Sky High (Alaskan Frontier Romance Book 2)

by Jennifer McArdle

  Lily’s hair, hastily pulled back into a ponytail, was beginning to glisten from the light mist falling from the sky. She hadn’t worn a raincoat the day before, so Lily had nothing to protect herself from the drizzle, but she didn’t really care.

  She hurried past the pub, said hello to a couple fishermen as they passed. She didn’t feel the slightest urge to stop in at the pub to check on things. All she wanted right then was to be alone. But where could she go to be alone? Her dad would be at home. The cove was too close to Mason’s house, so she couldn’t go there. She wasn’t even sure if she wanted to, after the night they’d spent together. She decided, instead, to take a long walk.

  Lily passed by The General Store, the northernmost building in town. The boardwalk ended there. Nothing lay beyond but wilderness, quiet and solitude. That’s exactly what she was looking for.

  Swinging a leg over the railing, she quickly climbed over and jumped down onto the soft earth. Her boots sunk into the muskeg soil, each step leaving an indentation, proof that someone had been there. The forest was thick, so Lily made her way toward the exposed tidal flats, a long stretch of damp shoreline covered in tiny shells, pebbles, and seaweed.

  What she needed was a quiet walk along the secluded, undeveloped shoreline. It was a roundabout way to get home, one that would take her significantly longer than the boardwalk, but time was exactly what Lily needed. Time and seclusion. She would pass by no one.

  The shoreline curved eastward almost immediately north of town, cutting off Lily’s view of the boardwalk and the buildings that lined it. That was why she’d chosen this path. There weren’t many places in town where she could find true privacy. None, actually. And with no roads, the only way to get out was to either fly out or boat out. For all the wide, open spaces in Alaska, the vast amounts of undeveloped land, sometimes it sure could feel like a small, enclosed space. There was nowhere to go, no way out. Lily had never minded it before, but now she almost understood why her mother left Heron so long ago.

  Seclusion. It was both good and bad.

  It was one of the things that had initially made her brother reluctant to get involved with Nora. Jake had feared she wouldn’t be able to handle the isolation and she would leave like their mother had.

  Not that Juneau was any less isolated. It was yet another town cut off from the rest of the world due to lack of any road in or out. But the isolation didn’t seem as noticeable there, probably because there was always something going on. More people. More entertainment. More distractions from the fact that they were essentially trapped on the edge of an island.

  She rounded Turner Point and Shoal Cove came into view. Near the shore sat the white house she’d grown up in. It looked quaint from this angle. Rarely did Lily approach the house from the water, not since she was a child and spent her days combing the expanse of beach left behind by the falling tide.

  Something on the ground caught her eye. Stooping down, Lily reached for an object in the sand. One end stuck up out of the tidal flats at an angle, the rest was buried. Lily pushed the sand aside and picked up the object. An artifact, she suspected. A remnant of the Tlingit peoples who lived on the island long before the town was founded. Lily examined it closely and then put it in her pocket. She had a small collection of artifacts she’d found on the beach over the years. She kept them as a reminder of the people who had lived there before her, to remind herself that one day she would be gone. She hoped she would leave behind something that later generations would find, something that would show them she’d been there once, as well.

  The sun was high in the sky, but not a single ray of sunshine was visible through the thick gray clouds overhead. The misty rain hadn’t lessened, but at least it hadn’t gotten heavier, either. Still, Lily felt the dampness. Her clothes were beginning to stick to her body. A sheen of water glazed her skin. She ignored it. One thing Lily was used to was the rain. It was a constant throughout most of the year in Heron, the bringer of life and lush greenery. It was the one thing Lily could count on.

  She wanted to be able to count on Mason, too.

  That morning, the way he’d held her in his arms, she’d felt so content beside him. She should have just relished the moment, but instead she’d taken it a step further. She put herself out there, and he responded by saying he loved her spirit. What did that even mean?

