“Not like you did my shirt…”
I groaned, flushing with mortification. “Thanks for the reminder.”
“Anyway,” he drawled, stroking the dash with a cheeky wink at me, “you wouldn’t have thought I’d hit a bird two months ago, eh?”
“What?!”
“Yeah” —nonchalantly flicking switches, twisting knobs and positioning levers— “a gull came straight through the windscreen on your side.”
“What?!” It seemed I was incapable of saying anything else. Visions of bird guts and feathers flew morbidly across my imagination. “You’re shitting me!”
“I shit you not!” he yelled over the sudden roar of the old radial engine. “But that bird sure shat itself!” The propeller blades had instantly blurred into motion. He slipped the green David Clark on and handed the second headset to me. “Don’t worry, lightning doesn’t strike twice…or so they say.”
“Well, they sound like idiots,” I muttered into the microphone.
Our repartee was subsequently suspended as Tristan taxied out into the waterway. “Ketchikan Radio,” he said, the transmission followed by a blur of information I only caught in spurts. “VFR to Thorne Bay…two souls onboard…an hour and thirty on the fuel…”
I watched him scanning the harbor traffic, his attention focused as a large ferry chugged by—the same one that had brought me across to this side earlier.
A static, monosyllabic response instantly droned into my ear cups a moment later, but the unfamiliar tinny voice spoke too fast for me to follow.
“Ketchikan area traffic, One Tango Alpha departing harbor east.” That said, Tristan turned a wide excited grin to me. “You ready?”
I answered with a grin of my own, eyes following as he opened the throttle wide. The engine roared as we plowed through the chop. Suddenly we were airborne, the beaver freeing herself of the little whitecaps, pulling her wings ponderously through the air. The widening of the narrows seemed to foreshorten the distance between the beaver and the glister of the vibrant blue water below.
“This is incredible!” I finally tore my eyes from the stunning view. “So you work for Bear Lodge too?”
“Nope, Alison and Owen are good friends and since their plane broke down this morning, I offered to take you on my mail run.”
He seemed so nonchalant about the broken plane. “Well, that’s…comforting.”
That dimple flashed again. “The salt water's pretty corrosive. Something's always breaking. Good thing I love turning wrenches just as much as flying.”
Honestly, I was too exhilarated and loopy from the jet-lag to dredge up much worry about corrosion or rivets popping off wings. “But this plane’s safe, right?”
“This old girl has the sweetest temper, don’t worry.”
“So she’s yours?”
“Sort of. My brother and I own and operate a fleet of ten amphibian Beavers and three Bell helicopters. Our company, Thorn Aviation, does a lot of charter work, tours, and general utility work like pipeline survey, mosquito spraying. That sort of thing. And—” gesturing with a thumb towards his cargo “—we just got the mail contract too. But any time Bear Lodge’s beaver is AOG, we help them out regardless. Ali and O are good people.”
“AOG?”
“Aircraft On the Ground—as in down for maintenance.”
“Ugh, I can see I’m going to have a steep learning curve here.”
“Nah, unless you find Sex on the Beach to be unfamiliar territory, I think you’ll catch on quickly.”
A vivid shade of carmine bloomed across my face. “Riiight.” There was no mistaking his bar humor, but, like the repressed freak I was, I’d gone and pictured actual sex. With him. On an actual beach. And since I’d not yet voted my cobwebbed hymen off the island, the word somehow held a mystical sort of power over me.
Tristan, though, hadn’t missed the heat flushing into my cheeks. “Um, it’s a type of cocktail,” he said, his left eyebrow climbing a little higher than the right. “Just so we’re on the same page here, that's vodka, peach schnapps, cranberry and orange juice. Not some sort of lewd suggestion.” Then he frowned thoughtfully. “Wait, you are going to be working at the Bear And Beaver, right?”
“I am, yeah.” That was the name of the bar that was partly affiliated with Bear Lodge. It was doubtful I’d be serving Sex on the Beach there, but one never knew.
“So have you had one?” he asked.
“Had what?”
“A Sex on the Beach.”
