More Than Pancakes (The Maple Leaf Series Book 1)
Page 18
Drew slid off the bed, but grabbed her wrist and pulled her with him. “You’re right. Not here. Downstairs where I’ve prepared everything.”
He yanked Lily out of the bedroom and dragged her down the stairs. She nearly fell twice, and her bag that she’d managed to take with her clunked against the railing. When Drew stopped in the great room, Lily crashed into him.
Then she got a look at the room.
Candles occupied every surface. On the coffee table, the end tables, the mantle, the hearth. Drew had closed the blinds and unbound the thick curtains shrouding the room in a nighttime darkness. Candlelight flickered over everything. In the middle of the room, the quilt from the couch had been laid out on the floor. Orange juice, fruit, toast, eggs, and coffee sat on a wooden tray on the corner of the quilt.
Lily walked into the room then turned to face Drew. “What are you doing?”
“What a lover should do. I was wrong to let you come here alone. You need me, Lily.” He stepped to her, and she shuffled back.
Mistake.
Drew’s jaw clenched. “You didn’t mind the lumberjack’s hands on you. You weren’t afraid of him.”
“I’m not afraid of you.” She managed to keep her voice steady though her heart slammed against her ribs. “Friends, remember? I know you won’t hurt me.”
Drew’s jaw relaxed, a faint smile tugging at his lips. He stepped forward again, and this time Lily forced herself to stay where she was. He pushed her hair aside and cupped her cheek. “Have breakfast with me.” He buried his face in her hair, let his lips trail along her neck while she stood like a statue.
The clock on the mantle read 8:30. Rick was going to think she wasn’t coming. Maybe he’d come here looking for her.
Please, let him come.
She didn’t want Rick to get caught in the middle, but she didn’t know what else to do. She could run for the door, but Drew was as fast as her. They’d gone jogging together along Pearl Cove in the past. He could keep up. While Drew continued to explore her neck with his lips, she searched around the room for something heavy, something sharp, but the thought of actually hitting Drew made her stomach flop. She wasn’t a violent person. She didn’t even like to watch violence in the movies. All her treasured films were romances and comedies. She didn’t do Silence of the Lambs.
Drew came up for air, edged her to the quilt, and motioned for her to sit. She put her bag on the couch and hesitated at the corner of the blanket.
“This food is only going to get colder,” Drew said. “I expected you downstairs sooner than this. Didn’t know you’d be playing so hard to get.” He kneeled and picked up a strawberry, held it up to her.
Lily stared at the berry. “Where did you get all this food? I didn’t have any of this stuff.” She’d only bought a handful of supplies, not expecting to be in Vermont this long.
“I stopped off after my plane landed. I know you can only make pancakes.” He chuckled as if he found her lack of cooking skills adorable. “That’s why you need me, Lily. To take care of you.”
He pulled on her arm, the muscles in his biceps flexing in silent warning. She kneeled beside him. Drew snaked his hands under the flannel shirt. “You also need me to get you out of these dreadful clothes.” He fingered the fabric. “Flannel? Really, Lily. What is this state doing to you? What would your grandmother say if she could see you now?”
In one swift movement, Drew jerked the flannel shirt off her shoulders, tearing one of the sleeves. Lily immediately stood and backed off the quilt. She righted the shirt and ran a hand through her hair.
“For your information, this is my grandmother’s shirt,” she said. “I wear it proudly.” She fisted and unfisted her hands as she stared at Drew. “You need to go. Now.”
She shook with anger. At Drew. At the situation he was creating. At what Vermont was doing to her. She was fucking Lily Hinsdale, Senior Hotel Designer for Utopia Resorts. She decided what she wore, what she ate for breakfast, who she ate it with, and by God, who she slept with. Stronger than her or not, Drew wasn’t getting what he wanted.
“Get your suitcase, and get out of my grandmother’s house. I’ll see you back in California.”
Lily picked up her bag, but Drew grabbed it and pulled her down, bringing her knees crashing onto the hardwood floor. She let out a yelp of pain as he ripped the bag off her shoulder, opened it, and took out her laptop.
