Green Fire (6 page)

As in most small towns, the post office was a cheerful meeting place for the regulars as well as visitors. It was also the center of local gossip, and Mrs. Hobson, the woman in charge of the Reed Lake post office, took her role as good-natured gossipmonger seriously. She was already waiting with avid attention to see if anything serious developed between the vacationing librarian and the wintering artist.

A casual friendship between Rani and Mike had sprung up immediately, and Rani had a hunch that if she allowed it to develop further, Mike would be more than willing. But Rani had no intention of getting too involved with an artist or a vacation romance. It wasn't the sort of thing she did. She knew where to draw the line to ensure that her safe little world stayed neat and orderly. As she bit into her overstuffed hamburger, Rani remembered Flint asking bluntly if she was sleeping with Mike. Nothing could have been farther from the truth.

"How about another try at dinner?" Mike asked, pouring ketchup on his french fries. "My treat this time. I haven't got the nerve to ask you to go to the trouble of fixing another meal after I failed to show up for the last one. There's that resort restaurant at the other end of town. The one that overlooks the lake. We could give it a try."

"Sounds great. Tomorrow evening?"

He nodded. "I'll make reservations. With all these hunters in town, we might need them."

"I doubt it. This crowd doesn't look like it dresses for dinner. These guys will be sticking to taverns and cafes, not dining at a resort. I'll be ready at six. Okay?"

"I'll clean the paint off my hands in honor of the occasion," Mike assured her.

Rani parked the Oldsmobile in the driveway of her rented house an hour later, shoved open the door and reached behind the driver's seat to pick up an armful of groceries. She was bent over, struggling with the heavy bag, when she felt a large, masculine hand settle all too casually on the small of her back, just above the waistband of her jeans.

She overreacted, her instincts telling her at once whose hand it was. "What the… ? Flint!" Her head came up too quickly, striking the roof of the car. "Ouch!"

"Are you all right?" There was genuine concern in his voice. "Here, I'll take that bag for you."

She backed hurriedly out of the way and collided with his sweat-streaked, bare chest. The fatigue sweater had apparently been long since discarded. When she glanced upward, she saw the rivulets of perspiration gathering at a point just beneath the line of his throat and trickling down through crisp, dark hair. He frowned at her as she ducked aside and then he leaned forward to pick up the bag. She wasn't really sure she wanted to know how he had received the wicked-looking old scar on his shoulder.

"Is your head okay?" Flint demanded as he straightened with the bag cradled easily in one arm. Zipp, as usual, had raced out to meet Rani and was now making himself a nuisance around her feet.

"It's fine, thank you. Just fine," she declared firmly. "Get out of my way, Zipp. Here, I can manage the bag, Flint."

"That's all right. I'll take it into the kitchen for you. How was lunch?"

"How did you know I had lunch? Have I got ketchup on my sweater or something?"

Flint shook his head, leading the way toward the front door. "I just figured you were probably meeting that guy for lunch. The one who didn't show last night."

"What amazing perception. As it happens, I'm meeting him for dinner tomorrow night, too." Rani shoved her key into the front door lock with undue energy. "Anything else you'd like to know about my schedule?"

"What are you doing for dinner tonight?"

"Dining alone," she informed him with a sugary smile. She knew what was coming and vowed silently not to let it happen. She had to put her foot down somewhere. The problem was that once you'd fed a stray cat it was damned tough to get rid of him. She should never have fed Flint Cottrell the night before.

Flint looked at the black four-wheel drive Jeep he'd arrived in the previous evening and then back down into Rani's wary eyes. "I don't think I'm going to get a chance to drive into town this afternoon. There's a lot of work around here. I won't be able to pick up any supplies."

"Really? How lucky for you that I took the liberty of picking up a few things for you."

A startled expression flashed through his eyes. "You did?"

"Uh-huh. Milk and cereal for your breakfast tomorrow morning and a frozen dinner you can pop into the oven this evening. I also picked up a six-pack of beer for you." At the time she'd selected the items in Reed Lake's small grocery store she'd been pleased with herself for keeping one step ahead of Flint. Now Rani found herself having to stifle a niggling sense of guilt.

"A TV dinner?" he asked reproachfully as he followed her into the kitchen. "You bought me a TV dinner?"

"Don't worry. From the sound of things you've been out of the country a lot during the past few years so you probably don't realize how they've changed. They're much better than they used to be. I got you fettuccine Alfredo."

"I don't go in for fancy gourmet stuff," he stated, setting the bag down on the kitchen counter with an air of challenge.

"Think of it as macaroni and cheese."

He swung around, suddenly filling her kitchen with dark, lean, male aggression. It was an aggression made all the more intimidating by his obvious self-control. "I'd rather have whatever you're having."

Rani swallowed and stood firm. "I'm afraid that's not possible. I'm eating alone tonight, Flint. Hadn't you better get back to work? I wouldn't want to keep you from your chores."

