What The Heart Finds (13 page)

“Yeah that's...
sort of what I meant,” Liam said, shaking his head.

“Alright. I'll do
that,” Eric said, standing slowly and reaching out to steady
himself. “As soon as the world stops spinning, I am going to
romance the hell out of that woman,” he declared, rapping Liam
on the shoulder and making his way out of the store, stumbling more
than once on his way back to the garage.

Eleven

Lena woke up the next
morning hot. Physically over-heated but also, she admitted grimly,
sexually frustrated.

Apparently hiding away at
the inn wasn't any kind of deterrent to Eric O'reilly. The man had
climbed a building for goodness sake. And she had let him get her
topless. On a balcony. Just tits out for anyone to see. Lena put her
head in her hands, shutting her eyes tightly as if she could squeeze
the memory out of them.

She comforted herself
with the idea that he should have gotten the rest of her car parts
and in a few days she could get the hell out of there. Away from him.
Back to her life.

She tried to stifle the
fleeting thought that she would regret leaving without having taken
Eric to bed. It was a ludicrous idea. But it was there. Right
underneath all her rational thoughts, hanging there heavy and
insistent.

“Get it together,”
she said out loud, picking through her closet and pulling out blue
slacks with white pinstripes and a white off-shoulder shirt. Maybe if
she went down to the dining room and casually chatted up some people,
she might be able to get a little bit more information. Like when the
busiest time of year was. And how many people usually stayed at the
inn at a time.

Since she had arrived,
she had only seen two other guests. Both of whom seemed to be very
familiar with the town. They were probably family members of
townspeople. Maybe they would have some more information for her.

“Hey Miss.
Edwards,” Devon greeted her as she descended the stairs. For
once he wasn't glued to his phone. “How has your stay been so
far?”

Lena smiled. Devon. A
perfect untapped resource. “It's been nice. Is it always so...
slow here?”

Devon moved out from
behind the desk, casually leaning against the banister. He wore a
gray vest over a black dress shirt and black skinny jeans. And he had
on sneakers, Lena realized with a smile. He somehow managed to pull
the look off. “It's on and off. We get busy around the winter.
There's a mountain up that way,” he said, gesturing out toward
the side of the inn. “There's a lodge with skiing,
snowboarding, all the fun winter sports stuff. So when they fill up,
we get the leftovers. From November through February we are usually
about half or three-fourths full. It should be more,” he said,
sounding confident and informed. “But the road gets treacherous
sometimes and we have no other way to get guests back and forth.”

“You know a lot
about it,” Lena commented, curious.

“Well,” he
said, smiling at her, his horn-rimmed glasses slipping down his nose
slightly. “I should. My family owns the lodge.”

“And yet you work
here,” Lena half-asked.

“Yes, well. Would
you want to work for your family if you didn't have to?”

“True,” Lena
agreed. “But you know... there really isn't any other way to
cart quests up that steep of an incline.”

“Oh there are
always ways,” Devon said, smiling. Charming. Intelligent. “From
the somewhat silly but low cost idea of dog sleds to the much more
expensive but practical idea of a gondola transport system.”

“That is actually a
really great idea,” Lena said, impressed. She never would have
even thought of it. Devon was wholly underutilized working at a front
desk at a small inn. Despite his preferences for not working with his
family, it was where he should be. Making a difference. Using his
innovative imagination to make the business even better than it
currently was. “You know that would even be a benefit for the
lodge. The staff can get into town more easily even when the weather
is bad. Or when they find themselves low on supplies. Have you
brought this up to your family?”

Devon smiled, the gesture
forced and slightly bitter. “My family is very stubborn. Set in
their ways. And they see me as a silly kid still. They wouldn't
listen if I tried.”

“That's a shame,”
Lena said, her words full of conviction. EM would love the idea. EM
would jump at it, eating the overhead cost knowing it would pay off
in the long run. She would make sure that when she presented the idea
to him, that she would give Devon full credit. Insist that EM bring
that up when he spoke about it with Devon's family. Maybe they would
take him seriously if a man like Elliott Michaels decided his idea
was gold.

Devon shrugged a
shoulder, brushing it off. “I'm really better suited here. I
get to do my own thing.”

Lena gave him a small,
tight-lipped smile. There were too many young people like Devon.
People with great, innovative minds who just lacked the passion to
follow through. If he just applied himself...

Lena shook her head. Not
everyone was like her. And Devon had grown up privileged. He hadn't
experienced the soul-sucking poverty that had led her to smashing
through any obstacle that got in the way of her goals. “What's
your last name Devon?” she asked, wanting to know who to give
credit to.

“Windsor, my lady,”
he said smiling and bowing to her.

Lena laughed, the sound
sweet and musical. “Well, Devon Windsor,” she said, still
smiling. “care to escort me to breakfast?”

“The pleasure would
be all mine,” Devon gushed, offering her his arm.

He led her to a table
next to a window, sitting down across from her without asking
permission. “So what brings you here? It's not ski season. We
haven't started all the summer farm events that brings a certain
crowd. Or the fall when we get all the people interested in our crazy
autumn celebrations. You literally picked the worst time of year to
visit.”

“Well,” she
said, smiling at the surly waiter who dropped off a cup of coffee for
her and an energy drink to Devon. Without having been asked. “I
have a... friend who suggested this town. He had spent a few nights
here once. And then my boss forced me to take my unused vacation
time. Since I didn't have anywhere else to go, I thought this would
be as good as any.”

“Are you
disappointed?” Devon asked, throwing back half of the energy
drink in one swig. “This place doesn't really seem your speed.”

