Ted was wrapping her carving.
He glanced up and smiled. “Do you want to tell—”
“No.” She kept her voice down. “Thanks for not saying anything.”
Ted spoke softly, obviously sensing her nervousness. “Decided that was up to you.” He finished taping the end of the parcel and set it aside. “Congratulations, though. He lives across the lake from you.”
“Thought I recognized him. What’s his name, again?”
“Jake Hunter. He’s a wilderness guide. Earns good money doing it. Quite well-off.”
“I see.” Judging people’s financial status was tough in a place like Polecat, where everyone kept a low profile, dressed casually, and drove dusty trucks and SUVs. She was flattered that a successful wilderness guide found value in her work.
Ted rang up her groceries and bagged them in the canvas tote she’d given him. She hadn’t bought much because she’d been so distracted, so Ted finished quickly. Fine with her. She’d prefer to be out the door before Jake returned to the counter.
She almost made it. She was tucking her change back into her purse when he walked up, his basket stuffed with everything from canned goods to paper products. He must be a fast shopper.
Not wanting to appear antisocial, she met his gaze while keeping her expression friendly but neutral. “Hi.”
“Hello.” He glanced at her with the same carefully neutral expression. But then a spark of interest lit his green eyes.
Her breath caught. She’d never looked into those eyes before. Grandpa Ike’s binoculars were good, but not that good. Yet she felt as if she’d met his gaze before, and seeing it—again?—brought back a half-remembered thrill. Crazy.
Even crazier, she flashed on the image of the black wolf in the clearing—a green-eyed wolf with dark, luxurious fur the same color as Jake’s collar-length hair. Clearly his purchase of the carving was messing with her mind.
The interest reflected in Jake’s eyes slowly changed to speculation. Maybe something in her expression had given her away, or maybe he’d picked up enough of her quiet conversation with Ted to figure out who she was. In any case, she needed to vamoose before he started asking questions.
Quickly breaking eye contact, she grabbed her canvas bag from the counter. Her smile probably looked more like a grimace, but it was the best she could do. “You two have a nice day!” She headed for the screen door.
As exits go, it wasn’t her best. Heart pounding, she climbed into the old truck Grandpa Ike had willed to her, started the ancient engine, and pulled out onto the two-lane road that skirted the lake. She’d escaped, but the adrenaline rush of making her first sale stayed with her.
Logic, the tool that her lawyer father embraced, told her that Jake buying the wolf carving wasn’t reason enough to change her life. Intuition, the tool that her photographer mother preferred, whispered that she’d reached a major turning point and shouldn’t ignore it. Grandpa Ike, who had been more intuitive than anyone else on her mother’s side of the family, would have told her to listen to her instincts.
Rachel wondered what Jake Hunter would have said if she’d had the courage to admit she’d carved that wolf. Or maybe, judging from the quiet assessment in those green eyes, he already knew.
Chapter 1
Jake finished answering e-mail from members of the group he’d founded the previous year, Werewolves Against Random Mating (WARM). Shutting down the laptop, he headed for the kitchen and snagged a cold bottle of Spruce Tip ale from the refrigerator. Then he twisted off the cap and walked into the living room. As usual, his gaze drifted to the Rachel Miller carving displayed on his mantel.
The soot from the hearth fires of three consecutive winters had darkened the wood. Maybe he should clean and oil it, now that summer had arrived once again. Or not. The soot that had settled into the grooves added character, in his estimation. Reaching out, he traced the distinctive and familiar slant of the wolf’s wide-set eyes.
When he’d bought the piece, he’d had no clue that Rachel would become internationally famous. But he’d suspected that his impulse buy might come back to haunt him, especially after he’d walked up to the counter and she’d turned to look into his eyes.
Leaning against the mantel, he gazed across Polecat Lake toward her property. It was nearly nine in the evening, but it might as well have been midday. Sunlight continued to play on the water, and the metallic whine of her power saw drifted in through his open window. She must be starting another large project, one that required the saw and the extra space provided by the workshop she’d had built about ten yards from her cabin.
Now that she was bringing in the big bucks, he kept expecting her to tear down that cabin and build a McMansion in its place. So far she hadn’t, and he respected her for keeping her operation low-key. Understatement was a Polecat tradition, one of the reasons he loved it here.
She’d bought a new truck, but he couldn’t blame her for replacing the unreliable bucket of bolts she’d inherited from her grandfather. She’d also hired a local kid named Lionel, who was part Native American, to clean her workshop and wrestle the bigger pieces onto her truck. A new truck, a roomy workshop, and a part-time assistant seemed to be the only concessions she’d made to her success, and Ted Haggerty claimed that she was the same down-to-earth person she’d always been.
If so, then props to her, because she’d created quite a stir, the kind that could turn a person’s head. No telling what this hunk of driftwood was worth now that she had commissions coming in from wealthy collectors all over the world. He should probably have it insured and protected in a climate-controlled safe.
Rachel Miller’s first wolf carving, if it surfaced, would bring a pretty penny on the auction block. To her credit, she’d never identified him as the buyer of her initial effort, and neither had Ted. Apparently no one except the three of them knew this work existed.
She’d sent him a note a couple months after he’d made his purchase, though. He knew that note by heart.
He hadn’t needed the note to tell him that he’d met her that day. His acute hearing had picked up snatches of her conversation with Ted, and he’d pegged her as the granddaughter who’d inherited Ike’s cabin. Ike had been a carver, although not nearly as talented as Rachel.
Then Jake had met her gaze, and her nervous excitement had given her away. Although he wasn’t an artist, he could imagine that putting your stuff in front of the public would be scary, and having someone buy it might take some getting used to.
He’d debated for days whether to respond to that note, which was still tucked under the carving on his mantel. In the end he’d decided not to. If he’d replied, she might have thought they could be friends. But he’d known from the moment they’d met that friendship wasn’t going to cut it. He wanted her, and he couldn’t have her.
That made living across the lake from her cabin a difficult proposition. Closing his eyes, he pictured how she’d looked three years ago, her hair falling to her shoulders in shades ranging from dark walnut to warm cherry. Her gaze had locked with his for one electric moment, making him think of summer storms and silvery rain.
She’d worn jeans and a faded T-shirt, an unremarkable outfit intended simply to cover her tall, lithe body.
