Then again, I’m not sure there’s any preparing for Cal. Each time I see him, he manages to surprise me. To cut through the thick skin I’ve spent so many years cultivating. Standing nestled against him, his very obvious—and impressive—arousal pressed against me, both of us watching the sky as it lit up in layers of warm pink and purple and gold, I wasn’t thinking about Rogue Word, or the Bad Luck Club, or anything other than the fact that this little stalking expedition had turned romantic as hell.
I’m thankful to the hemorrhoids couple for breaking the tension, because if they hadn’t come along when they did, I’m not sure what would have happened.
Be honest with yourself, a voice in my head challenges. Because part of me really enjoyed the way Cal was looking at me, as if the sunrise he was so hot and bothered about had nothing on me.
“In another month or two those could be breakfast,” Cal says, his voice husky, nodding to a bush a few feet from us. They’re blueberry bushes.
Could this place get any more magical?
We keep soaking in the view, the moment, while hemorrhoids couple discuss Harold’s cream habits—Margie doesn’t feel he uses enough and is worried about chafing. Given that his pants look two sizes too small, it’s a legitimate concern.
Then she turns toward us, as if noticing us for the first time. To be fair, the view really is that stunning, even though they missed that first brilliant moment when the sun made itself known. She also has thick glasses that suggest a vision problem modern science hasn’t seen fit to correct.
“Oh,” she croons, “we have company, Harold.”
“Yes,” he says. “You’re blind, woman. They’ve been here the whole time.”
She waves him off as if swatting a fly. Turning to us, she says, “It’s nice to see two young people so obviously in love. Harold and I were just like you, back in the day. Couldn’t keep our hands off each other. Did you come up here for a sunrise picnic? You’re going to feed each other, aren’t you?”
She says it like she wants a front-row seat.
Harold lets out a bark of laughter, and Cal has the look of a deer in the path of a semi. “No,” he coughs out. “We’re not. This isn’t…”
“Actually,” I say brightly, “we’re brother and sister.”
“Oh,” Margie says, her excitement dimming, “well, that must be the closeness I detected between you two. Have you been to Tea of Fortune? The woman who runs it is delightful, and she said I had a keen eye for reading people.”
I’m sure she did.
Harold lets out another huff. “If you were so good at reading people, why didn’t you foresee that the owner of our Airbnb has twenty ferrets?”
“That’s not the kind of thing you can see in someone’s energy, Harold,” she snipes. “Besides, I only conversed with him over the internet.”
They continue bickering about spiritual energy and ferrets and what they plan to do with the rest of their day—some combination of day drinking and lounging, which means they’re my kind of people—but Cal, whose stricken look has shifted to bemusement, nods toward a path leading over to the other side of the gorgeous view.
“Did your spy tell you I have a morning meeting to get to?” he says.
“No, she didn’t,” I say, more than a little disappointed.
He shoots me a victorious look. “Aha! So it’s a she.”
“I’ll even tell you who, if you’d like,” I say, falling in beside him after giving Margie a jaunty wave. I’m somewhat tempted to run over and give her my phone number—that woman is a hoot—but Cal would probably find that weird. “Why are we going this way? Don’t you need to get back to your truck?”
“The hike’s not over yet,” he says, keeping his gaze fixed ahead of us. “Didn’t your female spy give you a map?”
She had not. And I’d taken a bit of a gamble, actually, because Nicole is so nosy that she knows about both of Cal’s usual hiking spots—this one and Deep Gap.
It occurs to me that perhaps I should warn him that he has a real potential stalker on his hands. For all her bravado, she seems mostly harmless, but you never know. I mull it over for a few minutes as we walk along, Cal exhibiting the easy grace of a wolf, me barely making it down without tripping.
“You know, your friend Nicole has a thing for following people,” I say after a few moments of silence, taking a wayward glance at him. My gaze catches on his morning scruff, that unruly hair, and those muscles showing through his shirt. I nearly trip on some gravel. Clearly the Toms were a bad idea. Admittedly, I chose them for their cuteness and my lack of other appropriate footwear, not because I thought they’d do well on gravel.
He smirks. “Ah, so Nicole was the one. She likes to know everyone’s business.”
I feign righteous anger. “Oh, so it’s all fun and games when she stalks you?”
“Would you believe me if I told you it was her way of protecting me?”
In a weird way, yes, but instead I say, “It occurs to me that Bad Luck Club doesn’t seem to have cured her of her jealousy. Or Harry of his conspiracy theory addiction.”
He turns to look at me then, stopping partway down the path. “For someone who doesn’t know much about Bad Luck Club, you sure have a lot of theories.”
“So enlighten me,” I say. “I want your perspective. And I have to tell you, Nicole’s not the only one who wants to reveal the truth about Augusta. Blue and Harry do too. Harry. They ambushed me last night so I could ambush you. They want you and your father to get the credit you deserve, and they trust me to tell the story fairly.”
“Nice soapbox speech,” he says, raising his brows. “And why, exactly, do they suddenly trust you? Like I told you yesterday, you spun Harry up so much he was practically ready to pull out his tinfoil hats.”
Guilt pokes at me, but I tell myself Harry’s over it. He’s just fine, and he’ll be even better once Augusta gets what’s coming to her. “Half the reason Harry reacted like that was because I looked familiar to him and he didn’t know why. It set him off.”
Cal gives a short nod. “He might have mentioned something about that.”
“It’s because he knows my sister. You’ve probably met her too. Maisie. She’s Blue’s sister-in-law.”
Understanding flashes in his eyes as if some missing pieces of the puzzle are sliding into place. “I have. My dad adopted Ruby from her, but then I guess you know that. And she was at Blue’s wedding in February. Why didn’t you just say so from the beginning?”
“Maybe because I don’t want to always be known as someone else’s little sister. I wanted to do this on my own.” I sound like I’m whining, even to my own ears, and I don’t love it.
He studies me for a moment, then says, “Or you didn’t want her to know you were pestering her friends with questions they don’t want to answer.” His voice is soft, almost understanding.
“I’ll be generous and admit it’s a little bit of both, but I talked to her last night, and apparently she doesn’t care. And you know what? Your friends do want to answer my questions. Actually, they want you to answer them.”