CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“I SAW AN interesting sight last night on my way back from town.” Tyler was crouched in the dirt with Jackson, fixing a new wheel onto Sam’s bike. “Nothing wrong with this as far as I can see. Kid was just unlucky. And unstable. He shouldn’t have been on that trail. It’s clearly marked, so stop beating yourself up and blaming yourself. Hand me that wheel, will you? This is going to be good as new when I’m done.”
The buckled wheel lay on the ground, a distorted reminder of the horror of the day before.
“So this interesting sight—” Jackson focused on the conversation, grateful for anything that stopped him thinking about blood and hospitals. “Blonde or brunette?” He hoped it wasn’t a redhead.
He hoped it wasn’t Janet Carpenter.
“It wasn’t a woman.”
Jackson breathed again. “You notice stuff that isn’t female?”
“I noticed this.” Tyler pushed the new wheel down into the frame. “This was our brother. Dr. Cool. He was walking along the lake trail from Heron Lodge.”
Absorbing the implications, Jackson straightened, Janet Carpenter forgotten. “I’ll kill him.”
“Judging from his somewhat rumpled appearance, I’d say someone already tried to do that. He’d taken a swim in the lake and I’m guessing it wasn’t voluntary.” Tyler caught his finger in the spokes and cursed.
“He is spending far too much time with Élise. Shit, you’re bleeding. After yesterday, I never want to see blood again. Clean it up.”
“Your sympathy overwhelms me.” Tyler dealt with the blood and then reattached the brakes, his fingers swift and skillful. “That’s what I find interesting. Every time I turn around, he’s right there panting over her. When has he ever spent time with one woman before?”
“I don’t care who he pants over as long as it isn’t Élise. You know what Sean is like. When it comes to women, he’s trouble.”
“Maybe. Maybe that’s why she pushed him in the lake.” Tyler wiped his brow with his forearm. “But looking at his face, I’d say he was the one in trouble this time. Knowing the way Élise feels about relationships, he might be about to be served a spoonful of his own medicine.”
Jackson frowned. “You really think it’s serious?”
“No idea.” Tyler spun the wheel, checking it. “But he’s spent more time here in the last few weeks than he has in the last few years. Of course, that could be because of Gramps, but seeing as Gramps is looking healthier than you, I doubt it.”
Jackson muttered under his breath. “You’re still bleeding.”
“I’m done here.” Tyler turned the bike the right way up, spun the wheel and nodded with satisfaction. Then he swung his leg over the bike and rode it in a circle, testing the brakes.
“You are four times too tall for that bike. You look like something out of a circus.”
“Not letting the kid back on it until I’m sure everything works.” Tyler gave the brakes a final squeeze and sprang off. “Good as new.”
“I wish the same could be said for Sam. Every time I think of it I break out in a sweat.”
“He’ll be all right thanks to Dr. Cool.”
“Yeah. Shit. How the hell can I be angry when he does something like that?” Jackson rubbed his hand over his face, thinking of the alternatives. “If Sean hadn’t been passing—”
“He was and that’s the end of it. And he does stuff like that because he’s trained to do it. Don’t look impressed or he’ll be unbearable and then I’ll be forced to dunk him in the lake. We don’t want to be accused of pollution. You know what an eco warrior Gramps is. Come to think of it, you’re the same.”
Jackson stared at the mountains, remembering how calm Sean had always been in every crisis they’d had growing up. “Maybe he is trained, but he’s still damned good at it.”
“I’m not arguing with that. I’m going to wash this bike and then deliver it back to Sam’s family. Not that Sam will be riding it for a while from what I’ve heard. Weren’t they due to go home tomorrow?”
“We’ve given them the cabin for another week. Sam isn’t well enough to travel. First time I’ve been grateful we’re half-empty.”
“When he’s up and about I might give him a few lessons,” Tyler said casually and Jackson stared at him.
“You? Teach kids mountain biking? You’d die of boredom before you left the resort.”
His brother shrugged. “Exceptions can be made. It would be a shame if the fall put him off mountain biking.”
Jackson thought about what it would mean to Sam to get a chance to go mountain biking with his gold-medal-winning brother. “That’s good of you.”
