Chapter 19
I realized the reason she’d seemed familiar was because I’d often seen her gracing the headlines and breaking news topics along with pictures that didn’t do her beauty justice. She’d also gone viral more than once for her unconventional politics, and the long-held speculation by many was that her career was funded by a criminal enterprise. It was well known that Karsen Booker was not a woman you wanted to cross. She was a powerful friend and a terrifying enemy. She’d retired from politics and withdrawn from the public eye several years ago, but not an ounce of her commanding and charismatic aura was lost. She looked camera-ready right now, and equally capable of making anyone who crossed her disappear.
I inadvertently sat up straighter and put my guard up. I doubted this woman was going to murder me in cold blood in front of a crowd, but I got the sense that if she decided to go that route, she would get away with it.
“Declan called me last night and explained what’s been happening to you. I’m sorry about your grandparents’ property and the car accident. I’m sure things have been frightening for you. Once you get the payout from the insurance company for the fire damage, let me know how much they pay you, and I’ll double it. You can rebuild or sell it all off and start over somewhere else. Sometimes a well-timed retreat is the best way to win a battle.”
I rubbed the end of my cold nose and watched her without blinking. I felt like I was sitting across from a poisonous snake, and one wrong move would end up getting me bit and filled with venom.
“How did you find me?”
No one knew I’d left Banner’s after our confrontation. I’d only entered the brewery on a whim.
The older woman shrugged, and the corner of her mouth lifted in a slight grin. “A lot of people owe me favors. I called one in after I learned about the fire so I could be directed to your current whereabouts.”
I snorted. “Are the people who owe you favors the same people who owe them to Risky?”
A genuine smile crossed her beautiful face. “Risky? Is that what he’s calling himself these days? It’s cute.”
I sighed and reached out to fiddle with the empty pint glass. I was full of nervous energy, and that was my only outlet. “ Cute isn’t the first word that comes to mind when I think of him.” Not after I’d witnessed him kick someone off of my deck. Speaking of the unspeakable, “I hope your favors extend to making bodies vanish.”
The older woman hummed in agreement. “They do. Not that Declan needs my help for something as simple as that. However, I feel partly responsible for the mess he got himself into after he retired. I’ll clean everything up and not hold it against him.”
I huffed and averted my gaze. When I turned my head, I locked eyes with a towering beast of a man standing not too far away. He was handsome in a rough and brutal way. His hair was salt-and-pepper, but his age was hard to pin down. He was older than my table companion, but had a youthful vitality that gave him an air of agelessness. He had a scar running down one side of his face that was distracting. He appeared immune to the cold, standing off to the side in nothing more than a dark pair of slacks and a black sweater. It occurred to me that the former politician in front of me probably had to travel with security. This guy looked like a perfect fit for the job. No one dared to get within ten feet of him, clearing a wide circle around the table where I sat with the older woman.
“I think you’re fully responsible. You brought Risky home and turned him into someone who could drop bodies without remorse. Then he retired because he wanted a normal life. But your family has done everything they can to drag him back.”
She shook her head, but the nearly white strands of her hair didn’t move. “I agreed to let Declan go when he told me he wanted to quit. I was sad the family business was going to lose him because he was very good at what he used to do. I saw no issue with him wanting to start over with a clean slate.
“It’s regrettable my daughter wasn’t truthful with me about her attachment to him when she took over. I knew the two of them had had a fling, but Declan had never been serious about any of his romantic partners. Dealing in secrets and subterfuge leaves little room for the honesty needed to maintain a healthy relationship. I should’ve known Charley was in over her head with him. She takes after me in matters of the heart.” Her gaze softened as she looked at the massive man watching her from afar. “Unfortunately, she takes after her father in everything else. I know she did her best to hurt you, but I promise the situation is under control now. Charley will no longer interfere in your life or your relationship with Declan.”
I lifted my eyebrows and sarcastically asked, “Did you ground her? Or maybe you sent her to her room without dinner? What exactly is the punishment for attempted murder?”
By the way the older woman stiffened, I could tell she wasn’t used to anyone talking back to her in such a caustic way.
“If she doesn’t back off, then I won’t protect her from Declan. She knows the only way she retains control of the family business is because I allow it. She’s afforded certain liberties because her father and I are an impenetrable fortress that surrounds her. If I lower the drawbridge, it’ll become a bloody fight to the death to see if she’s capable of holding on to the throne I handed down to her. Not only business competitors, but extended family have had their eye on my operation since the start. I raised my children in a den of vipers.”
“You would do that to your own child?” And here I thought my mother was difficult to deal with.
