Unexpected Love (White Oak-Mafia #2)

by Liza O'Connor

“I guess. She was very grateful.”

  He felt her body tense, then she rose and walked to the windows, staring out.

  “Sorry. I should have phrased that differently.”

  She made no reply.

  “I can’t change the cad I was back then. But I promise you, Tess, my feelings for you are very different than anything I’ve ever felt before.”

  Without responding, she ran to the closet and grabbed her gear, including a heavy rain coat.

  Chapter 12

  Tess grabbed the phone and called Rescue again. This time Kyle answered. She told him where she’d spotted smoke. “Any chance Denny’s back from dropping off Grams.”

  She waited as he contacted Denny. After what seemed an eternity, he gave her the bad news. “It’ll be a half hour or longer before we can drop water.”

  “Do the best you can,” she said and hung up, having no time to waste.

  ***

  Finally, Steel understood. She wasn’t wearing a raincoat. It was fire gear. He noticed the remaining jackets in the closet. He found one that fit, donned the hard hat, and geared up.

  They ran the whole way down the trail. He was beginning to question if she’d really seen smoke when he smelled burning leaves. As they ran around a bend in the trail, they met a wall of white. Tess ran into it and disappeared from sight.

  Steel had no choice but to follow, but before he could, he had to secure his breather and ensure the oxygen in the tank was running.

  As he entered the white cloud, he worried about Tess. Had she secured her mask? He sure as hell hadn’t seen her do so. Thus, as he slowly moved forward, his view remained on the ground, worried she’d collapsed from smoke inhalation.

  How much could one girl take? The death of her grams and a fire in her woods on the same day!

  His first glimpse of her was her boot, which thankfully was standing upright. He followed it up and found the vague hint of her form before him. As if sensing him, she reached back, gripped his arm, and pulled him beside her, her other arm stretched out, pointing to a flicker of red flames.

  She pulled him to the left, and they circled the blaze. Seconds later, they stepped out of the smoke and could see empty beer bottles spread around what looked to be a poorly made campsite, now gone rogue.

  Tess pulled out her shovel and began tossing dirt on the burning leaves. Steel retrieved his own and did the same.

  A half hour into their efforts, the roar of a helicopter pounded above. Despite him knowing it was here to help, Steel grew weak in the legs and dropped to his knees to prevent from falling. Damn it, he’d thought he was getting better at dealing with helicopters. Unable to breathe, his vision began to fade…

  He ripped the mask from his face and gasped in air. Then something slammed him flat on the ground. He first thought the helicopter had landed on him. Only he wasn’t dead…he was just wet.

  He sat up and stared at the chaos before him. Wet, recently displaced leaves…white fog…Tess throwing soil here and there.

  You’re in Iowa. The helicopter just dumped water on the fire. No one is dying.

  Steel forced himself up. After locating his shovel, he assisted Tess in burying the last of the flames. Once done, she jerked off her fire gear, slamming it into a pile.

  He removed his gear as well. He had no idea what she planned to do next, but wanted to be ready to join her. She pulled some black plastic ties from her belt and handed them to him. “Let’s find these sons of bitches.”

  He was glad he’d already dumped his fire gear because, otherwise, he could have never kept up. Honest to God, Tess had to be the fittest person in the States.

  For a moment, he questioned if she knew where she was going but then realized she followed what looked like sneaker prints on the trail.

  Now he understood why she’d handed him plastic ties. They made excellent handcuffs.

  He moved in close behind her, trusting she was the better tracker.

  They lost the tracks when they reached the marshland, but since only an idiot would leave the walkway, there was only one way to go. Unfortunately, that was up to the village site or the mounds.

  “Damn it,” he cursed when he saw five teens headed up the narrow ridge trail. A different kind of panic filled his body.

  He’d expected Tess to run faster. Instead, she stopped.

  Steel gripped her arm. “We have to catch them before they reach the village site.”

  She shook her head and faced him.

