The Tourist Attraction (Moose Springs, Alaska)

by Sarah Morgenthaler

  When a momentary hush fell over the crowd, accompanied by heavy boots stomping across the wood flooring, Graham’s lips curved. And as a body took the seat next to Graham’s line of impatient customers, he paused in his work to hand the newcomer a soda and a cheeseburger. No one said a word in protest.

  “Thanks.” Easton Lockett’s deep rumble sounded like a freight train with a smoking habit, even though the owner of the voice would never even consider touching a cigarette.

  Some people were tall. Some people were built like tanks, muscular and wide. And some looked like they could sneeze and take down a brick building.

  Easton was bigger than all that.

  Having to duck when he came through the diner’s very normal sized doorway, Easton was beard and man bun above every person in the room. Climbing through the mountains as a wilderness guide his entire adult life had only put muscle on Easton’s massive frame, shrinking the rest of the world down a few notches or two. Graham wasn’t a little guy, but there was something about being near his friend that made him feel itty-bitty.

  Itty-bitty never had been a descriptor Graham enjoyed for himself, but when Easton handed him a ham and cheese hoagie, he decided that he’d let it go for the moment.

  “Took your time,” Graham told him. “I’ve been waiting on you.”

  Glancing at who wasn’t accompanying him, Graham raised an eyebrow. “Should I bother asking where my dog is?”

  “Where do you think?” Easton grunted in response. “Curled up in my sister’s lap on the couch.”

  “You know, most fur aunts and uncles bring their fur nephews back when the day is done.”

  “She likes him better than the rest of us.”

  Easton sipped his soda, ignoring Graham’s chastisement as successfully as Graham was ignoring his line of customers. People were used to this sort of treatment at the Tourist Trap. From what the reviews online said, apparently Graham’s lack of customer service was part of the appeal. Since Graham was all for giving the customers what they wanted, he ripped off a third of the hoagie, stuffing it into his mouth.

  “Oh man, that’s good. Ash?”

  “Yeah. She knows you’re sick of burgers.” Easton shrugged his shoulders. “And it’s not my job to help you with yours.”

  “Shame on you. What kind of friend do you call yourself?”

  “The kind that thinks you should hire an extra cook.”

  Grabbing his air horn from beneath the counter, Graham smirked at his childhood friend. “Naw. There are plenty of bodies in here to help with the work. Push that trash bin into the middle of the room, will you?”

  There was nothing like the piercing violence of an air horn screeching through an enclosed space to make everyone wince. With a sigh, Easton stood up and went to the end of the counter, where a fifty-five-gallon trash can with a construction-grade liner waited. Aiming a look of long suffering at Graham, Easton dragged it to the center of the room. The song on the jukebox ended, and everyone was too busy staring at Graham in surprise to put on another one.

  This was just how Graham wanted it.

  “All right, you dirty people,” Graham called out to his customers. “Time to clean up. No more food until you throw your crap in the trash.”

  He lobbed a wet dishrag to a woman in diamond drop earrings, then a second to Lana and a third to an annoyed-looking Easton. Graham gave them all a cheerful wave as he added a stack of clean rags and a little red bucket of sanitized water on the counter between customer plates.

  “Wipe your tables, folks, because I’m not the maid. If you don’t like it, the door’s right over there.” Graham pointed toward the entrance, just past a life-size cedar moose bust mounted on the wall. Far more impressive work than any he’d ever successfully carved, the moose’s rack alone was over five feet across. “Don’t knock yourselves out on Frank the Mounted Moose’s magnificence as you leave.”

  For some reason, they laughed, as if this was all part of the fun.

  While Easton grunted at the customers to throw their crap away, generally terrifying them with his presence, Graham used the rare moment free of expectations to finish his sandwich.

  A soft clearing of a woman’s throat was meant to get his attention. Graham ignored her.

  “Excuse me.”

  “No more drinks until the room is clean.” Graham kept his focus on the hoagie. “Grab a rag, and we’ll get there faster.”

  “Actually, I was hoping to just have a glass of water.”

