by Stacy Gail
“Good morning. Coffee’s not ready yet. Do you want to go back to bed and I’ll call you when everything’s ready?”
“Mm.”
Since he didn’t move and scowled, she took that grunt as a no.
“Okay. Everything else is done, so let’s try a tiny eye-opener.” Pouring some orange juice into a glass, she plucked up a slice of bacon and moved to where he stood. “Open wide.”
He cracked one eye open, saw her offering of bacon, and brushed it aside before he caught his hand around her nape. When he reeled her in for a slow, sleepy kiss she didn’t even try to fight it, and while she had the excuse of not pushing him away because her hands were full of bacon and juice, she knew that wasn’t the case.
She wanted to kiss him. She liked kissing him. And God help her, she hoped she could go on kissing him.
Slowly his lips rolled away so that he could nuzzle his face against hers. “Mm. Morning, Red.”
“Morning, Boom.” She didn’t move away as he pulled her closer, still holding her nape as he positioned the rest of his arm round her shoulder and pressed his forearm against her spine. And she had to smile when his head dropped to her neck so he could fit his face in its curve, no doubt hiding from the morning light. “You don’t have to be up just because I’m up, you know. Why don’t you go back to bed? Everything can keep.”
“Huhn-uhn. Time.”
She tried to remember when she last looked at the kitchen clock. “It’s after nine.”
“No. Time with you. You’re up, so I’m up.”
For a full second the words bounced around in her head without making any sense, before they sank into a pool of growing wonder. Time. He meant he wanted to spend whatever time he could with her.
Why?
She wasn’t totally clueless. He’d made it clear that he was as fiercely into her as she was into him, though she’d done her best to fight it. There was no guarantee that they’d have another morning together, so he was pushing himself past his aversion to mornings in order to spend every available second with her.
That was a beautiful thought.
Something unbearably sweet slid through her, a flood of warmth that swelled in her chest until it was all she could feel. She tried to shake it off by pressing her mouth to the hair above his ear—the only place she could reach with a turn of her head—and took a step back.
“Go sit down and I’ll bring you some of my famous beer biscuits and country gravy, along with lots and lots of bacon and coffee. And again, I promise no talking until you’re really awake.”
“Perfect woman,” he repeated his praise from the day before. This time however, he accompanied it with a sweet caress of the hand that went from her nape and down the line of her back. Her eyes widened when it kept going to cup her ass cheek to give it a friendly squeeze, and her temperature surged like a runaway rocket. Then he took the juice and bacon from her, turned to shuffle into the dining area… and stopped dead. “Fuck.”
“What?” Maybe the bacon tasted like crap.
He stared a long time out the window as if he didn’t recognize the brilliant, sunlit sight of Whiteout Mountain. Then he shook his head and slid into a seat without saying a word.
As Quinn led the way to the Gear Room, he glanced over at Mia by his side, her mittened hand curled around his. She didn’t shy away from him when he had taken her hand this time around, something he hadn’t missed.
He also hadn’t missed how the goddamn snow had stopped.
“The only problem with a sunny day in the mountains this time of year is that there are no clouds to trap the heat in.” He gave her hand a quick squeeze. “It’s probably around five degrees right now, but you can handle that, right?”
“Five degrees isn’t a big deal for a Chicago native. But the sun? With no manmade canyon shadows to hide in? An hour out here and whatever patch of skin I’ve got exposed is going to give new meaning to the term well-done.” She popped her nose out of the scarf long enough to wrinkle it playfully at him. “That’s probably something you don’t have to worry about, but if I don’t want to wind up looking like my ruddy-faced, leathery Welsh ancestors, remind me to bring along a tube of sunscreen next time we decide to hit the slopes.”
“The Blackfoot Nation’s probably not the world’s leading consumer demographic when it comes to using sunscreen, but some members of my family still have to be careful.” He opened the Gear Room’s door for her, then guided her toward the sound of raised voices near the pro shop at the back. “My great-grandfather was full-blooded, and my dad’s grandmother was half. Throw in some French, Scots and a dash of Spanish, and you have the Kingfisher family. And speaking of family,” he went on as they rounded a display rack in the pro shop and came up on that source of the voices—two people squaring off over a tablet and several unpacked boxes of merchandise. “Hey, Uncle Alex, Emma. How’s life in inventory?”
Just like he’d expected, his cousin Emma pushed her glasses into place and gave him a martyred look. “I want a raise.”
“We haven’t opened yet, Em.”
“I still think I deserve one, because people should be paid for going insane. This is so incredibly hard, Quinn. I seriously don’t care how many hand warmers are in stock. I don’t even see the point of why I should know all of this.”
He sucked in a breath the blast her for whining over nothing when a faint hum of sympathetic amusement came from Mia.
“I remember my first job at a fast food place in my neighborhood when I was sixteen,” she said, smiling at Emma. “I was trying to save up my money to buy this total hunk of junk that became my first car. I got started with bussing tables, cleaning the dining area, emptying out trash cans and, the worst of all nightmares, cleaning the restrooms. You don’t realize how disgusting people can be until you’ve cleaned up the deliberate messes they’ve made in a public bathroom.”
