by Jade Kerrion
He looked down. Felicity had knelt to fluff out her newest floral arrangement—sprays of delicate ferns surrounding scarcely open white tulips. She pushed to her feet, her lips pressed together, but a dimple danced in her cheek. “You did say to ring the doorbell.”
“So I did.” He stared at her. She looked fresh and pretty in a white turtleneck and a flowing dark blue skirt. Her hair was loose in a casual and unpretentious style. She smelled like intoxicating flowers, the scent lingering on the edge of his awareness, drawing him in. Cody, on the other hand, felt grungy. He hadn’t even showered after coming in from his overnight shift. He looked over his shoulder, assessed the state of his apartment, and asked, “Do you want to come in? Breakfast?”
Her smile turned hesitant. “It’s closer to lunch, but sure.”
He let her into his place, and for the next few moments, they stood staring awkwardly at each other in the tiny foyer. “I…uh…give me five minutes to wake up properly, and I’ll get lunch started. You can…” He gestured in the direction of the living room.
“Sure.”
He went to the bathroom, brushed his teeth, and splashed water on his face. Did he have time to shower? He sniffed under his arm and decided he would take the time. Ten minutes later, considerably awake, he walked into the living room to find Felicity browsing through the books on his shelves. “Are you thinking I need a librarian too?” he joked.
“A bit of organization never hurt anyone.” She smiled. “You read a lot of non-fiction. I never took you for a military history buff. It just seemed too…structured…for someone like you.”
“Hey, I don’t object to someone else’s structure as long as it doesn’t apply to me.”
“Cute.”
He grinned. “I’ve always had a way with words. Are you hungry?”
“I wouldn’t mind a bite.”
“Come on. I’ll feed you.” He scanned his refrigerator and pantry. “How about croissants with spinach, prosciutto, and cilantro-lime shrimp? And you’re a tea drinker, right?”
“Yes, and it sounds good.”
She sat at the table in the kitchen as he prepared the croissant sandwiches and boiled water for the tea.
Cody peered over his shoulder. Felicity was staring out the window, her expression pensive.
“What are you thinking?” he asked.
“About the last time I was here. You probably don’t even remember it but—”
“It was after Darrell’s funeral. You came to collect his stuff. You took the basket of flowers you’d given him.”
Felicity’s eyebrows arched. “Yes, I did.”
He returned to the table and set two plates down before sitting across from her. “The tea will need another minute or so to steep.”
“I didn’t think you would notice.”
“That you’d taken the basket? I might not have, but you didn’t take much with you.”
“I wouldn’t have known what to do with his clothes or his medical textbooks. What did you do with them?”
“Took them to Salvation Army.”
She nodded and took a bite of the sandwich. Her eyes widened. “This is really good. Quite an explosion of flavors.”
“Glad you like it.” He pushed to his feet and brought her tea and his coffee back to the table.
For a few minutes, they ate in companionable silence. She finally broke it with, “So, how are you doing here on your own?”
Cody stared at her, startled by the question and even more so by the concern in her voice.
He looked around his familiar apartment. There was evidence of Darrell’s presence—including the Carnival-themed dinner plates he and Felicity were using; Darrell had purchased them on a trip to Rio de Janeiro—but much of it was so deeply integrated into Cody’s daily life that the reminders no longer stung. “It was rough at first. Too quiet. But I got over that patch. It’s better now.”
“Good.” She smiled and changed the topic. “Tell me about Evergreen.”
So he told her about the quaint town square and the mountains that loomed over Evergreen, the hiking trails that led to stunning vistas, and the occasional directionally challenged mountain goat that found its way into town and managed to stand at the town’s only four-way intersection. “Created a traffic jam three blocks long,” he said with a laugh.
Felicity chuckled. “And then Animal Control came by?”
“No, I grabbed a broom and herded it back toward the mountain.”
“You did what?”