“Pfft, of course,” I said with a comical wave of my hand that I hoped conveyed my worldliness and sophistication. I’d also watched plenty of Sex And The City reruns. That, surely, made me urbane enough to handle a flirty conversation with him, didn’t it? I just wished I could flirt as well as Carrie did with Mr. Big.
“I hear it's all the rage down in Florida.”
“What is?” I said, grinning, “Sex on the Beach or…sex on the beach?”
“Don’t try to corrupt me, Evan”—grinning like a jackal as he stared out over the water—“I’m already as pure as the driven snow. And, anyway, you'd have to buy me a drink first. I'm old fashioned like that.”
“What’s your poison, Mr. Thorn,” I asked, chuckling.
Without missing a beat, “Anything but a Sex on the Beach.”
“Are you sure? The fact that you know your Sex on the Beach mixology, tells me you know way too much about girly drinks.”
“We all have our dirty secrets, Evan…”
And I’d have given anything to know what his were. The provocative edge in his tone inferred that I had only scratched the surface of this man’s character. And the brief, piercing look he’d shot me had dared me to look closer.
Midway through the flight, Tristan allowed me to take the yoke and pedals, instructing me with patience as he explained how each flight control moved the corresponding aileron or rudder. He was all calmness and quiet capability. A rugged bush pilot with a dimpled smile so perilous I feared for my heart.
I would have thought the flight from Ketchikan to Thorne Bay Seaplane Base would have taken longer than it did (or maybe it only seemed too short) but I was enjoying Tristan’s company too much to worry about kamikaze birds.
By the time the floats skimmed the crystal waters of Thorne Bay, I imagined that the Evan of yore was falling away, her hangups sloughing off like cruddy, old skin with every cleansing inch of water that rushed up over the floats.
4
Rumors
Owen Hodge was physically exactly what I had envisioned him to be—an archetypal outdoorsman, replete with rubber camo boots, a military green, moleskin jacket, and rubber hip waders. In spite of his incredibly active ‘sporting’ lifestyle (if hunting could be termed as such), he had a well-established, protruding six-pack, the kind of gut a person inevitably achieved from dedicated ‘beerthletics’.
Once my feet were firmly planted on the dock, he took my hand in his massive paw and shook it vigorously. I had to tilt my head right back just to meet his eyes. Tristan, who was himself an alpine giant, was soon treated to the same enthusiastic greeting.
“Welcome to Thorne Bay, Evan.” Owen grabbed my bag from Tristan, grinning indulgently at me.
“Population now three hundred and one,” said Tristan.
“You guys have a good flight?”
“Amazing!” I replied, watching Tristan's shirt stretch across his broad back as he began securing the aircraft to the cleats on the dock.
I was so busy fervently hoping that this would not be the last time I saw him that I was unaware Owen had noticed my blatant ogling. When he hemmed none too subtly, I looked up into his knowing grin. He had definitely interpreted my breathy “amazing” as being in reference to Tristan’s back and not the flight. Busted!
“Tristan, m’boy, you gonna join us for dinner?” He shot me a sly wink. “Alison’s got some caribou steaks marinating.”
“I’ll take a rain check,” Tristan replied, transferring his gaze only bri
efly to Owen. “Got plans with the family.”
“That’s too bad.” Owen glanced at me and shrugged, as if to say, ‘hey, I tried.’ “The ladies will be disappointed.”
My face burned with mortification as I was treated to an avuncular nudge of his elbow. Real subtle, man.
Tristan, meanwhile, was tying a clove hitch to the wooden rail, thankfully too absorbed by his post-flight ritual to notice my pained looks.
I caught myself wondering about his family. Please don’t have a wife! But of course a guy like that couldn’t possibly be single. His partner was probably disgustingly fabulous too.
“Thanks again for delivering the package safely.” Owen gave my back a cheerful slap—just in case Tristan was in any doubt as to which package he was referring to.
“It was my pleasure.” Though he answered Owen, his eyes were fastened to mine. This, of course, only seemed to amuse Owen more.
