Riding the Pause (5 page)

“Go ahead and deal them, card shark,” she said, steering the conversation back to more comfortable territory. “And get ready to cry.”

What was it about this woman that made him seem destined to shove his foot in his mouth? He’d all but called her judgmental, assuming she underestimated Cash when it was actually he who had underestimated her. He was judging her for judging when all she’d been doing was thinking about her injured brother. God, he was such an ass around her, he thought, shuffling the cards one more time before starting to deal.

Maybe it was the poise and polish. Even in purple long johns she seemed cool and eminently competent. The only time he’d seen her lose it was during the mouse incident and even then she’d recovered faster than a lot of people would.

Nobody could be that perfect, but apparently Rachel was. And she was sweet. He watched her stroke his dog, her touch gentle as she absentmindedly ran her hand through the black fur. He’d seen the way her eyes softened when she talked about her brother. He had no idea how hard it might be to crack Rachel’s shell and no intention of finding out, but there was no doubt in his mind that when she loved something or someone she did it with the same dedication that she did everything else.

They played for hours, laughing and trash talking, pausing just long enough to raid her beef stick and cheese stash and his apples and trail mix. It was still freezing outside and their spot in the shelter was warm and protected. Neither of them seemed to want to leave the sleeping bags to do more than heat water for tea.

They’d stayed tied game for game all afternoon until she’d finally declared the best two out of three and then promptly won the first hand. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had so much fun doing nothing with another person, and he’d watched with real pleasure as she relaxed as the afternoon wore on.

“You never did tell me what you do when you aren’t setting camp stoves on fire or fending off mice,” he said as she dealt the cards.

She accidentally double dealt his hand and picked up both piles of cards to reshuffle.

“Getting in my head isn’t going to get me out of my game,” she said, quickly dealing the cards again. “And you never said what you do either.”

She picked up her cards, and he saw her fingers drum on the dog’s back. It was the only tell he’d been able to figure out, and it usually meant her hand was good. His wasn’t, and if he didn’t want to lose, he had to do something quick to break her concentration.

“I make furniture,” he said and saw her eyes flash with real appreciation. The fact that he cared what she thought rattled him more than it did her. He was pretty sure they were headed in the wrong direction. “Dating anyone?” he asked as she reached for a card. Her hand froze halfway to the stack of cards and part of him wanted to say “ha ha” while the other part listened intently for her answer. An answer he had no business caring about.

She picked the top card off of the pile, smiled to herself, her full red lips curving sweetly. Looking up at him from underneath her inky lashes, her eyes flashing more green than hazel, she said, “No, I’m not dating anyone. I’m not interested in dating anyone. What I am doing is beating your sorry butt.” She laid down the jack, queen and king of hearts and three aces before discarding a seven and giving him a cat swallowed the canary grin. “I win. I am the champion of the world and you are the guy who gets to make dinner.”

She laughed out loud, and her excitement woke his dog who was eager to share in her celebration.
Traitor
. It didn’t matter. He was happy to make dinner. He could use the time to beat the crap out of the part of him that woke up and started to pay attention when she said she wasn’t dating anyone. The same part that hadn’t heard a thing she said after that.

“Use whatever you want out of my bag,” she said, climbing out of the sleeping bag and shoving her feet into her boots. “I only have about half a day’s hike tomorrow. Apollo and I are going to stretch our legs, aren’t we, boy?”

The dog’s whole body shook with excitement at her attention, and Ian tried not to care that the fact she was leaving the trail tomorrow meant she was probably local. He watched their shapes retreat up the hill to the bathroom through the slowing snow. Parts of the sky had started to break and he wouldn’t be surprised if it stopped snowing any minute. Or if the temperature warmed up enough to melt most of it by morning, meaning they could go their separate ways. Exactly the way it should be.

Ignoring the pain of loss he felt at the thought, he started to dig through the bags of food, looking for something he could turn into a proper victor’s dinner.

Ian managed a remarkably passable shepherd pie, and he was damn proud of himself. Using his canned beef stew and Rachel’s instant mashed potatoes mixed with some of the leftover cheese, he’d put together something that would never make it as restaurant food but was more than acceptable trail food.

The snow had stopped and he’d found enough dry wood tucked up against the shelter to start a fire in the fire ring. He took the last two sad apples from Rachel’s bag, cored them, and filled them with some of his brown sugar and dried fruit before wrapping them in aluminum foil and tucking them into the coals to roast.

“That smells so good,” she said, as he set the pie tin topped with cheesy mashed potatoes on the picnic table.

