Long Shot

Chapter 13

Jen sat alone at a central table in the Kafe, her laptop open to its multitude of windows, the cooling plate of hash browns and sausages and grilled tomatoes regretfully pushed to the back corner. The never-empty mug of coffee, however, sat within easy reach.

“Yep. Yep,” she was saying into the phone tucked between her ear and shoulder. “It’s on the G drive, Gretchen. I’m logged in remotely; I’m looking right at it. Invitation list for Fashion Week.”

Across the Kafe, Vera the city councilwoman looked up from where she was reading the newspaper, wearing a little frown of concern. Jen threw her a reassuring smile.

“Ah, okay. Found it,” Gretchen said on the other end of the line. Then, with a sigh, “The label is a little misleading, don’t you think?”

“The label is fine. Don’t make any changes to that list without running it by Tim. Anything new on Rollins? Anything I should know?”

“Nope. How’s it going there?”

Jen glanced at the rental contracts that had just come through from the Hemmertex building landowners. Based on the trillion ideas she’d gotten from Mr. MacDougall’s scrapbooks, she had a bunch of new aspects to price out and fit into an electronic presentation before she met with the entire city council. Then later, based on whatever the council told her, she had a conference call with the Scottish Society. She should be focused on that. She shouldn’t have to be checking in with Gretchen or worrying about Vera’s eavesdropping.

She shouldn’t be thinking about Leith. Except that there seemed to be little space left in her brain whenever he invaded it, and after last night that frequency had increased by, oh, a thousand.

Ending the call with Gretchen, Jen sat back in her chair and stared at the computer screen, which had blurred into squares of meaningless color. The coffee mug was barely warm when she wrapped her fingers around it, so she gestured to Kathleen for more. She had to remember to tip big.

The Kafe was filled with people she recognized from the other morning along Loughlin’s fence. The only person she’d met besides Vera was Bobbie, who occupied the booth nearest the door. The older woman had her own laptop open and she was making changes to her website.

The bell over the door gave its strangled ring, and Owen and Melissa and T and Lacey came in. The girls chattered, and they all sat down and ordered without looking at the menu. Owen said something and Melissa laughed. Vera narrow-eyed them with drawn lips. They seemed . . . together.

Shame and embarrassment forced Jen’s eyes to her lap. Despite Aimee’s reassurances, and Owen coming up to her last night at the Stone in an obvious attempt to win her over, Jen knew her sister was making a colossal mistake.

If Leith were here, maybe he could talk Jen down again.

It always circled back to him, didn’t it? And now he was gone.

Before sunrise that morning, she’d been awakened by the deep grumble of his obnoxious truck as it pulled out of 740’s driveway and rolled down the otherwise hushed street. She’d thought he was leaving for a day of maintenance rounds with Chris, but on her way into the Kafe, she’d passed Chris, who was exiting, and he’d told her Leith had taken off again for Connecticut.

She wasn’t fooled, even if Leith was doing a damn fine job of fooling himself. He hadn’t sped out of Gleann because the new client in Connecticut needed him later that day; just last night he’d hedged on when exactly he’d have to go back. No, something had freaked him out. It had started the day he’d brought her to his dad’s tomb of a house, and crescendoed as he’d tried to throw the caber. The look on his face—a strained mask of false well-being slapped over a debilitating pain—had been more than a shock to her. It made her feel awful for telling him to throw the thing, but how was she to know that something that had once brought him such satisfaction now poked at open wounds?

Up until that moment, last night had been pretty damn perfect.

She’d been a virgin all over again. Every experience with a man she’d had outside of him in the past decade had been annihilated by that kiss up against his truck. Absolutely destroyed by the feel of Leith’s body on top of hers.

She’d like to have claimed that she’d forgotten how well he kissed, or how big and gentle his hands were, and how much of her skin they covered at once. But the truth was, whatever nuggets of him she’d stored away were nothing—nothing—compared to what he’d done to her last night. Everything—the sensations he’d actually given her and the even more sinful ones he promised with his eyes and words—far, far surpassed her memories. Left them choking in the dust, actually.

Usually she knew exactly what she wanted in bed. Usually she got it, because she was used to getting her way and wasn’t shy about voicing it. There was no use sugarcoating her desires, not when there were things to get done. She liked a lot of kissing and foreplay, a good long fuck to work herself up, and then some really intense clit work to give her an orgasm. Wham bam, thank you, sir.

Yet she hadn’t said a thing to Leith last night. She’d let him practically throw her around that truck, her map to pleasure flying and flapping out the open window. At first she’d protested because the thought of not knowing exactly what would happen and how her body would react scared the crap out of her. But in the end, she’d loved it. That might have scared her most of all.