  There was a lot of money in this room—and didn’t it disgust him that he could identify an Armani suit on sight—but when Graham glanced up from his sandwich, the woman in front of him looked normal. She was wearing a worn Mickey Mouse sweatshirt and torn jeans, traveling clothes most likely, and her brown hair was twisted up in a messy bun. Actually messy, not those artfully staged messes the stylists got paid to create in the resort’s spa.

  Shoving her glasses further up on her slender nose, the woman dug in her pocket. “Extra ice, please.”

  In a world of too many Gucci purses, this one used her pockets. Graham liked her already. “Didn’t anyone warn you about the water here?”

  His customer tilted her head to the side, a long tendril of grown-out bangs falling into her eyes. “What’s wrong with the water?”

  The tendril wasn’t sexy. Lodged in between her glasses and her face, she had to cross her eyes and wrinkle her nose a few times to free it. Amusement curled through him, but Graham didn’t let it come through in his voice.

  “Ever seen what a three-quarter-ton moose with a full bladder can do to a fresh spring?”

  Suspicion and jet lag weren’t a good look on anyone, but with one eyebrow raised, her glasses couldn’t maintain their perch. If she’d taped them with Scotch tape, it couldn’t have been more adorably dorky.

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Behind the counter, where she wouldn’t be able to see, Graham used his soda gun to fill crystal clear water into a glass with ice. Then he added a drop of the yellow food coloring he kept for this exact purpose before giving the water a spin with a spoon. The drink he gave her was tinted faintly yellow, the color of pale urine.

  Either she didn’t mind a dash of pee in her water or she was too tired to care, because she took the glass. That eyebrow did climb a little higher.

  Easton was still pushing the trash bin around the room, so Graham watched her as she lifted the drink to her lips.

  “Are you sure you want to do that?” he asked just before she took a sip.

  She paused, lips to the rim of her glass. “You wouldn’t risk the health and safety of all these people serving tainted water.”

  Graham chuckled. “Glad to know you have faith in me, Zoey.”

  Furrowing her brow, she of the glasses and ice water frowned, the tendril of hair falling back in between her glasses and nose. “How do you know my name?”

  Graham cut his head toward the stunning woman holding court in the center of the restaurant.

  “I remember my customers, and Lana said you were a Tourist Trap”—pausing at the word virgin, Graham cleared his throat—“newbie. I’m Graham.”

  Someone must have said something exciting because a roar of guffaws made Zoey wince. The brief respite from the jukebox ended as they cranked it up again. He blamed Lana. She always loved to blast “9 to 5” every time he made her work. The tourists found it hysterical.

  When Zoey glanced around at the cheering crowd and grimaced, Graham rested his forearms on the counter and leaned in toward her. “Yeah, me too. My ears don’t work anymore. Not a Dolly fan?”

  “Not after a nine-hour flight. I’m not even sure where I am right now.”

  Customers he had already served started lining up again, ready for their free beers, but Graham kept his attention on the w
oman shifting from one foot to the other, her fingers tugging on the hem of her Mickey Mouse sweatshirt. She took a sip of her water without gagging.

  “We’re in Moose Springs, Alaska. An hour and fifteen minutes outside Anchorage and a thousand miles away from everything awful except your hotel. That place is a dump.”

  When Zoey choked on her water, Graham admitted, “Okay, it’s not too terrible up there. Lana said you wanted a Growly Bear?”

  “Umm…I’m worried what that means.” She must have noticed what they were doing to the statue near the jukebox. Barley—the life-size carved grizzly bear guarding the far corner—had been groped more times than Graham ever had, lucky son of a gun.

  “You should be.” Gesturing toward Barley with his chin, Graham added, “Look at that. It’s not right.”

  Zoey swirled her glass of moose pee in her hand, ice cubes clinking. “Do you think the artist meant for that…part…to look like that?”

  “True artistic expression should never be qualified or quantified.” Graham swallowed the last bite of his hoagie. “Besides, got to let the guy keep his dignity.”

  “Yes, but why is the grizzly wearing chaps?”

  “It’s a biker bear.”

