Editor's Choice Volume I - Slow summer Kisses, Kilts & kraken, Negotiating point

by Stacey Shannon, Spencer Pape Cindy, Giordano Adrienne

  * * *

  She was going to need a bigger refrigerator. Anna faced the appliance with her hands on her hips, scowling at the sheets of paper being held up by her grandmother’s substantial magnet collection.

  Her list of things she forgot to put on her first shopping list was under a small, silver spoon from West Virginia. A purple pig held the list of things she wanted to get done around the camp, while the status of her job search and the companies she needed to follow up with was pinned by a ceramic version of the Collie named Misty that Gram and Gramps had when Anna was little. Her knitting research notes were held up by a pewter keepsake from Nova Scotia and a list of phone numbers by a plastic snowflake. And under a variety of others were scraps of paper on which she was noting personal goals for herself.

  Her gaze caught on one—scribbled on the back of a receipt on the way back from the grocery store. Learn to drive a car.

  That one was a lot more daunting than cutting caffeine from her diet or getting her blood pressure back into a healthy range. As a matter of fact, she was pretty sure learning to drive wasn’t going to do her blood pressure any favors. But she wasn’t in New York City anymore and getting from point A to point B was a lot more complicated here.

  Which reminded her, she wanted to drag Gram’s old bicycle out of the shed and see if it was usable. Good exercise and transportation, if only on a very localized level. But anything that kept her from having to ask Cam for any more favors was a good thing. Grabbing a pen from the counter, she added the bicycle to the Around Camp to-do list and then stood back to look at it some more.

  She should have bought a giant pin board while she was in town so she could think properly. She kept copies of her lists on her phone, of course, so they could be accessed from anywhere, but she’d always had a large bulletin board so she could visually track her lists and move things around and contemplate them. The refrigerator wasn’t quite the same.

  Her cell phone rang in its simple, businesslike way and Anna glanced at one of the scraps on the fridge. Get a really fun ringtone! She hadn’t gotten around to that one yet. She picked up the phone, saw “Gram” in the caller ID box and smiled. “Hi, Gram.”

  “Hi, honey. I just wanted to call and see if you got settled in okay.”

  “I did. Everything’s perfect.” Except her lack of foresight, transportation-wise, and a very cranky neighbor. “I forgot how peaceful it is here.”

  “So you’re relaxing?” The note of concern in Gram’s voice made Anna wince. She should be worrying about them, not the other way around.

  “If I get any more relaxed, I’ll be sleeping around the clock. Oh, and I’m going to take up knitting. Cam said the library has a knitting club and one of the ladies might be willing to teach me.”

  “That’s wonderful, sweetheart. Knitting’s a wonderful thing, and very relaxing. And you’ve run into Cameron, then?”

  For a few seconds, Anna felt the temptation to launch into a description of their neighbor’s less-than-sunny personality, but then she remembered that he and her grandparents were actually kind of close. No sense in causing any conflict. “He helped me bring my suitcases in and reintroduced himself. And this morning he took me shopping so I could get everything I’d need for a while.”

  “He’s such a nice boy. It makes your grandfather and I feel a lot better knowing he’s keeping an eye on the camp for us. And now he’s keeping an eye on you, too, of course.”

  “It’s nice having him next door,” Anna managed to say without gritting her teeth. It would be even nicer having him next door if he had manners. She was still annoyed with herself for sitting when he barked at her to sit. On the other hand, his intention had been sweet, even if the execution made her want to throw something at him.

  She chatted with her grandmother a few more minutes, then pulled a stack of notepads and binders from the leather satchel at the end of the couch. After spreading them on the kitchen table, she fired up the netbook she’d bought with 3G access and prepared to see what was up in the financial world. She might be down, but she wasn’t out and she intended to keep in fighting shape.

  Chapter Three

  When he’d left for work at a little past seven that morning, Cam had thought it would be nice to get away from Anna for a few hours. Even though he knew on a logical level it was stupid, he’d swear her presence on the lake had jacked up the energy level, and he didn’t like change.