He handed her a spork and then looked around for their bowls.

“This is okay with me if you don’t mind,” she said, motioning to the tin sitting between them.

Grateful to have less to clean up afterwards, he sat down opposite her. He was pretty sure clean up duty was part of the loser’s dinner chores and the less to wash the better.

He hadn’t realized how hungry he was until they sat down at the table. They ate in silence, taking turns digging out bites of meat and carrots along with the potatoes. Rachel gave up about a third of the way through the tin of food, pushing it to his side of the table.

“That was delicious,” she said, licking the back of her spork.

He tried and failed to keep his focus on the food in front of him and not on the way the tip of her pink tongue moved over the plastic utensil.

“There’s dessert,” he said, feeling unusually pleased with himself. He’d known her for less than twenty-four hours. Her approval shouldn’t mean so much to him, but he liked making her smile. A lot.

“Really,” she said with real pleasure, and he smiled.

“Really.” He finished the last of the mashed potatoes and went to retrieve the apples from the coals, juggling the hot packages from hand to hand so he wouldn’t burn himself. He set one of the foil wrapped packages in front of her and the other at his place. Watching her, he waited until she opened her package before turning his attention to his own.

“I can’t believe you did all this with what was left in the food bags. Who knew my apples could taste like this,” she said, taking a bite of the soft sweet apple studded with dried apricots and raisins.

“We don’t make too shabby a team.” He’d been talking about the food, but sitting with her by the light of the campfire, the words took on a deeper meaning.

“Not shabby at all,” she said. “Tell me about your furniture.”

So he told her. How he’d always liked to work with his hands. How building the piece meant more to him than selling it. How he was much more comfortable in his workshop with Artemis and Apollo than at a gallery opening showcasing his work. How it was the paperwork that finally drove him out of his office and onto the trail.

“I can’t believe you have a cat named Artemis,” she said, when he finally stopped talking.

“She was a stray, and she’s a spectacular hunter. It seemed to suit her,” he said, shrugging his shoulders. “Your turn. I spilled my guts, and you’ve managed to tell me almost nothing about yourself. How do you spend your days?”

He could see her turning the question over in her mind. For as poised and reserved as she was, she had a face that made it impossible for her to hide what she was thinking. Either that or she wasn’t trying to hide with him. He liked that idea much better. He could see the moment she decided to answer him, and he quieted his body the way he would if he was hunting and there was an animal he didn’t want to spook.

“I don’t know,” she said and for the first time she seemed lost. “I lost my job. Got fired,” she clarified.

He could see how much it cost her to say the words and he wanted to reach out to comfort her, but even after only a day together he knew she wouldn’t appreciate him emphasizing her weakness. Regardless of whether that was the intent.

“The firm I worked for was sold to a German company. They didn’t need me anymore.” She let the words hang in the air, and for a moment they simply stared at the fire flickering in the stone circle.

“See the thing is, I’ve always known what I was doing. I knew which college I wanted to go to and which grad school, what I would do with my MBA and where I wanted to intern. Where I wanted to work. I decided and I did it. Except this time they decided for me, and now I’m not sure what I’m going to do. Or even what I want to do. I thought maybe if I spent a couple of days putting one foot in front of the other, I’d figure something out.”

“Did you?”

“Nope. No lightning bolts of inspiration on this trip. Just a trespassing mouse and a big black dog.”

Ian got up and went to his pack, feeling her eyes on him the whole time. He grabbed the flask he kept stashed for emergencies – medical and otherwise and set it on the table in front of her.

“What’s that?” she asked, wrinkling her nose and making a crease in her forehead.

“Liquid inspiration of the bourbon variety.” He uncapped the flask and put it into her hands.

“You’re a corrupting influence,” she said but she took the flask and gave it a sniff. “My daddy drinks bourbon.” She raised the flask to her lips but stopped before taking a sip. “You first.”

“Suspicious?”

“I’m about to drink bourbon from a flask given to me by a guy I’ve known less than twenty-four hours. That doesn’t sound suspicious. It sounds nuts.”

When she put it that way, he had to admit she had a point. He reached for the flask and took a healthy swallow, a little surprised when she took it back and followed suit.

“Feeling the burn,” she said with a cough. “But not the inspiration.”

“Give it time.” He reached for the flask and took another swallow.

They sat and watched the fire passing the flask back and forth between them until it was much lighter than it had been when they started. He glanced over at her, seeing the flush to her cheeks and the way her eyes shone in the flickering light, and he almost leaned in to kiss her.

