by JoAnn Ross
Although Mary occasionally grumbled about the “old days,” when the FAA wasn’t so strict, Finn knew safety was always her first concern, so she’d been quick to grant the time. Especially, as he’d pointed out, he was using some of those thirty hours to ride her damn float.
“So, I heard you and the Cassidy girl had breakfast together this morning.”
“Not much gets by you,” he said mildly.
“Not in this town.” She tapped her pen on the desk. “You also took her rental car over to her last night.”
“I did. And it’s not what you think. I didn’t spend the night with her.”
Her brows rose above the purple frames of her reading glasses. “Did I say anything?”
“You didn’t have to,” he said. “It might as well have been written all over your face with an industrial-size Sharpie.”
“Don’t hurt her,” she said, as serious as he’d ever seen her.
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Oh, I know that. But I’m not blind. You recognized her name the minute you heard it.”
“Maybe,” he hedged.
“Absolutely. It’s a good thing you were a pilot and not a SEAL like your brother, because you would’ve been a failure at undercover terrorist fighting stuff. You can’t lie for bagels.”
“It’s beans.”
“More like bullshit.” She cocked her head and gave him a long look. Wanting to prove her wrong, that he could be just as undemonstrative as Max, he stared right back at her.
“Barbara Ann said she was afraid the electricity sparking between the two of you was going to blow all the café’s fuses.”
“Barbara Ann’s a card-carrying romantic.” Thus the cake and the damn glitter, which, since he was still brushing it off body parts, had turned out to be the herpes of the craft world.
“There is that,” she said. “But that doesn’t explain what you were doing buying short ribs and kale when everyone knows that you neither cook nor eat green vegetables.”
“I can cook.” A burger, hot dog, or even a steak, which to Finn’s mind was all a guy needed to know how to fix. Not that he did it all that often when the café could serve the same thing up without leaving him any dishes to wash. “And green vegetables taste like grass.”
“Which, unless you spent a previous life as a cow, you’ve never eaten so have nothing to compare it to.”
She had him there. “How do you know I bought that stuff?” Finn had grown used to everyone knowing everyone else’s business. That wasn’t just small-town behavior. When pilots got together in their quarters, they could gossip like a bunch of old ladies.
“I called the market down there to order me up some frozen Gulf shrimp for my grandson Ty’s sixth birthday. Don’t forget, you agreed to be on the tree house building committee so he can wake up to the surprise.”
“I haven’t forgotten.” It had brought back good memories of being back at the ranch, hanging out in the tree house with his brothers.
“Good. Since you guys will be swinging the hammers, we women are providing the food. At any rate, I was going to have you pick the shrimp up for me since you were going to be in town anyway, but you weren’t answering your phone, as usual.”
“Geez. What’s with everyone suddenly being so antsy about my damn phone?”
“Because you have the thing for a reason. So people can get hold of you.”
“I answer it.”
“Selectively,” she shot back. With which he couldn’t argue.
“Anyway, Henry Doyle told me you’d already been in and gotten some meat, wine, green stuff, and a Three Musketeers bar. The last of which is totally believable. But you could’ve knocked me over with a fender when he told me you’d left with that dinosaur kale.”
“It’s feather.”
She ignored the muttered correction. “When I added that piece of information together with Barbara Ann saying that the Cassidy girl is doing a tryout to be a new cook, it all came together. You were shopping for her.”
“She called and asked me to pick up some stuff while I was just waiting around for those passengers to get off their ship, so it wasn’t any big deal.”
“It’s sweet, is what it is. I don’t suppose it has anything to do with you taking your thirty hours? Like maybe she’s going to be trying that recipe out on you before she sends it to Barbara Ann?”
“Maybe.” Finn felt like a damn six-year-old called into the principal’s office. Next he’d be scuffing his toe on the floor.
“She was engaged to be married to another man just days ago.”
“I’m well aware of that,” he said between set teeth.
The quirk of her lips revealed that he’d given away the fact that wasn’t his favorite topic. “You didn’t like the fiancé.”
“He was a prick.” Finn regretted the sailor talk as soon as he’d heard the word leave his mouth. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’ve spent my entire adult life up here working with men. I’ve heard a damn sight worse. Said worse, too,” Mary said. “My point was that, like I said, she’s bound to be emotionally fragile right now. While you’re ripe for some sheet tangling, given that you’ve been celibate since you arrived in town. Not for the lack of trying on the part of nearly every female under the age of fifty.”
Finn figured that was an exaggeration. But not by much. “I wasn’t aware my sex life was up for discussion.”
“Of course it is. If you stick around long enough, you’ll realize how living with the same folks day in and day out can get damn boring. We need new blood spicing up the talk.”
“Happy to oblige.”
“No problem. And if you decide to make a move on anyone, would you let me know? I’ve got fifty bucks down on Casey Doyle.”
“Casey? From Midnight Sun Manicures?”
“Something wrong with redheaded manicurists?”
“Not at all. I thought she was going out with some trail guide.”
