Falling Again

by Peggy Bird

  “No. I’ve been there, but this was the first I’ve spent any amount of time watching what she does.”

  “I’d love to see how she works some day.”

  “She’d be happy to have you. Today she was showing off her new series of pieces interpreting landscapes and it gave me an idea. I think we’re going to try to put together a body of work based on her interpretations of some of my photos. She thinks Liz Fairchild might be talked into having the exhibit at her gallery.”

  “What a great idea. And if you got her talking about her work and your project for any amount of time, it must mean she didn’t have a chance to give you instructions on how to live your life.”

  “Hell, no. Stopping her from fussing at me would take an act of Congress…no, an act of God.”

  “What was it this time? She’s already covered being alone on the mountain, so was it taking an umbrella with you when it looks like rain? Wearing your seat belt?”

  “It was you.”

  “Me? She was warning you away from me?” She could tell by his face he was enjoying her surprised reaction.

  “On the contrary. She asked me if I knew about your last relationship. Said she didn’t want to see you hurt again. Seems like you’ve also fallen under the protective wing of my sister, who fusses.”

  Fiona wasn’t sure if having Amanda look out for her was a good or bad thing. More accurately, she wasn’t sure what Nick thought of it.

  Without looking directly at him, Fiona asked, “So, what did you say?”

  “I said you’d told me all about it. She was torn between lecturing some more and cross-examining me to find out if I knew any details she didn’t. She chose the lecturing option; no surprise.” He took his knife to the sink and then washed his hands. “I said she had nothing to worry about. I’d taken it as my job to restore your faith in men.” As he dried his hands, he came up beside her.

  She laughed. “Big job, isn’t it, being responsible for your entire sex?”

  “It would be if I meant it. I really only want you to have faith in me.” He took her hands. “I want to earn your trust because if I can’t, I’ll never be able to convince you to…well, to see if we can be more than two people having a vacation fling.”

  Anxiety began to tense up her shoulders and cramp her hands around the pan she was holding. This conversation was getting into waters too deep for Fiona’s comfort. It was bad enough the work she loved seemed to be turning deadly, without having Nick begin to talk about trust and love and things even more dangerous than death threats.

  “Nick, I’m not sure I can deal with this yet.”

  He took the pan from her hands, wrapped his arms around her, and kissed the top of her head. “I get it. You’re skittish about a relationship.” He held her so she couldn’t back away. “But I thought from the way it’s been between us, maybe we could see if…”

  “We haven’t exactly been looking at this…at us…with any sort of reason or common sense, have we?” The panic she had begun to feel when he first talked about earning her trust had now taken over her throat and she had to force out the words.

  “Okay, let’s talk common sense—we’re good together. Right? We share interests. Even our careers mesh. You already know and like some of my family. They like you. Don’t you want to see what we can make of a pretty solid beginning? See where it could take us? I do.”

  “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Nick.” She had to get away while she could do it with dignity and not when she’d given in to the need to run, to flee this attempt to pin her down, just like Mark had done—before her ex walked away. But Nick wouldn’t let go of her.

  “Why do you think I won’t keep my promise? Is it because you think all men are alike? We’re not. I’m not him, Fiona. I know you haven’t known me very long, but surely you know me well enough to realize I would never, ever hurt you like he did.”

  “Stop, Nick. Please. I can’t do this.” The panic was getting worse. Now tears were threatening.

  He looked at her, sighed, and pulled her close. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you cry. I just wanted…just hoped…you might be interested in taking a chance on having something real with me.”

  “It’s not you I’m afraid to take a chance on. It’s the uncertainty of things. Of what happens when people…” She stopped before she said anything more compromising and pulled herself away from him. This time, he let her go. She ran to her bedroom and slammed the door.

  A few minutes later she heard a soft knock on the door. If she ignored it, maybe he’d go away. She should have known him well enough by now to know it wouldn’t work. He kept knocking. “Come in,” she finally said.

  He sat on the bed next to her where she had curled up like an armadillo trying to protect herself.

  “This isn’t what I had in mind for this evening,” he said. “I’m sorry. Would you rather be alone tonight? I can sleep in the guest room or go back to my hotel.”

  The thought was tempting, but she couldn’t throw him out of her bed, not when her panic was the reason for this, not his behavior. “Why would I force you to fight Pulitzer for the bed in the guest room?”

  “Maybe because I wasn’t very sensitive out there in the kitchen.”

  “It’s not you, Nick, it’s me.”

  “You’re sounding like a Seinfeld rerun.”

  She didn’t laugh or even smile. He leaned down and kissed her, then went to the other side of the bed and lay down on top of the comforter. He gently rubbed her back. “Tell me what you need so you feel comfortable with the possibility there’s an ‘us’ worth talking about.”

  “I just don’t know how there can be an ‘us.’ I still don’t even understand why you think you want to spend time with me.”

  She heard him softly laugh. “Wow. I thought I was more convincing. Or at least interesting enough to warrant your attention.”

  “You’re amazing. I’m the one who barely moves the needle past boring. You travel all over the world, meet interesting people. You can pack in five minutes for anyplace in the world and you probably speak six languages.”

