by Cora Seton
“They’re fine. They’re just… not part of my family as far as I’m concerned. Why are they even here?” he went on. “Where’s their father?”
“You think something happened between him and Mary?” Tory asked.
“Wouldn’t he have the kids if that was the case?” His fingers tightened on the steering wheel. “There’s something going on. But we were talking about your mom, not mine. You sure you won’t regret keeping her at arm’s length?” Weren’t women supposed to like being close to their mothers?
“She hasn’t bothered to act like a mother. Now she wants to be friends? Where was she when times were hard?”
“My mom wants us to sell the ranch,” Liam reminded her. “She thinks we should all move to Ohio and buy a spa near where she lives. She wants to be our consultant.”
Tory shook her head ruefully. “God, they’re a pair. Our moms were friends when they were young. Did you know that?”
“No.” Liam couldn’t imagine it. He snuck another look Tory’s way. Her face was tight with anger. Or maybe it was frustration. Her problems with her mother had been a long time in the making.
“They definitely hung out together in high school. I saw a photo once tucked away in an old album. I recognized Mary. Mom nearly ripped it out of my hand.”
Liam kept driving, considering that. Mary and Enid friends? That didn’t sound likely.
“I could use a beer,” he said.
“Me, too.”
He pulled into a liquor store parking lot. “Wait here a minute?”
“Sure.”
When he returned, a twelve-pack under his arm, he was relieved to see Tory still sitting in the passenger seat. She’d found a tissue and was dabbing at her makeup, the vanity mirror down so she could see her reflection.
“This damn heat is melting my mascara,” she said when he got in the truck. “I don’t look like a raccoon, do I?”
“You look good.” She always did, far as he was concerned. When Tory’s mouth quirked into half a smile, Liam’s heart lifted. He got the truck running again and pulled out of the parking lot.
“Where are we headed, anyway?” she asked as they sped down a highway toward Silver Falls, a sleepy little quadrant of streets, shops and cafés surrounded by sinuous roads that wound into the hills.
“My secret hiding place.” He wasn’t sure when he’d decided to take her there, but he couldn’t seem to make himself drop her home. Tory was an intriguing woman—and for all he wanted to get away from his family, he didn’t really want to be alone, either.
Tory straightened. “Really? You have a secret hiding place?”
“Yep. I’ve got three siblings and an ornery great-uncle living with me. Sometimes I need to get away. We’ll have a bonfire. Drink a beer. Look up at the stars. Everything will seem better then.”
When the silence stretched out, he turned to find Tory studying him.
“What?” he asked.
“You’ve got hidden depths, don’t you?”
Liam laughed out loud. “I sincerely doubt it.”
“I think you do. I think you’re hiding in plain sight, Liam Turner.”
“Maybe,” he conceded and took the next right.
“Why do I know this place?” Tory leaned forward to peer out of the windshield at the rough road sloping downward ahead of them. It was lined with trees, and in the darkness it looked like the beginning to every horror movie Liam had ever watched.
“I bet you came out here once or twice as a kid. We did when they had their open house days.” He slowed down as the pavement ended and the road became a dirt track.
“Open house…” Tory huffed out a surprised breath. “Runaway Lake! Oh my goodness, I haven’t thought about this place since I left Montana.”
“No reason to. With the lodge being privately owned, it’s not like you could spend much time here.”
“Is it open to the public now?”
“Nope.” Liam turned to smile at her. “Which is why it’s my hiding place.”
Runaway Lake Lodge.
Tory couldn’t believe it, but Liam was steering the truck around a sharp corner, and now they were rumbling over the old bridge that crossed Runaway River and pulling up to the main parking area.
Memories spilled into her mind. Sunshine. Beach toys. Laughter. Splashing. Hot dogs roasted over a fire. Campfire songs.
Once a year, the weekend after Labor Day, when the tourists were gone but the wind hadn’t turned cold, the Hunts opened the beach and picnic area to the public for a day of activities. It had all been very tame—geared toward families with young children. Teenagers counted themselves far too old for such things, but she must have gone four or five times at least when she was young and her family was whole. This was the kind of entertainment the Coopers believed in: homegrown and cheap.
Tears stung her eyes, but Tory forced them back. She’d been in Chance Creek weeks already. There was no reason for nostalgia to hit her now. Maybe it was Lance’s wedding. She’d already lost Olivia to marriage. Now Lance was gone, too—both of them aligning with the Turners. It was like her childhood was officially over.
Which was silly. It had ended when she turned thirteen.
Lance parked the truck and grabbed the twelve-pack. “Coming?”
“What about the owners?”
“What about them?” He shrugged and tucked the beer under his arm as he bent to look back into the truck’s cab. “The Hunts have been gone for years. There’s a caretaker who looks in now and then, but I’ve never seen him.”
“I don’t want any trouble.” She undid her seat belt and rested her hand on the door.
“There won’t be any trouble.”
She had no idea why she believed him. In the dim moonlight, Liam looked a little dangerous. He wasn’t a friend; she hardly knew him, really, even if they’d been thrown together more often lately because of the merging of their families.
What if he’d brought her here to hurt her?
