by Katy Paige
Lunch had been high-spirited, with plenty of teasing, and he’d loved watching Zoë. She took it all in stride, giggling and rolling her eyes at turns, giving as good as she got, clever with a turn of phrase, her brown eyes warm and sparkling.
Lars had taken Jane’s hand and led her away on the excuse of checking out some rock formations on the other side of the falls, and Paul had turned to Zoë, happy to finally have her all to himself. He lay back on the blanket and she lay down beside him, her shoulder barely brushing his, but insanely distracting all the same.
“Hey,” she said after several moments of staring up at the bright blue sky.
“What?”
“Remember earlier today? You started to say something, and you didn’t finish. Something about wanting…”
He had pressed his arm up against hers, finding her hand and lacing his fingers through hers. “I wanted to ask you over for dinner tonight.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. What do you think?”
She’d brought his hand to her lips and kissed it softly before murmuring, “I think yes,” forming the words against the back of his hand, which made her lips touch lightly against his stimulated skin. Then she lowered their hands without letting go, resting them in the small space of blanket between them.
That’s the first time Paul felt it.
In his heart. In his gut.
Inconvenient, and yet indisputable.
Not only was he falling for Zoë, he was letting it happen.
The scenery flew by as they neared the Roosevelt Arch and Jane peeked back to look at them. Paul caught her mossy green eyes and gave her a lazy grin.
“She’s asleep,” Jane whispered.
“I thought so,” he murmured back.
Her breathing had been deep and even for a good fifteen minutes now. The un-air-conditioned truck was warm from sitting in the sun all day and the breeze from Jane’s window was cool, creating the perfect conditions for sleep. Plus, he imagined that going up and down that hill had been challenging for Zoë. He’d noticed a more pronounced limp once they’d made it back up to the top.
Jane turned back around, her left arm reaching out to massage Lars on the back of the neck and he turned to his girlfriend, stepping on the gas a little harder before returning his eyes to the road. It wasn’t long before they pulled up in front of Paul’s house.
Paul shook Zoë’s shoulders lightly.
“Zoë,” he whispered in her ear. “We’re home.”
“I’m so tired,” she murmured, looking up at him with heavy-lidded eyes in the dim light of the truck. The sun was almost down.
“I’ll walk you to your inn,” he said. “We can do dinner another time.”
Lars opened her door, and helped her out as Paul came quickly around the truck to take over.
“Night, guys,” he whispered to Lars and Jane, whose elbow rested on the windowsill. “Thanks for today.”
“Thanks so much,” said Zoë, her voice raspy and low from sleep.
“Come find me at the Prairie Dawn tomorrow if you want, Zoë. I’ll be around.”
Zoë smiled at Jane and nodded. “Will do.”
Paul saluted Lars, then took Zoë’s hand, leading her onto the sidewalk as Lars pulled away.
“I’m awake. I can do dinner,” Zoë said, looking up at him with glassy, tired eyes.
“Rain check,” said Paul, pulling her toward her inn. “How about tomorrow?”
“Tonight,” she whispered as they reached the front porch at the Mountain View, stopping to face each other at the bottom of the steps, their hands still laced together.
“Tomorrow,” he insisted, landing a light kiss on her head before dropping her hand.
“Okay,” she sighed, her smile loose and dreamy as she stepped up three steps and found herself finally eye level with him. “Tomorrow.”
“Okay,” he said.
He stared at her in the twilight, the hum of the streetlights and smell of BBQ enveloping them as night inched forward.
He made no move to leave her.
So far, he had kissed her twice.
Zoë decided to even the score.
***
She licked her lips as she dropped her eyes to his mouth, leaning forward slightly and trusting him to catch her from falling. as though on cue, his hands spanned her waist at the same moment her lips landed on his. Her breasts pressed against his chest as he pulled her closer to him, and she stepped down once, closing the rest of the distance between them.
She poured everything she felt for him into that kiss, blurring the lines of Holly and Zoë for herself until they united as one person in her mind, utterly swept away by the man who stood before her.
