Taking Heart (5 page)

After toweling off, she slipped into a pair of skinny jeans and a black
top. She looked at the clock and wondered when Eric would call. She wished
she’d asked for his room number as well; she hated having to wait and wonder.

Fifteen minutes later she’d applied makeup and fixed her hair, and still
no word from Eric. When the clock said 8:45, she finally accepted that he had
changed his mind. It was just as well. She wasn't so sure she was ready for
company anyway.

She exited her room and took the elevator downstairs, wholly unsurprised
to find the bar nearly empty save for the bartender and a middle-aged man still
in a suit. She sat at the other end of the bar from the suit, hoping to be
alone with her thoughts.

“What’ll it be?” the blond bartender, who looked to be in his early
twenties, asked with a wide smile. After Ren ordered a Jack and Coke (the only
thing that came to mind at the moment), he said, “Thank goodness you came in. I
really needed someone to talk to.”

Ren flashed a half-hearted smile as he handed her the glass of brown
liquid.

“Taste okay?” he asked.

Despite the strong alcoholic after taste, she nodded. “Just what I need.”
After a few minutes of silence, she said, “I guess you don’t get very many
people here during the summer months, huh?”

The bartender leaned on the bar with the heel of his hand. “Not someone
who looks like you.”

Taking another big mouthful of the drink, she tucked a strand of hair
behind her ear and felt a slight flush on her cheeks. There was something about
the thin mountain air that was making her attractive to men around these parts.
She attributed it to the lack of oxygen.

“My name is Caleb,” he said with a grin. “What’s your name?”

“Renee,” she said, finally accepting that she wasn't going to drown her
sorrows alone.

“Are you here by your lonesome?” Caleb asked.

Common sense told her to say no, that she was actually here with someone
else, but she suddenly felt reckless. If Ben could screw around with his life,
why couldn’t she? “Yes. All alone.”

The man in the suit called Caleb over. Ren gulped the rest of her drink
as she watched Caleb’s lithe body moving around, his muscles pressing against
his thin shirt as he poured the man another drink. When he came back a few
minutes later, he had a taller glass full of amber-colored liquid in his hand.

“Try this. It’s my favorite.”

She regarded him with a raised eyebrow and took a small sip. “Long island
iced tea is your favorite?”

He leaned closer and said conspiratorially, “I think it’s better than
beer and gets you drunk faster too. But don’t tell anyone I said that. I have
an image to uphold.” He stood tall and made the muscles in his chest bob up and
down.

Ren laughed, already feeling the jolly effects of the alcohol. She really
should have eaten dinner first.

“So what are you doing in Winter Park by yourself?” He leaned on the bar
behind him and crossed his arms across his chest.

“Just need to get some things taken care of,” she said evasively. “What
gave me away?”

Caleb’s smile was boyish and broad. “If you were from around here, I
would know you already,” he said with a wink.

She couldn’t decide if the alcohol was already affecting her thinking or
if his greaseball type of charm was actually working, but she winked back. She
was opening her mouth to flirt back when a voice said from behind, “Can I get a
Miller Lite, please?”

Ren didn't need a visual to know who was standing behind her. Without
acknowledging the newcomer's presence, she turned back to the bartender and
rolled her eyes.

Eric’s nose flared as the bartender opened a beer while simultaneously
flashing Ren another wink. Eric hadn’t expected to go into the bar, had been,
in fact, on his way to drive into town and get some food, when he’d spied Ren
through the hotel bar’s glass doors. As he came closer for a better look, he’d
been surprised to find her smiling and talking with the young bartender, a far
cry from the glum person he’d been expecting to see. So even though he’d vowed
to keep his distance, curiosity got the best of him and he'd entered the bar to
find out what had made her so chirpy.

But now her head was turned away from him and she was refusing to
acknowledge his presence, and really, he deserved it for standing her up. He
just wished she wasn't so rude about it.

He sat down on the leather barstool beside her. “How did the apartment
cleaning go?”

A long time passed when she just plain ignored him. Finally, she turned
her head and fixed her big brown eyes at his face. “It was an enlightening
experience.” She took another sip of what looked like iced tea and turned her
attention back to the bartender.

“What were we talking about?” she asked him with a smile.

The bartender glanced at Eric then said to Ren, “I was going to say that
I would remember a face like yours.” He reached out and twisted a lock of her
brown hair around his fingers and it was all Eric could do not to swat the
offending hand away in protest.

Eric calmed himself and simply took another drink, because acting like a
jealous ape was not his M.O. He didn’t even know why he’d ordered the beer. He
should just finish it and go to dinner, like he'd originally planned.

“So it went well then?” he found himself saying to the back of her head.

She seemed
put
out when she turned around to
face him. “What makes you think cleaning out my dead boyfriend’s apartment
would have gone well?”

“Do you two know each other?” the bartender asked.

“We sat next to each other on the plane,” she said with a tired sigh.
“That’s all.”

Even though she was right, that if you broke it down, they were just
essentially two people who talked to each other on the plane, her dismissive
words still stung. They had a connection—or had he just imagined that?

“Actually, we’re more than that,” Eric said before he lost the nerve.
“We’re soul mates.”

Ren sputtered her drink and the bartender issued a snort. “What?” they
asked in unison.

