by Robin Bayne
Spying the ragged state of her fingernails against the soft curtains, Tia made a mental note to schedule a manicure in town. It was a luxury she only indulged in once or twice a year, most of the time because she was too ashamed of her hands after all that tapping to let Jody work on them.
It was dangerous to wear polish while she worked on food, anyway. The last time she’d had one was probably last New Year’s Eve, and Jody had shaken her head and suggested Tia take up smoking if it would end the constant assault on her nails. She’d only been half-joking.
Tia pulled on her favorite khaki shorts and a white T-shirt before heading to the kitchen. The noise of trucks grew louder as she approached. She flicked the oven knobs on to start pre-heating and opened the back door, stepping out barefoot onto the damp lawn.
Two large trucks sat by the old stable, motors running. Men in jeans, one shirtless, were busy unloading wood and other building materials.
Could Colt be preparing to rebuild the pier? She couldn’t help but smile as she crossed the grass, picturing a lake alive again with rubber rafts, boats and striped beach balls, and the kids with those inflatable water wings. Wet grass squiggled between her toes as she walked faster. When she saw him, Tia waved and smiled. “Colt!”
He turned and nodded in greeting, then returned his attention to a large sheet of paper.
“What’s going on? Are you getting in supplies for the pier? Or the new boat house?” Tia inhaled as two men in jeans and a tan shirt carried a large plank of wood past her head, the tangy pine scent trailing them.
Colt folded his paper like a map before Tia could see it. “This is for the stable. The stalls need new dividing walls. We can’t bring in the horses until it’s repaired.”
“Horses?” Tia reached for Colt’s arm to emphasize her concern. “Who said anything about horses?”
Eyes narrowed, Colt stepped closer. His navy T-shirt close the gap between them, tucked as it was into his faded jeans. The sweat from the early morning heat plastered his clothes to him nicely. What bothered her was his intent.
“You’re not still afraid of them?” Colt’s voice lifted, taking on a teasing tone, surprising her.
Tia counted to ten before responding. “No! And I never was. Not really. I just didn’t know you were turning this place into a working ranch. We haven’t discussed it.” She gestured toward an open field. “What’s next, bulls and rodeos?”
Before Colt could answer, George came out from behind the barn, whistling, confidently carrying a stack of wood. His dark hair, peppered with gray, stuck in sweaty clumps to his head and his white shirt clung to his still youthful chest. As he neared, he spied Tia and froze.
“Cami! What are you still doing here?”
Tia and Colt turned to look at him, forgetting all else for the moment.
“Dad, this is Tia. Remember our talk this morning?” Colt shifted his wide chest to make a virtual wall between Tia and his father.
Tia’s pulse quickened as she realized what was happening. George was having a problem remembering. A wave of guilt washed over her−here Colt finally had regained his memory, and his father was losing his.
“Colt, it’s OK,” she said, reaching for his arm again.
“Can we talk later?” he asked her, his voice quiet.
Tia looked from Colt to George, taking in the similar facial features, thick hair, the nearly identical frowns. “Fine, we’ll talk later. I’ll be in the house. But this will not be a dude ranch, Colton Reece.”
She whirled and started for the house, pausing only when she heard Colt call after her.
“It won’t be a fancy banquet hall either, Ms. Francis. Or should I say, great culinary chef?”
Tia straightened her spine, still facing away, and continued on as if she’d not heard Colt’s caustic comment. That was the second time he’d implied she was a culinary snob with highfaluting aspirations. When had she ever given Colt that impression?
She mangled a patch of buttercups beneath her feet, crushing them as badly as he’d crushed her with that comment. She’d have to be more ready, more businesslike, when Colt got an attitude, and keep in mind that George tried to throw her out the next time she started to feel sorry for him. Yanking open the screen door, Tia wondered if the soles of her feet were stained with yellow.
~*~
Meg, her young guest, was waiting for Tia by the pool, her dark hair braided and her green suit already wet.