It was the gentlest kiss they’d shared yet, soft and full of tenderness; the sort of tenderness people share when they’re realizing, for the first time, that they have feelings for each other.
“Zoë,” he breathed, releasing her lips. “Zoë… Zoë…”
She bent her head to the side as he dropped soft, slow kisses to her jaw, her throat, the soft skin behind her ear, relentlessly brushing his lips against her sensitive skin. She pressed closer to him as she imagined his lips continuing their journey down her neck to the soft hollow of her collarbone, grazing it lightly with his teeth before using his tongue to—
“Come up,” she murmured, her heart clutching with want.
He drew back and swallowed, his eyes shuddering closed as he shook his head lightly.
“No,” he whispered.
“Come up,” she asked again.
“No, love,” he repeated, dropping his hands from her waist.
Zoë drew back from him, confusion cooling her blood and bringing a tingly, embarrassed flush to her cheeks.
“Okay.”
But it wasn’t okay. She didn’t understand. He wanted her as much as she wanted him. She couldn’t have misunderstood that.
Tears burned the very backs of her eyes as she turned away from him, running up the stairs and into the inn. She shut the front door without glancing back at him and leaned against it as the first tear of disappointment and embarrassment coursed down her cheek.
A faint rapping directly behind her head made her quickly wipe the tear away with the back of her hand. She took a deep breath and composed herself before opening the door.
His face. Oh, God, his face.
He flexed his jaw twice, holding her eyes unmercifully.
“Do you have any idea how hard that was?”
“To say no?”
“To say no.”
“Good,” she whispered, unable to keep the touch of bitterness out of her voice, even as his eyes were beseeching her to understand, breaking her heart with the strength of his longing.
“I just needed to be sure you knew that,” he whispered.
Then he turned and walked away.
CHAPTER 14
“Zoë! I’m dyin’ here! Why haven’t you called?”
Zoë rubbed her eyes and looked at the clock on the bedside table. 5:47 a.m.
“It’s early here, Sand.”
“Well, it’s almost eight here and I gotta go open the shop soon. How’s it going? How’d he take the news?”
Zoë rolled over on her side, propping herself up on one elbow.
“Well, I, um…”
“What? He’s mad? He’s happy? You’re killin’ me…what happened, Zo?”
Zoë cringed, stalling for time.
“Oh, crap. You didn’t tell him yet.”
She could hear the flat disapproval in Sandy’s voice and she groaned, falling onto her back, staring at the ceiling.
“It’s complicated.”
“No, Zo, it’s not. We practiced. The whole reason you went out there was to tell him the truth. Did you forget that?”
“Forget it? It’s torturing me every second that I’m with him.”
“With him?”
“Yeah, I mean, I’m spending time with him.”
“As Zoë.”
>
“Of course as Zoë.”
“But he still thinks he’s cyberdating Holly?”
“Yeah,” Zoë said quietly, guilt infusing the single word.
There was a long pause on the other end of the line before Sandy spoke again. “You’re messin’ with his head, Zo. It’s not right.”
“He likes me for me. He likes Zoë. We’re hanging out. We’ve kissed—”
“Kissed? Oh, no…”
“No, it’s not like that. It’s not a hookup. I love—I love him, Sand. I love him. I can’t lose him and all I think while I’m around him is that he’s such a stickler for the truth. He’s such a good man, and when I tell him I’ve been lying to him, he’s going to walk away. I just want it to be really, really hard for him to walk away.”
“Zoë. It’s not going to be hard for him to walk away from a pile of lies.”
Zoë’s eyes filled with tears, spilling from the corners of her eyes.
“Why can’t I have a little happiness?” She sobbed. “I don’t deserve something good in my life, do I?”
“Oh, honey, of course you do. But good things don’t usually grow from bad foundations. You’re making a mess of this.” Sandy paused and Zoë heard her take a deep breath and sigh. “Maybe you need to get some space from him and remind yourself why you went out there and what you need to do. Before it’s too late.”
“I don’t have a car, Sand. It’s a small town and my inn is on the same block as his house. Where am I supposed to go?”