That wasn’t what this was supposed to be about. He wasn’t getting her drunk to seduce her. He was lowering her inhibitions so she could figure out what she was passionate about. What she wanted to do next with her life. He kept telling himself that as he watched her wrap her lips around the end of the flask, her tongue darting out to catch a stray drop of bourbon when she pulled the flask away.

“Now,” he said, forcing his attention away from her mouth and back to the fire. “What do you like to do?”

“Control things,” she blurted out, clapping a hand over her mouth when she realized what she’d said.

The inspiration might not be there yet, but they had the lowered inhibitions thing going for them.

“Okay,” he said with a laugh. “That’s a start.”

“It’s not. It’s horrible. What kind of person likes to control everything?”

“The kind who’s good at things and likes to make things easier for other people,” he said, reaching for something positive. He couldn’t imagine trying to control everything. The thought alone was exhausting. He didn’t even control the wood he worked with. He saw the piece hiding inside the raw materials and just helped it come out. His life was pretty much the opposite of control.

“I like the idea of being a creative person,” she said, her words taking on the barest hint of a slur. “But I can’t create anything. I can’t paint or play music or build anything. The only thing I’m really good at is understanding variables and minimizing risk. I rock at that and I’m organized as all get out.”

“But that’s a good thing, right? Being organized makes things run better.”

“Fine,” she said. “But what things? There has to be something I can get excited about. My whole purpose can’t be to boss people around and make them do what I want. Especially when I don’t even know what that is.” She tipped her head back, and he watched the long graceful line of her throat move as she swallowed. And swallowed.

“Maybe that’s enough inspiration,” he said, taking the flask from her and setting it to the side.

He got up to put another log on the fire. When he turned back, he caught her watching him. She pulled her plump bottom lip between her teeth, and his blood headed south. The bourbon had been a calculated risk. Given how she was looking at him and how much he wanted her, maybe he’d miscalculated.

He wasn’t in the habit of having one night stands with strange women he picked up on the Appalachian Trail. He sure as hell hadn’t packed his backpack with seduction in mind. And he didn’t have sex with drunk women no matter how much he wanted them. Especially Rachel. He knew she wouldn’t forgive either of them if they did something when she’d been drinking that she wouldn’t do sober.

“You look like a lumberjack,” she said, eyeing him hungrily. “Bet you have your own chainsaw.”

She’d managed to snag the flask and was gazing at him over the rim. She looked flushed and beautiful, her features soft and relaxed in the flickering light of the fire. He had a feeling that Rachel drunk would be a lot of fun if he wasn’t working so hard to fight off his baser instincts. From the speed the alcohol hit her, he doubted she let loose very often. Holding onto her when she did was bound to be a wild ride, but unfortunately one he wouldn’t be having.

“Share,” he said, taking the flask from her hand and draining the last of the bourbon. It might put him in a class with a bunch of thirteen-year-old girls, but he liked knowing his lips were where hers had been. Given her current state of inebriation, it was nothing less than his civic duty to remove the rest of the alcohol.

“Do you?” she asked, looking up at him under her inky lashes, a mischievous smile tugging at the corner of her lips.

“Do I what?” He swallowed hard, willing his brain to stay with him in the present and not travel south with the rest of his blood. He was afraid it would take a stronger man than him to resist her if she hit him with the full force of her charm.

“Do you have a chainsaw?”

“I do,” he said relieved it was a simple answer.

“Bet you know how to use it,” she said, sounding like she was talking about something other than the chainsaw.

“Let’s get back to you.” He decided it was safer to sit across the table from her. The fire was warm against his back and he didn’t have to worry about accidentally brushing against her thigh.

“Let’s not,” she said, tipping her head back and letting her eyes drift shut.

Maybe not so safe
, he thought looking at the long elegant stretch of her neck. It was much too easy to imagine, pressing his lips to the tender spot where her pulse beat in her throat and kissing his way down to her collar bone. He watched her, his heart hammering in his chest, and the only thing keeping him from reaching for her was the moral code that said never sleep with a drunk woman.

Swallowing hard, he opened his mouth to ask her how she felt. He knew he was kidding himself, but maybe she wasn’t as drunk as he thought. Before he could speak her lips drifted apart and he heard the unmistakable sound of her soft snoring. Shaking his head, he stood and went around the table to help her find her sleeping bag. He nudged the table away from the wall so he could reach her and bent to scoop her up in his arms. She curled her body into him, and he breathed in the clean floral scent of her shampoo.

“Come on, Sleeping Beauty,” he said, brushing his lips over her smooth forehead. “Let’s get you to bed.”