When I Fall in Love (Christiansen Family) (17 page)

Casper leaned back on his hands as if they were old friends catching the sunset every day.

It felt comfortable. Easy.

“In a second, the sun is going to go down, and the sky is going to turn this amazing mix of red and orange. The lake becomes a sort of deep purple, and the clouds will be streaked with color as if they’re on fire.”

“You sound like you’ve seen this before.” She didn’t want to add the sudden thought that he’d brought other girls out to this very spot.

“My dad and I used to come here. He would fish on the big lake sometimes, and after we pulled in the boat, we’d sneak back here, take in the magic.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“It’s just one of the many treasures of Deep Haven. One of
the reasons I love living here.” He sighed. “And one of the reasons I hate the thought of leaving.”

“You’re leaving?” Of course he was. She should have seen this coming.

“I don’t know. I’ve been offered this internship in Roatán. It’s an island off Honduras where there’s a number of shipwrecks and pirate treasures.”

She couldn’t help but laugh, then stopped when she saw his expression dim. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I thought . . . You’re serious.”

“Yeah, I think so.” He wrinkled his nose at her. “Or I thought so. Until just a second ago. It does sound a little hokey, doesn’t it? But I’m an archaeology major, so
 
—”

“So it’s not hokey at all.” She glanced at the sunset, and indeed, it had turned magical, the colors revealing the artistry of God.

Funny, she never would have had that thought before moving here. Maybe Liza’s religious thinking had infected her. The thought sank in and didn’t hurt.

“Is that what you want? To be a treasure hunter?”

“I’d like to find something precious, yes. Maybe Blackbeard’s treasure. Or a lost artifact from the Crusades.”

“So you’re like what’s his name
 
—Indiana Jones?”

He laughed and it sweetened the air. “I guess so. Mostly I just want to find the things hidden, the treasure that no one sees or doesn’t think to look for.” He picked up a rock, tossed it into a puddle of flame. “What do you want?”

A home. A family. This moment with a man who wouldn’t jump on his motorcycle and drive away.

“I want to be safe,” she said quietly, before she could stop herself.

His expression drained. She tried to lighten her words with a
smile but then looked away. “I came here because I had nowhere else to go, and Liza offered me a home.”

He was still looking at her, and she blinked, fighting another rush of tears to her eyes. Why had she said that?

“You came to the right place,” he said finally. Then he wove his hand into hers.

He didn’t take it away, even after the sun had disappeared, even after the sky turned from fire to soft indigo velvet.

And as he drove her home under the glow of a fresh moon, she conceded that maybe, yes, she had.

I want to be safe.

The words dug into Casper, had turned him in his sleep. Who could have hurt Raina, made her feel unsafe?

That thought had plagued him deep into the night, until finally he’d gotten up, found himself a stale cup of coffee, heated it, and sat outside, watching the stars.

With her words, her behavior this week started to make sense. It had taken him an entire cup of coffee and small talk, even some teasing to get her to look him in the eye after their accidental dunking in the lake. As if she were angry . . . or afraid of him.

Then, after their first team paddle, onshore at her suggestion, he’d glanced around to offer her a ride home and found her halfway to Liza’s house. Not that it was a far jog from the harbor, but . . .

But he’d hoped to ask her out for another cup of coffee.

Instead, he’d caught up and walked her home, then sat on her front porch, telling her about Darek and the rebuilding of the resort.

She listened, her golden-brown eyes on his. As if she liked hearing him talk.

As if he might be interesting.

And then during practice, she’d started calling him Captain, my Captain. He had no doubt she meant it as a joke, but the moment she piped up, so did Emma, and finally the entire team started calling him by the nickname.

He could admit he liked it.

So clearly she’d started to mean more to him this week than he’d realized. And tonight at dinner
 
—what was that wink? It nearly took his heart from his chest with one swift motion.

Raina had this serious, almost-bossy way about her, with the way she organized the buffet table. Then, the next moment, she turned quiet, a servant, like she had with her silent but thorough cleaning up after the campfire.

He couldn’t believe everyone left her there alone.

Or that she had thought he wasn’t serious about watching the sunset. He’d only mentioned it twice during practice.

His coffee had gone cold, the wind off the lake carrying a briskness that tempered the humidity of the night. He sat and wondered again why a girl might wish to be safe.

Whatever her reason, Deep Haven was the perfect place to hide while a person figured out their next move. He knew that better than anyone.

When the sliding door squealed open behind him, he turned to catch his father walking out, wearing jeans and a paint-stained sweatshirt, his fishing hat. He smiled at Casper. “Wanna see if the walleye are hungry?”

Casper dumped his coffee out on the grass and headed down the dock, following his father to the tied-up canoe.

He got in at the stern, let his father take the bow, and paddled them along the shore. He’d fished Evergreen Lake for so many years that he didn’t need directions across the smooth plane of water, glassy and gray in the fading darkness. He held the canoe steady as his dad landed his cast just outside the marshy area, where the walleye would be waking from their slumber.

His father said nothing as he reeled in. Cast again.

Casper lay back on the stern, arms under his head, feet on the gunwales, watching the sky turn to pewter.

“She’s lost, Casper.”

He frowned, glancing at his father.

John didn’t look at him as he continued. “She’s searching, and she looks at you like you could be her world. Be careful.”

Casper sat up. “Dad. Are you talking about Raina?”

His dad reeled in again, checked his jig, recast. “I like her. Your mom and I both do, but I see the way you look at her
 
—”

He did? How did Casper look at her?

“I’m just saying, I think there is more to her than you know. She’s been hurt and I don’t want you to think you can fix her.” He gave a soft flash of a smile. “That’s Jesus’ job.”

Casper nodded. But maybe Jesus could use him to help.

