Stranger in the Moonlight (26 page)

“I, uh . . .” Kim’s head was still reeling from what he’d just said to her. “Where will you live?” she managed to get out. Travis was on his way to the bathroom.

“With you if you’ll have me. I like your house, but I think you should move your workroom to Joe’s place. You want to take a shower with me? That way your garage will be free. I believe in taking care of automobiles. Are there any good mechanics in town?”

As he disappeared behind the bathroom door, Kim sat there, staring. The sheet fell away but she didn’t notice.

Travis looked around the door. “If you keep sitting there like that, I’ll have to come back and make love to you again and I really am hungry. Have mercy on me, will you?”

He moved out of view but Kim still sat there. She wasn’t at all sure of what she’d heard or what she was feeling. This weekend she’d expected a man she’d known for months to ask her to marry him. Instead, she’d just received a proposal from . . . From Travis, she thought and smiled. She envisioned him on the bicycle as he flew down the hill of dirt. His face and clothes were filthy, his teeth were coated in grime—but she’d never seen anyone happier. That boy had just asked her to marry him!

She heard the shower water. She took a few more seconds to blink, then she went running. “I like where my workroom is,” she said. “I don’t have to get in a car to get there, so I can work late at night. You can’t—” She didn’t say any more because Travis’s long arm swept out and encircled her waist. The shower curtain was trapped between them.

“I’ll drive you,” he said before he kissed her again. “I’m good at driving.”

“Yeah, if you like roller coasters without brakes.”

“And you do,” he said as he kissed her again.

Thirteen

Kim was sitting
outside the B&B waiting for Travis. Just as they were at last dressed—the shower had taken a very long time—his cell phone rang. “On this number it’s either Penny or my mother or you,” he said as he dug the phone out of his trouser’s pocket. “Penny,” he said as he answered the call.

Minutes later he told Kim that “an incompetent moron named Forester” was having a meltdown and needed some help. “Sorry,” Travis said, “but this will take some time. He’ll destroy the entire deal if I don’t walk him through it. Do you mind?”

“Of course not,” Kim said. “I’ll wait for you outside.” As she left the room, she picked up her sketchbook. Maybe she’d have an idea or two for her designs. She doubted that she would, since all she could think about was what Travis had said to her. Had he really planned his entire life around her? Was that possible? But then, a part of Kim wondered if she’d done the same thing. Not consciously, as Travis seemed to have done, but unconsciously. Since she was a child and began sneaking into her brother’s room where there was an Internet connection that wasn’t ruled by her mother’s iron parental controls, Kim had been searching for him. Her quest to find Travis had fluctuated with how her personal life was going. After a breakup with a boyfriend she had cried, eaten ice cream, and spent whole days on the Internet.

Now she realized that she’d probably seen photos of the rich Travis Maxwell, but she hadn’t given them a second glance. She’d long ago figured out that Travis and his mother had been running from an abusive father. No one ever thought of super rich young men as having been anything but pampered and spoiled. She’d kept her searches off the society pages.

As for what Travis said about their getting married, more than anything in the world, Kim wanted to throw her arms around his neck and say yes. But she couldn’t do that. There were too many problems yet to solve. Travis was still too connected to his other life, to his bastard of a father. How could they be happy until all that was settled? And his mother was going to need a great deal of help. As much as they all loved Joe, he was a small town man; he’d never be a match for Travis’s notorious father. Randall Maxwell was known all over the world as a man who held his own against anyone—on a global scale. How could Joe, the owner of a small hardware store, cope with that? Travis would have to step in and take care of it all. How long did it take to divorce a superwealthy man who didn’t want to part with a dime? Years? How could she and Travis have a life when he was constantly wrapped up in that mess?

It seemed that the obstacles around them were insurmountable. Not that she’d give him up. Not ever. But it was a question of time before they’d have their own lives, their own home, their own . . . children.

When she stepped outside into the cool evening air, she took a breath. She reminded herself that no matter what the obstructions, they’d have each other and there was light at the end of the tunnel. The thought that she did have a future where she wasn’t alone—as she’d started to fear—made her smile, and as she did, her mind began to clear. And as she had since she was a child, she began to think about jewelry. In the fading light the leaves on a nearby maple tree looked like moonstones. Or maybe cut quartz. Of course the ones in the shadows were pure garnets. She hadn’t used garnets in a long time so maybe now was the time to start again.

There was a little seating area set back under the trees, and she sat down on a pretty wooden bench and began to draw what she saw in her mind. The stones, even the curve of the leaves reminded her of a woman’s neck. She could make the gold flow along the skin, then angle up over a collarbone. If she did it right, the necklace could be really sensual. Of course each one would have to be fitted to the wearer, but that would be nice to do. She hated those necklaces that were a stiff, round circle. No one had a perfectly round neck and she thought the jewelry stood out awkwardly.

She was so busy with her thoughts and her drawing that she didn’t see or hear anyone until a man almost tripped over her feet.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

Kim looked up to see a short, stout, sixtyish man standing to her right and holding a broom. He had on an old pair of jeans and a plaid shirt that looked as though it had been washed hundreds of times. He was smiling at her in a way that reminded her of people at home.

“Please go back to what you were doing.” He nodded toward her sketch pad in a way that made her think he was curious.

