Second Chances (Nugget Romance 3) (9 page)

“Harlee, leave it alone, please.”

“So I guess you’re definitely out for bowling?”

“Definitely out.” He put his goggles back on and began sanding what looked like the arm of a bench. “Text me your mom’s address for the furniture.”

“All right.” Harlee started to leave, but his phone rang. So she stayed, because, hello, she was nosy.

“Hey, Fiona.” His whole face lit up as he talked to his stepsister and Harlee realized that she’d been wrong. He was definitely as handsome as Brad Pitt.

When she got back to her house, Darla was waiting. She had an ancient Jeep Cherokee that had more dents than an empty tin can. But it was all-wheel drive.

“You ready to go?” Darla called, hanging out of the driver’s window. She’d tinted her blond hair purple.

“Yep.” Harlee jumped into the passenger seat. “Thanks for driving.”

“You look great,” Darla said.

“You too. Love the color.”

Darla shrugged. “It washes out.”

“Is your dad holding down the barbershop?”

“For a little while, then he’s coming to the open house too.”

From what Harlee could tell, the whole town was attending, to lend Griffin support. She suspected that they were also a little curious and were using the event as an excuse to get a gander at the homes. Griffin had supposedly advertised the grand opening in Nevada and Northern California, hoping to hook buyers in the market for vacation houses.

“Griffin wants us to each take a model, in case anyone has any questions and to make sure no one steals anything,” Darla said. “He’ll brief us when we get there.”

“Sounds good,” Harlee said as they drove through an elaborate gate and stopped at a guard station, where a security person waved them through. “Wow, this is nice.”

The place was a winter wonderland. Although most of the snow from the storm had melted, some of the giant log homes were still frosted in a thin layer of white. They parked near the Sierra Heights clubhouse and went inside to be greeted warmly by Griffin. He was everything Darla had described and more. Incredibly good-looking, but equally laid-back. He was also attached at the hip to an impossibly gorgeous brunette. Harlee got the sense she and Darla had interrupted something between the two of them. But this is when he’d told them to show up.

Griffin had just enough time to give them a quick tour before kickoff. There was an eighteen-hole golf course, a swimming pool and spa, outdoor kitchen with pizza oven, and tennis courts. The development certainly seemed like a mismatch for the working-class vibe of Nugget. But Harlee had to admit that it was awesome.

“You shouldn’t have any trouble selling these homes,” she told him optimistically.

“We’ll see,” he said, his eyes drifting off in the direction of the brunette, who he’d introduced as Lina. She returned a wan smile.

It didn’t take a psychic to see that something was going on there.

During the next hour, all the so-called Baker’s Dozen ladies arrived. Donna and Emily had gotten there shortly after Harlee and Darla to set up the food, mostly trays of finger stuff and cookies that wouldn’t make a mess. There was also coffee and hot apple cider, which made the clubhouse smell heavenly.

Harlee and Darla grabbed a few nibbles and drinks before heading off to their assigned models—Darla the “Pine Cone” and Harlee the “Sierra.”

“Text me if anything interesting happens,” Darla said.

“Likewise.”

Harlee’d just gotten inside her model when Maddy, her police chief husband, and a spectacularly hot guy Harlee had never seen before popped in. “Hi. Welcome to the Sierra.”

Maddy gave her a hug. “This is so nice of you to do for Griffin.”

The hot guy gave her a once-over and introduced himself as Nate Breyer, Maddy’s brother. “So you’re the private investigator?”

“I’m not a licensed private investigator. I’m more like an investigative reporter.”

“You’re on hiatus from the
Call
?”

“Something like that,” she said, because it was a hiatus. A forever hiatus.

“I call it the
Crawl
,” he said. “You know why?” When she shook her head, he proceeded, “Because every Sunday it’s nowhere to be found, even though I pay for a full subscription.”

She laughed. “You should call circulation about that.”

He leaned in a little closer. “Why can’t I just tell you?”

“A, because I’m not working there. And B, because I’m a reporter and have nothing to do with home delivery.”

From the way Nate was looking at her she got the impression that he’d like her to deliver his paper. Naked. She also figured that he was about ten years older than her. Not necessarily a problem.

“Nate, come look at this kitchen,” Maddy called.

He let out a sigh of resignation. “She wants me out of her guest house.”

“You live here?” For some reason he didn’t strike her as the mountain type, not to mention that the
Call
didn’t deliver this far north.