“You think this will stop Utopia?” He waved the laptop in her face.
Lily shielded herself with her hands and slid away from him. He followed her until her elbows touched the wall across the great room. She had nowhere to go.
“It won’t. A stupid documentary about how quaint and charming this place is won’t stop the company. Won’t stop me.”
“You haven’t even seen the presentation.” Lily tried to get the laptop back, but Drew whipped it out of her reach. “Let me show it to you.” Work, get him focused on work.
“I don’t want to see it, Lily. I don’t want to see any of this bullshit.”
He hurled the laptop at the fireplace where it exploded into plastic bits against the stones. The pieces fell like electronic hail onto the hearth and wood floor. The following moments of silence were deafening. Lily held her breath, waiting to see what Drew would do next and hoping she could avoid injury. Fortunately, she’d saved all her work to her flash drive and had emailed a copy of the presentation to Tam and herself.
Drew turned to face her, all the red drained from his skin. “I’m sorry, Lily. I don’t know what happened. I just… I don’t know.” He shook his head, and his hands trembled. He was so not in control.
“You need to go back to California, Drew.” She somehow got to her feet, walked over to him. “It’s this place. Vermont. It’s no good for people like us. It squeezes the life out of us.”
Drew nodded. “All the quiet gets to you. You can’t think straight.”
“Exactly.” She retrieved her purse, cringed at the shattered remains of her laptop, and said, “I’ve got a few things to finish up with here.” She gestured to the house. “Regardless of what happens to this land, I need to box up some things. Personal stuff of my grandmother’s. You understand.” She used a voice she would use with a small child, comforting, reserved.
“Of course.” He looked exhausted as if he’d surprised himself with the level of anger he’d displayed. “I can help you.”
“No.” Lily actually reached out her hand and patted Drew’s arm. “It’s something I need to do on my own, and you need to get back to California.” She led him to the stairs, started him on his way up.
“You’ll be coming back soon too, right?” He looked at her over his shoulder.
“Soon as I can.” She managed to give him a little smile, and Drew’s shoulders relaxed as he continued up the stairs.
“We belong in California,” he called.
One of us belongs in a padded cell.
As soon as Drew hit the upstairs hallway, Lily bolted for the door. She didn’t even think about how many animals were watching her as she ran for the Jeep. She started the vehicle, hit the gas.
How could she be more wary of what was inside that house than outside it?
Chapter Fourteen
Rick stood outside the store with Poe. 8:45. Lily wasn’t coming. He should have known better than to think she’d choose him over Drew. To go hiking no less.
“Stupid, Poe. Just plain stupid.” He walked into the store to get his walking stick. “That’s what happens when you let your dick be in charge.” He puffed out a breath and considered asking Aunt Joy if she still wanted to check the taps with him. He seriously shouldn’t go alone with his ankle, but alone was exactly what he wanted. No conversations. No questions.
Poe let out a bark and rose to her hind legs to look out one of the store’s front windows. By the time Rick arrived at the window, Lily’s Jeep skidded to a halt, mud churning up under its tires. When she got out and headed for the store, his heart skipped a little i
n his chest—a good skipping, an alive skipping.
He grabbed the other walking stick and met her outside. She wasn’t wearing a jacket, but what she was wearing had him stopping in his tracks. Flannel and work boots? God, she was perfect.
Except for the panicked look on her face and a torn shirtsleeve.
“What happened?” In two big steps, he was in front of her. The walking sticks dropped to the ground. “Why is your shirt ripped?”
Lily stared at the woods, and Rick thought she wasn’t going to answer.
“Sorry I’m late.” She squinted at him in the morning sun. “Drew needed a little convincing to go back to California.”
“Did he do this?” Rick fingered the tear in her shirt.
She looked at the rip until he used his finger to lift her chin.
“Lily, did he do this?” He said the words slowly, trying to contain his rising anger.