The thought settled inside him, and he carried it with him all the way past his father’s early morning catch of three walleyes, into breakfast with his family, and to church, where he slipped into a pew beside his parents.

But not without noticing Raina, dressed in jeans and a yellow T-shirt, sitting next to her aunt Liza. Third row from the front, on the right-hand side.

I want to be safe.

The words dogged him through the praise and worship,
through the sermon, and pressed a hand against his back after the service ended, pushing him through the crowd until he found her.

His heart gave a little jump when Raina’s eyes lit up. “Casper!”

“Hey.” His hands suddenly decided to turn sweaty. As if he had never asked a girl out before. Good grief, his voice had even turned tail on him.

He smiled until he could round it up, then said, “So . . . every Sunday night my family has a campfire . . . and . . . well, would you like to join us tonight?” He could have hung the moon on her smile, her nod. “I’ll pick you up around five, then.”

For the rest of the afternoon, Casper buried himself in the finishing work of cabin seven, hanging a door, installing baseboard in the bedroom, and measuring for the decking.

He came in at four, showered, changed into fresh jeans and a T-shirt, and headed into town on his motorcycle.

It wasn’t until he’d pulled up to Liza’s house that he remembered her words:
But if you offer me a ride on your motorcycle, I’m outta here.

He saw them echoing on her face as she came out of the house. Maybe she’d had an accident on a motorcycle once. His stomach clenched as he swung his leg over his bike and walked up to her with an extra helmet.

She looked so pretty standing there, wearing a floral top with jeans and flip-flops. She had a shade of pastel pink on her toes, her hair in a messy ponytail.

“I totally forgot about your fear of motorcycles,” he said with a grimace.

“My fear . . . I . . .
Oh
. Yeah, my
fear
.” Her eyes widened but she took the helmet. “I’ll be fine. Just don’t go too fast. Or flip the bike. Or . . . park. No parking.”

Parking?

She smiled at him and put on the helmet. “I’m ready, Captain, my Captain.”

And just like that, the tension in his chest eased. She climbed onto the bike, settled her hands on his hips.

He would have preferred she wrap her arms around his waist, but this would do. For now.

Casper followed her rules
 
—not too fast, no wheelies. He did, however, have to park the bike in the dirt lot of the family’s lodge.

Raina got off and handed him the helmet. She stared at the lodge house like she had at last night’s sunset. “It’s beautiful.”

It was? He saw the roof still needing repair from the fire and the ash-pocked cedar boards, graying and warped with age. He saw tall, angry weeds along the walkway, two stones that had cracked with age, and the ugly paint job he’d done on the red door so many years ago, an adolescent reaction to having to work on a Saturday.

He saw the forest burned and dismal behind them despite the wall of evergreens they’d planted along the far edge of the property. He remembered too well the lick of the fire, charring their resort, a memory only barely blotted out by the handful of framed-in, half-built cabins now dotting the property.

The place looked sickly, feeble. Wanting.

But it had given him a good reason to stick around this spring, this summer, without having to answer any probing questions.

“Have you lived here all your life?” she asked, now taking down her hair, running her fingers through it.

Don’t put it back up,
he silently asked, but she wound it against her head, secured it.

“Yeah,” he said. “Evergreen Resort has been in the family for four generations.” He gestured to the pathway that led to the fire pit.

He didn’t know when the family campfires had started, just that he’d spent every Sunday he could remember gathered with his parents and any family members in town, roasting marshmallows, trading highs and lows of the week.

His father had already started a blaze, his mother unloading her basket of graham crackers, chocolate, and marshmallows. Tiger waved his stick in the air like a weapon, and Casper caught it with one hand. “Whoa there, kiddo.”

Tiger giggled, especially as Casper pulled him into his arms like a football and tickled him. Tiger screamed with laughter, fighting him. Casper finally let him down and glanced at Raina. She was grinning, her eyes glistening.

Huh.

Ingrid looked up. “Raina, honey. So glad to see you. Grab a stick. We’re a little ways from roasting, but it’s always good to be armed.”

John smiled at Raina, then glanced at Casper, question in his eyes.

Casper ignored him. “We’re short family members tonight. Amelia is on her way, I think, but Grace is still in Hawaii, and I’m not sure when Darek and Ivy are getting back.” He didn’t mention Owen, mostly for his mother’s sake.

Raina claimed a stick and found a spot on one of the long rough-hewn logs.

He wiped his hands on his pants, his stomach suddenly churning. Okay, this felt weird
 
—her here, as if it were a date.

With his parents sitting across from them. Oh, boy.

Tiger had grabbed a handful of marshmallows. He came over and offered Raina one from his grubby mitt.

“Tiger, Raina doesn’t want that
 
—”

“What are you talking about? Of course I do. Thank you, Tiger.”

Tiger grinned. Casper stuck out his tongue at his nephew.

“Hey, we’ll have none of that, Casper,” Ingrid said, laughing. She brought a plate with chocolate and a cracker over to Raina. “Have you ever made s’mores before?”

“No,” Raina said, taking the offering. “I’m a city girl. This is my first s’more experience.”

Tiger took it upon himself to show her how to spear the marshmallow with the stick, watching her progress while Casper retrieved his own supplies and sat next to her.

“Not one camping trip as a child?” he asked.

“Nope. My dad was a trucker. It was just me and my brother most of the time, and he didn’t have time to take us anywhere. We sometimes went to day camp at a local church, summer school, but never camping.”

John slapped a mosquito. “Welcome to the woods.”

Casper wanted to ask about her mother but didn’t know how. He imagined her alone for long stretches of time, her dad on the road. Imagined her coming home to a cold, dark house, afraid in the middle of the night, caring for her brother.