  She should have known better than to expect anything from him. She should have known better than to let her heart get involved. Hadn’t she promised herself that she would keep things casual? She was just supposed to be having fun. But somewhere along the line, it had become so much more than that. She’d fallen for him again, head over heels.

  There it was, plain and simple. Lily loved him. Maybe she never stopped.

  Mason, on the other hand, had never opened himself up easily. He kept the most intimate parts of himself closed off from everyone. Lily suspected he’d never fully given himself to anyone, not even to her. It was his nature. Where Lily found it easy to interact with others, Mason struggled with it.

  She supposed Dalton’s death didn’t help, either. Mason was even more closed off, now that Dalton was gone, than he’d ever been. Lily believed she was helping him tear down the walls he’d built around himself, helping him come to terms with Dalton’s death. But progress was slow with Mason.

  And when Lily confessed her love for him, all Mason could say was he loved her spirit.

  Lily felt guilty, then. She recognized Mason’s words for what they were. It was the best he could do at that moment, when he was obviously feeling so exposed, vulnerable. Hadn’t he just revealed a secret? Wasn’t he still grieving for his brother?

  Overly sensitive, that’s what she’d been. She was still coming down from the high of having spent the night with Mason. She’d given him her body and her heart. So, when those words came out of his mouth, it was completely natural for Lily to react the way she did. But it wasn’t warranted.

  She knew Mason.

  He would never hurt her, at least, not again. Not like he did before. Especially not if Lily reined in her emotions, at least for the time being.

  Lily remembered the way he’d cradled her in his arms that morning, the way he touched her hand at the breakfast table. Maybe he hadn’t said he loved her, but he definitely felt something for her. And if she was patient enough, eventually he would admit his true feelings.

  Chapter 13

  Samuel sat at the kitchen table. He’d been sitting there for hours, trying to figure out how to broach the subject. The afternoon sun had long since disappeared and the room was now dark. He hadn’t bothered to turn on a light.

  Lil would be home soon. Of that, he was sure.

  She hadn’t come home the night before and he had a pretty good idea where she’d been. With Mason. He wasn’t so much concerned about Lil getting involved with the guy. In fact, he’d pretty much expected it the minute Mason got back into town. The way they were as kids, Samuel knew there was no stopping it.

  But that didn’t mean Samuel didn’t worry about his little girl. Even though Lil wasn’t a child anymore, she would always be his baby.

  Right now, though, Samuel was more concerned with the fact that his daughter was secretly taking flying lessons. She’d begged him to let her learn to fly when she was younger, but he worried she was too easily distracted for that kind of thing. Besides, he figured it was a passing phase. She grew up and she never mentioned it again.

  Samuel hadn’t thought about Lil’s desire to fly for years, so long he’d practically forgotten the way Lil had pouted about it for weeks.

  And then he got a phone call from Gus that afternoon and found out Lil had been spending a lot of time up in the air with Mason. By the looks of it, he’d said, they weren’t just taking pleasure rides. Gus was pretty sure Lil was learning to fly.

  Thinking on it, Samuel wasn’t surprised. But he was disappointed she’d chosen to hide it from him. He prided himself on the fact that his kids could always tell him anything.
He never expected Lil to keep secrets. She never had, as far as he knew, until now.

  With a creak, the door opened and then closed. Lily tossed her tote bag on the countertop and flipped the light switch.

  “Oh!” She jumped when she saw her father sitting at the kitchen table. Then she let out a relieved sigh. “You startled me. What are you doing sitting here in the dark?”

  “I was waiting for you.”

  “In the dark?”

  “Didn’t want to waste electricity. Besides, sitting in the dark gives a man a chance to think.”

  That didn’t sound good. Concerned, Lily sat down at the table across from him. He looked tired, worried. “What’s going on,” she asked guardedly. “This isn’t about Mom, is it?”

  Samuel almost laughed at that. “No, it’s not about your mother. Not everything is about that woman, even though you like to think so. This is about you.” He paused for a second and looked her in the eye. He actually felt a little silly, sitting across from his daughter like she were still a child. “Is there anything you want to tell me?”