“You must’ve wanted that car bad,” Quinn remarked while his cousin stared at Mia with a level of horror that only a teenager could adequately pull off. “Guess inventory doesn’t seem too bad now, does it, Emma?”
“Though if you’ve had it with inventory like you just claimed, I don’t have a problem with you cleaning the restrooms in all the public areas,” Alex announced to his daughter with what sounded like his very last thread of patience. “I just want you to learn how to work for a living. Whether it’s here counting hand warmers until you’re cross-eyed, or unclogging backed-up toilets and constantly breathing through your mouth, it doesn’t matter to me. I’m good either way.”
“Inventory’s not that bad,” Emma announced in a difference tone that was borderline angelic. Quinn almost didn’t recognize her. “I’m sure I’ll get the hang of it.”
“That’s a way better attitude than I had.” Mia nodded, and her expression was a masterpiece of commiseration mingled with encouragement. “I lasted less than a week at that place before I hit the Classifieds again. I’m Mia, by the way, the stranded traveler who wound up on Quinn’s doorstep.”
“Mia, this in my uncle, Alexander Muir and his daughter Emma,” Quinn introduced, reaching out so that his hand rested in the small of her back. “We’re here to screw up your inventory by heisting a tube of sunscreen, if you know where you can put your hands on one.”
“I know just where to look.” Alexander handed the tablet to Emma with a hard, speaking look before he headed to the checkout counter. For her part, Emma renewed her focus on the boxes around her, and Quinn felt a stirring of hope that his young cousin wouldn’t be completely useless after all. “The whole family’s heard about you and your travel woes, Miss Mia, so I have to say I’m glad to see you’re trying to have some fun while you’re here with us. I’m also glad,” he added, lowering his voice and glancing in the direction of his daughter, “that you came along with just the right thing to say to make my daughter rethink how hard she has it here. Yeah, it’s tough learning how to do new things, and having the pressure of getting things done right is a pain in the butt.
Work is hard—that’s why it’s called work. But she could have it so much worse than she does.”
“In a weird way I’m thankful I had such a hideous introduction to the workforce.” Mia grinned, plucking off her mittens to stuff them into her pockets. “It showed me what I was capable of. I’m sure she’ll figure that out too, as time goes on.”
“I just hope we can avoid any strikes or walkouts before opening day.” Alexander offered up a tube of sunscreen and Quinn took it before Mia could reach for it. “Let me know if you need any help in scrounging up some equipment for hitting the slopes.”
“Your mom wasn’t kidding about everyone around here being related,” Mia murmured as they headed back out to the main area filled with lockers and a stairway that led up to the gondola loading level. “Must be nice, having such a huge family.”
He thought of his father and brother, and their cold condemnation of how he lived his life. “I don’t know if nice is how I’d put it.”
“If your family’s getting on your nerves, I think it means they care enough about you to make themselves a nuisance.”
“I guess.” He lifted a brow as her wistful tone sank in. “Do you have a big family?”
She shook her head and tucked a stray curl under the red knit cap she wore. “It’s just me and my aunt in Chicago. My father lives in Florida with his wife and a couple of grown step-siblings I don’t know very well. That’s pretty much it.”
“So you’re not close?”
“Not really.” She wrinkled her nose in lieu of a shrug, glancing up the stair steps toward the gondolas. “I always got the impression my dad blamed me for being the one who ran my mom off, so I’ve never really been able to relax my guard around him, but that’s okay. He’s got his life and I’ve got mine, and I know he did the best that he could by me. Generally speaking, things are peaceful between us.”
He shook his head, amazed at how unemotional and matter-of-face she sounded. “How can it be your fault that your mom ran off?”
“Well, I was born, and that’s kind of what kicked things off.” She grimaced, clearly trying to find the right words to explain. “To this day my mom’s an incredibly busy woman with her career—a career that doesn’t allow time for her to also be Mother of The Year. My dad always felt that because she was so lacking in the mothering skills department—and she felt bad about it—she avoided coming home as much as she could by going from one project to the next.”
That didn’t sound good. “What does she do?”
“Photojournalist. She’s good at it, too. She’s won several awards throughout her career.”
“Was she ever a part of your life?”
Mia seesawed a hand. “Not really. She left for the final time when I was ten, when my parents made it official and divorced. I haven’t seen her since, though she does call on my birthday to say hello.” Again she glanced up the stairs to the bank of glass doors above them. “What’s up there?”
“Loading area for the gondolas. We’re running all the lifts as of today to make sure everything’s in working order.”
She looked at him hopefully. “I know you wanted to teach me the basics of skiing, but could we take a look before we get started?”
“Sure.” In moments they were up the stairs and through the doors that kept the frigid temps of the open gondola loading bay out of the rest of the building. But instead of concentrating on the two workers doing a practice run-through of how much time it took to load ski equipment onto a red and black gondola, he was focused on the woman beside him. “Sounds like you had a crazy time as a kid, with an absentee mom and a less-than-loving dad.”
