dislike someone to feeling this kind of trust in less than twenty-four hours might not be a good thing. She might be falling under his legendary, lethal charm, just like everyone else.
Of course she was! Why else had she agreed to fly off into the unknown with a man who was, well, unknown?
She did touch her locket then, a reminder that even the known could become unknown, even the predictable could fail.
Before she really had time to prepare herself, the plane was rumbling along the airstrip and then it was lifting, leaving the bonds of gravity, taking flight.
Dannie was surprised, and pleasantly so, to discover she liked small airplanes better than big ones. She could watch her pilot’s face, she could feel his energy, he did not feel unknown at all. In fact, she had a sense of knowing him deeply as she watched his confident hands on the controls, as she studied his face.
He glanced at her, suddenly, and grinned.
For a second he was that boy she had seen in the photo on the beach, full of mischief and delight in life. For a second he was that football player in the other photo, confident, sure of his ability to tackle whatever the world threw at him.
Something had changed him since those photos were taken. She had not been aware he carried a burden until she saw it fall away as they soared into the infinite blue of the sky.
“You love this,” she guessed.
“It’s the best,” he said, and returned his attention to what he was doing. And she turned hers to the world he had opened up for her. A world of such freedom and beauty it could hardly be imagined. Joshua pointed out landmarks to her, explained some of the simpler things he was doing.
An hour or so later he circled a lake, the water dark denim blue, lovely cabins on spacious tree-filled lots encircling it. Wharves reached out on the water. Except for the fact it was too early in the year for people to be here, it looked like a poster for a perfect summer. Still, she was actually sorry when the flight was over.
A car waited for them at the end of the runway, and introductions were made. Sally and Michael Baker were an older couple, the lines of living outdoors deeply etched in both their faces. They were unpretentious, dressed casually in jeans and lumber jackets. Dannie liked them immediately.
And she liked it that Joshua did not introduce her as a nanny, but said instead that his sister had sent her along because she didn’t trust him completely with her children!
The Bakers had that forthright and friendly way about them that made children feel instantly comfortable. Jake went into Sally’s arms eagerly.
“I think he’s been waiting all his short life to have a grandmother,” Joshua said.
“He doesn’t have a grandmother?” Sally asked, appalled.
“The kids paternal grandparents are in Australia. My mom and dad were killed in an accident when I was growing up.”
Melanie had told Dannie her parents were gone, but never the circumstances. Dannie had assumed they were older, and that they had died of natural causes. Now she wondered if that was the burden he carried, and she also noted how quickly he had revealed that to the Bakers.
There was a great deal to know about this man. But to know it was to invite trouble. Because even knowing that he’d lost his parents when he was young caused a growing softness toward him.
“That must have been very hard,” Sally clucked, her brown eyes so genuinely full of concern.
“Probably harder on my sister than me,” he said. “She was older.”
Suddenly Dannie saw Melanie’s attitude toward her brother, as if he was a kid, instead of a very successful man, in a totally different light.
Michael packed their things in the back of an SUV, and they drove toward the lake. Soon they were on a beautiful road that wound around the water, trees on one side, the lake, sparkling with light, on the other.
Then they came into a clearing. A beautiful, ancient log lodge was facing the lake at one end of it, gorgeous lawns and flower beds sweeping down to the sandy shores. Scattered in on the hill behind it were tiny log cabins of about the same vintage.
“It’s beautiful,” Dannie breathed. More than beautiful. Somehow this place captured a feeling: summer laughter, campfires, water games, children playing tag in the twilight.
A children’s playground was on part of the huge expanse of lawn before the beach, and Susie began squirming as soon as she saw it.
“Is that a tree fort?” she demanded. “I want to play!”
Sally laughed. “Of course you want to play. You’ve been cooped up in a plane. Why don’t I watch the kids at the park, while Michael helps you two get settled?”
Dannie expected some kind of protest from Susie, but there was none. As soon as the car door opened, she bolted for the playground.
Michael and Joshua unloaded their bags, and they followed Michael up a lovely wooden boardwalk that started behind the main lodge, wound through whispering aspens, spruce and fur. The smell alone, sweet, pure, tangy, nearly took Dannie’s breath away. The boardwalk came to a series of stone stairs set in the side of the hill, and at the top of that was the first of about a dozen cabins that looked through the trees to the glittering surface of the lake.
The cabin had a name burned on a wooden plaque that hung above the stairs to the porch.
Angel’s Rest.
There were a pair of rocking chairs on the covered, screened-in front porch. The logs and flooring were gray with age, the chinking and the trim around the paned window was painted white. A window box was sadly empty. Dannie could imagine bright red geraniums blooming there. A worn carpet in front of a screen door said Welcome.
Michael opened the door, which squeaked outrageously and somehow only added to the rustic charm. He set their bags inside.
It occurred to her she and Joshua were staying together, under the same roof. Why was it different from how staying under the same roof had been last night?
The cabin was smaller, for one thing, everything about it more intimate than the posh interior of Joshua’s apartment. This was a space that was real. The decades of laughter, of family, soaked right into the cozy atmosphere.
“This is our biggest cabin,” Michael said. “There’s two bedrooms down and the loft up. Sometimes the kids sleep on the porch on hot nights, though it’s not quite warm enough for that, yet.”
“How wonderful there’s a place left in the world where it’s safe enough for the kids to sleep out on an unlocked porch,” Dannie said.
Michael nodded. “My daughter and her kids usually take it for the whole summer, but—” He stopped abruptly and cleared his throat. “Dinner is at the main lodge. See you there around six. There’s always snacks available in the kitchen if you need something before then.”
And then he closed the door and left them.
Alone.
The cabin was more than quaint, it was as if it was a painting entitled Home. There were
