by Cara McKenna
“Here,” he said, and suddenly his big, warm man-paw was cupping her elbow, shooting panicky pleasure up her arm and neck.
“I’ll let you in on a little secret,” he went on, weaving her through the bodies to an open spot at the counter. “Pitcher,” he said to the female bartender.
“Glasses?”
“Two.” Vince dropped some bills on the wood and hefted the pitcher. He nodded to the proffered pint glasses, and Kim grabbed them, too swept up to protest.
“Thanks,” Kim said to the bartender, and got a thin smile in return. She followed Vince to the right, trying not to notice the shape of his shoulders shifting beneath his snug tee. The big room formed a sort of horseshoe around the bar, and they headed to one end. There was a picnic table in the back, and upon its bench a young couple was rounding third base. Considering how short the girl’s skirt was, it wasn’t a difficult feat.
Vince whistled. “Hey, Justin.”
The guy looked barely old enough to drink, and he sobered before Kim’s eyes, registering who was addressing him. “Oh, hey, Vince. What’s up?”
“Looks like somebody keyed your truck, man.”
“The fuck?” The kid was on his feet in half a breath, making a beeline for the door, girlfriend on his heels.
Vince pushed their empty glasses to the side and set the pitcher down. He gestured for Kim to grab the far bench.
She sat, shocked by how quiet this corner was. There weren’t any speakers nearby, and the way the drop ceiling came down above the bar dampened the acoustics. And when Vince took his seat across from her, that big body corralling her view of the crowd . . .
“Wow. This is surprisingly cozy.”
“Everyone calls this table the honeymoon suite,” he said, and filled both glasses. “Hence the consummation we just interrupted.”
“He’ll be pissed when he realizes his truck wasn’t keyed.”
“Funny, I figured he’d be relieved.” Vince’s lack of concern reminded Kim that a stick-thin twentysomething would need to have a death wish if he chose to take issue with this man’s scam.
Shrewd eyes took her in, their color lost in the bar’s low lighting. “This quiet enough for you?” His voice and gaze had grown mild, making her feel oddly calm. It was that, or the scotch she’d just pounded. The scotch, definitely the scotch.
“It’ll do, thank you. But I’ll probably only stay for the one glass. I’m wiped.”
“Beat from a long day documenting our scenic beauty in the name of corporate propaganda?”
“No, not today. You think I went tromping around the desert dressed like this?”
“No, I figured you wore that to look good for me.”
God help me. “Sorry to crush your hopes, but I went straight from the airport to the highway, to this long meeting with the marketing people. That’s why I’m overdressed. And exhausted.” That, plus a two-hour phone call spent dumping my boyfriend.
She hadn’t meant to dump him. Not today, anyhow, not over the frigging phone. After a year and a half, Ryan deserved better. It should have only been a ten-minute chat, the requisite “So, what are you up to?” check-in before she prepped for her meeting. But he’d sensed something in her voice, in her limp, “Love you, too.”
It had unraveled from there, cycling from fearful questions and hollow reassurances to apologies and ambivalence, to mean accusations, to more apologies, to surprise, to anger, to crying—his—and consolation—hers—to the other way around. Two hours. So much for getting her head on straight before that meeting. She’d spent the homestretch camped on the floor by an outlet, toying with the cord of her phone charger. Finally Ryan had sighed and said, “I guess you should just give me the ring back if you’re that unsure.” The ring he’d given her, what? Four days ago? Bended knee and everything. Half a carat, princess cut, platinum band. Princess cut. Beautiful, but that name—gag. She didn’t want to be anyone’s princess. She didn’t even want to be Ryan’s wife, she’d realized after she’d flown out of Portland. She wasn’t done feeling like an individual, stupid as that sounded. As if getting married would weld them together into some bland, homogenized blob . . .
When he’d proposed, she’d gently urged him to stand and told him the truth—she wasn’t sure. Wasn’t ready. Then he’d closed her fingers around the ring like something out of a movie and said, “Just hold on to it,” all dramatic and earnest. And she had, willing herself to feel . . . more. But she never had.