“To my child, no. But she’s not only that. She’s the woman I handed the empire to I’d spent a lifetime building. She promised she would take care of it and help it grow long after I was gone. If she can’t appreciate what she was given, I have no problem making her fight for it or taking it away. It’s the nature of the business we’re in.”
I frowned. “Politics?” I knew that was a cutthroat career field, but this woman had made it sound like a medieval battle to the death.
“Charley and I are both lawyers. You have to have intimate knowledge of the law if you plan on breaking it or dancing along the line of what’s permitted and what’s not. I hope she never follows in my footsteps and goes into politics. I actually never wanted either of my kids to get into the family business. I always thought I would leave it to Declan or one of the other kids I’d helped along the way. But my daughter has always been determined to walk her own path.”
She was eerily calm, considering the path her daughter had chosen led to me nearly losing my life in several ways.
“I appreciate you intervening.” I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder. “I don’t need or want you to pay me off. Rebuilding my grandparents’ dream property feels wrong. So does starting over somewhere else.” I couldn’t protect what I had. I didn’t deserve a second chance to destroy something special. “I’m not sure that I’ll ever see Risky the same way. I respect everything he’s done for me and how he’s protected me, but I feel like I don’t even know him.”
Karsen leaned forward in her seat, her gaze intense and unwavering. It was unnerving—the way she seemed to peer directly into my thoughts and feelings.
“That’s just not true. The man you met when you first encountered him was Declan Risk, a newly retired fixer. The man you made is Risky, a bumbling handyman who just wants to experience what it’s like to live a quiet life in a beautiful place. Don’t mistake who he was for who he is now. He would have never come out of retirement and reached out to me if it wasn’t to protect someone he cared about. He excelled at his job back in the day, but he never enjoyed doing it. He had more moral integrity than most of my young recruits, and it only grew the longer he was in the trenches. He made it clear that once the debt he felt he owed me was cleared, he was walking away for good.”
Since she’d leaned forward, I moved backward, feeling the need to put some space between us out of a sense of self-preservation. For someone who looked and carried themselves in such a refined manner, this woman was terrifying. I’d been called cold and distant my whole life. I’d been referred to as frigid and inhumane. Sitting across from Karsen Booker, I understood what it was actually like to face someone who had ice water in their veins. I bet there was nothing this woman faced that rattled her. She didn’t even flinch when talking about putting her daughter in danger over a business dispute.
Risky’s former boss leaned back when she noticed she was making me nervous. I finally felt like I could breathe. She smiled at me, and I could see her fondness for Risky on her face.
“I want to help you rebuild for several reasons. One of those is that Declan always talked about this quaint little town and your grandparents’ property with fondness. He’s not someone who has many pleasant memories. I want to preserve the few he’s held on to. I owe him that much.”
“It won’t be the same if I rebuild it. Honestly, my grandparents were what made the lodge so special and memorable for so many. I think I was doomed to fail from the start. I was foolish to think I could capture that sort of magic when I’d never been as kind or welcoming as they had been.”
I enjoyed having people and noise around because it filled the void inside of me, left by being made to feel like my parents’ constant burden. My grandparents had thrived in sharing their love of Blue River and the mountain with others because they genuinely thought it was the best place on Earth. They’d worked hard to make sure everyone made the type of memories they shared with each other.
The beautiful older woman reached out and grabbed my hand. The leather of her glove was buttery soft and clearly expensive. She gave my icy fingers a light squeeze. “We don’t leave things for our loved ones because we want you to re-create what we’ve already done. We hand it over so you can make it bigger and better. We want you to turn what was once ours into something that is now yours. It’s enough that you’re taken care of and happy. Trust me. Remarkable things often rise from the ashes.”
She patted the back of my hand and rose gracefully to her feet. “Again, I apologize for my daughter’s behavior. Under different circumstances, I think you and she might’ve been friends.”
I thought that was highly unlikely but kept the opinion to myself.
The man with the scar on his face stepped next to the white-haired woman, throwing a protective arm around her shoulders as they moved through the crowd. It was obvious people recognized her, but was brave enough to approach her with that scary man hovering over her like a vicious guard dog.
I ordered another beer when a server appeared next to the table. My mother called three more times, but I sent them all to voicemail. I wasn’t in the mood to deal with her. I gave a cursory look at the hotels and motels to see if there was any availability, only to be greeted with sold-out blocks on every reservation calendar. I knew I could walk into one and possibly land a room because of a last-minute cancellation, but that felt like too much work. Instead, I decided to hitchhike up the mountain and go home—or what was left of it.
Hitchhiking in the mountains wasn’t as dangerous as it was in the city. Especially in the high season. There were often groups of kids, loaded down with equipment, trying to flag down a ride between the different mountains. It was common for other skiers and snowboarders and even the locals to pick up passengers and drop them off.
