I feel like I’m being fired all over again. How humiliating, having to explain myself to this guy. Walking back to the couch, I sit and wipe my face off with the sleeve of my sister’s ruined pink cashmere sweater. When the quiet gets too much to bear, I glance up again.
He watches me for one, two, three excruciating silent moments. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why were you fired?” His tone does not evoke warm fuzzies or the desire to pour my heart out. In fact, he sounds more annoyed and inconvenienced than ever.
“Oh…uh…” I’m too emotionally drained to come up with a plausible excuse on the fly. “A tweet. I was fired over a tweet.”
Turner slips out of his coat and hangs it back up on the row of hooks on the wall. He kicks off his boots. “What did you tweet?”
“What difference does it make?”
“I’m still deciding whether to believe you,” he barks. “Now, what was it?”
It’s my turn to sigh tiredly. “A story I broke years ago…on the quarterback of the Dallas Stars, Halpern. He––”
“––died a month ago. I know.” Crossing his arms, he studies me. “You broke the story on him four years ago?”
For the first time since we’ve met, Turner looks less than pissed off and more than curious. I nod, dry my eyes again.
“And?”
“And management didn’t approve of the tweet I sent out on the day of his accident.” I look away, at my knuckles, red from the cold. “They got a lot of blowback…I’m sorry if that upsets you.” Frustrations bubbles up again. I’m not ready to surrender to this sour, high-handed, possibly-violent jerk. “I’m sorry he beat the shit out of a woman that weighed less than his Rottweiler. And I’m sorry he’s not the hero you wish he was. I only report the news––I don’t make it.” That has me thinking about everything that’s happened since I returned to New York. “At least––I try not to.”
Turner shakes his head. “I feel for his family, but he wasn’t the person his fans thought he was.”
The phrasing gets my attention. “You say that as if you knew him.” There’s no chance a loner living in a rundown farmhouse on the outskirts of Lake Placid would ever cross paths with a hundred million dollar Super Bowl winning quarterback.
Turner walks away, heading straight for the room where he “paints.” Right before the door closes, I’d swear on a Bible that I hear him say, “I did.”
Chapter 6
The Tri-Lakes Region, made up of Lake Saranac, Placid, and Tupper, has a rich history. Here’s some trivia for you, President Calvin Coolidge made White Pine Camp the summer White House in 1926, and the Lakes hosted two Winter Olympics. The first in ’32 and the last in ‘80.
A bonafide sports factory, the area in general has been pumping out pro athletes for decades. Over two-dozen of them competed in the Vancouver Games and almost a dozen in Sochi. And many of them still return to train here when they’re not competing.
Lake Saranac in particular became popular in the 1800s as the preferred destination of the famous and wealthy who were fighting and recovering from tuberculosis. The Cure Cottages, as they were called, became temporary homes for writer Robert Louis Stevenson and composer Bela Bartok, among many others.
My great great Swedish ancestors (somewhere along the way we lost an extra s) purchased one of these properties. However, once the tuberculosis vaccine was discovered, the cottages lost their appeal, and it was repurposed as a hotel.
Comfort Cottages has been in my family for four generations. And after everything that’s happened in the last week, I’m reminded that I’ve always sort of taken it for granted that it would always be here to catch me if I fell.
Well, I’ve fallen.
Turner’s Expedition slowly chugs up the cleared driveway of the hotel and a small buzz swirls in my gut. Being back here feels less than a punishment and more like a personal challenge. That’s good, I guess.
While Turner pretends I don’t exist, I examine the man who both saved my life and made it a living hell the last two days. Head cocked back, muscular arm extended, one big hand resting on top of the steering wheel. His expression says one thing only––back off.
I’m happy to, pal. I’m happy to back way off.
He woke up early and told me to get dressed. Then he handed me a shovel and the two of us––okay, mostly him––shoveled the porch. After which he pulled out the snowblower and cut a path wide enough to drive his Expedition to the main road. He didn’t said one word to me other than, “Maybe hit the gym once in a while,” after I got tired and had to sit to catch my breath.
I revise my prior assessment of him being a cousin to the Uni-Bomber. He’s not dangerous, just mean for whatever reason. He’s more Ebenezer Scrooge. Yep, Ebenezer Scrooge of the Adirondack Mountains has a nice ring to it.
A hot Scrooge––because fair is fair.
Which doesn’t matter because Scrooge and I will be parting ways forever as soon as he drops me off. “How did you know?” I ask, unsure whether I’ll get an answer.
Frankly, it’s less a question and more an accusation. I gave him the address and he drove straight here without needing direction or GPS.
“Google map.”
The sly passing glance he gives me earns him an involuntary eye-roll.
Whatever, Scrooge.
Dad’s outside gathering wood for the fireplaces when we pull up to the main house, a big twenty-room, white Victorian with glossy navy-blue shutters. It serves as reception and the family residence, hosts weddings and banquets. A smile lights up his face when he sees the SUV approach.
We park out front and Turner gets out of the Expedition “Gene,” he says, tipping his head at my father.
“Jake,” Dad says, not missing a beat.
Gene? Jake? Wtf?
Dad’s attention shifts to me. “Carebear! How’s the head?”
Reaching up, I brush my fingers over the unicorn next to my temple. Yeah, it’s still there. “I’ll live. Hi, daddy.”
Slipping out of the Expedition, I walk into my father’s open arms. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch Turner watching us. Our eyes meet and he ducks his head. Opening the back door, he takes my suitcases out.
“How are you?” I ask, glancing up at my father.
“Good, now that you’re home.”
Turner brushes past us and deposits my stuff on the porch, and I level my so-called good Samaritan with an accusing squint. “Jake?”
And get another glare-lite for this. It’s like his calling card at this point; he’s never without it.
“You two know each other?” I ask my father, my attention bouncing back and forth between him and the man I’m developing unchristian-like feelings for.
“Carrie! You had us worried sick,” my grandmother calls out.
She appears at the top of the stairs, looking exactly as she did the last time I saw her two years ago, when they came to visit. She’s wearing her standard issue red turtleneck with a fair isle sweater over it, jeans, and her hair is the same shellacked white helmet. To complete the outfit, a skinny cigarette is tucked between two fingers in one hand and Elvis, her Main Coon, is tucked under the opposite arm. Seeing me, he hisses. Freaking hell spawn.