“Mom!”
She turned and saw her oldest jogging up the path. Goodness. How had he gotten to be a man? He was twenty-nine, and it still surprised her sometimes. She could picture him at every moment of his life. The chubby baby so eager to walk he crashed into everything. The little boy with red cheeks and a soft heart for worms in the garden. The boy obsessed with Spider-Man and the teenager who lived for anything that took him outdoors. Skiing, snowboarding, rock climbing, dirt bikes.
“Hey!” He wasn’t even panting when he reached her. “Whatcha doing?”
She nodded toward the back of Russell House. “Remember all Dad’s lectures about defensible space?”
Jake cringed. “Oh yeah. He would not approve of that.” He swiped his hand along the tree line. “He’d want it all gone.”
“I know. I’m trying to think of a happy medium. What if we do cut back some of the trees—”
“Most of the trees?”
“Okay, most of the trees that are really close to the house. We push that back and then maybe do some new plantings? Lower trees like dogwood and redbud that would offer some spring and summer color. Build a gazebo and make some paths with flowering bushes and seasonal color.” She turned to Jake. “What do you think?”
Jake was his father’s son. “I think that definitely reduces the fire hazard close to the house, and also, wedding parties would go crazy for a forest gazebo. Kara would call it Instagram-worthy.”
Monica smiled. “If Kara would like it, then you know it’s probably a winning idea. I still have to run all this by Grace and Philip of course, then find room in the budget—”
Jake sighed deeply. “This means I’m going to be stuck with that minivan for years, doesn’t it?”
“Do not hate on the minivan!” Monica punched his arm. “That is a luxury minivan, Jake Velasquez.”
“It’s still a minivan,” he muttered. “An SUV would be cooler.”
“And cost more to maintain.” She patted his shoulder. “If anyone can make a minivan cool, it’s you, Jakey. I know you’ll survive.”
He stayed silent, staring at the back of the house.
“What’s up? You have your deep-thinker face on.” Which wasn’t typical for Jake. Caleb and Sam were her deep thinkers. Sylvia, her sharp-witted strategist. Jake was far more in the throw-yourself-in-with-enthusiasm-and-figure-out-the-details later camp.
“So… does Russell House have a policy about… um…”
Monica frowned. “A policy about what? Russell House is pretty much me and Grace, so whatever it is you’re worried about—”
“I’m not worried.” His cheeks were a little red. “I was just wondering about maybe possibly asking someone out. Someone here that I work with. And I was wondering if, you know, that was okay.”
Oh yes! Monica tried not to do a happy dance. “Is this person someone you supervise in any way?”
“Absolutely not. We have very separate jobs. If anything, she’s my sup— Mom, you know I’m talking about Kara.”
“I figured, but I didn’t want to assume.”
“I think all the other women who work here have husbands or boyfriends anyway.”
“And if you wanted to ask any of them out, I’d have a much bigger problem than you working together.”
“Mom, can you just tell me—”
“I have no problem with you and Kara going out.” She really thought about it. “In theory.”
“But…?”
She turned to her son. Her very gorgeous son who had left a trail of brokenhearted girls through Glimmer Lake High School. “If things don’t work out—”
“I think we can stay friends,” he said. “I’m friendly with most of my exes. Not that it wouldn’t be awkward, but—”
“Maybe just… go slow?” She winced. “I hate giving you dating advice. I just know that she is interested in you, and—”
“You think so?” His eyes lit up. “I can’t tell with her. She’s always friendly, but then she’s friendly with everyone, you know? So it’s hard to tell… I mean, that’s cool.” He turned away and nodded. “I think I can go slow.”
Really? ’Cause you’re so not good at doing that in any other area of your life.
Monica didn’t say that. “Good. I think slow is good when it’s someone you work with. And that is all I’ll say about that.”
“Okay. And that’s all I needed to know.” His cheeks were still a little red, but he crossed his arms over his chest and nodded back at the house. “The gazebo and garden is a good idea.”