  It might have been a nice break if he hadn’t spent the better part of the morning thinking about her. First it occurred to him she might try to drag stuff out of the shed by herself and get hurt. Then he realized he’d never given her decent directions—including the short cuts—should she decide to walk to the store.

  And somebody really should teach her how to drive. The problem with being a woman dependent on others for transportation was that she could find herself in a bad situation because she needed a ride and some asshole thought he could take advantage of that.

  It wasn’t his job to worry about it, he’d told himself a dozen times or more, but he couldn’t shake the feeling he was going to be helping his neighbor get her driver’s license. All he could do was hope she didn’t drive as fast as she walked and talked.

  After he wrapped up the repairs on Mrs. Barr’s back steps, Cam packed up his tools and loaded them in his truck. His stomach was growling so, after he accepted a small check and a giant bucket of oatmeal raisin cookies, he drove to the gas station and grabbed one of their “home-made” bulky rolls. They weren’t great, but they’d fill the hole. A couple more errands and there was nothing left to do but head for home.

  Sure enough, when he looked out the window, the Fraziers’ shed door was standing open and his neighbor was nowhere in sight. He crossed his arms and scowled but, when she didn’t appear, he started worrying. Those damn chairs were heavy and if she was pinned under one of them…

  Cam was halfway across their backyard, muttering under his breath the entire time, when she emerged from the shed and he stopped as if he’d hit a glass wall.

  Heat and exertion had rumpled the sleek out of her hair, leaving it slightly tousled around her face. Her cheeks and the skin across her chest revealed by a V-neck T-shirt were pink and her face glistened with a fine sheen of sweat. She’d dumped the heels for white sneakers that looked brand new and her shorts revealed more of her legs than he’d seen before. He’d always considered himself a breast man, but Anna’s legs made him imagine all sorts of things he probably shouldn’t be thinking about his friends’ granddaughter—most of which involved those legs wrapped around him.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, more harshly than he’d intended to.

  She jumped and then pointed her finger at him. “I’m going to put a bell around your neck.”

  “You’re welcome to try. What are you doing in the shed?”

  “It’s tempting to point out it’s none of your business because it’s not your shed, but since I’m planning to ask for your help in the very near future, I was making a list of things I want brought out of the shed so I only have to bother you once.”

  “Oh.” So she had more common sense than he gave her credit for. “You done with the list?”

  “Yeah, I just finished. There’s not much, actually.”

  “Let’s do it.”

  She pushed her hair back from her face, which drew his attention back to her nicely mussed appearance. She looked like a woman who’d just had sex. “You just got home from work. It can wait until later.”

  “I’m here now.”

  “Okay, well…” She pulled a small notebook from the pocket of her shorts and flipped it open. “The chairs are huge and they’re closest to the door, so we should start with them.”

  An hour later, he was as sweaty and flushed as she was and he was pretty sure he’d be digging through his medicine cabinet for some muscle rub later, but everything on her list was out of the shed and in place. The Adirondack chairs were in place on the deck, along with the match
ing table with the hole in it to hold the umbrella. It had taken both of them to get the gas grill up the steps and, even then, it had been such a pain in the ass he would have offered her the use of his if it didn’t mean she’d be spending time on his back deck. She even made him drag all of Betty’s planters out, even though he doubted she had any idea how to do any container gardening.

  “I appreciate this so much,” Anna said when they were finally done. “I’ll go grab you a drink.”

  She was standing close enough to touch and for a few crazy seconds, he thought about it. He imagined sliding his hand up her arm and across her back as he pulled her even closer, then cupping the back of her neck as he kissed her until she was out of breath for a better reason than lugging junk out of the storage shed.

  “I’m good,” he said abruptly, before he did something stupid. “I’m going to go shower and grab a beer.”