“Nah. I live in San Francisco, but Maddy and I own the Lumber Baron. So I’m up here a lot.”

“Are you thinking of buying a place?”

“Maybe, depending on what kind of deal I can get. I better catch up with the sister,” he said, and winked.

As soon as he walked away Donna came up behind her. “Foxy, isn’t he?” Who said foxy anymore? Harlee tried not to laugh. “That’s Sophie and Mariah’s baby daddy.”

“Oh yeah, I remember you telling us something about that.”

“He’s single,” Donna volunteered.

“Really?” Maybe she should invite him bowling. Although a small part of her still held out hope that Colin would come.

That day at least fifty families from outside the area traipsed through the models. Griffin sold two houses and took her, Darla, and Lina to dinner to celebrate. Afterward he treated them all to bowling, for helping. One of his new mechanics, a nice-looking guy named Rico, joined them. By the end of the night he’d proposed to Darla more times than Harlee could count. He kept telling her in Spanish, “
Me encanta tu pelo morado
.” I love your purple hair.

She and Darla had taken to calling him “Rico Suave.”

By the time Harlee got dropped off at her cabin it was almost midnight. That’s why she was surprised to find Colin and Max sitting on her porch in the freezing cold.

C
olin had waited all night for Harlee to get home and now that she was here he felt pathetic. Griffin Parks had dropped her off in his overpriced Range Rover. They’d looked hella cozy sitting in his leather-upholstered bucket seats.

“Hi.” She waved to him as she jogged up the stairs, her face wreathed in alarm. “Is everything okay?”

The dog stood up, shook his coat, and wagged his tail, happy to see her. Colin searched for something to say. Even he knew that camping out on a woman’s porch in the wee hours of the morning bordered on restraining-order behavior.

Yet, Harlee opened her door and ushered Max and him inside, like he’d dropped by to borrow a cup of sugar. “You guys look frozen.”

She turned on the heat and went straight to the kitchen to put a kettle of water on the stove. He followed her, taking a seat at the dining room table.

“How long have you been here?”

“Just a few minutes,” Colin said, studying the legs of the table so she wouldn’t see that he was lying. “Max and I were on a walk and decided to stop by.”

“At midnight?” Her brows shot up and then her lips quirked in a half smile. “You’ve totally been waiting for me, haven’t you?”

He shrugged nonchalantly. “Just a little while. I’ve decided to do the acupuncture.”

“Really?” She went from radiant to shamefaced in under forty seconds. “You felt left out tonight, didn’t you?”

No. Maybe he’d bowled once or twice as a kid, but had no memory of it. It wasn’t like he craved wearing smelly rental shoes. He certainly hadn’t missed going to the real estate open house. That appealed to him about as much as getting smallpox. He’d just really wanted to be with Harlee.

Yeah, it was sixty kinds of stupid, given all his issues. Especially the ones she didn’t know about. He’d once read that male bees died during midflight sex. If that wasn’t tragic enough, their penises were ripped off during the mating ritual. That would be him, if he didn’t watch it.

“Is there anyone good in Reno?” he asked. Knowing her, she’d research until she found the most acclaimed acupuncturists in the surrounding area.

“I’ll research it. I’m really good at that. And I want to get the best.”

Yep,
he called that one right. She made his insides warm—she was such a good person. What the hell could she possibly see in him? But she saw something.
That
she’d made abundantly clear. He wasn’t so arrested that he couldn’t tell the signs. The way she checked him out when she thought he wasn’t looking. The way she’d folded into him the night of the power outage when he’d carried her to bed.

“Okay,” he said, and stood up to go.

“I’m making tea.” She pouted, and he sat back down, his boots bumping Max under the table.

“Did Griffin sell any houses?” He’d been over to Sierra Heights a few times to do handiwork for Griffin and thought the guy was out of his mind. Although ruggedly beautiful, Nugget didn’t strike Colin as the kind of place people bought million-dollar homes.

“He sold two,” she said, pouring loose tea into some kind of strainer deal. “And I think Nate might buy one.”

“Nate Breyer? He was there?”

Harlee stopped what she was doing. “You must know him from when you worked on the Lumber Baron.”

“Yep.”

“What? You don’t like him?”

“I like him fine. He’s Maddy’s brother. He bought that inn when she was going through a tough time, to help her work her way out of it. Of course I like him. I just didn’t expect him to be going to open houses. That’s all.”

She handed him a mug. “Let that steep for a while. Why was she going through a rough time?”

“You’re a nosy little thing.”

