I crawled over to the passenger seat, intending on exiting the car the same way I entered it (which was pretty much my only option), when I realized that in my haste to avoid being squashed flat by the logging truck, I’d run the car right off the tiny dirt shoulder, and into a dense wall of blackberries. There was no conceivable way I was going to climb out of the window into that, even assuming I could shove the blackberry vines back enough to escape the car.
“Crap.” I sat back down in the driver’s seat, and considered the door to my left. Due to the fact that the door itself didn’t work, it was tied on tightly from the outside. Likewise, the window had been cemented into place, since the mechanism that managed it had long since given up the ghost. “Well, I guess I’ll have to go out the back.”
The little car shook as another logging truck whizzed past, the wind from its passage sending my shoulder-length hair whipping around my face when I peeled back the duct tape holding the thick, clear plastic that stood in place of my rear window.
I was halfway out the window, swearing to myself as I tried to reach behind myself and disentangle the bit of my shirt that had somehow been caught on the twisted window frame, when a car passed me, slowed, stopped, then, with blithe disregard to both laws of the road and common safety, backed up until it was stopped behind me.
“Problem?” the man who got out of the car asked as I struggled with the tangled wad of shirt behind me. I was half in the car, half out of it, one hand braced on Eloise’s sloped rear while my legs kicked around inside.
“Yeah, my shirt is caught on something and I can’t . . . ow! Son of a bitch, Eloise!”
“My name is Gregory, not Eloise,” the man said with a voice filled with humor. “Perhaps I can help.”
“Sorry, I was swearing at my car, not you,” I answered, releasing my hold on the twisted cloth, and leaning forward, sucking the blood off my punctured finger. “Be careful. The metal’s jagged just around the top, and it’s sharp.”
The man reached in alongside my hip, sliding his hand up and onto my butt.
“Whoa, now!” I jerked to the side, my legs kicking again as I tried to escape both the caught shirt and the butt groper. “That is totally uncalled-for! What sort of a man takes advantage of a snagged woman to cop a quick grope?”
“Sorry,” he said, quickly moving his hand. “I didn’t mean to . . . er . . . grope. I’m just trying to locate . . . Ah, this must be it. Hold still, or I won’t be able to unhook the material.”
I twisted around to glare suspiciously at the back of his head as he bent into the empty window, but he must have been telling the truth, because he didn’t attempt any more unsolicited touching. The shirt gave way as he released it.
“Oh, thank you,” I said in relief, intent on sliding forward down Eloise’s rear. Two strong hands under my arms caught me instead, pulling me out until I was upright on the road. “Oh. Er. Thanks,” I repeated.
“My pleasure. I don’t mean in reference to touching your ass, although that was very nice. In a wholly accidental way.”
“Yeah, well, it’s not the way to make friends or influence people,” I muttered, spinning around as I tried to see the damage to my favorite gauze blouse. I finally twisted it around, grimacing at the dirty hole now present in the back.
“Would it be rude of me to inquire why you were climbing out the back of your nonexistent rear window?” the man asked.
I sighed and released the shirt, then turned my attention to my butt-groping savior. One look at his curly blond hair, Californian surfer-dude good looks, and mischievous blue eyes had my mind going blank for a few seconds.
Gently, he reached out and pushed my chin upward until my mouth closed. I blushed, ashamed that I’d been gawking so brazenly.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, wondering how the hell one man could be so handsome and not have a harem of women traveling around with him. Maybe he was gay? No, in that case, the harem would be male. I shook my head. No matter what his sexual preference, this man was so handsome, it just wasn’t possible that he was there at that moment, standing by the side of a little-used road in the backwoods of southern Oregon.
“Why are you shaking your head at me?”
“You’re not real,” I said. “You can’t be real. Unless America’s Sexiest Male Models is filming at Crater Lake, or something like that. Because otherwise? No. It’s just not possible.”
He laughed. He had a nice laugh, baritone with just a hint of huskiness. “I assure you that I am very real. Although I do thank you for the compliment. At least, I think it was a compliment.”
“Oh, it was.”
He laughed again, which relieved the awkwardness of the moment, then suddenly jerked me to the side as a large Land Rover with a boat in tow hurtled past us, far too close to the shoulder for safety. “Idiot American drivers.”
“You’re not American?” I asked in surprise. He certainly sounded West Coast to me.
“I was born in a very small town in what is now Romania, actually,” he said with a little bow. “My name is Gregory Faa. And will you give me the pleasure of knowing your name?”
He had absolutely no accent, but the way he put words together did sound a bit foreign. Or at least, very upper-class. “Kiya Mortenson. Sorry I gawked just then. I wasn’t expecting to be rescued from the depths of Eloise by a Romanian supermodel.”
