The Seduction of His Wife

Chapter Fourteen

T hey’d gotten another eight inches of snow, and the New Year arrived with enough sunshine to bring the temperature up to thirty degrees. Perfect for fishing and riding a baby snowmobile on Frost Lake, Grady had declared at breakfast. Sarah’s determined smile caught Alex’s eye, because he had no idea what the crazy woman had to smile about.

She had come out of the lodge with five of the most pathetic-looking fishing traps he had ever seen, and Paul had taken to a fit of laughing when he recognized them as white elephants that Mary had been trying to sell for years. But Alex had quickly ended Paul’s amusement with one well-placed snowball, which started a storm of frozen missiles flying at everyone. Except for Sarah. She was already on the lake, carrying her woebegone traps under her arm, a bait pail and ice scoop in one hand and a chisel in the other. Alex groaned. She was going to be one of those serious fishermen, he could tell from her no-nonsense walk. He headed out onto the lake after her, his finely crafted traps in his new pack basket slung over his shoulders. “Wait up, Sarah. Do you even know where you’re going?”

“Yes, and I’m going to catch tonight’s dinner.”

Oh, God. She was going to be so disappointed. Frost Lake was slow fishing on its best days, and Sarah was expecting to catch a whole platter of fish with her pathetic traps? Alex groaned again as she walked away. Peeking out of her pocket was an old book on ice fishing she must have found in the attic. Well, he’d simply have to keep her mind off fishing and on fun instead. Being an experienced ice fisherman, Alex had a kite in his basket along with his traps. Whole hours could pass without so much as a wind flag; the fish were either biting or they weren’t. And any good ice fisherman worth his salt always carried plenty of toys.

Sarah stopped a good forty yards from him, nearly two hundred yards from shore, and slowly looked around. She studied the new blanket of snow, she studied the cloudless sky, and then she slowly scanned the shoreline.

“What,” Ethan asked Alex, “is she looking for?”

Alex shrugged. “She’s got an old book on ice fishing,” he said, as if that explained everything. Ethan broke into a smile for the first time in days. “A serious fisherman.” He slapped Alex on the back. “We’d better set up if we don’t want to lose. Hey, where’s Delaney going?”

Paul and Tucker stopped beside Ethan and Alex, and they all watched Delaney carrying her fishing traps over to Sarah.

“She really is going to desert us,” Paul said. He looked down at Tucker. “You know what this means, Tuck?”

The boy just shook his head.

“This means war!” Paul said with a laugh, grabbing Tucker and swinging him up in a high-flying circle. “And we’re going to blow them out of the water.”

Grady arrived then, shaking his head. “I don’t want anyone’s feelings hurt,” he warned. “Besides, what kind of men would you be if you took advantage of them? Between the two of them, there’s only ten years of ice-fishing experience, and all of it belongs to Delaney. So play nice.”

Paul stopped swinging Tucker to gape at his father. “Are you nuts? They’ll have us doing dishes until spring.”

Everyone turned at the sound of ice being chopped.

“Alex,” Ethan said. “Delaney knows we have a gas auger. Why are they chopping the ice with that chisel?”

“It’s a real old book,” Alex reminded him.

The men went to work drilling holes, which they did at the rate of twenty-five holes to one of Sarah’s. They set out their traps and baited them and then went about making a camp out of the coolers, food basket, and folding seats they had brought. And then the younger Knights got out their kites, along with some of the largest, knottiest balls of string ever seen. Fishing was fun, but kiting was serious business.

Tucker was starting on the next generation of kite flying, and he had Grady to thank for the new spool and crank that made hauling in the long lengths of twine easier. Ethan’s kite was by far the largest, but he said that was so it could carry all the string he intended to put on this year. Alex took a quick look at Sarah before he opened his own colorful kite. She was sitting on a folding chair, studying her trap. She also had that silly book opened on her lap. Alex hurried to get his kite in the air, tied it off on a stick he sank in an ice hole, and then walked over to show Sarah how to set her trap.

He didn’t make it two steps before he was stopped by his father’s hand on his arm. Alex followed Grady’s gaze and saw a game warden coming toward them on a snowmobile, headed straight for Sarah and Delaney. Alex started toward them again, when he suddenly remembered he’d forgotten to get Sarah a fishing license, but Grady tightened his hold.

“Let her fight her own battles,” he said at Alex’s questioning look. “Besides, if that’s Daniel, this could be fun.”

Alex decided his dad was right. Daniel Reed was a bachelor, and no more immune to a pretty face than any of them. Alex couldn’t wait to see if Daniel didn’t melt into a puddle of testosterone at Sarah’s feet.

Paul and Ethan came to stand beside Grady and Alex, Paul still holding his kite in his hand. They broke into collective grins when Sarah stood up as the uniformed officer got off his snowmobile and approached her. Alex’s grin went especially wide when Delaney inched closer to Sarah and took her hand.

“Ma’am,” Daniel said, tucking his gloves into his pocket as he looked at the pathetic ice trap sitting in the uneven, undersized hole. “I’m Daniel Reed, the game warden around here.” He touched his hat brim as he finally looked up—and choked in surprise.

She was beautiful. Stunning. Gorgeous!

“Officer Reed,” she acknowledged warmly.

And her voice was like honey! Daniel looked at the Knight men, who were obviously enjoying his discomfort. He cleared his throat and finally found the nerve to look back at the beautiful woman. “Could I see your license, please?”

“License?” she repeated. “I need a license?”