  “Oh. Huh. I guess I can see that.” Zoey started to turn, then she hesitated. Curling her finger at Graham to lean in closer, she lowered her voice.

  “Watch that guy at the end of the counter. The one in the blue shirt.”

  Blue shirt, khaki pants, third to enter the diner in a group of six. They’d been working their way through Graham’s selection of Alaskan brews, vocalizing their thoughts on each loudly enough to impress the poor schmucks stuck sitting nearby.

  “Don’t worry. I keep count of how many drinks they’re having,” Graham promised her in reassurance. “Counting to three is one of my many skills.”

  “I think you might have lost count on Lana already.” Zoey’s lip quirked up a little. “And he just took a twenty from your tip jar. Thanks for the drink.”

  Graham’s head snapped around, but all he saw was blue shirt and his buddies lifting their beers and simultaneously chugging, frat boys grown up to be no more refined than they’d started.

  When he turned back, Zoey had reseated herself at her small table, book in hand and glasses slipping down her nose.

  She was reading a book. In the loudest restaurant ever. Fascinating.

  To be exact, she was reading Luffet and Mash’s How to Do Alaska. There wasn’t actually a Luffet, and Mash was a guy named Jerry who had passed out on Graham’s floor last year after an ill-conceived notion the entire resort needed burgers after their Christmas celebration. Sobering him up in a snowbank had been fun, but Jerry’s idea of how to do Alaska was nowhere close to the real—or right—way.

  When blue shirt came up and asked for another round, Graham kept close watch out of the corner of his eye. Sure enough, his elbow was right next to the tip jar.

  “Watch out,” Graham said in gruff warning as he scooped out a massive order of fries and grabbed their last beers. “I keep a trap in there.”

  “What?”

  “The tip jar. Be careful. There’s a live fox trap in the bottom of the jar beneath the bills. It will shatter your wrist.”

  Blue shirt looked at him like he was crazy, but he didn’t stick his hand inside the tip jar this time when he dropped in a couple dollars. Idiot. Graham wasn’t a hunter. Killing defenseless wildlife had never appealed to him, but even he knew enough about hunting to know traps were rarely smaller than seven to eight inches across when set. At most, the tip jar was five.

  Maybe he would get a larger jar and actually keep a trap in there. Would serve anyone with sticky fingers right. Speaking of serving…

  Zoey and her book were still at the table near him. She should have stuck out like a sore thumb in this crowd, but Zoey blended in to near transparency.

  For some reason, he found that refreshing.

  Since she had saved his tip jar, Graham stopped what he was doing, ignored the yowls for more food, and leaned over the counter. Easton was still waiting for the last of the tables to finish clearing their trash, much to his friend’s obvious annoyance. Graham could have helped him, but talking to her seemed a lot more interesting.

  “Hey, Zoey. You want that Growly Bear? Last one of the night.”

  “Umm…maybe?”

  “Yes or no, darlin’. If you’re going Growly, you’re going all in. If you have doubts, step away from the bear.”

  When she lifted her chin and pushed her glasses higher on her nose with the tip of her pinkie, Graham couldn’t help the wide grin stretching across his face. Damn, she was cute.

  “I’m in.”

  * * *

  What had she just gotten herself into? She didn’t even drink.

  Those same words had been replaying in Zoey Caldwell’s head ever since she’d gotten off the plane in Anchorage. She wasn’t a risk taker, far from it, but she’d dreamed of coming to Alaska her whole life. Zoey had scrimped and saved every spare penny she could scrape together for years. When she had finally saved up enough and Lana mentioned her plans for her next trip to Moose Springs, offering to share a room as she always did, Zoey couldn’t pass up the chance at her dream vacation.

  A trip to Alaska wasn’t just the top item on Zoey’s bucket list. Alaska was the whole bucket and the water inside it.

  Never had Zoey been so excited, so overwhelmed, and so ready to sleep off the jet lag her nine-hour flight had given her. But Lana insisted on them coming to the rustic little hamburger and hot dog joint, claiming this a rite of passage. The Tourist Trap was charming in the same way the guy at the grill was charming. A little rough around the edges, but amusing. There weren’t any menus, only a whiteboard sign with a Magic Marker. It read Menu: Same crap we always have. Specials: Whatever you jerks didn’t eat yesterday.

