by Nicole Snow
“Can we have one, Daddy?”
“Please?”
I bite my tongue to keep from answering. We've had enough kids at the lodge to teach me a thing or two. Whether I like it or not, it’s never my place to get between a guest and their children.
Cagey, like a trapped beast, he walks towards the table, keeping his eyes on me. I don’t move, not even a step when he stops close enough to lift the lid off the plate of sandwiches. I'm not about to let him know he’s frightened me, but I do get a whiff of his cologne. That has me biting the inside of my cheek. Damn if he doesn’t smell as good as he looks.
Another suspicious look from his haunting eyes breaks the spell.
Clinging to the good sense God gave me, I say, “Again, sir, I wasn’t sneaking around. I’m not trying to poison you, either. Whenever guests check in after meal time, we provide them with an evening snack.” He doesn't look convinced. “Try it. Simple. Delicious. Yummy.”
He doesn’t respond, but picks up half a sandwich and takes a bite before nodding to the boys.
You're welcome, jerk, I think to myself. Some people.
The boys each take a cupcake and as they peel back the paper holders, I open the two cartons of milk and insert the straws Marcy included on the tray.
Then I pour him a cup of tea, using the hot water provided. “I can make you coffee if you’d prefer. It's instant, but it's not half bad.”
“No, this is fine.”
He’s still grumpy, but his voice has lost some of its growl.
I hand each of the boys a milk carton, who both have pink frosting mustaches by now. “My name's Tabby.”
“My name's Adam.”
“I’m Chase, and daddy...” The second sweet boy pauses, his eyes going big as he looks at his father.
“Rex,” he growls. My sinfully handsome porcupine has a normal name. Small relief.
“Well, I’m happy to meet you, Adam and Chase.” I purposefully don’t extend my welcome to Grumpy. “I hope you’ll have fun here at the Grand Pine Lodge.”
“Do you live here?” the one I think is Adam asks.
“Yes, I do, and I work here, too. So, if there's anything you need, just ask.”
“Like more cupcakes?” Chase asks hopefully.
My first instinct is to say yes, but I hold back. “That would be up to your father...”
His eyes, as cold as ever, are on me. Not my face, but my sweater. It might be because it’s the same color of pink as the frosting on the cupcakes and his sons' faces, but I doubt that.
Chills criss-cross my spine. My poor battered heart beats faster. It's like he can see right through the heavy wool. My nipples tingle, harden, adding to my shame.
Why? I’ve been hit on by men three times my age and boys alike, but I’ve never had this reaction.
“I think one’s enough,” he says. “You each eat a sandwich now and drink your milk.”
I grab the menu off the tray before my mind, and body, reacts to how kind and gentle he suddenly sounds. “How long will you be staying?”
He picks up the tea and drinks it down before answering. “Just a few days.”
“Well, here’s the menu for the next three days. You can either have your meals delivered to your room or eat in the dining room. We’re small, so the meal times are also listed, however, we can provide sandwiches and other items all day.”
“And cupcakes?” Adam beams like the sun.
I can’t help but smile. I used to dream of having children as adorable as these two, but it'll never happen. Reality and the roots I've laid down here go deep. I'll have to just enjoy the kids who visit the lodge. There aren’t many men out there willing to give up their lives in order to help manage a place in the middle of nowhere. The few who might think they're willing would soon change their minds. This is a twenty-four hour, three-hundred and sixty-five day job, that also includes one very grumpy old man. My life has no place for children.
Besides, this is a small town. Split Harbor's dating pool isn't exactly extensive or quality. One very lucky lady already landed the resident billionaire a couple years ago.
“More cupcakes?” Chase echoes.
Touching the tip of Adam’s nose, I say, “Some days it’s cookies.”
“I love cookies!” Chase yells.
“I like cupcakes more,” Adam says.
