It occurred to Martha that the boy might be really hungry. He'd said he needed a job. She required a helper, and he'd already proved himself to be efficient as well as helpful. His small size meant that he'd fit into the limited working space. She could do a lot worse than to hire Randy Gallahorn.
She fixed him another bagel. "Come back tomorrow at nine in the morning if you really want a job," she told him as he wolfed it down. "You and I can learn how to run a Bagel Barn together."
"Yes, ma'am," Randy said enthusiastically. He grinned at her for a moment before loping away, and she noticed a spring in his step that hadn't been there before.
It wasn't until later that she thought about Sidney's requirements that people buy bagels from pretty women at his Bagel Barns.
"Rubbish," she mumbled to herself as she stood back to admire the way the Bagel Barn looked on the dock of Ketchikan. It was a bit incongruous, a little red barn standing against the background of the boats in the harbor and the cloud-covered mountains beyond, but she was proud of it. She was looking forward to working there. Sidney and his silly ideas were the farthest thing from her mind.
* * *
The man was watching her the next day when the tourists came charging off the tender from the cruise ship Trondheim, newly anchored in the harbor. He was a tall man, with cheekbones like ridges and a jaw like a rock. With his weathered face and bronze-brown hair hanging slightly over his shirt collar, he was attractive in a rugged way. In fact, he was downright handsome. He radiated an aura of raw sexuality that made Martha do a quick double take.
He leaned casually against a flower-bedecked lamppost as he sipped from a Styrofoam cup and studied his phone in his other hand. Martha thought to herself, He's just the kind of man I expected to find in Alaska. According to Lindsay's information, there were ten men for every woman in this state. Did that mean that she could look forward to meeting nine more guys just like him? A shiver of anticipation ran through her at the thought.
But then Martha became busy heating water for tea for the tourists, fretting over cream cheese that was a bit too hard to spread well and worrying that she might not have enough change. She sent Randy to the bank for rolls of dimes and quarters and started toasting bagels.
The next time she looked, the lamppost was managing to hold itself up without the support of the man who had been there, and he was nowhere in sight. Martha sighed but brightened quickly when she remembered that there would be nine more men just like him.
After that Martha stayed busy. Many of the cruise passengers had slept too late for breakfast, and evidently there'd been a long wait in the ship's salon as they'd queued up for tickets to get on the tender. They were hungry and they were thirsty.
There wasn't a lull until eleven o'clock, when the passengers thinned out, but by that time a smattering of shop owners from nearby businesses wandered over for a coffee break. The sky was overcast, but it wasn't raining, and benches scattered here and there among tubs of bright petunias provided a pleasant place to sit and watch the boats moving in and out of the harbor.
Then the lunch business started, and many of the customers were curious townspeople who had watched the Bagel Barn go up the day before as they walked or drove past.
"I said to myself, there's a lady who must be an Alaskan. You didn't even let the rain stop you," said an elderly bearded man who stopped to buy a cup of tea.
"I had to open today," said Martha with a laugh. "I promised my boss. Anyway, they tell me it doesn't often stop raining."
"It only rains twice a year in Ketchikan. January through June, and July through December." He laughed uproariously at what Martha suspected was one of the more hackneyed local jokes.
Martha sent Randy home at three when business tapered off. She would have closed up, but she wanted to clean off the counter and rearrange her supplies. As she worked, the man she'd noticed leaning against the lamppost earlier strolled up.
"Are you closed?" he asked.
Martha wheeled around in the enclosed place and, unused to it, knocked her head on a wooden support at the top.
"Oh, I'm sorry if I startled you," he said as a whole galaxy of stars and planets whirled and clashed inside Martha's head. When the star wars quieted, she opened her eyes to look into a pair of the brownest eyes she'd ever seen. Even if the Bagel Barn had been closed, she wouldn't have told this man so. Looking at him up close was definitely a thrill at first sight, and then and there she dismissed from her mind the other nine Alaskan men who should rightfully be hers.
"N-no," she stammered. "I haven't closed yet. What would you like?"
