by Bella Riley
He got the picture. She wanted to get rid of him for a little while. And the truth was, he needed a break from her smile, from her fresh, sweet scent, from the way soft, silky pieces of hair had escaped her ponytail and were brushing against her chin.
Despite needing to remain on guard with her, he couldn’t deny that she was very good at her job.
“Thank you, Rebecca. You’ve taught me a lot today.”
Instead of accepting his compliment, she frowned. “Something tells me you already knew how to clean a toilet.” She bit her lip. “The truth is, I might have been a little bit upset with you earlier today. I shouldn’t have wasted so much of your time with cleaning the rooms.”
“I appreciate you telling me that, but you didn’t waste a single second of my time. I need to learn this inn from the ground up and that’s what you were showing me. Most people wouldn’t have the guts to hand me rubber gloves and a scrubber.”
She cleared their plates from the table and put them in the commercial dishwasher. “Let me know if you need anything else today. Otherwise, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
He was looking forward to it far more than he should.
Fortunately, the one person guaranteed to help remind him to stay far, far away from the temptation that Rebecca presented was likely waiting for his report on Stu’s whereabouts.
No doubt, dealing with his mother would be a fitting punishment for those few moments when he’d foolishly let himself enjoy being with Rebecca.
Chapter Seven
Rebecca had been too close to Sean for too many hours. There shouldn’t have been anything exciting about bumping into each other as they made beds and vacuumed floors, but evidently even doing completely mundane tasks with him got her heart moving too fast.
She still couldn’t believe how good he’d been about doing whatever she had tasked him with. He hadn’t once acted too important for bathrooms or dusting. Even Stu had always complained about doing the cleaning on days when they were short staffed. But Sean had simply gotten to work and done a heck of a job. Maybe even a better job than she’d done, given how distracted she’d been by his nearness.
Okay, so she felt like a big coward for running, but how could she have stayed another second more without being able to take a full breath? She needed to clear her head. No, more than that, she needed to get it screwed back on straight.
Because the craziest thing of all was not so much that she could feel herself falling under his spell… but that moment in the guest room when he’d seemed just as captivated by her. As if he was surprised by his feelings, but couldn’t help feeling them anyway.
Nearly at the front desk, Rebecca caught sight of herself in a hall mirror. Her eyes were bright, her cheeks were flushed, and her normally well-groomed hair looked like she’d been driving in a convertible with the top down all afternoon.
She must be crazy to think Sean was attracted to her, she thought as she pulled out her hair band and tried to quickly finger comb her hair back into some semblance of order. She didn’t have to see pictures of the women he dated to guess his type. Polished. Highly educated. Perfect.
Not that it mattered. Because even if he was attracted to her, even if Stu’s disappearance wasn’t hanging awkwardly between them, she still wouldn’t go near him with a ten-foot pole.
She knew darn well what her old MO would have been. Just like Andi had said, Sean’s mysteriousness, the hints of darkness she saw in his eyes, along with fact that he was drop-dead gorgeous, would have had her giving herself over to him, like a modern-day beauty to the beast, turning herself inside out to win his love.
To save him.
Only, all the while, she’d end up losing herself more and more. Until the day he’d decide he was done with her.
Rebecca knew all about losing, about trying to rebuild herself back up into something whole again. Hadn’t she already learned her lesson, darn it? Looking back into her relationship file told a clear-cut story. One darkly handsome, dangerously mysterious man after another. Stu had been the only deviation to the picture-perfect pattern, but that was simply because she’d been trying to swing as far as she could in the opposite direction.
She couldn’t fall into the old trap again, couldn’t repeat the same cycle she knew by heart.
Especially not when one Murphy brother had already left her in the lurch.
No question about it, the next time she fell in love, it was going to be with a man who didn’t fall into either of those categories and was neither too sweet nor too mysterious. For once in her life, she was going to be strong and smart rather than letting her contrary heart lead the way.
Because, unfortunately, her heart hadn’t been right one single time.
“Sorry I’ve been gone all day, Alice,” she said as she approached the check-in desk.
“Don’t worry about it,” the young woman said with a smile. “Hey, did you do something to your hair? Or are you wearing different makeup?”
Rebecca stopped dead in her tracks a couple of feet from the desk. “No.” She dreaded having to ask but she said, “Why?”
Alice shrugged. “You just look so pretty today, that’s all.”
Rebecca knew the right thing to do was to say thank you. But she was terrified that Alice would put two and two together and realize what—who—was responsible for her flushed cheeks.
God, she could only imagine the gossip in town if people thought she was drooling over her ex-fiancé’s older brother.
“You know what? We’re pretty low on fire logs. If you don’t need me for anything else, I’ll head out and grab some before you go for the day.”
“It’s really cold out there today,” Alice said, “and we probably have enough logs to last the next couple of days.”
But Rebecca was already shoving her arms through the warmest down coat she had in the back office. After putting on her snow boots and grabbing her bag, she headed outside.
