2. Willow
TWO
Willow
“So? Who is he?”
I was still hovering at the entrance, something pulling at me to go back outside and demand answers from the man who had just completely scrambled my brain. Lily’s sharp jab in my ribs made me flinch and grunt at the same time.
“Ow!”
“You’re completely drooling here,” she said with glee. “Who is Mr. Hottie?” She frowned as soon as she gave him the nickname. “No, not Hottie. Hotcakes.”
“Hotcakes?” I grumbled with an eye roll as I moved past her and headed to my easel. “Aren’t we too old to be calling guys nicknames?”
“We’re twenty-six, not old.” Lily’s eye roll was far more dramatic than mine, but then she always did manage extra emphasis on most things. I was quiet and subdued, and Lily Summers was the exact opposite. It’s why we made such good friends.
Her reasoning, not mine .
I didn’t think it mattered what made us friends other than the fact that we were friends. I’d earned another eye roll the day I said that too. Lily was the queen of the eye roll. Until I met her, I’d never known there were so many interpretations of a simple roll of the eyes.
“So?” She looked at me expectantly as I pulled out my tin of pencils. “Who is he?”
Trying to be casual, I shrugged. “I don’t know.” Keeping my head down so she couldn’t read me too well, I knew I hadn’t fooled her when I felt her move closer.
“You don’t know?” Her voice dropped into a whisper. “I saw you walk to him.”
“Yeah, I did that.”
Glancing up, I saw her dark eyes watching me curiously. “You approached him. And he’s a stranger?” My quick nod caused her to grin mischievously. “So, you do think he’s hot?”
That brought my head up to look at her. “What?”
“Oh, come on, girl, you wouldn’t have approached a stranger for no reason.” Lily ran a critical eye over me, frowning slightly. “You could be better dressed.”
“It’s nine in the morning.”
“So?” She pointed at her black jean skirt, her shapely, toned legs bare underneath. “This skirt is perfectly fine for a Monday morning but still shows off what the good Lord gave me.”
“You do have amazing legs,” I conceded as I considered my friend. Her skin was a rich deep brown color with a natural warm undertone. Her skin was smooth and luminous, emanating a natural glow. Another contrast between us—where she was dark, I was pale. Lily loved spending time in the sun, where I preferred the shade, or more honestly, the solitude of my art studio.
“And had you been showing a bit more of what God gave you, you may have kept Hotcakes’ attention longer.”
Swatting my best friend’s arm, I gave her a stern look. “Firstly, I don’t want his attention; secondly, it shouldn’t be what I’m wearing that keeps his attention; and thirdly, I do not want his attention.”
“You said that twice.” Lily didn’t care that I’d scolded her. She was watching me, enjoying my discomfort. “So, Miss I-Don’t-Want-His-Attention, why did you go up to him and get his attention?”
Looking around the room at the other two occupants, who were over at the far end of the room, talking about their weekend, I still lowered my voice in case they overheard. “I think he’s been watching me.”
Lily’s almond-shaped eyes widened fractionally. “Oh my God, really?” she whispered excitedly.
Stunned, I stared at her. “It’s not a good thing!” I whisper-hissed. “I mean like watching me.”
Lily gawked at me in confusion, causing a frown line to appear. “How do you know?” Checking to see the whereabouts of Peter and Lorna, she moved closer to me. “I’ve never seen that guy in my life. Where did you see him before this morning?”
“Saturday.” Tucking my hair behind my ear, I tried to avoid her eyes as I spoke. “I was at the farmer’s market, and he was there. I saw him because, well, he looks like that ,” I confessed with a blush. “I didn’t think he saw me, but after I got some things, I looked and he was behind me, and just…watching. ”
Lily’s nose scrunched up as she listened. “So…you saw him and liked what you saw?” When I made eye contact, she let out a small murmur as she thought about it. “Then he saw you…and maybe he liked what he saw?”
“Yeah. I thought that too.” Opening my artist’s A3 sketch pad, I placed it on my easel. “Then I saw him yesterday, and this time, he was trying not to be seen.” I recalled the feeling of being watched as I went on my morning walk. “It wasn’t until I was coming back from Josie’s that I caught a glimpse of him, and I dunno, Lil…I just knew he was following me.” Sitting on my high stool, I let out a sigh. “And then this morning, there he was, at the top of the street, just…watching.”
“You went for a walk and got a coffee from Josie’s and walked home?” Lily didn’t look convinced as she summarized the last two mornings. “And then today, you see him again.”
“You’re making it sound like I’m overreacting,” I muttered, straightening up as Peter and Lorna walked over to join us.