Cody grinned. “You should have seen the horns on that thing. Nasty curved things, at least two feet long if you stretched them out. No way I was going to say ‘Shoo, Billy Goat,’ without having some protection between me and that goat.”
“But a broom?” Felicity burst into laughter.
“Long, pointy. In medieval times, it might have passed for a spear. Good enough.” He faked indignation. “Hey, it worked, okay?”
“And it has done wonders for your image.”
Cody’s grin widened. He could not recall the last time he had seen Felicity smile and laugh as if she were at ease around him. His bad boy image was a small price to pay for a fresh start in his friendship with her.
He saw her to the door after a leisurely lunch. “Come back next week?” he asked as she walked down the pathway.
She stepped into a turn so that she faced him once more. Her gray eyes looked thoughtful, but she wore a faint smile. “I think I will.” Her smile widened into a grin before she spun around. Her long, blond hair swished around her shoulders as she walked away.
~*~
The next Sunday, when Felicity visited, Cody took her on a drive through the mountain passes. “I think late summer, early fall, is the best time to visit,” he said. “Darrell liked it in winter, when everything was washed in white, but I prefer it green—plus there are fewer bad accidents in the mountains in summer.”
Felicity stared out the window at the scenery rushing by. “It is pretty,” she agreed. Her voice trailed briefly into silence. “When you say ‘bad accidents,’ how bad? Like an avalanche?”
Cody inhaled. He knew Felicity enough to tread carefully. The last thing he wanted to do was to freak her out or seal her impression of him as an adrenaline junkie. “An avalanche would be pretty bad, but we haven’t had one out here in a while. Usually, ‘bad’ is hikers getting lost because they’ve strayed off the path, or don’t know how to read a map and compass and find their way back. Finding them in summer is not exactly a walk in the park, but winter’s tougher. Time’s an even greater enemy.”
Felicity nodded. “I guess you know the trails around here pretty well.”
“We work them everyday. When I’m on the day shift, we usually take drives out here to help the park rangers keep hikers safe. It’s always better to keep them from trouble than to rescue them later.”
Felicity chuckled. “That is definitely not what I expected to hear from you. Sometimes I wonder if I know you at all.”
“I don’t think we ever really had a chance to know each other, even though I lived in your house for four years.”
“Fourteen to eighteen weren’t necessarily my best years,” Felicity said with a laugh. “Oh, God. Teenage angst—when your problems seem bigger than everyone else’s, and even the world’s. It’s a wonder most of us turn out to be well-adjusted adults in spite of being teenagers once.”
He did not want her to change the topic. “Most days, we didn’t talk. Some days, I don’t even think we saw each other.” Cody slowed the Jeep and glanced at her. “I’m glad we’ve got the chance now.”
The smile she returned was hesitant.
Careful, don’t push too hard, Cody coached himself. He pointed at a hill. “Darrell and I went camping one weekend. There’s a great stream that passes through that valley, and we hit it in bass season.”
“Catch anything?”
“Darrell did. Do you like camping?”
“Never really tried. I’m a big fan of attached b
athrooms and central air-conditioning.” Felicity’s smile was wry. “My favorite kind of hiking trail is paved with asphalt.”
Cody looked at her aghast and clutched his heart.
Felicity laughed. “I’m really kind of out of my element here. All this big space around me makes me nervous.”
“Really?” Cody looked around. “Nothing better, I should think. Endless horizons in every direction. Limitless choice.”
“But which way will you go?” she asked. “It would be easy to be crippled by indecision here. Sometimes, I think fewer choices help people make better decisions.”
Cody shook his head. He definitely needed reminders that he and Felicity had life philosophies poles apart. There was a limit to what physical attraction and even love could work through.
Love?
Had he really thought of love in conjunction with Felicity? Frowning, he yanked his thoughts away from mountain views and private little valleys. He tore his mind away from love as he turned to grin at her. “You just need more practice in decision making. I’ve got the perfect place for that.”
~*~
Cody parked his Jeep in front of an ice cream parlor in downtown Evergreen.
