So that was why she had three suitcases. One was probably filled with supplies.
“Will I need to prepare the walls for you?”
“Oh, good question. Yes, please.”
“Just tell me what you need and when and I’ll get her done.”
“Great, thank you. That won’t be for a while, though.”
They continued chatting about the steps to undertaking this project, both engaged and distracted from whatever other cares they had. He promised to take her to the college to see the outdoor walls soon. After she explained what needed to be done, he planned to remove the stucco and prep the walls to her specifications while she painted her smaller-scale grid.
After dinner she helped him wash the dishes, then she went on and on about how beautiful his house was and how extraordinary her living quarters were. Suddenly the day, and meal that had gotten off to a rocky start, was ending on a much better note.
Because she’d eaten so little, he showed her where the leftovers would be and several other choices for snacks, making sure she understood the mi casa es su casa philosophy they needed to agree on. It was called Scandinavian hospitality or the Viking code and the god Odin had originally laid down the law in the poem Havamal: “Fire, food and clothes, welcoming speech, should he find who comes to the feast.”
She thanked him again and said good-night, then quietly went up the stairs. He planned to take the dogs out for one last quick walk, but before he did, he watched her hair sway as she ascended the stairs and, to his surprise, he also noticed the twitch of her hips. But what man wouldn’t?
Having a woman in the house had already changed things. A life force was again coming from that end of the second floor. The often overbearing emptiness of the house seemed tamped back a bit, and it felt…well, it felt damn good.
Later, when he laid his head on the pillow, he tried to remember the last time he’d engaged a woman in a conversation for more than two minutes. Not counting women trying to engage him in conversation, like his guesthouse renter, Lilly, who was always full of questions about the town. But what could he expect from a reporter? Or little old ladies at the market with single daughters or granddaughters.
Nope, he’d initiated this conversation tonight, and somehow he’d managed to draw Marta Hoyas out of her shell, even if only for a little while. The thought made him happy, a foreign feeling for him. Well, he’d had a couple of glasses of wine, which probably helped that along.
Yeah, that had to be the reason for that goofy-feeling grin pasted on his face.
Not the beautiful woman from Sedona.
Chapter Two
“Ellen?” Leif rolled over in bed, mostly asleep. “Ellen?” No flash of a dream came back to him like usual. What had driven him out of deep sleep thinking of his dead wife? And what time was it? He looked at the bedside clock—quarter to five. Almost time to get up anyway.
Leif sat up, gave a quick shake of his head and pulled on his jeans for the short walk to the hall bathroom. Another inconvenience of having a woman in the house. As he woke he understood he must have been dreaming about Ellen, but usually when he did he remembered it. He didn’t remember anything about this dream. If that was what it was.
He heard a sound and stopped. It was very faint but undeniably a sound he remembered.
He stood quiet and listened harder. There it was again.
Retching.
The old and familiar heaving from when Ellen had suffered through chemotherapy came rushing back. He must have heard that unmistakable sound in his sleep.
Retching? What was up?
He squinted and listened. It had gone quiet again, but the puking sound had come from Marta’s room. Had she gotten food poisoning from what little she’d eaten last night? Damn, that would be horrible. He felt fine, so why would she get sick?
After he finished his quick pit stop and washed his hands he heard more retching and fought off a wave of terrible memories. Oh, God, Ellen, what you went through. He strode to the end of the hall, not wanting to be nosy but unable to let this lie. It was quiet again.
Marta was curvy—not ultrathin like anorexics or bulimics tended to be. What a crazy thought to even entertain, that she might have an eating disorder. That couldn’t be it. But she’d picked at her meal and looked queasy during dinner, even said her stomach had been giving her fits.
She’d also refused alcohol.
A lot of people didn’t drink. But a warning thought planted inside his brain and made him back off as he heard one more round of intense dry heaves. He wanted to help her out, but it could prove embarrassing for her, and that wasn’t his intent. She needed—deserved—privacy. If she was sick, he’d gladly take care of her, but not without an invitation. She was a grown woman and he assumed she wouldn’t hesitate to ask for help. Unless she was one of those superproud ladies who couldn’t ask for anything.
He ran his hand through his hair, torn. Let it be, Andersen. He listened to his intuition stemmed from the fact she’d refused any wine last night. A troubling thought of what a woman throwing up first thing in the morning usually meant made him step away from the door, then he headed back to his bathroom for a shower.
*
Later, Leif had eaten and was feeding the dogs, having decided to take them with him over to the job for the day. He’d promised to finish the add-on to Gunnar Norling’s house in six weeks, and Gunnar had offered to help as much as possible. That meant today, before the sergeant’s shift at Heartlandia PD, they’d install the triple-paned windows that had arrived yesterday. Even though he’d been driving his crew hard on this project, no way would Leif ask them to work on Sunday. The guys needed at least one day off. He and Gunnar could handle it.
After both dogs took a quick whiz, he whistled for them to jump into the bed of the truck. He’d removed the cover and had thrown in his window installation tools. Just as he finished closing the tailgate, he noticed Marta standing in the kitchen doorway in a robe that looked like a Native American blanket. With her hair parted down the middle and not brushed, it tumbled over her shoulders in a wild mess. The vision moved him in ways he hadn’t felt in years. It also bothered him to react so viscerally to a near stranger. She might be pregnant, for crying out loud.
