Chapter One #2
At the top of the stairs, they stepped onto a narrow landing that smelled faintly of lemon oil and old wood. Willa glanced at his leg.
“Are you…all right?” she asked.
“I’m good.”
It was a big assed lie. A pulsing dull drumbeat spiked with some sharper mule kick jabs. He planned to take a double dose of pain meds the second he got his duffle open.
They walked down a short hall with slanted ceilings and scuffed baseboards.
Willa pulled a key ring from her pocket, flipping through it as she walked.
She made another glance at his leg so Cal decided to fill her in so she’d know he wasn’t in delicate health, just recouping and dealing with the pain of traveling.
“Charity fundraiser,” he said. “A bull ride that went sideways. Literally. Tore my ACL clean through. Had surgery, did the rehab, but it’s never been the same. Sometimes it locks up. Sometimes it just likes to remind me who’s in charge now.”
She stopped and turned toward him. “You’re an actual bull rider?”
“Used to be. Rodeo promoter more recently. The bull riding part was a bet.” He paused. “Why is being a cowboy or bull rider part of the soulmate legend too?”
Willa shook her head. “Not exactly. The legend just says strangers meet here under a full moon after a pint of Mooncatcher. That’s it.”
Cal followed her, his steps heavier now.
“In Wild Rose Point,” she continued, “we don’t get many strangers this time of year at midnight during a storm. It’s the kind of town where everyone’s known each other since kindergarten. The only time we see new faces is late spring, summer and early fall. Tourists.”
She stopped at a door at the end of the hall and unlocked it.
“So yeah,” she added, “a stranger showing up in late October? People are gonna talk.”
Cal let out a low breath. “Seems like they already are.”
She pushed the door open and stepped aside, waving him in. “It’s only just beginning.”
Cal stepped inside and took a quick look around.
The apartment was small but clean, with a worn-in kind of charm.
Hardwood floors, a leather armchair that had seen better days, and a little kitchenette tucked into the corner.
The bed was neatly made, the quilt clearly handmade.
Two large windows overlooked the street below, rain still streaking the glass, and he could just make out the glow of the saloon’s neon sign reflected in them.
Willa handed him a key, her fingers brushing his for the briefest second before she pulled away.
She sighed. “Look, I’m sorry about the attitude earlier. I just… you should know, this whole legend thing? It’s going to have the entire town playing matchmaker.”
Cal raised an eyebrow. “Because of the beer?”
“Because of the timing,” she said. “And the full moon. And the fact that you just happened to show up tonight, limping in like some kind of folklore prophecy wearing a cowboy hat and those… jeans.”
Cal looked down at his jeans, worn but clean. “What’s wrong with my jeans? I mean, other than they’re soaked with rain.”
Willa gave him a slow once-over that started at his boots and climbed all the way back up. Her expression was unreadable, but her eyes definitely lingered longer than necessary.
“Absolutely nothing is wrong with them,” she said finally, her voice a little lower. “And that’s the problem.”
Heat stirred in his chest. Just a flicker. Barely there. But he felt it.
Cal shoved it aside, quick and hard. He was here to rest. Regroup. He wasn’t here to get tangled up in local legends or flirt with a woman who clearly had no patience for him.
And besides, if she was eyeing his jeans, she was probably stuffing that reaction into the same locked box he was.
Which was good.
Because he wasn’t supposed to be interested either.
“It’s not going to help the gossip that I live in the apartment right across the hall,” she muttered.
Cal blinked. “That so.”
Willa nodded and leaned a shoulder against the doorframe. “So unless you plan to sneak out before dawn, you’re about to become Wild Rose Point’s favorite romantic subplot.” She paused, tilted her head slightly. “So, why are you in town anyway?”
Cal hesitated. “To look up an old friend.” She stared at him, clearly waiting for more. “Eden Preston. She was my high school… flame.”
Willa’s posture got a whole lot straighter. “You’re here for Eden?”
Cal nodded, slowly. “Yeah. You know her?”
“Of course. Small town,” Willa muttered. “Eden moved here with her folks about 20 years ago.”
Yep, that’d happened Cal’s and Eden’s senior year of high school when her mom had gotten a job offer she couldn’t turn down.
Neither of them said more, but the rest filled in easily enough in his mind.
Eden and he had been trading emails off and on for years, ever since she reached out after her divorce.
Nothing serious, just check-ins, the occasional memory, a photo of her dog or a link to a playlist he probably never listened to.
But she’d mentioned Wild Rose Point more than once.
Said he should visit sometime. No specific invitation, no planned dates.
After the bull and the ER and the spiraling exhaustion of the life he’d been living, coming here had felt like a pause button. A place to breathe.
So yeah, now had seemed like a good time.
Willa stood there quietly, unreadable now, arms crossed, her gaze flicking just briefly toward the hallway.
“Well,” she said, her voice not quite as neutral as she intended it to be, “that’s… good to know about Eden and you.”
Willa lingered for a second longer in the doorway, then nodded, as if making some internal decision she wasn’t planning to share with him.
“You’ve got towels in the closet, extra blankets in the chest by the window,” she went on. “The Wi-Fi password’s taped to the fridge.” Her voice had cooled a few degrees, not unkind but not quite warm either.
“Thanks,” Cal said.
She stepped back into the hall, hand on the doorframe. “I hope you manage to get some rest. The Seaglass doesn’t quiet down just because you’re probably in need of some pain meds and a long night’s sleep.”
He offered a faint smile. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Willa started to pull the door closed, then paused, meeting his eyes one last time. “For what it’s worth,” she said, “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
The door shut with a soft click.
Cal stood there for a moment, the key still in his hand, the ache in his leg pulsing a little harder now that the adrenaline was wearing off. He set his duffel on the bed, limped to the window, and looked down at the street below.
Rain still misted against the glass. The glow from the Seaglass sign reflected in the puddles like something half-magical, half-warning.
He should change out of his wet jeans and take his meds. He should lie down. He should stop thinking about how Willa’s voice had changed when he mentioned Eden’s name.
And yet, as he stood there, listening to the muffled sounds of the bar still carrying through the floorboards, he wasn’t thinking about Eden at all.
He was thinking about Willa.
About the way she looked at him like trouble had just walked through her door. About the heat behind her sarcasm.
About the way she’d eyed his jeans.
It didn’t make sense. She wasn’t what he came here for, but apparently his brain, and other parts of him, hadn’t gotten the memo. And in a town full of soulmate legends and full moon nonsense, it figured that Willa would be the one already stuck in his head.