, he’s simply an accomplished master at seduction. Perhaps he’s like a stalking lion, crafty by instinct. Perhaps he’s learned that playing hard to get works with some women and he’s just using you to ignite Kayla. After all, Kayla appeared unfazed by his ungallant remarks just now. In fact, she seemed all the more determined.

  Kayla was on the verge of trying another tack when Hazel, observant as a circling hawk, joined them.

  “Kayla, dear, you’re ignoring our other guests,” the cattle queen said diplomatically. “After all, you’re one of the main reasons they’re here. And who could blame them, you little Texas bombshell? Now don’t disappoint your admirers. Mingle, mingle, disperse your considerable charms so all may enjoy.”

  Hazel’s blandishments worked. Kayla smiled at the flattery and left, and Hazel turned to the taciturn couple.

  “There’s one more bottle of wine cooling in the brook. Would you mind going to fetch it, Jo?”

  “I’ll go, Hazel,” Nick said quickly, rising lithely to his feet.

  “No, you’re our guest,” Jo said. “I’ll go.”

  He extended a hand to help her up.

  Jo knew Hazel watched them, her eyes narrowing with pleasure.

  A tactful refusal was needed, but Jo couldn’t think of one. So she took his hand, marveling at his easy strength as he tugged her effortlessly up.

  “It’s in that little clutch of boulders right past the pump,” Hazel added. “Same place you go to get the drinking water, Jo.”

  Jo could’ve sworn that a look passed between Hazel and Nick, and that a smile flitted over his lips but didn’t quite land.

  Don’t be ridiculous, she chided herself as Nick adjusted his long-legged pace to hers along the looping, descending path. Even if Hazel was playing Cupid, she certainly wasn’t conspiring with Nick. How could she be? But the delusion was understandable viewed through the lens of Ned Wilson’s dishonesty and the damage it caused her.

  “Like it up here?” Nick asked, his tone friendly and easy.

  “It’s beautiful here. I don’t even mind all the work,” Jo replied matter-of-factly.

  He seemed determined, however, to regain her favor after their little altercation earlier.

  “Hazel mentioned yesterday that you’re a teacher,” he ventured. “What subject?”

  “Music,” she answered hesitantly. She feigned great interest in the aspens and spruces, hazed in the spun gold of the westering sun.

  “What instruments do you play?”

  “Piano and guitar.” She peeked at him. He seemed genuinely interested and sincere, which downright terrified her. A smug, narcissistic jerk she could toss on his rear. A downright nice guy might actually get under her skin and really hurt her. “I especially like the guitar. Mostly classical and flamenco.”

  “I don’t have a musical bone in my body,” he confessed as they crossed the stone footbridge. “I don’t even sing in the shower. But I’ve heard the guitar is the easiest instrument in the world to play badly, the hardest in the world to play well.”

  He was right, and this unexpected comment surprised and impressed her. But instead of warming up to him, she felt a quick flood of caution. There might be no limits to the sheer depths of his smoothness. She really had to be careful. He could be one of those guys who had a remark to suit every taste, as if memorized from flash cards. Until she knew better, she would do well to suspect he was up to something. The handsome spider might just be reeling in his fly…and frankly, if she hadn’t still been feeling the wounds from Ned, maybe she’d even let herself be reeled in. No doubt Nick Kramer took great care to please a w
oman in bed.

  “Here, I’ll get it,” he offered when she started to clamber down the steep bank of the bubbling brook. The wine bottle was visible from above, neck protruding fron an encirclement of half-submerged rocks.

  She opened her mouth to demur, but in moments the lithe, agile smoke jumper had grabbed the bottle and climbed back up again. She couldn’t help noticing the swelling of muscles in his back and shoulders as he bent down to grasp the bottle.

  “Candy’s dandy, but liquor’s quicker,” he quipped as he handed her the wine.

  He’d used his contracted version of the old Ogden Nash quote quite harmlessly, she realized later when she recalled her walk with him. But at the moment, in her defensive mood, something about it and Nick’s tone as he delivered it again reminded her of Ned.

  She gave him a wary stare.

  “Don’t tell me I just grew horns again,” he groaned. “I’ve seen wild fillies less skittish than you.”

  “I’m not some filly for you to corral,” she returned.

  His eyes darkened with anger. “You take one look at a guy,” he snapped, “and you know everything about him, right? Well, guess what—you don’t know jack.”

  “So what do you think I am?” she lashed back. “A Forest Service camp follower? A smoke-jumper groupie? Just because I’m here doesn’t mean you have to hit on me. Or that I have to succumb.”

  “Hit on…?” His handsome features tightened. “For God’s sake,” he said disgustedly. “Are you a ball-breaker by nature, or is it just me you despise?”

  It wasn’t his words that suddenly intensified her anger like flames in a gust—it was his tone. In fact, he had a real knack for using his tone with the subtle force of raised eyebrows. A trait, unfortunately, that instantly reminded her yet again of Ned Wilson.

  Ned, too, had a dry, subtle sense of humor—and absolutely no sense of honor. It wasn’t fair to tar Nick with the same brush, but she couldn’t help wondering—did Nick also share Ned’s talent for deceit?

  She eyed him with cool distaste.

  “It’s just you I despise,” she flung back at him, forgetting to lower her voice as they approached the summit campground.