by Kaitlyn Rice
“Exotic looking? Black hair?”
He didn’t bat an eyelash.
“A blond princess?”
“More like a sleeping beauty,” Trevor blurted. “She spoke openly to me, as if I were her brother or husband, and she was almost abnormally naive.”
“And you liked her.”
Trevor rolled his eyes. “Lord, Sam. Is this junior high?”
“Was that a yes, my cynical friend?” Sam’s tanned cheeks formed two deep crevices when he smiled.
Trevor scowled. Sam had been the world’s biggest cynic until he’d fallen for Darla. Now he’d decided he had some obligation to pull Trevor into romantic bliss alongside him. The guy had been nudging him toward women constantly, and he’d been way too interested in Trevor’s weekends.
“Did you get her number, bud?”
Sighing, Trevor strode into his office.
“What about her name?” Sam asked from beyond the wall.
“Just settle yourself down, Sam. She was a tourist. I’ll never see her again.”
Sam fell silent, thank God.
Trevor set the cup on top of his file cabinet and pulled out a topographic map, refusing to think about the woman another second.
He’d never been the type to start up with anyone he couldn’t afford to know well. His parents had been expert at that—between the two of them they’d been married six times. Several of those marriages had lasted less than a year, and several had produced children.
Trevor had eight stepsiblings between the ages of two and his own thirty-two. Except for the toddler, they all had commitment issues.
Not him, though. He stuck with long-term, noncontractual relationships with women who appreciated his realistic view of marriage. He’d been with Martie for four years and Christina for three. Chris had moved on five months ago, and Trevor hadn’t found his next serious girlfriend, yet.
But he would. And they’d have fun and no regrets.
Clearing a spot on his desk, Trevor moved his cup there, then carried the map around to sit and study it. Five college-age counselors would be arriving in three days, requiring a week of intensive training. The following Monday, twenty-six younger boys would arrive, and those were merely the first-session campers. By the end of the next seven weeks, ninety-six boys in various stages of adolescence would have rotated in and out of here. As director of the camp, Trevor needed to be ready.
He lifted the map, forcing himself to think about day hikes and climbing excursions.
“Hey, Trev?”
“Yeah.”
“What color was that rattletrap?”
He froze in his seat for a moment. Then he got up and walked out to the front office, where Sam stood gazing out the screen door. A tan car was pulling into the drive. Trevor watched it slow to a stop behind his Jeep.
When that shoe hit the ground beneath the car door, he knew it was her. Maybe she was lost again.
“Sam, I’ll give you twenty bucks to go out there and give her directions to Longmont. I’m behind on work.”
Sam didn’t answer immediately. Probably because he was preoccupied, watching the leggy brunette get out of the car. “Your sleeping beauty?” he asked.
“She’s not mine, but yeah.”
“She doesn’t look lost now.” Sam’s chuckle got on Trevor’s nerves.
“She said she was going to Longmont,” Trevor said.
“Darla’s friend is arriving this weekend sometime,” Sam reminded him. “Isabel Blume? From Kansas?”
Isabel Blume, from…Kansas.
The lost woman was Darla’s good friend? Trevor would never have suspected. Darla wore leather boots, sturdy jeans and a short haircut that’d require little fuss while she worked around the ranch. She was as good as Trevor and Sam at following a trail and better at fires and fishing.
Trevor couldn’t imagine the lost woman doing any of those things. Hadn’t Darla said her friend was coming to help wherever she was needed, so Sam and Darla’s dadgum July wedding could be saved?
“Your fiancée didn’t tell me her friend was so…”
So, what? Friendly? Sexy?
Distracting?
“…green.”
Sam had already headed outside. Trevor watched him step off the porch to shake the woman’s hand. He watched her smile that same, openly friendly smile. Then he watched her skirt flutter up again.
He’d have to be careful to keep his thoughts off those legs and on the safety of the camp kids.