"What have you got?" he asked, looking over as much of her as he could see. The counter at the front of the booth came to above her waist, and she wore the perky red checkered apron that Sidney had insisted upon and in which she felt less than radiantly chic.
She reeled off the different kind of bagels. She also told him what kind of drinks they had, and he ordered a bagel with cream cheese and lox and a Coca-Cola. This was a good sign. Martha had long ago decided that her lips would never touch those of any man who drank Pepsi. Or who smoked. A quick glance told her that there was no telltale rectangle of a cigarette package in his chest pocket. Two points in his favor. But did he like chocolate-chip cookies?
While she was preparing his bagel, she felt as though she had six thumbs on each hand. Furthermore, the man didn't go and sit on one of the nearby benches but leaned on the counter, his flannel-clad elbow blocking her access to the toaster oven. She had to ask him to remove it, which made him raise his eyebrows and step backward to give her more room, but he still didn't sit on the bench.
She handed him his bagel and his drink, and he still didn't go sit on a bench. He didn't say anything, either, and Martha felt awkward. He was so close she felt as though she ought to talk with him, and yet he didn't look as though he cared if she talked to him or not. So Martha merely pretended to go on cleaning the ledge where the toaster oven rested, even though she'd cleaned it once before.
She watched from under her lashes as he ate the last of the bagel and wiped his hands with a napkin.
"Pretty good," he allowed.
"I'm glad you like it," she said uncertainly. She was ready to pull in the top half of the simulated barn door that comprised the front wall of the booth, but he was in the way, his elbow resting on the counter again.
"Only one way it could be better," he told her. "You should be using Alaskan fish instead of what you're selling."
"It's the very best lox," she said, a bit too defensively. "My boss orders it from Los Angeles."
"Yeah, I know, I know. But it's not really salmon. It comes from the Atlantic Ocean near Nova Scotia or Newfoundland, and biologically it's trout, like all its Atlantic relatives known as salmon. Real salmon comes from the Pacific."
"Oh," Martha said, surprised. She had never been big on biology. She didn't see what difference it made whether she served salmon or trout as long as it tasted good.
"You're catering to tourists here, right?"
She nodded, captivated by the gleam in his brown eyes. They weren't only brown; closer inspection revealed them to be swimming with little golden flecks.
"And do you know what tourists order in Alaska? Salmon. They take it home in cans. They order smoked salmon to be sent back to them in the Lower Forty-eight. They even pay hundreds of dollars to charter planes and boats and guides so they can fish Alaskan streams to catch Alaskan salmon. And you're selling lox from Los Angeles. That's a shame."
Martha considered this. The man had a good point.
"Our smoked salmon would taste great on your bagels. It's smoked with alder wood. You can't beat the flavor."
"I'm sure it's very good. It's just that I have my orders as to what I should sell here, and I can't take matters into my own hands yet. Maybe later. Where would I buy this salmon?"
"Oh, there's a little shop down the street. Just go in and they'll show you what they have."
She flashed him
a smile. "I'll do that—someday."
"Someday," he agreed, and with one last grin he hurried off along the boardwalk toward the docks.
He was an attractive man, and she wished she'd made some kind of impression on him. She didn't think she had, however. He'd obviously been more interested in talking her into using Alaskan salmon than in anything about her. Perhaps he was one of the local fishermen. He looked rugged and individualistic, the way Martha imagined a fisherman should look. He was only trying to drum up some business, and she couldn't blame him. She'd probably have done the same thing herself.
Martha slowly made her way to the car, stepping over lots of puddles. By the time she got back to her apartment, she had conjured up a scenario where he came back to buy a bagel the next day and the next and then they cruised off together into the sunset in his boat as she gazed into his brown eyes.
Which was utterly ridiculous, and she knew it. He was probably only being polite when he said he liked the bagel. And if he gazed into her eyes as he piloted the boat, they'd capsize or worse.
The trouble was that on her second day here, Martha was very lonely. She'd never been in a town where she didn't know one single person. She'd never had to start from scratch in building a social life. Come to think of it, she wondered if there was any social life around here.