Tyler looked alarmed. “Maybe don’t mention it to anyone. It’s not going to be a habit.”
“Fine.” Hiding a smile, Jackson stooped and cleared up the tools. He glanced at the bike, which looked as good as new. “And Tyler, thanks.”
“No problem. I can’t fix the kid, but I can fix the bike and one out of two isn’t so bad.”
* * *
ÉLISE BARELY SLEPT. Instead, she lay awake, reliving the events of the day before, blood merging with red lipstick in her aching head until dawn sent beams of light through her bedroom.
To take her mind off Sean, she busied herself making a large chocolate cake, icing it and then carrying it over to Sam’s family’s lodge.
The door was answered by Sam’s father. Judging from his white face he was suffering the same what-if flashbacks that tormented her.
“Hi.” The buttons on his shirt were unevenly fastened, as if he’d dressed in a hurry and hadn’t bothered looking in the mirror. He opened the door wider. “I was going to find you later to thank you.”
“Is that Élise?” Sam’s voice came from the living room. “Can I see her?”
Receiving a nod from the boy’s father, Élise stepped over a pile of toys in the hallway and found Sam tucked up on the sofa with a blanket over him watching cartoons. He was pale, but smiling.
“How are you doing, mon petit chou?” She bent down to kiss him on the forehead. “I brought you a cake. It’s chocolate. Your favorite. I made it myself.”
“Oh, wow, that’s enormous. Mom! Come and see my cake. It’s the same one I had for my birthday.”
Élise was relieved to see him so energetic. “So how are you feeling?”
“A bit weird, but Sean says that’s normal. He’s not worried.” Sam stretched his hand out toward the cake just as his mother walked into the room with the baby in her arms.
“Sam, no! You can’t have cake before you eat your breakfast. And it’s Dr. O’Neil to you, not ‘Sean.’” Her face was pale, the dark circles under her eyes announcing that she’d had no sleep the night before.
Sam’s eyes went huge. “He told me to call him Sean.”
“I’m more comfortable with Dr. O’Neil.”
“I’ll let you be guardian of the cake.” Smiling, Élise handed the cake over to Sam’s mother and sat down next to the boy. “So you must be so tired after your night in the hospital. Did you come home this morning?”
“No. I didn’t stay in. Sean—I mean Dr. O’Neil—drove me home last night.”
Élise hid her surprise. “You mean he drove back to the hospital to pick you up?”
How had she not known that?
Why hadn’t he mentioned it?
Because she’d pushed him in the lake and thrown a candleholder at him.
“He never left,” Sam said proudly. “He stayed with me the whole time, just like he promised. When they told him to go home, he refused. And one of the doctors tried arguing but Sean, I mean Dr. O’Neil—” He grinned sheepishly at his mother. “But he just stood there with a funny smile on his face saying he’d leave when I left and not before. It was so cool. Like he was my personal doctor or something. And the man who fixed my leg said that Sean saved my life.”
His mother turned a shade paler and this time she didn’t correct him. “We owe him everything.”
“I’m going to be like him one day. I want to save lives.” Sam peered at the cake. “Is it chocolate frosting?”
“Oui. Yes.”
“You can speak in French,” Sam said generously. “I’m learning it at school. Je m’appelle Sam. And I know sang because you taught me that.”
Remembering, her stomach turned. She never wanted to see sang again. “Super, you have a very good accent! So you are saying Dr. O’Neil never left the hospital?”
“Not once. And then he gave me his private phone number and he said I could call it anytime I felt weird. Isn’t that right, Dad?”
“We owe him a great deal, that’s for sure.” Sam’s father looked exhausted. “Can I get you a drink, Élise? Something cold? Coffee?”
“No. Thank you. I have to get to work.” Still absorbing the fact that Sean hadn’t broken his promise at all and had, in fact, stayed with the child not only until he woke up from the anesthetic but until he’d been discharged and safely driven home to his cabin at Snow Crystal, Élise stood up. “I’m going to send over lunch so that you don’t have to leave your lodge this morning. Are you tired of pizza?”