He’d also have to discourage any more electrified touches or lingering looks. It might be all right to entertain sexual thoughts about a woman he knew he’d never see again, but in the real world, this one wasn’t his type.
Too dewy-eyed. She’d want the white picket fence, the scruffy dog and two children—a boy and a girl if it worked out, but of course she’d adore whichever she got.
Trevor knew that story, too. It had always read like pure fiction to him.
Besides, he had other things to worry about. The ninety-six boys whose parents had paid for this camp deserved his undivided attention. Those kids would learn nothing good from watching their camp director engage in a dalliance with some sexy tourist.
In fact, he’d love to teach them the opposite: that a man should be strong enough to wait for a healthy relationship with a woman he admired.
There went her skirt again.
Okay, so he did admire her legs.
“What in blazes is she doing wearing a skirt to a Colorado mountain lodge, anyway?” he complained to himself just before he shoved his way out the screen door.
“IT IS YOU!” Isabel said as soon as she saw her highway rescuer appear outside. “I knew that Jeep was familiar.”
“Thought you were headed to Longmont.”
“I was. I mean, I did go through there.” She glanced out toward the road. Hadn’t Darla told her she would pass through Longmont? “I was told I had to, to get here.”
The trill of a cell phone interrupted.
“That’s mine,” Sam said, digging it out of his shirt pocket. “Could you help her with her bags, bud? We’re putting her in the Ripple River room, up at the house.”
Isabel watched him put the phone to his ear and walk toward the far end of the porch.
“You were past Longmont when I saw you, only a few miles from here,” the younger man said, returning to the conversation Isabel would have been happy to forget.
She felt silly about getting lost, but this had been her first time to travel so far without her sisters to help navigate. Considering the non-map-reading child she’d had for company, she’d done all right to lose her way only once in almost six hundred miles.
“You must have made a loop back around.”
“Must have.” She stuck her hand out. “Isabel Blume, from Kansas.” She paused, then said, “Well, I guess you know quite a bit about me already. But we didn’t trade names.”
He pressed his hand into hers, his grip firm and warm.
“Trevor Kincaid.” He broke the clasp immediately.
“You’re Trevor?” She might have recognized his voice if she’d been expecting to meet someone she knew out on that highway. But who’d have dreamed that a law professor would be so strong and rugged looking?
But then, Darla had told her that Trevor was also an avid outdoorsman. And that he was deadly serious at times and a load of fun at others.
Come to think of it, Isabel knew a lot about him already, too. And judging from the things that Darla had said, she was going to like him. “I don’t know if you remember, but we spoke on the phone once. It’s great to meet you in person!”
“Mmm-hmm.” He backed up a step. “If you’ll pop the trunk, we can unload.”
Whoa! What had just happened? Isabel’s enthusiastic greeting had been met with a distinct coolness.
She would disregard the snub. Perhaps she’d imagined it. “Old-fashioned car, old-fashioned opener,” she said, handing Trevor her trunk key.
“If you’
ll help me grab some bags, we can probably do this in one trip.” Trevor opened the trunk, stared inside and added, “Or maybe not.”
She had brought a lot. In addition to her own luggage, there were Angie’s smaller suitcases and two boxes of toys. Isabel had designed a quilt to give Sam and Darla as a wedding gift. That was in another box.
Everything inside this trunk was necessary. Isabel ignored Trevor’s attitude and helped him unload. They set the garment bag and suitcases on the ground, then stacked the boxes beside them.
When they got down to Angie’s pink floral suitcases, Trevor took them out, his expression puzzled, and slammed the trunk lid.
Did he think those cases belonged to her? “The Barbie cases aren’t mine,” Isabel said. “They belong to Ang—”
“Shh! Did you hear that?”
She had. It had been a soft, high-pitched sound.
“Could be one of the calves.” He peered toward the east.
Isabel listened again, then glanced at the car window. “No, that’s Angie. The slam of the trunk lid must have awakened her.”