“Where are you going?” Curiosity knit her brows.
“I’ve got a job today. I left you a note in the kitchen. Sorry, but I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“Oh, okay.” She folded her arms. “That’s all right, then. I’ll wait to talk to you later.”
“Is there anything you need?” He thought back to the noises emanating from her suite earlier.
“Besides a good night’s sleep and peace of mind?” She offered a wan smile. Her pained look made him want to wrap his arms around her and tell her everything would be okay, and what was up with that impulse? But other than having a pretty solid hunch, Leif didn’t know what her problem was. He really didn’t have a clue if things were okay in her world or not. Obviously, something had robbed her peace of mind.
“Do you want me to stick around? Take you anywhere?”
She shook her head. “No. I’ll be fine. I’ll work on the grid.” She glanced down at her slippers, then quickly back up. “I would like to talk to you about something when you get home, though.”
“If it’s urgent, I’m all ears.”
“Not really urgent. I’ll talk to you later.” She started to back away from the door.
“Okay, then.” Leif opened the cab door and started to get inside.
“Oh, hey, what time will you be home?”
“Gunnar’s got to be at work at three, so I’ll see you before then.” It felt eerie having a woman ask when he’d be coming home after all these years. “Do you want me to bring some lunch or anything?” Saltine crackers?
“You’ve got plenty of food here. Thanks. We’ll talk later.” With that, the beautiful, straight-out-of-bed vision disappeared from the door.
As he backed out the truck, Leif was certain Marta
was going to tell him she was pregnant, and he chided himself for having already developed a little crush on her.
On a pregnant lady. How desperate is that?
*
Seven hours later, Leif returned home and put the dogs in the gated backyard and pool area. He went in the back door, took his dirty shoes off in the laundry room, then headed to the kitchen. The house was quiet enough to hear a drip of water in the sink. As he turned the faucet completely off, he noticed a bowl in the sink. She must have eaten cereal, so at least that was something.
He headed up the stairs in his stocking feet. Not wanting to come off as a sneaky surprise, he cleared his throat and made a fake cough, preparing to hear her news—I’m pregnant.
“Marta?” he said, taking a turn for the studio.
“I’m in here.”
He entered the bright white room, thinking maybe he’d overdone it with three skylight panels, but Ellen had always loved it, saying it was the perfect natural lighting for intricate stitchery. Maybe Marta would like that, too.
She was hunched over a table, a long piece of white paper spread along the entire length. A second piece of paper was laid out on the other worktable.
“Come here and have a look,” she said. “Tell me what you think so far.” She glanced up, her hair pulled back into a low single braid, though a few wavy tendrils had broken free around her face. He fought the urge to tuck one behind her ear. She wore a teal-colored plaid flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up and holey old jeans. He couldn’t help but notice she still wore her slippers.
“You could have turned the heater on, you know,” he said, worried she’d been cold all day.
“I’ve been fine. The skylights bring in a lot of warmth.”
Good to know. He stepped closer, her dark eyes and olive skin quickly reminding him he was still a man. She used a graphite pencil and a yardstick to draw the final sections of grid over her mural sample.
“This is the tedious part,” she said, then stood. “Come and look at this. Let me know what you think.”
Long sections of Heartlandia history were sketched and laid out before him, beautifully depicted with her natural and flowing artistic style.
“Notice something?”
How beautiful you are?
Actually, something besides the fact she smelled like cinnamon and ginger did draw his attention. He pointed to a blank area at the beginning of the mural. “That?”
“I’ve been concerned about this project from the start. All the information the college provided me was exceptionally helpful, but when I began my sketches, I kept feeling blocked right here.” She pointed to the beginning.
“I wound up having to work backward because this strange sense of darkness stopped me from advancing. I got the Chinook and fisherman part just fine, but something—pardon me for sounding overly dramatic, but forbidding is the only word I can use to describe it—tugged at me to start even before then. Yet no one sent any information about before that point.”
Ah, jeez. Was this woman a psychic? Were artists more in tune with secrets?
For the past few months a private panel had been meeting at city hall to discuss this exact matter. Sleepy little Heartlandia hadn’t been founded by the Scandinavian fisherman with the help of the native peoples—the Chinook—as they’d always assumed, but by a scurrilous pirate captain named Nathaniel Prince, also known as the Prince of Doom.
The perfect little tourist town had been thrown into a dither over this newly discovered fact, in no small part thanks to Leif. While breaking ground for the new college, he’d dug up an ancient trunk filled with journals. The pirate captain’s journals. After authenticating the captain’s accounts and having Elke Norling, the town historian, decipher them, their worst fears had proved true. There had been a concerted effort somewhere back in time by the people of Heartlandia to suppress the truth, and now it was time to come clean.