The crisp, cold air shocked the breath out of her for a moment. But instead of turning around and heading back into the warmth of the inn, she was glad for the way the cold woke her up. She couldn’t daydream about impossible happily-ever-afters in this kind of weather.
Crunching carefully through yesterday’s snow, she was just turning around the corner of the inn when she looked up and saw the most breathtakingly beautiful sight.
The sun was just starting to set over the snow-dusted lake, a dozen spectacular colors radiated down from the sky to the icy treetops on the mountains that surrounded Emerald Lake.
For all that she longed to see the seven wonders and smell the salty scent of the ocean as it crashed on coasts all over the world, Rebecca was home. Emerald Lake would always be the place her heart longed to come back to, a haven for her soul, for her dreams.
Sean being here, Stu being gone, didn’t change that. This small town, her friends, her career as innkeeper, they were all part of her new life.
One day she’d find the missing pieces: a husband who loved her as much as she loved him, and children to cuddle and play with and love the way that her parents loved her.
All would be well, she told herself as she started stacking wood in the small red wagon she kept by the pile.
Fortunately, she knew her own heart and mind this time. And she knew better than to go in and try and save Sean. Even though it went against every part of who she actually was, even if it ended up being the hardest thing she’d ever done, she was going to remain completely logical where Sean was concerned.
And for once, she was going to save her emotions for a man who was capable of returning them.
Besides, between running the inn and the festival, she had so much on her plate she couldn’t possibly waste any time mooning over some guy. Lord knew, over the years, she’d put more than enough energy into men who were incapable of ever loving her.
Expecting his mother to be home and his father to be off working one of his contracting jobs, Sean was surprised to find his father at the house, lifting a h
eavy sander out of his truck.
“I’ve got the other side, Dad.”
Neither of them said anything more until they’d carried the sander into the house and up the stairs to his parent’s bedroom. Most of the furniture was out of the room. Only the bed frame and mattresses were propped up against the wall.
After they put the sander down, his father said, “I could use an extra hand with the bed, too, if you don’t mind.”
When Sean was a kid, he and Stu had loved to play hide-and-seek in the huge king sleigh bed. His father had made the head-and footboards out of a birch tree he’d cut down himself. Growing up, Sean had thought his father was the biggest, strongest man in the world.
Taking in his father’s gray hair and slightly gnarled knuckles, he wondered when that had changed. He hadn’t spent much time with his father since leaving for college and suddenly he realized it was one of the things he regretted most.
“I’m happy to help,” Sean told his father.
Moving the heavy frame was definitely a two-man job. No question about it, Sean thought as his muscles complained at the weight, he definitely had spent too much time behind a computer these past years.
As a boy growing up on Emerald Lake, he’d spent most of his time outside. Boston had plenty of nice spots, but nothing compared to his hometown.
“Couldn’t have done that without you,” his father said when they’d completely cleared out the room. “I’ve been meaning to refinish these floors for a long time. Figured since work was a little slow this year, it would give me a chance to finally get your mother off my back. You know how she’s been wanting me to redo these floors since you were in high school.”
Sean was about to suggest they head down to the kitchen to discuss Stu’s possible whereabouts when Sean’s mother called up the stairs.
“Sean? Bill? Are either of you up there?”
Sean thought he saw his father’s shoulders tense and his mouth tighten at the corners.
That made two of them.
Elizabeth was standing in front of them before either man could reply. “Oh good, I’m glad you’re here, honey,” she said to him, and then to his father, “I hope you didn’t scratch any of the walls getting that bed frame out.”
“We were careful, Elizabeth,” Bill replied in a flat, borderline irritated voice.
Odd. Sean had never heard his father actually respond to his mother like that. He’d always just silently taken her jabs before.
What the hell was going on here?
First Stu had disappeared. And now his father was practically standing up to his mother. If Sean added in the way Rebecca kept getting under his skin, it was starting to feel like the earth was shifting on its axis.
His mother raised her eyebrows at Bill’s curt reply before saying, “These floors have certainly waited long enough to be fixed up, haven’t they, Sean?”
She’d asked him the question in a light voice with a smile, but Sean could feel the tension between his mother and father from where he was standing. Besides, didn’t she know he had always been able to see past the smile and hear past the lightness?
“I’m sure they’re going to look great,” was his only possible response.
She reached out and put a hand on his arm. “When I saw your car, I was hoping you were here to tell us that you’ve heard from Stu.”
Regardless of how he felt about his mother, the hopefulness in her eyes was difficult to see. Especially when he didn’t have any good news for her.
“He did send me a letter. Similar to the one he left you.” He ran a hand through his hair, using the movement as an excuse to shift away from his mother’s touch. “Unfortunately, he didn’t say where he was going or for how long.”
Elizabeth’s face fell. “How could he just leave us all like that? It isn’t like Stu to do something like that.”
Not having an answer for his clearly distraught mother, Sean continued to relay the information he did have. “I’ve spoken with several of Stu’s friends and none of them have heard from him.”
