that. “Put ’em down. You’re in Montana now. I can’t let a woman do the heavy work while I watch.”
“Isn’t that a little chauvinist?”
“Maybe where you’re from, but I call it doing the right thing.” He crossed over Mary’s lawn. “Besides, you don’t know where you’re going.”
“Uh, how about into the house?”
“So you think.” What was a guy to do? “It’s one thing to have an independent streak, it’s another to let a man stand around gettin’ lazy.”
That made her smile and he liked this because her shyness faded away and her unique loveliness shone.
“One thing I don’t approve of is a lazy man.” Amusement warmed the violet of her eyes. “I suppose I should put you to work and keep you respectably useful.”
“Exactly. It’s for the greater good.”
She lowered the bags with a thud at his feet.
“Mary has the carriage house ready for you, out back.” He got a good grip on the crackled handles of the bags and heaved. “Are there rocks in here? Weights? Or really big shoes?”
“Books.”
That explained it. He’d noticed the backpack. “Are you a student?”
“Yep. Classes start in three weeks.”
She was a little old for a college girl, although she might be putting herself through. That could slow a student down, working full-time and juggling classes. He should have noticed the little details. Her car was twenty-years-old and if he’d described it as having had seen better days, he would have been kind. She was as neat as a pin, but her clothes were simple and not exactly designer. Her flip-flops were wearing thin. And then there was the backpack—typical student ware.
Curious, he led the way along the path curving around the house. “What’s your major?”
“I’m finishing up a master’s in business. Hey, don’t look so surprised.”
“You want to be a businesswoman?”
“A lot of people do. Why?”
How did he say it? “For some reason I figured, since you lived in L.A.—”
“That you thought I’d be like my mom and want to be an actress.” Hurt shadowed her eyes and dimmed her smile.
“Hey, I didn’t mean any insult.”
“I get that a lot.” She shrugged one slim shoulder, as if it were no big deal.
Caleb figured it was. There was something about her, something he still couldn’t put his finger on. But there was a lot to like about her.
“Oh, there are the horses.” She changed the subject as they circled around the side of the house. “I hope the gate is secure.”
“I roped it up good. It’s gotten to be a sort of game to Malia. She’s smart, I’ve got to give her credit for that. I’ll have to order a new latch and hope it’s the one she won’t be able to figure out. Thanks for your help back there. If you hadn’t driven the truck back, right now I’d be walking in the hot sun to fetch it. Would you like something to cool you off?”
Suddenly his voice sounded distant and tinny. What was happening? Lauren’s feet froze in place at the top of the walk. Emotion spun through her, unnamed and misty, like fog rolling in with the Pacific’s tides. Was it a memory of the past? Or the wish for one?
“Are you okay?” Caleb stopped, reversed and came to stand in front of her. His big shadow fell across her and it felt oddly intimate. “You’re pale all of a sudden.”
“I just…I think I remember this place.”
It was there, just beyond her reach, an image she couldn’t bring into focus. It remained fuzzy, hidden by the mist of twenty years, but it was there. A voice she couldn’t hear, a faint scent of apples and cinnamon. Leaves rustling through the trees and a feeling she couldn’t pin down that remained cloaked in fog.
The hint of memory disappeared, leaving her empty and alone. Her heart ached with loss and she didn’t know why.
“It doesn’t seem like a very good memory.”
Caleb’s voice surprised her. For a moment it was as if she were alone in the dappled sunlight. But he was there, towering so close he filled her field of vision.
“Why don’t you sit down,” he suggested, “right here out of the sun.”
There was something in his words, something kind and unexpected. Caleb Stone took her arm, his strong hand cupping her elbow, and guided her. She sank onto the bottom step on the porch, shaded by the house and the overhead trees.
Caleb’s hand moved to her shoulder. A comforting gesture. He clearly thought she was ill. “It’s over a hundred in the shade. This mountain air is so dry, you dehydrate before you know it. I kept you out in the sun too long.”
Her chest twisted so tight, she couldn’t answer. She didn’t think it was the heat and sun that was affecting her so much. It was the past and this reaction was something she hadn’t expected. She hadn’t come here to dredge up hurt. No, she’d come out of curiosity. She wanted to know where she’d come from. Who she was. Maybe that would help her figure out better where she was headed in life.
“You stay right here.” His big fingers squeezed once, gentle and soothing, sending a rush of peace through her troubled heart. “I’ll be right back.”
His boots knelled against the wood steps and the wraparound porch. A screen door squeaked open somewhere at the side of the house.
The pressure in her chest increased. Was she upset by this stranger’s kindness? Or from memories, unseen and without shape, remembered in her heart? And why? Why had it always remained a blank? Mom refused to talk about the past. Refused to say if there were any siblings, a father, cousins, aunts and uncles, grandparents left behind. People that might have mattered to her.
Caleb’s steps approached her from behind with an easygoing cadence. She heard ice tinkling in a glass. “Here.”
She stared at the tall glass of lemonade he offered. The scent was bright and sour-sweet as he lowered the glass into her hand.
“You’re still not looking too well. Did you drive straight through?”
She shook her head. Took the glass. Stared at the lemony goodness. Here was the edge of that memory. She tasted the lemonade and already knew the flavorful and sweet-tart taste before it hit her tongue. Frustrated, she wished there was more to her recollection.
“You rest here. Rehydrate.” Caleb rose. He remained behind her, out of her sight, but his presence was substantial all the same. “I’ll take your bags out to the carriage house.”
It had been a long time since anyone had helped her. “Thanks, Caleb.”
“Sure thing.” Then he was gone, leaving her
