by Jill Snow
Wookie yipped, as if sensing her distress. Lily clenched her fists, reminded again of the groceries. She stuffed them, bag and all, into the fridge. Better that than the open air.
What was she going to do?
Maybe one of the other cabins had a real kitchen. She pulled her items from the duffel bag and strewed them across the floor in her haste to find her tennis shoes. Why had she brought so many pairs of shorts and not enough jeans? The mountain air was a lot chillier than the city and even though it was warm now in the full sun, the nights would likely get colder.
She didn’t have enough sweatpants and jeans to last the week. She’d have to wear the shorts during the day even if her legs got a bit chilled. She located her tennis shoes and hauled them on over her bare feet without even tying the laces. Her heels squashed down the backs, but she didn’t care.
Maybe her parents were right all along. She had no common sense. She didn’t think ahead. She wasn’t good enough to get anywhere in life. Maybe this silly little competition was too much for her, after all.
Wookie whined, leaning against her leg and lending Lily her support.
Lily patted Wookie’s silky fur and squared her shoulders. No, she wasn’t willing to give up just yet. But one way or another, she had to get out of here. Change cabins. One of the others would be far, far away from the shotgun-toting cookie-scented new neighbor and something on this campground had to have a microwave. It was the only way she was going to survive this stupid competition.
Chapter 5
“Heel,” Lily told her dog. They had gone through puppy training together, so Wookie should be able to follow that one, simple command. Under normal conditions, the dog would usually stay by her side and not wander off to inspect trash bins at other people’s cabins.
Her main concern at the moment was that she keep Wookie far away from the trigger-happy maniac staying next door to her. Fortunately, the dog seemed happy enough to trot along next to her, snuffling as she smelled all the exotic forest smells along the way. They didn’t make quick time to the main lodge, but at the very least, she never lost sight of Wookie.
By the time she got there, she stormed up to the door, only to wince at the racket coming from the far end of the lodge. Wookie barked and took off, her little legs flailing as she ran toward the source. “Wookie!” Lily had no choice but to follow.
Fortunately, it seemed the woman she had come to find was outdoors. Ruby stood at the bottom of the ladder with a pile of shingles on the rung in front of her. Lily’s hulking next door neighbor perched at the top of the ladder, hammering the shingles. She should have known he was the source of all that racket.
If he was up there fixing the roof, he must be the handyman at Pinecrest Lodge. Maybe that was why Ruby gave her the cabin next to his, in case Lily had any problems. Well, she did have a problem—with him. Any other cabin would be better than the one next to his. Especially if it came equipped with a microwave and a real fridge.
Wookie darted up to Ruby. Sitting back on her hind legs, the dog whuffed and begged for attention.
Ruby released the ladder to look down. “And who are you, furball?” Her voice was kind.
“That’s my dog, Wookie. Sorry if she’s a bother.” Lily glared at the neanderthal, but he didn’t seem to notice as he finished hammering a nail.
In the sudden silence, Ruby beamed. “Oh good, you’re both here. Lily, this is Ethan. Ethan, Lily is in the cabin next to yours.”
“We’ve met,” the grump said, sarcasm layering his voice. “Can you hand me another shingle?”
Instead, Ruby walked away from the ladder. “Why don’t I bring us all some cookies and you can take a break, Ethan? You never did have that cup of coffee.” As she spoke, she rounded the side of the cabin and disappeared.
“Don’t walk—” He broke off with a strangled sound. Frowning, he gripped the edge of the roof and looked down. “Would you mind holding the ladder while I step down?”
Lily couldn’t very well leave him hanging there, even if she didn’t like him. She took Ruby’s place, bracing her hands against both sides of the ladder. It trembled with his weight. When his rear end—in a very nice pair of jeans—neared her, she decided he was close enough to the ground to be able to walk the last few steps alone.
The moment she stepped away from the ladder, she bent and scooped Wookie into her arms, holding her safe. Just in case.
Ethan wiped his brow and rolled his eyes. “You don’t need to protect your dog like I’m going to hurt her or something.”
“You almost shot her!” Lily glared.
For a long moment, Ethan held her gaze. Then, relenting, he shook his head. “I was never going to shoot her. The gun was loaded with rock salt. I hoped the noise would scare her away. I thought she was a raccoon.”
Did Lily believe him? He had no reason to lie. Still, she eyed him warily.
He sighed and ran a hand over his short-cut brown hair. “Look, I wouldn’t hurt a dog, but there are animals out here that would. Best make sure she doesn’t stray away from your cabin, I can’t keep an eye out for her.”
“Don’t worry,” Lily said darkly. “I plan on asking to be moved as far from your cabin as possible.”
“Oh.”
Lily turned to face Ruby, who held a tray with two steaming cups of coffee and a plate of cookies. The kind old woman cringed, the wrinkles in her face deepening.
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible. You see…” She looked down, her cheeks turning pink. “None of the other cabins are fit for use. There’s a problem with the plumbing that I haven’t been able to work out. I swear, they worked like a charm earlier this summer. I don’t get it.”
