Wild Women of Alaska Collection

by Tiffinie Helmer

  Oh, boy.

  "Why don't we calm down?"

  Neither of them liked that.

  He took a step back and tried again. "Faye, would you please brew us some coffee? Mom, I'm sure Trix has something stronger...somewhere." They could head downstairs to the bar if she didn't. "Just try to—" At their narrowed-eyes, he didn't dare say calm down again. "I'll go and get Trixie."

  And put on a shirt, maybe a bullet proof vest.

  He made a hasty retreat and entered the bedroom to find Trixie sitting up in bed, the sheet clutched to her chest, her face strained.

  "You heard?" He grabbed his shirt that was in a heap on the floor.

  "Uh-huh."

  "Suggestions?"

  Her eyes slid to the window. "We're only a couple stories up."

  He choked on a laugh. "And the snow will break our fall."

  "Except it hasn't snowed in days because it's too cold outside."

  "I bet it's warmer out there than in your kitchen."

  "Got a plan?"

  "How about the truth?"

  She shrugged. "Well, that's something we haven't thought of."

  "Yeah, well. I think it's time."

  Trixie pulled the sheet free of the mattress, stood, and wrapped it around her. "I need a shower first."

  His blood thickened in his nether regions.

  "Don't even think about it."

  He grabbed the edge of the sheet and tugged her toward him. "We need to do this first." Tenderly he leaned down and kissed her, keeping it light and playful even though he wanted to take it deeper. "Good morning."

  "That's still to be determined."

  "Any morning I wake up with you is a good morning." He released her and pushed her toward the shower. "I'll stall, but if you aren't out in five minutes, I'm joining you."

  Her eyes flared with interest, and he growled. She giggled and hurried into the bathroom.

  Damn, but he wanted to follow her into the shower and not deal with the company that waited in the kitchen. The company who was again hollering his name. Buttoning up his shirt, he found a few missing, but he made the most of it and returned to the kitchen.

  "Where's Trixie?" Faye asked.

  "In the shower. She'll be a few minutes. Let's have some coffee—or amaretto—if you'd prefer." His mom had the bottle open and most of her glass already emptied. She was taking this much harder than he'd figured she would. "How about I cook up some eggs?"

  "You'd need to buy some first," Faye muttered, pouring a cup of coffee.

  He noticed she didn't offer him any, so he grabbed a mug and filled up one for him and then one for Trixie. She'd want this after her shower. For the hell of it, he filled one for his mother and set it on the table where she ignored it, finishing off her amaretto and adding more to her glass.

  "Mom, is that really a good—" he shut up at the look she sent him.

  "How could you keep something like this from me?"

  He'd made a life of keeping things from her that would hurt her, when he'd gotten into trouble as a kid, his marriage, and almost dying on his last assignment. It's what sons were supposed to do, right? Protect the women they loved. But looking at the distress in his mother's eyes, he wondered how much was evasion in the pretense of protection?

  Trixie steeled herself against the scene to come and walked out of the bedroom. She should have known she'd have to pay for last night, but she hadn't thought the bill would be called due so soon.

  Miles must have said something. She bet he'd left her place and headed right to the bar. She should have been more together last night and kept that from happening. At the very least, she should have told Faye they were married when Logan had returned. Actually, when she'd eloped would have been better.

  All eyes landed on her as she joined them. Faye's watered, Janet's were the same, and both were full of hurt and pain.

  She looked at Logan. Guilt had a vicious hold on him too.

  "We're sorry," she started." We should have told you."

  "Yes, you should have, "Faye said with a sniff.

  "Why didn't you?" Janet whispered as if the words were too hard to get past her breaking heart.

  Oh man. This was bad.

  "Why don't we all sit down," Logan said. He held out a chair for Trixie and set a cup of coffee in front of her.

  Faye sank into a seat next to Janet and Logan took the one next to Trixie. It was like they were teenagers again, and Faye and Janet had found out they were sleeping together. But this wasn't going to be a talk about safe sex—oh crap, they hadn't practiced that last night either.