“No!” Sam’s face lit up. “Cheese and tomato, but not with slices of tomato. That’s yucky. They do it like that in the village. I like the way you always do it with that thin sauce. It’s better than back home.”
“Pizza it is, and no slices of yucky tomato in sight. And chocolate cake for dessert.” She walked to the door, her head spinning. Sean hadn’t left. He hadn’t broken his promise. How could she have gotten it so wrong? “I’ll put together a few extra bits for the adults.”
“We appreciate that.” Sam’s father walked with her to the door and once they were outside he caught her arm. “I wanted to say thank you for yesterday. I was panicking so hard I don’t know what would have happened if you two hadn’t shown up when you did.”
Élise covered his hand with hers. “Sean is the one you should be thanking.”
“Yeah. And I intend to do that next time I see him. I can’t stop shaking,” he confessed, rubbing his fingers across his forehead. “Couldn’t sleep last night. Kept imagining what would have happened if you both hadn’t come along right at that moment.”
Élise didn’t say she’d been imagining the same thing. “Let’s not think about that. I have to get to the Boathouse. If you need anything, just call Reception and they’ll get a message to me.”
What time had she arrived back at Heron Lodge?
Midnight.
When she’d seen Sean sitting on her deck she’d assumed he’d been with the pretty nurse.
Instead, he’d been driving the family home from the hospital. Sticking close by Sam’s side the whole time, refusing to leave even when they’d asked him to.
And his reward for that sacrifice and for keeping his promise to a small boy was being on the receiving end of her furious temper and taking a dunking in the lake.
* * *
SEAN WAS SITTING on the deck of the Boathouse, drinking a coffee provided by Poppy.
The place was packed, inside and out, and he thought about what a tremendous job Élise had done, building the café up so fast. There was no sign of her and he assumed she was over at the restaurant.
His grandfather sat opposite him, talking about something.
Sean had no idea what. He wasn’t listening. His mind was fully occupied by thoughts of Élise. He remembered the look on her face just before she’d pushed him in the lake. He remembered her hair, slick against her beautiful face as rain dripped through the forest canopy onto their bodies. He remembered that bare shoulder and her faltering voice as she’d revealed the truth about her past.
Realizing that his grandfather was waiting for a response to a question he hadn’t even heard, Sean picked up his coffee and made an effort to concentrate.
“What were you saying, Gramps?”
“I said, I’ve been hearing things about you.”
Things?
Braced for a comment about Élise, Sean gave what he hoped was a casual shrug. “You don’t want to believe everything you hear.”
“I’m happy enough to believe this.”
Which meant he was matchmaking again.
Sean sighed and put his cup down.
One night with a woman and suddenly everyone around him was booking the church.
“I don’t know what you’ve heard, but it’s probably exaggerated.”
“Really?” His grandfather’s gaze was sharp. “Because what I’m hearing is that you saved the boy’s life.”
Sam. He was talking about Sam, not Élise.
Realizing he’d almost given himself away, Sean breathed deeply.
“He was bleeding. I stopped it. It was basic first aid.”
“Didn’t sound that basic to me. Word is, you’re a hero.” His grandfather picked at one of the little almond cookies Poppy had baked fresh that morning. “Everyone is talking about it.”
“The kid’s doing well. That’s all that matters.”
“But he’s doing well because of you.” His grandfather’s tone was gruff and Sean gave a faint smile.
“Hell, Gramps, is that praise? Because it sounded almost like it.”
His grandfather bit into the almond cookie. “All I’m saying is that I’m glad you’ve put those hours of training and reading to good use. You didn’t waste your brain, which is good because I hate waste. I’m proud of you.”
It had been a week of shocks. First the revelations from Élise, then the near tragedy with Sam and now this.
Sean felt his throat thicken. “Gramps—”
He didn’t know what to say and it didn’t help that Élise chose that moment to walk onto the deck of the Boathouse. Her hair shone like polished oak and curved around her pretty face. For a moment he saw her with long hair and imagined her being dragged across a stark, gleaming kitchen by her ponytail.
His gut clamped in a tight knot.