It was cold, and it started snowing again. I regretted not grabbing a hat and gloves before leaving with Banner. Not that any of my belongings had survived the fire. The basement apartment was annihilated, like the main part of the lodge was. The damage was extensive, and the building was unstable, making it off limits. I didn’t want to pick through the debris of my life anyway.
What’s done is done.
The only option I had was to start over. Whatever that looked like.
I ended up walking along the mountain pass for over an hour. My hand got too cold to keep my thumb extended. I shuffled through the falling snow with my hands shoved in my pockets and my head down so my eyelashes didn’t freeze together. I couldn’t feel my toes, and my nose wouldn’t stop running. It was weird that, now that my body was frozen, I could tell that my heart had never been made of ice. I had been deluding myself by thinking it was safely tucked away in a glacier when it’d always been far too sensitive and exposed.
Just when I thought I was going to have to call my neighbor and beg for a ride, a shiny, new truck pulled alongside me, and the passenger window rolled down.
“Lucky, get in. You’re going to freeze to death.”
I lifted my head at the sound of Risky’s voice. His tone was stressed out and thick with concern. The truck was driving up the pass, away from town. I wondered if he had also had a run-in with his former boss.
I was too close to getting frostbite on my extremities to ignore him. It took a minute to get my icy digits to cooperate and open the door, and even longer for me to haul the rest of my body inside. I sighed when the warmth from the heater blasted against my chilled skin. Comfort outweighed my trepidation now that I knew how cold-blooded he could be. I held my hands in front of the vents and shot Risky a look out of the corner of my eye.
“Did you know I was walking home, or did you stumble upon me by accident?” I kept my tone bland, not interested in starting a fight in such a small, enclosed space. I didn’t want to end up back in the cold, even though I was the one who had put myself there in the first place.
“I’ve been looking for you for hours. Banner sent Dex a message saying you left her place after you guys had a fight. She was worried about you, but didn’t have my number. After the kid let me know what was going on, I drove all over the mountain and Blue River trying to find you.” Relief rang in his voice now that I was finally sitting next to him.
I lowered my face closer to the blowing air and sighed as it slowly began to thaw.
“I was having a beer with your former boss. I have to say, she leaves quite an impression.”
The truck jerked as his foot slipped on the gas. His head swiveled to look at me.
I pointed at the road and snapped, “Pay attention.”
“You saw Karsen? When? What did she say to you? Did she scare you or threaten you?” With each question, his voice rose.
I watched his hands tighten on the steering wheel until his knuckles were white. Tension practically radiated from him in waves.
“She apologized for her daughter trying to kill me and burning my house down. She offered to double the insurance payout so I could rebuild if I wanted to. She also sang your praises and told me you were a different man now that you no longer work for her. I got the impression she didn’t want me to be afraid of you. I didn’t have the guts to tell her she was way more frightening than you were.” I sat back in the seat properly and turned to look at him. “She promised to keep her kid on a leash, and if she doesn’t back off, she’s willing to let you handle the situation.”
“I called her to let her know what was going on. Karsen deals in dirty business, but she’s always kept a firm bottom line. She would never act out of jealousy and revenge the way Charley has. I just wanted her to know we were going to have a problem after the fire. And that the fixer market was going to end up missing a shit ton of contractors if Charley kept sending them after you. I didn’t expect her to intervene, and I didn’t plan on her showing up here. She’s always had a hands-off approach and let Charley make her own mistakes.” His voice lowered and sounded deadly serious. “Don’t take the money. The last person you want to be indebted to is a Booker. If you want to rebuild, I’ll give you the money. Don’t get mixed in with those people, Lucky.”
“Aren’t you that sort of person, Risky?” I laughed and shifted to look at the snow whizzing by the passenger window. “I’m already involved in things I wish I weren’t.”
I didn’t even dare ask about the body that had tumbled down into the valley. What I didn’t know couldn’t hurt me.
Risky sighed, and it seemed like he deflated next to me. “I wanted none of this. I retired. I left that life behind. I thought I could leave behind the guy Karsen needed me to be as well. People can change. I wanted to become someone different. At first, it was only for me, but the more I got to know you, I wanted to be a guy who fit into your life. Not one who risked it.”
I chuckled again, but it was dry and brittle. “I’ve never been lucky in anything. Why would I ever think love might be an exception?”
Risky looked at me again. This time, his voice was soft, and he sounded fragile. “Do you love me, Lucky?”
“Probably.” Love was such an unknown for me. I’d always treated it like a deadly disease. It was something to be avoided at all costs. And now that I was infected, it really seemed like it might kill me and anyone I spread it to. “God help us both.”