Chapter Ten
C ornering Grady was like trying to catch fish without bait. He’d slipped out of the house the last three mornings before Sarah had even gotten out of bed, and in the evenings he locked himself away in the office right after dinner, then headed straight to bed from there. Avoiding Alex, however, was even harder than cornering Grady. The man wouldn’t leave her alone. Having told her he wanted her and being told he’d have to get in line seemed to have turned the Knight family darling into the family pest. Sarah had thought she was merely being honest but now realized she’d become a challenge. It seemed the more she was around Alex, the dumber she got. Like this morning, when he’d suggested she spend a few minutes sitting in one of the pickups to get familiar with it, so that when he popped home for lunch, she’d be ready for a driving lesson. Sarah had planned to head up the lake and start cleaning one of the cabins to live in and had told Alex she didn’
t have time today, but maybe tomorrow.
He’d told her to be sitting in the pickup at noon.
Sarah glanced at her watch, saw it was one o’clock, and smiled as she looked around the cozy cabin she’d been cleaning all morning. By now, Alex had found her note taped to the windshield of the red pickup, saying that tomorrow was really a better day for her driving lesson. Drat the man, she was not going to let him get into the habit of bossing her around, much less interfere with her business plans. And if she didn’t corner Grady in the next few days, he would learn right along with the others that she had moved to the NorthWoods Sporting Camps. She had more than a thousand dollars and countless hours already invested, and moving now instead of next spring made sense. It would take her the rest of the winter to whip all the cabins into shape, and then she still had to get at least the front room and the kitchen of the main lodge ready for guests.
Sarah checked the ancient potbellied stove in the corner to make sure the fire was dead, then slipped on her jacket and headed outside. She stopped on the narrow porch of Cabin One and took a moment to soak in the view of the deep, pristine lake rimmed with lush, evergreen-covered mountains marching all the way past the Canadian border. “Perfect,” she whispered on a deep breath of pine-scented air. “Just perfect. I can lure tourists here from as far away as Europe and Asia.”
Sarah walked to the bicycle leaning against the cabin and checked that the old red wagon was tied securely to the seat post. She’d used it to haul cleaning supplies, a quilt and bedding, and the curtains she
’d hung up this morning. “I’ll need to set up a Web site to draw international guests,” she thought out loud as she pulled the bike upright and swung her leg over the seat. She pushed off, the empty wagon rattling behind her. “One more expense to add to my budget. But maybe the Web site can wait until I see how my first season goes.”
Satisfied that her business plans were progressing nicely, Sarah pedaled out the half-mile lane that led to the main hauling artery. Alex had likely returned to the cutting site by now, hopping mad from her note, she hoped, and she had plenty of time to get home and start dinner. They were having lamb tonight, since Sarah knew Alex hated lamb.
She didn’t really understand why she liked pushing Alex’s buttons, but she did know it was fun. She couldn’t remember ever feeling so provoked by the opposite sex—in an exciting, butterflies-in-her-belly sort of way, that is.
Sarah raced down a short hill and madly pedaled to make it up the next knoll, the wagon bouncing on the frozen road behind her. Maybe she should write a book. Not one of those trouble-causing romances, but a book on running an inn, with recipes and little anecdotes about memorable guests. Lord knew, there could never be enough how-to books.
Sarah pulled onto the main hauling artery, making a wide swing because she was going so fast, and the wildly bouncing wagon nearly pulled her off balance. She just pedaled harder, picking up speed with a laugh of delight. Life was good. She had Delaney and Tucker to love and the excitement of a new business venture looming ahead, and for the first time in her life, she finally felt in charge of her destiny. Almost like a heroine in one of her books.
Almost. It was just the hero part that kept plaguing her. But she was a modern woman, not a damsel in distress who needed rescuing. She was damn well capable of rescuing herself. Sarah saw the empty logging truck headed toward her long before she heard it, because the wagon behind her was making so much noise. She steered to the side of the road, and the truck sped past, the driver giving her a big smile as he reached up and blasted his air horn. Sarah pedaled faster. Drat. The driver would surely tell Alex he’d seen her, and then Alex was going to ask her what she was doing so far from home in the opposite direction of town, and why in hell she had been dragging a wagon behind her.