Mercifully, before Owen could embarrass me any further, we finally left the dock. When Tristan was satisfied the Beaver wasn’t going anywhere without him, he joined us in the parking lot. Owen had by now dumped my duffle into the bed of his white and tan F-350.
Once my seatbelt was secure, the driver’s door opened and the truck dipped momentarily under Owen’s weight. Soon after, my passenger window slid down as he jabbed a finger on the control at his door, bellowing his goodbye across me. His wave was punctuated by the obnoxious sound of the foghorn under his hood. “Tell Dean I’m ready to talk numbers!” he added, shifting the truck into drive.
“He’ll be glad to hear it!”
I offered Tristan a small wave as we pulled out of the lot, which he acknowledged with an enigmatic half-smile. A momentary pulse of igneous green, like St. Elmo’s fire, suddenly flickered in his eyes, catching me off guard. But when I blinked again it was gone. Just how jet-lagged was I really? Intrigued by what I thought I'd seen, I studied his tall figure receding in the side mirror at my door as the distance stretched between us. As if disturbing canines hadn’t been weird enough…
Tristan stood watching us all the while, seemingly preoccupied, with his hands stuffed into his pockets. Eventually, though, we turned onto Main street and he disappeared from view altogether.
“Don’t worry.” Owen had caught the direction of my gaze and mistaken my woolgathering for angsty yearning. “You’ll see him again.”
“But I…I wasn’t—”
“Say no more.” Those shaggy brows quirked meaningfully at me.
I rolled my eyes. I hadn’t come here to chase tail. In fact, I hoped Tristan did have a girlfriend and ten beautiful, illegitimate kids as well! But if that really was the case then Cupid over here wouldn’t have been playing matchmaker, would he?
Attempting to distract him from his mischief, I asked, “How long’s the drive, Mr. Hodge?”
“Please, call me Owen. And we should be there in about half an hour. I don’t like driving too fast since we get a lot of meeses on this road.”
“Meeses?”
“Moose.” He then chuckled at his own pitiful joke. “Those bastards pack a punch. You gotta watch those moose knuckles…”
Oh boy.
As Jason Aldean’s twangy crooning poured from Owen’s stereo twenty minutes later, I couldn’t help but snort as my new boss began country rapping along with Dirt Road Anthem. The off-key serenading continued on my left as the last of the sunlight spilled across the North Pacific Ocean that soon appeared on my right. And before I knew it we were turning off the asphalt onto a dirt road that shortly brought Bear Lodge into glorious view.
It looked almost like one of the ski resorts we’d stayed at in Lake Tahoe last year, with its timber logs and stone facade. It was situated on a picturesque, lakefront property of about twenty acres, or so Owen informed me as he killed the ignition and offered to take me on the grand tour.
The main building consisted of about ten luxurious suites, one of which had been vacated that morning and the guests flown, by Tristan, to Ketchikan just before I’d arrived there. The room was immaculate and already awaiting occupancy. Well, that or a Travel Magazine photoshoot.
The romantic lighting complimented the white wainscoting and russet cedar floors. In the marbled bathrooms hung luxuriant, fluffy towels and the king sized bed was draped in ivory bedding that bore a surplus of downy pillows, all expertly arranged. It was all sumptuous and perfectly deserving of the five-star quality, as far as I could tell, that Bear Lodge boasted.
Too bad these weren’t the crew quarters. Pretty sure Gramps wouldn’t have financed that anyway. Not that I’d have let him, even if he wasn’t as tight as a camel’s ass during a sandstorm. Which he was.
Further along the tour, I was shown the dining room and restaurant, fitness center, reception area, and the cozy lounge with its library overlooking a massive fireplace and, beyond the large windows, the sprawling heavily forested mountains.
The bar, where I would soon be employed most nights, was off to the side of the property and connected to the lodge itself by a winding, conifer-lined, pebbled pathway. Although the trees along the path were festooned with solar lights, the light pollution was appropriately muted.
For those guests that sought to be further isolated, there were ten private chalets interspersed amidst the woodland that encompassed the vast estate, but they were all currently occupied and so I was denied a peek inside.