When she blinked, a few tears chased each other down her cheek, and Rick saw red. “Is he still at your grandmother’s?” He took Lily’s keys from her hand and headed for her Jeep.
“Rick, no!” she said. “He’s leaving. He’s packing up and leaving.” She wiped her cheek. “Let’s go on our hike. He’ll be gone by the time we get back.”
“I can send the police over there. Only take a minute to make a call.” What he really wanted to do was march over there and pound on Drew’s face.
“No.” Lily twisted the strap of her purse. “He needs to cool off. He’ll fly back, focus on work, and by the time I get to California, he’ll be fine.”
“If he’s not…” Rick rested his hand on her shoulder. She flinched. She wasn’t telling him everything. “If he’s not, promise me you’ll get the police involved.” He wasn’t sure the police shouldn’t be involved now. What else had Drew done to rattle her so?
She nodded then rolled her shoulders. “It’ll be fine.” She dug in her bag and pulled out a flash drive. “Can we load the presentation on your computer before we go? My laptop is… no longer functioning, and I want to have copies in different places.” Her voice wavered for a moment, then she appeared to collect herself and put aside whatever had happened at her grandmother’s place.
Rick took the drive, picked up the walking sticks, and led her through the sugarhouse to his small office. He pulled out the desk chair, made her sit then powered up his computer.
“Do I want to know what happened to your laptop?” He grabbed a bottled water off the supply shelf beside his desk and handed it to Lily.
She took the bottle and drank in long, slow swallows. Some of the color returned to her cheeks, but she shivered as she set her purse on the floor and stared at the bottle. Rick reached behind the office door and pulled a flannel-lined denim coat off a hook.
“Here. Put this on.” He handed the coat to Lily, and she shrugged into it. She looked lost in it, but he loved the sight of her in his clothing.
“I left without a jacket,” she said as if she’d just noticed. “I needed to get out of there.”
Rick crouched in front of her, rested his hands on her knees. “Lily, look at me.”
She raised her gaze. Some of the blue-green fire he’d seen in her eyes last night had fizzled.
“Did Drew hurt you? Please tell me.” He braced himself for an affirmative answer.
“No.” Lily shook her head. “No, he didn’t, but I think he could have.” She rubbed her own arms. “I think he wanted to, but then he came to his senses.”
She told Rick of her morning encounter with Drew as he uploaded her presentation to his computer. When she finished her tale, he gathered her in his arms. She stiffened at first, but then let her body go limp in his hold.
“Please let me call the police,” he said. “At the very least, Drew broke into your grandmother’s house.”
“I don’t think Drew meant to be… a… a…”
“Lunatic?”
“Yeah, okay, lunatic.” Lily sifted out a breath as she folded and unfolded her hands in her lap. “He just forgot how to be reasonable for a minute. He wouldn’t hurt me.”
“He won’t touch you,” Rick whispered. “You’re staying with me today.” He backed up and looked at her face. The thought that someone would treat her in the way she’d described made him have thoughts about the Browning Buck Mark Hunter pistol he had locked in this office.
“It’s okay if you don’t want to tackle the woods,” he said. “I can send Hope and Sage.”
“No.” Lily cleared her throat and appeared to mentally file away the morning’s events. “No, I want to go, Rick.” She pointed to the computer. “Then I want to show you my fabulous presentation. The one that will get me out of your hair. And out of your coat.” She stood and cuffed the sleeves so they didn’t hang below her hands.
“There’s no rush on getting you out of my hair or my coat, Lily.” He offered her a smile and patted himself on the back when she smiled. “We’ll check the taps along the fringe of the property. If they’re doing okay, the rest are probably fine too.”
Rick handed her a walking stick, and they ventured out with Poe galloping ahead and sniffing at absolutely everything in sight. He could tell Lily didn’t want to talk any more about Drew, and that was fine with him. He still thought the police should be called, but he would respect her decision. He just hoped his unwillingness to relinquish his property didn’t cause Lily harm. He didn’t want that.