“I can’t help but think that none of this would have happened if Rebecca hadn’t come here. She’s very sweet, but obviously things weren’t good between her and Stu. Perhaps that’s why he felt like he had to leave.”
An instinctive urge to defend Rebecca rose up inside Sean. But before he could say a word, his normally mild-mannered, quiet father said, “That’s ridiculous, Elizabeth. He adored Rebecca. Just like the rest of us do.”
“Ridiculous? Adored?” His mother’s color was high. “He was fine before they got engaged. Everything was just fine.”
“No,” his father said, “everything was not just fine. Instead of blaming Rebecca for hurting your son, you need to open your eyes and give her credit for single-handedly holding things together at the inn.”
Blinking rapidly in surprise, Elizabeth finally turned to Sean for support. “Now that you’re here, you can take over the inn for a while, can’t you, honey?”
“I spent the morning working with her and can tell you firsthand that Rebecca is an excellent innkeeper. I have no intention of taking over for her.”
Deciding to end the conversation—the whole poorly thought out visit, actually—Sean turned to head for the stairs. His father followed him, putting a hand on his arm before he could walk away.
“Thanks for the help, Sean. I’ll be by the inn soon to see if you need me to return the favor and to catch up on what you’ve been up to.” In a lower voice that kept the conversation between the two of them, he added, “I know this might sound strange, but unlike your mother, I’m not too worried about Stu. It’s occurred to me since he’s left that sometimes you need some distance to see things more clearly. Perhaps that’s all this is for him, a chance to finally see things for what they really are.”
Too quickly, his mother was there again, following them down the stairs to the front door.
“Don’t go yet, Sean. I’ve barely had a chance to talk to you since you’ve been back.”
Bill’s voice was firm. “Rebecca needs his help at the inn.”
His father was right. Rebecca’s workload was tremendous, especially after she’d spent the whole morning cleaning rooms with him instead of attending to her usual business.
He didn’t want to take up any more of her day than he already had. At the same time, it was his inn. He was familiar with the finances—he wouldn’t have bought the business blind, not even to help his brother—but there was a lot to be learned from going through a company’s files. He’d spend the rest of the afternoon familiarizing himself with the back-end of the business—the high and low periods, the number of staff and their salaries, and the growth potential.
“I’m sure your mother is sorry about her outburst. Please don’t say anything to Rebecca about it, Sean.”
“Of course, I won’t.”
Hopefully an afternoon filled with facts and figures would help loosen the tight knot that five minutes with his parents had put into his gut.
“How dare you apologize for me!”
Elizabeth had never been so mad… or ashamed. She was allowed to have feelings, wasn’t she? She should be able to speak her mind to her family, especially when she was a mother worried about her son.
Anyone would understand that. Except for her husband, evidently.
“Someone needed to apologize, Elizabeth. You were completely out of line.”
She was too stunned by what felt like Bill’s continued attack to say anything for a moment. Finally, in a softer voice, she asked, “Why are you speaking to me like this? I’m not the one who hurt Stu so badly that he felt he had no choice but to leave town.”
But instead of helping to make Bill understand where she was coming from, she watched his normally cheerful, relaxed expression settle more firmly into disgust. At her.
“Whatever drove him away, it wasn’t Rebecca. Couldn’t you see how upset she was when she gave us the news that they’d called off their engagement—and that they n
ever should have made the mistake of getting engaged at all? She has never been anything but honest with us—and everyone else in this town. She’s barely holding it together without his help. He should have stayed to face the music with her.”
Not understanding how he could possibly talk that way about their son, Elizabeth went back on the attack. “You should be worried about Stu, not some girl we barely know. What if all along she was seducing him into giving her control of the inn?”
Bill’s bark of laughter at the word seduce shocked her. How dare he laugh in the face of her fear. Her anger. Her worries.
“Seduce him? Are you kidding? There wasn’t an ounce of spark between Rebecca and Stu. You had to see that. If you ask me, not getting married was the best thing for the both of them.”
God, how she hated his talk of sparks. Way back when, the sparks had burned so brightly for her and Bill. Where had those sparks gone? For so long, she’d held out hope that they would come back.
But now that Stu was gone, sniping and fighting had replaced the heavy silences between them.
Leaving her almost all out of hope.
Chapter Eight
The next morning, Rebecca woke up shivering. The heat was on and she hadn’t kicked off the covers, but her bedroom was strangely cold. In fact, ever since Stu had disappeared, the room had gotten colder and colder each night. She’d taken to wearing her long underwear and thick socks to bed.
She half expected to see her breath in the air as she reluctantly pushed back the covers and sprinted to the bathroom. Although the tiled floor should have felt like ice against her bare feet, it was much warmer in the bathroom than it had been in her bedroom. While she waited for the shower to heat up, she went back out and made a quick tour of the rest of her suite. The only cold room was the bedroom. All the others felt just fine.
She’d left the doors open to the living room when she went to sleep. The heat should have come into her bedroom. Instead, it was as if there was some kind of invisible barrier there keeping the warmth out… and holding the icy cold in.