  She didn't need that stress on top of handling this. Get this over with and then she could count up the days on her calendar. Damn it, why hadn't they—again, think about it later. She glanced at Logan. His jaw tightened. Was he thinking what she was thinking?

  "Someone better start talking," Faye said.

  "Yes, please." Janet held up the empty bottle of amaretto. "Do you have any more? I could really use some more."

  "Mom, drink the coffee. Please."

  "I don't know if I can do this, Logan. I don't understand why you would keep something so important from me. I thought we had a better relationship than that."

  Logan paled. "We did. We do."

  "Then, why?"

  "Janet, I made him promise. I'm the one to blame."

  "Now, wait—" Logan grabbed her hand and enfolded it in his. "We were young, stupid, and not thinking straight."

  "Clearly, you're both at fault," Faye said, "and there will be a lot to make up for, but right now tell us what happened."

  Quickly, Trixie ran down the chain of events that led to their marriage and separation.

  Janet was the first to respond. "You did what? You tried to manipulate Trixie into leaving town like that? Logan Joshua Slade, I taught you better."

  He blanched at the use of his name said that way. "You're right, Mom, you did teach me better. At the time, I was selfish, only thinking of myself and what I wanted."

  "Wait," Faye said. "So that explains why you sent all the money..." Faye stopped speaking at Logan's shake of his head.

  "What money?" Trixie asked, feeling like cold water had been dumped on her. No one answered her. "What money?"

  Logan swore under his breath and looked away.

  "No more secrets," Trixie said. "Between any of us." She looked to Faye and to Janet who seemed oblivious about the money, and then back to Logan whose mouth was set in even a tighter line.

  "I'm sorry, Logan," Faye said.

  "What money?" Trixie freed her hand from his and folded her arms across her chest.

  "I knew things were tight with Faye's cancer, and you working all the time. So I sent money."

  "How much?"

  "Enough, okay."

  "I need to know how much? Logan? Aunt Faye?"

  "Sweetie, he was just looking out for you. For us."

  "Are you telling me the money you received as an inheritance from some long lost uncle was from Logan?" They'd used that money to revamp the bar and buy up the block, basically the seed money to build the businesses.

  "Uh, yes..."

  "What about the other 'uncle' whose trust sends us monthly 'interest' payments?"

  Faye suddenly found the wood grain of the table fascinating. "Sorry, Logan," she mumbled.

  He owned everything. Everything they built was because of him. "Oh my God." She stumbled to her feet.

  "Now, Trixie—"

  "You—You've—" She couldn't comprehend it all.

  "Trix, calm down. Don't do this." Logan stood and held out his hand, but she backed up out of his reach.

  "Calm down? I just found out that you own...everything. All that I have worked for, slaved for, dreamt of, took pride in—it's...yours."

  "The hell it is." He took two long strides and grabbed her upper arms. "It's all yours, I don't want it. I sent money because I wanted to make sure that you were taken care of. I knew how difficult things were."

  "And
you were being the dutiful husband?"

  "No, yes, shit. That isn't the way it is."

  "Is?" The trust money was set up as a direct deposit and arrived monthly like clockwork. She wrenched out of his gasp. "You stop the funds right now."

  "No."

  "What do you mean, no? I don't want your money." All she'd ever wanted was him. But he made that impossible with his conditions that she didn't have a say in anything. How could she trust him now? He'd been manipulating her from the beginning. "You look on this money like you're taking care of the little wife. I see it as a form of control. If you'd wanted to take care of your wife, you would have been here, not getting yourself shot and almost killed in some Middle Eastern country."

  "What?" Janet said. "What is she talking about, Logan? You were shot?"

  Logan closed his eyes and then slowly opened them. "Mom, can we talk about that later?"

  "No, now. You tell me now."

  "No secrets, Logan," Faye repeated Trixie's words. "They need to stop."