  “You’re describing what I do for a living, not who I am. I think fascinating is knowing more about the city you’ve lived in for nine years than most people know about a place they’ve lived all their lives.”

  “Right. I travel to faraway places like Salem, Oregon, and look at a file some bureaucrat’s trying to hide from me. Luckily I don’t need a passport to do it because I’ve never even had one.”

  “Is lack of a passport the reason you can’t see me with you?”

  “Of course not. There’s our backgrounds. Your parents are professionals. My father worked on the docks. You went to private schools and a trust fund paid for your education. I’m still paying off college loans.”

  “I’ll give you there was more money in my family. But our upbringing wasn’t so different. Our families are close, warm, and supportive. In spite of my bitching, I love my sister as much as you love yours. And we both have good relationships with our parents. True?”

  “I guess.”

  “No guess. It’s true. What else you got?”

  “Why did you want to find me?”

  “Find you? When?”

  “In D.C. Why? I mean, I understand why you chatted me up at Danny and Jake’s engagement party. We were the only two people there who weren’t paired up, so you…”

  “Talked to you because you were the most beautiful, most interesting woman in the room.”

  “Oh, please. You didn’t call after the party. I couldn’t have been that interesting.”

  “You’re the most interesting, most beautiful woman in any room. When you start talking about what you care about, like your job, you absolutely glow. But I couldn’t figure out how to contact you without Amanda interfering. Then she told me you were in D.C. and I had my chance.”

  “You went to a lot of trouble because you admired my passion for my job.”

  “Obviously there was mor
e. And after the first time I kissed you, there was the other passion I discovered. That one I definitely wanted to know more about.”

  “So, this is just about sex.”

  “Fee, are you trying to get rid of me? Is that what this is about?”

  “No. God, no. I’m trying to understand how we got here—why you got here—before we try to go someplace else.”

  “Would it help if I told you how hard I worked to get this gig in Portland? I’d turned Travis down when he asked me to be his photographer so I could take a better paying job in Belize. But after I saw you in Washington, I spent a week convincing him to dump the photographer he’d been talking to and let me work with him. I knew it would be a long assignment in the Northwest and it would give me a chance to see you.”

  “You turned down more money to come here?”

  He kissed the tip of her nose. “Yup, you were worth more. And I’ve been moving some things around to free up a couple, three weeks so I can come back to Portland after my next two assignments. I have the week in New Mexico, then a week on the ship. Then, after we both have some time apart, maybe we can figure out what this is between us. Are you willing to try?”

  She closed her eyes and thought about the weeks they’d spent together, about how easily she’d fallen into wanting him around. About how hard it would be to give him up.

  And how much it hurt when Mark betrayed her.

  “I won’t stop you from coming back to Portland,” she said.

  He pulled her close. “That’s the best I can get tonight, I imagine.” He kissed her forehead. She put her arm over his and nestled her head into his shoulder. Eventually, as he rubbed her back and kissed her hair, she began to feel the tension drain out of her body and even to her surprise, after awhile, began to slip slowly into sleep.

  • • •

  Cold, fully dressed and with Fiona still tangled in his arms, Nick woke at 6 A.M. He’d not only never undressed after he’d soothed her to sleep, but apparently he’d fallen asleep himself before he managed to get under the blanket. He slipped out of bed and took a hot shower as quietly as he could, put on clean boxers, turned up the heat, and went to the kitchen to make coffee.

  He had royally fucked up the night before. Why he thought he needed to herd Fiona into some sort of box about their relationship, he didn’t know. He had never thought in terms of forever-after with a woman, so why had he been so insistent? Was he really ready to settle in one place, giving up the freedom to take off whenever a good assignment came up for a domestic life?

  Or was this fantasy of roots and a family the result of hanging out with his sister for longer than usual, watching her with her family? In spite of wanting to get her off his back most of the time, he’d always admired her and had often walked in her footsteps. When she went off to college to follow her dream of being an artist, it gave him the courage to pursue journalism. When she struck out on her own as a glass artist, it gave him the idea to enlarge his view of what he could do with the images he took other than sell them to magazines and newspapers.

  So now, when he saw her settled with the man she loved and who clearly loved her, saw her as the contented mother of a daughter and the stepmother of two sons, was he trailing after her again or was this what he really wanted?

  Maybe it would be better to back off a little. Give this some thought while he was away, like he’d said to Fee last night. Then, when he came back to Portland, maybe they could talk about it more intelligently.

  Maybe Fee was the one who knew what the smartest course was and he should let her set the pace. He’d better figure it out quickly so he could make it right with her when she woke.

  • • •

  Nick wasn’t there. His pillow was cool to her touch, which meant he’d been out of bed for a while. She hugged it to her, inhaling the smell of him on the pillowcase, a clean smell of soap and his cologne, a smell she would never forget. He was so sweet, so loving, so open. Nothing like her ex. Why was she hesitating about what he’d said last night?

  She clutched the pillow, listening for sounds of him in the living room, but the door to the bedroom was closed and she couldn’t hear anything. Maybe he’d left. After last night, she wasn’t sure she’d blame him if he had. No, his jeans were on the chair across the room, his leather bag beside it.