She had the distinct impression it was touch and go for a moment. Flint looked as if he were having difficulty deciding how far to push her. Then, just when she was very much afraid he was going to carry the challenge further, he picked up the six-pack of beer, and turned and stalked to the door.

Rani sank into a chair, relief overcoming her for a moment. The situation was getting outrageous. She was right to take a firm stand. She had to draw the line and make it stick because if she didn't Flint Cottrell would just keep pushing.

She had no intention of letting a man with Flint's unstable background push his way into her world.

Rani didn't know what woke her shortly before midnight. She had read until nearly eleven and had been asleep for less than an hour. There was no sense of danger, merely a feeling of something being different in the room. She lay still for a few minutes, analyzing the situation with sleepy care. Then she turned slowly on her side to peer at the curtained window. The shadowed figure of a man stood outside the glass, his solid shoulders silhouetted in the watery moonlight.

When she realized there was someone in the garden, Rani's sense of danger came belatedly into play. The quick breath she sucked in caught in her throat, and her hands suddenly tingled with that prickly feeling she always got when she was startled or alarmed. For an instant she couldn't move. With a sense of horror, she recalled that the catch on the window was broken, and there was no way to lock it.

But even as she watched, her nerves chilling, the figure slipped past the window. There was a soft, rumbling meow and a small thump as Zipp uncoiled from the foot of the bed and leaped onto the sill. The cat poked his head between the thin, white cotton curtains and sat staring steadily into the darkness.

Rani suddenly knew who was abroad in the garden. What she couldn't figure out was why Flint was roaming outside at this late hour. It was cold, probably no more than thirty-five or forty degrees outside. The days had fallen into the typical pattern of autumn in the mountains: chilled nights and mornings that warmed into comfortable, short-lived afternoons.

Lost in thought, she pushed aside the comforter and padded barefoot across the old wooden floor. Zipp turned his head briefly to acknowledge her presence beside him at the window, then returned to stare fixedly out into the shadows.

"What's the matter, Zipp? Do you envy him? Want to go outside and do a little night hunting? I knew sooner or later you'd miss the old days. He reminds you of them, doesn't he?" Rani smiled wistfully at her cat. "I'm not surprised. I thought of you the minute I saw him standing on my doorstep in the pouring rain, demanding shelter and a meal. And like a fool I gave him both, just as I gave them to you. But at least you've got enough sense to come in out of the cold. Apparently Flint doesn't." She straightened away from the window and reached for her coat and a pair of shoes. "Come on, we'd better go and bring him inside before he catches a chill."

She flung the trench coat over her long-sleeved, ankle-length nightgown, slipped into her leather loafers and started down the hall. Zipp bounced off the windowsill to trot at her heels. When Rani reached the kitchen and opened the back door, the cat dashed past her into the darkness, alert to the kind of excitement only night can bring a cat. Rani followed more slowly, wondering what sort of excitement the shadows brought Flint Cottrell. Memories of past hunting expeditions? She knew without giving the matter much thought that if Flint had ever gone hunting it wouldn't have been for the usual game. He wasn't one to take pleasure in killing animals. She remembered the scar on his shoulder: it was a good bet a human opponent had been the cause.

She found him around the corner of the house. He was apparently studying the broken brick walk in the pale moonlight, the collar of his sheepskin jacket pulled close around his neck. His head was bare as usual as he bent to examine the path, and his hands were thrust deep into the pockets of his jacket. Rani knew he was aware of her presence as she slowly approached, but he didn't look up.

"It's cold out here. You'd better get back inside," Flint said without looking at her.

Rani's chin lifted as she huddled into the trench coat. "Interestingly enough, that's just what I was about to say to you. What in the world are you doing running around outside at midnight, Flint?"

"Thinking."

"Oh, that explains it," she assured him dryly. "Do you always do your best thinking when you're freezing?"

"I wasn't doing any decent thinking at all indoors. I decided to try a walk in the garden." His voice was edged with annoyance as he finally turned his head to look at her. "Any objections?"

"Yes, plenty of them. You're disturbing my cat, for one thing."

Flint scowled. "Zipp? What the hell's wrong with him?"

Rani half smiled. "I'm afraid seeing you abroad in the moonlight has brought back memories of his own freewheeling past. When he saw you out here he couldn't wait to get outside himself. But I don't believe he's using the opportunity to think. He's probably hunting. Lord knows what he'll bring into the house tomorrow morning."

Flint watched her for a long moment. "If he does bring something home, he'll expect you to tell him what a terrific hunter he is."

"No doubt."

"You will, won't you, Rani?" Flint suddenly sounded quite certain. "You'll scold him at first and then you'll relent and tell him how magnificent he is."

"I don't see what all this has to do with your being out here at midnight. What were you trying to think about?" Rani took a couple of steps closer to him, attempting to read his eyes in the shadowed light. The gaze that was so unusually green in the daytime, however, was mysteriously lacking in color tonight. She couldn't begin to guess at his thoughts.