“I guess you should just give me the ring back,” he’d said.
And scarcely three hours ago she’d said, “Yeah. I guess I should.” And in that instant, as she imagined handing over the tiny token, the relief had felt like a cement truck rolling off her ribs.
After a minute’s silent sipping, Vince hauled her back into his orbit. “You taken any pictures yet? Apart from those glamor shots of me.”
“Just a couple panoramas of the mountain range, on my way into town. By the old mines.”
He cracked a smile, one that gave him a dimple, rounded his cheeks, and softened his hard features. Softened Kim’s spine and left her slumped comfortably on the bench. Just the scotch. Keep your legs together and ignore the rebound bait.
“I used to mess around down there with my friends, when we were kids,” Vince said. “We’d pry the boards off the mine shafts and play like we were cavemen.”
How apropos. “Isn’t that incredibly dangerous?”
He smirked and held up his glass as though saluting her fretfulness. “Spoken like a true city girl. Anyhow, once they realized that either dumbshit kids or transients were camping out in there, they filled them in with rocks and cement. Ruined all our fun.”
“It’s a wonder you lived to adulthood.”
“Most of us are still around. Fortuity lifers, you might call us. Though we traded the mine shafts for the auto shop in high school. What was your childhood like?” he asked, leaning in with his elbows planted, as though he might actually be interested.
Don’t be fooled. He’s only buttering you up. Kim sipped her beer.
“It was fine. I grew up in northern Oregon. Only kid. Spent most of my free time with my face in a book. You guys would’ve thought I was incredibly boring, I’m sure.”
“To each their own.”
She studied the tattoos inked up and down his improbable arms. Dark feathers from under his sleeves all the way to his wrists. Went with the one on his neck. “Is that a crow’s wing?” she asked.
“It is.”
“Why crows?”
He shrugged, broad shoulders bunching beneath black cotton. “Crows are good. Smart. They stick around, clean up people’s messes. What’s not to like?”
Something in his tone—some sharp tinge of bitterness—had her wondering if maybe he could relate to that duty.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Think you just did.”
“You’re coming off kinda bipolar, Vince. I can’t tell if you’re trying to get in my pants or run me out of town on a rail.”
“Me neither, but it’s turning me on. How about you?”
She ignored that. “What exactly do you have against the casino?” He certainly didn’t seem the type to take moral exception to such a project.
Vince swallowed a deep drink and refilled his glass. “I like my town how it is. The casino will bring money—I don’t deny that. But it’ll also put locally owned joints like this bar out of business, and replace them with the clean, familiar, chain shit tourists like. I know this town doesn’t look like much worth saving, if you’re not from here. But I don’t want it turned into just another destination exit off the highway. Some soulless bastard love child of Aspen and Reno.”
“I get that.” Though she agreed with the other thing he’d said—from an outsider’s point of view, there didn’t seem to be all that much worth preserving. That wasn’t fair, though. Not everyone got to grow up in a hometown as pretty and well-to-do as Kim’s. And frankly, for all its loveliness, she
hoped she never had to go back there.
When Vince tried to top off Kim’s glass, she blocked the rim with her palm. He took her wrist in his free hand and moved it aside, pouring against her wishes. Bossy fucker.
He let her go, and she clutched the spot he’d held, frowning her annoyance. And why did her skin feel all hot and antsy? Christ, this man.
A different antsy feeling suddenly overtook her—a hum that had nothing to do with attraction, accompanied by a jingling noise.
“That your phone?” Vince asked.
She pulled it out, checked the screen. Shit. Ryan.
Ignore him, or man up? Then she glanced at Vince, and with a strange, mean pang of perfect certainty, she decided to put the pushy prick on hold. Just to rouse him.
“Sorry. This is important.”
Vince shrugged his indifference and she got up, wandering a few paces to stand in the short hall that led to the restrooms. She hit TALK on the fifth ring.
“Hi, Ryan.”