“Well, of course I am. I’m a reporter—and an investigator.”

“Her husband left her for another woman,” Colin said, not knowing why he was telling her this since it wasn’t any of her goddamned business. But the whole town knew anyway.

She gasped. “The police chief? What a creep.”

“Not him,” Colin said. “Her first husband—some big hotel mogul.”

“Oh. That’s awful. Is that how she met the chief?”

“Yeah,” he said, wanting to change the subject. He didn’t like gossiping about people.

“For a guy who doesn’t get out much, you seem to know a lot about this town.” Harlee took the strainer out of his cup. “You can drink it now.”

He took a sip and got a nice taste of peppermint.

“It’s herbal,” she said. “That way it won’t keep you awake.”

“It’s good. Thanks.”

She rested her chin in her hands with her elbows firmly on the table. “That was your sister on the phone earlier, wasn’t it?”

“You don’t miss anything, do you? Fiona, her husband, and kids want to come for Thanksgiving. We’re watching the weather.”

“Where do they live?” Harlee asked.

“Los Angeles.”

“Is that where you’re from?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“You’re killing me with all the long answers.”

“I’m not much of a talker,” he said.

“No. Really?” She smiled at him to make sure he knew she was teasing. “Why don’t you just go to Los Angeles?”

Colin let out a breath. “Because I don’t fly. And it’s about ten hours by car each way. I don’t have the time off.”

“Is it because of the demophobia that you don’t fly? Airports must be horrible for you.”

They were the worst. The one time he’d gone inside Reno-Tahoe International to meet Fiona at the gate, Colin had thought he’d suffocate to death. “Yup. I also have claustrophobia, so even if the plane is empty I won’t fly.” He hadn’t intended to tell her that, but maybe she’d see how screwed up he was.

And the phobias were only the beginning.

“Claustrophobia too?” Harlee gave him a sympathetic look, but didn’t seem to be judging. “Did you always have them? Or did something happen?”

Oh, something happened all right. He’d been locked up like an animal with the worst people on earth. But he wasn’t going there. “Hey, Harlee, you think we could talk about something else?”

“If you want to.”

“Yeah, I want to,” he said, and grinned at her, because when he did that it seemed to shut her up.

“Guess what?” She didn’t wait for him to guess. “Griffin is going to help me find a used four-wheel drive so I can get rid of the Mini.”

Griffin, huh? When he’d proposed the idea, she’d shot him down. “That’s good.”

“You want to sit on the couch? It’s more comfortable.”

He knew where this was going, but like that poor honey drone, he couldn’t seem to stop himself. “Sure.”

He passed the fireplace mantel on the way to the sofa and looked at the framed pictures. He recognized Harlee’s mom, who posed with a man who must be her father. “Who’s this?” He held up a photo of a younger Harlee with a guy maybe a few years older.

“That’s my brother, Brad.” She pointed to a side table with another picture of him, a woman, and a baby. “That’s his wife and my niece.”

“Nice,” he said. “You two close?”

“Yup. When I was younger I used to be jealous of him. But now that he’s my father’s greatest disappointment, I love him like crazy.”

“Why is he your father’s greatest disappointment?”

“He’s not.” She laughed. “I just like to give him crap about not becoming a doctor. My dad is an internist and wanted his son to follow in his footsteps, so Brad went to law school instead.”

“Well, a lawyer isn’t bad,” Colin said. Hell, her family was a freakin’ Norman Rockwell painting compared to his.

“Except he’s a cop,” Harlee said.

Colin wasn’t sure he heard right. “Like with the police department?”

“Oakland PD, to be exact. That’s a badass department,” she said. And there was serious pride there. “After he got out of Stanford, he had this epiphany that he was meant to protect and serve. He helps me out with my business sometimes . . . I mean, it’s all legal. He would never do anything unethical.”

She patted the seat next to her. “Colin, come sit down.”

She looked so pretty sitting there. Her sweater was blue and it matched her eyes and he could see the curves of her breasts through the material. And he really wanted to sit next to her. But her brother was a fucking cop.

He looked at his watch. “It’s one in the morning, Harlee. I really should go. I’ve got a long day.”

“Okay.” She got to her feet and he could tell that she was disappointed. But everything about her life—her brother, her business, her perfect family—told him to back off.

“I’ll call you Monday with what I come up with on acupuncturists,” she told him.

“Sounds good.” Colin whistled for Max and headed to the door, Harlee on his heels.