  “Oh, okay.” She looked disappointed. “Can I make you supper or something? To say thank you, I mean. For helping me today. And yesterday.”

  “Just being neighborly.” He headed back to his own place, cursing himself for a fool the entire way.

  Because he wanted to kiss her or because he hadn’t kissed her, he wasn’t sure.

  * * *

  Anna was losing her mind. She had multiple to-do lists on the fridge, financial reports to read and knitting how-to videos cued up on the laptop, but she was sitting in a chair on the deck doing nothing.

  Not nothing, exactly. She was actually pretending to do nothing while she was, in fact, watching a shirtless Cam Mayfield swing a hammer. And what a view it was, all tanned flesh and rippling muscles. She should probably feel guilty about using his body as her entertainment, but she didn’t have cable.

  She wasn’t sure the afternoon was doing much in the way of relaxing her, though. Over the last week, she’d spent a lot of time thinking about her neighbor and he wasn’t always fully clothed in those thoughts. Nor was she. Since he’d barely said half-a-dozen words to her over those days, she wasn’t sure why her subconscious was filling her head with images of him—or them—in all sorts of naughty scenarios, but the fact more than one had started with him coming over to “repair” something for her made the current tableau all the more delicious.

  Taking a long sip of her unsweetened, decaf iced tea, Anna watched as Cam rummaged through a pile of wood until he found a piece he wanted. It looked like siding off an old barn and it had taken her a little while to figure out what he was building. He’d started by making a frame, then he started cutting the weathered gray boards to fit and she realized he was building a chest. There was one in the corner of Gram’s living room, so he must have made one for her grandparents. If he built this one the same way, he’d put distressed metal corners on it, with nice hinges and a latch.

  And, dammit, he caught her looking again. Cam raised his hands in a questioning gesture, while she prayed he was too far away to see the guilty blush on her cheeks.

  “I’m relaxing,” she shouted.

  He shook his head before bending down to plug his saw back into the extension cord snaking down from his house. After admiring that view for a few seconds, Anna dragged herself out of the Adirondack chair and tried to figure out what she was going to do next. Her body wasn’t used to being idle and she needed to burn off some excess energy. Or that was where she told herself the excess energy came from, anyway.

  She’d had Cam drag Gram’s planters out at the same time as the chairs, and she’d spent time yesterday putting the pots in place and filling them with potting soil she’d found in the shed. She wasn’t sure if dirt that came in bags expired, but it didn’t smell bad so she went with it. She had no flowers to put in them, though. The day before yesterday she’d scraped down all the window trim because it was flaking and she wanted to repaint it as a favor to her grandparents. But she had no paint.

  Not being able to drive was becoming a big problem. She wasn’t hurting for food because she’d been thorough in making up that first list, but there were all sorts of items necessary for her to-do lists she couldn’t get for herself. Plus she wanted to go to the library Tuesday afternoon for the knitting club and, the more she thought about it, the less she wanted to walk a six-mile round trip into town.

  Time to tackle the bicycle. She should have asked Cam to drag it out while he was getting the chairs, but she’d forgotten to jot it down on the notepad she’d been using and it slipped her mind. He was done and gone before she thought of it, and she hadn’t wanted to bother him again.

  Anna walked down to the storage shed and analyzed the piles, trying to determine the best way to get Gram’s ancient bicycle off the hooks on the back wall. If she stood on the seat of the riding mower without getting wrapped up in the netting from what looked like an old screen house balled up and shoved in there, she could probably lift it off the hooks. Then she just had to navigate her way back through decades of accumulated stuff—much of it fishing related—without killing herself.

  The bike was off the wall and she was trying to figure out how to turn around on the small mower seat since the rear tire of the bicycle wouldn’t clear the wall when a shadow filled the doorway and cut off the little light she had.

  “What are you doing now?”

  “I’m getting Gram’s bicycle out so I can ride it to town,” she said, leaving out the part where she was stuck.

  “Lean it up against the wall and come out of there. I’ll get it.”