Daniel nodded, only to realize he was being impolite—or, more likely, dumbstruck. “Yes, ma’

am,” he finally got out. “But not if this is Delaney’s trap,” he hurried to assure her. Daniel sighed when she shook her head. He had known Delaney wouldn’t be caught fishing with that contraption.

“It’s mine,” the gorgeous angel with the honey voice said. “My book didn’t say anything about a license,” she continued with a frown. “I never needed one on the coast.”

The woman held a book out to him. Daniel took it, scanned the cover, then turned to the first page and grinned. “They didn’t need licenses when this book was printed,” he explained as he thumbed through the ancient study. “Today,” he informed her, realizing that as long as he wasn’t looking at her, he could at least string a sentence together, “you need one in freshwater. But,” he continued in a rush when he foolishly glanced at her worried face, “I’ll let you go this time, seeing how you’ve only got one…ah…that one trap set.” Not that it would ever catch a fish. “Just make sure you get a license before you come out again, okay?” he offered, feeling brave enough to look at her again. She gave him a smile that made him go weak in the knees.

“Does Delaney need a license?” she asked.

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “Not until she’s sixteen. Are you visiting from the coast?” Daniel asked, his curiosity making him bold when he noticed she wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.

“No, I live here. I’m Sarah—ah—Knight,” she told him. “I’m married to Alex. We live over there,” she said, pointing at the lodge in the distance.

Everything suddenly clicked into place for Daniel. So this was the woman Alex had married. But why hadn’t the lucky bastard put a ring on her finger? Daniel decided he sure as hell would have, if she belonged to him. “I know your husband,” he said. “I’ll leave you to your fishing, then, and go visit the others. Have a fun day, Delaney. Mrs. Knight,” Daniel said with a nod as he climbed back onto his snowmobile.

He was shaking his head when he stopped in front of the four grinning Knight men. “You guys ought to be ashamed of yourselves,” he scolded. He leveled his gaze on Alex. “She says she’s your wife.”

“She is,” Alex said, his hand outstretched.

“Business slow?” Daniel asked, returning Alex’s handshake.

“No.”

Daniel scanned the twenty-five large, expensive ice traps sitting in perfectly drilled holes. “You got a thing against women ice fishing?”

“No.”

Daniel looked at Alex’s beautiful wife, who was cutting another hole for Delaney with a rusty old ice chisel. He looked back at Alex, one eyebrow lifted.

Alex sighed. “She’s got this book,” he started to explain.

Daniel held up his hand. “Say no more. She’s one of those serious fishermen, I take it,” he said, grinning at the kite Paul was holding.

“She’s going to catch our supper,” Alex said.

“Hope you brought hot dogs,” Daniel returned with a chuckle as he headed back to his sled.

“And, Alex? You might want to buy her a license tomorrow. That gorgeous smile of hers won’t help her with the female wardens.”

The three men went back to work on their kites the moment Daniel drove away, and Grady helped Tucker get his kite airborne. Delaney suddenly let out a loud, excited whoop, and Alex turned to see his daughter jumping up and down in front of Sarah, who was madly pulling line up from a hole. A fish suddenly shot through the ice, fighting mad at being yanked from its watery home. It was a damn big fish, too. Alex turned to look at his brothers.

They were all standing over their own traps with dumbstruck expressions on their faces. Alex laughed and walked over to congratulate Sarah…and maybe eat a little crow. The five men reached Sarah and Delaney at the same time, and they all stood silently as Sarah expertly took the beautiful landlocked salmon off the hook and bopped it on the head. She turned a proud, stunning smile on them without saying a word, then bent down to rebait her hook. Alex watched in amazement as she dipped into the bucket of minnows, netted one out, then held it between her fingers while she carefully attached the tiny fish and placed the baited hook, line, and sinker back down the hole. She watched the fish to make sure it was lively enough, then fed out the thick line until she came to a button threaded through it. She wound the remaining line around the rickety reel, reset the flag, and carefully set the trap down over the hole on its rickety legs. Alex glanced over at his five traps. Then he looked at Paul, Ethan, Tucker, and Grady’s traps. All of them had been in for more than an hour, and not one flag had gone up. Just then, Delaney’s flag shot up about ten yards away. Four grown men groaned, and Tucker tried out his first curse.

“Excuse us,” a very smug Sarah said as the two women rushed to the waving flag, where Delaney landed a lively—and large—lake trout. This time, both girls beamed at them, and Tucker’s second curse was downright appropriate. All five men scrambled to their traps, their kite flying suddenly forgotten. The Knights sat down that evening, red-faced from both sunburn and total humiliation, to a platter of perfectly cooked fish. The women tried to be humble and gracious in victory but were unable to keep their pleased smiles from escaping. If it hadn’t been for them, they’d all be eating hot dogs, since there wasn’t even one active flag for the men all day. Twenty-five traps had sat for nearly five hours, their stubborn flags refusing to budge. It was a silent meal that night, the beautiful fish indeed tasting like crow. And Alex realized he’d have to watch Delaney more closely now, because she was getting a smile on her adorable face that would have him beating the boys off with a stick.

“Sarah, we’re going to have our yearly NorthWoods Timber meeting this evening after the kids go to bed,” Alex said as he pushed his empty plate away. “We can have our dessert then.”

“I’ll have the coffee ready,” she assured him, getting up and walking into the great room with Delaney. “Just make sure not to dent any pots when you clean up,” she added sweetly, pushing a giggling Delaney ahead of her.