Spirit Lake (4 page)

She picked up the two-by-four weapon and glowered at him. Cole looked down at her, a surprise itself. As teenagers they were about the same height. Right now she didn't seem to appreciate the growth spurt that had hit him back then. Her weapon wiggled back and forth, right under his nose as if it were an irritating mosquito, something else irritating he didn't like about Wisconsin's northwoods.

He turned away to pick up her jacket from his makeshift bed, then dangled the jacket off the end of his outstretched arm.

“Here,” he growled, “put it on. You'll catch cold."

She snatched the garment away, then waved the board at him. “Go sit down."

“I could hoist you up closer."

“You're weaving like a drunk."

“Did we drink last night?” Muzzy, he squinted at her. “What did we do last night?"

Her face squirreled up in repugnance. “Absolutely nothing and that's the way I liked it, thank you very much."

“But I am listing to the starboard side a bit much."

“Just don't fall,” she snapped. “Not after all I've gone through to make sure you survived the night."

So she took her doctoring seriously. She was worried about his health. He was right up there with some vermin she healed on other days of the week. That amused him, but confound it, he had to get rid of her before she discovered who he was.

Again she set to slapping the belt up at the screw sticking out of the crossbeam. She said, “Please. Sit down. I'll be out and back with help in a jiffy."

“Won't be necessary. I was just passing through."

“More like dropping in."

He wanted to chuckle in the worst way, but restrained himself. Instead, he lunged to catch the belt. When he did, she stiffened, stumbling away from him, almost tripping over her two-by-four. Grimacing against a sharp pain in his leg, he stooped over and picked up the board, tossing it to her. “You forgot something. Didn't mean to scare you."

She wiggled the board menacingly at him. “Keep your distance."

“Look. I'm not going to hurt you. I want outta here too."

Finally, her shoulders rose and fell in a sigh. “Okay."

If she recognized him, she sure played it cool. His whooziness returned, but he gritted his teeth against the temptation of mentioning anything that might draw her close to his face again.

He said, “I'll hoist you up. You find that screw or something to grab onto. Then use this shoulder to step on.” He nodded toward his healthy shoulder.

She stepped over, her head at an odd tilt when she looked at him. Following his orders, though, she allowed him to lift her, all that sweet, thick hair of hers showering back into his face, making him smile.

Soon she peered back down from above, freed. “I'll go get some tools to undo that door,” she said, her hair raining down over one shoulder at him.

Afraid she'd bring that sheriff, he sniped, “No!"

She sucked in her breath. Her wildflower smell wafted over him again, almost buckling his knees. Not daring to look up into her face, he said, “Get my knife. I left it with my backpack on the verandah."

“So that's where it is."

A fever slammed through him again like a Florida hurricane. “Sounds like you had busy hands while I slept."

She blushed. “Oh, don't worry. Everything was strictly professional. What do I do with the knife?"

“That door is probably swollen. If you can pry the knife in, I might be able to bust the door loose by pushing at it from this side. Try the hinges, too. See if you can loosen them with the knife."

“You can't make it up those steps and shove at that door without falling."

“Then you hop back down here, lift me up through the hole, and you can shoulder the door while I carve."

“Very funny. I was concerned for your health."

“Are you always this worried about an old hobo? Your life can't be that dull, lady."

She quickly looked away, but he'd seen the odd wince tie up the corner of her mouth before she could stop it. He found that reaction curious, but then her shoulders grew rigid again. “I want you out and on your way, is all. I've got better things to do with my life than watch you hit your head on the cellar floor. You're filthy and you don't belong here."

For some reason, her brusqueness wounded him. He grumbled at her though, “All the women tell me that."

“Stuff it,” she said, almost sounding the way he remembered her. He grinned to himself.

The cellar door soon budged for them, and Cole staggered onto the verandah but she quickly stood sentry in the weedy yard, clutching his knife, her eyes wide with fright again.

Never in his life had his mere presence frightened a woman. As a speedboat racer spending plenty of time on famous beaches, he was used to the opposite reaction from women.