They walked quietly, side-by-side, until they hit the tree line. Poe trounced around in the leaves that had been revealed under the snowmelt. She poked her nose into rock crevasses, turned over leaves, picked up fallen twigs. Lily laughed at the coyote, and the sound floated through Rick.
“She’s a puppy at heart.” He took the stick Poe had dropped at his feet and threw it a distance away. The coyote dashed off in a flurry of leaves after it.
“How old is she?” Lily leaned on her walking stick. She waited for an answer, but her eyes tracked everything around them as if she were waiting to be ambushed.
“Poe is seven.” He took Lily’s hand and continued walking.
“How long do coyotes live?”
“Roughly the same as dogs, thirteen to fifteen years,” Rick said. “In captivity, that is. They don’t last as long in the wild. Most coyotes die before reaching their second year.”
Poe raced back to Rick, dropped the stick again, and wagged her black-tipped tail, ready to go another round.
“She has you to thank for making it past two then.” Lily picked up the stick. “May I?”
“Go for it. She doesn’t care who throws it as long as it gets thrown.” Rick held his breath as Lily hurled the stick across the clearing in front of them. Sure enough, Poe darted off like a red-gray blur.
“She’s kind of a sloppy runner and noisy,” Lily said.
“She hasn’t had a proper coyote mom to show her how to run without making all that ruckus. I played with her right from the start, always had her running around, but she knew it wasn’t hunting. No need to be stealthy.”
The coyote started back toward them, but something caught her attention by a boulder. She sniffed around, dug in the leaves, but never put the stick down. Rick led Lily to the boulder, amazed that she didn’t object to going deeper into the woods. How much had Drew scared her this morning? Apparently enough that she’d risk the woods to stay by Rick’s side.
He used his walking stick to edge Poe back from the boulder. After setting the stick down, he bent to peer in a little hole and found what had the coyote so curious.
“Look.” He tugged Lily over and pointed into the hole.
“Bunnies.” She whispered the word.
“Have you ever seen live bunnies?”
“No,” she said, lowering beside him and putting her own stick down. “They don’t make a habit of hanging out on the streets of La Jolla.”
“Is that where you live in California?”
“Yes, by the water. Pearl Cove.”
“That explains the tan.”
“Ah, yes, dreadful Vermont.” Rick scooped up one of the bunnies that had tried to make a run through his feet. The bunny settled into his hands as if it had meant to end up there.
“It’s not afraid of you.” Lily shuffled a little closer. “Isn’t it supposed to be terrified?”
“Probably,” Rick said, “but it’s been this way with me and animals since I was a kid. Ask Aunt Joy. She had a continuous stream of critters in her house when I lived with her. Poe’s not my first unusual pet.” He stroked the soft brown fur, and the bunny pressed its tiny body into his palm.
“What kinds of critters?” Lily reached out a finger and stroked the bunny’s back. She rested one hand on Rick’s shoulder as she did so, and he wasn’t sure who enjoyed her touch more, him or the bunny.
“All kinds of critters. Hold out your hands.” Rick transferred the fluffball to Lily’s cupped palms, and she didn’t move a muscle as the bunny sniffed her wrists. “Two raccoons, a skunk, groundhog, owl, fox, and a red squirrel. Most of them were hurt in some way, and Aunt Joy and I nursed them, but they couldn’t go back to the wild. They wouldn’t have survived.”
“You’re a regular wildlife hero, Mr. Stannard.”
The bunny nibbled on the cuff of Rick’s coat at her wrist.
“Seems you’re capable of making friends too.” He motioned to the bunny.
“It’s easy to make friends around here. Hope, Sage, Poe.” Lily leaned over and pressed a light kiss to Rick’s cheek. “You.”
After letting the bunny hop off her hands, she picked up her walking stick and stood. “Show me more.” She waved a hand to the trees around them.
Rick used his walking stick to get to his feet. “I think you might actually like it out here.”
Lily scratched Poe between the ears. “Maybe.” She started walking, the coyote sticking by her side. Rick wished he had a camera to preserve that moment. A beautiful woman, a gorgeous animal, a pristine setting.