Well, so be it. He would know about her opening the camps in a couple of days, anyway, when she moved into Cabin One. She’d be safely settled in her new home when the explosion came, when Grady told his sons about his plan to let her reopen the camps. None of them wanted the camps reopened, because they didn’t want tourists clogging their roads and traipsing through their forest taking pictures of moose. Maybe she should invite Delaney and Tucker over that first night, so they wouldn’t have to listen to the heated discussion.
Sarah approached the sharp curve that was half a mile before the lane leading home. That reminded her that she’d have to put up a sign with an arrow at the fork in the road, so her guests didn’t end up at the Knight homestead. She was just thinking she could take a shortcut through the woods, since her wagon was empty, and cut a good mile off her trip, when she rounded the corner and spotted a car parked on the side of the road. It was right beside the shortcut, and Sarah quickly decided to take the long way home.
She steered to the opposite side of the road as she neared the car, noticing it had Massachusetts plates. Probably out-of-staters hunting grouse, the only game open to hunting right now. Deer season had ended two weeks ago, and thanks to Ethan, Sarah had a freezer full of venison. Just as she was approaching the car, two men emerged from the woods. Sarah’s first impression was that they looked out of place. They weren’t dressed for the woods but wore black leather jackets and sneakers. One was trying to fold a map; the other one was carrying a hunting rifle. Not a shotgun, which was used for grouse, but a rifle.
Sarah picked up her pace. The men seemed startled to see her and stopped on the edge of the ditch. They stood there as she pedaled past, staring at her with narrowed eyes. She gave them a short smile and a quick wave and kept on pedaling.
Sarah didn’t look back when she heard their car doors open and close; she merely pedaled harder, wanting to get to the turnoff as fast as she could. Had Grady hired surveyors to cruise this section of woods for harvesting? Sarah had met one or two of the foresters they usually used, and they were local men, dressed for the woods.
She was just a quarter-mile from the lane when she looked back and saw the car speeding toward her, leaving a plume of frozen dust in its wake. She didn’t know why the men disconcerted her; she only sensed that they hadn’t liked her catching them walking out of the woods. She looked back again to find that the car had slowed down behind her. This was not good. In fact, it was starting to get downright scary. Why didn’t they just pass her?
She heard the engine rev just before the car sped by and came to a sliding halt not fifty feet in front of her. Sarah steered her bicycle straight into the ditch, jumped off, and ran into the forest at an angle that would take her to the path that led home. The fallen leaves, frozen and dried crisp, made a lot of noise under her feet, but that also allowed her to hear them following. She heard when they suddenly stopped to listen, and she immediately stopped, too.
She didn’t dare move. She looked around the forest, hoping for a place to hide, and spotted a large pine tree with several low-hanging limbs. Watching where she placed her feet, Sarah moved toward the tree, all the while listening for signs of pursuit.
One of the men said something she couldn’t make out, and they both started running in her direction.
Sarah sprinted the last twenty feet to the tree and grabbed the bottom branch to swing herself up, then climbed high into the concealing branches until she could barely see the ground. The men stopped not ten feet away from the base of the tree, and Sarah went perfectly still. They slowly scanned the area as they listened for sounds of her running. Both had guns; one of them had the rifle he’d been carrying earlier, the other a handgun.
“Come on out, honey!” one of them yelled.
Sarah saw him put the handgun into his pocket as he motioned for the other man to set down his rifle. The other guy set the rifle on the ground, then the first man kicked some leaves over it. “We don’t want to hurt you,” he said in a heavy accent as he looked around. “Are you lost? We can give you a ride to town. Come out, lady.”
Just then, Sarah heard a truck coming down the road—a pickup, by the sound of it. It was going quite fast, and she would bet her shoes it was Alex racing home, hoping to catch her pedaling down the road.
The pickup came to a sliding stop, the tires chittering as they dragged on the frozen gravel. The two men below her instantly reacted. One pulled his handgun from his pocket; the other retrieved his rifle from the leaves. Both men spun to face the road.
“Sarah? Sarah! Where are you?” Alex shouted.