This was definitely not your average rustic getaway because Bear Lodge catered more to the affluent members of society, seeing that each chalet went for a cool seven hundred a night! I’d have thought Owen would have been more bumptious and snooty, considering what Bear Lodge was—pure luxury—but he was exactly the opposite: unpretentious and jocular. Although his humor ran to the coarse side he was overall harmless and good-natured.
My room was, comparatively, very modest, as, presumably, were all the other plebeian accommodations tucked away from the main building.
Owen, after heading back to his truck to grab my bags, helped me carry them up the small set of stairs and left me to my unpacking, promising to come back for me later. Their house was a few miles up the road, separate from the lodge, and I’d been invited for dinner.
I hope they’re seitan steaks, I thought with a groan, but somehow I doubted that.
To my everlasting relief, however, Alison had marinaded a few squares of tofu for me, having found out earlier, from my mother, that I preferred my sustenance to be of the non-sentient variety. She and I hit it off instantly. But that was to be expected since I’d been born a generation too late (hell, more like a century), and I usually got on with the baby boomer generation. My music preferences alone were an attestation to that.
Poor Owen hadn't been able to get a word in edgewise as we made our way through almost every topic imaginable. No subject was taboo by the third glass of Prosecco! Sadly, not even my pitiful love life.
“So Owen tells me you’ve taken a shine to Tristan,” she said, grinning shrewdly.
I tucked a hair behind my ear and threw Owen a bit of a dirty look. “Did he also tell you how unsubtle he was?”
“Pfft! He’s as subtle as a Mack truck.”
Owen rubbed his protuberant belly and shot his wife a suggestive wink. “Engineered to last, baby. Just call me Mack Lovin’.”
“Case in point,” she went on, shaking her head.
He raised his rum glass to Ali, smirking. “Cheers, sweetness.”
“You should come with a warning label,” I muttered.
“You’ll thank me one day.”
“Pretty sure I won’t,” I countered.
“I just don’t see the need to pussy-foot. You women seem to think we men can smell what y'all want.”
“Hmm, maybe Tristan can.” Ali shot me a conspiratorial grin. “He seems like a perceptive guy.”
“I’m not pussy-footing!” I interjected, embarrassed. “And there’s nothing to smell.” Unless, of course, my pheromones gave me away? Pfft, could a girl not just partake of a ch
eeky ogle without everyone alerting the bloody media?! “Anyway, I barely know the guy.”
Owen’s answering look was completely dubious. “I know when someone’s twitterpated, I got eyes,” he scoffed.
“Well, obviously you need glasses.”
“You young people—” rolling his eyes as he adjusted the logs in the fire pit “—always wasting time and playing games.”
“That’s half the fun!” Alison reached over to top my glass off again. “Except some of you men are as thick as bricks when it comes to flirting.”
“Hmph. Just grab the bull by the balls, I say.” He emphasized his statement with a passionate shake of his fists. “What have you got to lose, eh?”
“My front teeth?” I snickered. “Seriously, though, my problem isn’t that I play games. I’m just…not socially adept. I literally scare men off without even trying to.” They always seemed to interpret my shyness as frigid reserve. That was when I wasn’t humiliating myself by spilling ice teas over crotches or hacking granola at handsome strangers. I didn’t mean to be either clumsy or reserved, but such was the case, unfortunately.
Owen gave a dismissive shrug. “Strong women usually do scare off the riff-raff, remember that.”
Ali nodded. “He has a point.”
Owen’s smile grew mischievous as he leaned over to me. “Ole Tristan didn’t look scared to me.”
Just the mention of his name summoned all the blood back to my face. “Doesn’t he have a girlfriend?” There it was. I had finally asked.
“Not sure.” Ali shot a sidelong glance at her husband. “Reckon he’s seeing that Nicole character?”
I got the distinct feeling that she didn’t care for whoever this Nicole person was.
“Hmph.” Seemed like Mack Lovin’ had had enough of discussing Tristan’s love life. “Ask Dinwiddie,” he said, ironically, “she knows everything.”
Thorne Bay Page 3