Page 11 of A Family Affair: The Cabin
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Pete Finnegan liked the woods, his English pointer, dark ale, and a meal that could be made with one pan. The simple life, his mother called it, and he agreed. But the life he’d left four months ago hadn’t been simple, and it certainly hadn’t involved woods, an ale, or a simple meal. Nope. That life had been all about glitz, glamour, and keeping his soon-to-be fiancée happy. If he’d taken a deep breath and looked around, he would have seen he didn’t belong in a city any longer, no less a city where people were directed and redirected like cattle. Forget names or faces and to hell with common courtesy. Above all, do not make eye contact. No idle chit-chat either. Who cared why the cashier wore a sling on his right arm or the young boy limped. And if the attendant who’s been parking the car for two months straight doesn’t show up for a week, don’t ask. Not. Your. Problem. And it sure as hell wasn’t your business.
But Pete had grown up in Magdalena, been surrounded by people who made it their business to know about busted arms, limps, and anything else that involved a town resident. If anybody had turned up missing—with Magdalena’s definition of missing, which was unavailable for longer than a two-hour stretch—there’d be a plan of action in place involving a search party headed by the police departmentandvolunteers. Residents didn’t fool around, especially in the winter, when snow, ice, and frigid temperatures could threaten a person’s life.
He’d been gone from Magdalena fifteen years, but he’d never forgotten the closeness of the town, bordering on what he’d called nosy. At twenty, he’d wanted people to stay the hell out of his business. That included his parents, especially his father, but Jack Finnegan wasn’t about to sit by and watch his son cause embarrassment to the Finnegan household. Okay, so maybe underage drinking at “Dave’s Happy Hour” in Renova hadn’t been a good move, and maybe Pete’s temper had gotten the best of him, but he’d been twenty friggin’ years old. A kid. Did his old man really have to force his hand?You want to be one of them free spirits, on your own with not a single soul to answer to, huh? You think that’s life? You think that’s what will happen when you head to California? Huh?Go on, pack up your bag and go, Mr. Unconventional.Go save a tree and grow a ponytail. See where that gets you.
Pete’s mother hadn’t wanted him to leave, had told him years later a piece of her heart broke off the day he drove the old jeep out of Magdalena, but he’d been determined to prove his father wrong.
And he had.
Seems he had a talent for spotting run down real estate that could be turned into lucrative property with a little work and a lot of vision. There’d been big payouts. Huge, in fact. By twenty-six, Pete had enough cash to travel the country in a private plane, trade out the jeans for custom suits, buy a place with an ocean-front view, and accumulate more friends than a football stadium. The women came along, too, blonds, brunettes, redheads.
It was a wild time.
It was fun and dangerous, and as the years rolled by, Pete’s obsession to be the best consumed him.Thatwas the beginning of his downfall. One gigantic, risk-heavy deal, that was more about winning than strategy, failed and stole everything. Gone were the houses, the cars, the vacation spots. The friends. The woman he planned to marry. Heather. She’d trailed her slender hand along his jaw, placed the softest kiss on his mouth, and told him she wasn’t equipped to live a life of want and worry, one without money. And then she was gone.
Everybody and everything he’d identified with evaporated in the span of forty-six days. There were no more deals to be made, no boardroom handshakes or late-night drinks. Pete’s arrogance and belief thathe could notfail proved his greatest failure.
He’d just turned thirty-five. For the next four months, he traveled to places like Oregon, Utah, Colorado, stopping long enough to earn a little cash to keep the old truck he’d picked up running. What he’d once earned in minutes with the click of a button would now take him days, and involved mucking stalls, carrying wood, building and staining fences. But he did it; he did it all because the work was honest, the sweat was real, and when he closed his eyes at night, he was too damn tired to think about regrets.
He’d landed in Magdalena last month, driving in the same as he’d driven out…angry, broke, and determined to find a way out of the mess he’d created. Yeah, he’d sure made a name for himself, but one look at the townsfolk told him they thought the stories about his great success out west were more fiction than fact. Who could blame them? When a thirty-five-year-old limps home in an old truck and moves into the room where he grew up, that doesn’t spell success.
Nate Desantro had hired him to fix up a cabin and that meant time alone without questions or judgments. Nothing but woods and solitude. Pete spotted the cabin, pulled the truck off the road onto the gravel driveway. Why was there a car with Illinois license plates parked near the front door?Illinois? What the hell?He pushed aside thoughts of his sorry-ass life and hopped out of the truck. If somebody was poking around inside, maybe taking up squatter’s rights on property that didn’t belong to him, well, Pete was not going to sit by and let it happen. Nate wanted him to get the place ready to sell and that’s what he planned to do. After all, he’d given his word and while it might not stand for much out west, in this part of the country, it still meant something.