  Anyone but Tess, he would have pushed aside and continued on his own.

  “They’re drunk. If they see us and try to run away, some of them will fall off the ridge and die.”

  He remembered all the empty cans and bottles. Tess was right. Even walking up that path could be lethal for them.

  “We need to head back the way we came and go off trail. They’ll stop running once they see we aren’t following them. Then they’ll leave the trail at their first chance, which is where you believe the gardens once existed. They won’t go any farther.”

  “You can’t be certain of that!”

  “They’re drunk and exhausted. They’ll just want to sleep. They know Rescue dumped a ton of water on the fire. They know we put it out. If we turn around and give up chasing them, they’ll think they’ve gotten away. Trust me, when we find them, they’ll be sound asleep.”

  If she was wrong, they could do tremendous damage to the only village of Paleo-Indians ever discovered. But he trusted her.

  And she evidently trusted him. She passed him and headed the way they came. He wondered if she understood how hard it was for him to follow. Every instinct in his body told him to continue after the kids and stop them before they could wreck his site.

  The moment they left the marshes, she headed up the steep incline to the left. A mountain goat had nothing on Tess’s skills. Steel was trained in mountain climbing, but he still struggled to keep up with her. She had clearly traveled this path before. Her hands and feet knew exactly where to find purchase.

  After clearing yet another steep ridge, she stopped. Steel had no idea what she was fixated on, but his eyes went to unnaturally placed six-inch to eight-inch rocks hiding in the leaves.

  Tess touched his arm, and when he tore his gaze from the rocks, she placed her finger to her lips and moved forward slowly and silently.

  They came upon the sleeping bodies of four drunk teens twenty feet ahead.

  Tess pointed to him and then two of the teens while she moved to the others. She slammed her foot into the back of one pressing him to the ground. “Move, and I’ll blow your damn head off,” she warned.

  “And if she doesn’t, I will,” Steel added, stepping down on the back of his biggest problem.

  Evidently, in Iowa, that was a very potent threat. Not one of the boys resisted being handcuffed. Even drunk, they knew they didn’t want to be shot.

  Not trusting their ability to navigate the narrow trail down, Tess led them through the woods. Steel followed behind, distracted by the rocks he’d seen on the way up. There was something there. He just wasn’t sure what.

  She led them back to the marsh and called Rescue. “Thanks for the assistance. I found the fire starters. Drunk teens…four… That would be great… Are you kidding me? Well, don’t pack up and leave just yet. Let me see what I can do. These woods will need you.”

  She hung up the phone and glared at the boys, finally sobering up. “How’d you come in?” she demanded.

  Steel studied the four and identified the leader, who oddly was not the biggest. He gripped the boy’s neck. “You and I are going to take a walk,” he declared.

  He heard one of the teens ask, “Where’s that guy from?”

  “You ever hear of James Bond?”

  Tess’s response made him laugh. Evidently their punk leader heard the same because he groaned.

  Once they were out of sight of the others. “Don’t fall off. A body could disappear for weeks in these woods.”

  The kid turned and fa
ced him. “We were just having some fun.”

  “Your fun almost started a forest fire.”

  He blinked several times. “I yelled at them to put it out, but the pansies got scared and ran.”

  “Since when can’t one person put out a camp fire? It’s not that hard.”

  “A wind gust sent embers and shit all over the place. All of a sudden there were fires everywhere.”

  “And how could you have prevented that?”

  “We could have never started a fire,” he suggested.

  “That’s right. But let’s say you were stupid and did start a fire. How else could you have prevented it?”

  “I could have…built a pit with walls?”

  “That would have been better. What else?”

  “Not built it in a leafy area.”

  “So you’re saying building a campfire under trees is probably not a good idea?”

  The boy hesitantly nodded.

  “What about beer cans and bottles. Were you planning to cart those out?”

  “Yeah, sure…”

  “Bullshit.”

  “No really, we were.”