Felicity peered through the window at the sign in front of the shop. “One hundred flavors?”
“Yeah, and they’ll let you sample as much as you want.”
“Heaven help me.” Felicity rolled her eyes, but stepped out of the car and followed him into the store. Their hands brushed as they squeezed past a family of five coming out of the store. The brief touch, ironically, made Cody want more of this beautiful, gray-eyed woman who had poise, grace, and was nothing like him. He stood back as Felicity peered at the extensive ice cream display with her habitual seriousness. Fingers interlaced behind her back, she looked like a demure Catholic schoolgirl contemplating lunch options in the cafeteria. She straightened and glanced sideways at him. Her arch look immediately dispelled the Catholic schoolgirl-illusion. She looked at the teenager behind the counter. “I’d like a small cone, please. One scoop of strawberry.”
Cody’s eyes widened. “But you didn’t even ask for samples of anything.”
She matched his wide-eyed expression. “But I always get strawberry.”
Cody flung his arms into the air. “Women.”
He got a large cone, piled on four flavors, and joined Felicity on the wooden bench outside the store. The wind was brisk; summer was winding down, and the fall promised several more months of cool temperatures before the onset of winter.
Felicity licked her cone. “We’re running out of ice cream eating season.”
Cody blinked. She had mirrored his thoughts, yet again. “Yeah,” he said, to cover his confusion. “Do you want to try mine?” He held out his gargantuan cone.
She gave it a skeptical look. “When I think of complementary flavors, lime sorbet and hazelnut crème do not come to mind. Did you even think about how the flavors might blend, or—in your case—not blend?”
He waved her concerns away. “Blending is for the weak.”
“And the tasteful.”
Cody laughed. His Catholic schoolgirl had a sharp sense of humor. “Your loss,” he said before licking his cone.
A female voice called out, “Cody!”
He looked up and saw a young woman walk briskly toward him. She looked vaguely familiar, but he could not quite place her. She stopped in front of him, cast Felicity a confused and cautious look, and then looked back at Cody. “Do you remember me? You saved me about a month ago.”
He must have looked blank, because she added, “Off the ledge, at night.”
“Oh!” He searched his memory for a name. “Judy?”
Her face fell. “Joni.”
“Joni. Hi, yeah, it’s good to see you again.”
She gave Felicity another quick look, but Felicity was focused on eating her ice cream as if her life depended on it. Joni looked back at Cody. “I called and left a message about getting drinks, but um…I guess you might not have gotten the message.”
“Message…?” Damn, he did recall a message, but it had come in around the same time as Felicity’s job crisis in New York and subsequent relocation to Boulder. He had heard Joni’s voicemail, planned to respond later, and then forgotten about it entirely. “I’m sorry. I meant to but things just crept up on me.”
“Okay.” Another anxious look at Felicity. “Maybe we could get drinks another day?”
“I, uh…” He, too, glanced at Felicity, who appeared as innocent as an angel. “Not sure that’s a good idea.”
Joni’s mouth turned down, but she nodded. “That’s fine. I totally understand.” She took a step back, waved, and left as quickly as she had showed up.
Cody gazed at Felicity and spoke, his voice bland. “If you stare at that ice cream cone any harder, your eyes might cross.”
Felicity’s lips twitched moments before her smile flashed, bright and full. It dazzled him and made his breath catch. Her apology did not sound the least bit apologetic. “I didn’t mean to cramp your style.”
But I want you to cramp my style. Cody bit the words back. It was too early. Felicity was not ready to hear that kind of talk from him. Hell, she had barely gotten over thinking of him as the guy who had killed her brother. She needed more time, and he intended to give her as much time as she needed. It struck him as singularly ironic that he had finally learned patience, just in time to win the heart of woman he had admired since she was a girl of fourteen. He stared at her over his ice cream cone. Felicity’s gaze darted away before flicking back to him. A half-smile tugged at her lips. Their knees bumped.