“Did you go in? Alone?” Tia surveyed the patio. “You know you need an adult out here, right?”
Meg held up a book. “No, I’ve been reading. I know you come out to swim every morning. There was a man out here before and he splashed me real good.” She shook the book. “And page ninety-seven got all wet and transparent right on top of page ninety-eight.”
“Was it Colt?”
“No, his dad, I think.” Meg flipped the dry pages of her book, then carefully set a tassled bookmark inside and pushed it under her chaise.
Tia sensed the girl had more to say. Putting her towel and tube of sunblock on the neighboring lounger, she looked at Meg. “You want to swim with me?”
The girl scooted to the edge of her seat. “Miss Tia? Are you a good swimmer?”
“I’m not bad.”
“Oh, ‘cause Mr. Colt’s dad said you weren’t so good, but he said Cami was, whoever that is.”
Tia bristled, but managed a smile. “I’m the good swimmer. My sister is good at...other things.”
“Could you teach me to swim?”
“Is that what you look so nervous about?”
Meg, pink cheeked, nodded.
“Well, we can get you started in just a couple of minutes. Ever heard of the dog paddle?”
~*~
“Lunch was good,” Colt said, wiping his mouth with a paper napkin. “I’m heading out to the stable again.”
Tia took that as a ’thank you’. “Mmm.” She rose to clear the table, ignoring his comment on the stable. “George was subdued as he ate.”
Colt shrugged. “He hates shrimp.”
“Can we talk about this morning?”
He shrugged again, and Tia felt the urge to punch him. “Then can we talk about last night?”
He looked up then, one eyebrow raised.
Ah, she’d gotten his attention. Suddenly nervous, Tia concentrated her gaze on the leftover bread bowls.
“What about it? Did I miss something? Nothing happened, as far I recall.”
She’d waited for everyone else to leave the table so she could speak to Colt privately, and now here she was, tongue-tied, noticing things she shouldn’t, like his broad shoulders dwarfing the back of the dining room chair.
“Did you want something to happen? Is that it?”
Tia gasped. “No! Nothing like that.” She set her load of dishes on the sideboard and came back to stand in front of him. His height meant she only had to look down at him a little as he sat, arms crossed, tilted back in the chair. He really was too big for the furniture.
“What I meant was, we need to set some ground rules. We can’t be telling each other secrets anymore.” Especially not the kind you tell. “I mean, as friends, make that business partners, there are certain things that are none of the other’s business, you know? Personal things. And we really shouldn’t be...touching each other.” She backed up against the wood front of the sideboard again, hands sandwiched between her bottom and the wood to keep them still. “Agreed?” She met his gaze, startled by its intensity.
“You always loved my shoulder rubs. And you know they weren’t…meant to seduce you. You almost hummed when I hit that one spot on your shoulder blades.”
“You remember that, do you?” Male memory, she thought, can be so selective.
“Yeah. So do you.”
She wouldn’t argue. Refused to. But he’d already gotten too close, and she’d been foolish enough to let him. “Colt, we shouldn’t be doing...anything. For the sake of the business—which by the way, we both have a stak
e in—we have to keep a professional distance.” She held up one hand. “Now I know I didn’t object to the neck rub before, and I apologize. I shouldn’t send mixed signals. For our sakes, and Cami’s, let’s keep this platonic. Agreed?”
He closed his eyes for a few seconds, and then spoke quietly. “That’s what you want?”
She nodded. “It’s the way it has to be.”
He’d made his choice a long time ago, setting the stage for what had to be now.
Tia’s tummy felt funny, like it held a tiny, plummeting elevator car. Must be the shrimp.
“Then you got it.” He stood abruptly, letting the front legs of the chair fall, and then scraped it across the hardwood floor to its place under the table. Stalking to the doorway, Colt paused to sling some final words her way. “The horses will be here in a few days. And I’m not with your sister anymore.”
No discussion. No agreement.
Tia figured he’d planned it that way all along.