Oh, God. Alex was coming into the woods to look for her. And he was heading straight toward the two men!
“Sarah!” Alex shouted again.
She had to do something. The men had their guns pointed in his direction, and if he got any closer they might shoot him.
Sarah started climbing down the tree and stopped just above the men when she heard one of them say something in a language she didn’t recognize. One man started to sidle to the left, as if he planned to ambush Alex.
Dammit, she had to do something. “Alex, they have guns!” Sarah yelled, just as she leapt onto them. Both men went rolling to the ground with grunts of surprise, and Sarah yelped at the pain of her knee connecting with a hard shoulder. The man beneath her lashed out with his gun, striking her in the ribs.
The other man rolled to his feet and grabbed her hair, pulling her up in front of him. She kicked back and connected with his shin, elbowing him in his belly at the same time. She then kicked the first man, who was now pointing his gun toward the road, and Alex shouted again.
“Alex! They’ve got guns!” she yelled, as loud as she could.
The man behind her grabbed Sarah by the shoulder and yanked her to the ground. A shot cracked through the woods, and Sarah screamed before realizing the sound had not come from either of the men beside her. They were crouched, motionless, looking toward the road, the one man pinning her down with his knee.
“Leave her,” the man with the handgun said, grabbing his partner off Sarah and shoving him deeper into the forest.
Stunned by her unexpected freedom, Sarah buried her face in her hands, her whole body shaking uncontrollably.
“Sarah? Sarah, where are you?”
She lifted her head and took a shuddering breath, trying to stop trembling. “Alex? I’m here. Th-they ran away, but I don’t know where they are!” she yelled.
Alex broke through the dense underbrush and dropped to his haunches beside her, scanning the woods around them with his gun poised to fire. Sarah scrambled to her knees and buried her face in his jacket.
Alex rocked Sarah back and forth in one arm, crooning nonsense to her as he scanned the woods. They, she had kept shouting, which meant there had been at least two men. Alex watched the woods for several minutes, his scowl darkening when he glanced down and saw the pieces of bark and leaves in her tangled hair. “What happened, Sarah?” He squeezed her softly when she didn’t answer and scanned the forest again. “What are you doing out here all by yourself?”
The sound of a car starting drew his attention, followed by the violent revving of an engine and the sound of tires spinning on gravel.
Alex eased Sarah away so he could see her face. “How long had they been chasing you? Did they hurt you?” he asked softly.
When he realized she wasn’t going to say anything, only shake her head, Alex tucked his gun into his belt, stood up, picked Sarah up, and carried her back to his truck. He set her in the passenger’s seat and closed the door, unloaded the handgun, shoved it under the driver’s seat, and climbed in. But instead of starting the truck, he stared out the windshield at the bicycle and Tucker’s old red wagon lying in the ditch.
“You shouldn’t ride a bike on this road, looking for your twigs and stuff,” he said, using every ounce of patience he had to soften his voice. He saw that Sarah was trembling uncontrollably, and his anger immediately vanished. He started the truck and put it in gear, then pulled Sarah against his side and headed for home with his arm wrapped tightly around her.
He had come back to the house two hours ago, hoping to spend time alone with Sarah by giving her a driving lesson—and getting her to see that he wasn’t just another member of her fan club. But all he
’d found was her note on the windshield. Angry, though not really surprised, he had conceded this round in their battle of wills and gone back to work.
But then one of the drivers had climbed out of his rig at the logging yard just half an hour ago, unable to quit grinning as he told Alex that he’d seen his wife pedaling down the road like a cat with its tail dipped in turpentine, dragging an old wagon behind her.
Alex had sped back toward the house, hoping to catch her. When he’d found the unfamiliar car sitting by the side of the road, he’d started to worry. Seeing the bicycle and the wagon lying in the ditch and finding two sets of large footprints going into the woods, Alex had pulled out the handgun they always kept under the seat.
“Where were you, Sarah, when you yelled that the men had guns?” he asked, now that her trembling seemed to be easing, though she had her face buried in his side.
“In—in a tree.”
“You climbed a tree?”
She nodded against his jacket.
“And then what?”
“I jumped on them,” she whispered.
