4. Holt
Chapter Four
HOLT
Juliette’s wearing my work shirt, sitting beside me as we ride into town.
I've worn that old shirt fifty times and never thought twice about it.
But now it's rolled up at her wrists and open at her throat, revealing her creamy skin and freckles.
I can't look at the road for more than ten seconds without my eyes flicking back to her like a magnet.
She's got the window cracked despite the cold, one hand riding the wind outside, while Six is sprawled across the bench with his head in her lap.
Fifteen years between us. When she was learning to drive I was already standing outside hotel suites in a suit and an earpiece. There's a whole lifetime between us. Which means I have no business wanting to reach across the seat and put my hand over hers.
“Our first stop is the market,” I say, to distract myself. “You need clothes and some boots too, if they've got your size. It gets muddy and your sneakers won’t cut it.”
“Good. I have a budget.”
“It’s good you’re paying cash. No paper trail, which is smarter than a few professionals I've known. Let’s keep it that way.
” She turns and looks at me when I say that, raising one pretty eyebrow, but doesn’t ask me any questions.
We’re both still careful with each other, not saying what we want to out loud.
Wildwood Market has a clothing aisle; work jeans, t-shirts and a rack of canvas jackets.
Juliette goes through it like she's on a timer, no dithering, and comes out with two pairs of jeans, three shirts and a gray thermal. She checks every price tag. That girl was wearing a wedding dress that could pay my property taxes, but she’s squinting at the tag on a ten-dollar shirt.
While she's in the changing room, I put a women’s rain jacket and two pairs of socks on the counter and pay for them. She notices when she comes out and opens her mouth to argue with me.
I shake my head. “Rain's forecast all week. And if you want to fight about socks, we can do it in the truck.”
She gives me a little half-smile and nods. There's a look on her face I can't place as she hugs the jacket to her chest.
Latte Da! is mid-disaster when we come through the door.
It smells like scorched sugar, and there's a line four deep at the counter with nobody behind the register. Nora's voice carries out of the kitchen doorway, using the kind of language that would cost her a dollar a pop in the church swear jar.
“Holt Newell, thank the Lord. Tell me you can bake.”
“Not unless you want things burnt to order.”
“Then you're of no use to me, hon. The O'Connor party ordered four dozen cinnamon rolls and a sheet cake for tonight, Mayla's over in High Vale buying pregnancy clothes, and my buttercream has split twice.”
Beside me, Juliette’s looking through the kitchen doorway at the wreckage. She takes in the mixer bowl of curdled frosting and there's a hunger in her face I haven't seen since I met her.
“Your butter was too cold… for the buttercream. It's not broken, it just needs heating up.”
Nora stops with a customer's change in her hand. “Who's this, then?”
“Juliette,” she says, before I can invent anything. “I'm staying with Holt while my car gets fixed. May I?”
Nora waves her through the doorway.
What happens next is like magic. Juliette rolls up her sleeves and then washes her hands meticulously.
She takes the bowl of curdled buttercream over the gas burner, and in a few minutes of low heat and hard whipping it turns to silk.
Then she checks the rolls and presses one with a fingertip.
Frowning, she tells Nora the proof box is too warm and she's got maybe twenty minutes before the whole batch is wasted.
Suddenly, the two of them are moving around that kitchen like they've worked together for years. I'm standing by the register holding a rain jacket and a bag of socks, unable to take my eyes off her.
She's fast and capable, the talent in her movements obvious, even to someone with no cooking skills like me. This is what she looks like when she isn't on the run or scared, and she’s beautiful, in her element, her eyes lighting up.
The rolls go in and Juliette pipes a test rose of buttercream on parchment, studies it, stirs again, then pipes another one that could win a county fair.
“Where'd you train?” Nora asks, pushing her glasses up on her head.
“Our…” Juliette stops. “There was a chef where I grew up. Monique. She let me help in the kitchen when nobody was paying attention. Then helped me with some classes to get my diploma, later on, I did them online.”
Nora doesn't ask about why Juliette would want to take pastry classes in secret. She unties her apron, takes it off, and smiles.
“I open at six. Pay in cash, and my coffee machine hates strangers so you're on ovens till you learn it. Can you start tomorrow?”
Juliette looks at me. I keep my face expressionless, because this is hers to decide. But inside, I’m hoping she’s going to agree.
“Yes. I can start tomorrow.”
The bell over the door rings out as Mary from the inn comes in for her afternoon coffee, and it all goes wrong.
“Well!” Mary’s voice is delighted. “You must be the bride.”
Juliette wraps her arms around her body. I put myself between her and Mary without even thinking about it, an old positioning habit, shielding her in case of trouble.
“Ted Farley said there was a girl in a wedding gown getting in your truck when he drove past, Holt. It's the most exciting thing that's happened here since that elk got into the market. Bettina’s going to put it in the church newsletter. Was there a wedding?”
“Her car broke down on the pass,” I say. “Costume party in the valley… you know how they get down there.”
Mary's face says she doesn't believe a word of it, but she smiles politely. She sails out with her coffee, and Nora looks at me across the pastry case with her eyebrows raised.
Nora shakes her head. “Church newsletter? That's six hundred mailboxes, in case you're counting.”
People talk. That old adrenaline rises in me; I’ve got to keep her safe. Whoever bruised her wrist is going to come looking for her, sooner rather than later. And they’ll be looking for any trace of her. A newsletter will be like a flashing sign to point her out.
Juliette laughs at something Nora says, and I have to remind myself she’s not mine. I can’t keep her here if she wants to go.
We drive home with a test batch of the cinnamon rolls, at Nora’s insistence. Juliette chatters about Nora’s ovens and the pastry-to-cinnamon ratio. At the cabin she hops down before I can get her door, and stops. Her big green eyes look up at me and I have to remember to breathe for a second.
“In the market. You’d already figured me out… about the cash, the paper trail. You said that thing about professionals. What did you do, Holt? Before the mountain?"
Six waits by the porch steps, looking between us.
“Security; I was a bodyguard. I kept people safe… most of them.” I take the grocery bags inside before she can ask what happened to the rest.