  Logan inflated his chest as if gathering strength from the depths of his soul. Trixie waited. He'd glossed over what had happened to him last night when she'd demanded he tell her.

  "Do not protect me from this, Logan," Janet whispered. "I didn't know you thought of me as so weak."

  That is what he did. He'd been taking care of his mother for so long with the parade of useless men in her life, he'd had to be the strong one. And he'd tried to shield her too.

  "Tell us, Logan," Faye said.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose and took another deep breath. "I'm on medical leave from the Army."

  "Are you hurt now?" Janet said.

  "What happened?" Faye asked.

  "I'm fine, pretty much recovered, and just waiting for clearance."

  "Clearance?" Trixie asked. "You're returning to the Army?" Why had she thought he was out and here to stay? "You're leaving again?" She took another step back. What about last night and him wanting a wife? Was it all bullshit? Did she know anything about him?

  "Wait, Trix—"

  "Where are you hurt?" Janet asked. "How bad?"

  "Just in and out bullets, and I lost a kidney, other than that I am perfectly fine."

  "Kidney?" Tears popped into Janet's eyes. "You lost a kidney?"

  "Shouldn't you sit down?"

  He'd lost a kidney? "You didn't tell me that," Trixie said. "What else are you keeping from me?

  He cursed again. "This is all going wrong. Please, everyone stop talking at once and listen to me."

  "I think I've heard enough for now." Trixie couldn't take one more thing or she'd break. "I-I need to get to work."

  "The bar doesn't open until five," he said.

  "I have bookkeeping, orders, and schedules to write before the bar opens."

  "You need to hire more people."

  "Already telling me how to run things?"

  "No, shit, fuck—"

  "Language," Janet scolded.

  "Trix, please, we need to talk about this. What about last night?"

  He was leaving her again. She huffed out a breath. "We should have talked before last night happened." God, she was such a fool.

  "Don't do this."

  "I need some time, Logan."

  "It's been eight years, how much more time do you need?"

  "I don't know." She turned and grabbed her scarf and coat and walked out the door.

  Chapter Twelve

  "Let her go, Logan," Faye said, staying his arm. "You need to reassure Janet first that you're still among the living. And Trixie will do better once she thinks things through."

  He didn't know about that, but she was right about his mother. "Mom." He gathered Janet in his arms where she buried her nose against his shirt, and gave a few sniffles before straightening and stepping back.

  "Take off your shirt and let me see."

  "Mom—"

  "Do it." There was no arguing with that voice.

  He took off his shirt and stood there while she investigated him.

  Her silence was damning.

  "Mom, I'm all right. Full recovery—"

  "Minus a kidney."

  He couldn’t dispute that. "People live full lives with only one kidney. I'm fine."

  "You should have told me."

  "Yes, I should have, I just didn't want you to worry. You worry too much as it is."

  "I'm in a better place now. I know that I didn't provide the best of...stepfathers...but there were other things you could have done besides getting married in secret and joining the Army. Why didn't you talk to me?"

  "Things weren't...good back then. I was just thinking of a way out where I could take Trixie with me. Believe me, I know how much I messed up." And he'd paid hard for his mistakes. Was still paying.

  "You have to make this right, Logan."

  "I know. Let me drive you home and we can talk some more."

  "I'd like that."

  He turned to Faye. "Can you—"

  "Yes, I'll keep an eye on Trixie and call you if she does something crazy like join the Army or something."

  "Ha." He hugged her. "Thanks, Faye."

  "I really hope you two can work all this out, Logan. While I've always thought of you as part of my family, I like the reality of it even better." She kissed his cheek.

  "I hear the cat's out of the bag," Gemma said when Trixie answered the phone.

  She'd closeted herself away in the office in the darkened bar. Yes, she was hiding, but she needed some solitude.

  "You heard?"

  "My barista is friends with Faye's barista, remember?"

  "Right." Damn, freaking small towns.

  "How are you doing?"

  Trixie shrugged and then realized belatedly that Gemma couldn’t see her. "Been better."