He blurted out the question before he could stop himself. “Are you dating my brother?”
Felicity looked thoughtful. “No,” she said simply. She said nothing else, but surely she must have known, as he did, that everything between them changed in that moment.
Cody grinned. There’s a God in heaven.
~*~
The sun was setting when Cody finally walked Felicity back to her car after a day of exploring Evergreen together. “Thanks for coming down.”
“Sure,” she said. She slid into the driver’s seat and looked up at him. “Make sure you water the flowers.”
“I will. Drive safe. Text me when you’re home.”
A frown flicked over her face, but it vanished quickly. “I never took you for the worrying type.”
“I just needed to find the right person to worry over.” He leaned down and brushed a quick kiss on her cheek before she could pull away. Keep it casual, he coached himself. He stepped back and closed the car door for her. He did not look away until her car turned the corner. “Yes!” A broad grin split his face. His life was sizzling again, and he knew exactly why.
CHAPTER NINE
Months passed. The leaves flashed briefly into dazzling autumn colors before fading and falling from the trees to carpet the ground in rot. In contrast, Felicity and Cody’s relationship strengthened slowly. Felicity refused to rush it, and Cody, she thought, likely understood and felt the same way. They needed to fill the Darrell-sized gap between them with friendship before they could progress any further.
He changed his work schedule to accommodate her Sunday visits and took her on long drives and short hikes in Evergreen. Sometimes, they met in Denver to revisit their old haunts. She took him to concerts and bookstores; he took her to parks; they often compromised by going to restaurants.
They were strolling through Washington Park on a brisk day in mid-December, her arm looped through his when she finally broached the topic. “I need a date.”
He arched his eyebrows. “You are on a date. A cheap date, admittedly, but a date nonetheless.”
She laughed and clarified, “I need a date for a high-brow event. Gowns, suits, tuxedos. That kind of thing. Are you up for it?”
“I have a suit; might as well get some mileage out of it. What’s the event for?”
“It’s next Saturday in Boulder. It’s your p
arents’ twenty-fifth wedding anniversary.”
His shoulders tensed and hunched subtly—a defensive motion. “I don’t think—”
“Are you afraid? Is Evergreen’s Alpine Rescue hero afraid of a black-tie dinner?”
“Where is it?”
“At the house.”
A muscle twitched in his smooth cheek.
He was afraid. Felicity frowned. “Won’t you tell me what the problem is? Why did you run away, and why won’t you go home now?”
“You wouldn’t understand.” The shake of his head was sharp and dismissive.
“Not if you don’t tell me.”
“There’s nothing to tell.”
She rolled her eyes. “How about you let me be the judge of that?”
“If I say yes to the dinner, will you stop pestering me about the past and things that can’t be changed?”
“Those two things aren’t related.”
He stopped and stared at her. “Aren’t they?”
Her breath caught. She recognized that look on his face; she had seen it on him in the very same park some twelve years earlier—the expression of a teenage runaway trapped between two equally wretched options.
At that time, Darrell had offered a third option—friendship. Now, Felicity extended the same. How could she not? If there was anyone she owed more to, she could not think of it just then. Cody had given her not just a fresh start, but also his family, even though he still stood out in the cold, alone.
If that wasn’t love, then nothing was.
He loves me. The thought was like a flame nestled next to her heart, igniting little sparkles that danced into her fingertips and toes. Everything seemed brighter, clearer, when viewed through the certainty that she was loved. She stared at him, lips pursed. If only she could share the warmth and the light with him, and chase away the cold darkness that cast a shadow over him each time he thought of his family.
With a smile, she tugged him toward a bench. He slouched down and stared out into the distance. He looked grim, and worse, sad and alone, as if there was a part of him she could not reach. She leaned against him, and he absentmindedly slipped an arm around her waist, tugging her close to him. She could hear the steady thump of his heartbeat, and feel his chest rise and fall with every breath that bordered on a sigh.