Strangers in the Night Read online

Five years. She was thirty-one, a widow who lived with her father and her dog, who hadn’t been on a date in … God, almost two years now, and there had been a grand total of only three dates anyway. There weren’t any neighbors nearby, the motel kept her busy during the summer when travel was easier, and she made it a point not to get involved with any of the guests, not that she had met any with whom she wanted to get involved.

  Stricken, she looked around as if she didn’t recognize her surroundings. There had been moments before when the reality of Dylan’s death hit hard, but this was different. This was like being kicked in the chest.

  Five years. Thirty-one. The numbers kept echoing in her mind, chasing each other in circles like maddened squirrels. What was she doing here? She was living her life secluded in the mountains, so immersed in being Dylan Bradshaw’s widow that she had forgotten to be herself, running the small, exclusive resort that had been Dylan’s dream.

  Dylan’s dream, not hers.

  It had never been hers. Oh, she had been happy enough to come to Idaho with him, help him build his dream in the wilderness paradise, but her dream had been much simpler: a good marriage, kids, the kind of life her parents had enjoyed, piercingly sweet in its normalcy.

  But Dylan was gone, his dream forever unfulfilled, and now hers was in danger too. She hadn’t remarried, she had no children, and she was thirty-one.

  “Oh, Tink,” she whispered. For the first time she realized she might never remarry, might never have a family of her own. Where had the time gone? How had it slipped away, unnoticed?

  As always, Tinkerbell sensed her mood and thrust himself closer to her, licking her hands, her cheek, her ear, almost knocking her down in his frenzy of sympathy. Hope grabbed him and regained her balance, laughing a little in spite of herself as she wiped away the slobber-hound’s latest offering. “All right, all right, no more feeling sorry for myself. If I don’t like what I’ve been doing, then change, right?”

  His plumy tail wagged, his tongue lolled, and he grinned his doggy grin that said he approved of her speed in figuring out what she should do.

  “Of course,” she told him as she headed down the trail toward the last cabin, “I have others to consider. I can’t forget Dad. After all, he sold his house and came out here because of me. It wouldn’t be fair to uproot him again, to say, ‘Thanks for the support, but now it’s time to move on.’ And what about you, goofball? You’re used to having plenty of room to roam, and let’s face it, you aren’t dainty.”

  Tink trotted after her, gamboling at her heels like an overgrown puppy, his ears pricked up as he listened to her tone. It was conversational, no longer sad, so his tail happily swished back and forth.

  “Maybe I should just make an effort to get out more. The fact that I’ve only had three dates in five years could be my fault,” Hope allowed wryly. “Let’s face it, the drawback to living in a remote area is that there aren’t many people around. Duhh.”

  Tink stopped dead, bright eyes fastening on a squirrel scampering across the path in front of them. Without even an apologetic look for abandoning her, he tore out in furious pursuit of the squirrel, barking madly. Clearing Idaho of the villainous squirrels was Tink’s ambition in life; though he had never caught one, he never stopped trying. After fruitlessly trying to break him of the habit, fearing he would tangle with a rabid squirrel, Hope had given up the effort and instead made certain he always got his rabies vaccination.

  The squirrel scrambled up the nearest tree and stopped just out of reach of Tink’s lunges, chattering at him and spurring Tink to even more barking and jumping, as if he suspected the varmint was mocking him.

  Leaving the dog to his fun, Hope went up the steps to the long front porch of the last cabin. Though the little resort had been Dylan’s idea, his dream, going into one of the cabins always gave her a sense of pride. He had designed them, but she was the one who had decorated them, took care of them. The furnishings were different in each one, but similar in their simplicity and comfort. The walls were decorated with tasteful prints, rather than ratty deer heads bought at garage sales. The furniture was comfortable enough for a couple on a honeymoon and substantial enough for a hunting party.

  She had tried to make each one feel like a home instead of a rented cabin, with rugs and lamps and books, as well as a fully equipped kitchen. There were radios but no televisions, because reception in the mountains was so spotty and most of the guests mentioned how peaceful their stay was without it. There was a television in Hope’s cabin, but it pulled in only one station during good weather and none at all during bad. She was considering investing in a satellite dish, because the winters were terribly long and often boring, and she and her dad could play only so many games of checkers.

  If she did, she thought, she might add an extra receiver or two so a couple of the cabins could have television service to offer as an option. Things couldn’t stay the same; if she kept the resort, she would have to continually make changes and improvements.

  Taking a wrench from her hip pocket, she turned the valve that shut off the water to the cabin, then set about draining the pipes. The cabins were heated electrically, so when the power went off, they would quickly become icy inside. Each cabin did have a fireplace, but if a blizzard came, she certainly wouldn’t be able to battle her way from cabin to cabin, building fires and keeping them fed.

  That accomplished, she secured the shutters over the windows and locked the door. Tink had given up on the squirrel and was waiting for her on the porch. “That’s it,” she told him. “All finished. Just in time too,” she added, as a snowflake drifted past her nose. “C’mon, let’s go home.”

  He understood the word “home” and leaped to his feet, panting eagerly. A snowflake drifted past his nose, and he snapped at it, then was off on another manic tear, running back and forth, jumping at snowflakes and trying to catch them. His expression invited Hope to laugh at him, and she did, then joined him in a snowflake chase that turned into a game of tag, and ended with her running and jumping through the falling snow like a five-year-old herself. By the time she reached the big cabin, she was exhausted, panting harder than Tink and giggling at his antics.

  He reached the door before she did, of course, and as always he was impatient to get inside. He turned his head to bark at her, demanding she hurry and open the door. “You’re worse than having a child,” she said, leaning over him to turn the doorknob. “You can’t wait to get out, and once you’re out, you can’t wait to get back in. You’d better enjoy the outdoors while you can, because if this snow gets as bad as I think it will, it’ll be a couple of days before you can go for a run.”

  Logic made no impression on Tink. He merely wagged his tail harder, and when the door opened, he lunged through the widening crack, yipping a little as he trotted around the spacious, two-story great room, checking all the familiar scents before darting into the kitchen and out again, then coming over to Hope as if to say, “I’ve checked things out and everything’s okay.” She patted him, then shed her heavy shearling coat and hung it on the hall tree, sighing in relief at the immediate sense of freedom and coolness.

  Her home was beautiful, she thought, looking around. Not grand, not luxurious, but definitely beautiful. The front of the A-frame was a wall of windows, giving a wonderful view of the lake and the mountains. A big rock fireplace soared the entire two stories, and twin ceiling fans hung from the exposed-beam ceiling, circulating the warm air that gathered at the top back to the ground floor. Hope had a green thumb, and luxurious ferns and other houseplants gave the interior of the house a lush freshness. The floor was wide wood planking, finished to a pale gold and covered with thick area rugs in rich shades of blue and green. Graceful curving stairs wound up to the second floor, and the white stair railing continued across the balcony. For Christmas she always wound lights and greenery up the stair banisters and across the balcony, and the effect was breathtaking.

  There were two bedrooms upstairs—the master bed and bath and