“Colin.” She reached up on tiptoes and brushed his lips with hers. It was a friendly kiss, not a let’s-go-to-bed-and-I’ll-rock-your-world kiss.

But hell if it didn’t rock his world anyway.

 

So far, the fireman had checked out. No wife waiting in the wings, pretty good credit history, and his chili had won first place at the Sonoma County fair five years in a row.

This could be The One for Alex, Harlee hoped as she filled out her report. Like Frances Guthrie, Alex Bean had become one of Harlee’s regulars. Like them all, she was desperate to find love.

Harlee was starting to believe that love was as unattainable as a department store in Nugget and that there were no good men. At least most of the ones she’d investigated hadn’t been good. In fact, they’d been bad to the bone. Her dad and brother seemed to be the exception. And Colin, who despite his quirkiness and reticence had an amazing spirit. Even though she hadn’t known him long, she could feel it. The way he took care of Max. The way he helped people. And the fact that he was the carpenter of choice for everyone in town. People trusted him.

Unfortunately, he was either asexual or completely not into her. Because she had literally thrown herself at him—shoved her body so tight up against his that a piece of paper wouldn’t fit between them. Most guys she knew would’ve gotten the message by now. And she was pretty sure that Colin had. But nothing. He hadn’t even tried to kiss her back when she’d pecked him on the lips last night.

It was weird, because she’d so gotten the impression that he liked her. Like really liked her. Like he thought she was a goddess.

Maybe she scared him. People had warned her before that she came off a little aggressive. Hey, that’s how you got the big stories.

It’s not like she scared everyone. Take Nate Breyer. He seemed perfectly at ease with her and had even asked for her number after the open house. On paper, Nate had more going for him than Colin. He was a big San Francisco hotelier, an excellent conversationalist, and dripped with sophistication. Like a numbnuts, she’d politely turned him away. She just wasn’t looking to get involved right now, not even casually.

That’s why this little torch she carried for Colin was crazy. She didn’t understand it, but the man did something to her. Perhaps it was the vulnerability she sensed under his rough exterior. Or maybe she just wanted to fix him. Anyway, it didn’t matter, because he’d made it abundantly clear that he just wanted to be friends. All for the best, she told herself, as she hit the button on her computer, sending the firefighter’s CV to Alex.

Next, she took a quick peek at Journalismjobs.com, perusing the board for anything that looked interesting. The Bozeman paper wanted a political reporter. She supposed she could just as easily freeze her ass off in Montana as she could in Nugget. Then again she got free rent here. In Calgary, they were looking for an energy reporter. Getting a Canadian work visa would be a bitch. And she didn’t know anything about energy, unless you included energy bars, Harlee’s breakfast of champions. Her favorite was an ad wanting a “slick city reporter,” in Temple, Texas.

That would definitely be her. She was so slick that she’d gotten herself culled from the herd.

Downsized.

Reduced.

Fired.

For the next hour she distracted herself by researching acupuncturists. She found two—one in Reno and one in Truckee—who were members of the American Academy of Medical Acupuncture, which required two hundred hours of training. Both were affiliated with the National Certification Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine. So definitely not quacks.

She printed their backgrounds and literature from their websites, then checked Yelp for the hell of it. Both acupuncturists got rave reviews, so she printed those too, wanting to give Colin plenty of information before he made his choice. She contemplated running Colin through a few of her databases just to see if anything stood out that could shed some light on his phobias. But Harlee shut down the computer instead, deciding she’d stalled long enough. It was time to go into town and make the dreaded trip to her post office box. She’d been avoiding her mail like a kale juice cleanse. Bills, bills, and more bills. In her closet, she found her parka, bought for half price at the outlet store, thank you very much, and shrugged into it. Today she opted for her fleece-lined rubber boots because it looked like snow. On her way out, she grabbed a scarf, hat, and gloves, before cranking the heat in the Mini.

Cold didn’t even come close to describing the temperature. Nugget was only four hours away from San Francisco, yet it may as well have been the frozen tundra. Located in the Sierra Nevada, near the southern border of the Cascade Range, Nugget was one of the snowiest towns in America; a fact that people had trouble believing, given that this was California. But on a day like this, Harlee believed. And it wasn’t even Thanksgiving yet.

She pulled up to the post office, which was a few blocks from the square, and got that leaden feeling in her stomach. In the lobby, she found her box, unlocked it, and pulled out piles of envelopes. It seemed like just yesterday she’d filled out the change-of-address card. Still, her creditors seemed to have found her.