He made his way to the compact car, peeked inside. Nice and neat, no food wrappers, napkins, scraps of paper…no socks, hats, tennis shoes…nothing but a string of red and gray beads dangling from the rearview mirror. If he had a guess, he’d say the car belonged to a woman and the woman was a neat freak. Pete glanced at the driveway and the grass surrounding the cabin. If the snow were still on the ground, there’d be a better chance of tracking the intruder’s comings and goings. But spring had come early and the rains hadn’t kicked in like he remembered they used to after a long winter. He tried to open the car door, but it was locked, a sign that the intruder was not only neat, but careful.
Pete reached in his jeans pocket, dug out the key to the cabin, and headed toward the steps. Some people might call the cops if they suspected someone had moved into their vacant place, but not him. He’d rather figure out the lay of the land before he made any quick judgments or took action. It could be a young kid, hitchhiking and down on his luck, or a couple playing house, or an old man who had no place to go and no family. He fit the key in the lock, eased the door open with a creak.
The first thing he noticed was the smell. Not musty air or staleness as he’d anticipated, but blueberries and butter. The next thing he noticed was the orange and green bag on the end of the couch with knitting needles and a skein of yarn poking out. Candles on the coffee table…a pack of matches…
Who the hell was staying here and why?Paperbacks lay stacked on the other end of the couch. He counted seven. A notebook with a rose glued on the cover sat beside them. No television. Imagine that? He guessed life did exist without televisions and remote controls. Pete followed the blueberry-butter smell to the next room, which must serve as a dining area where a single place setting with a knife, two types of forks, and a spoon rested on a wooden table. A bouquet of greenery had been plunked in a water glass and tied with a pink ribbon.
This was definitely a woman’s handiwork, which meant the intruder was either a woman on her own, or part of a couple. When Pete reached the kitchen, he found the source of the blueberry-butter scent. Twelve blueberry muffins with sugar-cinnamon crumble tops lined the cooling racks. The dishes were washed and drying on a towel. He moved to the stove, lifted the lid on the large pot, sniffed. How long had it been since he’d eaten a bowl of vegetable soup? Ten years? Longer? He guessed the last time was when he left Magdalena, fifteen years ago. Pete grabbed a spoon from the utensils on the drying towel, dipped it in the soup, and tasted. Just like his mother used to make…
“What are you doing?”
He swung around, spoon in hand, and came face to face with the intruder. A woman. She had chestnut hair, hazel eyes, and lots of curves. A beautiful woman. The most dangerous kind.
“What are you doing?” she repeated, her voice clipped, eyes narrowing on the spoon in his hand.
Pete set the spoon on the counter, rubbed his jaw. “Good job on the soup. You know, I’m wondering the same thing myself. What areyoudoing?”
She yanked out her cell phone, held it up, and spat out, “I’m going to call the police and report you for trespassing.”
That was a good one. She was going to reporthim. Pete crossed his arms over his chest and stared her down. “Go ahead. I’m supposed to be here.” He gave her the look he’d perfected years ago, the one that made people nervous. Not this one. She kept that hazel gaze trained on him and lied.
“You’re trespassing on my property.”
Great. A beautiful womananda liar. “You sure about that? I saw the Illinois license plates on the car…” Let her weasel out of that one.
“Is it against the law to have a vacation spot in another state?” She let out the tiniest huff, clutched her phone, and snarled, “You need to leave or I swear, Iwillcall the police.”
“Uh-huh.” Pete scratched his chin, debated his next words. The woman was lying, but why? She appeared to be alone. Was she on the run from someone or something? Did he care? He’d been sent to do a job and all he wanted was a little peace and quiet while he tried to figure out what he was going to do with the rest of his life. A thirty-five-year-old shouldn’t have to crawl home and ask for his old room back, but that’s what had happened, and it wasn’t pleasant. In fact, it sucked, and it was all on him. His old man hadn’t said a word, just eyed him up and down, nodded, and tossed a house key his way, reminding him to lock the door when he came and went.
“Mister, do you hear me? This is my place and you have to leave.”
Maybe he should tell her the truth, but that seemed too easy. He’d rather let her dig herself deeper before he blew the lies apart. Besides, he was hungry and vegetable soup and a blueberry muffin or two made his stomach rumble. “A man hired me to fix up the place and get it ready to sell.”