Tory rolled her eyes at the thought and got out of the truck. Liam wouldn’t hurt her. He knew Steel would put him six feet under if he tried. Her oldest brother was a force to be reckoned with.
Besides, she got the feeling Liam was—lonely.
Did he feel as much of an outsider in his own family as she did in hers? Tory shivered a little although the evening air was still warm, and to her surprise, Liam came to wrap his blazer around her.
“What about you?” she asked, grateful for its warmth.
“I’m not cold. I’ll get a fire going soon enough.” He led the way down to the beach to a ring of logs around a huge firepit. Even if a spark escaped, it would find nothing in the sand to set alight. In a drought year, that was important.
Tory took a seat as Liam dropped the beer nearby, returned to the truck, grabbed an armful of wood and came back. In just a few minutes he had a blaze going.
“No one will see and come looking?” she asked.
“Nope. Like I said, no one lives here anymore. The place is going to the dogs. You should see it in the daylight. Real shame. The lodge is sound enough, I think, although there’s moss on the roof. The greenhouses are empty, but it’s the treehouse cabins that are falling apart.”
“The treehouse cabins.” Tory couldn’t believe she’d forgotten them, but she’d only ever gotten glimpses of them when she was a child. Those were off-limits on public days, and she could understand why. Dozens of people had shown up for those occasions. No treehouse could stand that many kids climbing up into it at once. “I’d love to see one.”
“Not in the dark. Too dangerous.” He handed her a beer.
“Maybe in the light sometime then,” she ventured.
Liam grunted. “Maybe.” He popped the top off his beer and took a drink but didn’t gulp it down, she noticed. She took a drink, too, and sighed. Domestic beer, and not a craft brew, like she’d gotten used to drinking in Seattle. Not her favorite, but it would do.
He took a seat on the ground, his back t
o the log on which she was sitting. A few minutes later, she joined him there. It was far more comfortable like this.
“You’ve got to get up early in the morning,” she observed some time later. “Should we be getting back?”
He took another drink of his beer, buying time, she thought.
“I’m staying out here for a while—a few nights, actually, but I’ll drop you home whenever you’re ready.”
“Staying here? Why? Aren’t you needed at the ranch?”
“A man needs to get away once in a while.”
“Is everything all right?” She couldn’t believe she’d dared to ask. That was a personal question, and she didn’t know Liam well enough to be personal.
She thought he’d say yes, and leave it at that, but he hesitated again.
“No.” He shook his head. “Not even a little bit.”
Tory waited, holding her breath. Was Liam Turner actually going to confide in her?
“There’s always too much to do,” he went on. “Always money that’s short. Always something broken, something to fix, something to find. Used to be Noah helped a lot more, but he’s busy. I have to make all the decisions, and that’s fine, but—”
“Sometimes there’s too many decisions for one person to make,” Tory finished for him. “Don’t I know it.”
“You in a hurry to get back?”
“To Enid and the rest of my family? No.” She wasn’t. She didn’t want to explain—again—to her mother why they’d never be close. Didn’t want to endure Enid’s sad eyes and puppy-dog expression. It wasn’t fair. Enid was the one who’d caused all this.
“Then stay,” Liam said. “I’ve got enough gear for one more.”
“Stay? With you?”
“I’m not going to jump you. Not even if you want me to,” he added with a grin.
“I don’t want you to jump me.” Tory wasn’t sure that was strictly true, but she sure as hell wasn’t going to let Liam know that. For some reason she kept finding herself looking at him. At his firm jaw. His strong hands. Those shoulders. Liam wasn’t a kid anymore, that was for sure. He was all man.
“I’m just saying I’ll be a gentleman. There’s plenty of room. No one will ever come looking for you here. No one even remembers this place.”
“I doubt that. I bet kids come here all the time to party and have sex.”
“I’ve never seen any of them. It’s like it has a spell on it,” he mused. “Like it’s just waiting for its people to come back.”
“Whatever happened to the Hunts?”
“The boys grew up. Joined the military. Their mom got sick of running the resort all on her own after a while, I guess. She took off, too.”
“Remember her flowers?” Somewhere on the property there were rows of greenhouses and fields behind them that had burst with color all summer long. Monica Hunt had supplied cut flowers to florists for miles around.
“Yep. They were something. So, what do you say? Want to join my camping trip?”
“You got any grub?”
“I do.” He sounded amused.
“Pancakes and bacon for breakfast?”
“You got it.”
“Hot chocolate?”
“Yep.”
“A sleeping pad?”
“Yeah, I got those, too. Greenhorn,” he added in mock disgust.
“You brought more than one? Who did you think was coming with you?”
“No one.” He moved to put another log on the fire, and sparks shot up in the air. They danced into the sky to compete against the pinpricks of light from the stars. “I just had a whole truck bed. Figured I’d be extra comfortable.”
“Glad you did. Yes, I’ll stay,” Tory said decisively. “I’d better text Steel, though, and let him know I’m okay. If anyone were to track me down here, it’d be him.”
“You’re probably right. Don’t need your brother coming after me. You can’t use your phone, though. No reception at all in this hollow. We’ll have to walk out to the other side of the bridge and up the road a bit.” He stood up.
