by Robyn Carr
“Four eggs, side of bacon, side of sausage, hash browns, biscuits and gravy, wheat toast, orange juice and coffee till you float,” she finished for him.
He smiled at Patti and it was most definitely a smile. If I were Patti, Marcie thought, I’d think he wanted to ask me out on a date. But all Patti said was, “Gotcha, Bub.”
By her first refill of coffee, Marcie started to get right with the world. Nothing straightened her out like caffeine, she thought. Hot coffee, not that stuff Ian left warming on the woodstove when he went to sell wood in the mornings. And this was good and strong. She came around. “So, are you and Patti friends?” she asked.
“Patti’s my waitress about once every two months,” he said. “She does a good job.”
“Why didn’t you sing in church?” she asked boldly.
He put down his cup. “I didn’t want to.”
“Why?”
“Look, don’t make me act all conceited. I was in choir in high school. I was in our high school musical—we did Grease. I have an okay voice. I don’t want to join the choir.”
“Who were you in Grease?”
“It’s not important.”
“Who?”
His hand went over his mouth and he mumbled something.
“Who?” she asked, leaning closer.
His eyes came up. “Danny.”
“You were the star! You were frickin’ John Travolta, except you sing better!”
His eyes shifted around nervously. “You just got a little loud there.”
“Sorry,” she said. “Sorry. But really…Have you ever studied music?”
“I studied military strategy. I thought you knew that.”
“Okay, sorry, brushing up against that forbidden territory. But Jesus, you sing like a god! Wouldn’t that be something you’d think about pursuing?”
He was quiet for a long moment and finally said, “I sing for myself. It’s nice. It passes time. You’re not going to save me, Marcie. You’re not going to pull me out of the hills and turn me in to a rock star.”
She was speechless. For a split second, that was exactly what she’d had in mind. Not a rock star, exactly, but a famous singer at least. “Well, it’s just a stupid crime that you don’t even have a radio,” she said churlishly. “No matter where you live, you should have music around you.”
And he laughed.
Their plates arrived, along with a check that Ian snapped up. She just stared at his huge breakfast with wide, startled eyes.
“Now what?” he asked.
“Holy smokes, do they see you pull into the parking lot and fire up the grill? That didn’t take five minutes!”
He curved his lips into a smile for her. “I like that they’re efficient. They work, they get the job done.”
“Yeah,” she said. “Um—let me split the check. I have money.”
“I know. Eighty dollars.” He dug into his eggs.
“Really, I’d like to pay my share,” she said.
He lifted a sausage patty off his plate and slid it onto hers. “Forget it, I’ve got it. Try this, it’s the best sausage patty you’ll ever taste.”
“You obviously need a lot of fuel to do what you do,” she commented. Then she tasted the patty. “Hmm, right. You’re so right.”
He plunged his fork into the large biscuit and gravy and held it out to her. “Here. This is even better.”
For a second she was still. He was feeding her right off his fork? Then before the mood could drift away, she leaned toward that fork and sampled the biscuit and gravy. She hummed in agreement, let her eyes drop closed in appreciation and when she opened them, he was smiling happily. There was something so intimate, so generous about that simple gesture, it touched her heart.
“I knew you’d like it. I can never finish everything. Help yourself.”
“Thank you, Ian,” she said quietly.
When they pulled into the Eureka Public Library, she asked, “Can we browse a little? Or are we in a hurry?”
“How are you feeling? You coughed some.”
“I feel so much better doing something. I’d like to pick up a couple of books to keep me busy while you sell firewood. And I’m not sure what I want.”
“Take your time. I like to read the papers,” he said.
And she did take her time, luxuriously. Roaming the stacks, picking up novels with pretty covers, reading the cover copy and then the first page, having a real hard time choosing. She sat on the floor in the crowded aisles, so happy to be in the midst of entertainment again. She’d been reading classics to Bobby, more for herself than him, but her own tastes ran to newer romances. Deep, emotional romances with happy endings. Where things worked out. Whatever book she chose would have to be the right one; it was the only diversion she had. She had no idea how much time had passed when he said, “You just about ready?”
“Oh! Sure. Can I please have these three?”
“You think you’ll read that many before you leave?”
She just smiled at him. “Yes,” she said, knowing that was half an answer. Or less.
While Ian was checking out the books and then waiting by the door, Marcie was chatting it up with one of the librarians. They started off talking softly but very soon they were laughing, touching each other’s arms as they whispered close. He cleared his throat once and both women looked at him. He treated them to a glower, then they just resumed their conversation, interspersed with soft laughter. It looked as though they’d become best friends in just a short time.
Finally Marcie tore herself away from a hug and followed Ian to the truck. When they were inside, he was sulky. “You weren’t going to get all involved. Hook up with people. All that.”
“I didn’t,” she said.
“Well, that looked pretty cozy, back there. I told you—you’re the kind of person people want to get to know, talk to—”
“Don’t worry, Ian. I totally protected your anonymity. I told her you were my brother.”
“Great,” he pouted. “Now she’s going to ask me about you. And I told you—I’m friendly and pleasant and then I move on.”
“You can do that. She’ll find it perfectly understandable.”