“Thanks. I think Grace will like it too.”
Monica’s phone started buzzing in her pocket. She grabbed it and looked at the screen. “Okay, meeting’s over. That’s Kara. The fire inspector is here.”
“It’s probably someone you know.”
She shook her head. “New chief for the region. Case Jorgensen retired last year.”
“I hadn’t heard that.”
“Yeah. Pretty sure it was a surprise to everyone.” Monica started walking around the house. “But he’d been at the department for over thirty-five years I think? I’m sure he and Sheila were ready to be done.”
“Okay, have fun with that. I’m going to get the oil changed on the boat. It’s overdue.” He bent down and kissed her cheek. “Thanks, Mami.”
“Be safe.” Monica watched him jog away from the house and toward the lake.
She turned the corner of the house and saw the familiar red-and-white pickup truck of the state fire service pulled up in the gravel drive in front of Russell House. A man stood beside the truck, marking something down on a metal clipboard. He was nodding at whatever Kara was saying and appeared to be taking notes.
“Oh! There’s Monica.” Kara pointed at her. “She’ll definitely be the one who can answer your questions.”
The man turned, spotted her, and Monica froze.
She didn’t know this man—didn’t know the first thing about him—but she’d seen him before.
Who are you?
The man of her dreams was literally standing in front of her. Fortunately—or unfortunately?—this time he was wearing a uniform.
Chapter 7
He stepped forward and held out his hand to shake hers. “Ma’am. Gabriel Peralta. I’m the new unit chief for the area. Nice to meet you.”
Monica blinked twice and cleared her throat. “I’m… Monica. Monica Velasquez. I run… I mean, this is my hotel. It’s a partnership actually. I’m a partner in the hotel, but I run it. With Kara, I mean. Whom you’ve met. Obviously.”
Dear God. What was she doing?
Monica reached out and grabbed the man’s hand, shook it, and dropped it like it was on fire.
Chief Peralta cocked his head. “Have we met?”
“No. Nope.” She’d maybe said that too forcefully. Monica cleared her throat. “I don’t believe so. I knew your… I mean, I knew Case. The chief before you. My husband worked with him.”
Peralta’s eyes lit up. “Oh, is your husband in the fire service?”
“He was, but he died.”
The man’s eyes went wide.
Sexy dark eyes…
Stop. It.
“I’m so sorry,” he said. “Was it—”
“It wasn’t in a fire. He had… I’m sorry, can we start over? You caught me at a weird moment.” She was acting like a lunatic. In her defense, Monica had never met someone in real life she’d only ever seen in a sex dream. “I’m Monica. I’m the manager and part owner of Russell House.” She put on her customer smile. “You’re Chief Peralta, and I believe Kara said you were here to talk to me about defensible space around our structure prior to the fire season.”
“Sure.” Chief Peralta started on the safety spiel. “So, as I’m sure you know, Russell House backs up to national forest land, which makes it a little different than county.”
“Mm-hmm.”
He was as handsome as he’d been in her dream. More, in fact, now that she had a clear picture of him. G
abriel Peralta had high cheekbones and wide arched brows that gave his face dramatic planes. Full, expressive lips that drew the eye when he talked. His jaw was clean-shaven and sharp, with a slight cleft in his chin. She could see a hint of silver stubble on his cheek which—judging by how early it was—told Monica he could probably grow a full beard in a matter of days if he wanted.
His shoulders were broad and his hips narrow. He had to work out religiously, because the normal middle-aged spread had not seemed to touch him. His dark blue uniform was crisp and familiar. It wasn’t exactly like Gilbert’s since Chief Peralta worked for the state fire service and not the county, but they were pretty similar.
“…so with your permission, I’d like to do a full walk around of the entire complex so I can give some recommendations.” He clasped his metal clipboard with both hands and stood at casual attention.