“Jesus! Kim, finally.”
“Finally?”
“I’ve been calling you all afternoon.” He sounded frantic.
“Oh, sorry. The reception’s really crappy around here—I haven’t had more than one bar since I landed. Plus, I had my meeting. What’s happened? Is something wrong?”
A sigh of sheer annoyance banished her worry. “Is something wrong? My girlfriend dumps me over the phone, out of the blue, then ignores all my calls—isn’t that enough?”
She felt her own annoyance rouse at that. At his entitled, petulant tone. “I can’t help if I don’t have a signal. And I can’t really talk. It’s really noisy where I am—”
“We need to talk.”
“You do, clearly.” And since she had dumped him over the phone, she’d better just suck it up. Maybe it’d take so long, Vince’s undoubtedly short libidinal attention span would send him trotting off after some other woman, and save Kim from her chance at an ill-advised rebound.
She leaned against the wall. “What’s on your mind?”
Another noisy sigh, loud enough to crackle the line. “I want to apologize,” Ryan said. She could tell from his stiff delivery, he’d practiced this speech in his head a hundred times. That’d be just like him, too. The king of reservations, of preordering, of preparedness. If she’d ever gotten pregnant by him, Ryan would’ve had the kid’s name down on preschool applications before she’d finished peeing on the stick.
“I shouldn’t have pressured you,” he said softly. “I get that. I just felt like, how can I be so sure, while she’s on some entirely different page? Is it me? It must be me. But then I thought, maybe she’s just scared . . .”
Kim began to tune out. Nothing pissed her off quite like being told what she was feeling. Her father had been a master of the craft—translating her emotions for her, assigning them logical causes. How many times had he made her feel unheard, made her cry, then blamed those frustrated tears on a recent academic shortcoming she couldn’t have cared less about? God, men.
As Ryan continued his monologue, enumerating for Kim the many reasons she was scared of settling down, she let her gaze drift to the man who’d sequestered her here in this calm corner of a chaotic bar, in a wild town.
What was the opposite of Ryan’s smooth cajoling? she wondered.
Rough ordering, probably.
With a punch of hot curiosity, she let herself imagine what a guy like Vince would be like in bed. What he’d say. What he’d want, and how he’d likely bully his way into getting offered whatever that was, just like he’d strong-armed her into staying for the beer. And though that all seemed kind of dangerous, it was also exciting.
And above all, forthright.
Ryan’s voice had all but disappeared, and she realized her hand had drifted from her face. She heard her name from a few inches away.
“Kim? Kim . . . ?”
She brought the phone back to her ear. “Yeah. Sorry.” Wait a second. “Actually no, I’m not sorry.”
“Kim?”
“You just spent the last two minutes explaining to me what I’m feeling.”
“No, I didn’t. That’s not what I’m trying to do at all. I’m just saying, I understand why you might be freaked-out—”
“That, right there!” She caught herself, lowered her voice. “You don’t understand at all. You’re just writing me into some convoluted script that makes you sound all compassionate and sensitive, and makes me out to be all delicate or, like, too stupid to even know what I’m feeling.”
“Kim—”
“You’ve talked me out of every exciting thing I’ve worked up the nerve to go after since we met. It’s like I’m still living with my dad.”
A scoff.
A motherfucking scoff.
“You’re being really irration—”
“Oh my God.” She laughed into the receiver. “Listen to yourself, because I’m done. I’ll e-mail you about getting my stuff out of the apartment next week. After that, have a good life.” And she hit the END button, oddly giddy as she powered off the device and slipped it into her pocket.
Before returning to the table, she spent a few more breaths watching Vince. Strong body relaxed on the bench, thighs spread wide, big hands with their big fingers lounging on the tabletop. Those hands . . . on her body. That gruff voice saying God knew what. Filthy things, maybe. Orders? Not asking, Like that? Or, Is this too fast? Or, Are you close? No questions. Christ, what would he say? The possibilities had her body thrumming.
She took her seat, her face surely flushed for more than one reason.
