by Tina Leonard
Emma picked up a local newspaper—really more of a brochure, two sheets of rather plain black-on-white text—and sat down to read.
“If you’re looking for the big fellow, he said he was leaving to find some trouble.”
Emma looked up. Assuming Miss Sugar was speaking of Santana, she said, “He’s not in the car with Nick?”
“Nope. That young fellow’s got to be cold. The snow is four inches thick on the top of his car. There’s ice underneath everything. Quite a snowfall, I’d say.”
“What kind of trouble can anybody find in a snowstorm? Isn’t everything closed for the night?”
“I mentioned that there was always a darts game across the way in Peter Miller’s barber shop. Your friend said he’d check it out.” Miss Sugar smiled. “Of course, there’s also a beer to be found.”
Emma was surprised that Santana would leave Sierra to play darts. “I think I’ll check on Nick.”
“Oh, I’ve been keeping an eye on him. Every now and again, he switches on the car. Probably to charge his phone.” Miss Sugar went in the kitchen, returning with a Styrofoam cup of coffee and a plastic baggie with cookies in it. “Don’t fall down out there. I don’t want to be sued for the limb you’d no doubt break in this weather. Tell him breakfast is at seven a.m. sharp.”
“I will. Thank you.” She took the food and went outside, heading to the driver’s side. As she’d suspected, the window was iced up. After a few shoves, Nick managed to get the door open. He took the coffee gratefully, and the cookie bag.
“Thanks.”
“No problem. Where’s Santana?”
“I’m not my cousin’s keeper.”
She glanced across at Peter Miller’s. “I’m going to join you for a minute.”
“Good luck getting the door open.”
“I work with large animals. I’ll see if I’ve got brute strength enough to crack it open. I hate to see you suffering out here alone.”
She went around to the passenger side, relieved to find that door not as caked with ice. She got in, not surprised that Nick had his car charger plugged in.
“Getting a lot of work done?”
“Surprisingly, yes. California’s two hours behind, so that helps. And London is several hours ahead. Life’s good, despite the storm.”
“And the lack of wheels.”
“Now that part sucks.” Nick drank his coffee. “I think Santana went to see if the locals know anything about tire thieves around here.”
She stiffened. “He didn’t go to play darts?”
“Well, he might do that. But his parting words to me were I’m going to check out the local grapevine and experts on wheel removal.”
Emma didn’t like the sound of that. “Miss Sugar says the thieves come from the city.”
“Santana said Miss Sugar might be covering her ass.”
Emma considered it. “It’s possible.”
“Sure. No one wants to taint their town. It’s bad for business. And civic pride is important in small towns, anyway. How’s Sierra?”
“She seems much better. Miraculously cured.” Emma wouldn’t have believed it if she hadn’t seen it.
“That was smoke and mirrors for your benefit. Whatever was bugging Sierra disappeared just as fast as it came,” Nick scoffed. “Her cure had nothing to do with that bottle of water she drank.”
That was probably true. “I think I’ll go check on him.”
Nick glanced at her. “I doubt he’d approve.”
“Why?”
“Because he just wouldn’t. You know that. Santana doesn’t even like me sitting in this car. That’s why he’s appointed himself guardian of the misfits.”
“Misfits?”
Nick shrugged. “You think he’s happy about being stuck in a small town in a snowstorm with a man who took over his home and his livelihood, his somewhat rebellious little sister, and his veterinarian girlfriend? With missing wheels and a too-friendly B&B owner, and a vintage—putting it kindly—wedding gown in the backseat? This is a Navy SEAL nightmare.”
“For the record, I’m not the girlfriend.” She got out of the car. “Don’t freeze to death.”
Nick shrugged. “I’m learning survival skills, and Miss Sugar assures me that these are wool blankets. She swears I’ll be warm as toast.”
She got out of the car. “Glad to hear it.”
“Emma.”
“Yes?” She leaned down to look in the car at him.
“Just go back inside. Santana will yell my ear off if he finds out you left.”
“I’ll be back in five minutes. Tops.”
He tapped his Rolex. “Don’t make me get out of these blankets to come after you.”
Emma smiled. “You won’t have to.”
She closed the door and carefully negotiated her way across the street. The shop was dark inside, but when she pushed the door, it swung open, a bell tinkling on the handle. “Hello?”
Raucous laughter and the sounds of male camaraderie erupted from somewhere in the back of the barber shop. She went in the direction of the noise and found a door marked Employees Only.
Maybe twenty men were inside, engrossed in a soccer game on a huge TV, neglecting the six dart boards on an opposite wall. In the thick of the scrum was Santana, leaning against a bar, staring at the screen, drinking a beer. A goal was scored, a yell went up, and high fives were passed all around.
Emma quietly crept out, relieved that he was having a good time. Very likely for the first time since he’d returned home, he’d found a place where he could relax and unwind from deployment, from everything that had happened since he’d come back.
She rapped on the window as she went by Nick’s car and opened the door. “You’re missing a great time over there.”
He looked surprised. “At this time of night, in this town?”
“Don’t be such a snob. Go have a beer. They’ve got a big screen TV that would probably impress even you.”
