she answered.
“Great place.” His tone was a tad sarcastic, unusual for him. Probably a sign that he was getting wound up about things.
“It’s not so bad. I’ve been in worse.” Then she laughed quietly. “But your cabin was nicer.”
He managed a chuckle in response, but the difficulty of producing it was another warning. Okay, so his isolation was about to be disturbed in a couple of ways. His days of communing with the woods were going to be disrupted, thank you very much, Buddy.
He stifled a sigh for fear Sky might misinterpret it.
“Okay,” he said. “I said I’d give you a radio. Keep it with you all the time, especially when you’re in the forest. I want you to promise me that if anything feels even the least bit wrong you’ll radio me.”
“I can do that.” She paused. “You are at REDCON Three.”
“I’m rapidly getting there.”
“Because of me?”
Yeah, because of her. She threw another factor into the Buddy equation, and he was already unhappy with that. “It’s Buddy,” he said, which was at least partially true. “He’s acting out of character. I’m not going to be entirely easy until I know what’s happening over there.”
“I can help with that.”
He almost jammed on the brakes. “Sky, stay out of it. Nobody knows the dimensions of the problem, or if there’s a real threat. Nobody. It’s not your responsibility. Don’t get in the middle.”
“I’m not going to turn tail. I’m not going to do anything except paint and pay attention. But you’re sadly mistaken if you think I’d leave a comrade to face this alone.”
When had he become a comrade? Well, of course, when he’d told her he had been a marine. That was going to complicate matters, because he knew that code too well. There’d be no talking her out of this if that was the tack she was taking.
Nor could he see any way to argue with her about it. There were some things the military just stamped on your soul, and that was one of them.
Another complication.
“I won’t do anything stupid,” she assured him. “I have no desire to. But I’ll just be alert and keep my eyes out, okay? I can do that while I paint without being obvious.”
He supposed he was going to have to be content with that. But then he got to thinking about what might have set her off yesterday. If she could figure it out, that could be important. He absolutely hated the possibility that it might happen to her all alone in the woods.
“What were you thinking about yesterday morning?” he asked.
“What? Oh, you mean when...it happened?”
“Yeah. Maybe there was a trigger of some kind.”
She fell silent long enough for him to wonder if he had offended her. But eventually she spoke, just as they were reaching the outskirts of town.
“Truthfully? I seem to remember thinking how peaceful it was in the square, and how nice to be able to look at all those blank windows and closed doors and not have to wonder what was behind them.”
Blank windows and closed doors. “That may have been it,” he remarked. “Think about it.”
“Perhaps,” she said presently. “It could be. It was a funny way for my thoughts to turn, but then I’m usually busy with something and don’t pay attention. Yesterday I wasn’t busy at all.”
“I’ll tell you a secret I’ve never told anyone else.” He felt her eyes on him. “When I first got back, I couldn’t stand closed doors even inside my own apartment. It took a while.”
“Yes,” she answered quietly. “And driving. It was six months before I could drive without seeing everything on the road as a threat.”
“Yeah. I remember that, too. Once burned and all that.”
He wheeled the truck into the parking lot at the La-Z-Rest Motel, next to her car. “If you want, pack up enough stuff so you can stay overnight at the cabin. I can show you the way back later. It’s not far from where you were painting, believe it or not.”
“Thanks, I’ll think about it. Your bosses won’t give you trouble?”
“Not if I tell her first.”
He bent across her, getting a whiff of deliciously womanly scents that drove his libido into high gear. Crap. The downside of spending so much time by himself was a certain group of unsatisfied needs. But now was definitely not the time.
He pulled a radio out and handed it to her. “You’ve probably used these before.”
She looked it over. “It’s very similar to one I had in the army.”
“It’s almost identical. The government tends to buy big lots.” Despite his every resolution and all his good common sense, he couldn’t stop himself from touching the back of her hand and then squeezing her shoulder. “Keep in touch. I want to know where you are, okay?”
For an instant he saw a flash of rebellion in her face, but it vanished quickly. Evidently, she understood the sense in his request. “Will do.”
He sat with his motor idling while he watched her disappear into her motel room.
Trouble, he thought. For the first time he wondered who was going to give him the most: Sky or Buddy.
Then he put the truck in gear and backed out. Time to get to work.
* * *
Buddy watched Cap’s three guys unload nonperishable food from two box trucks into his beat-up barn. The barn would serve for now, until they finished the new cabin and its underground cellars.
What almost nobody knew was that beneath Buddy’s own cabin, over the years he’d built an underground bunker for his family. Nothing fancy, but bit by bit he’d strengthened it until it could stand against anything but a direct nuclear attack, not that he was expecting one of those here on his remote mountain.
But now Cap and his guys were joining Buddy, and that meant more food and necessarily a bigger bunker, or at least an additional one. Buddy didn’t mind. He kinda liked the way Cap thought, and he liked the control Cap exerted over his men, as he called them. They jumped to do what he said like good soldiers.
But it also gave Buddy a chance to impress Cap, because building underground on the side of a mountain had certain problems. Buddy knew how to deal with them, and Cap didn’t. So Buddy might not have an army of his own, but he was an expert in some things. That meant Cap needed him.
As the thought drifted across Buddy’s mind, he felt a quiver of unease. It had seemed like such a good idea to join forces with Cap and his group. It helped with a lot of things, like the guns, the ammo, the expense, even the food.
But on the other hand, from time to time it occurred to Buddy that Cap could just take