“Well, then, I guess I’ll have to make both, won’t I? Cookies and cupcakes. I like staying busy.” I wink at them before turning back to their father and hand him the menu. As he takes it, I get another whiff of that amazing cologne mingled with his scent. It’s faint, but intoxicating and very good at making heat swirl deep inside me. The sandwich must have done him some good because he’s no longer scowling. He’s no longer quite as scary. His hair is darker than the boys, but I imagine when he was young it was just as sandy blond as Adam and Chase’s. He was probably as adorable as they are, too.
“Where are you from?” I'm pulling my mind back where it belongs.
He sets the menu down on the dresser. “We’ll be eating in our room, but aren’t fussy. Whatever gets brought up will be fine. Along with coffee and milk. The earlier, the better.”
I get the hint. It’s none of my business where he’s from. His clothes, jeans and a flannel shirt, could be worn in the city or country, but his accent reminds me of Russ, who is very proud of being born and raised in Chicagoland.
I should leave, but for some reason, it's hard peeling my eyes off him. I’m intrigued. Curious to know where his wife is, the boys' mother, but can’t simply blurt it out.
He’s staring back, harder than before, which has my insides tingling again in ways it shouldn’t. Ridiculous.
“Well, Cupcake,” he says slowly. It takes me a second to realize he means me. “You going to stand there all night, or let us finish eating in peace?”
Fine, whatever. I deserve that. He is a guest, after all.
Still, I’m irritated. And know I need to leave before saying something that will really piss him off. “I’m going,” I say, “but the name’s Tabby. I'd appreciate it if you'd –”
“Short for Tabitha?”
“No. Just Tabby.” I cringe a little more than I usually do, giving up my nickname masquerading as a name.
He gives me one more solid toe-to-head stare that has me holding by breath before he whips around. “Let me get the door, Cupcake.”
Nicknames. They shouldn’t irritate me the way they do, but I can’t help it.
Not when everyone always assumes Tabby is a nickname. It’s the only thing my father ever gave me – whoever he was. One among many boyfriends who came calling on mom. My throat thickens slightly as I glance towards Adam and Chase. Those two boys don’t know how lucky they are. Neither does their jackass father. I give them a small wave, walking out the door that’s being held open impatiently by daddy's huge hand.
“Goodnight, Rex,” I say, simply because he's a guest. A jerk, but a guest nonetheless, and we can’t afford to lose customers in the winter. Not even a giant asshole.
He merely shuts the door.
I huff out a breath, and though I’d like to take a moment and lean against the wall to catch my bearings, I need space pronto, so make a beeline for the stairs.
Once I’m in the hallway safely downstairs, I place a hand on the wall, taking a few deep breaths. I’ve never had a man affect me like Rex. For no apparent reason, too.
It's so perplexing anger mingles with the heat he's left in my blood. Okay, so most women would be intrigued by six feet of mystery and muscle, especially one that freakin' sexy. But it doesn't explain why I'm coming undone for a Neanderthal who just wiped his feet on my back.
Annoyed, I push myself off the wall and head for the front desk. There, I move the mouse to wake up the computer and type in the password. The main screen appears.
Rex Osborne. Blue Chevy pick-up. No license plate number listed.
No, of course not. Gramps thinks that’s a silly question even though I've warne
d him it might be important for security. Paid cash for two nights.
I log out and walk to the front door. Tall, dark, and sometimes handsome strangers are nothing new to the lodge. Insta-fascination I really shouldn't be experiencing is.
Maybe it's because our other handsome strangers come here to unwind, relieve the stress in their lives. Not this one. The man upstairs was wound tighter than a drum, and the blue pick-up backed up so it’s practically hidden beneath the trees confirms something tickling at the back of my mind since he accused me of sneaking around outside 205.
Rex Osborne is hiding something. Or maybe, he’s hiding from someone.
Either way, I want to know more. After locking the front door and turning down all the lights, and checking the kitchen, where I also leave a note for Marcy, I put on my coat and leave through the employee entrance. Rather than taking the shoveled pathway to my cabin, I walk around the lodge, to the far end of the parking lot. I'm able to get a better look at his truck from here.
Illinois plates. I knew it.