What kind of handyman was Ethan if he let things get to this state of disrepair? Maybe he was a new hire. Ruby did seem to be keeping watch on him awfully closely, too close for a trusted employee.
As Lily cast him a sidelong glance, she caught his look of surprise and suspicion before he hid it. Clearly, Ruby hadn’t yet told him about the plumbing. He had to be a new hire, for sure. Shouldn’t that be the first thing on the list of priorities?
“If I can’t move, is there a microwave or something that we can move into my unit?” Lily tried to hide her panic over what she would do if the answer was no.
Ruby looked surprised at the question. “I have a microwave in my kitchen, if you need to use it. The cabins don’t have the outlets for electricity. It’s part of the charm of camping… and a remnant from how scarce electricity was when the campground was formed.”
“Fifty years ago,” Ethan informed sagely.
“Longer than that,” Ruby proclaimed. “My late husband and I bought this campground off of a nice old man when we married.”
“Well, thank you,” Lily said with a forced smile. She couldn’t use Ruby’s microwave. That would definitely be against the rules of the contest, to come to the main lodge for all her meals. What was she going to eat?
Cold noodles from the frozen dinners seemed like the only choice. She’d just have to pick out the uncooked meat. This week was getting worse and worse. Would she last?
For the promise of a promotion, of the realization of her dream, she would do anything. She had to do this, to prove to everyone that she had what it takes.
Ruby looked from Lily to Ethan and back again. “Will this be a problem?” Lily’s heart hitched, the woman had a hopeful, vulnerable look on her face and judging by the way the place was falling apart, she needed the money that both of them were paying. Lily didn’t have the heart to cause trouble.
“No,” they both said at once, then looked at each other.
“We’ll make it work,” Ethan said gruffly. He softened his words by taking a cookie off the plate Ruby held.
“I’ll pretend he doesn’t exist,” Lily muttered under her breath. No one appeared to hear.
Wookie struggled against her arms, following the progress of the cookie as Ethan bit into it. She wheezed and sneezed. Lily tightened her hold, ma
king sure that her dog couldn’t break free.
Wary, Ethan stuffed the rest of the cookie into his mouth and wiped his fingers on his shirt. Charming. “As long as you keep that dog away from my cabin, I don’t foresee us having any more problems.”
“Don’t worry. I’m only here for a week. On vacation.”
Vacation…if only. She imagined what a vacation would look like, and she imagined sunny beaches and fruity drinks. Definitely not early autumn in the mountains with a Neanderthal-turned-handyman.
He held out his hand, eyebrows raised. His expression said, Truce? On the other hand, his mouth—his very appealing mouth—said, “Nice to meet you, Lily.”
She juggled Wookie onto one hip as she shook Ethan’s hand. It was warm and strong. “Nice to meet you.”
Wookie snorted, as if she didn’t believe Lily’s words any more than Lily did.
It’s only for seven days. She could ignore him for that long.
Somehow.
Ruby placed the two coffee cups and the empty cookie plate in the sink and glanced out the window at the distant mountain view. It was so nice of Ethan to help her fix the roof, but she didn’t want to rely on him for too much. Ruby was nothing if not self-sufficient.
She knew she was getting on in years and couldn’t keep up with the needs of running the campground like she used to. But with no children and Walt long gone, she didn’t have any help. She had to make do the best she could. All her family; her brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews had their own lives now and she wouldn’t impose on them for help. Glancing at their pictures on the fridge brought a smile to her face, but that smile faltered when her eyes came to rest on the empty spot where the violation notices had been tacked.
Her gaze flew to the breadbox and the notice peeking out from underneath. They were coming faster and faster. Thankfully the town council—many of whom she’d known her entire adult life—had been lenient on her, but things were breaking down around here so quickly, she wasn’t sure what the future might hold.
She would hire someone, but she didn’t have funds. Selling was not an option, either. The campground was too valuable to her. She’d met her husband, Walt, here when they’d both worked at the campground one summer. They’d purchased it right after they’d married and had built it into one of the most sought after campgrounds in the area. It had been their whole life and what a wonderful, rewarding life it had been.
Ruby wasn’t ready to let go of that life yet. It was all she’d ever known and all she’d ever wanted. With Walt gone now, she had to keep things running. It was all she had left of him. And deep down inside she had a feeling, this campgrounds’ days were not over. Not yet.
Shaking off the sadness that threatened, she thought of her two resident campers. While Lily and Ethan had appeared not to like each other, Ruby had sensed something simmering under the surface. The way Lily and Ethan had looked at each other, each trying to act like they weren’t really looking, was reminiscent of the way her and Walt had pretended not to look at each other when they’d first met.
A smile crept on her lips as she thought about those early days with Walt here at the campground. They had been magical. One thing had always been true about Pinecrest Lodge, it was lucky for couples in love. Ruby had been witness to that magic many times over the decades and she had a feeling it was just as true now as it had been in her and Walt’s day.
The exterior might be falling apart, but at its heart, Pinecrest Lodge still had some magic left in it yet.
Chapter 6
Ethan peeked past the curtains in his bedroom, looking out between the thin line of white bark pine trees shading the neighboring cabin. Movement stirred there as his neighbor readied…something.
Ignore her.