~*~
Seeing Bob and Pete had the barn under control, Colt left them to the job and walked to the old carriage house. He’d like to renovate this into a four-car garage to supplement the smaller one attached to the house. Examining the door hinges, Colt picked off chips of loose paint and rolled them between his fingers. Just like the sign out front, this wood was seriously neglected. The painting he’d need to handle himself; there were only so many favors he could call in from his buddies.
Winters could produce a lot of snow in Massachusetts, and he wanted his and Tia’s cars protected. The guests should have access to the garage through the house. Plus he’d need to invest in a snow blower and plow—something he’d never needed living in Maryland with Cami. He plucked a half-foot strip of ruler-thin, painted wood from the wall.
The thought of getting snowed in with Tia shook him a little. They could be alone at any time if no guests were booked. He couldn’t depend on George to hang around for company over the long winter months. The man was sure to take off again soon, because for some reason when George could remember Tia he disliked her.
Colt had hoped his father would still think of Tia as a daughter, but could the problem be that Tia looked so much like her mother? Then again, George had never seemed to want Colt with Cami either, and Cami’s appearance was less like Evelyn’s. Back then Colt had chalked it up to George not wanting Colt to get involved with a woman while he was recuperating. His father thought he might be making a mistake and he had been right on the mark about that.
George hadn’t responded to Colt’s attempts at discussion this morning, as Colt put his father on notice concerning his right to order anyone to leave the inn. In the end, Colt had been the one reassuring George that it wouldn’t happen again, not the other way around.
Colt aimed his flashlight at the ceiling, then the walls, still clutching the wood. The smell of deteriorated leather and dry-rotted wood hung between the beams. No electricity had ever been run to the carriage house. That was another huge project, and as good as Colt was at a variety of building skills, messing with hot wires had never been his skill. If Tia wouldn’t, or couldn’t, finance an electrician, he’d have to attempt it himself, with or without classes. He had at least five months before any snow would fall.
Colt figured he had a better chance of becoming a master electrician in that time than of winning Tia back.
He snapped the wood in two.
~*~
“Hey, Colt, I hear your fiancée, Cami, is back in town.” Don Grable, owner of Grable Hardware, called to Colt from the front of his small store. The store was empty of other customers, and the man’s voice echoed across the tops of the metal shelves.
Shuffling through bins of nails, Colt looked up across the assorted bolts and screws and washers and called back amiably. “That’s ex-fiancée, and it’s not her. It’s her sister.”
“Ooooh.” Don didn’t look up from his counter, but began to arrange items on display and whistle a tune.
Colt swore under his breath. Here it was again—that awkward way people acted whenever his bout with amnesia or his past came up. Moving toward the checkout, Colt jingled his handful of nails.
“So how is Tia?” Don now checked the roll of tape in his register.
Colt knew what the man really wanted to ask. How was he getting along in his old house? Why had he decided to move back there with his old flame, the one he’d jilted in such a blatant way? Shaking his head, Colt went back for a tube of caulk. “Tia’s fine,” he said, returning and dropping his stuff on the glass counter, letting the items clank as they hit.
Don couldn’t look away now, eyeing Colt by tilting his own graying head up. “Hear you’re fixing up your pa’s inn.”
“Yeah.”
“With your old girlfriend? Cami, or Tia, is it? Trouble with those sisters, you know.”
Colt stood quietly waiting until Don took the hint. How would he answer that question, anyway? Tia and Cami were both part of his past.
“That’s twelve eighty-eight.”
Colt handed him a twenty, took his change, and left, having no patience with the man’s open curiosity.
A pickup truck ground to a stop beside his SUV, swung backward and in one fluid motion parallel parked in one of the store’s metered spots. “Hey, Colt,” Jake called from his open window, his blond ponytail swinging as he hopped out. He made a fake punch to Colt’s gut and clapped him on the shoulder. “We need a new blade for the reciprocal saw.”
“I’m sure Don would love to sell you one. Go on.”