Alex was speechless. She’d jumped on the men with guns in their hands? “Why?” he croaked.
“They were going to ambush you.”
Alex felt the tremor begin deep in his chest before it worked out to his fingers and toes. She’d left her hiding place to save him? Holy hell, was she an idiot!
She suddenly pulled away, and Alex realized he’d spoken out loud. He tightened his arm around her and glared out the windshield as he turned onto their lane. “You do not jump on men with guns.”
She hit him with her own angry glare. “So I was supposed to sit there and watch them ambush you?”
Alex couldn’t for the life of him pick which emotion was in charge at the moment. He was violently shaking over what she’d done, but it might be anger tying his gut in a knot. She tried to sit up again, and he let her.
“Fine,” she said. “Next time, I’ll just let them shoot you.”
“Why were they chasing you?”
“I don’t know. I was pedaling down the road just as they came out of the woods.”
“You’ve never seen them before? In town? At Mary’s store, maybe?”
“No.”
“They were coming out of the woods, they saw you pedaling by, and they just started chasing you?”
She nodded.
“Did you talk to them?”
“No, I just waved at them and kept going,” she said, looking down at her hands as she gripped the knees of her dirty jeans.
Alex pulled into the yard, shut off the truck, and turned in his seat to face her. “You waved at them,” he repeated evenly.
His voice must have betrayed his anger, because she flinched. Alex closed his eyes and took a slow breath. “Sarah, you can’t go waving at strangers you see in the middle of nowhere.”
“No! It wasn’t like that. They didn’t follow me because I waved. I think they didn’t like the fact that I caught them coming out of the woods.”
“They were probably just hunting. Why in hell would they chase you for catching them hunting?”
“They were on the shortcut that leads to home. And they weren’t hunting. One guy was folding a map, and the other guy had a rifle, not a shotgun. And they were dressed in leather jackets and sneakers.” She shifted to face him, anger rising in her face. “I didn’t say anything to them. I just acknowledged their presence and kept pedaling. I couldn’t just ignore them.”
“Yes, you could.”
She started to open her door, but Alex reached out and took hold of her arm. “Sarah, you have no idea of the effect you have on men. When you smile, the pope himself would forget his vows.”
“So this is my fault?” she asked, her voice rising in disbelief. She jerked from his grip and folded her arms under her breasts. “Because I was foolish enough to smile and wave at those men, I invited them to chase me through the woods? With guns?”
“No. That’s not what I’m saying.”
“Then what exactly are you saying?”
Alex blew out a frustrated breath and rubbed his face with both hands. Dammit. He needed Sarah to promise never, ever to put herself between him and danger again. Hell, what he really needed was to kiss every scratch and bruise on her body and assure himself she really was all right.
Her door opened, and Alex silently watched her stalk into the house. He finally followed her, went over to her closed bedroom door, and stood listening to her quiet sobs for a full five minutes—every tick of the old kitchen clock echoing his escalating urge to lash out. Then he walked away before he broke down the door.
Sarah didn’t see Alex again that day, and it was nearly midnight and he still wasn’t home. He hadn’t returned to the work site, the others had said when they came home for dinner. After Sarah had told them what had happened, Ethan started cursing, then grabbed his jacket and stormed out, with Paul right behind him.
Grady had paced for twenty minutes as he made Sarah repeat exactly what had happened, before locking himself in his office. Sarah had kept Delaney and Tucker busy making Christmas decorations at the kitchen table after dinner.
But now it was nearing midnight, the kids were in bed, Grady was nursing a bottle of whiskey in his office, and Sarah was the one pacing the kitchen floor, fretting and worrying and blaming herself. A truck finally pulled into the dooryard at a quarter to one. Sarah ran to the back door and saw three men get out and make their way to the porch. Their footfalls were heavy and unsteady, and one man was being supported by the other two. Sarah threw open the door just as Grady rushed into the kitchen.
Alex was between his brothers, his head bent as he cradled his ribs. When he looked up, Sarah couldn’t stifle her groan.