“I like the way the light plays on those maple leaves,” she said.

“They are beautiful, aren’t they?” He put his hands on the top of the broom handle and stared at the leaves. “Are you one of the people staying here?”

“I am.”

“I don’t mean to be nosy, but is it a family reunion? We don’t usually have this many guests here.”

Kim suppressed a laugh as she thought of the truth of why so many people were there. Travis had planned to oversee her and Dave. Only Dave had been sent away. “No,” she said. “It’s just my . . .” She wasn’t sure what to call Travis. Her fiancé? But then he hadn’t officially asked her to marry him, not with a ring (what Kim told the young men who wandered into her store was necessary for a proposal), and she certainly hadn’t accepted.

“Your young man?” he asked.

It was an old-fashioned term that seemed to fit the situation. “Yes, my young man invited some people.”

They were silent for a moment, then the man glanced at her sketchbook. “I’ll let you get back to what you were doing, but if you need any help with anything, let me know. Just ask for Red. That’s what my hair used to be.” He started to walk away.

“We have that in common. Actually,” Kim said, “maybe you can help us find someone.”

Halting, he looked back at her. There was something about him that she liked. He had a sweet smile. “I have trouble keeping all the newcomers straight, but if the person is over forty I can probably help.”

She smiled at his use of “newcomers.” It was the same term they used in Edilean. “How about if the person died in 1893?”

“Then I probably went to school with him.”

Kim laughed. “Dr. Tristan Janes. I assume the town was named after his family?”

“Yes it was,” the man said as he motioned toward one of the empty chairs across from her. He was asking her permission to sit there.

“Please,” she said.

As he took a seat, he said, “Will your young man mind that you’re having a tête-à-tête with another man?”

“I’m sure he’ll be wild with jealousy, but I’ll be able to calm his beastly spirit.”

Red chuckled. “Spoken like a woman in love.”

Kim couldn’t help blushing. “What about Dr. Janes?”

“There used to be a library here, but when the mill closed the town pretty much died with it. They moved all the books and papers to the state capital. If they hadn’t done that you could go to the library and read it all. I’m a poor second best. Anyway,” he said, “a Mr. Gustav Janes started the town back in 1857 when he opened a mill that ground the flour for everyone in a fifty-mile radius. His only child, Tristan, became a doctor. I read that ol’ Gustav, who couldn’t read or write, was deeply proud of his son.”

“As he should be,” Kim said. “Tristan died young, didn’t he?”

“He did. He was rescuing some miners and the walls collapsed on him. It took them a week to find his body. He was well loved and hundreds of people attended his funeral.”

“And I’m sure that number included an ancestor of mine,” Kim said. “It seems that she was carrying his child, who was my—let me get this straight—my great-granduncle.”

“I think that makes you an honorary native of Janes Creek.”

“Not a newcomer?”

“Far from it.” In the distance they heard voices coming toward them, and Red stood up. “I think your young man is returning and I should go.”

“The question everyone in my hometown wants to know is whether or not Dr. Janes was married.”

“Oh no. I read that he was the town catch, a beautiful young man, but he never married. I’m sure that if he’d lived he would have married your ancestor. Especially if she was half as pretty as you are.”

“Thank you,” Kim said as Red started to walk away. “Oh!” she called out. “Do you know where he’s buried?”

“All the Janes family are at the Old Mill. If you go out there, be careful. The place is falling down. Take companions with you. Big, strong ones.”

“All right, I will,” she said as he disappeared around a corner and out of sight.

To the left, on the other side of the dense hedge, came Travis, frowning as he spoke on his cell phone. But when he saw Kim he smiled and said, “Forester, just
do
it!” and hung up.

He held out his arm to Kim. “Ready for dinner?”

“Yes,” she said as they walked toward the main building.

Concealed in the bushes and watching them was the older man, Red. He was smiling.

“Sir?” said a man in a suit.

“What is it?” Red snapped.

“You have a call from Hong Kong and Mr. Forester needs—”

Red frowned. “My son took care of Forester. I need you to send someone to the state capital. I want to know everything about the Dr. Tristan Janes who died in 1893.”

“In the morning I’ll—”

Red gave the man a sharp look.

“I’ll call the governor.”

“You do that,” Red said as he walked away from the hotel.

The man picked up the broom and followed Randall Maxwell to the waiting car.

The sound of
the shower running woke Kim, and as memories came to her, she stretched luxuriously. Last night had been wonderful. At dinner a table had been set up for them on a little glassed-in porch, and Travis had chosen the meal ahead of time. They’d had three different wines with their six-course dinner. Outside, the stars sparkled and the moonlight flowed over the soft glow from the candles. By the dessert course they were feeding each other—and it was all Kim could do not to jump on Travis and rip his clothes off.

“Shall we retire to our rooms?” he asked before dessert was finished.

“If you’re ready,” Kim said in her most demure voice.

“I have been . . . ready for the last hour.” He sounded like a man in pain.

Kim gave a very unadult giggle.

They managed to bid their server—the same young woman who’d checked Kim in—good night and didn’t so much as touch each other on the long trip up the stairs. Travis opened the door and let Kim go in ahead of him. He closed the chain lock, and turned to look at her.