“She was. Until he took a group out on an overnight trip and was seen teepee-creeping with a blond accountant from Boise.” She shook her head. “You really ought to keep up with things. At any rate, she’s on the market again. So, if I were you, I’d seize the carp. Before someone else lands her.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” For about a second. “I’m still trying to wrap my mind around the idea of people betting on who I may or may not sleep with.”
“Like I said, we’ve got to take our entertainment where we can find it. Not that you’re helping things out that much, because for a hotshot flyboy, you lead about the most unexciting life any of us have ever seen.
“Barbara Ann’s holding the pot. Which is growing considerably, by the way. So, the longer you hold out, the better it’ll be for me if you end up with Casey.”
“What makes you think I’m the kind of sleaze guy who’d kiss and tell?”
“You wouldn’t have to. Someone would find out.”
And from there, the word would spread, Finn knew. He didn’t mind for himself, but if things were to happen between Tori and him, he’d want to protect her from gossip. Especially if she were to stay here for longer than the season.
“One thing you are going to have to do before you get involved in any hanky-panky,” she warned. “You need to tell her who you are. Because while I understand your reasons for not wanting people to know you’re one of those Brannigans, somehow things always get out. And it’s not as if you’re the mogul your father was—”
“Not even close.” Finn hadn’t even looked at Osprey’s books. Mary had told him they were running in the black, and her word was good enough for him. All he wanted to do was fly.
“I realize you only knew him as a hard, distant man,” she said. “One who had to have been focused on business to build such an empire—”
“You think?”
“I don’t think. I know. That man who sat around the campfire telling tall fish tales, and who took you up flying with my Mike, and who, may I point out, pai
d for those flying lessons you took with money he’d worked damn hard for, that man was Colin Brannigan, the billionaire who’d lost his parents when he was a teenager. In a plane crash,” she pointed out. “Which makes it even more remarkable that he’d not only pay for all those flying lessons for you but even left you Osprey as a legacy.”
Finn had heard about his father’s parents, but he’d never really put the pieces together until now. “I suppose that would’ve been hard,” he allowed. As bad as having lost his mom was, Finn guessed it would’ve been worse to lose both your parents at an age when your head was already messed up from teenage hormones.
If so, the old man must have gotten over the loss and moved on, because according to his older brothers, there’d been a time when their father had been all in when it came to his family.
Which, in turn, had Finn thinking about what Luke had told him about their dad having fallen in love with their mom at the lodge Luke had inherited. The one where Luke was currently building himself a new life with his old girlfriend and her niece. It still weirded him out to think of Luke settling down in one place. At least he wasn’t entirely giving up his extreme video business.
When Luke and Lizzie had told him about their engagement on FaceTime, he’d learned that his dad and mom had shared a teenage summer romance that hadn’t survived time and distance when Kathleen Hayes had returned home to Kentucky. But then his parents had found each other again at the lodge. Coincidentally his dad had been twenty-seven when they’d reunited. The age he was now. Which didn’t have anything to do with him. It was just another coincidence.
“I’d better get going and drop off the stuff at the cabin.”
“And tell her?” Mary asked pointedly.
“No time right now,” he dodged the question. “Not if you want me back here for the afternoon flights.”
“But you will tell her who you are? And that you own Osprey?”
“Sure.”
Someday. But Tori was at a stressful time in her life. Why risk making things even worse? That’s what Finn told himself as he drove toward the other side of the lake. By the time he’d reached the cabin, he’d managed to convince himself that it was the best way to handle the situation.
* * *
What had she been thinking? Barbara Ann had been right. Frying wings and grilling sliders was very different from the meals she’d planned. One using the short ribs, and to show versatility, another using fresh king salmon, which, luckily for her, was in season. The two dishes were ones she’d made before over the years. She’d tinkered with them until she honestly believed they could hold their own against any similar dishes in many of the top restaurants in the country.
While in southern Oregon for the Music in the Mountains festival, she’d taken a road trip up the coast and had dinner at Chef Maddie Durant’s Michelin star restaurant in Shelter Bay. The chef had been warm, friendly, and despite the fame garnered by her time as a TV chef, eager to chat with diners. It had been the Culinary Institute of America–trained chef who’d recommended adding the port for an extra layer of depth.
But cooking for the various foster families she’d lived with, and for friends—most of whom were musicians, always happy for a free meal—was turning out to be far different than auditioning for a job. For the first time, she truly understood how those Chopped contestants felt. Though, in a way, they might have had it better. Because they were working against the clock and didn’t have time to second-guess every ingredient.
Like she’d been doing since she’d found herself frozen in the vegetable section of the Trading Post, torn between fresh coriander or flat-leafed parsley to add to the crushed potato/crab mixture she was planning to top with crispy grilled salmon and surround with roasted grape tomatoes.
“Perhaps you’re taking too much of a chance,” she worried aloud as she paced the cabin floor, watching out the window for Finn.
She’d made the potato/crab mix as a warm salad many times before but had decided topping it with the salmon would elevate it and impress Barbara Ann. “People here eat salmon and crab all the time.” This was where both the seafood ingredients came from, as anyone who’d ever watched Deadliest Catch knew all too well.