  Zoey liked it here already.

  Swirling her glass idly, Zoey decided the gorgeous cook should have at least added salt to her yellow water and made it room temperature.

  If one was going to be a smart-ass, it was important to go all in.

  Graham was disturbingly attractive. Too attractive. Grab your moose pee and run back to the hotel on the mountain type of attractive. In Zoey’s world, that level of attractiveness was almost off-putting. Medium attractive was more her type. Safer. Calmer. Less…whatever was happening over there behind that grill.

  If the Tourist Trap wanted to make money, they needed cooks who were remotely approachable. Not tall, muscled, scruffy-faced men in blue jeans and snug white T-shirts with warm eyes.

  He caught her looking at him and winked.

  Graham gave exceptionably good wink.

  “Oh, you’re a bad, bad idea.” Zoey groaned, shaking her head. “Nope, not doing that.”

  “Not doing what, love?” Lana dropped down in the seat next to Zoey, drumming her fingernails on the tabletop. “Who are we not doing?”

  “No one.” The clack of rattling ice cubes against metal pulled her attention. Yep. Sexy T-shirt man was shaking something in a makeshift cocktail shaker fashioned from a YETI tumbler. Strong fingers held the shaker closed with a single hand, biceps flexing as he absently shook the YETI and scooted fresh-seared burgers to the far side of the flat top grill.

  Competent and gorgeous just didn’t seem fair.

  Lana followed Zoey’s eyes. “Oh, trust me. He’s not for sale. That boy is locals only. But he can shake a cocktail, can’t he?”

  Blushing, Zoey took refuge behind her book.

  In the land of the midnight sun, June was technically the month with the most hours of sunlight. And since she’d arrived on the summer solstice—the longest day of the year—it was no wonder this day seemed like it had lasted forever. The first flight from Chicago to Seattle had been a series of children kicking her seat back, strangers tryin
g to talk to her despite her earphones, and rushing through the airport terminal because someone—who would remain unnamed—hadn’t given herself enough layover time between flights. Added to her natural reluctance of flying, Zoey nearly clawed her way out of the plane from Seattle to Anchorage, the final leg of her trip.

  One look at the mountains rising in the skyline surrounding Anchorage, and Zoey knew getting here had been worth every second.

  To her pleasure, Lana had hired someone to pick her up from the airport instead of Zoey having to take a shuttle. Lana accompanied the chauffeur, so Zoey had her friend to talk to on the long drive to Moose Springs. The winding scenic road had been stunning, even with her growing headache and jet lag. The deep green and blue mountains with their snowy peaks rising above the hotel and the quaint Alaskan town with its small lake cradled in the foothills below were incredible. Then they’d pulled into the hotel and Zoey’s jaw had dropped.

  Moose Springs Resort was, to put it simply, absolutely fabulous.

  Somehow the rustic luxury of the world-class lodge was even better than what Lana and a hundred internet image searches promised. Lana had invited her to come along every time before, but as with all of Lana’s adventures around the world, Zoey had been forced to say no. Just because Lana wanted to fly off to Europe on any given weekday didn’t mean Zoey could afford to take off work to go too. Her friend might be a trust fund baby with more than enough cash to spend on them both, but Zoey refused to let Lana foot the bill of their friendship. Besides, she had a waitressing job she couldn’t risk losing.

  Finally being able to say yes to a trip with her friend was just as fabulous as the resort itself.

  “There’s just no one interesting here yet.” With a dramatic sigh, Lana’s eyes swept the room. “It gets better around here closer to the Fourth of July… Oh! I see a familiar face. Come with me, and I’ll introduce you.”

  Nope. Nope nope nope. Theirs was a friendship with long-established rules. Shaking her head, Zoey leaned in. “I don’t make you listen to stories about my job, and you don’t introduce me to your other friends, remember? Everyone always thinks I’m your assistant.”