He couldn't take his eyes off the way the morning's rays set her hair aflame. She was a treasure. Or a Pandora's box, he reminded himself. Don't touch.
She's not the reason you're here, buddy. You don't want to hurt her. Don't get her involved
. Except to help his head. It ached right now. Bigtime.

“Do you have any aspirin on you?” he asked.

“I could take you to Dresden in my boat,” she said, to his surprise.

“No thanks.” He didn't need to accidentally run into her father or the sheriff. Another Pandora's box.

“A fever with that leg isn't something to ignore."

“I'll give it a good dunking in the cold lake. That should do the trick."

Aghast, she lowered the knife a little. “That won't keep the swelling down forever."

He grunted, keeping his voice low. “I'll catch some rest and be on my way. A few days okay?"

“Better make it sooner than that,” she said, gesturing with the knife.

“And why's that?"

“Because the fire department's coming out soon to burn this place down. They're just waiting for the final say-so from the sheriff and a local attorney."

His brain came alert. The condemnation sign. “When?"

“They could choose to burn it just about any day now. It has to be gone before the end of summer."

His mind raced. Any day? What if he needed more time? And what about the legal papers on this place, folded now in his pack next to him? Come to think of it, he hadn't read them carefully. He assumed Mike knew what he was doing. Would he have to see this sheriff after all, and now an attorney?

Panicked, Cole fished for information. “Doesn't somebody own the place?"

She scoffed and pulled her jacket closer around her, the knife still in her hand. “An older lady owned it a long time ago, but she's dead now. There's been plenty of public notice in the papers, but nobody wants to pay the back taxes for, well, that thing."

The hand with the knife jabbed at the rotting house. Her obvious disdain for the property ruffled him. Didn't she remember how it used to look? He wanted to ask, but couldn't. Then there was his pride. This house had been in his family. Great-aunt Flora Tilden had come to them via a brief marriage, but still, she had been shirt-tail relation.

He probed some more, playing the innocent. “The old woman, she lived alone? No relatives to pay the taxes?"

“Nobody who cares."

That stung. Instinctively, Cole knew she wasn't condemning just a house. She was condemning his whole family. No. Try him. Just him. Guilt rose and he wanted to rush off the verandah, take Laurel in his arms and explain away the years. But he couldn't. He didn't want to drag her into his messed up life again.

She turned and started a stiff walk through the tall grass and brush, fading into the mist hanging over the lake.

Clenching his jaw against the pulsations in his leg, he limped after her. Reaching the top of the embankment, he peered down at Laurel in her small craft. After three yanks, her boat coughed and started.

“Could use a tune-up.” It came out of his mouth before he could stop himself. “I could do that for you."

She glanced up, scorn deepening the shadows across her eyes. “Don't hang out here. You hear me?"

A definite warning. The chill of it tightened the imaginary vise on his leg until he couldn't breathe. “A couple of days.” He felt like he could sleep for a whole week.

“Two days,” she snapped, turning her face back to the water. “Then I call the sheriff about your trespassing."

Then she motored away, and he watched her until she became a murky, watercolor rendition of herself. When the boat's sputtering stopped on the opposite shore, he arched a brow. So she lived in the log cabin. Alone? He remembered when her father started building it. Cole helped lay flat rocks for a walkway, but he never got to finish the job.

Fire lanced through his calf then. He leaned down ... and found his leg wrapped in a woman's undershirt under his jeans. So that's what those busy hands had done last night. He shook his head, thinking about her comforting a stranger even as she must have feared for her life. Didn't she learn anything from what happened fifteen years ago?

He straightened up, turning to stare at the old house. That “thing,” she'd called it. The reason he'd returned. Or was it? He could have hired a detective to scour the place first, but he hadn't.

No, it wasn't just the house he'd come back to explore. He'd come back because of his own feelings of emptiness that had gnawed at him since the day he'd left this place. Like wearing the wrong size clothes, he'd walked through life uncomfortably, making do with a murky memory that never quite allowed him to touch it.