  “Then why weren’t they in a pile, or better yet in a backpack? And why would you break the bottles if you intended to pick your mess up and take it with you?” He gripped the boy by the front of his T-shirt. “Lies piss me off.”

  “All right! We were drunk and stupid, okay? I planned to take the stuff out, but those idiots started throwing them at the trees…and then the fire started…” The boy burst into tears. “I’m really sorry, man. Please don’t kill me.”

  “So tell me how you came in.”

  “By boat. It’s tied up at that tree line.” The boy tossed his head in the direction of the trees by the marsh.

  Steel stopped at the sound of a helicopter. Damn it! He needed to get the kid back before he lost his James Bond image.

  “Let’s see how your story jives with your pack.”

  He returned the boy to Tess. “I’m going to check and verify their boat is where he says.”

  ***

  Tess nodded, understanding Steel’s need to escape the sound of a helicopter. How was he going to take it when she suggested they hire the rescue team for the park?

  Rather than sending the teens up the narrow ridge trail, Tess led the boys to the area that still held six bundles of white oak lumber waiting to be used to curve the marshland trail into a loop. It made a perfect landing site for the helicopter to land. Denny, who was piloting, remained inside while Kyle hopped out, focused on one of the kids. “Jason! What the hell!”

  The kid that Steel had dubbed the leader of the group hung his head in shame.

  Kyle grabbed him by his shirt and threw him headfirst in the helicopter. The others stared at him in fear. “Get in the damn copter, morons,” he yelled. Once the last boy scampered into the helicopter without the use of their hands, Kyle approached her. His face scrunched in pain. “How much damage did they do?”

  “Minimal. Just some broken bottles. You guys saved the day with the water.”

  He breathed out. “One of those morons is my kid brother.”

  She chuckled. “I hope it was the first one because I was worried about that kid suing you for rough handling.”

  “It was. And once Dad hears about this, my handling will seem like gentle love pats.”

  Tess recalled young Steve’s punishments and frowned. “May I suggest a different solution?”

  “Sure.”

  “Bring them back tomorrow morning when they are sober, and they can spend the day picking up their broken bottles and cans. Then when they’re done, they can take their boat back home.”

  Kyle grinned. “That’s a perfect solution. Honestly, I didn’t know how I was going to tell Dad he’d lost his fishing boat in this nonsense.”

  “Tell him we’ll pull it off the water so no one takes it.”

  “You shouldn’t have to do that,” Kyle objected. “Let’s cut the boys loose and make them do it.”

  “I don’t know if you noticed, but the boys are very drunk.”

  “Then let me do it.”

  Tess was about to object the rescue squad had more important things to do, but shrugged. They probably didn’t if their boss had declared they were going to be fired.

  They arrived to find Steel cursing a blue streak at the boat. Kyle ran forward and took over trying to get the engine to tilt up and out of the water. When he couldn’t do it, he jumped into the waist deep water and felt about the prop.

  “Any chance you got a knife?” he asked Tess. Before she could bring him her knife, Steel handed him his.

  A few minutes later, with Jason being cursed every third second, the engine finally tilted up. By the amount of fishing line wrapped in the prop, the boys must have reeled in half a mile of someone’s line.

  She pondered how they’d even managed to make land.

  Steel offered Kyle a hand out of the water. Together, the two men easily pulled the boat onto land and carried it deeper into the woods.

  Kyle was red-faced angry now. Tess suspected him being soaking wet didn’t improve his state of mind. When they arrived at the helicopter, Kyle took a moment to sit on the stack of oak lumber, remove his boots, and pour brown, muddy water out of them. He then leaned into the helicopter and hit his brother with both boots before climbing in and closing the door.

  Denny was struggling not to laugh as he raised his hand and motioned her back.

  Tess turned, planning to move Steel away from the helicopter, but he was gone.

  She headed to the woods figuring that’s where he’d be waiting. To her surprise, he wasn’t there.