  It was strange, but Lily felt like a kid again, caught with her hand in the cookie jar. She fought the urge to lie, knowing it would do no good.

  “I’ve been seeing Mason.” She blurted it out as if it were a bad thing.

  Surely that’s what he was concerned about, Lily thought. He suspected she was getting involved with the man who’d broken her heart, and he didn’t approve. Well, it wasn’t his choice, now was it?

  “This isn’t about Mason.” Samuel’s words surprised Lily and she narrowed her eyes at him, not quite convinced.

  “Then what’s this about, if it’s not Mason?”

  “Well, I guess it is about him, but not like that.”

  Samuel folded his hands on the table and took a deep breath, unsure how to explain.

  The fact was, he was glad Lil was finally seeing someone. He’d worried about her, wondered if she would ever find happiness. He knew she liked living in Heron, that she felt satisfied with her work at the pub and volunteering to direct the fall production each year. But he worried she would never experience the happiness that starts with finding a lifetime partner. He wanted her to experience love. He wanted her to have a family of her own. So it was a relief to see her with Mason.

  “I don’t care if you’re seeing Mason,” Samuel began. “It’s about time you started dating again. It’s no secret I want to see you settle down – and I’m not saying Mason is the one – but it’s no good being alone. You’ve been alone for too long.”

  Satisfied he’d gotten at least one thing off his chest, Samuel leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. Lil’s love life wasn’t the reason he’d been sitting in the dark kitchen waiting for her to get home.

  “So, what’s going on?” she asked again.

  “I think you have the answer to that question,” he said, giving her a chance to tell him, hoping she would come clean about it.

  “I think there’s something you may have forgotten to tell me,” he prompted.

  Lily’s face turned pale. He knew. He found out about the flying lessons, she realized. She shouldn’t have kept it a secret, but she knew he didn’t like the idea of her piloting an airplane. They’d been through this discussion before, years earlier. He had made his standpoint very clear back then. He didn’t want her flying.

  “He’s been teaching me to fly,” Lily quietly admitted, expecting a lecture would soon follow. “I’m sorry. I should have told you. But I knew what you’d say. You don’t think I’d be a good pilot.” She paused, unable to look him in the eye. She felt ashamed for lying to him. “But, dad, I’m doing it. I’ve been up there a couple times now and it’s amazing. It’s everything I thought it would be. It’s so… freeing.”

  As she spoke, her fingernails absently picked at a burn mark on the surface of the table. Her mother, the only person in the family who wasn’t a natural in the kitchen, had scorched the tabletop years ago with a hot cast iron pan. Now, Lily stared at it as if her life depended on it, bracing herself for a lecture. But it never came.

  “Was that so hard?” Samuel asked instead. The tone of his voice wasn’t harsh or critical. It was gentle, laced with humor.

  Lily looked up at him, surprised.

  “You’re not mad?”

  Samuel chuckled and shook his head.

  “Lil, you’re a grown woman. You can make your own choices, you ought to know that by now. I didn’t let you take flying lessons when you were younger because you were still too immature. I’m your father. It was my job to protect you and that’s all I was doing.”

  “So you don’t care if I get my pilot’s license?”

  “Not at all. You should pursue your passions, follow your dreams. Just don’t try to hide it from me, okay? I don’t want you to ever think you have to hide things from me.”

  Lily’s face broke out into a smile. She jumped up from her seat and scurried around the table, wrapping her arms around him in a big hug. “I’m sorry, Dad. I wanted to tell you. I really did. I was just afraid you would try to stop me.”

  She stopped talking long enough to grab a glass from the cupboard and fill it with water.

  “I really am sorry, Dad. No more secrets. I promise,” she said before taking a drink.

  Then she sat back down at the table and began telling him about flying. It felt good to be open with him about it, to not feel like she needed to hide it.