“I’m not a model,” he said with another smile. “I take it that your car has broken down?”
“Well,” I said slowly, following him when he went around to the front of the car. “With Eloise, it’s not so much a case of breaking down as it is running on a hope and a prayer, but yes, we got run off the road, and she stopped and won’t start again. Oh, the engine is in the back on a VW Bug. Are you good with cars?”
“Not particularly.” We moved to the rear of the car. In silence, we both contemplated the workings of Eloise’s motor. “I can give you a lift into town, though. I’m sure you can get someone to tow the car there.”
“Ew. Tow truck.” I bit my lip and tried to calculate how much money, if any, was left on my credit card. My bank account was sorely depleted due to Lily having to return to work, and thus not paying me for my covert fill-in job. “Um . . . yeah. Maybe I’ll just let her rest for a bit. Sometimes she will start up if she’s had some time to recuperate from trauma.”
A large RV lumbered past us, narrowly missing hitting Gregory’s shiny red car. He cocked a light brown eyebrow at me. “I wouldn’t risk leaving my car on this road, even if it was”—he glanced over my shoulder to where Eloise sat—“temperamental. It’s not safe.”
I eyed his sports car. “I don’t suppose if we had a rope, you could tow me into the nearest town? Or maybe just to a pullout spot, if there is one on this road?”
“No,” he said gently, taking me by the shoulders and pushing me toward his car. “Jaguars do not tow other cars. Get in, and I will take you down the road to the next town. It’s not far, three or four miles at best.”
“But, Eloise—”
“It will take us ten minutes at the most to get to town. We must hope that your car will be safe for the time it takes for the tow truck to fetch it.”
Limply, I allowed him to seat me in his car, all the while mentally chastising myself for not standing up to this handsome Good Samaritan. It wasn’t like me to be a doormat for any man, but here I was sitting silently, guiltily enjoying the mingled (and heady) aroma of leather seats, expensive car, and sexy man as he whisked me away.
“Were you on your way to your workplace when you had car trouble?” Gregory asked politely a few minutes later. Fir trees that lined the narrow road whipped past us on the right side, leaving the impression of a green blur that was punctuated now and again by sharp, craggy rocks that jutted out of the earth and jabbed pointy fingers to the sky. To the left, off and on through the dense trees I caught a flash of silver light, ind
icating a stream or perhaps one of the lakes that dotted this area.
“I wish. I’m unemployed at the moment. I was helping out a friend, but that ended kind of badly; hence I’m on my way home. I live near the coast, so it’s important that I be able to get Eloise started again.” I gnawed my lower lip for a few seconds, not wanting to ask the question uppermost in my mind, but not seeing much of a way out of it. “Do you think a tow for Eloise would be much above fifty bucks? If it’s only a couple of miles, that is?”
He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. “I shouldn’t think so. A bit on your uppers, are you?”
“Huh?”
“Sorry, that was a Briticism. I take it that you’re a bit short of ready cash?”
“And unready cash, and cash that will never have a chance to be ready because frankly, it doesn’t exist, and probably never will.” I sighed. “My unemployment ran out a few months ago. The job market is crap for someone who has no marketable skills other than the ability to coax a forty-five-year-old car into running long past its normal life span. You don’t happen to know of anyone who’s looking for a secretary or receptionist or something like that? I can type and answer phones and file if needed.”
“I’m afraid I don’t, no,” he said, shooting me a sympathetic look as we headed into a tiny little town named, according to the decorative sign by the side of the road, Rose Hill.
“What do you do?” I asked, grimacing when the question came out somewhat accusatory. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that like I expect you to give me a job. Are you a model?”
“Me?” He laughed again. “Hardly. I’m in acquisitions.”
“What kind of acquisitions?”
He shrugged. “Whatever I find profitable at the time. Lately I’ve been working out of Los Angeles exporting artwork to affluent Asian technology companies who wish to make an entrance into the global marketplace.”
“Sounds cool. What are you doing out here in the boonies of Oregon, if you don’t mind me being nosy?”
“I don’t mind at all. My family is here, and due to the work I just mentioned, I haven’t been around much. My grandmother has been demanding I visit for the last six months, and this was the first opportunity I’ve had to drive up here. Ah. There is the garage I remember seeing earlier this morning. Would you be terribly offended if I offered you a small loan to cover the cost of a tow?”
“Offended? Are you kidding? I’d be more likely to throw myself on you and kiss you in gratitude.”
His eyes twinkled at me with a roguish glint that had me grinning. “I’m in a bit of a hurry right now; otherwise I would take you up on that offer.”
“Hot art acquisition waiting for you?” I asked, climbing out of the car once he had stopped in front of a tiny gas station with attached one-car service bay. On the far side of the building a shiny new tow truck sat in the shade of the ever-present pine trees.