Emotion slammed into him and all he could think was not now.
He couldn’t handle his feelings for her now, not when his grandfather was saying things he’d never said before.
“I didn’t save him.” He forced himself to concentrate. “The surgeons did that.”
“From what I’ve heard the only reason they had someone to save was because you’d saved him first. Of course, just because you’re a hotshot doctor doesn’t mean you couldn’t come home more often. It wouldn’t kill you to show up for family night once in a while.”
Family night? He squirmed. “You still do that?”
“Yes, as you’d know if you were here a bit more. Your grandmother would love to see you there.”
Élise was walking toward him, her eyes on his.
Her heels tapped on the deck.
His heart tapped against his chest.
He wondered if she was about to push him in the lake again. At this rate he was going to have to buy himself a whole new wardrobe.
“Good morning, Sean.” She gave him a cool look and then bent to give his grandfather a hug. “Walter. You are looking so much better. You have some color. How are you feeling?”
“I’m good. But I can’t walk five steps around this place without someone telling me my grandson is a hero.” Walter gave a grunt. “Load of fuss about nothing, I say. If he can’t save a boy after all that training, what is the point of it all I ask?” But he stood up and closed his hand over Sean’s shoulder. The strength in that wrinkled, weathered hand made it difficult for Sean to speak.
“It was lucky we arrived when we did.”
“Lucky you were home. You see? You don’t need to go back to Boston to save a life, you can do it right here at Snow Crystal.”
Sean laughed, relieved to have that hint of normality. “You never give up, do you?”
“Never. And neither do you. Which is why that boy is alive.” Walter turned away and kissed Élise on the cheek. “I’m going to leave the two of you. I can’t stomach all this medical talk.”
“I love you, Walter.”
Sean paused with his hand halfway to his coffee cup because now he understood. He understood why she lost no opportunity to say those words to the people who mattered in her life.
He reached for his cup and finished his coffee, noticing the way Élise’s hair curved around her jaw, drawing attention to her mouth.
The mouth he wanted to kiss again. And again.
He waited until his grandfather had moved away to talk to Poppy before meeting Élise’s gaze. “So did you come here so that you can push me in the lake again? Because if so I should probably move a little closer. I don’t want to splash that family of four over there.”
“I came to say I’m sorry.” She sat down in the seat vacated by Walter. “I accused you of breaking your promises. You should have told me I was wrong.”
“I tried. You weren’t listening and then I was inhaling lake water and after that—” he dropped his gaze to her mouth “—you wanted me to leave.”
“I was very angry with you. And now I’m angry with me. And you should be angry with me, too.”
Angry?
He was feeling all manner of emotions he didn’t recognize, but anger wasn’t one of them. And it was starting to terrify him. For him, women slotted neatly into a clearly identified part of his life labeled entertainment. They provided company, someone with whom to share dinner, enjoy the opera and, yes, sex. They were part of his life without ever influencing it. They came into his life and when they left he rarely gave them more than a passing thought. He was the master of the superficial, an expert in the art of keeping himself detached. Until now. Now, his head was full of Élise. She intrigued him. She excited him. He thought about her. All the time.
Shit.
Part of him wanted to run but his feet were nailed to the deck. “I’m not angry. You were upset about Sam. So was I.”
“I thought you’d told him a lie. You didn’t. I shouldn’t have yelled at you. I was wrong to lose my temper.”
“I’m not afraid of your temper. And besides, you weren’t really yelling at me, were you?” He spoke softly, wishing they’d started this conversation somewhere other than the crowded Boathouse. A swift glance told him that no one was near enough to overhear what was being said. “You were yelling at him.”
Her breathing grew shallow. “Him?”
“Pascal. The guy who stomped all over that heart of yours. The guy who broke his promises and made you afraid to risk falling in love again. The guy who lied.” He lifted his cup and finished his coffee, thinking that from the outside it probably looked as if they were talking about the food or the weather. “The one who makes you keep your relationships to one night, no more. That’s the guy you were yelling at, and I don’t blame you. If I met him, I’d probably yell at him, too. I might even lob a candleholder at him and push him in the lake, too.”