“Sure, boss.”
“I’m not your boss anymore. Even when I was, I couldn’t get you to cut that girly hair off. You’re ready to be your own boss.”
Jake laughed. “Try telling my father that.”
“I did. When I gave him my notice.”
Jake looked up at Colt with appreciation. “Hey, thanks, man.” He shifted his weight, jingling coins in his pocket, suddenly uncomfortable. “Guess I’ll see you at your place Saturday night. Oh, and don’t forget to stop by The Stable tomorrow tonight. Jenny will be there.”
Colt nodded, amused at his friend’s unease. “Don’t worry about me. Worry about yourself on Saturday. You showing up?”
“How could I not? Your old lady’s fixin’ me up with her friend, Liz. She sounds hot.”
“Tia might be older, but she sure isn’t my old lady. That was years ago—a whole lot of years ago. Be respectful to Liz.” Chuckling at his own humor, Colt fished his keys from his pocket. “Later.”
“Yeah, later.” Jake made his way into the store, turning a wary glance toward Colt before disappearing into the cool interior.
It felt good to tease his old friend again. Rubbing his chin with one hand, Colt grinned.
~*~
After finishing the design for her catering flyer, Tia checked the printer’s website for cost. She could easily make flyers on her own printer, if she was willing to settle for ink on colored copy paper. But she wanted slick, glossy handouts, the kind that would attract classy customers to her inn for their wedding receptions and anniversary parties. A full honeymoon package was her specialty.
She’d set up the largest suite with a white decor, including a white canopy bed and white satin drapes, set off by white-on-white striped wallpaper. The white stone fireplace fit right in as the showcase for a romantic fire, and she’d sprinkled the bed with red satin heart shaped pillows. It was a bridal dream.
After a fully catered wedding dinner, the party and guests could dance in the main hall or mingle on the flagstone patio. The happy couple had their choice of a jazz ensemble or a top-forty-type band, either of which would entertain their friends and relatives for hours after they chose to sneak off to their suite and admire each other in the frothy white bed.
It was the wedding night Tia had always imagined for herself, and since she had not had the chance to live it, she planned it for other brides. She knew the fantasy was mainly for the women; most of the men she’d catered for hadn’
t much interest in the decor. As long as they had a bed and a TV, they were happy. Tia smiled at the thought.
Her chest burned a bit as she recalled her own potential groom ending up with her sister. The petty part of her was glad they hadn’t enjoyed a fantasy wedding either. They’d only lived together platonically, which was bad enough, while Colt recovered. She’d known once Colt was himself again that he’d balked at living with Cami without a marriage license. He was honorable that way.
Tia shifted her monitor to see the screen better. The price for printing her glossies couldn’t possibly be that high! Tension inched up her spine, and she reached up to rub the back of her neck. Perhaps a different printer, maybe a local one, could offer a better deal.
She needed a good night’s sleep. More, she needed to go check on her guests and close up for the night. Without that routine she wouldn’t rest well, and since Colt had left shortly after dinner, she assumed she’d need to lock up. Clicking the screen off, Tia pushed to her feet and stretched the taut muscles she’d hunched over her computer since finishing dinner dishes. She had her hand on the doorknob when her phone rang.
Sighing, Tia knew she’d need the reservation book, so she tucked her cellphone under her ear and left her room as she answered. But it wasn’t a guest calling, she realized, as the phone slid from its shouldered cradle to the floor.
The number was displayed. It was her sister.
5
“Cami.” Tia’s pulse quickened as she retrieved the phone, feeling a sweat break out across her forehead. She paced the hall, scarcely noticing the framed photographs of the Cape that lined it, the ones she usually studied, but today just tapped.
“Stop rattling your nails,” Cami said, her tone teasing and familiar. “It’s just me.”
Tia clenched her hands into fists. Cami still knew her well. “Why are you calling?” She needed to know what her sister wanted, but was determined to maintain a little maturity.
