RaeAnne Thayne Hope's Crossings Series Volume One: Blackberry Summer\Woodrose Mountain\Sweet Laurel Falls (91 page)

“Well, there you go. I'm in the same lot.”

Naturally. She should have expected that, since many of the
downtown business owners parked there and instructed their employees to do the
same, to leave room for customers in the closer parking spaces. What else could
she do but shrug and walk beside him as he headed toward the lot?

They walked in silence for a few moments, and she tried not to
notice the heat of him, which drew her on the wintry night as a fire in a
fifty-gallon drum attracted hobos. She did her best to focus on the snowy
sidewalk to avoid falling on her face in front of him.

“So how's the new office so far?” she finally asked.

“Good. We're still settling in. I imagine I'll only be here one
or two weeks out of the month, the way my schedule is right now. I'm going to be
heading out of the country in a month or so, which will complicate things.”

That was
something,
at least. “I
haven't had a chance to talk to Sage much this week, but in the few
conversations we've had, I can tell she seems to be enjoying the work.”

He slowed his steps slightly, and she adjusted her own pace to
match his. “Actually, I'm glad you brought her up,” he said. In the
old-fashioned streetlights, his eyes suddenly looked troubled. “I wanted to talk
to you about her anyway and was planning to drop by the bookstore tomorrow.”

Maura frowned, aware of a complicated little tangle of
emotions. She wanted things to go well between Sage and Jack, for her daughter's
sake. For her
own
sake, on the other hand, she
wouldn't mind a little distance between the two of them, especially if it meant
she could avoid these sudden encounters with him that left her off balance and
unsure of herself. “Is there a problem?”

“Not with her work. She's been great with helping me set up the
office, and she's very efficient and eager to please. The perfect employee,
really.”

“That's great.”

“She's got natural instincts too. The other day she pointed out
a couple of problems with a building I'm working on that I hadn't even
considered.”

Every mother liked to hear good things about her children—but
why did she have the feeling a big “but” was coming? “What did you want to talk
to me about, then?”

He was silent as they stepped down off the curb and crossed the
street, and she felt as if they were picking their way around the conversation
as carefully as she was trying to navigate through the ice in the road.

“I don't know how to ask this without just blurting it out,
bald and unadorned,” he finally said. “Is there any chance Sage has a drinking
problem?”

Sage?
A drinking problem?
For a
brief moment, she thought she must have misheard him. This was their
daughter
he was talking about. Sage—funny, bright,
giving Sage. On the heels of Maura's shock came the low thrum of anger.

She jerked to a stop. “What kind of question is that? You're
asking me if my daughter is…is some kind of drunk? Why the hell would you even
think
such a thing?”

He stopped alongside her and held up his hands. “Calm down. I'm
just asking. I was a college student. I know kids her age can sometimes take
things to excess. Maybe party a little harder than they planned.”

“Not Sage,” she bit out.

“Well, I don't know what else to attribute it to. A couple of
mornings since we opened the office, she seems almost hungover, out of it and
pale when she shows up. This morning I heard her throwing up in the bathroom.
She was better in the afternoon, but she still didn't seem like herself.”

How did he know what Sage's real self was like? He barely knew
their daughter! She wanted to snap the words at him, but she remembered her own
concern for Sage since she'd moved her things home from her dorm. She had to
agree her daughter had seemed very under the weather, but Maura would never
believe she was abusing alcohol. Sage didn't even like the taste of beer. She
had admitted as much after her first year of college, when Maura had probed
about the notorious Boulder party scene.

“I think she might have a bug,” she told Jack now. “I can
promise you, she's not out partying. For one thing, she's still underage. For
another, since she came back from school, she's been in bed before
I
am every night. Even over the weekend.”

“That doesn't mean she's not drinking by herself.”

Just the idea of that shook her to the core. Sage
had
been struggling since Layla's death. Was it
possible she was drowning her grief in alcohol? No. She wouldn't believe it.

“I know my daughter, Jack. That's not her. If nothing else, she
would never want to ruin her chances to work with you by coming in with a
hangover. I think she has a bug,” she said again. “I had planned to take her to
the doctor in the next week or so if she doesn't start feeling better, but if
it's affecting her work, I'll try to get her in earlier. She needs to be working
on her online courses.”

“She's doing her job. I have no concerns in that area. I was
only worried about her health.” He studied Maura in the streetlight's glow. “I
shouldn't have said anything. Now I've upset you.”

“No. I'm glad you did. It's my job as her mother to worry for
her.”

“And mine now as well,” he said, as if she needed that reminder
of the strange turn her life had taken the past month, with Jack now a major
part of their lives after all these years.

“I'll push her to go to the doctor,” she promised. “If you see
anything else unusual, please let me know.”

“I'm not sure how Sage would feel about me snitching on her to
her mother.”

“Why not? Fair is fair. She tells me everything you do,” she
lied.

To her surprise, he laughed. “In that case, I'll be sure to
drop a dime if I see her doing anything crazy. Which one is your car?”

They had reached the parking lot, she realized, without her
having much recollection of the actual journey. “That SUV there on the back
row.”

The wet snow of earlier had frozen to the windshield, leaving
the worst kind of mess. She sighed. Apparently she wouldn't quite be able to end
this long day yet.

“Go in and turn on the defroster and heater. I'll scrape for
you.”

“I can take care of it.”

“So can I. Where's your scraper?”

Arguing with him would only make her sound ridiculous. She
reached inside the door on the driver's side and pulled out her ice scraper.

“Thanks,” he said, taking it from her and immediately starting
work on the windshield. “Go inside and get warm.”

She didn't answer, just grabbed the second scraper that—like
any good mountain dweller—she kept in her vehicle as a backup.