Sure enough, the little girl’s head poked up in the seat, and her face soon appeared in the window. “Izzabell, can I come out now?” she bellowed.
“I can’t wait until she sees how gorgeous this place is,” Isabel said as she walked around the car. “She missed seeing the mountains as we approached Denver.”
Opening the door, Isabel grinned when Angie emerged. With tangled red hair and sleep creases pressed into one cheek, she was still adorable. “Come here, hon.” Isabel took the little girl by the hand and led her to where Trevor waited.
He bent down to speak to the child. “Hi, Angie. I’m Professor Kincaid,” he said. “Would you like to see some hummingbirds?”
Angie nodded.
He turned to point at a massive pine tree, off near a footpath into a wooded area. “See those feeders hanging from the limbs? There are usually several birds hovering around them. You can see them better from the path. Go take a look, if you’d like.”
Angie headed in that direction. When Isabel started to follow her, Trevor caught her eye. “She’ll be within sight. Let her go.”
After Angie had skipped away, he asked, “Why is she here?”
“I told you about that on the highway. Remember?”
“Not really.”
Isabel squinted at him, thinking he’d changed since their first meeting. She explained again in more detail, about Angie’s mother’s surprise announcement that she was remarrying, and the argument that had followed between Roger and his ex about what to do with Angie while all of the adults in her life followed other pursuits.
“I didn’t want Angie to feel as if she was nothing but a bother, so I brought her with me,” Isabel finished, shrugging. “Darla knew I might have to bring her. She suggested it, actually.”
“And you said Roger was…who?”
“My neighbor,” Isabel said, feeling deceptive. But her status with Roger confused even her. Her sisters had convinced her to break up with him for the summer. Josie had advised her to talk to every man she met so she could find out exactly how wrong their mother had been about the entire male population.
Flexing her flirt muscles, she’d called it.
Big sister Callie had said almost the opposite—that Isabel should discover what it felt like to be on her own for a while.
Recognizing the wisdom in both of her sisters’ advice, Isabel had declared a summer of independence from Roger.
His response? “Do what you have to do. I’ll be here when you get home.”
So she wasn’t with Roger, exactly, even though she still hoped he’d propose when she returned from this trip.
Angie hollered that she couldn’t see any birds, so Isabel and Trevor started toward the path. “I’d forgotten you had a kid in the car at all,” Trevor said on the way. “Aren’t you staying until Sam and Darla’s wedding?”
“Yes, I am.”
They reached Angie, and Trevor bent down near the child to point out a couple of fluttering shapes. “Those are hummingbirds,” he said. “You have to stand real still, and watch them a few minutes. Then you’ll see.”
“Oh, those! They look like big ol’ bugs!”
“I know they do at first. But keep watching them.”
He stood up and scowled at Isabel. “She’s staying all summer, too?”
She studied the tiny row of dimples that had formed above his eyebrows. “No. When Angie’s mom returns from her honeymoon in a few weeks, she’ll fly through Denver. We’ve already planned to meet at the airport, and she’ll take Angie home.”
Trevor kept staring at her. The man might be moody, but he had great eyes. She hadn’t figured out their color yet. Gray? Green? And despite his efforts to hide it, his gaze held a reluctant interest in her that was enticing.
She’d have to be careful around him. He seemed…dangerous.
“I called Darla at her mother’s house early yesterday morning to tell her about it,” Isabel said. “Guess she got busy and didn’t pass along the message.”
“But starting next Monday, we’ll be running an orienteering camp up here,” Trevor said. “The boys are older, between twelve and eighteen, and expect to learn real wilderness skills. We explore offsite part of the time, but when we’re on property we attempt some dangerous things. We work with gear—fish hooks and climbing apparatus. Fire. Surely you realize a younger child will be in the way.”
Angie moved closer to Isabel, pressing her face into the side of her waist. After glaring a warning at Trevor, Isabel rubbed the girl’s arm. “It’s all right, hon,” she said. “Darla and I really did discuss this yesterday. She assured me that we’d work out any problems.”