My best friend wasn’t one for pulling her punches. “Because I think you are. We live in a small town. We have lots of tourists who come here to hike and walk . You live a few streets over from Main Street where all the stores are and where the coffee gets sold. Especially to someone who may be camping.”
“So…you think it’s a coincidence?” I saw her nod and I thought of my brief conversation with him this morning. “When I spoke to him, he said he hadn’t been watching me.”
“Well, duh. Even if he is a serial killer, he isn’t going to admit it.” Lily saw my what-the-fuck look and shrugged it off. “Girl, I said it was probably a coincidence; I didn’t say don’t trust your gut.”
“You girls okay?”
We both turned to Lorna as she took her seat. Lorna was a woman in her fifties, her two kids were in college, and she had severe empty nest syndrome. She’d signed up for art classes to get her out of the house before she drove her and her husband to divorce. That was what she’d told me when she came in for the first lesson. She’d also signed up for Zumba classes, and baking classes at the community center, and I was sure I heard her tell Lily she was thinking of learning Spanish.
Going from a mom supporting two kids who had full extracurricular activities to a stay-at-home mom with no one to rely on her had been a culture shock she wasn’t prepared for. Now she was filling up her days with classes, learning skills she hadn’t had time to learn when she had her kids at home.
I’d learned all that from her within the first five minutes of meeting her. Within the first three, I knew what she wasn’t saying: she was lonely. Lorna was also one of the sweetest women I’d ever met. Terrible painter, but she gave it her all and enjoyed it, and that was all that mattered.
“All good, Lorna,” I told her with a smile. “How was the weekend?”
Lily huffed but said nothing else as I turned my attention from the mysterious stranger to my two students, well, three if you included Lily.
The morning flew by. I’d bought some wildflowers from the market over the weekend, and I had them arranged in a vase for my students to draw for this lesson. Still art was an acquired practice. So many thought it was about replicating what was in front of you. Many forgot that it was an interpretation of what you saw. I walked amongst the three easels now and again, giving pointers and admiring their efforts.
Lorna, straight and true, saw nothing but the flowers. Her brow creased with concentration as she did her best to match the shade of the paint on her palette to the color of the wildflowers.
Peter, middle-aged and slightly too generous with his hugs, concentrated more on the effect of light and shadow than the flowers themselves, creating a more sinister effect than I think he was hoping for.
Lily…well, Lily had drawn two stick figures holding hands. “What is that?” I asked, fighting my smile as I pointed at the odd-shaped square in one of the figure’s hands.
“Picnic basket.” Her tone betrayed her disappointment that I hadn’t guessed that.
“Mm-hmm. And the flowers you’re supposed to be concentrating on?”
She gave me a flat stare. “I’m setting the scene! The flowers will come later.”
“Of course.” Going back to my seat, I hid my laughter. She didn’t need to come here. She had no interest in drawing or painting—she told me that herself—but she liked the quiet, and the fact I only had two paying customers made me her very own charity case. Lily’s father owned the lumber mill just outside of town, and another three in the state. He was quite happy that his daughter didn’t want to rush into finding a job after four years of college. He said she’d find something eventually.
My classes were twenty dollars for two hours, three times a week. I wasn’t breaking anyone’s bank with the cost of my classes, a fact Mr. Summers, Lily’s father, liked to remind me of every time he saw me.
An entrepreneur I was not, but it paid towards my mortgage, so there was that.
Sitting back on the seat, I looked at my sketch pad. His face stared back at me. The wildflowers were no more a part of my sketch than they had been in Lily’s.
He was a strikingly handsome man with a rugged yet sophisticated appearance. I knew exactly why Lily had called him Hotcakes . With long golden-blond hair that was pushed back from his face, cut to just below his ears, he had an effortlessly windswept look. His skin had a warm, sun-kissed tone, suggesting an active, outdoor lifestyle, which made sense that he was here in this town. He was most likely a hiker. The trails up the Rockies would appeal to him, I had no doubt. His strong jawline was accentuated by a thick layer of stubble that added to his masculine appeal, and his deep brown eyes were warm and intense, so dark they reminded me of high-quality dark chocolate.
Broad shoulders hinted at the strength that lay under his simple neutral-colored shirt. He was definitely eye-catching. Sitting back, I considered his portrait as I thought about what Lily had said. He was good-looking. It would be easy to believe that I’d been the one watching him , yet even as I stared at his lifeless portrait, I could feel the sense of something from him that I’d yet to put a name to.
His overall demeanor had been confident and charming, but he had shared nothing with me, not even his name, and I frowned as I considered the art in front of me. Did that sense of mystery add to his allure? I recalled the way he had spoken when he’d called me conceited.
