by Bella Andre
Just for tonight. By tomorrow he'd make damn sure he'd worked out a way to get back into his own damn lakefront cabin.
Walking around the front of the Inn, he remembered going to piano and popcorn nights in the oversized great room with a fireplace big enough that a half dozen of them could stand up inside it. Looking at it now, he could hardly believe it was the same place. It now sported weatherproof windows, a new wing off the back, and extensive landscaping.
He pulled open the door and was surprised to see his old friend Stu Murphy standing behind the front desk. They'd both been big fans of superhero comic books and had spent endless hours up in the Poplar Cove lofts reading by flashlight.
But Connor wasn't in any mood for a walk down memory lane. He should have known better than to come downtown, to the Inn, where he would run in to all these people who knew him as a kid. In a small town where everyone knew everything about everyone else, they'd all want to know about his scars. About what he was doing out here.
"Connor MacKenzie. How long has it been?" Stu said. "Glad to see you back in the Adirondacks."
Connor worked to cover his black mood as he shook his friend's hand. "You work here now?"
"Actually, I own it. Sean and I bought the Inn a couple years ago." Stu did a double take at Connor's scars and paled. "I heard you were a firefighter out west."
"Yup. Sam and I are hotshots in Lake Tahoe."
"Sounds great," Stu said easily, his relief at not having to go there palpable. Just as Connor had known it would be.
Putting street clothes on the day he'd left the hospital, Connor had made the decision that he wasn't going to hide his scars from anyone, even if most people probably wished he would. He'd always been more comfortable in T-shirts. He ran hot, even in cold weather, always had.
His burns weren't some sort of battle scars that he would forever wear with pride, but he wasn't ashamed of what had happened either. Firefighters often got burned. It was the risk of the job. But also part of the adrenaline rush, the reason they were all out there. Because there was nothing better than bringing a fiery bitch to her knees, nothing more satisfying than knowing he'd saved another forest, another house, another life.
Still, he hadn't realized just how uncomfortable most people would be with his scars. Even people he'd thought were friends.
Ginger was one of the only people he'd ever come across who hadn't pretended not to notice. Instead, she'd blurted the first things that came into her head.
Her reaction almost felt like a welcome change.
"So what are you doing out here?" Stu asked.
"Sam's getting married here end of this month. I was planning to take the next few weeks to fix up Poplar Cove."
Once he got Ginger to grant him access to his own house, that was.
"I'm getting married too." Stu backed away from the counter and poked his head into the office behind the front desk. "Rebecca, do you have a minute? There's an old friend of mine I'd like you to meet."
A pretty brunette came out and shook his hand. "Hi there," she said as Stu made the introductions.
"It's always nice to meet another one of Stu's friends. I'm sure the two of you got up to a lot of trouble as kids."
Just then Stu's cell phone rang. "Shoot. It's the bride again. I swear this is the last wedding we're having here. Ever again."
Stu's fiancee lowered her voice, grinning as he walked away. "At least I now know exactly the kind of bride I don't want to be." She cocked her head to the side. "Were you just coming by to see Stu, or did you need something else?"
"I need a room. Just for tonight."
Her face fell. "Oh, I'm so sorry, Connor. I wish we had one, but this wedding has simply taken over. Every single room. Even the ones that we don't usually rent out. These people have practically moved into the supply closets. And all the local B&Bs are booked too for the next few days. But I can make a few calls to some of the nearby towns if you have a few minutes."
It didn't take long for her to confirm that the nearest opening was an hour away at a motel on Piseco Lake at the southern tip of the Adirondacks.
"Don't worry about it," he said. "I'll figure something out."
Damn it, he should be sleeping at Poplar Cove. He could just imagine Ginger's face if she found him kicking his feet up with a beer on her porch when she got off work, how her eyes would get big, the way her cheeks would flush with outrage.
What was he thinking? He'd just met her. He didn't know her at all. And beyond getting her to agree to let him work on the cabin, he didn't plan to. She was just some random woman who happened to be living in his family's lake house.
The fact that there was something intriguing about her--he hadn't expected a woman as soft and artsy-looking as her to have such backbone--was irrelevant.
But Stu's fiancee clearly couldn't stand to think of him being homeless for the night. "I'm sure Stu wouldn't want you going all the way to Piseco. If you wouldn't mind sleeping on his couch, you could stay with him until a room opens up when this wedding is finally over."
He knew a good offer when he heard one and after she brought him upstairs and showed him into Stu's suite of rooms and his couch for the night, he quickly changed into his running gear. Five minutes later he was sprinting away from Main Street.
He should have known this trip would turn into a total clusterfuck. For twenty-eight years, everything he'd wanted had come right to him. The perfect job. Gorgeous women. Life had been easy. Fun. Exhilarating.
Two years after his accident everything should be back on track. Not unraveling more every day. So many times in Lake Tahoe he'd wanted to get in his car and just drive. Anywhere. Just to get away. To get out of his head. To leave what had happened on the mountain behind. Especially on those nights when sleep didn't come, when all he could do was replay those sixty seconds in Desolation Wilderness when everything had changed.