Again she wrinkled her nose, her eyes on the gondola car that left the loading bay. “It wasn’t that bad. My dad and I are okay. When he told me why my mom left, he was just saying what he believed, that’s all. My mother wasn’t built for the settled, family life. Too much commitment and not enough excitement. She’s been all over the world, putting a human face on conflicts and problems you’d otherwise never hear about. As I’ve gotten older, I can now see how she felt that was more important than making it to a sit-down meal or a school play with her totally boring and ordinary family.”
“What the fuck, Mia.” His mouth tightened, getting pissed off at a woman he’d never even met. “Don’t slam yourself or your family for not being able to hold her attention. The problem wasn’t you. It never was.”
“I didn’t say there was a problem. She just had a very important job to do, as she would remind me whenever I’d plead with her to stay.”
“Geez, that’s fucking heartbreaking,” he muttered, shaking his head. “So basically that bitch told you from the get-go that you weren’t important enough for her to settle down and be a responsible mother.”
“Well… no. I mean, yes, but how you said it was really harsh. She’s not a bitch.”
“I call it how I see it.”
She huffed, and the vapor of it floated away on the frigid air. “Well, you’re wrong. When it comes to putting a spotlight on a famine in Africa versus whether or not you’re there to tuck your daughter in when you know she’s safe at home in the suburbs, I can understand it.”
“No. Just no.”
“I don’t even know what you mean by that.”
“I mean you’ve got everything all wrong, Red.”
“I think I know a little bit more about my life than you do.”
“What you think you know isn’t the truth. You’ve been brainwashed into thinking you should be fine with being thought of as unimportant. But that’s bullshit.”
She looked at him, aghast. “That’s ridiculous.”
“You said your being born kicked off a problem, and that’s why I’m calling bullshit. You didn’t have a choice in being born, Mia. But your mother had a choice when it came to having you and raising you. She may have told herself she was a damn hero for doing her job, but the bottom line is she took care of her own needs and put you in the backseat to do it. When she did that—and she did it one hell of a lot, from the sound of it—she trained you to think that the backseat was where you belonged. But you don’t belong there. You matter, you got that? You are fucking important.”
She looked at him like he’d gone crazy. “No, I’m not.”
Shit, she was serious. “Let me ask you this. Are there other journalists in the world who could have covered whatever stories she covered?”
“I…for crying out loud, you know the answer to that. Of course there are other journalists in the world.”
“Was there another woman who gave birth to you?”
She blinked, this time in confusion. “What?”
“Logically you know there were other people who could have done the job of putting a spotlight on whatever assignment she had—hell, there probably were other journalists from other news outlets right alongside her. But was there another person in the world who could have been a mother to you? The answer is no,” he went on, satisfied he’d gotten through to her when he saw realization dawn in her expression. “I’m not saying every working mother is wrong, because I’m not. Most of them are hitting the bull’s eye when it comes to being Superwoman by juggling both a family and a career, including my own mom. But yours didn’t. She dropped a ball. Worse yet, she chose to drop a ball. And that ball was you.”
“Yeah, well, I survived without any damage.”
“Seriously? That jackass you once thought you were engaged to walks all over you and you don’t let out a peep about it, when I know you can verbally tear people apart… and you don’t think you took on damage?”
Heat poured into her eyes, and he was screwed up enough to think it was one of the sexiest things he’d ever seen. “Until Jackson tells me otherwise, I’m still engaged.”
“He has told you otherwise, and you know it. But you’re devoted to that dick because devotion was never shown to you, and you know how much that hurts. Shit, all of this makes so much sense now.”
“Gee, Doctor, I’m so glad m
y damaged psyche is no longer a mystery to you.” She crossed her arms and nailed him with a blistering look. “You make me sound like I’m so programmed by my trivial childhood traumas that I’m unable to make clearheaded choices about my life. I’m nowhere near as weak as you seem to think I am.”
“You’re not weak, but your choices have put you in a position of weakness, and that sucks. Early on in life you got taught the completely fucked-up idea that you don’t matter, and that’s why that asshole’s been able to walk all over you. He didn’t value you, and you’ve let him get away with that shit because you don’t expect to be valued.”
He thought he’d gone too far when she took a half-step back, as if she’d suffered a physical body blow. Then her chin went up in defiance, just like it had when he’d first seen her readying herself to tear into that flight attendant.
“I’m not letting him get away with anything, and I’m sure as hell not weak-willed. I just need to know that we’re officially done. And then…” Her eyes narrowed and a half-smile that looked sharp enough to cut appeared. “That’ll be that.”
“How much more do you need before you hit the eject button on this asshole?”
“I don’t know. Enough to stand up in a court of law?”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” When her stubborn expression didn’t change and her gaze dared him to do something about it, he grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the loading area. “Forget skiing for today. You need a new perspective on things, and I know just where you can get it.”
Chapter Nine
Mia could feel the thrum of her heart in her throat as Quinn led her onto an empty gondola car and shut the door behind them. As they surged away from the loading area, she took a breath to mention that she wasn’t all that cool with helping him test the workings of their gondola system. Then the Gear Room’s floor went away and suddenly they were aloft in a frozen-white world, and all she could do was let out a squeak and clutch Quinn around the middle as if he could somehow hold them in the air if she just squeezed him hard enough.