“Go on a tour. Isn’t there a big park right there?” The way Sandy said “park” like “pahk” made Zoë sniffle and grin. She sounded like home.
“Yeah. There’s a big park.”
“So? Go on a tour for a day or two. Clear your head. When you get back, you go right to his house, knock on his door and tell him the truth. Lay your cards on the table. Be brave. And you know what? Maybe he won’t walk away, Zo.”
“He’d never trust me again,” she whispered, more to herself than to Sandy.
“You’ll never know unless you give him the chance to decide.”
Zoë took a deep sobbing breath and wiped her eyes, asking how Sandy was feeling and reminding her to take good care of herself. She thought about asking about Thea and Brandon, but she didn’t want to further muddle her already precarious composure and break down into more tears.
When they said goodbye, Sandy reminded her, “You got so much good in you, Zo. So much. I bet he sees it. I know he does. I was wrong before…it’s going to be hard for him to walk away.”
“Thanks, Sand,” she said in a shaky voice, pressing end on her phone and placing it back on the bedside table.
Sandy was right. She needed to tell Paul the truth and perhaps placing a day or two of space between them would make it easier for her to steel herself. She got out of bed and got dressed quickly. It was almost seven o’clock when she started into town, hoping to catch one of the Lindstroms open for business. She’d noticed their office yesterday, a stone’s throw away from the Prairie Dawn.
It had rained overnight, and the sidewalks were wet, and the misty air was heavy and cold on her walk into town. As she passed Paul’s house, she noticed two upstairs lights were on, but she kept moving, quietly and quickly. She wasn’t going to be distracted from her plan.
Walking over the bridge, she glanced down at the river below, thick and wild from so much rain last night, then continued across, looking fondly at the gazebo in the parking lot of the Cowboy Lodge where she and Paul had talked on Saturday night during that intense rain shower. She passed the Prairie Dawn, where she saw Maggie behind the counter, working at a laptop, and Graham taking chairs down from tabletops, getting ready to open in the next few minutes.
A few storefronts later, she stood in front of Lindstrom & Sons, which was open for business early, as Zoë had predicted. She was fairly sure some tours must have to leave in the early morning.
When she opened the front door, an overhead bell jingled cheerfully, and three sets of bright blue eyes looked up at her in surprise.
“Zoë!” said Nils, standing up from behind his desk and coming to the door to extend his hand. “It’s good to see you again.”
“You too,” she said, smiling up at the hulking blond man.
“This is my dad, Carl.” He gestured to an older, white-haired man sitting at the adjacent desk. Mr. Lindstrom rose, putting out his hand.
“Good to know you, Zoë.”
“You too, Mr. Lindstrom.”
His eyes were light blue like a husky pup’s, so icy blue they’d almost be disconcerting if they hadn’t been accompanied by a tan, weathered face that crinkled with a warm smile.
“You’re an early bird!”
“Still on Connecticut time, I guess.”
“You from Connecticut?” asked Nils, crossing his arms over his chest as he leaned against his father’s desk. “I thought Rhode Island.”
Zoë swallowed. Caught in a lie. “I flew out of Rhode Island. I actually live in Connecticut.”
Nils’s eyes narrowed just a fraction before he gave her a small smile.
Zoë turned her eyes quickly to a strikingly pretty blonde, blue-eyed teenager sitting at a desk beside Mr. Lindstrom.
“’Morning,” said Zoë.
Carl gestured to the young woman. “This is Julie Sørensen. My niece. My sister’s girl.”
Zoë offered her a warm grin, which Julie returned. She might be as old as eighteen but not much older than that. “Hey, Julie.”
“Hi,” she answered, Lindstrom-blue eyes trained on Zoë.
“Julie’s come to help out for a while. With Lars leading so many of his own tours lately, we needed someone here to answer phones and whatnot. Just got here yesterday, but she’s already settling in.”
“How’re you liking Gardiner, Julie?”
She offered Zoë a tight smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “It’s just fine.”