Angie came out from hiding and put her hands on her hips. “Is he jist an ee-bil ol’ Grinch?” she asked in a normal voice.
Isabel stifled a smile. He’d deserved that. Though Trevor had valid concerns, he shouldn’t voice them in front of Angie. “I think the word you’re looking for is grouch,” she corrected, without bothering to lower her voice, either.
He deserved that, too.
Trevor shifted his gaze between Angie and Isabel, then shrugged. “Okay, then. Leave the luggage where it is and come inside.”
Chapter Three
Isabel and Angie followed Trevor through a large office, then into one of several smaller rooms off to the side. He waved toward a bench that ran along a long, windowless wall. “Have a seat,” he said.
“Wow, look at that tree chair!” Angie exclaimed, eyeing the bench constructed from a rough log. She ran the length of it twice, then plopped down in its middle and ran her hand along the smoothed seat.
Isabel remained near the doorway, watching as Trevor strode behind a cluttered desk, sat down and picked up a large map.
She sat on the bench near Angie, feeling confused. “Why are we here?” she asked. “Didn’t Sam mention the Ripple River room?”
“Yes, and I started to tell you bef—”
The bench squeaked loudly, drawing their attention. Angie was bouncing on her bottom. Isabel knew why. She lifted her brows and turned to Trevor. “Rest room?”
“Out in the main office.” After a subtle sigh, he dropped the map and got up to point out the way to Angie.
When he returned, he explained, “The Ripple River room is small, and really meant for one person.” He sat in his chair, then leaned back, dropping his elbows on the armrests and linking his fingers. He stared at Isabel, his expression sober. “I’m not sure where to put you, considering this change. We’ll have to wait for Sam.”
Although he didn’t say she’d caused trouble by bringing Angie, he implied it.
Oh, man, did he imply it.
“I explained that Angie is only here because of special circumstances.”
“I know.”
A minute later, Angie hopped back into the room on one foot. Kids that age could amuse themselves so easily, Isabel thought. Taking an extra notebook and p
en from her purse, she handed them to the little girl.
He’d see. Angie would be no trouble at all.
Trevor returned his attention to his map, and the office grew quiet again. Isabel heard only the occasional rattle of his map, the scratch of Angie’s pen against the paper and the tick of the clock.
She perused the Lonely Stars quilt tacked to the wall behind Trevor’s head. All of her quilts were her own unique designs. She’d done this one in rich indigo blues and deep forest greens, with stars in a silvery white.
“I sold your quilt to Darla last year,” Isabel said to break the uncomfortable silence. “She said it was your Christmas present.”
Trevor looked up at her, then turned in his chair to scrutinize the quilt, seeming almost surprised to discover it there against his office wall. “That’s right, you have some sort of crafts business, don’t you?” he said. “I’d forgotten how Darla knew you.”
Success! He’d sounded halfway friendly again.
She’d keep talking to see if it helped. “Actually, my mother started Blumecrafts when I was a baby, and built it up in catalog sales. She died four years ago, but I kept the business going.”
She gazed at the quilt, wondering if he would appreciate the artistry and work she’d put into it.
He turned back around and leveled a sober stare at her. “You make a decent living, selling these quilts?”
“I do fine, especially since we’ve put the catalogs on the Internet. I also sell handmade baskets and some accessories—my hand-pieced leather handbags were a hit on the West Coast last year.” She lifted her chin. “You can’t buy Blumecrafts items at your average retail store.”
He’d nodded all the way through her explanation, but as soon as she quieted he said, “I expected you to be older.”
What did her age have to do with this conversation?
Isabel wondered if the man was ever impressed, and why she cared one way or another. “I’m old enough.”
That map must be incredibly interesting, because he started reading it again.
“Do you have some kind of problem with me?” she asked.
His eyes never left his map. “No.”
“No?”