“You're as stubborn as ever, aren't you?” Jack said when she
joined him at the windshield.

She gave him a cheeky smile. “Parenthood has only made me
better at digging in my heels.”

“I'll keep that in mind.”

The words weren't sexual at all, but for some crazy reason, she
felt a ridiculous heat spread from her stomach to her thigh muscles.
Grrr.
She ignored it and put her back into making sure
she scraped more ice off the window than Jack did. He'd grown soft living in
California, where he only had to worry about a little fog, while she had spent
twenty winters honing her ice-removal skills.

They didn't say much as they worked, only the occasional
comment about how he had forgotten how cold it could get once the cloud cover
moved off, and how this winter had been mild compared to some. When they'd
finally cleared off the last window, he shook the remaining snow off the scraper
before handing it back to her.

“There you go. You should be able to see now.”

“Thank you. I generally find that useful when I'm trying to
drive. Shall we do yours?”

“I think I'm good.” He gestured across the parking lot to one
of the few other vehicles there, an SUV that looked brand-new, judging by the
temporary plates hanging inside the disgustingly frost-free back window.

“How did you manage that?”

“I had errands this afternoon after it snowed and I brushed it
off then. Thanks for the offer, though.”

She shrugged. “You're new in town. Well, if you don't count
your first eighteen years, anyway. I wouldn't want you to think we're not
neighborly to our architects, brilliant or not.”

He chuckled and reached in front of her to open her
driver's-side door, in an astonishingly sweet gesture. She gazed at him. This
whole thing would be much easier if he would act more like a jerk instead of
doing these kind things that left her flustered and off guard.

She brushed past him to climb inside her SUV again, too aware
of him to pay as much attention as she should to her footing. Her boot slipped
on a patch of ice just outside the vehicle, and to her mortification, she felt
herself falling. In an instant, Jack released the door and grabbed for her
instead, clamping his hand around her upper arm and catching her.

She managed to find her balance, but her good sense seemed to
have completely deserted her. She couldn't seem to look away from the sudden
flare of heat in those blue eyes, the pulse beating along his jawline, the warm
air that emerged in a cloud with his exhale.

She should move. Right now
. The
warning whispered through her like a cold wind, but she instinctively blocked it
out. He was warm and sweet and gorgeous. Why would she possibly want to
move?

CHAPTER NINE

S
HE
HELD
HER
BREATH
as he lowered his head to kiss her, his mouth
warm against the winter night and tasting sweetly of cinnamon.

She shouldn't respond. If she stood here like an ice sculpture,
he would probably take one quick taste and then move on. Some part of her brain
knew that was the wisest course, but the rest of her apparently didn't want to
listen. He was warm and delicious and she hadn't known the sweet seduction of a
man's kiss in
forever
.

His arms wrapped around her, pressing her against the door, and
she thought he murmured her name, low in his throat. That sexy sound apparently
was all her foolish body needed to ignite. She wrapped her arms around him and
kissed him back, lost in the heat and the wonder of it, all tangled with
memories of so many other kisses.

He had always been a fantastic kisser. Even as a young man, he
had known just how to taste and tease and explore. Now, age and experience gave
him a laser-sharp focus on her mouth that left her weak and achy and wanting
much, much more.

Why had they bothered scraping all the snow when the heat they
generated would have done the job?

She had a sudden memory of their first kiss. After weeks of
hanging out together, talking and laughing and helping each other through their
respective family crap, she had been dying inside, waiting and waiting for him
to finally take the next step and wondering if she was going to have to paint a
big red X-marks-the-spot on her mouth to clue him in that she wanted him to kiss
her.

Finally, one evening they had gone hiking up in Silver Strike
Canyon. They had been sitting on a boulder enjoying the twilight and the picnic
she had packed and, suddenly, out of the blue, he had grabbed her sandwich out
of her hand, tossed it into the grass and devoured her mouth until neither one
of them could think straight.

The memories were all tangled up with the present. She was no
longer that seventeen-year-old girl. She was a mature woman with needs she had
ignored far too long, but right now, in Jack's arms, she wanted to be that
reckless, wild girl, throwing caution to the wind in the arms of the boy she
loved.

His kiss deepened, heightening the aching hunger, and she
kissed him back, pressing against his hard strength.

For all she knew, they might have stood there all night,
kissing until their toes went numb with frostbite. She wanted to, but suddenly
the sound of a car's engine out on the street pierced the haze of desire. Before
she could pull away, she heard a loud honk, then a bunch of whooping and
catcalling, then teenaged voices grew more distant as the car passed them.

Oh, good grief. What was she doing, standing out here on a
frigid January night, tangled in Jack Lange's arms? She felt as if she had been
in hibernation for twenty years, just waiting for him to return and wake
her....

She jerked out of his arms and sank down sideways on the
driver's seat, wishing she could shove him out of the way, slam the car door and
squeal out of the parking lot. But she was thirty-seven years old, not some
foolish teenage girl. She was certainly adult enough to face up to her
mistakes.

Jack looked down at her, his ragged breathing sending out
little puffs of condensation. “We always could generate enough flames to burn
down the whole Silver Strike forest.”

“Winter nights at this high altitude can do crazy things to
people's judgment,” she said, her voice as prim as her maiden aunt Gertrude's
underwear.

He looked amused. “So you're saying the cold and the altitude
are to blame for my overwhelming urge to slip into that backseat with you right
now and see just how crazy our judgment can get?”

Her whole body felt flushed, tingly, and she couldn't quite
catch a full breath. “Have a little originality, Jack. You mean you haven't
changed your technique at all in twenty years?”

His smoldering look had a wouldn't-you-like-to-know flavor to
it. “Oh, I've definitely branched out. But I have to say, once in a while
there's something to be said for the tried and true.”