She couldn’t interfere.
Just because she was fascinated…
Just because she was cursed…
Claire made a scoffing sound as she reached the bottom of the hill and slowed to make her turn. The story of Valentina was no more than a colorful fable to tell the guests. The Bel Vista publicity department would eat it up. They might even market it. Valentina soaps, candles, sachets. Valentina postcards. Cliff-side tours. Maybe even a Valentina reenactment every year on the fateful wedding date.
It would be awful. But they’d make money. And so would the town. Emmie and Toivo would be well paid for the marketing rights to their family name, if they had the foresight not to sell them along with the house.
Would they? The question gnawed at Claire, a good sign that she was already too involved in these people’s lives. She was supposed to swoop in, gather information, make a report and then leave the negotiations to the corporation. No need to start worrying about the aftermath.
Her gut cramped. Oh, dear. Some executive she made.
Deliberately, she focused her thoughts on the town. It was much as she’d envisioned last night—quaint and picturesque, the old brick buildings softened by spring flowers and the bursting foliage of mature trees. A number of businesses had opened their doors, but the downtown area wasn’t very busy aside from the occasional pedestrian and a few cars and other vehicles crisscrossing the intersection. Alouette businesspeople would likely welcome the increased tourist traffic of an aggressively marketed B and B inn. It wasn’t only the Whitakers she should think about. If she recommended that Bel Vista buy Bay House, it could turn out to be a boon to the town as a whole.
Uh-huh. So why did that feel like a justification?
She didn’t relax until she reached the desolate county road. The soothing quiet and the fresh green promise of spring spoke to her. In the dark, the forest had seemed foreboding. Now it was bright and alive…but all the same.
She drove slowly, looking for familiar landmarks. A tree was a tree was a tree. Coming from the opposite direction made it even more difficult to tell them apart.
She continued on to the Buck Stop, planning to turn and retrace her route. When she pulled into the sparse gravel parking lot, bumping across ruts worn into the dirt, she saw a woman lounging beside the crooked screen door, smoking a cigarette beneath a Live Bait sign. Would that be Wild Rose Robbin? The one Noah saw regularly? She was about medium height, a lighter weight than Claire but built sturdily. A strong woman. Or maybe that was the attitude she projected, even though half her face was hidden behind an unruly mop of dark hair.
Claire parked. She shut off the engine, then hesitated, wondering how she should approach the stranger, who was looking at her unfamiliar car with some suspicion.
The woman took a deep drag, dropped her cigarette and snubbed it out beneath her heel. Instead of leaving it, she stooped and picked up the crushed butt, exhaling twin plumes of smoke through her nostrils. She ambled toward the car. “Can I help you?”
Claire rolled down her window. “Maybe. Are you, um, Rose?”
The woman cocked her head to one side. “Wild Rose, yup.” She scraped back her tousled jet-black hair, revealing a face that was not as old and ravaged as Claire had expected. As if an employee had to be as run-down as the business—Claire scolded herself.
Wild Rose had a hard face, though. Her expression was sober and reserved, and her narrowed dark eyes had the weariness of one who’d seen it all. And maybe done it all, too.
Claire gulped. “I was wondering…do you know Noah Saari?”
Wild Rose’s shrug was neither a confirmation nor a denial.
“I met him last night,” Claire said, uncomfortable with the other woman’s scrutiny. She’d dressed casually this morning, in pants, a sweater and the trim suede jacket, but she was still bandbox perfect in comparison to Wild Rose’s disheveled hair, loose plaid shirt and scruffy, threadbare jeans. Rose’s boots were like Noah’s, built for rugged use, whereas Claire had on a pair of expensive black leather ankle boots with stacked high heels. You wouldn’t know to look at her that she’d grown up in T-shirts, shorts and flip-flops. In her years away from Florence, she’d forgotten—purposely, she supposed—how to dress for the country.
Wild Rose hadn’t responded.
“He helped me get my car out of the ditch,” Claire prompted.
“Mmm.”
“I, uh, thought maybe you’d seen him this morning. He might have mentioned me? It seems I lost my purse, and I was hoping….” Claire let her voice trail off. She didn’t know what she was hoping. That Noah had found her purse and dropped it off at the Buck Stop, or that he’d been so awed by their meeting that he’d emerged from his lengthy hibernation to seek her out?
“Noah doesn’t come by that often.”
“But he was here last night.” Claire remembered the small brown paper parcel tucked inside his belt.
Wild Rose’s mouth pursed. “He had a craving.”
Thoughtful, Claire drew her teeth across her bottom lip. She really did not need to get involved in that. Her father hadn’t been a drunk or anything, but he’d tippled frequently enough that it had contributed toward his all-around laziness. Sam Levander’s name had been on the sign, but it was his no-nonsense wife who’d run the family’s thriving gas station and repair shop, leaving Claire to manage domestic duties.
“Does he live close by?”
Wild Rose folded her arms, one hand cupped around the cigarette butt. “Why’re you asking?”
“I’m Claire Levander, from Chicago. Here on…business. I’m staying at Bay House. I ask because I lost my purse, as I said, and I thought possibly Noah had found it.”
“He’ll return it if he did.”
“He doesn’t know who I am.”
“Does now.”
“Oh.” Claire blinked. “All right. Thank you.” She didn’t move.
“Anything else?” Wild Rose prompted.
“I’m—no.” She could hardly ask this taciturn woman about Noah’s past. Or his scars. “Thank you,” she repeated. “I’ll be on my way.”
Wild Rose nodded. She walked away, tossing the butt into a rusty trash can beside the door, then turning to look as another car pulled into the parking lot, spitting gravel as it braked hard. Wild Rose’s expression twisted and she fled inside, letting the screen door bang shut behind her.
Claire watched as the fair-complected man she recognized as the Whitakers’ next-door neighbor emerged from the black BMW. Lindstrom was the name. He glanced at her and she smiled, almost reflexively, feeling wary. He looked presentable enough, expensively dressed and good-looking in a conventional, slightly flabby way. Home in Chicago, her friends would have probably voted that this one was more her type than Noah Saari. But there was a sour air about the man that made her uneasy. As if he’d gone soft and rotten at the core.
Lindstrom stopped, leaning