  Wrapping her robe around her, she opened the door and immediately smelled coffee. In the kitchen she found Nick, in boxer shorts and bare feet, putting dishes away in the cabinet. She could see he’d been busy—all the remains of their uncooked, uneaten meal from the night before had been cleaned up and all the dishes washed.

  She stood beside the breakfast table, not sure what to say, so she said nothing. When he turned and saw her, a smile curved his mouth and broke her heart.

  “Morning, beautiful,” he said. “Coffee?”

  “Yes, please.”

  He grabbed two mugs from the counter and poured the fresh brew into them, brought one mug to her and put it on the table before he gathered her into his arms and kissed her. “About last night. I’m sorry. You’re right. We need to go as fast as we can go together. So, a day at a time is how we’ll do it.”

  She was vaguely disappointed by his acquiescence. “I’m the one who should be apologizing and asking for another chance.”

  “Please. It was me being a sweet young thing. We’re impatient.”

  “I thought we’d forgotten my stupid comment.”

  “I’ve had second thoughts. I’ve decided I want to be your sweet young thing. Among other reasons, it gives me something to hide behind every now and then. Like this morning.” He went to the other side of the kitchen and got his mug of coffee. “It also gives me a reason to demand breakfast. Sweet young things need to be fed, particularly when they get sent to bed without any dinner.”

  “Yeah, we both kinda did, didn’t we? Let me take a shower and get dressed and I’ll make us something to eat.” She watched him for a moment, not sure whether to say any more about the night before—but Nick was making it clear he wanted to leave it alone so she would, too. Before she went to the bedroom, she asked, “Are you shooting someplace today?”

  “Yeah, Mt. Adams, assuming the weather cooperates.”

  “I don’t like to sound like Amanda, but make sure you have your phone on, will you? And let me know when you’re on the way home, please?”

  “You do sound like my sister. Why?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t usually believe in premonitions but something feels weird about today.”

  He came up behind her and put his arm around her waist, nuzzling her neck. “It’s probably just an emotional hangover from last night.”

  “Maybe. But be careful, will you?”

  “Nothing’s going to happen. But I’ll be careful, I promise.”

  Chapter 13

  Lost in unanswerable questions, Nick almost missed the turnoff to Trout Lake and the Mt. Adams highway. Had he panicked Fiona last night? Overplayed his hand? Trapped himself with words he’d never be able to take back? He didn’t know. He did know there wasn’t much time left to try and make it right. Travis arrived the next day; they would be shooting all over the Cascades for the next week…his alone time with Fiona would be limited.

  Lack of time with her was one sure thing. The other one? He was clearly falling for the beautiful redhead. What wasn’t clear was what loving her meant, for now or for the future.

  A sign for the South Spur trailhead directed him to a place to park his car. And once he started hiking the trail and taking scouting shots of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest for Travis, he got lost in something other than questions—the light, the beauty of the trees, lost in doing the job he loved.

  He took image after image of waterfalls and stunning views of Mt. Adams, the creeks and rivers running full and the beginning of the wildflower season. He even got a couple shots of what he thought was a Northern Spotted Owl. The one thing he hadn’t seen was another human being. It was a good day.

&nb
sp; Then, hours later, when he got back to his car it was apparent he’d been mistaken about the lack of people. There had been at least one other person around.

  With a knife.

  All four of his tires had been slashed and the note stuffed under the windshield wiper explained why. “If your smart you’ll stick to your piktures and stay out of other peoples busness. If you don’t, theirs a chance you’ll end up like your tires.”

  Bad grammar and spelling aside, he was sure whoever had written it meant every word.

  It took him twenty minutes to find enough cell signal to call Triple A and more than two hours for them to get to him with new tires. Which was just enough time to amp up his fear that the tire-slasher was still around. He jumped at every sound, every tree branch moving in the breeze, every call of a bird, every rustle of dry grass. Usually when he was in a tight place his photographer’s eye would divert his attention and he could manage the fear by shooting images. Not today. Even the sight of a doe coming out of the woods with her fawn to eat in the late afternoon light wasn’t enough to take his mind off the fact that someone had followed him and threatened his life. This wasn’t just a photo shoot. It was personal.

  • • •

  Fiona fussed all day about the conversation of the night before and her premonition about Nick heading for trouble. Her uneasiness about what was getting to be a dangerous confluence of her personal and professional lives got worse when her contact in the Forest Service added one more bit of information to what she knew—the name of the in-holder who had the rights to the property on Mt. Hood where the cabin stood was Duke Wellington.

  Suspicion confirmed.

  Or was it? Her contact went on to say he’d sublet it to a corporation—an out-of-state company called Energy, Inc. The company had built the cabin. The Forest Service had seen and approved the plans but had never met anyone other than the attorney representing the company.

  Fiona immediately called Wellington’s office but he was away on business so she could only leave a message. A half-dozen phone calls and a couple hours of searching online failed to give her any more information about Energy, Inc. Whoever was behind the company was apparently quite good at hiding.