“What about the fire?”
“We’ll be back in a minute. There’s nothing to burn on this beach.”
“That’s true.”
Tory took in the silence as they walked, aware that things were rarely this quiet at the ranch—or in Bozeman—or Seattle for that matter. She’d missed this kind of country stillness.
“Chance Creek has its moments, huh?” he asked as if guessing her thoughts.
“Silver Falls does, I guess.”
“You don’t like our town much, do you?”
“What did Chance Creek ever do for me?” she countered. All her later memories were tinged with the shame of knowing everyone knew about her father’s exploits, even before he was caught. Tory had been so glad to get away from that. In Seattle, no one knew her. She’d been able to completely reinvent herself as an upright, dependable, trustworthy citizen. Without her family around to screw things up for her, she’d never had to worry about being the butt of gossip or the receiver of pitying glances.
She’d needed that.
Since she’d been back she’d braced herself every time she ventured into town, but the truth was no one had whispered or turned their back on her. Maybe things had changed.
“What did you ever do for Chance Creek?” Liam asked with another smile.
“I don’t want to talk about this.” His question reminded her of the Founder’s Prize and her aunt Virginia’s demand that she win it for the family.
Out of the question. She wasn’t even going to try.
“How about this, then? Are you seeing anyone?”
“You said you’d be a gentleman,” she reminded him. They’d crossed the bridge and walked up the road. She pulled out her phone and checked it. “I’ve got bars here.”
“Just asking,” Liam said as she wrote her text. “Trying to fill in the blanks of the past thirteen years.”
“I’m not seeing anyone. You?” she added when she was done with her message to Steel.
“Nope. Single.”
She looked around at the dark trees and starry skies. “What a pair of sad sacks we are.”
Liam leaned forward and kissed her.
Chapter Two
“Hell, I didn’t mean to do that,” Liam said. What was wrong with him? This was exactly what he’d said he wouldn’t do—to Tory and to himself.
Tory hadn’t moved. Her lips were parted, and the look she was sending his way was half outraged, half amused.
“What?” he demanded when she didn’t speak.
“I knew you wouldn’t get through the evening without trying that.”
“Oh, you did, did you?” he asked, stung. “But I notice you stayed anyway. Maybe you wanted me to kiss you.”
“Maybe I did.” She looked as surprised as he felt after she said the words. “I mean—we were just at a wedding. I have been single a long time, and I’ve been… I don’t know. Sad today.”
He found himself shifting closer. “I could kiss you again.” He was losing his mind. Out of control. The last thing he should be doing was kissing Tory Cooper.
“Okay.” Tory tossed her hair back and grinned at him.
Liam’s body reacted before his mind caught up. He wrapped an arm around her, buried a hand in her hair and tilted her head so he could meet her mouth with his.
God, she tasted good. Felt good in his arms. Smelled like heaven. A floral scent mixed with woodsmoke.
When he pulled back, aching for more but determined not to push it, Tory let out a breath.
“The two of us shouldn’t work like that,” she said.
“Know what you mean.” The sparks flying between them rivaled that of the fire they’d left behind.
Speaking of which.
“We’d better get back.”
“Yeah.”
They retraced their steps and took their seats leaning up against the log. This time Liam noticed Tory sat closer, though.
And whe
n he put his arm around her shoulder, she didn’t pull away.
They sat like that for a long time before Tory shifted. “Are we sleeping right here?”
“Do you have a better idea?” Liam was finding it hard to focus on anything except the curve of her neck and the light, smoky scent of her hair. Things had gone from zero to sixty before he’d realized they were even at the starting gate. He wasn’t sure what was happening. All he knew was he didn’t want it to stop.
“Just wondered if you planned to break into the lodge or something.”
Liam pulled away. “Break in? I’m not Steel—” He bit off the rest of his sentence, realizing too late what he was saying. “I mean—”
Tory shifted away. “You mean Coopers are the criminals, not Turners. And yet you’re the one who’s trespassing, right?”
“So are you!” She was right; he took pride in his family’s reputation for doing what was right. He did his best to walk a moral path, although Noah was the one who had the lock on that.
“At your instigation.”
“That wouldn’t hold up in court.”
“Probably not,” she agreed with a lopsided smile he couldn’t interpret. “So we’re sleeping here on the beach.”
He tried to keep up. Tory was running rings around him tonight. Had she come to the wedding planning to flirt with him? Maybe she thought it was funny.
He needed to keep a clear head.
“That was the plan. It’s not supposed to rain, so I wasn’t going to bother with a tent, but I’ve got one if you’d prefer,” he said.
“I’m fine under the stars, but I’ll probably head back first thing tomorrow, so if you don’t mind, I’ll call it a night.”
He did mind, and he was sorry that things had gotten tense between them when they’d been going so well, but while he might not be the world’s best conversationalist, he did know when to shut up. He’d ruffled Tory’s feathers with that remark about Steel, and she would take anything he said now as a further attack, whether or not he meant it that way.
He got to his feet and held out a hand. When Tory took it and allowed him to help her up, he breathed a sigh of relief. He hadn’t screwed things up beyond repair.