His mouth had almost touched her where she’d craved it. He’d almost dragged his tongue through where she’d gotten swollen and wet. And because that was her favorite act, and because he was Leith, she would have come nearly instantly. Just the thought of it now, the intense dream of what had almost happened, shot a thrilling shiver through her entire body, which she had to disguise by shifting on her Kafe chair and reaching for her coffee. The black liquid made ripples against the cream-colored porcelain and she stared at them, trying to turn her mind to purer thoughts.

This man was doing strange things to her head. He was making her think of the past, of whom and what she’d had to let go when she’d walked away from here. She didn’t like that feeling, that whispering question of What if? There was no room in her life for regret. She’d already overcome so much, and her goals and dreams still rose before her, a mountain she was still in the midst of climbing. To return to the past would be like falling off the cliff face without a rope. To return to the past would mean she’d hit the rocks at the bottom, and land at the feet of her mom, who would laugh and tell her she’d known all along that Jen would fall.

But he was Leith, and the man he was now was far more potent and exhilarating and alluring than his past self.

She wanted him. Maybe she even needed him.

“I see the caber was put back.”

The hard screech of a chair against the floor jolted Jen from her thoughts. The mug slipped from her fingers and dropped an inch or so to the table, sloshing muddy coffee over the side and onto some papers. Opposite, Sheriff Olsen angled a chair to the side and sat down without asking permission, one forearm leaning in to touch the rim of her breakfast plate. He wasn’t leering or smirking, but with a shudder she wondered how much of her body he’d seen last night.

“It was?” she asked. When Olsen nodded, she realized Leith must have hauled the thing back to the park before leaving for Connecticut, when the sun had barely lit the sky. Olsen tapped his pinky and forefinger in quick succession on the table.

“You’re looking at me like you think I burned down the barn.” The concept was so preposterous, she didn’t think a joke would hurt.

“Did you?” He rested his other hand on his round belly.

Did he really think she did it? She swallowed and looked as serious as possible. “No.”

He let her sweat for a good ten seconds before shaking his head. “I believe you. We’re looking at other suspects.”

“When I was in there the other day, I saw a blanket and things that looked like someone had been sleeping there. Or at least smoking some cigarettes.”

“Mind if I have someone call you later for the details?”

“Sure.”

Since Olsen didn’t seem to be going anywhere, she asked, “So what’s a Swede doing in this valley? I’m surprised they didn’t stop you at the gates and turn you back around.”

He snorted, then wiped his nose on her napkin. “Wouldn’t they have stopped you, too, then?”

“Yeah, but I’m ‘aunt-ed in,’ so to speak.”

Aunt Bev had married a Gleann Scot, though she’d never taken his name, and her husband had opened the Thistle. She’d taken over the B&B after his death. Her aunt had once said that because she’d stayed on in Gleann and showed such love for the Thistle and what her husband had built, the native community had gradually—although possibly never completely—accepted her.

“I’m half-Scottish,” Olsen said, his fingers curling over his gut and giving it a good jiggle. “The meatier half.”

After that, the sheriff didn’t seem so much like he’d come over here to interrogate her. “The caber was my idea,” she said. “So if you need to write anyone up, it should be me, not Leith.”

Olsen waved the hand sporting a tarnished wedding ring. “You don’t need to worry about that.” He threw a nervous look around the Kafe, clearly anxious about what might happen to him if he ever dared arrest Saint Leith MacDougall for anything, including jaywalking.

“Are you two friends?” she asked.

He gestured to Kathleen for some coffee. “Isn’t everyone friends with Dougall?”

If that wasn’t the truth.

“We’ve hung out some over the years,” Olsen added. “Less since his business took off. Hardly at all since Hemmertex left.”

“You sounded excited about seeing him throw last night. Did you used to watch him at the games?”

“Yeah, of course. Thanks, Kathleen.” He sipped his newly delivered coffee. “Then he stopped winning so he stopped competing. Football, track, the games—he was great at everything. Four years ago he had a piss-poor showing. The shine of his star was gone. So he stopped.”

Jen leaned back in her chair and gazed out the window where Kathleen had gone out to water the hanging flowerpots with a big green watering can. Drops leaked from the bottoms of the pots and splashed against the glass. Olsen’s assessment of Leith didn’t seem right. Maybe part of Leith’s troubles was the fear of failure—anyone who’d been at the top of their field and then stumbled downward would feel the ache of losing—but that wasn’t entirely what she’d witnessed last night.

“When did Mr. MacDougall die again?”

Olsen scrunched up his face. “Three years ago? It was winter, as I recall.”

That made more sense. Leith had thrown badly one summer, then his dad had died that winter. If her math was right, Hemmertex closed and his business dried up barely six months later. Too many layers of loss, stacked upon each other, pressing him down.