Zoë had lots of experience with quiet teenagers who had much more going on in their heads than showed on their faces. She’d lay any bet that Julie’s still waters ran pretty deep. She watched as the younger woman settled back into her work, reaching for her mouse and concentrating on the computer screen in front of her.
“Well, what can we do you for, Zoë?” Mr. Lindstrom looked at her from over his wire-rimmed reading glasses, setting a pile of papers to the side of his desk and picking up another. “Nils can help you with whatever you need.”
Nils gestured to the small loveseat that sat in front of a coffee table in the windowed front area of the small office. Zoë sat down on the edge of the loveseat. Nils settled across from her in one of two wingback chairs.
“I thought I’d take a tour,” she said. “At the airport, you mentioned a group on Tuesday? Tomorrow?”
Nils nodded. “Yup. Still on. But one change. We’re out for two nights now. Not one.”
“Oh.” Zoë hadn’t planned on being away for two nights. Frankly, wasting one night away from Paul felt like a big enough sacrifice. Two felt like eternity.
All the better to steel yourself for returning to tell the truth.
“Okay,” she said. “Two it is.”
“We’re back on Thursday afternoon. Gardiner Harvest Dance is Thursday night which is sort of the way we wrap up that tour.”
The Harvest Dance. It sounded like something out of the 1940s. She wondered if it was held in an old barn with folk dancing, fiddle music and fruit punch. She grinned at Nils.
“Harvest Dance?”
Nils grinned back sheepishly. “Old Gardiner tradition. It’s held out in an open-air pavilion about fifteen minutes north of here near Bald Mountain. Bald Mountain Resort puts it on every year. They decorate it all up for the fall and there’s dancing and the like. Folks like it.”
“Folks’ll have their traditions, Største,” said Mr. Lindstrom from behind them, licking his forefinger to separate papers.
“Ja, Pappa,” answered Nils gently, shrugging at Zoë with
a sheepish grin.
She raised her eyebrows in question at his nickname. “Schtor—”
“Means biggest or largest. In Norwegian,” he explained in a soft, warm voice.
“Oh.”
“My mother was Norwegian. I’m the oldest of four. So… Største,” he said, his cheeks flushing pink.
“I like it,” she said, wanting to put him at ease.
She couldn’t help but notice Julie’s blue eyes peeking at them from behind her computer, and decided to include the teen in their conversation. “You’re Norwegian too, aren’t you, Julie?”
She nodded. “Ja.”
“Do you have a Norwegian nickname?”
“I—I mean, I don’t—I—” Her mouth sort of hovered open like a fish gasping for air.
Nils twisted his neck to wink at his much younger cousin before turning back to Zoë. “She has one, but no way she’s telling.”
Julie’s eyebrows knitted together briefly in consternation before she buried herself in her work with unflinching attention. Zoë was curious, but Julie’s nickname would have to be a story for another day. A day when her uncle and cousin weren’t there to tease her.
“So,” Nils said, his gruff, business voice returning, “do you want to go? For the two nights?”
“Yup. Sign me up.”
He stood up and went to his desk, returning with some forms. “Just fill these out.”
“Oh, um. I forgot to ask…how much walking’s involved?”
“Usually a fair amount. But this tour is special, so not as much.”
As relieved as Zoë was to hear that, her curiosity was piqued. “Why’s this tour so special?”
Nils took a deep breath and cleared his throat. “You ever hear of the Blazin’ Grannies?”
She shook her head slowly, eyes widening.
“Well, you’re about to.”
***
With her tour organized and paid for, Zoë headed back toward the Prairie Dawn to get a cup of coffee. On the short walk, she considered the decision she’d just made, hoping it wasn’t a massive mistake.
Apparently, The Blazin’ Grannies was a group of older ladies who had decided “not to wait for death lyin’ down.” The group of forty-five ladies between the ages of seventy-five and ninety lived year-round in Tampa, Florida. They planned three annual trips with their retirement money, always to adventurous places, always with a flair for danger. The tagline of their peculiar club was: “I’d rather die living!”