He was a mess. His face looked as if a skidder had hauled a load of logs across it; one eye was swollen almost completely shut, his other eye squinting below a bandage that covered his forehead. His left hand, holding his ribs, was also bandaged. His shirt was torn, there was blood on his collar and sleeve, and his lower lip was split. The smell of antiseptic wafted into the kitchen ahead of him. Ethan and Paul all but carried Alex to the table, then carefully settled him onto a chair. Grady, who had been speechless up to now, started cursing.
“What happened?” Sarah asked past the lump in her throat.
“You’re what happened,” Ethan snapped, turning on her.
“Ethan!” Alex said, only to suck in his breath.
Ethan ignored him, bringing his anger back to Sarah. “He went looking for those men who chased you today and spotted their car at the Greenville hotel.” He pointed at Alex. “The man’s not even near his full strength, yet he went looking to avenge you. When those bastards fled, my jackass brother tore after them. We found him and his truck wrapped around a tree!”
“That’s enough!” Alex shouted, slamming the table with his fist. He moaned in pain but never took his eyes off Ethan. “This is not Sarah’s fault,” he bit out with deadly softness.
“That’s enough from both of you,” Grady ordered. “It’s no one’s fault, except maybe Alex’s for going off half cocked.”
Ethan glanced at his battered brother, then stormed back out the door, his angry footfalls fading to a deafening silence. Alex’s groan broke the tension.
Sarah stepped to him and cupped his cheek, turning his face toward her as she examined him through blurry eyes. “Oh, God, I’m sorry, Alex.”
Alex groaned when Paul and Grady moved to help him stand up. “If this had been last year, those men wouldn’t have stood a chance when I’d caught them,” he boasted, which he ruined with another groan.
“No,” Paul assured him. “But then, you wouldn’t have had to go after them last year, would you?”
“Get a glass of water, and bring those pills, Sarah,” Grady said over his shoulder, nodding toward the tiny brown bottle Paul had set on the table as they helped Alex through the swinging door. “We’ll get him into bed.”
It seemed forever before Sarah was sitting by Alex’s side and the two of them were finally alone. The doctor had declared his ribs were bruised but not broken, Paul had explained. Alex also had six stitches over one eye, three cracked knuckles, and a banged knee. Sarah sat on the bed, a glass of water and two pain tablets in her hand.
Alex gave her a lopsided smile. “Ethan is really a sight to behold when he’s angry, isn’t he?” he said, obviously trying to make light of his brother’s scene downstairs. Sarah shivered.
Alex reached for her hand. “Don’t take his words to heart, Sarah. He’s not mad at you. He’s mad at me for wrapping my truck around a tree, and madder still at the thought that I might have caught up with them.”
“Oh, Alex. You shouldn’t have gone after those men.”
Alex said nothing, and she closed her eyes. “One of them spoke with an accent. And they had a map and a rifle when they first came out of the woods.”
“It doesn’t matter, Sarah. All that matters is that they’re gone and I’m basically okay. I’m busted up a little bit, but I’ll be fine.
She reached out and took his bandaged hand in hers. “I won’t bicycle on the road again.”
“This isn’t your fault, Sarah.”
She just sniffled, and he lifted their joined hands, then said mischievously, “If you kiss my boo-boos, I bet I’ll feel better.”
That jolted Sarah out of her tears. Did the man think she was dumber than dirt, not to realize he was taking advantage of his situation? Then she saw the twinkle in his eyes. Though she hadn’t done anything wrong, he had gone after those men because they’d gone after her. She lifted his hand to her lips and gently kissed the back of his bandage.
“Ohhh,” he moaned. “I couldn’t feel a thing. The bandage is in the way.” He pointed to his swollen eye. “Kiss me here?”
Sarah grinned and softly kissed his temple.
“And here?” He touched his lips. “If you kiss me here, I know I’ll feel good enough to go to sleep,” he cajoled.
Sarah looked at his poor, swollen mouth, then lifted her gaze to his. “How long ago did the doctor give you a pain killer?”
Alex looked fuzzy. “I don’t know. A while ago.”
Sarah hesitated the briefest of seconds, then leaned down and gently touched her lips to his. Alex leaned forward to deepen the contact, then dropped back onto the pillow. “Now I feel better,” he whispered, his eyes closed and his battered face wearing a pained smile.