Her nose tickled in sensory memory of all the dust in Mr. MacDougall’s home. Though Leith claimed to have healed from his father’s death, he hadn’t. He’d mistaken recovery for just pretending to recover. He thought that leaving Gleann and moving away actually meant he was moving on.

Maybe the town was fooled, falling for his numerous excuses—“I have to work.” “I’ll be out of town.” “I’m not interested in competing anymore.”—but Jen saw his denial for the big ol’ Band-Aid that it was.

If Aimee were inside her head, her sister would be telling her to butt the hell out of Leith’s business. Except that he’d let her into his dad’s house and inserted himself back into her life and, yes, her heart. He didn’t honestly expect her to turn her back on that, did he?

Maybe he did, since she’d been the one to walk away ten years ago.

“Well.” Olsen gave the table a slap and stood. “I just wanted to let you know the caber was taken care of, in case you hadn’t heard. See you around.”

He wandered over to the back booth, which had already been set with two newspapers side by side.

Jen needed to work someplace else. Someplace that didn’t scream Leith! around every corner. Yeah, right. Like that place existed anywhere in a ten-mile radius. Maybe Aimee would let her camp out at the kitchen table in the apartment above the Thistle’s garage. She gathered up her papers, shut down her laptop, and grabbed a cold sausage with her fingers, eating it in three bites. After paying her bill, she was on her way out when Bobbie glanced up and their eyes met. It would be awkward to just walk out without saying anything; that’s how Gleann worked. Jen went over and greeted her.

“Are you looking for company?” Bobbie asked politely, with a pointed look over at Jen’s mostly uneaten breakfast. “Sometimes it’s easier to eat with someone across the table.”

Is that why Jen barely ate? Because she was alone all the time?

“Thanks, but I’m heading over to the Thistle.” Jen gestured to the bright-green and orange website pulled up on Bobbie’s laptop and smiled. “I checked out your site. It’s excellently done.”

Bobbie looked delightfully surprised at that, sitting back against the booth cushion. “Thank you. Although, forgive me if I’m wrong, but you don’t seem like the type of person who’s into crafts and scrapbooking.”

Jen chuckled. “Nothing to forgive. You’re right. But it doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate a great business model and terrific design. You do it all yourself?”

“Yes. I was an interior designer for years in Boston, and when I retired I turned from the big picture to the small details.”

“I saw you have a huge online following. Almost half a million between social media and your blog? That’s really incredible. I mean, do you know that? Do you realize that most Internet entrepreneurs would kill for those numbers?”

Bobbie’s smile shifted from polite to genuine, widening as she bowed her head. “I do. But don’t sound so surprised. You’re starting to give me a complex.”

“I’m not surprised. I’m impressed as hell. There’s a million blogs and sites out there that just talk, talk, talk, but you’ve managed to create a pretty tight-knit community.”

At that, Bobbie’s smile faltered. She turned her head to the window. Across the street, a few doors down, stood the empty storefront that had once housed her shop. Jen had removed the old poster of Leith in order to put up her own newly designed promotions, but she’d rolled up the old one and brought it back to Mildred’s, intending to throw it away. Someday. When she got around to it.

The old Picture This sign swayed over the sidewalk, its color faded. Even the vines trailing up the stone facade looked a little forlorn.

“So why did my store fail?” Bobbie asked, almost to herself. She laced her fingers on the tabletop. “I thought the big virtual community would translate to something like a pilgrimage here, where I could talk to people one-on-one and work on projects. It wasn’t about money; I’ve got plenty of that. I really wanted to help out Gleann, too. I love Rob, but when I came here, I fell in love with this place almost as hard. So much character and history. Too much to be lost.”

Suddenly Jen’s fingers itched to get to a keyboard and translate all the words and tangents and ideas that were pinging around in her brain. A single concept could do that sometimes. A bare kernel of a notion or intention.

“I think you had the right motives,” Jen said, “about the pilgrimage. I’m just not sure that a single store was the answer. It wasn’t enough.” It would take a lot to make Gleann enough, too, but she left that part out.

“So what would you suggest?” Bobbie let out a soft, short laugh that others might have taken as snobbishness, but that Jen understood as a quiet challenge, from one smart woman to another. It was something she’d seen often on the face of Tim Bauer when she’d brought him a new concept and he would say, “Okay, lay it all out, get me the numbers, and then show me you can do it.” It was a look Jen relished, that charge to prove her worth, her acumen.

“Let me get back to you.” A warm glow bloomed in Jen’s chest, spreading out through her body, coming alive with possibility. She beamed at Bobbie. “I have an idea. Or fifteen.”

Only when she reached the gate of the Thistle and stopped short, looking up at the sweep of Tudor eaves, did she realize that back in the Kafe talking to Bobbie, she hadn’t thought of Iowa or her mom once.