Emma smiled and shut the door. “Goodnight, Miss Sugar,” she called, and Miss Sugar’s head popped around the corner from the kitchen.
“Good night! Seven a.m. sharp, earlier if you’d like! Tell your crew!”
She’d forgotten to mention it to Nick, and Santana didn’t care about breakfast right now. There was time for that later. She went down the hall and out the door that separated the establishments, crossing the small stone pathway. Inside the bungalow, she listened at Sierra’s door.
Hearing nothing, Emma went into her room, took a fast shower in the cramped but clean bathroom, and hopped in bed, grateful for the clean sheets and the wool blanket on the bed.
Miss Sugar was right: her blankets were warm as toast.
• • •
Emma was just about to fall asleep—her eyelids were so heavy she was two seconds from the best sleep she’d had in years—no dogs, no pets to worry about, this was like being on vacation—when she heard her bedroom door open.
She froze, her eyes snapping open. She was positive she’d locked the door. “Who’s there?”
The door closed. Emma blinked. Maybe she’d heard the door across the hall opening. But there’d been a slight shaft of light peeking through the darkness for just a second before the door shut.
She squealed as something large fell across her bed.
Chapter Eleven
“Sorry,” Santana said. “That wasn’t the most romantic entrance I’ve ever made.”
She sat up, relieved. “What are you doing?”
“Checking on you.”
“Did you hurt yourself? What did you just trip over?”
“I think your boots. Or my own big feet.”
Emma smiled in the darkness. “Are you under the influence?”
He snorted. “Not from three beers.”
“I wasn’t expecting company.”
“Obviously, considering you left a booby trap between the bed and the door for me to kill myself on. And yet, I should be used to evading dogs and cats and parakeets.�
�
“Lovebirds. My beautiful birds are lovebirds.” She heard boots thudding to the floor. “Again, why are you in my room?” Emma asked.
“You checked on me over at the local excuse for male entertainment. Thought you might need me.”
“No, you didn’t. You thought I was spying. Probably sent by your sister, that’s what you thought.”
He crawled into bed, flopping onto the pillow, sighing with what sounded like exhaustion. She realized he’d probably been up since four a.m. with the cattle at the ranch, before he’d decided to drive Nick to the airport.
Before their adventure had ever begun.
“All right, I didn’t think you needed me. But I was pretty sure I needed you.”
A warm glow started inside her. “Is Nick still outside?”
“Do you really think that money-obsessed carpetbagger is going to let anything else happen to his beloved heap?”
She smiled in the darkness. “Now that you put it that way, I guess not.”
“That’s right. If I’ve learned anything about my unexpected cousin-on-paper-only, it’s that he respects money more than anything else in the world.”
“I don’t think he’s all that mercenary.”
“Don’t rob me of my delusions. I need them.”
“Oh.” It was important to keep separation between he and Nick so he wouldn’t resent him. As long as Santana was the employee, and Nick the employer, Santana didn’t have to think: He could just work. For however long that relationship remained beneficial.
It was good for both of them.
“So who won the game?”
“I have no idea.” He sighed, sounding sleepy. “I went looking for information, and found a whole world I never knew existed. Back room bar and shenanigans. My brothers would love that place.”
“You miss them, don’t you?”
“I miss our family—the way it was. Yeah. I miss what we were. Before.”
Emma leaned against the pillow, tucking the sheet under her arms. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s nobody’s fault. Except maybe dad’s. But what the hell. Gambling’s a terrible addiction, and I’m glad he was able to break it, at least to some extent.” He sighed again, deeply.
Emma thought it best to change the subject. “When does Nick think they can bring him new wheels and tires?”
“The boys across the way think they’ve got a set of wheels they can temporarily put on, at least so a tow truck can load him up and take his precious hunk of junk to the city for extra-special treatment at whatever fairy tale store is required for rich folks and their expensive rides. How’s Sierra?”
“Last I saw, much improved.” Emma’s brows furrowed. “It was so weird how that fever hit her. My guess is that it was around one hundred two.”
“She was definitely ill.” He was quiet for a minute. “She’s not herself anymore. The truth is, she’s been acting strange ever since we found out about our father.”
Emma thought about Miss Sugar’s astonishing gossip. “She doesn’t talk about it much.” Actually, Sierra was more quiet than her brothers about her grief. “I’d like to say that Sierra is just being quiet, but in some ways, she was the wild one of your family, I’d have to admit. I get why you’re worried, but maybe it’ll pass in time, Santana.”
“It’s the tattoos and the hair that worry me. She was never really a renegade.”
“I wouldn’t take those things necessarily as the mark of a renegade. You have a tattoo.” He had a pretty spectacular lightning strike on his upper back, right shoulder.
“It’s the piercings and everything else.” Santana shifted on the bed. “It’s the wedding dress store, too.”
“Why is that cause for alarm?”
“It just worries me how fast she jumped into an arrangement with Nick.”
“You did.”
“Yeah. But this magic wedding dress business is crazy. Sierra knows nothing about owning a store, nothing about retail. I don’t like any of it. But there’s not much I can do about it.”