II: Settling In (Rex)
I stay hidden behind the curtain so she can’t see me. She’s already looked up at the window twice, as if sensing she was being watched, or she might just be that nosy – something that'll get her into more trouble than she’d ever bargain for.
Cupcake. I’d called her that out of defense, needing to keep my distance. Distance from everything and everyone.
Especially soft spoken girls who look as delicious as their dessert namesake. Her with the scorned looks lodged in her honey-hazel eyes. Her with the dark chocolate hair warning me it'd feel like velvet on my fingers. Her with the hips, the legs, the ass that's divine, hopelessly hidden behind her Ms. Average outfit.
Shit. I catch myself hard and shake my head, remembering she's one more problem I don't need.
How the fuck did I end up in this predicament? By fucking, that’s how. At least at the beginning.
Of all the men in the world, all the one-night stands, I’m the one who's getting royally fucked long after the fun ended. As my anger churns harder and hotter inside my guts, guilt rises to meet it. Cupcake has already walked away from the truck, back around the lodge, so I move away from the window. Stopping near the foot of one of the double beds, I stare at my twin boys
They're sleeping soundly. So innocent, so good, they almost take the edge off old mistakes.
Yeah, they came out of that one-night stand causing the present woes, too. I don’t regret that. Never will.
It’s ever screwing the bitch who bore them I regret. Should've known six years ago when I met her she was more trouble than any man needed. She’d been hot, sexy, and all over me. I'd had a hard week laying custom shingles on the roof of a frigging Senator's mansion.
I was ready to get drunk and wet my dick. We barely made it out of the bar. I fucked her in the front seat of my work truck parked in the alley. Afterwards, we’d gone back inside and partied some more, then we both left without another word.
Typical party at a watering hole on Chicago’s rust belt. I never planned on seeing her again. Nine months later, when I was served the papers about submitting a blood sample, I'd long since forgotten her name. Until reading the second page of the court document, where our history was described, vividly.
I'm no deadbeat. I gave a paternity sample, accepted the DNA results, and agreed in court we'd share visitation to Adam and Chase. Limited and supervised visitations for her. Nelia claimed she hadn’t known how to get a hold of me before the boys were born. An obvious lie. The name of my construction company, T-Rex Builders, was on the side of every work truck. Any number of people from the bar that night could've told her who I was, how to contact me.
She knew what she was doing from the start. Never attempted to get a hold of me to see the twins she abandoned, just thought I’d hand over child support, and lots of it, on a monthly basis.
She’d been dead wrong.
In more ways than one. Too fucking many to count.
And now she's dead.
Only saving grace about that is Adam and Chase didn’t even know who she was. When, if ever, they heard about her death, they wouldn’t mourn. Mommy is something they hear in fairy tales, not a fact of life.
Call me a cold-hearted bastard, but it's a small relief. Both that my sons won’t suffer her loss, and that she’s permanently out of our lives. She wasn't any type of mother to the boys the past five years, nor would she have ever changed. Didn’t have it in her.
Raising kids takes heart, and Cornelia Hawkins didn’t have a loving bone in her body, or the slightest clue what it took to be a mom.
Hell, Cupcake's already shown more affection towards the boys than Nelia ever did. Tabby, as she prefers to be called – the very reason I’ll keep calling her Cupcake – may never know how badly Adam and Chase needed those chocolate treats tonight.
Not only had they been as hungry as me, and that was a damn good sandwich, the boys needed an ounce of kindness. Two weeks of driving around, spending nights in sleazy hotels and eating greasy drive-thru burgers, was taking its toll on all of us.
If Adam hadn’t had to pee, and I hadn't pulled off on a side road to give him some privacy, I’d have never seen the faded sign advertising this place.
Grand Pine Lodge: A secluded hidden gem.
That’s what the sign said, and that's exactly what we need. Sanctuary. A couple days off the road to wrap my head around what’s happened, and what I can do about it next.
Because I’m not spending the rest of my life in jail for murder.