“No. I'm not...
disappointed. I didn't have any expectations really. I was just
curious. And I mean... the horseback riding and cheese tasting were a
lot of fun. I feel kind of lost without my car to be honest. I cant
go explore anything.”

“And maybe you
hadn't quite been prepared for local legend Eric O'reilly,”
Devon supplied, crossing a personal boundary in such a casual way
that she couldn't fault him for it.

“Yes, well. Yeah...
that wasn't in my plans. I just wanted to get away for a few days and
enjoy some peace and quiet.”

“Yeah you're not
going to get that with Eric interested in you.”

“He's interested in
everyone,” Lena grumbled, putting cream and sugar into her
coffee.

“True enough,”
Devon allowed. “But you know he's not just the man whore
everyone calls him. He's actually a pretty decent guy.”

“Wow,” Lena
said, raising a brow. “No one seems to want to defend him.
Except...”

“Anna,” Devon
supplied, nodding. He placed his arms on the table, leaning in like
he was about to share a bit of juicy gossip. “I was here for
that whole thing. I met Anna at the Spring Into Summer dance and that
was right in the middle of the whole love triangle thing they had
going on.”

“Sam seems like a
really great guy,” Lena said, feeling a bit uncomfortable.

“Salt of the
Earth,” Devon agreed. “He's really great to Anna. They're
happy. But Eric and Anna were an interesting pairing too. I was kind
of routing for them to be honest. I always ship the wrong couples.”

“Ship?”

“Yeah,” Devon
said, smiling with a bit of superiority as if she was behind the
times. “Ship. As in shipping. It means you root for two people
to be together.”

“Ah I see,”
Lena smiled, thinking how long it had been since she didn't recognize
some sort of slang term. “Why did you... ship them?”

“I don't know. Anna
really brought out the good in Eric.”

“Probably because
she is so good herself,” Lena agreed.

“Exactly. But I
think she made the right choice. No matter how much Eric loved her, I
think he needs a more challenging woman. Someone to call him on his
bullshit. He would just eat that up.”

Lena silently stirred her
coffee, choosing not to think about how that pretty much described
her. “So what about you?” Lena asked. “Are you
seeing... anyone special?” she asked carefully, not entirely
sure if Devon was straight or gay or fluid.

“No,” Devon
said, smiling wickedly. “no special lady for me. Not for lack
of trying,” he said, winking.

“Oh come on now,”
Lena said. “You're a good looking, charming guy.”

“Oh, it's not me,”
Devon said, laughing like that was ridiculous. “It's just...
hard to date girls who you used to give yourself cootie shots for.
Kinda ruins the romance when you flash back to that one time that
they tattle-taled on you for trying to take an extra ice pop at the
school fair.”

“Yeah I could see
that killing the mood.”

“So you're not
gonna give him a shot, huh?”

Lena considered Devon
over her menu. “If you were me, would you?” she asked,
genuinely curious.

“Yeah,” Devon
said, his grin lopsided, almost uncomfortable. “I think I
would. I mean... if there was a female version of Eric, I cant
imagine not wanting to give that a shot. It seems like a once in a
lifetime opportunity, don't you think?”

“Maybe,” Lena
grumbled, glancing back down at her menu. Why did everything have to
lead back to Eric? All she wanted to do was put the idea of him
behind her. She certainly didn't need people coming out of the wood
works and telling her she should mess around with him. That was
literally the last thing she should be hearing when she was trying to
convince herself to stay away from him.

“So what are the
autumn activities you were talking about?” she asked, the segue
awkward and harsh to her own ears.

But Devon smiled. “Oh
you haven't seen fall until you've seen it here. All the farms have
events. Hay rides, pumpkin picking, apple picking, huge elaborate
corn mazes, entire acres turned into haunted houses. The whole town
gets decorated first for harvest and then for Halloween. There's
parades and then three separate parties on actual Halloween evening.”

“Don't the kids
trick-or-treat?”

“Well right here in
town, they do. But most of the kids live out on the farms and
whatnot. It's too far to walk between. So the school gets set up. One
room for the small kids, not scary, full of activities. One room for
the teens. Kinda scary but mostly just a place to chill and talk and
listen to shock rock. And then the adults get the gym. It's a big
deal. People come to town just for the weekend.”

“You get full
here?”

“That's an odd
question,” Emily said, walking past and grabbing dishes off of
an empty table.

Lena glanced at Emily,
her posture very rigid. Her face a bit stern. Like maybe she was
suspicious. Lena smiled, trying to seem genuine. “I was just
curious. If I decided to come back, would I have to like... reserve a
room way in advance?”

“It wouldn't hurt,”
Devon said, looking between them curiously. “At least a week or
two in advance anyway,” he added.

Emily eyed her for
another short second before walking away.

Lena ordered strawberry
crepes she had no intention of eating, her stomach swirling around
ominously at the possibility of Emily being on to her.

That was it. She had to
get into the computer system once and for all so she could go back to
being a normal person on vacation. Maybe if she wasn't so on edge all
of the time about her job then she could relax and Emily wouldn't be
so suspicious.

Twelve

She spent her afternoon
pacing her room, anxiety making her feel jittery. She had to get into
the computers that night. If Devon was working, the task would be
almost impossible. He never came out from behind the desk.

And Emily would be even
worse. Granted, she was almost never at the actual desk. But she was
always jetting around from one task to another. There was nothing
predictable about her behavior. Which made sneaking behind the desk
even more dangerous.

Lena shook her head as
she moved across her room. It didn't matter how dangerous it was. She
had to get it done. Because if she didn't, Emily was never going to
get off her case.

There was a sharp
knocking on her door, making her heart fly into her throat. She
looked over her shoulder at the door as if expecting it to burst
open. But there was just silence for a moment, followed by more
knocking.