Monica did not look at his arms. Much. For long. “I think that sounds fine. Having been married to a firefighter, I’m pretty familiar with the ideals for defensible space, and I have some ideas about the backside of the house that I’m going to broach with my partners. They actually own the house, so I can’t make any changes without their approval.”
He nodded. “A written report with suggestions might go a long way to convincing them the changes are necessary. Would you like to walk with me and tell me what you have in mind?”
“I…” Kara couldn’t do it? Shit. Of course she couldn’t. Monica hadn’t talked to her about any of her ideas. “Of course.” She glanced at her assistant in a panic. “Do we have any…?”
Kara looked at the giant watch she wore on her tiny wrist. “You’re free for the next forty minutes, then you have a phone appointment on your calendar.”
A phone appointment with a physicist to talk about precognition.
“Right.” Monica looked back at Peralta and had to clear her throat again. “Let’s say thirty minutes so I have time to get my notes together for the call. Does that work, Chief Peralta?”
“More than enough time. And call me Gabe please.”
He smiled, and it was absolutely devastating. Butterflies took off in her belly. Monica was pretty sure Kara squeaked… something before she retreated from the blistering male charm of Gabe Peralta.
“Gabe.” She nodded. “Of course.” She pointed down the path she’d walked around when she was examining the back of the house. “Let’s start this way.”
He tucked his clipboard under his arm and reached for his phone.
No wedding ring…
“Do you mind if I take some pictures? This place is incredible.”
Monica smiled. “Thank you, and of course not. Take all the pictures you want.”
“When was the house built?”
“In the early 1940s. It was built by Gordon Russell, who was the founder of Russell Timber Company, and it was a family home for many years. He wanted it to be very grand, so it was based on older designs like—”
“National Park Service rustic, right? Kind of arts and crafts, like the old lodges.”
She turned, surprised. “Yes. It borrows a lot from those styles.”
Gabe nodded, still staring at the facade of the house in admiration. “They did an incredible job. It looks like it’s been here for centuries. I can see they used local stone. Whoever designed it was really thinking. Was it Underwood?” Gabe muttered, “Maybe a student of his.”
“You’re an architecture fan?”
“My ex-wife is an architect. I wasn’t really into it before I met her—I just liked what I liked, you know?” He continued taking pictures, walking closer to Monica. “But she was always talking about it, and I got interested. After we split, I was kind of hooked. And thinking about how the natural world and human buildings work together is part of my job.” Gabe looked down at her. “I can already tell you’re going to have some issues with the perimeter though.”
Monica was trying hard not to think about the slight scent of cedar on his skin. “Let me tell you what I have in mind.”
Because I have so very much on my mind.
She plopped down at her desk after half an hour with Gabriel and leaned her face fully into both her hands.
Dear Lord. What was she going to do about this?
She was attracted to this man. Wildly, ridiculously attracted to this man whom she’d already had a sex dream—sex vision?—about. But she didn’t know him! She didn’t know if she wanted to know him. And she was acting like a bumbling idiot.
She’d handed him off to Jake, knowing that her son would understand everything the man was talking about. After all, he’d been raised by Gilbert and knew way more about fires and fire safety than the average ski bum.
Monica took a bottle of water from the fridge in her office and held the cold glass to her neck.
So do you want to start one of those dating profiles?
Val’s question hit her like a slap.
Yes. That’s what she needed. She was having his ridiculous reaction to Gabe because she hadn’t even been near a man in four years. She just needed to get out there. Flirt a little. Wear a pretty dress and be around men who might find her attractive. Sure, she was a little round in more than a few places, but there were lots of men who liked that. She had a good smile. She had great hair. And she was interesting. Right?
Maybe to someone who liked hotels?
Oh hell. Monica was going to go for it before she second-guessed herself. She opened her laptop and put in the address of a dating site that was all over TV ads. Within a few clicks, she was enrolled and had put up a picture. She didn’t waste time answering too many questions—she had a phone call to make—but she put up some basic information, two pictures, and a list of her favorite movies.