  She waited until the helicopter thumping disappeared. “Steel?” she called out.

  A shrill whistle from above made her smile. She climbed up the ridge and sure enough, there was her archeologist moving away leaves, exposing rocks that had clearly been stacked in long narrow rows.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Best guess, given the closeness to the fishing grounds, I’d say smoke racks.”

  She knelt down beside him. “Then the boys’ stupidity has a bright side.”

  He nodded. “The area we need secured just got extended.”

  “Just as well. Putting a fence on this decline would be deadly to install and high maintenance. Do you still want to isolate the area we need to fence in today, or would you rather I do that while you examine what you have here?”

  He sighed heavily. “My heart wants to play here, but my brain says we need to get the fence up as soon as possible. This is quickly becoming the archeological find of the decade.”

  He stood and offered his hand. “If we make it a top priority, any chance we can get it up before winter?”

  His question didn’t surprise her because, in truth, she knew they needed to protect this hill. “Let’s assess the terrain first,” she said, not wishing to confront what such a change would mean to her woods.

  Traveling was slower since Tess insisted upon marking trees and measuring the footage of fencing that would be required and making note of any impediments, such as large boulders and the need to drill through embedded stone that would make installing the fencing more time consuming.

  “I thought these hills were supposed to be all soil.”

  “No, the glaciers carried and dropped some pretty big rocks along the way. I think they were what caught and held the dust in place,” Tess said and then laughed. “From Minnesota, no doubt. First rocks, now bears.”

  It was dark before they returned home, both exhausted from a long, hard day.

  Tess headed straight for the shower. As she scrubbed herself clean, she wondered what Grams was cooking. She didn’t care. She was so hungry she’d eat Grumpy.

  Pain swept the strength from her legs, and she collapsed, hitting the bottom of the tub hard.

  Both Grams and Grumpy were gone.

  No…Grumpy was gone, but Grams was here.

  Warmth filled her heart
.

  Pounding on her bathroom door startled her.

  “Tess!”

  “I’m okay,” she yelled and pushed out of the tub. She grabbed a robe and tugged it on. Then she opened the door to a terrified Steel.

  He pulled her into his arms. “God, I heard a thump…” He pushed her away so he could study her face. “Did you fall?” he asked as he pried opened her eyes.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, not appreciating him shining a light in her eyes.

  “Checking to see if your pupils can dilate. They do, so I can rule out a concussion.”

  Next, he patted her arms, legs and torso, no doubt searching for injuries.

  “I’m fine, Steel.”

  He pressed his hand to her forehead. “What’s your doctor’s number?”

  “I don’t have one.”

  “Everyone has a doctor.”

  “I don’t get sick,” she explained.

  He led her to her bed and sat, pulling her next to him. “Can you tell me what happened to make you fall? Did you get dizzy?”

  “No. I was hungry and wondered what Grams was cooking for dinner. Then…” Tears sprouted from her eyes, and she buried her face into his chest.

  “Oh, Tess. It’ll get easier,” he promised.

  “I’m okay,” she whispered. “I haven’t lost her, but still, when I remembered I’d lost her physical presence, it made me cry.”

  “How about if I make you my one and only meal while you rest in your bed?”

  Tess nodded. “Okay.”

  “I’ll wake you when dinner is ready,” he promised and left her to sleep.

  Instead of sleeping, Tess felt a great need to handle Grams’ funeral. She called Mr. Dickens in Dubuque.

  After introducing herself, the man replied. “Tess, I’m so sorry Helen has died. I had no idea she was even sick.” His voice then lowered. “Your father called me an hour ago telling me he wanted your grandmother’s body sent to Chicago where they would have a proper funeral, and she’d be buried beside her husband.”

  “Grams hated that monster,” Tess squeaked. “And Father is not in charge of her funeral. I am. Grams wanted to be cremated, and I’m to spread her ashes in her woods.”

  “I really don’t want to get in the middle of this.” The fear in his voice was audible.