Wild Heat (Northern Fire)

by Lucy Monroe

  She wanted to witness that.

  It reminded her so much of the friend from her childhood, the boy who taught her what it meant to belong to Cailkirn, not just live there.

  Only, as she listened to Tack give an entertaining and accurate history of the town, accompanied by colorful stories, as they traveled north on Sterling Highway, it wasn’t Alaska or the area that Caitlin fell in love with.

  It was Tack.

  The feeling welling up inside her as she watched him talk into his headset from the front passenger seat of the tour van was as unstoppable as the inlet tides and deeper than the ocean’s abyss.

  If she’d recognized this love during sex, she would have written it off as passion’s excess. If she’d acknowledged it when he was helping her, she’d have convinced herself it was the gratitude and loyalty of friendship. Even if she’d gotten an inkling when she found another one of his photo gifts on her desk, she’d be able to dismiss it as sentimentality.

  But right here? Right now? Her heart so full that tears tightened her throat, she had no excuses.

  The moment was too prosaic not to be profound.

  She’d been so certain she was inured to adoration of this magnitude, and if it were any other man in the world, she would be. However, the walls Caitlin had built around her emotions had no hope of keeping him out.

  Because Tack had been firmly entrenched in her heart since Caitlin was six years old.

  His voice washed over her, the words no longer registering as she examined her new knowledge with the exultation and terror of a woman facing true love for the first time in her life. But as certain as the realization that she loved him was the discovery the emotion had always been there.

  She just hadn’t let herself see it.

  Not when they were teens and she never got crushes on other boys at school. Not when they were college students and it had taken her into the middle of their sophomore year before she accepted her first date.

  With Nevin Barston.

  Not when she’d felt raptor-size claws slash her heart when she pushed Tack away and stopped responding to his calls, texts, or e-mails.

  The magnitude of her self-delusion shook her as much as finally accepting the truth of her feelings for Tack, maybe even more.

  How long would she have kept hiding from the one emotion she’d denied, the one bigger than all the others combined?

  Had the sex opened the cracks in her self-realization? Or had it been day-after-day exposure to this man who was the man to her?

  Or maybe the layers between Caitlin and the inexorable understanding had been peeled away by the years of pain without him. Nevin had added to that pain, but he hadn’t been the deepest source of it.

  Oh man. She really needed to talk to Dr. Hart.

  Caitlin loved Taqukaq MacKinnon and she always had.

  She’d never loved Nevin Barston. Caitlin had been bowled over by his sophistication and good looks, but he couldn’t occupy a place in her soul that was already full.

  He might have done his best to break her spirit, but he could never break her heart. Because he hadn’t owned it. Not even a little corner of it.

  It had always belonged to Tack, and she suspected it always would. The love of a child for her dearest friend had morphed into something else as they grew into man and woman.

  And there had been a time he had loved her too. He’d never said, but she’d known somewhere inside her that she owned his heart too.

  She’d ignored that knowledge and followed her plan to outrun the agony of a childhood loss she’d never dealt with.

  In some strange way she’d felt like she owed it to her parents to leave Cailkirn too. They’d been so adamant about leaving the town behind. There had been a part of her that thought she had to honor their memory by following their dream and getting out.

  Oh man.

  Her therapist had been right when Dr. Hart had posited that Caitlin hadn’t disliked Cailkirn or Alaska, but the painful grief she identified with living there.

  It had caused an obsessive need to leave the small town and she’d known subconsciously she’d never go if she acknowledged the depth and breadth of her feelings for Tack.

  So she’d denied them. And him.

  Doing it had cost her the one person left in her life she couldn’t afford to lose. Tack had been her anchor since she was six and then she’d cut the line and set adrift.

  She couldn’t deny the horrible awareness that these revelations were coming eight years too late. The damage had been done and this huge feeling inside her had nowhere to go.

  Tears tightened her throat to the point it became hard to breathe. Her heart began to pound heavy and rapid in her chest. The first panic attack since Tack had taken her to his house the first time swelled inside her.

  “Isn’t that right, Kitty?” Tack said loudly through the tour van’s speaker system connected to his headset, like he realized she wouldn’t have heard him otherwise.

  How had he known she was getting lost in her own head again? What sixth sense connected them?

  She looked around, but the faces of the other passengers didn’t give her any clues as to what he was talking about.

  “Excuse me?” she asked, her panic ebbing slightly as she did her best to focus on Tack.

  “I was telling these fine people that even our resident ghosts think Cailkirn is something special.”

  “If they didn’t, they’d move on to the afterlife,” she said, finally catching up.

  Laughter sounded around her and she forced a smile in response, though her words hadn’t been meant to be funny. She’d just said the first thing that came to her mind.

  “Is it true your grandfather haunts the bed-and-breakfast your family runs?” a woman in the second bench seat back asked.

  Caitlin shifted in her seat so she could look back toward the tourists. “I’m not sure he haunts the house as much as he does my gran.”

  “That’s so romantic.”

  It would have been more romantic if he’d stayed in Cailkirn to take care of his family, Caitlin thought. She kept that particular belief to herself.