Fucking bitch. I knew what she was doing, but sure as hell hadn’t expected this outcome.
Worst part is, I'm not the one who killed her.
I run my hands through my hair, scratching at my scalp. It itches like hell from not being washed good and proper in a couple days. The other hotels were too run down, too caked in dirt, I'd barely had time to run my head through the sink.
This place is old, but it's actually clean. Time for a real shower. Then a good night’s sleep. I’ll be clearer headed in the morning, able to think things through.
I grab the duffel bag I purchased in some dinky roadside town and head for the bathroom.
The shower helps. Bed's comfortable, too. So I let my mind wander free while I'm waiting to fall asleep. Even crack a grin as the Cupcake's face forms in my mind. That pink sweater hugged her in all the right places, didn't it? And those eyes...they're not really hazel. I remember more.
A brownish-green with specks of gold that sparked hellfire at times. Especially when I’d asked if she was going to stand there invading our space all night. Her long hair was thick and dark brown, pulled back in a ponytail, making her look even younger. So did the way she hadn’t worn makeup. She hadn’t needed any. There was a natural beauty to her. A grace, almost. Something I haven’t seen in a woman in ages.
Chicago's full of girls with hair as colorful as rainbows and decked in cosmetics. Plenty of them are pretty, some teetering towards beautiful, but there's something about Cupcake’s naturalness that takes my mind off everything else. At least briefly.
Or maybe it's her attitude. I’d startled her, frightened her even, but the moment she’d seen the boys, she’d turned friendly and kind. Sweet as the name I've given her. That stirs up more than it ought to. Makes me wish things were different for Chase and Adam.
Hell, I wish that for myself. If Nelia was more like Cupcake, life would be pretty damn good right now. I wouldn't be in this mess. I'd be home, probably with something pink and delicious to come home to.
I like that thought, insane as it is. I drift off imagining the boys enjoying their colorful frosted cupcakes all over again.
My lungs are on fire, my breathing ragged, coming in gasps that hurt going out as much as the air burns going in. I grab my head as the spinning slows and the faint sunshine coming in the window confirms I’m not in a penthouse apartment, standing over Nelia’s dead body.
Sweat pours down my neck a
nd my hands shake as I tell myself it was only a dream. A fucking nightmare that I’ve already lived through and will continue to. Have to for Adam and Chase.
A knock at the door makes me realize that's why it ended. In the dream, Aiden had knocked on the door. That’s not what happened in real life. He’d come at me like the crazy drugged up shit-hole of a man he’d been. I’m not sorry that fucker’s dead either. Never will be.
The knock sounds again. Now, wide awake, the idea Cupcake could be outside my door has me tossing aside the covers. I grab a pair of jeans out of the duffel bag. “Coming.”
Without bothering to zip or snap the jeans I shove my legs through, I open the door. The gray-haired old man who checked us in last evening stands there with a grimace. I can't tell if it's a frown or a smile.
“Tabby’s note said you wanted breakfast early,” the man said. “If she made a mistake, I can bring it back later.”
“No,” I answer. “No mistake. Thanks.” I open the door wide enough to take the tray. “The boys are still sleeping, so I’ll grab it.” They're always starving when they wake up. As he hands me the tray, I say, “Hold on, though, I’ll get the one from last night.”
I set the tray on the table, find the one from last night, and carry it to the door. The man was hard to read, but knowing I can’t afford anymore enemies, I say, “Thanks, the boys enjoyed the cupcakes.”
“Tabby will be glad to hear it. I'll give her your compliments. You need something, just push one on the phone. That rings the front desk.”
I nod and close the door, then give myself permission to crack a smile. The phone system in the place is as horribly outdated as everything else here. Damned if I care, it's not a dump like some of the other roadside motels we’ve stayed in the past two weeks. The lodge is clean and well maintained, just old.
The building must date back to the 1950s, maybe earlier. Being the carpenter I am, I'd noticed all that when we’d checked in. The place has solid bones, and with the way it’s been kept up, it could stand for another century.