He also called me desperate and pathetic.
I was glaring at his portrait now. Maybe the air of mystery I had created around him had erased my memory of him being charming .
Squinting at his picture, I tilted my head slightly. No, something was missing from this. It looked like him, but it wasn’t him . How I knew that, I wasn’t sure. Yet I knew something was lacking.
Taking my sketch pad off the easel, I turned to a new fresh page, quickly sketching the flowers in front of me. No good would come of sketching the handsome, arrogant man. A man who I knew was watching me. I was certain of it, and if I saw him again, I wouldn’t confront him; I would do what I should have done to start with and avoid him.
Confrontation wasn’t my style. I’d surprised myself this morning when I approached him. It was so out of character.
Gritting my teeth, I scolded myself for thinking about him. Again .
Glancing at the clock, I reminded my students that they had thirty minutes left in class, and I gave the vase in front of me my undivided attention for the next twenty minutes.
As Peter and Lorna said goodbye, Lily helped me tidy the store.
“It’s better than yoga,” she told me with a smile as she stacked the easels. “I get more zen playing at nothing than I do in the warrior position.”
“You love yoga,” I reminded her. Her comment about playing at nothing , I chose to ignore .
“Who doesn’t like yoga?”
Me. The uncoordinated.
“What are your plans for the rest of the day?” I asked instead.
Lily toed her sneaker as she avoided looking at me. “I know it’s a ploy, I know it is, but dad left the account ledgers on the kitchen counter when he left this morning.”
Grinning, I watched her try not to squirm. “Ahh, that old trick,” I teased.
Exasperated, she threw her hands in the air. “He knows I’m going to look at them, I know I’m going to look at them, but does he ask me to look? No. I’ll balance his books, and he won’t mention it, and then we’ll do the whole dance again in a month.”
“Why don’t you just take his job offer?”
“Because then I’m the girl who could only get a job working for her dad!” she wailed.
“But you want to work for him,” I countered reasonably.
“But he doesn’t need to know that, Willow!”
Shaking my head, I switched the store computer on. “You two make my head hurt. You did accounting at college, you want to be a bookkeeper, he wants you to be his bookkeeper, you get along great—I don’t understand why you aren’t working at the mill.”
Lily groaned loudly. “Because then he has all the power.”
“He’s your dad.” Rubbing my forehead tiredly, I met her sullen frown. “You both confuse me,” I admitted. “If my dad were here, I’d jump at the chance to work with him every day.”
Lily snorted. “You don’t even know who your parents are. For all you know, he could be some child-abusing alcoholic and is probably dead or in jail.” Her snort turned to a disdainful sniff. “You told me you were found outside a church in a cardboard box. Abandoned. Why would you want to know those people? They left you.”
She would never understand. She had her father, a man who doted on her. Her mother had left them both a long time ago after a sordid affair with her father’s best friend, and while I knew her mom had tried to reach out a few times to Lily, her efforts had been in vain. Lily Summers was the most caring person on the planet until you wronged her, or her dad, and then God help you because she didn’t believe in forgiveness for betrayal.
But still, Lily knew where she came from. Despite her relationship with her mom, she still knew her.
I didn’t have that knowledge regarding my birth parents. I’d spent my life in an orphanage until I was ten. Then I was fostered by a nice couple, who kept me until I was sixteen. They died in a car crash, and I was back in the foster care system, spending time in three different homes until I hit eighteen.
My original foster parents had left me a sizable sum when they passed, which had taken seven years to pass through the legal system when my “aunt” had contested the will. It was with their money I’d bought my home, a simple two-bed bungalow, in a small town at the foot of a mountain, surrounded by fresh air.
A fresh start in a new town.
One where I was surrounded by nature and felt at peace. I’d met Lily in my first week, and we’d hit it off. In her way, Lily had adopted me more solidly than any foster parent before her, and when days were hard and I struggled to get out of bed, Lily was the one who made sure I was taken care of.
It was the knowledge that I had of how loyal she was as a friend that made me not start the old disagreement about the reasons why I was left. Instead, I simply listened as she listed the reasons why working for her dad was a bad idea.
When she was gone, I found myself back at the sketch pad, the page turned to the stranger’s portrait.
Unease sat low in my belly as I stared. He was so familiar, but I knew I’d never seen him before the market on Saturday.
“What mystery do you hold?” I asked the sketch, my finger trailing over his jawline, imagining the feel of his short beard under my finger. “And why do you scare me?”
The sketch had no answers, and as I closed the cover, I knew I had none either.