“She has to give it a shot. If it doesn’t work out, she’ll go to work at the fire station,” she reminded him.
“Over my cold, dead body.”
Santana went silent for a moment, then she felt his big frame leave the bed. By the sudden tugging, she could tell he was pulling his boots back on. “Where are you going?”
“You need your rest. I’ll see you in the morning. Miss Sugar says seven a.m. sharp for breakfast, or we go hungry. Goodnight, Emma.”
He left, closing the door quietly behind him, and Emma knew sleep was going to be impossible now that he’d left her without even a kiss.
• • •
Nick started when the passenger-side door opened again. When had his car become the local hangout?
Sierra got in, slamming his door with a bit more force than a car this expensive required. “Careful,” he chided.
“This is just a car,” Sierra glared at him. “Nothing special. It’s metal and glass and some really nice leather seats.” She reclined her chair.
Nick wasn’t certain how he felt about that. He already had a wedding dress taking up space in the back, where technically he could at least lie down if he moved the damn thing. He was probably more comfortable up here, though. “Do you have a point?”
“Yes. It’s that you shouldn’t worship things so much that you freeze your balls off.”
“Says the woman with an ancient, moth-eaten gown in my back seat.” What had happened to him? The bachelor lifestyle was one he’d savored, enjoying it to the fullest.
Until everything had changed.
Damn Dad, anyway. Why did you have to leave me with these five responsibilities?
Of course the Darks weren’t his responsibility, technically. He could just walk away.
“It’s not moth-eaten!” Sierra shot him yet another glare, which would probably look really menacing on anyone but her. She had the cutest pixie face and expressive eyes, and darling full lips.
She also had face jewelry and wild hair that looked like she’d stuck a finger in a socket. And a sassy mouth.
He shifted in the seat, thinking he was in no danger at all of his balls being frozen. Something about Sierra had the strangest ability to heat him right up, to an uncomfortable degree.
“This dress is a piece of history of a bygone era,” Sierra told him.
“Are we opening a museum or a dress shop?”
“I am opening a place where dreams come true.”
“And I’m financing this.”
“Yes, out of the corner of your Scrooge-like heart that has some desire for excitement and human contact left in it. Give me a corner of that blanket.”
He tossed half of both of the blankets over her, feeling weirdly like two kids making a fort out of the family linen. It was an experience he’d never had, lacking siblings. Nick glanced at his uninvited guest, noting Sierra’s eyes were closed, her hands fisted in the blankets, holding them close to her chin.
“You shouldn’t be out here,” he said gruffly. “You just got over a fever. We hope.”
“Miss Sugar’s spoonful of sugar worked. I’m fine.”
“You’re not that susceptible.”
“Look. For years all we had out in Star Canyon was a D.O. We lived on home remedies. Not everybody needs to run to a fancy doctor with a prescription pad every time they fart.”
“Are you suggesting I do?”
“Fart?” She shrugged. “Everybody does. Except I forget, you’re not Mr. Everybody. You’re special.”
He sighed. “Why are you out here, heating up the inside of my car?”
“Because you need company. Being lonely is boring.”
“You think I’m boring?”
She rolled her head to look at him. “Don’t you think you’re boring?”
It just so happened that he did, but he wasn’t going to admit it. “So you came out here to tell me I’m a selfish stiff who’s so Ebenezer Scrooge I won’t ge
t out of my costly chariot, and if I so much as sneeze, I’d feel the need to dial up my premium physician for an instant consultation.”
“Sorry,” she said, “it was too much to dump on you at once, wasn’t it? And anyway, that’s not why I’m here. But I’m crabby, so try to overlook it.”
“Thank you,” he said mildly.
“You can sleep in my room with me,” Sierra said.
“I…beg your pardon?” Nick was dumbfounded.
“There’s no reason to be out in this Arctic tomb. You can sleep in bed with me. I promise not to touch you.”
She sounded as if that was the last thing she’d ever want to do, akin to handling a large snake.
“I think Miss Sugar would be offended.”
“Miss Sugar may have to deal with it.”
He considered Sierra’s pointed look. She definitely meant what she was saying. “This is a trap, right?”
“What?” She raised a brow. “You mean the kind of trap where I invite you to sleep in my room, then claim I’m having your baby? Don’t be stupid. My brothers would kill you if they even thought you touched me.”
“Do they do that often?”
“Threaten suitors?” Sierra laughed. “My brothers are well understood in Star Canyon. They don’t have to threaten anyone. You, they’d kill.”
He straightened. “So you’re inviting me to walk into a dangerous situation.”
“Thrilling, isn’t it?”
“Not really.” He burrowed down further in his seat. “I prefer females who are less encumbered by marauding brothers.”
“Yeah, well. You and every other man.” She sighed. “I was hoping you were different.”
He looked at her. “Why?”
“Men with courage are hard to find.”
“Courage? Dealing with homicidal cousins would make me a courageous figure to you?”
“We’re not really cousins, you know.”
“It might be better if we were.”
“That’s…weird, even coming from the world’s biggest pinhead.”
She didn’t understand that filial distance was a good thing. How could he want to kiss Sierra as much as he did?