That was something she'd find out tomorrow. There had to be something to do besides stand around in the rain and wish that weathered, rugged-looking men would carry her off into the sunset.
Anyway, he probably hated chocolate-chip cookies.
Chapter 3
Not long after he said goodbye to Martha at the dock, Nick Novak stomped the mud off his feet on the wide wooden porch of his snug cabin on Mooseleg Bay outside the town of Ketchikan.
The cabin was called Williwaw Lodge because his father's fishing boat had been driven ashore at this point on the ragged coastline of the bay during a furious williwaw, the name Alaskans gave to the often violent winds that roared over steep mountains, striking the water close by the shore. When the storm cleared to reveal a far-flung landscape of exaggerated grandeur, Nick's father knew that this horseshoe-shaped cove was the place where he wanted to raise his family. The Novaks became homesteaders. Nick had lived here all of his thirty-two years.
"Nick! Nick!" called a small voice, and a dark-haired boy catapulted around the woodpile stacked at the side of the house and latched on to one of Nick's legs.
"Hold it, hold it," he said, but then he swung the boy up and around, hoping that he would laugh. The boy never laughed.
"How are you, Davey?" he said, smoothing the boy's hair tenderly.
"Okay," said Davey.
"What does Hallie plan to feed us for dinner?"
Davey buried his face in Nick's neck.
Nick patted Davey on the back and strode, still carrying him, through the door into the house. The screen door slammed behind them.
"Hallie?"
"I'm back here," called his housekeeper. Nick saw her chunky figure through the kitchen window. She was bending over to pick strawberries.
Nick shifted Davey to his free arm and lifted the lid of the iron pot on the stove. Inside was fish stew, Hallie's own special concoction of fish and tomatoes, onions and peppers, and it smelled good.
Hallie huffed and puffed her heavy frame up the back steps. She carried a basket she had woven herself from marsh grass and seal gut, and it was filled with plump, juicy strawberries.
"I'm going to whip up a cobbler for dessert," she said breathlessly. "Davey helped me pick some of these, didn't you, Davey?"
Davey's eyes lit up with pride, but still he didn't speak.
"That's wonderful, Davey," Nick said. He was crazy about the kid, always had been. He just wished that Davey responded to him more.
"It'll be an hour or so before dinner's ready," Hallie said. "There's plenty of time for you and Davey to do something together if you like." She had recovered from her exertion on the stairs and began to hull strawberries over the sink. Poor Hallie, thought Nick. It was a lot to ask of her to keep up with a lively little boy every day.
Nick knew it was hard for Hallie, sociable soul that she was, to live here with Davey day in and day out when Davey hardly ever spoke a word. Hallie would prefer to live closer to her fellow Tlingits in the town of Ketchikan, which is what she had been planning to do three years ago when he'd suddenly, with no prior warning whatsoever, brought Davey home to stay.
"I see I can't leave you with an infant on your hands," Hallie had said on that long-ago day.
"If you could just stay until I get someone else," Nick suggested, not knowing at the time how hard it would be to find another housekeeper who was willing to live in the wilderness on the edge of the bay. Now, three years later, Hallie still lived here, and she was tired of the rigors of the Alaskan bush.
These days it seemed less likely than ever that Hallie would feel free to leave anytime soon. Of course, there was nothing holding her here—Nick had made it clear that if she absolutely wanted to, he would not make it difficult for her to go. No, there was nothing holding Hallie—nothing except a sweet little boy who hardly ever talked.
Nick carried Davey out to the wide, grassy front slope that led down to the dock where both his boat and his floatplane were moored. Davey ran to get a rubber ball, and they tossed it back and forth; Nick's quick eye discerned that Davey's motor development was equal to that of any of the children his age whom Nick had observed playing in the park at Ketchikan. Davey would be four years old tomorrow, and there seemed to be nothing wrong with him physically. He was slow in learning to talk, that was all.