“Oh? And why’s that?”
“Well, she wondered about you. Said you ask for some heavy reading sometimes, but that you didn’t make much conversation.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yes,” Marcie explained. “I said you were brilliant, but not a very social animal. I said she shouldn’t expect a lot of chitchat from you, but you were perfectly nice, and there was no reason to be shy around you—you’re safer than you look.”
“Is that so? And how did you convince her of that?”
“Easy. I said you were an idiot savant—brilliant in literature and many other things, but socially you weren’t on your game.”
“Oh, Jesus Christ!”
She noted the late-afternoon sky, the sun beginning to lower. “Ian, when was the last time you went out for a beer?”
“Been a while,” he grumbled miserably.
“I’d so love to see that Christmas tree in Virgin River at night. Could we pass through there for a beer? By the time we’ve had a beer, it might be dark. I should try calling my sister again before she comes hunting me down—and there’s that nice little bar there, with a phone I can use.”
“Aw, Marcie…”
“Come on. It’s been such a perfect day. Let’s end it on a positive note. Let me buy you a beer and maybe some of Preacher’s dinner—he cooks like a dream.”
“Preacher?”
“The cook in that little bar.”
“I don’t really like big crowds.”
She laughed at him. “Ian, if the whole town turns out, there will be fewer people there than in that truck stop or in the church. Besides, you told me that you’re around people all the time, you’re just not a joiner. So come on. Man up.”
It was barely five o’clock when Marcie and Ian entered Jack’s bar, and there were
about twenty people there. Ian stood by the door and surveyed the new surroundings warily. He noted hunting and fishing trophies on the walls, the dim lighting, the welcoming fire. It didn’t look threatening. While there were a couple of tables of people engaged in friendly conversation and laughter, there were also a couple of solitary men having a drink or a meal apart from the crowd. One he recognized as the old doctor, seated up at the bar and hovering over a drink, left entirely alone.
Marcie went right up to the bar, leaning on it, talking with the bartender. Ian spied an empty spot at the far end of the bar in the corner where he thought he’d be comfortable. He approached Marcie’s back, meaning to steer her there. As if she felt him come near, she turned and said, “Ian, meet Jack Sheridan. Jack, Ian.”
“Pleasure,” Jack said. “What can I get you?”
“Beer?”
“Bottle or tap?”
“Whatever’s on tap,” Ian said.
Jack drew the beer and said to Marcie, “Help yourself to the phone, Marcie. Preacher’s back there.” Then, she skipped away and Jack put the beer in front of Ian.
Ian picked it up and migrated down to the corner of the bar he’d staked out. Then he watched with interest for several moments as Jack made a few drinks, polished some glasses, exchanged friendly banter with a couple of customers, arranged some bottles, took a tub of dirty glasses to the kitchen, and seemed to completely ignore Ian, the old doctor, and the other lone drinker at the opposite end of the bar. It was probably ten minutes—Marcie must be having a very interesting conversation with her sister. How is she explaining me? he wondered to himself.
“How’s that beer?” Jack asked, dishtowel in hand, eyeing the nearly empty glass.
“I’m good,” Ian said.
“Just let me know,” he said, turning away.
“Ah,” Ian said, getting his attention but not exactly calling him back.
Jack turned, lifted an eyebrow. Silent.
“She tell you to leave me alone?”
A small huff of laughter escaped Jack. “Pal, the first thing you learn when you open a bar—talk if they talk, shut up if they don’t.”
Ian tilted his head. Maybe he could stand this place once in a while. “She tried to explain me to the librarian in Eureka as an idiot savant.” Jack smiled and Ian felt an odd sensation—it was a funny story; he liked sharing a funny story. He used to make the guys laugh when he wasn’t making them work. “She tell you she was looking for me?”
“She did.”
For some reason unclear even to him, Ian did something he hadn’t done since finding himself in these mountains—he pushed on it a little bit. “She tell you anything about me?”
“Couple of things.”
“Like?”
“Like, you and me—we were in Fallujah about the same time.”
“Should’ve known. You have that jarhead look about you. Just so you’re clear—I don’t talk about that time.”
Jack smiled lazily. “Just so you’re clear, neither do I.”
“Hi, Erin,” Marcie said into the phone. “I’m just checking in.”
“Marcie, good God, where have you been?” she asked.
Marcie could just imagine Erin beginning to pace with the phone in her hand, something she did whenever she was stressed and not quite in control. “You know where I am. Right here, in Virgin River. I’m staying not far from here. Didn’t you get my messages? I talked to Drew and Mel Sheridan said she talked to you—”
“Some woman I’ve never heard of and don’t know called, yes,” she said. “She says you’re staying with him? You’re actually staying with him? Someplace without even a phone?”
Marcie sighed deeply. “Calm down—he doesn’t need a phone. He lives in a perfectly comfortable cabin on a ridge with an incredible view and he sort of…invited me to stay if I wanted to…”
“Sort of? If you wanted to? Marcie, what the hell’s going on?”
“I want you to listen to me, Erin. Listen and stop commanding. I found him, I want to get to know him, I want to understand him. Everything. I want to understand everything. And that takes time. And there’s no place I have to be right now.”