But that was the wimp's way out. So he'd held tight. Waited for the Forest Service to get it right and put him back with his crew. Waited until this morning, when he'd gotten on the plane to New York.
Was it too much to ask for a little peace and quiet? For some space to get his shit together and push his body until it finally gave up the fight and did what he goddamned wanted it to do? Was it too much to want to help his brother with his wedding and bring his great-grandparents' cabin back to its former glory?
His lungs were burning, but it was the good kind of burn, the kind of pain that reminded him how lucky he was to be alive. Sprinting like this was what had gotten him off that trail in Lake Tahoe with nothing more than a couple of fucked-up hands and arms, some nasty scars on his shoulders and neck.
And that was why he was going to run past the pain, run until he was too exhausted to notice it anymore.
Two hours later, he limped upstairs in the near state of exhaustion he'd been shooting for and found a message on Stu's fridge telling him to grab whatever he wanted. He downed one beer before his shower and was already halfway through the second as he made his way out to the end of the Inn's long dock. Searching for a spot with cell service.
Ginger had been right about one thing. It was long past time to check in with his grandparents.
Standing out on the edge of the dock in the fading light, he watched a small sailboat drift by. He'd just spent a couple of hours running through cedar and poplar trees, but he hadn't really taken in his surroundings yet.
His whole life he'd been a doer, a mover. But sometimes as a kid, late at night after the campfires were out and the moon was high in the sky, he'd learned to be still. To sit quietly and listen for the call of the loon. To watch the water lap softly at the shore.
Right here, in this moment of perfect silence on the lake, he should be feeling it in his solar plexus.
But he didn't. Couldn't.
Pulling his phone out of his pocket, he dialed his grandparents in Florida. "MacKenzie residence."
"It's Connor."
> "Who? I used to have a grandson with that name. But I haven't heard from him in so long I've forgotten all about him."
He wasn't in any mood to give his grandmother the apology she was fishing for. Not after she'd gone and rented Poplar Cove out from under him.
"I'm at the lake. At the Inn. Where I'm going to be sleeping on Stu Murphy's couch."
"Get over it, Connor. You and your brother haven't used the cabin since you were kids. And is that any way to talk to your grandmother?"
He should have known she wouldn't let him get away with being an ass. Hell, she'd single-handedly controlled two crazy-active kids every summer for eighteen years. A tiny woman, she was deceptively tough. She didn't care if he was three or thirty. She wasn't going to put up with his shit.
"The young woman we rented it to came highly recommended by the Miller girl. You know, the one who manages all of the summer places? In any case, it's been a blessing knowing someone is there to make sure the place doesn't fall down."
Her admonishment was loud and clear. Given that his grandparents now lived full-time in Florida and had stopped making the drive back and forth to the Adirondacks every six months, it made sense to rent the place out. Not because his grandparents needed the money, but because the log cabin hadn't been built to remain empty for years on end.
Poplar Cove was the kind of place kids should be running through, dripping on the porch in wet bathing suits, leaving a trail of sand from their feet all the way up the stairs to the bedrooms. And, on a more practical note, it certainly didn't hurt to have someone in residence who could alert the owners if something broke and needed fixing.
"Have you met our tenant?" she asked. "Is she pretty?"
"Yes, I've met her," he said, not bothering to answer the second question. His grandmother would get far too much satisfaction from knowing just how pretty Ginger was.
"What does she think of you?"
"Not much. Told me to get off her porch."
"Good for her. Sounds like a girl with a good head on her shoulders."
"The place needs work, Grandma. Lots of work. Far as I can tell, it'll take me most of the next month to get it all taken care of."
His grandmother made a sound of irritation. "Here's the deal, kid. Ms. Sinclair has a lease with us through Labor Day and I intend to honor it."
He rolled the woman's last name around on his tongue. Sinclair. It sounded fancy. Posh. Even a little stuck-up. Funny how none of those tags seemed to fit the barely dressed, out-of-tune singer with the paintbrushes and wild curls.
"If you really think you need to get in there to fix anything," she continued, "work it out with her. And FYI, if this phone call is any indication as to your approach, I'd think about putting on some of the charm you used to be famous for." In the background he could hear his grandfather speaking. "It's cocktail hour, honey, got to go. Love you!"
Connor hung up the phone, staring out at the sun slowly setting over the lake as he pondered the unexpected complication to his summer plans.
His grandmother was right. His best bet for getting Ginger to give him what he wanted would be to yank the old charming Connor out of the rubble. But it had been a long time since he'd been with a woman, since the days when all he had to do was grin and they'd fall into his arms.
That first time he'd gone back to one of the usual firefighter groupie haunts after his grafts had healed, he'd barely been in the bar ten minutes when he realized he didn't belong there anymore. Not because the women looked repulsed, even though he knew that would come if they got too close and made the mistake of running their fingers over his scars.
He didn't belong there, because he wasn't fighting fire anymore. And he wouldn't belong in that world again until he convinced the Forest Service to put him back on his crew.
The sun kept falling, the clouds turning a brilliant red-orange that he remembered so well from childhood. But then, suddenly they weren't clouds anymore.