  "Well, are you sitting down? I heard from my lawyer friend in Anchorage."

  Mentally she groaned. Did she want to hear this now? But then how long was she going to stay in the dark? On that thought, she turned on her desk lamp. She'd been hiding in the shadows for too long. "Hit me."

  "You already know that Alaska is a no fault, fifty-fifty state."

  "Right, why does that sound ominous when you say it?"

  "If you are to get a divorce, by law you will have to divide all your assets and debt fifty-fifty. There are no negations. The state will not grant a divorce unless both parties agree. So he would own fifty percent of all your holdings, business, etc. But then you'd own fifty percent of all that he owns, too, including whatever debts he has accumulated."

  He already owned fifty percent of everything. She'd done the math and had totaled up the money received from Faye's "uncles." A headache pounded loud behind her eyes with the truth. "Sounds like a nasty business."

  "Your best bet is an annulment. That dissolves everything like it never happened."

  Except it had. And now everyone else knew it too. "Thanks, Gemma."

  "You okay, Trixie, did something else happen?"

  Just that she'd started to hope, to believe in love again, that she and Logan could be together again. Her heart had been walled under ice all these years and now it lay open, exposed, and beating hard for the man she'd given it to. "I'm okay. I'll talk to you later."

  She hung up the phone and sat there behind her desk. She'd bought this desk at a yard sale and had kept it to remind her of how hard she'd worked, taking the bar that was once a dive and turning it into a trendy, popular bar that made the top ten places to see in North Pole.

  Her carefully orchestrated empire cracked like ice calving from the side of a glacier. The "inheritance" had been the seed money that they'd used to expand the businesses and enabled them to become successful over the years. She'd taken a lot of pride in what she'd accomplished on her own. But she hadn't done it all herself. Half was Logan's.

  And she didn't know what she was going to do about that.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Logan spent the day with his mom, reassuring her that he was fine, and c
oming clean about most of what had happened to him in the last eight years. Some things he still kept quiet. There were some things a mother never needed to know. Things he wished he could forget.

  He was emotionally exhausted and edgy. He needed to talk to Trixie. Today couldn't have ruined what they'd established last night. But then what had they resolved other than that they desired each other? No words of love had been spoken. No promises.

  He'd called her cell phone a few times and was sent right to voicemail. Needing time alone, he headed outside to chop some wood, after promising Janet he wouldn’t over do.

  He'd done everything wrong. He saw that now, but how did he fix it?

  A big diesel pickup truck pulled into the driveway and Mr. Watchman—er Axel—climbed out. The guy at least had good taste in trucks. And women. They didn't make classier women than his mother.

  "Hey," Axel, said, walking over. "Heard you've had an interesting day."

  Couldn't sneeze in this town without someone handing him a tissue.

  "That's one way of putting it." Logan swung the axe and split the log in two. There was something extremely satisfying about chopping wood.

  "How much truth to you being married all this time?"

  "A lot."

  "Huh." Axel turned over one of the logs, took a seat after setting the brown paper bag he'd carried on the snow crusted ground. "Want to talk about it?"

  "Nope." Logan set up another log and severed it in half.

  "Mind if I ask you something?"

  "You going to ask even if I do mind?"

  Axel laughed. "Yep, that I am. But I'd prefer it if you set the axe down first."

  "Ah, shit. Is this about my mom?"

  "Yep."

  Logan swung the axe and imbedded the blade into the stump. He overturned a log and sat too. It was dark and cold, the air vaporizing with his panted breath. He slapped his gloves together. "All right. Ask."

  "Here this might make it easier to take." Axel reached into the paper bag and pulled out a beer and handed one to Logan. "Plus, if we don't get inside soon, they're going to freeze."

  What the hell. He took the offered bottle and twisted off the top, taking a long draw from the neck. There could be worse things than sitting in the cold, freezing his ass off drinking a beer with his mom's current boyfriend. Not that he could come up with one on the fly.