“This is making me nuts! My little sister, with some crazy stranger on an isolated mountain—”
“He is not crazy! He’s a good man! He’s been very generous with me! I’m completely safe, and there’s nothing about this to make you concerned. He goes to work every day and in the evenings when he’s back at the cabin, we talk a little bit. We’re just getting to know each other. Today we went to church and to the library. Stop hovering—you knew I was going to do this!”
“Let me talk to him,” Erin said. “Put him on the phone. I have a few questions.”
“No,” she said in a panicked gasp. “He can’t come to the phone—he’s out in the…the…restaurant. I’m an adult, and he doesn’t need your permission to invite me to stay in his cabin. You’re going to have to trust me!”
“It’s not trust and you know it—it’s him! I don’t know him, I only know that when you were up to your neck taking care of Bobby and Ian Buchanan was out of the Corps, he never even called to ask—”
“He saved Bobby’s life,” Marcie shot back. “He risked his life to save my husband. What more do I need to know? I want to thank him, I want to—”
“Saying thank you should take about five minutes,” Erin interrupted.
“I’m not talking about this anymore. I’ll call you in a few days—and work on calming down in the meantime. Erin, do not mess this up for me!” She disconnected the line with an angry poke of one finger.
And looked up into those dark, brooding eyes of Preacher’s. Beneath the scowl was a lift of his lips. “Well,” Preacher said. “That’s a new twist to the story. He saved your husband’s life? Hoorah.”
“I thought you knew,” she said.
“All I knew was you’re widowed,” he said. “How about this guy? He seem an okay guy?”
She took a breath. “Wild animals will eat out of his hand.”
“That a fact?” Preacher said. “I trust wild animals more than a lot of tame men. You should stay for dinner.”
“I was hoping to, but why?” she asked, thinking hard on the previous comment.
“It’s meat loaf night,” he said simply. “It’s the best ever.”
“Oh.”
“And it’s a special night. Mel, Jack’s wife, she found the perfect topper for that tree and now we can finally return the cherry picker. Half the town’s turning out for the lighting. Should’ve come a lot sooner, but we couldn’t do it until she was okay with the topper. The woman looked at every angel and sparkle-ball and star in three counties and rejected them all. But now she has it—so we’re going to fire it up. Next year, we’ll get it done earlier.”
“Cool.” Marcie smiled. “What time on the tree?”
He looked at his watch. “About an hour from now.”
Nine
M arcie joined Ian at the bar and sat up beside him. Jack was there instantly. “What can I get you?” he asked with a wipe of the bar in front of her.
“I think—I’d like a glass of wine. How about a nice merlot? And two meat loaf dinners. And whatever you do, do not let this guy get the check—I invited him, and it’s my treat. My turn. He’s been feeding me since I got here.”
“You bet,” Jack said.
Ian turned toward her. “I’m not sure about staying long…”
“If you have an anxiety attack, we can go. But if you can hang in there a little while, I bet the meat loaf will amaze you. This cook, Preacher? He’s unbelievable. I had some of his venison chili when I first got to town and it almost made me pass out, it was so good.”
His lips curved in a smile. “You ate venison, Marcie?”
“I didn’t have a relationship with the deer,” she explained.
“You don’t have a relationship with my deer either,” he pointed out.
“Yeah, but I have a relationship with you�
��you’ve seen me in my underwear. And you have a relationship with the deer. If you fed him to me, it would be like you shot and fed me your friend. Or something.”
Ian just drained his beer and smiled at her enough to show his teeth. “I wouldn’t shoot that particular buck,” he admitted. “But if I had a freezer, I’d shoot his brother.”
“There’s something off about that,” she said, just as Jack placed her wine in front of her. “Wouldn’t it be more logical if hunters didn’t get involved with their prey? Or their families? Oh, never mind—I can’t think about this before eating my meat loaf. Who knows who’s in it?”
Ian chuckled at her. “You’re right about one thing. Not a bad little bar here. I never checked it out before.”
“Toldja,” she said, sipping her wine. “What would you like to talk about?”
“We’ve talked all day. I haven’t talked this much in four years. I think I might be losing my voice.”
“I haven’t talked this little…”
“I kind of assumed that…”
Just then Jack delivered two steaming plates that he held with towels. He reached beneath the bar and produced a couple of sets of utensils wrapped in napkins and asked, “Another beer?”
“Why not?” Ian said in what was an unmistakably friendly voice. “The lady’s buying.” And then he put his napkin on his thigh.
Marcie stared at that thigh for a long moment. This was the sort of thing that had her confused. He looked a little crazy, till you got used to him. He could act as if he had needs barely above the animal kingdom, taking roughing it to the next level. When he was in his working clothes, he looked as if he barely subsisted. He could growl and snarl like a lunatic. But he had intelligent diction, good table manners, and while he might not be terribly social and on the quiet side, he had no trouble being around people. He was perfectly cordial.
She had expected a man completely screwed up by his past, by his war experiences, someone hard to reach and nearly impossible to change—a difficult situation, but easy to understand. Instead, what she found was someone pretty normal. It left her with many more questions than answers.