“You look pissed,” said Vince.
“I’m fine. Just . . . client bull,” she lied.
“Guess old Sunnyside is a pain in everybody’s assholes, not just us locals.”
“You decide I’m not the enemy after all?”
He nodded. “You’re not one of them—I buy that. Free agent, like you said. You’re just here to take pretty pictures.”
She smiled sweetly to mock his saccharine tone. “That’s right, mister. Just little old me with my little old camera.”
“How long you in town for?”
“Till Tuesday.”
“Lucky for you, I got Sunday morning free. And since I’ve lived here my entire life, there’s nobody better qualified to take you around to Fortuity’s most photogenic locales.”
“Is that so?”
“Spots you can’t reach by car, even.”
“I’m not shooting for National Geographic, here. I just need enough shots to satisfy the people in marketing and impress the investors.”
“Surely you got into photography for more than PowerPoint fodder, though?”
Damn him for reminding her. There’d been that January trip to Patagonia she’d bailed on at the last minute, when Ryan had begged her to stay. Sure it hadn’t been for a job, just for her, for her portfolio . . . And sure, the trip would’ve been expensive, and she wasn’t exactly rolling in it, not since she’d cut the cord with her overbearing father two years ago. But it also would’ve been amazing. She’d barely been abroad before, and only to the UK. Yet she’d stayed behind, swayed by Ryan’s damnable logic.
“What photogenic locales?” she asked, and as she lifted her glass, she realized she’d caved a little. Oops.
Vince smiled, clearly catching the scent of her surrender. “Hot springs,” he offered.
“Already got those highlighted on my map. Next.”
“Not the springs that’re marked. The good ones.”
That piqued her curiosity. “What else?”
“Got the best angle you ever saw of Lights Out, and I know exactly what time to be there.”
“Is Lights Out that big, pointy mountain? It can’t take much to make that thing look good.”
“You say that now, but I will blow your mind, sweetheart.”
“My name is Kim.”
“I will blow your mind, Kim.” This time when he said it, his eyes narrowed like he was envisioning a far
different persuasion of sightseeing. Like the kind that would take him through the natural wonders nestled between her crossed legs.
“Why would you want to spend your day off helping me?”
He made a face like she had a good point, then ticked his motives off on his fingers. “First, I’ve got misgivings about the project, and I want to grill you about everything you know from Sunnyside’s marketing folks. Second, I need to test out the new suspension on my bike—”
“Bike?”
“And no better way than off-road, with an extra rider. Third, I like the way you smell. And fourth, maybe you and whatever corporate clearance you’ve got can get me into one of the construction sites.”
She barely followed the final point, left all warm and confused by the one about how she smelled.
“You’re very . . . forthcoming,” she said, then drank to cool her blazing cheeks.
“So you in?”
“I’m not sure. I’m tired. I just want to go back to the motel and get some sleep.” With that, she rose and shouldered her purse and camera bag.
Vince stood as well. “You want a lift, or a stroll?”
“Oh, are you my chaperone, now?” The motel didn’t warrant one—it was maybe a quarter mile away, just over the railroad tracks. “Thanks, but I’m fine to walk.”
“That’s handy. So am I.”
“I don’t need an escort.”
“Would you like one?”
Now that was a good question . . . Frankly, yes, she would like it, and not for her safety. Simply because after the day she’d had, Vince’s energy and attention were really the perfect balm. She shrugged, sensing it was as good as a green light to this man.
Kim followed him through the crowd and outside, where Vince slipped his jacket on beside the door. She had to admit, he was made for the thing. A slim leather bomber, perfectly fitted to his extraordinary frame. He’d mentioned a bike—so did that make him a biker? Not her type at all. Then again, scotch wasn’t usually her thing, but damn if she hadn’t needed that double, tonight. She eyed the half dozen motorcycles lined up at the front of the lot, wondering if one of them was his. Jesus Lord, not the one with the neon green tribal crap airbrushed on it, and the two-foot-high ape-hanger bars, please.