  Apparently she had her grandfather’s abysmal timing. Only he’d died when he left Cailkirn. She hadn’t.

  Did that mean she’d been given a second chance to win back Tack’s love? Could they live out the dreams he’d abandoned when she kicked him out of her life?

  Did she want to try?

  Caitlin wasn’t at all sure she had the mental or emotional reserves to stand up to his rejection if she told him how she felt and Tack shut down any hope of a future between them.

  Her heart physically hurt in her chest as she accepted he’d already done that.

  Maybe it was for the best.

  She wasn’t sure she still had it in her to hope, to reach for dreams that could shatter as easily around her feet as the mirror Nevin had once thrown at her.

  Needing respite from her heavy thoughts, Caitlin spent the rest of the ride to the trailhead answering questions and sharing her own stories to help Tack entertain the cruise passengers.

  Once they’d parked and everyone got out of the van, Tack locked it up and started giving instructions for the hike.

  Two young men, one blond with the jock look and the other undeniably Goth with black hair and polish on his nails, broke off from the group. They’d been in the backseat with an older couple that might have been their parents and had spent the entire drive either talking to each other or texting on their phones.

  They sidled toward Caitlin, separating her from the others as well.

  The blond spoke. “So, my bro here bet me ten bucks you’re one of the ship’s passengers. He says I’ve got no skills of observation.”

  “The only faces he remembers are the ones facing him on a football field,” the Goth twentysomething claimed.

  Caitlin managed not to roll her eyes. “You lose that bet.”

  She wasn’t impressed with either brother’s powers of observation. They had to b
e the only two people in the van who didn’t know she was a Cailkirn resident.

  “So, you’re a local?” the blond pressed.

  “Yes,” Caitlin said shortly. “I work for MacKinnon Bros. Tours. You need to listen to Tack right now.”

  The Goth did roll his eyes. “Don’t step off the trail, leave the wildlife alone, don’t litter, blah, blah, blah. We’ve heard it before; this is our third stop on the tour. Mom and Dad insist on doing some kind of adventure at each port.”

  Caitlin recognized the blasé attitude of a college student trying to seem uninterested in anything but clubs and parties. She also noticed he remembered three of the key rules of hiking. At least he had that over the teens who had precipitated Savannah Vasov’s first sighting of a bear.

  “But other people need to hear what he’s saying.”

  “You don’t. You’re an expert, I bet,” the blond said.

  His brother sidled up until he was almost touching Caitlin. “You could be our personal tour guide.”

  “I’m not a guide. I work in the office.” She deftly sidestepped him and tried to put more distance between herself and the young men. “All of our guides are certified wilderness experts.”

  Even Bobby had his basic certification. Tack had told Bobby that if he wanted to keep working for the business, though, he’d need to get additional certifications in the winter when their tour schedule was light.

  The blond moved toward her left and his brother flanked her on the right, stepping close again.

  Persistent little brats.

  Then, without her having to say a single thing, both young men backed up and started moving away fast.

  Caitlin turned around, unsurprised to find Tack approaching. The look on his face? A little less expected.

  If she were the boys, she would have retreated too.

  “I’m sorry,” she said when he reached her. “I tried to get them to stop talking.”

  “Were they harassing you?”

  “No. Just flirting.”

  “You didn’t flirt back.” It was a statement.

  But she still felt the need to respond. “Not even remotely.”

  He nodded. “You okay?”

  “Sure. It was harmless, Tack.”

  “Stay close during the hike.”

  “I’m not helpless.”

  “But you’re on the hike to see what we do, not to have amorous advances from little boys.”

  At twenty-eight, Tack wasn’t exactly ancient, but Caitlin wasn’t about to remind him of that fact. He was in full protector mode.

  “You’re hot when you get all protective like this,” she whispered as she passed him to join the others at the trailhead.

  It was all she could do not to snicker when she noticed the two brothers standing on the other side of their parents as far from Tack—and her—as they could get.

  Tack kept her right beside him as he started the hike, his hand landing in the small of her back.

  She stared up at him in shock.

  He shrugged. “They’ll all be gone tonight.”

  When their cruise ship sailed. In other words, no one here was a local and it didn’t matter if they knew she and Tack were involved in a casual sexual relationship.

  Not that it felt all that casual with the looks he was giving the college boys and his hand remaining so possessively on her.

  This hike was entirely different from the time before. Tack pointed out the flora and fauna along the way and shared stories of wildlife sightings and information on those they could expect to make.

  He told them the history of the trail and about the devastating wildfire burn from twenty-plus years ago.

  Caitlin was entranced, listening as closely as any tourist who had never stepped foot on the Kenai Peninsula before.

  When they reached the overlook, the cruise passengers took tons of pictures, and so did Caitlin.

  She even talked Tack into taking one with her.

  Tack had passed out nutrition bars and bottles of water before the hike. It looked like pretty much everyone was taking advantage of both now that they were resting.

  “Remember, if you pack it in, you pack it out,” Tack told them, and watched closely to make sure none of the hikers from their group left any trash behind.