Later, after dinner and after he had tucked Davey into the bottom bunk bed in the boy's room, Nick and Hallie sat out on the front porch, fighting the monster mosquitoes that stormed out of the woods on summer nights. Hallie burned an odoriferous bug bomb that held the insects at bay for a while, and even though Nick would have rather been inside reading a good book, he didn't excuse himself. Hallie had so few people to talk to.
"I spoke with Stella on the shortwave radio today," Hallie said. "She's baking the cake for Davey's birthday celebration tomorrow evening."
"Chocolate, I hope," Nick said with a chuckle. Davey loved chocolate, and Stella, who was Nick's sister-in-law, baked the best chocolate cakes Nick had ever tasted.
"Of course it'll be chocolate. I'm going to fry a few chickens and mash some potatoes for dinner, and Davey and the other kids can play tag and pop balloons after we eat. It'll be a good old-fashioned birthday party."
"Are the adults expected to join in?"
Hallie laughed. "I guess it depends on how good you are at pinning the tail on the donkey."
"Not too good, as I recall. I only went to one birthday party during my childhood because we always lived way out here."
Hallie's smile faded. "That's too bad. A kid should live near other kids, I've always thought."
"I had other kids. My brothers Dan and Fred. And my friend Hank." Hank had grown up on the bay with the three Novak boys; his family had homesteaded a parcel of land on the other side.
"Davey has no one. Maybe you should think about moving into town. Davey might talk more if he had children his own age to play with."
Nick's father had fished Alaskan waters all his adult life from this homestead on the bay. Nick couldn't imagine living in town after all these years. He loved it on the bay.
He said, "Mmm. I've been thinking about it. I can't picture leaving the old home place, though."
"For Davey's sake you could leave," Hallie pointed out.
"It depends on how well the store does this summer," Nick hedged.
"How's business so far?" Hallie wanted to know.
"It's off and running. These tourists can't get enough Alaskan salmon. I'm glad now that I opened the store, and I wonder why I waited so long."
"Are you going to close it this winter?"
"I haven't decided. There won't be so many tourists then, but maybe we'll d
o a brisk local business."
"I doubt it. So many of the locals catch their own fish or know somebody who does. They won't want to buy smoked fish out of a store when they can get free fish and smoke it themselves."
Nick sighed. "That's true." He wondered idly about the Cheechako woman he'd met today at the new Bagel Barn down by the dock. Surely she wasn't planning on keeping that little snack shack open in the winter. He wished he'd been able to talk her into serving Alaskan salmon on her bagels. She might want to try sablefish, too. He'd mention it to her next time he saw her, and he hoped that would be soon. There was something intriguing about her.
"I heard there's a new snack place in town," said Hallie as though she could read his mind.
"Yeah, I know. I ate there today."
"What do they sell? Wanda told me it was some kind of doughnut." Wanda was Hallie's sister; they talked every day on the shortwave radio, which was the only way to communicate from Nick's cabin with anyone in town.
"It's not doughnuts. It's bagels. I'll bring you one sometime."
"Maybe I'll stop by there next time I go to town. Wanda says the lady who runs the place is real pretty. Maybe she'd make you a good wife. If you had a wife, I could go live in town with Wanda and her grandkids."
"You can go live with Wanda anytime you really want to," Nick said. He didn't want this to morph into a conversation about him.
"Humph. I won't really want to as long as Davey needs me. You know that, Nick."
"Yeah. I know that." Suddenly Nick stood up. "I can't handle the mosquitoes any longer," he said. "I think I'll turn in." He wheeled and walked abruptly inside.
"Good night," Hallie called after him, but he didn't reply. Well, Nick was always a little moody. Like Hallie said, Nick needed a wife.
Hallie lingered for a while on the front porch, creaking back and forth placidly in her rocking chair and staring out over the slick black water of Mooseleg Bay. Out on the bay, rearranging the reflected patterns of stars on the surface of the black water, she saw a slow-moving trawler. She heard the engine juddering along toward the other shore and wondered who it was. It was a lonely job, fishing. She was glad Nick didn't fish anymore. He had plenty to do with running Novak and Sons Cold Storage and Cannery and now the new store selling fish to tourists.
Kisses in the Rain Page 3