  As Lily launched into an account of her flying adventures, Samuel listened with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, but his thoughts were elsewhere. No more secrets. Lily’s words echoed in his head, bringing back an old guilt he’d kept buried for too many years. He needed to tell her. It wasn’t fair to keep it from her. It never had been. He just wasn’t sure how to bring it up.

  She was in the middle of telling him about her first time at the controls and she wasn’t leaving out any detail. He didn’t want to interrupt, so he waited until Lily paused to take another drink of water. It was only a few seconds.

  “You know, I’m glad you and Mason are spending time together,” Samuel said before Lily launched back into the story. “He was a good kid. Did what he was told.”

  Samuel remembered that fact well enough. Mason had done exactly what his parents asked of him, no matter the consequences.

  “Dad, I know where this conversation is heading,” Lily said, sensing that her father wanted to discuss something more serious than her adventures up in the air. “You’ll take your sweet time getting to the point, so I’ll save you the energy. You’re worried he’s going to break my heart again.” She said it matter-of-factly, certain that’s what he wanted to discuss. “You don’t have to worry about that. Mason hurt me once before, but we were just kids. He didn’t know what he was doing. Neither of us did. Maybe it got to be too much for him and he couldn’t take it. I don’t know. But the point is…”

  “No, Mason knew what he was doing.” Samuel interrupted. He said it with such certainty, Lily realized he wasn’t merely speculating. Her father knew something about it.

  “You think he deliberately tried to hurt me?” she asked. Lily couldn’t believe Mason would have tried to hurt her on purpose, that he would plan to break her heart. No. He’d simply let things go farther than he was prepared for. The intensity of their relationship was more than he could handle at that age. He was too young to understand what he was doing or what impact it would have on her.

  “That’s not what I’m saying,” Samuel shook his head. “Not even close.”

  “What, then?”

  For so long, Samuel had wanted to tell her the reason Mason had broken her heart. But he figured Mason would never come back and Lil would move on with her life. There had never been a reason to dredge up the past. But now Mason was back and they were picking up where they’d left off. She had a right to know.

  “Maybe you should hear it from Mason.”

  “Dad, if you know something, tell me,” Lily
said, growing impatient. It was clear her father was holding back.

  Samuel sighed.

  “Like I said, Mason always was a good kid.” He was trying to put it as delicately as possible. “He did whatever his parents told him to do.”

  The meaning of her father’s words took a moment to set in.

  “His parents… made him break up with me?” Even as she said the words aloud, Lily couldn’t believe it. “Why would they do that? That doesn’t make any sense. They always liked me.”

  Samuel stood up and walked across the kitchen. He grabbed a jug of juice out of the fridge and poured himself a small glass. It was a diversion. He was stalling

  “Dad, why would they do that?” Lily asked again.

  “Seems he was going to pop the question. He had a ring and everything.”

  Lily was stunned. She sat there in shocked silence, trying to find her voice.

  “He was going to… propose?” It came out as a rasp.

  The revelation took her breath away. Her mind raced, trying to put the pieces together. He planned to ask her to marry him, but instead he broke off their relationship. How could things go so drastically different? What kind of sway did his parents have over him? Or was Mason really so weak-minded, so willing to give her up?

  “And you knew,” she said, the words barely more than a whisper.

  Samuel couldn’t deny the role he’d played.

  “Yes. I knew about it,” he admitted. He saw the look on her face, the shock and disbelief.

  He also saw anger beginning to swirl in her eyes.

  “What was I supposed to do?” Samuel tried to explain. “You were 16 years old and I could tell you were head over heels for him. Neither one of you was old enough to be making a decision like that. In a few more years, maybe. But not at that age.”

  The look in Lily’s eyes turned cold as polished steel, but she didn’t say anything.

  “We tried to talk some sense into him, to convince him to wait until you were both 18. We weren’t getting through to him. But his parents won out in the end. They always did have an unhealthy need to control their children’s lives.”