  Suddenly one of them was pointing up at the sky and shouting that it was an eagle.

  Everyone went silent, watching the majestic bird circle in the air above. Whether it had eyed prey or was just curious about the group of humans pointing and exclaiming, the eagle flew in dips and swoops, putting on a show no amount of money could have guaranteed.

  Caitlin didn’t even try to get a picture, she was so enamored of the beautiful bird. Coming upon wildlife, even on hikes like this, was not certain—especially with a noisy group who chattered the whole way up the trail. And eagle sightings were getting rarer each year.

  Tack came up close, settling behind her. “This is why I do what I do.”

  She nodded, understanding in that moment more than she’d ever thought she could. When his arms slid around her, she relaxed against him, letting the security of his presence complete the perfection of the moment.

  The eagle finally flew off, breaking the spell holding the group silent.

  People started talking and looking ready to make the return hike.

  Tack leaned down and kissed her temple. “You’re hella hot when you’re all spellbound by the beauty of our home state,” he said, neatly turning the tables on her from earlier.

  * * *

  Caitlin’s bubble of contentment burst when they got back to town and he dropped her off at the bed-and-breakfast.

  “Aunt Elspeth wants to know when you’ll be by for dinner again.” Caitlin had learned Tack avoided dinner at the Knit & Pearl once tourist season hit and it was filled with guests. “What do you want me to tell her?”

  “The first week of October.” He didn’t sound like he was joking or willing to compromise on that.

  Still, she had to try. “Come on, Tack. Even full to capacity, we never have more than a dozen guests.”

  “I spend all day with tourists. I’m not eating my dinner with them too.”

  “You didn’t seem to mind them today.”

  “I don’t. They’re my livelihood, but I don’t want my job sharing my dinner table.”

  Caitlin did her best to hide her disappointment. After his invitation to join him that morning, she thought he was as interested in spending time with her as she was with him. Even if it meant putting up with a few strangers at the table.

  Apparently, she’d been wrong.

  It was hard to swallow the truth that while she’d finally admitted to a love that was never going away, he still saw her as a project and his current casual sex partner. She couldn’t forget that one.

  “See you later tonight?” he asked, proving her thoughts.

  She almost said no, but if this was all she got of Tack, she wasn’t giving up a moment of it. “Nine-fifteen like usual.”

  He’d taken to stopping by to get her after Gran and her aunts were in bed. Last night had been an exception, but one she had a feeling wouldn’t happen often.

  He brought her home around midnight. They’d gone a little later on a couple of memorable occasions, but sleep was as necessary as food to Caitlin’s healthy recovery. And she didn’t like the thought of Tack doing challenging and even dangerous hikes with too little sleep.

  Come to think of it, now that the tourist season was in full swing, they probably shouldn’t meet every night.

  She’d have to bring that up later because the van was already disappearing from the bed-and-breakfast’s drive.

  * * *

  “What do you want?” Tack demanded, leaning over her sweaty, flushed nakedness.

  Kitty did not suggest what he thought she just had.

  “It’s not what I want.” She glared at him, her blue eyes sparkling with annoyance despite the vocal orgasm she’d had only moments before. “Some of your
tours leave at seven in the morning. That means you’re getting up closer to five to prep.”

  “First, I prep my pack when I get back from a hike, not before going on the next one, so it’s always ready. Second, I get up at five-thirty every morning, regardless of what time my tours are.”

  She winced. “That’s even worse. You’re not getting enough sleep even now.”

  “So what?” He could sleep when he was dead.

  “We need to limit our late nights to a couple of times a week. You probably already realized it, but it didn’t occur to me until earlier today.” She bit her lip, her expression thoughtful. “Maybe Friday and Saturday nights because you can sleep in the next day, or at least take a nap.”

  Yeah, like either of those things were going to happen. He wasn’t going to bed in the middle of the day unless she was in there with him.

  “And maybe Wednesdays.”

  He tugged one wild curl. “Wildcat, you’re overthinking this.”

  “No.” She shook her head, causing an interesting ripple effect down to her naked breasts. “This isn’t overthinking. It’s me watching out for you. You do it enough in the other direction; it should be a familiar concept.”

  “You’re not getting any more sleep than I am.”

  “You’re wrong. I take a nap before dinner almost every evening.”

  He was actually relieved to hear that. She was still recovering, even if the strides she’d made in the last year were pretty damn amazing. “What does your family think about that?”

  “It’s not all about what our families think,” she said fiercely. “Anyway, you don’t have to worry about it. My gran and aunts think I need a break from the tourists. They each have a time of day when the others cover for them so they can have solitude.”

  “That’s good.”

  She frowned at him. “For me, but it doesn’t help you.”

  “I need help?”

  “You aren’t getting enough sleep. Haven’t you been listening to me?” she asked peevishly.

  “I admit, listening isn’t on the top of my priority list when you are lying naked in my bed.”

  “We’re not on the bed.”

  She was right. They hadn’t made it past the sectional in the great room. It was better than the time he hadn’t even let her get out of the cab of his pickup.