Plans were in place for a town meeting, where the information would be revealed by mayor pro tem Gerda Rask, with Elke by her side. And Lilly Matsuda, the new journalist at the Heartlandia Herald, had agreed to run the entire historic findings in a three-part story. But that only solved the first problem; the second was even worse. Captain Prince had alluded to a second trunk filled with gold coins and jewels…buried at the Ringmuren. Which happened to be sacred burial ground for the Chinook. Even now, the thought of dealing with this town-wide problem made his head want to explode, and because he was the guy who’d kicked off the whole mess and he’d been on the secret panel from the start, he couldn’t avoid the predicament or the fallout.
The bigger question, right this moment, was how much should he tell Marta. And how crazy was it that she’d sensed a problem without knowing about Heartlandia’s dark side? One thing he did know—he’d wait a bit, feel things out more, before saying a word to her.
“The problem is—” Marta watched him as she spoke. Was she trying to read his reaction? He went still, willing his face not to give anything away, afraid he already had. “The problem is Elke gave me scant information before this shipwreck where the Scandinavian fisherman first arrived in these parts. I think that’s the issue. What about the native people, the Chinook? I need more information to do the mural justice.”
He inhaled, not having a clue what to say or how to handle things right this instant.
“I hope you don’t think I’m crazy. I assure you I’m not a woo-woo type at all. It’s just this dark feeling I keep getting has clouded my vision of the project from the start. Once I’m past this initial area, I’m fine.” She pointed to the beginning, the blank part of the mural, tapping her finger. “But this part right here, well, something isn’t right.”
“I’m sure there’s a logical reason, and we’ll find it while you’re here.” A cop-out for sure, but the best I can do right now.
The only thing Leif could think of at the moment was to distract her. Because he sure as hell couldn’t give her a truthful answer, not before the mayor made her official announcement about this very thing to the people of Heartlandia. And not before all hell broke loose. Man, maybe he should give her a heads-up first.
“So is this why you’ve been all keyed up? Not able to eat? I think I heard you throwing up this morning.” May as well come clean.
She took a quick surprised inhale, then nailed Leif with open, honest eyes. “I see I’m not the only one gifted with intuition.” She smiled. “Look, since you’re being direct, I will be, too. I’m pregnant. Eight weeks. Sick as a dog most mornings. Can’t wait for this first trimester to pass. It’s my first pregnancy, so all I can do is believe the books.”
Leif had been right, but hearing the words from her mouth took his breath away and made him suddenly want a drink. He strode to the sink, opened a cupboard and found a glass, filled it with filtered water, gulped a few swallows. “Would you like some water?”
She nodded, probably more to be polite than for any other reason. He filled a second glass for her, handed it over, then engaged her eyes. He saw questions in hers, and realized this moment would speak volumes about his character.
“You want to talk about it?”
Marta took a sip of water, apparently thinking, then sighed quietly. The expression on her face seemed to communicate, I may as well. “I’ve recently broken up with a man I’d been involved with for five years.” She looked resigned, not brokenhearted.
Leif was already stuck on the first sentence. Didn’t people usually get together when they got pregnant, not break up? Was she waiting for this guy to show up and take her home?
“I wasn’t trying to trap him or anything. The pregnancy was definitely an accident. But when I told him, I thought maybe he’d ask me to marry him.” She put the glass on the counter, folded her arms, paced toward one of the windows and gazed outside. “He wasn’t exactly happy with my news, but at least he didn’t say he didn’t want me to have it or anything.” She glanced at Leif over her shoulder, then back outside. “I got the feeling he just
didn’t give a damn. ‘Things don’t have to change’ was all he said.” She swung around, suddenly animated, an accusing expression on her face, as if Leif was a representative for all of the lousy men in the world. “What was that supposed to mean? Of course things would change. Everything had already changed. We’d be parents.” Out of nowhere she’d found a tiny cuticle on her index finger to bite and went for it with gusto. “I’d given him five years of my life. I’d given him everything I had. And now I’m pregnant and he isn’t particularly interested in that part.” She used the back of her hand to brush the air. “‘Just take care of it,’ he said. ‘Get this pregnant part over with, then things will be back to us again.’ How selfish of him. How foolish of me to think he’d ever want to marry me.” Rather than say more, she curled her bottom lip inward and bit it.
At least she wasn’t crying. He wouldn’t know what to do if she started sobbing.
Leif had been right. He’d recognized a fellow traveler on the broken and hurting road. Turned out he wasn’t the only person in this house whose spirit needed some mending.
“I’m very sorry to hear this. Uh, not that you’re pregnant, but about your breakup. That things didn’t work out for you.”
“I understand. Thanks. I guess that’s life, right?” She lifted her chin.
Yeah, he knew about “that’s life.” It had kicked the spirit out of him, too.
“Maybe he’ll come to his senses while you’re here.”
“I no longer care if he does. It’s over.”
“What about the baby?”
“Look, I’m sorry to drag you into my problems,” she said.
His first response was to say, “That’s what friends are for,” but they were practically strangers. “For the record, I’m glad you opened up.”
She tossed a surprised glance his way. “Thank you.”
He needed to do something to change the mood, to move away from the heavy subject, to keep himself from walking over and taking her into his arms for a tight, long and comforting squeeze. He hardly knew her, yet he already felt the urge to protect her.
Falling for the Mom-to-Be Page 3