Big Sky Reunion

The picture of Mindy walking into church with Aunt Martha popped into his head. A summery dress that skimmed her calves. Golden curls bouncing as she pushed her aunt along. Blue eyes that sparked like a summer wildfire, challenging him to keep his distance.

Like the upcoming riding events, he’d always loved a challenge.

Too bad she hadn’t still been at the knitting shop when he went back to town for Arnie’s prescription.

Daniel reined April into the ring where he’d set up an obstacle course—a low bridge to walk over, logs laid out in a path to be daintily stepped over, a rail to straddle. Although the trail event wasn’t timed for speed, the time to finish the course was limited, and time penalties were added for every misstep or refusal the horse made.

“Okay, here we go.” With the almost imperceptible pressure of his knees, he urged April toward the bridge.

“The clock is ticking,” Arnie announced.

Without faltering, April went up and over the bridge. Daniel maneuvered her to the next obstacle, the row of logs, which she took with ease. Throughout the course, she didn’t falter once. Even when he dangled the required bundle of burlap on a rope in front of her face, she didn’t flinch.

They reached the end of the course, and Daniel trotted April over to the fence. “How’d we do?” he asked Arnie.

“A perfect ride. More than two minutes under the limit, bro.”

“Ha!” He gave April a congratulatory pat on her neck. “Eat your heart out, Charlie Moffett. This year you’ll meet your match. And eat our dust.”

Chapter Three

Monday morning, Melinda took her aunt to Manhattan for her three-times-weekly physical therapy appointment. When they got back home, it was time for lunch, followed by a much-needed nap for Aunt Martha.

Melinda gathered up a bucket, rolls of paper towels, plastic trash bags and cleaning supplies and carried them to the shop. The door opened much easier this time and she stepped inside.

A groan escaped her lips. Where to begin?

“Take your pick, Melinda Sue,” she said aloud. The whole shop had to be cleaned up eventually.

Leaving the door open to let some fresh air in, she walked over to the cash register beside a glass case that displayed yarn winders and bobbins.

She’d checked the cash drawer on Saturday and found less than twenty dollars in change. Tugging a plastic box out from beneath the register that was crammed with file folders, she squatted down to go through the records.

Invoices from three years ago were mixed with even older records. None were noted as paid. A handwritten ledger showed checks written from 2001 through most of 2006 and a bank balance that wasn’t worth writing home about. Hadn’t Martha paid any bills since then? Maybe she’d switched to a different bank account.

Blowing out a discouraged sigh, she made a cursory examination of the rest of the business records, then set the box aside. She’d have to talk to Martha about the bookkeeping. Her time while Martha napped would be better spent cleaning and tossing what wasn’t usable.

On her knees, she pulled everything out of the display case, set the items aside and used window cleaner on the neglected shelves and inside of the case. Years of grime darkened paper towels as one section of glass after another began to sparkle.

“Hello? Anybody here?”

Melinda started at the sound of Daniel’s familiar voice.

“The shop’s not open,” she called from behind the counter.

“Your door is.” His boots tramped across the wood floor until his long, jeans-clad legs materialized in front of the display case. “Hey, Goldilocks. Looks like you’re hard at work.”

“I am.” She considered asking him if he’d enjoyed his date with April, but thought better of it. Instead, she squirted window cleaner on the next section of glass.

“Is Aunt Martha planning to reopen the shop?”

“We’re thinking about it.” She swirled the glass cleaner around, blurring her view of his legs.

“That a fact?” he drawled, an arrogant grin in his voice. “Want some help?”

She lifted her head too fast, whacking it on the inside of the display case. She rubbed the back of her skull.

“No! I’m fine.” She looked up at him. Foolish woman! She should’ve known he’d be grinning at her, a wolfish grin, a grin that crinkled the corners of his eyes and made them flash with amusement.

“You got another one of those squirt bottles? I can do the outside of the case while you’re working on the inside.”

Trapped on the inside, he meant.

She wanted to tell him no, she didn’t have another bottle of window cleaner. But he was just clever enough to look over the display case, spot her spare bottle and see that she was lying.

She reached for the bottle and tossed it up and over the case, following that with a roll of paper towels. “There you go, Swagger. Do your best.”

“I intend to.”

An odd shimmer of unease slid down her back. What did he mean by that? And did she want to know?

Over the next few minutes, she kept her head down and her hand moving on the glass. At one point, her hand and his were only the thickness of two paper towels and the glass apart. His heat seemed to burn right through the transparent barrier to her palm.

She snatched her hand back. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead.

“I wouldn’t think Aunt Martha would be well enough to keep the shop open by herself,” Daniel commented in a casual tone.

“Probably not.”

“She going to hire someone to help?”

Melinda sat back on her haunches and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. “If you must know, I’m going to manage the shop for her.”

“Yeah? You know enough about knitting to run this kind of operation?”

“I ran a very successful knitting shop in Pennsylvania until—” She clamped her mouth shut. She didn’t want to finish the sentence. Daniel had no need to know about Jason. She didn’t want his sympathy and didn’t want to discuss the subject. The depth of her loss, her failure, was far too painful.

“Then I bet your aunt is happy you’re staying in Potter Creek.” He took a final swipe at the outside of the display case. “So am I.”

She didn’t respond. She couldn’t. The sincerity in his lowered voice had nearly undone her. Her chin trembled. She tamped down the emotion welling in her chest as hard as she could and dug deep to find the protective shield that had kept her sane the past three years. A shield that kept the PTSD at bay most of the time.

She balled the damp paper towel in her fist. “Don’t feel you have to stick around on my account. I’m sure April would be happy to see you,” she said.

He laughed. A big, booming, masculine laugh that exploded from deep in his chest and bounced off the walls of the cluttered knitting shop.

Confusion knitted her brows. Why did he think her remark was so funny?

Standing, his grin unnerving her, he placed the glass cleaner and paper towel on the counter. “I’ll be sure to give April your regards.”