It was what he had resolved to do over the next week. There was more than ample work to be done on the campground. The fact that the plumbing had gone haywire in the other cabins after having functioned properly all summer tickled his suspicions. He should be worrying about that, not about what the cute neighbor was doing at the back of her cabin. Cute? Where did that come from? Didn’t matter, he was going to focus on fixing things for Ruby. He let the curtain fall between them, resolute. For all intents and purposes, Lily did not exist.
And yet, when he exited his cabin, he found himself touring the perimeter, checking to make sure that little dog hadn’t come to investigate his trash again. He’d thrown the bags into the dumpster at the main lodge, but he checked nonetheless. No animals.
At the side of his cabin facing hers, his gaze strayed toward her again. What was she doing? Every time he looked, she seemed to be fumbling with some basic camping activity. If she knew nothing about camping, why had she chosen to vacation here, of all places? Was it the latest city-girl fad? Maybe they thought the fall mountain air was good for the skin or some other garbage.
Though, he had to admit she was easy to look at. She’d gathered her blond-streaked hair into a partial ponytail, exposing the darker layer at the base of her neck. Her sleeveless top and jean shorts hugged her figure and drew his attention to her long legs. Back and forth she walked to the wood pile, carrying pre-cut firewood back to her fire pit.
Wait—no, she was only carrying the logs. She would never light them without kindling! Could this woman do nothing for herself?
Stifling a sigh, he loped across the stretch of land between them before she broke a nail or some other disaster. It wasn’t in his nature to watch others suffer when he could help. He’d help her this once, but then he was going back to ignoring her for the rest of the week.
“Why won’t you burn?” Lily hissed between gritted teeth. Tears stung her eyes but she refused to give in to them, she refused to give up. Lighting a fire was the most basic camping skill that there was.
And she wasn’t even smart enough to master that.
You could look up a tutorial on your phone. Even if she got enough signal in these mountains to search for a tutorial video, that would be cheating. She was supposed to be devoid of technology, writing about her true experiences and struggles in the wilderness.
Reporter Can’t Light Fire; Starves to Death.
Yeah, that would be a fantastic headline…
Wookie whined at her knee, bringing her attention back to the present. She’d had her nose buried in her dish since Lily had set it down. Now, a crumble of her food still left in her dish, she cocked her head, her fur falling into her eyes again.
Lily gently brushed it aside so her dog could see. “Finish your dinner, girl. I’ll sort this out.”
She wished she felt as confident as she sounded.
“You’ll never light those logs without kindling.”
Lily sucked in a breath at the strong tenor of Ethan’s voice. She swallowed hard, then tipped up her face to look at him. He looked just as good as last time, his jeans cradling his hips and his shirt rolled up to his forearms. If it wasn’t for the hint of a scowl marring the appealing shape of his mouth, he could have walked from the pages of a fashion magazine. Mountain man edition.
“Kindling?” she asked, cringing as she spoke the word aloud. He must think her an idiot.
She felt like an idiot. Why hadn’t she found an instruction audiobook and listened to Camping 101 on the drive here?
“Yes. That,” he said, pointing to a pile of worthless sticks.
When she gave him a quizzical look, he sighed and stomped over to the pile, scooping some into his arms. She stepped into his path as he strode for the fire pit.
“I’ll take that,” she said, a bit breathless at the nearness of their bodies, even with all that wood between them.
His scowl deepened. “I’ll light the fire for you and then I’m going back to my cabin.”
“No!”
He raised his eyebrows at her, then stepped around her to drop the pile of sticks next to the unlit logs.
“I have to do this myself.”
“Why?”
Drat! She didn’t have a good answer. S
he sucked on the inside of her cheek as she thought. She couldn’t tell him the truth, about this stupid contest. It was embarrassing. She bet the other reporter deep in the wilderness wasn’t having any trouble at all, but was churning out tips for nature-lovers everywhere. He’d get the promotion, for sure.
Unless she did this herself.
“Fine, I want to do this myself.” As the words came out she realized it was partly true. All her life others had done things for her. Surprisingly, she realized that she wanted to depend on herself and not others. Something broke in her apartment, call Daddy to fix it. She got a new painting, call Daddy to hang it. No wonder her parents didn’t think she could do anything herself. Her mother still brought over home-cooked meals so Lily would have something besides frozen dinners and white wine in her fridge!
“Do you know how to lay kindling so it’ll catch the logs on fire?”
“No…”
“I’ll tell you what to do,” he said, more than a little gruffly. “Then you’ll know how to do it yourself next time.”
Lily nodded and Ethan sat on the log. Wookie immediately rushed to his feet wagging her tail and staring up at him adoringly. He motioned toward the logs she’d dumped in the pit. “Take them all out.”
“What? I just put them in.”
“Do you want to learn or not?”
Lily did as told.
“Okay, now take the kindling and layer it in the bottom. Make sure to leave air space in between each stick.” Ethan picked Wookie up and Lily thought she heard the dog sigh with joy. Traitor.
She got to work, laying out a row of sticks, then crossing another row on top. When she was finished she looked back at Ethan for approval.
“Now put one of the logs on top.”