“As you said, I wish. Unfortunately what awaits me is a visit to my grandmother and her nightmarish herd of five pugs. Hello? Is someone here able to help me?”
I followed him into the minuscule office, filled almost to capacity by a man in dirty blue overalls and, inexplicably, a knitted hat with antlers and deer ears.
“Whatcha need?” the large man asked as he shifted off a hard metal stool and gave us both the once-over. “Gas is self-service. Pay in advance at the pump.”
“My friend here is in need of a tow.”
I listened silently as Gregory described the location of Eloise, and tossed a hundred-dollar bill across the cluttered counter just as casually as I might flick a piece of lint off my shoulder.
The tow man grunted an acknowledgment, pocketed the money, and hoisted his bulk back onto the stool at the same time he bellowed out a name. “Norm!”
Another rotund man emerged from the depths of the service stall, wiping his filthy hands on a crusty rag. “Yeah?”
“Got a tow for you. ’Bout five miles out of town between here and Heron Creek Road. Old VW.”
Norm hawked and spat, nodding as he trundled out to the tow truck.
I watched him nervously, and wondered aloud if I should go with him to ensure Eloise’s safety.
“Can’t. Against the law,” the station owner said before picking up a hunting and fishing magazine, and burying his nose in it.
“Don’t be such an automotive mother hen,” Gregory said as he escorted me out of the confines of the small office, and steered me over to a bench that sat in the shade opposite the station. I eased myself down carefully, mindful of splinters, since the bench was made out of a roughly hewn split log. It marked the outer boundary of what was obviously a little picnic area, complete with two squirrels who were mating under a beat-up picnic table, and a trash can that—if odor was anything to go by—was housing the several-days-old corpse of a large mammal. Some of the mountain sagebrush that Dalton was so allergic to lay just beyond the area. “Your car will be fine. I hate to leave you by yourself, but if I don’t get to my grandmother, she’ll rip several strips off me.”
“Sorry to delay you,” I said, and I was, although not so much that I didn’t add, “Enjoy the pugs.”
He made a face. “I’m hardly likely to. They’re little monsters.”
“Aww, they’re so cute and adorable, how can you say that? I love pugs. I’ve always wanted to have one, but just haven’t been able to get enough saved to afford it. Do you have far to go?”
“You’ve never met my grandmother’s beasts. She treats them like they are human, letting them in her caravan, and eating food she cooks. And no, she’s staying about a mile from here. Are you familiar with the Appleton Mill in the Umpqua Forest?”
“Not really, no.” I searched my memory for grains of information. “I know the forest is near here because I’ve seen a ton of signs for various camping facilities.”
He nodded. “My family is residing in the forest at the present.”
“Residing? I didn’t think they let people build there.”
“Not in houses. In caravans . . . er . . . RVs, you call them.”
“Now, that’s the way I’ve always felt camping should be done,” I said with a smile of appreciation. “None of this sleeping out in a mildewed canvas tent that every animal stronger than a slug can get into. Is your family back-to-nature kind of people? I heard there’s a fairly large contingent of nature lovers who hang out in this area.”
“Something like that.” He glanced at his watch and swore under his breath, then eyed me for a second. “It’s too bad you live so far away. My grandmother said just this morning that she is feeling the strain of caring for her little monsters. If you were available . . .”
He left the statement a half question. I shook my head with real regret. “I’d love a job taking care of dogs, especially adorable pugs, but I’m afraid the commute from my apartment to this area would kill Eloise. Not to mention would cost more in gas than any dog-care salary would cover.”
“Alas.” He took my hand and, to my surprise, bent over it, pressing my fingers to his mouth for one scorching hand kiss. I gawked at him again, amazed at the sensation, and unsure of how to react. Did one clasp the hand that held one’s own? Shake it? Kiss his hand in response?
A giggle built up inside of me at the idea of me gravely bending over his hand and kissing his knuckles. Oh, if only my phone could take pictures, my friends would all receive one of me doing just that.
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Kiya,” he said, releasing my hand. I held it stiffly at my side, feeling horribly awkward.
“Likewise. And thanks for the tow loan. Do you . . . er . . . have a card or something with a mailing address so I can send it back to you when I get home?”
He hesitated for a few seconds. “I am between addresses at the moment, but a letter sent to me care of this address will reach me.” He pulled a card out of his wallet and offered
it.
I mouthed the name of the law firm printed on the card, then tucked it away, and thanked him again. He smiled and got into his car, leaving me alone with the two randy squirrels, the dead thing in the garbage bin, and a wish that, just once in my life, something would go right.
Katie MacAlister, Time Crossed: A Time Thief Novella (A Penguin Special from Signet)
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