  She wanted to argue, but since she hadn’t yet figured out how to rescue it and she suspected Cam wouldn’t leave until she did, she balanced the bike’s tires on the mower and leaned it up against the wall. When she turned around to step down, Cam had his hand out.

  Even though he was just trying to keep her from breaking an ankle or her neck, Anna savored the feel of his hand closing around hers to steady her. His skin was rough and she got a little shiver, wondering what that would feel like sliding across more of her bare skin than the palm of her hand. For a second she even considered pulling a silly, teenage stunt like pretending to trip so she could “fall” into his arms, but she didn’t have the nerve and, before she knew it, she was safely out in the sunshine again.

  The warm glow of desire faded somewhat into annoyance when Cam reached across the pile of junk and retrieved the bike without breaking a sweat. Of course he was taller and stronger than she was, but he didn’t need to show it off so much.

  Cam looked the bike over and shook his head. “The tires are flat and I don’t think this chain’s been oiled since Reagan was president.”

  “Is it fixable?”

  “Probably. When’s the last time you rode a bike?”

  “I did the stationary bike at the gym almost every day.”

  He snorted. “When’s the last time you rode a bike that wasn’t bolted down?”

  She had to think about it. “At least ten years. Twelve maybe. Or fifteen. But you don’t forget how, right? That’s where the saying ‘like riding a bike’ comes from.”

  “You really want to ride this bike?”

  “More than I want to walk six miles to learn to knit.”

  “I’ll drive you to the store and help you get the stuff you need.”

  He sounded like he’d just offered to take her place in the dentist’s chair, but she didn’t care. “I have a list. Can we go to the flower store, too? And the paint store?”

  After inhaling deeply through his nose, Cam shrugged. “There’s a Home Depot about forty minutes from here. You can get everything you need there. And we may as well grab dinner while we’re out, so I’m going to go take a shower while you get your lists ready.”

  Since he was a guy and taking a shower probably wouldn’t take him as long as it took her to do her hair, Anna raced into the house and changed her shirt, since the light pink one she’d had on had suffered during her adventures in the storage shed. Then she grabbed her purse and her phone and made sure everything from the lists on the fridge were in it.

&nb
sp; After locking up, she cut through the tree line and headed for Cam’s pick-up…where she stopped short. Oh, hell no.

  * * *

  Cam sat in the passenger seat of his own truck, calling himself a moron and an idiot and every other name he could think of that cast doubt on his intelligence. But Anna needed to learn to drive and nobody else was around to do it.

  He saw her standing in the driveway, shaking her head, and rolled down his window. “Oh, by the way, you’re driving.”

  “I can’t drive. It’s been longer since I’ve driven a car than it has since I’ve ridden a bicycle.”

  “It’ll come back to you.”

  She hadn’t moved yet. “I told you I don’t have a license.”

  “Then don’t hit anything or get stopped.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “Once we hit the main road, I’ll drive. But you can handle these back roads and maybe through town.” Her feet weren’t moving yet, so he tried softening his tone. “You don’t know where your next job’s going to be. Maybe it’ll be in a big city and you can make do with public transportation, but it wouldn’t hurt to know how to drive.”

  “What if I wreck your truck?”

  “You won’t be going fast enough to wreck anything. And it’s insured.” He could picture himself explaining that one to his insurance agent. Well, my neighbor’s really hot and she doesn’t know how to drive, so…

  She walked around the front of his truck as if she was facing down impending doom, then climbed into the driver’s seat. After he showed her how to adjust the seat and tilt the wheel so she was comfortable, she put on her seat belt and stared at the key in the ignition.

  “You turn it,” he said after a minute or so.

  “I know that part.”

  “Okay.” It was starting to get hot and the sooner she turned the key, the sooner they’d have air conditioning.

  She fired up the engine and he tried not to notice the way her hands were shaking as he led her through backing the truck out of his driveway and getting it headed down the dirt road.