home that same afternoon, she’d found an explosion of feathers in the living room, a live frog—that she hadn’t even been tempted to kiss—in the bathroom, and muddy paw prints on the
counters
. And Tuesday morning, she and Trisha had awakened to find they weren’t alone in their beds again, even though Julia had replaced the pins with heavy nails and shoved a chair up against the cupboard as added insurance. Only that morning Big Cat had brought along a fat white buddy—apparently Nicholas had three cats, not two—and Julia had managed to slide out of bed before it could snag her pajama pants. She’d met Trisha in the hallway just as the girl had been coming to tell her their nocturnal visitors were back, and they’d repeated the food-luring trick using leftover tuna casserole.
There was now a piece of scrap plywood Julia had filched from the resort’s maintenance shed covering the outside of the cat door, being held in place by a couple of heavy pieces of firewood she’d filched from the woodshed, because she hadn’t quite dared to drive nails into the building’s siding. In retaliation, she’d arrived home that afternoon to find their front pathway littered with enough bird feathers to stuff a pillow.
So other than her ongoing war with Nicholas’s cats, the only unanticipated addition to Julia’s plan to put her humiliating weekend behind her was that she had to
actively
avoid Nova Mare’s director of security now that she was living at the resort. It seemed that every morning as she walked from her apartment to housekeeping, she narrowly escaped Nicholas coming in or out of the registration pavilion that also housed the resort’s offices. Then, walking home yesterday afternoon, he’d been coming out of the barn leading a monstrous, scary-looking horse, and Julia had seen him just in time to scurry behind a tree before
he
saw
her
.
But she hadn’t been quite so successful this morning, nearly running Nicholas over with her cart when she’d rounded a curve—she hadn’t been speeding, since
her
cart was about as fast as a turtle—as he’d been coming back from an obviously long run on the mountain trails with four of his big, strapping security guards. Julia had nearly driven into a tree at the sight of all that naked chest and leg muscle glistening with sweat despite it being only fifty degrees out with a crisp wind. For crying out loud, it had taken her heart half an hour to quit racing and her cheeks at least twice as long to cool down, the amusement in Nicholas’s sky-blue eyes as he’d given her a wink on his way by making Julia nearly wear out the wheels of her vacuum on her next cottage.
For a second there, she’d seriously thought about
becoming
the town slut.
That had actually lifted her spirits, though, when she’d realized Clay hadn’t completely killed her interest in men, since there seemed to be a few sparks of what she suspected might be passion left floating around inside her somewhere. Still, she wasn’t letting that welcome revelation override her common sense, and she sure as heck wasn’t going to start daydreaming about Nicholas kissing her again.
So she daydreamed about being Inglenook’s guest liaison instead.
In fact, Nicholas notwithstanding, over the last few days Julia had often wanted to pinch herself to make sure she was still alive, because it certainly felt like she had died and gone to heaven. The last time she’d left the mountain had been to pick up Trisha at the marina when Duncan had brought her across the fiord Sunday afternoon, and truthfully, Julia didn’t care if she stayed up here until the day she really
did
die.
She hadn’t even left to get groceries, instead leaving that chore to Trisha.
They’d actually started a ritual of nocturnal swims in the outdoor heated saltwater pool, in utter and complete awe to be floating on their backs staring up at the stars that seemed close enough to touch. And Trisha appeared to be embracing adulthood
counters
. And Tuesday morning, she and Trisha had awakened to find they weren’t alone in their beds again, even though Julia had replaced the pins with heavy nails and shoved a chair up against the cupboard as added insurance. Only that morning Big Cat had brought along a fat white buddy—apparently Nicholas had three cats, not two—and Julia had managed to slide out of bed before it could snag her pajama pants. She’d met Trisha in the hallway just as the girl had been coming to tell her their nocturnal visitors were back, and they’d repeated the food-luring trick using leftover tuna casserole.
There was now a piece of scrap plywood Julia had filched from the resort’s maintenance shed covering the outside of the cat door, being held in place by a couple of heavy pieces of firewood she’d filched from the woodshed, because she hadn’t quite dared to drive nails into the building’s siding. In retaliation, she’d arrived home that afternoon to find their front pathway littered with enough bird feathers to stuff a pillow.
So other than her ongoing war with Nicholas’s cats, the only unanticipated addition to Julia’s plan to put her humiliating weekend behind her was that she had to
actively
avoid Nova Mare’s director of security now that she was living at the resort. It seemed that every morning as she walked from her apartment to housekeeping, she narrowly escaped Nicholas coming in or out of the registration pavilion that also housed the resort’s offices. Then, walking home yesterday afternoon, he’d been coming out of the barn leading a monstrous, scary-looking horse, and Julia had seen him just in time to scurry behind a tree before
he
saw
her
.
But she hadn’t been quite so successful this morning, nearly running Nicholas over with her cart when she’d rounded a curve—she hadn’t been speeding, since
her
cart was about as fast as a turtle—as he’d been coming back from an obviously long run on the mountain trails with four of his big, strapping security guards. Julia had nearly driven into a tree at the sight of all that naked chest and leg muscle glistening with sweat despite it being only fifty degrees out with a crisp wind. For crying out loud, it had taken her heart half an hour to quit racing and her cheeks at least twice as long to cool down, the amusement in Nicholas’s sky-blue eyes as he’d given her a wink on his way by making Julia nearly wear out the wheels of her vacuum on her next cottage.
For a second there, she’d seriously thought about
becoming
the town slut.
That had actually lifted her spirits, though, when she’d realized Clay hadn’t completely killed her interest in men, since there seemed to be a few sparks of what she suspected might be passion left floating around inside her somewhere. Still, she wasn’t letting that welcome revelation override her common sense, and she sure as heck wasn’t going to start daydreaming about Nicholas kissing her again.
So she daydreamed about being Inglenook’s guest liaison instead.
In fact, Nicholas notwithstanding, over the last few days Julia had often wanted to pinch herself to make sure she was still alive, because it certainly felt like she had died and gone to heaven. The last time she’d left the mountain had been to pick up Trisha at the marina when Duncan had brought her across the fiord Sunday afternoon, and truthfully, Julia didn’t care if she stayed up here until the day she really
did
die.
She hadn’t even left to get groceries, instead leaving that chore to Trisha.
They’d actually started a ritual of nocturnal swims in the outdoor heated saltwater pool, in utter and complete awe to be floating on their backs staring up at the stars that seemed close enough to touch. And Trisha appeared to be embracing adulthood
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