There. That was a start.
Shutting down her computer, she reached for a yellow legal pad where she’d written some questions and grabbed her phone.
Okay, don’t chicken out now. Sure, the woman has a PhD and is probably ten times smarter than you, but she’s friends with Mark and she offered to answer some questions.
She entered the number for Dr. Katherine Bassi and touched the Call button.
“Hello?” Monica said over a crash in the background. “Hello?”
“Hi! Hey. Yes, can I help you?”
“Is this Dr. Bassi? My name is Monica Velasquez, and Mark Brannon—” There was another tumbling sound. “I’m sorry, but are you okay?”
“Uh, yeah. Sorry. Yeah, this is Katherine. Mark’s friend? Oh right! Right.”
“Are you okay? Do I need to call the paramedics?”
The woman on the phone laughed. “I have the day free of classes, and I decided to organize my pantry. It’s way more of a disaster than I thought it was. I’m not injured, but how do I have so many nearly empty boxes of spaghetti?”
Monica smiled. “Pringles cans.”
It sounded like a door shut. “What?”
“Pringles cans. Use an empty Pringles can to keep the extra spaghetti in when you don’t use the whole box. They’re the perfect height and they’re easier to store.”
“Oh, that is a really good idea. They are the right size, aren’t they?”
“Pringles cans come in useful for all sorts of stuff.”
Katherine said, “And to get them, you have to eat potato chips. There’s really no downside to that.”
“Not really, no.” Monica was already set at ease. Dr. Katherine Bassi might have a PhD, but she sounded like someone Monica would like. “So this is Mark’s friend, Monica.”
“Monica, it’s nice to meet you. Mark said you had questions about parapsychological phenomena?”
“Wow, that sounds so much more official than psychic stuff.”
“Ha! Well, scientists like their fancy labels. Just so you know, I’m definitely a scientist. I think most of the stuff you see on TV and in movies is nonsense.”
Monica felt her optimism shrinking.
“But,” Katherine continued, “I’m also a biophysicist, so
I know how much about human biology and the brain we don’t know at all.”
“So do you believe in parapsychology, or…?”
“I think most of what human beings have referred to as psychic phenomena or supernatural abilities will eventually be explained by science we don’t have yet. I have witnessed personally and retrieved secondhand information from sources I trust about things that cannot be explained by current science. But much of what we know now was unexplained at one time. Does that make sense?”
Monica nodded. “I think so. So you don’t think there’s anything unnatural about psychic powers. You just think they’re misunderstood.”
“I think they are probably evolutionary relics—senses that we had or found useful at different times—that we gradually grew out of. Or spontaneous mutations that still occur. There’s no way of saying for certain right now. But that doesn’t mean we’ll never know. Neuroscience and biophysics progresses every day.”
“Right.” Monica blinked. “And you’re a…”
“Biophysicist.”
“Right.” Monica was questioning everything but decided to plunge in anyway. “What do you think about time?”
“That’s… a very general question.”
“Yes, but… Okay, what do you think about visions?”
“Visions? As in precognition?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, I don’t think that’s possible.”
Monica blinked. “But you just said—”
“I was talking about humans perceiving energy fields left by the dead or communicating on unknown neural levels that most people can’t understand, things like that. But there’s no scientific basis for believing in precognition. The future is too random to be predicted.”
Monica felt her heart pounding. “But… if I have a friend, one I believe without question, like you mentioned having sources you trust, because she’s a levelheaded, honest—”
“I don’t see any scientific bases for precognition. As I said, the future is far too variable to be predicted. That said… I understand trusting a friend, and nothing I say is going to make you not trust that person. Who am I? I’m just a physicist from a little college in the middle of California. You know your friend, and you trust them.”
Psychic Dreams: A Paranormal Women's Fiction Novel (Glimmer Lake Book 3) Page 5