“You heard me,” Eric said with a sly sort of smile. “Soul mates,” he
repeated, saying the words slowly, impudently.

Ren finished the rest of her drink and stood up. “Charge room 234,” she
told the bartender and steadied herself on the bar as she stood up. She turned
to Eric. “You are insane.”

“And you,” Eric said, standing up and taking her elbow. “Are drunk.”

“No. I’m not.”

“Do you need an escort up to your room?” the bartender asked quickly,
walking out from behind the bar.

“Why? So you can take advantage of her?”

“How do I know that that’s not your intention?” the bartender shot back.
“As hotel personnel, I have the responsibility—”

Eric snorted. “Oh, responsibility your ass. You were trying to get her
drunk.”

Ren pulled her arm from Eric’s grasp. “Will you two shut up? I’m not
drunk and I can make it to my room without any help!” she said and stomped off.

Eric moved to follow her when the bartender said, “If you do that, I’m going
to have to call security.”

“What the hell? She’s my friend!”

The guy, who looked a few years younger than Eric, moved back behind the
bar and stood near the phone attached to the wall. “You say you're soul mates,
but she says you're just some guy she met on the plane,” he said derisively.
“You sound more like a stalker to me.”

Eric balled his fists at his sides but knew that the bartender had a
point. There was no way to explain why he felt like he’d known Ren forever. No
way without sounding certifiable, that was. So he did the only thing he could
do and left.

An hour later, he walked back into the hotel lobby carrying a box of
pizza from Hernando’s. After peering into the bar and seeing that everything
had already been turned off, he headed to the unmanned front desk.

The clerk emerged from behind a door. “Can I help you, sir?” she asked.

“Could I please use your phone?” The clerk looked at him with
thinly-veiled
suspicion, so Eric added, “I’m a guest here.
Room 315. Sorenson.”

She handed him the cordless phone and stood there, watching him dial, but
Ren's phone only rang and rang. He had almost given up when she finally
answered.

“Hello?” she said in a croaky voice. “Ben?”

Eric paused to consider this Ben—the bartender perhaps—but
said, “No, it’s Eric. Are you still drunk?”

She sighed. “I wasn’t drunk.”

“Are you hungry then?”

A pause, then, “Maybe.”

“Well, I’m at the lobby, holding a box of the best cheese pizza in the
state.”

“And?”

“And I got it for you.” From across the room, Eric spotted the bartender
heading towards the exit, but not before glaring at Eric. Eric showed the guy
his back. “I hope you like cheese pizza,” he said into the phone.

“You tell me, soul mate,” Ren said, her croaky voice still managing to
drip sarcasm.

He groaned inwardly. “Just meet me downstairs if you want it.”

Five minutes later she emerged from the elevator wearing a pink robe,
black
flip flops
, and a sleepy expression.

“Back to being frumpy again, I see,” he said as she padded towards him.

“I was already asleep, thank you very much,” she said, reaching up to
smooth her hair. “So where’s this cheese pizza?”

He motioned outside. “Right this way.” He led her out past the parking
lot and onto a grassy hill where he had arranged a starlit picnic, complete
with a blanket, the pizza, and paper plates.

“Well, aren’t you sweet,” Ren said, but she frowned as she stared down at
the food. “I don’t understand why you stood me up earlier and now you’re doing
all this.”

“Sit down and eat first before I tell you.” After they got settled on the
blanket, he handed her plate with a large slice of the pizza. He took a bite
from his own. “Earlier in the day, after I saw you at the parking lot, I made
the decision to avoid you.”

Her eyebrows furrowed. “Why?”

“Because I was too interested in you and I didn’t want to get attached,”
he said, shrugging to appear nonchalant.

“And this,” she said, gesturing towards the food, “is your solution?”

He nodded as he chewed.

“Well, you’re doing a bang-up job of avoiding me.”

He swallowed his food and took a deep breath, finally deciding to drop
the act. “I don’t know why, but I just can’t seem to stay away from you.”

Her eyebrows rose. “Is that why you said we were soul mates?”

He laughed softly. “Relax. I just said that to piss off bartender boy.”
He took hold of a lock of her hair. “I could never forget a face like yours,”
he mimicked.

She grinned and smacked his hand away. “Shut up. He was just being nice.”

“Who’s Ben? Is he Ben?”

She bit her lower lip and looked up at the night sky that was glittering
with stars. “Ben was my boyfriend.” She filled her mouth with more food and
continued to avoid his gaze.

“I’m sorry,” he said, watching her face intently, studying her lovely
profile under the moon's glow. “So he died seven weeks ago, and now you’ve come
to Colorado to clean out his apartment? I can see why you’d need a drink and
some kindness after that.”

She turned to him, her eyes glistening. “I never even got to say
goodbye,” she said in a whisper. “One day we were making plans for a visit, and
the next day he was just gone.”

Eric leaned closer and wrapped an arm loosely around her shoulders.
“Don’t cry. Come on, crying makes me nervous.”

She burst out laughing, wiping at her cheeks with the sleeve of her
bathrobe. “At least you didn’t tell me that everything was going to be alright.
I hate it when people say that.”

“So how is it going?” he asked, allowing his hand to slip away from her
shoulders. “I mean
,
it’s obviously not going to be
easy. But…”