They were red-orange flames.
He was back in California, out on the mountain, in the deadly heat, running, running, running but not getting anywhere. Not getting away.
God, he'd never felt heat like this. Never run so hard. His lungs were running on fumes and then he was choking, gasping, his lungs shutting down as he tried to breathe in oxygen that wasn't there anymore.
This was it.
He'd finally met the fire he couldn't outrun.
He could practically hear the flames laughing at him as they blew him down, pulling him in, dragging him backward, dragging him under, taking him straight into hell.
Oh shit, his hands were melting. The pain took him over as every goddamned cell broke apart and all he could think was Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Death would be a sweet release from this torture, but he didn't want it, was fighting with everything he had.
He wasn't done yet, damn it!
And then, he realized he couldn't feel his hands anymore, couldn't hold on to his Pulaski. It dropped out of his hands, fell in a loud crash ...
Connor abruptly found himself standing back on the dock. The empty beer bottle was lying on the dock between his feet. The breeze had picked up, cooling the sweat that was covering his face.
What had just happened? One moment he was looking out at the lake and the next ...
Fucking PTSD. The episodes hadn't started up right away, not until the pain from his skin grafts had become unbearable. His first Forest Service reinstatement denial had made them worse. With every appeal that had been denied, his episodes had grown bigger, more intense.
And he'd had to work harder and harder to deny their existence.
CHAPTER THREE
"HEY SWEETHEART, you brought me the wrong pie."
Ginger looked down at the thick slice of lemon meringue she'd just set in front of Mr. Sherman. He was one of the diner's regulars, an old-timer whose wife had passed away long before Ginger arrived at Blue Mountain Lake. Either he didn't know how to cook or didn't want to. Most nights, he arrived at six p.m. on the dot and sat down at the table in the back corner. Sometimes he was joined by a friend. Tonight, he'd dined alone on meat loaf and mashed potatoes. Cherry pie was his standing dessert order.
"I'm sorry about that, Mr. Sherman," she said as she picked up the offending plate. "I don't know where my mind is tonight."
A blatant lie.
Ginger took the lemon pie back, switched it with a slice of cherry, gave it to Mr. Sherman, and was wiping down the counter with more force than necessary when the bells on the front door chimed. She put down her rag and she was reaching into the menu box when she looked up.
And saw him.
Connor.
The immediate instinct to smooth down her hair and check her shirt for stains was so strong her hands were halfway to her head by the time she realized what she was doing.
What was she doing? Why was she worrying about impressing Connor?
That part of her life, the one where she made sure to be primped and polished just in case she ran into an acquaintance in an overpriced chichi grocery store was over and done with. She was simply going to show Connor to a seat, take his order and then deliver his food as she would any other customer.
And no matter what, she wasn't going to have any kind of hormonal reaction to his broad shoulders or chiseled jaw.
Cold as ice. That was her.
He sat down right in front of her, looking just as dangerous as he had on her porch.
"You're here. Ginger Sinclair."
She'd never heard anyone say her name like that, almost like it was a curse, but with a distinct sensual vibration beneath it.
Her heart jumped in response and she watched in horror as his eyes honed in on the pulse point at her neck. And then, as Elvis sang about how he couldn't help falling in love, she swore she could hear Connor's breathing speed up as he watched her body react to his close proximity.
She felt herself lean in toward him, saw him shift clos
er to her on the bar stool even as her fingers were itching to reach out, to touch him and see if he would feel as hot as he looked.
The menu she'd been holding smacked into the underside of the counter and snapped her out of the crazy spell just in time. Connor looked a little stunned too.
What had just happened to her? To both of them? Had they both become unwilling participants in some sort of mad scientist's chemistry experiment to combine Man A with Woman B to see how quickly they'd combust?
Annoyed by her ridiculous lack of self-control, Ginger slapped the menu down on the gleaming Formica counter harder and louder than she'd planned.
"Tonight's special is meat loaf and mashed potatoes. I'll give you a few minutes to look at the menu and decide what you want."
But instead of looking at the menu he said, "I know exactly what I want."
She knew he had to be talking about food, and yet the way he said it felt like--
"I didn't know you worked here. I'm glad you do. Now I don't have to wait until morning to see you again."
Oh. Oh my. A half dozen ceiling fans kept the diner cool. She shouldn't be feeling so warm.
"I've been wanting to tell you that I was a complete jerk this afternoon."
She could feel herself softening, melting down from her core outward. But then she looked at him and realized her reaction was probably exactly what he'd been expecting.
This afternoon she could have sworn he wanted to throw her bodily off the porch. He had to have an ulterior motive. A second later it hit her.
"I take it you spoke with your grandparents?"
"I did. But my grandmother isn't the only one who thinks I misbehaved. Earlier today you asked if we could start over. Any chance that offer still stands?"
Her body screamed Yes! at the exact same time that her brain shouted Don't you dare, he's playing you!
Frankly, she had a hell of lot more faith in her brain to steer her right.
He thought he could come in here smelling like fresh soap and pine needles and blink those shockingly blue eyes at her and get her to dumbly agree to whatever he wanted.
Like hell.