She was staring at him, those green eyes wide and wary. “He can’t swim.”
“All the more reason to push him in. There’s a deep part about a hundred yards up the lake path. That should do it.”
“You gave Sam your phone number in case he needed you in the night.”
“Yeah, well, I figured he was unlikely to call me twenty times a day to tell me he loved me.”
“He might. He has a serious case of hero worship.”
“He had a scary experience.”
“So did I. I can’t forget it.” She lifted her hand to her face and breathed deeply. “All night I saw him bleeding. I kept thinking about what would have happened if we’d stayed to look at the view for another five minutes, or if we’d stopped just two minutes longer on the path.”
“We didn’t. And thinking like that will drive you crazy.”
“I think I’m already a little crazy.” Her hand dropped. “You really were a hero. You were so calm.”
“You didn’t see the size of the whiskey I poured myself when I got back to Jackson’s.”
“But that was afterward. At the time—you didn’t even shake. And—” she swallowed “—I was thinking of other things, too.”
His gaze met hers. “What things?”
“Camping.” She licked her lips. “I told you so much. Things I haven’t told anyone.”
He wondered why knowing that made him feel good when in reality it should have made him panic. “I’m glad.”
“Are you?”
“When someone tries to knock you unconscious with a hard object it always helps to understand why.”
“I really am sorry. I accused you of sleeping with that nurse. And you’re not at all that guy.”
He wanted to agree with her, to reassure her and tell her he would never do a thing like that, but he couldn’t, could he?
“Maybe I am that guy. Maybe our reasons are different, but I don’t do relationships any more than you do. For me, work always comes first.” Or at least it always had. Now? He wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure of anything anymore and it was starting to unsettle him because he’d always known exactly what he wanted. Always been clear about his goal.
Hell, any moment now he’d be building a house and putting up a white picket fence.
And as for Élise—he’d thought they were the same, but he knew now that they weren’t.
She wanted a relationship and a family. She wanted it all. But she’d been hurt and she didn’t trust. That put her in a different place to him.
When he dated a woman he never talked about the past or the future. He lived in the present. For both their sakes he ought to go back to Boston and stay away until Christmas.
“I have to go back to Boston tonight.”
Something flickered in her eyes. “Of course you do.”
That was it. So now he should stand up and get the hell out of there before he did something that was going to end in trouble.
I’ll see you around, Élise.
“There’s a new restaurant about an hour from here I’ve been meaning to try. If you could persuade my brother to give you a night off next Saturday, you could come and give your professional opinion.”
She stared at him. “You mean go out together?”
“As opposed to having crazy sex in the forest?” His tone was dry. “Yeah, I mean go out together. Spend an evening together where I don’t ruin my shoes. Share food and conversation. It’s not hard to do.” But he guessed for her, it was.
“So—you mean like a date?”
He’d chosen not to give it a name. “Well, I’m planning on getting through the evening with our clothes on, if that’s what you mean. If we’re in public, we might even manage it. So what do you say?”
“I don’t date.”
“Neither do I. So I guess that makes both of us clueless about that part, but we both eat so we could just focus on that and see how it goes. We have fun together. It doesn’t need to be any more complicated than that.” He enjoyed her company. She enjoyed his. That was all it was. Two people spending time together.
“All right.” She said it slowly, as if she wasn’t sure. Then the dimple flickered in the corner of her mouth. “But I’m only saying yes because it means you’ll be coming back here again next weekend and that will please Walter.”
“You could just cut me out and have dinner with Gramps if you prefer.”
“No, because then you wouldn’t have a reason to come home. But we could take him with us. If we’re keeping our clothes on, it wouldn’t make any difference.”
“I might have been lying about that. I might have been planning on getting you naked after dinner.”
She laughed. “Maybe I was planning on getting you naked. Can you really take the time off?”
“Yes.” More juggling. More favors. “Can you?”
“I’ll need to check with Poppy and Elizabeth. I should be able to. We have a strong team now. And anyway, this is research. It’s important.”
“Research?”
“I’m a chef. It’s good to sample other people’s food occasionally.” She stood up. “I’ll see you on Saturday.”