“You should’ve stuck with manly meat. Maybe braised pork belly over a fennel and cabbage salad.” Who didn’t like bacon? “Damn.” She rubbed her forehead, feeling the beginnings of a major headache. “You should have had Finn pick up some pork belly while he was getting the ribs.”
Even as she paced and worried, Tori knew she was behaving uncharacteristically. She’d never been a fusser. Having lived with disruption during her adolescence and teen years, she’d learned to keep her expectations low. Which was why, as upsetting as having her music stolen from her in her record company’s bankruptcy had been, she hadn’t been entirely surprised. Those things happened. And since she’d never be able to afford to buy her songs back, she’d just have to write new ones.
Two years ago, she’d won a gig teaching at a WomenSong summer music camp in the Ardennes, in southern Belgium, only to have it closed down after the first week because the programs coordinator and treasurer (both married to other people) had run off together. Unfortunately, they’d stopped to drain the camp’s bank account before boarding their plane to Paris, stiffing the students and the staff.
Rather than cry crocodile tears, she and her Taylor had hit the road, on buses, trains, and occasionally hitching, spending the rest of the summer singing her way across the country and into France as far as Paris, where a helpful travel agent had helped her trade in her original return ticket to one back to the States.
And, of course, then there’d been that fiasco with Carter.
No. She wasn’t going to think about the man who should have broken her heart. But, she’d realized, he couldn’t. Because she’d never given it to him.
Deciding that all she was doing was wearing a path in the wood plank floor, she picked up her Taylor and went back to work on her new song, which was showing progress.
My foolish heart is like a gypsy wind,
A lonely ship, a skipping stone.
Tossed by lovers’ lies and promises,
Fated to wander and to roam.
And hadn’t she always done exactly that? And would again. Despite Barbara Ann’s offer for full-time employment, Tori wasn’t intending to stay in Caribou beyond the summer season. Especially not with Finn living here.
The former fighter pilot was too hot. Too tempting. Too male.
She’d no sooner sung that last word than she heard the Jeep approaching. Jumping up, she left her guitar on the couch, ran to the door, and threw it open.
“Hi.” Unlike when she’d first spotted him standing like a lone beacon in the Anchorage terminal, Tori had never been so happy to see anyone. She did wish she hadn’t sounded schoolgirl breathless. “You made it back.”
“That’s the plan,” he said as he walked toward the cabin on that loose-hipped, long-legged stride that didn’t help with her decision to give up men when she’d boarded that plane at LAX bound for Alaska. “Since crashing really wasn’t an appealing alternative.”
“I’m glad. And not just because you’d have taken my ribs down with you.”
“Nah. No way would I be responsible for you blowing your audition. After dragging myself out of the flaming wreckage, I would’ve somehow managed to crawl my way back to town, even though, battered and broken, I’d be fighting off the grizzlies and wolves trying to take your precious short ribs away.”
Layered, she considered as he walked into the house with two green-and-black canvas bags. Finn Brannigan had more layers than that ripped-off version of a blooming onion Barbara Ann served at the café. Tori had taken the laminated dinner menu home so she knew what she’d be competing with. Every so often that aviator’s ice would crack just enough to give a glimpse of the only man she’d ever met who was truly capable of breaking into her well-protected heart.
“I really appreciate this.” Her purse
was on the end of the entry table. When she went to get it, he caught her arm.
“I’ve got it.”
“But—”
“You’re going to be feeding me a better dinner than I’ve had in years. I should be paying you.”
“Thank you.” She was too poor to argue as he continued into the kitchen, where he placed the bags on the counter. Digging into the first one, she pulled out the ribs, wrapped in waxy white butcher’s paper, and a huge bundle of pebbly dark green kale that looked as if it had been pulled straight from the earth.
The second bag held a bottle of port and another of cab.
“I figured that’d go well with the ribs,” he said when she’d glanced over at him.
“It’s perfect. And expensive.” While at the Trading Post, she’d been tempted to put a mid-priced mass-market wine in her basket but hadn’t been able to justify spending her rapidly diminishing cash.
“I figured it should live up to the meal.”
She felt her lips curving. “I hope I can live up to your expectations.”
“You’ve already done that.” The sexy-as-sin smile he flashed had all her good parts forgetting she was not in the market for a replacement fiancé. “I took a few of my monthly required FAA hours off tonight and finish my last flight around six. If that works for you.”
“That’d be perfect.” The ribs would need to braise for three hours after searing. Which gave her plenty of time to plate around seven thirty. It was strange, she thought, living where the sun stayed up all day. She imagined it took some time to adjust, because if you just went by the way your body felt, you could be eating dinner at a summer midnight sunset. “And seriously, thank you.”
“No problem,” he said. “I like seeing you smile. And I’m really looking forward to tonight.”
Her throat caught as his warming gaze lingered on her mouth. Was he talking about looking forward to more than dinner? Even knowing Finn Brannigan was trouble, reminding herself that all her relationships with men had been both shallow and fleeting, Tori found herself hoping that he was.