He shivered again. Then the heat came with the new memory of the grown woman lying beside him last night.

He closed his eyes against a damnedable thought.

He wanted to take her up to the attic in that old house before him now, crush her in his arms, and kiss her until all of his ills were cured.

Opening his eyes, he looked at the decrepit house again. It was the reality. Maybe deep down, where his heart met his soul and the heat of truth was unbearable, he knew he'd wanted to see Laurel Hastings again. But she was a woman he could never have.

He swung back around to catch a last glimpse of her, but the fog had swallowed her up. Just like his dreams.

But her sweet scent lingered on the damp air, teasing him, swirling about his body, swelling him toward a new ache. How could he want her like this after so many years?

He parted his lips, tasting the soft brush of satiny fog. Tasting her.

And that would have to do. Tomorrow, he must be gone.

Chapter 3

AT HOME, LAUREL couldn't get into her usual efficient rhythm.

Out in the animal shed, she spilled water while trying to refill pans for bigger animals like Rusty and drippers for the smaller ones like the baby squirrels. She knew why she was clumsy and she hated it: that man over there. His festered leg, that fever she'd felt under her palm, his refusal to let her take him to a doctor—none of it would leave her. Especially his wry humor. And his voice ... something about his voice still bothered her.

Should she call the sheriff? Should she go back over there with provisions? He needed more than aspirin. He didn't want more than aspirin. The stranger in need had tied her in knots.

She decided fixing formula for the baby squirrels would calm her. But at the kitchen counter, she glanced at the man's knife sitting there and proceeded to break egg shells into the homogenized milk. She had a devil of a time fishing them out. Then when she took the hand beater to the mixture, the bowl almost tipped over and she noticed she'd already whipped the mixture to an airy froth no baby could possibly have.

While rinsing the beater under the sink faucet, she acknowledged being rattled. “You just spent the night worrying and tending a man who hopped off a train. You have the right to feel odd this morning."

Looking back on it gave her the creeps. The drifter could have killed her.

“But he didn't,” she muttered again.

He had a hint of anger about him.

“No, that was droll sarcasm.” She grabbed the dish towel and dried the beater.

But he was shiftless, never looking her in the eye.

“But no, that was him squinting, a normal reaction to pain.” She plunked the beater down and sagged back against the counter. “And you just left him over there? How could you do that?"

Stop being silly, she chided inwardly. She identified with anything injured, although a possible convict hopping off the train was stretching it. He may be hurting, but she didn't want any tall, muscular, dark-haired growling stranger around. And since when do you notice all that detail? Just how lonely are you, Laurel Hastings?

She shoved off the counter, tidying things, making busy work to calm herself. He didn't try to harm you, said a voice in her head. He even had a sense of humor. That thought rattled her more. What if he was just down on his luck? What about that infection he had? Blood poisoning started that way, zipped right into a person's organs, rendering the person ... dead. If not tended to.

She rushed to her living room viewing scope. For wildlife watching she kept a long-barreled lens mounted on a tall tripod at the picture window overlooking the lake. She placed her eyeball into position.

She didn't see him. Relief flowed through her. Good. He heeded her warning and left. She wouldn't have to call the sheriff. She wouldn't have to—as her mother called her doctoring profession—"worry and tend."

But she worried while going about chores in the animal shed. After feeding the squirrels, she moved to Rusty's cage. The white splint reminded her of the man's leg. She tugged her lip with her teeth. Staring at Rusty, she knew the man's flesh was probably red as the animal's fur. He needed aspirin, clean bandages....

Stop it
.

Why think of him? Was she stung by his refusal to let her help him to a hospital? Yes. And then there were the contradictions: gruffness sandwiched with humor; fine clothes sandwiched with hopping dirty trains.

Curiosity plagued her. On her way back through the breezeway, she noticed a plume of smoke across the way. Startled, she rushed into the house and swung her viewing scope back and forth until she spotted him. Her heartbeat came alive, but a frown followed. He nurtured a sloppy campfire one stick at a time.