Just Once (4 page)

O’Malley’s is much the same as I left it: dimly lit with wood-paneled walls, small stage for a live band, busy bar. Only a few couples dare hit the dance floor this early—and this sober—twisting and twirling to the tinny jukebox songs.

There are enough of us that we take up four tables, and I end up jammed at one end with Hailey and sous chef Mark, along with a few of the wranglers I met earlier. Apparently the ranch hands never come to the bar, and rarely socialize.

“So, Kate,” Hailey says once we all have beer. “We’re dying to know what brought you back.”

I look around in surprise. She and Mark are openly attentive, and a couple of wranglers appear to be eavesdropping. “Well…I worked here for three years when I was younger, and I kept in touch with Hank and Mary off and on after that. Then it just happened that this year they needed a kitchen/cabin manager at the same time I was looking for something else to do—”

“What were you doing before?” Mark interrupts.

“Uh, I was working in Thailand. Trying to work, to be more specific. I just couldn’t concentrate, and this felt like the right place to escape to.”

“You left Thailand for this?” Hailey asks, gesturing to the almost entirely denim-clad population of O’Malley’s.

I laugh. “Yep.”

“That’s the right answer,” a voice booms over my shoulder. Everyone jumps. I turn in my seat to look up in pleasant surprise at Zeke O’Malley, proprietor and bartender extraordinaire. I knew him well in my younger days, and he’s seen more of my drunken antics than anyone should have to.

“Zeke!” I jump up to hug him.

He’s a barrel-chested old man who could probably still wrestle a bear—a story he swears is true—and he hugs me back.

“As I live and breathe,” he says when I pull away. He looks me up and down as though confirming that I have, in fact, survived this long.

“I’m here for the summer,” I say. “Back at Ponderosa.”

“I had a feeling we’d see you again.”

“Did not.”

“Did too. Not everybody’s made for life out here, but some people are. You’d be surprised.”

“Zeke!” someone bellows. “Beer!”

He smiles at me, revealing an additional missing tooth since the last time we saw each other. “Be good, Eight-Shot Kate. Assuming you know how?”

“Me?”

He laughs and disappears into the crowd.

When I turn back to the table, everyone is staring. “Wait,” Hailey says, wide-eyed. “
You’re
Eight-Shot Kate?”

I bury my face in my hands and slump in my seat as absolutely everybody begins to laugh. A gaping Mark points to a glittery bra hanging from a mounted moose head. “Is that your…And that picture…?”

And sure enough, there’s a photo of me—from behind, thank God—dancing topless on the bar.

Hailey slams her hands on the table, making the beers jump. “Did you perform a striptease for Zeke’s birthday when you were seventeen?”

“On top of a table?”

“While singing an original song?” someone else chimes in.

My face is burning. “I was nineteen,” I correct through my fingers. “And very drunk.”

Everybody laughs uproariously. The wranglers start to clear the table, and right on cue, Gretchen Wilson’s distinctive voice spills out of the jukebox, telling everybody she’s here for the party. “Eight-Shot Kate! Eight-Shot Kate!” people start chanting, slapping the table.

“No!” I say frantically, waving them away. “Absolutely not! I’m not nineteen. And perhaps most importantly, I’m not drunk.”

“Tequila!” the people shout.

“And I’m not going to be!”

Mercifully they stop their shouting, but everyone is looking at me with new eyes. The ceiling-fan-obsessed girl has been transformed into the face of the pink rhinestone-studded bra and topless photo (from
behind
) that’s been hanging around this dingy backwoods bar for more than ten years.

“Those days are past,” I say firmly, but they don’t look convinced. “Maybe if you’d met me a year ago, but now…no more.”

They groan their disappointment.

“You pervs. Drink your beer. It’s on me.”

And just like that they cheer up again, drinking and dancing the night away until I stand up to go shortly after midnight. Everybody boos me for being the first to leave, but tomorrow is my first official day of work, and I’m determined to set a fine example for the kitchen/cabin girls. I set myself a limit of two beers and stuck to it…plus two shots of tequila. When I stopped there everyone teased me, so to shut them up I finally joined a bunch of people on the dance floor—remaining fully clothed and respectable, but still having fun.

Come to think of it, that’s the first time I’ve danced in a while. I flash back to the last time I was in a bar and immediately shake my head to clear it. That was the reckless Kate. This is the new me. Nothing to worry about.

I rode over in one of the ranch vans, but Randy Cooter and his old cab are parked in their usual spot in front of O’Malley’s, so I hop inside and ask him to take me home. Randy’s not much of a talker, which I appreciate because I’ve been talking and shouting all night and need to tone it down a notch. The cab windows are open, and the warm mountain air blows through. I’m told we’re experiencing a heat wave at the moment, which explains the uncommonly hot weather for early June.

We make the ride home in silence, and fifteen minutes later I pay Randy and wave goodbye, weaving my way over the gravel to the staircase leading to the bunkhouse. Each step lends a sense of foreboding as I approach my sweltering room. I squint through the darkness as I stop at my door. There’s a large box leaning against the wall, but I can’t see what it is.

Pushing open the bedroom door I’m greeted with a wall of heat and groan as I instantly start to sweat. I flip on the light and blink as my eyes adjust. I’ve unpacked a little and made up the bed with its tattered sheets, but it’s just too hot to sleep, and I don’t want to show up at Hank and Mary’s house drunk (just a little) and asking to spend the night.

I reach outside and heave the box into the light, grinning when I see that it’s a brand new ceiling fan.
Excellent.
Not quite as good as if it were actually hung on the ceiling, but we’ve made progress.

I strip out of my jeans and blouse and swap them for shorts and a tank top, then park myself in front of the window, gazing over my shoulder at the ceiling fan. I look up at the metal post protruding from the ceiling.
How hard can it be?
I wonder. I kneel on the floor and open the box, pulling out the brief instruction manual. The fan needs to be assembled, but according to the illustrations, all that’s required is a screwdriver. I think we’ve got a few tools and a stepladder in the supply closet. A bead of sweat trickles down my back, and I make up my mind.

I’m braless beneath my tank top, so I pull on a sweater before slipping into my sneakers to run downstairs in the dark. I let myself into the supply closet and dig around until I find a rusty old screwdriver. I scoop up the stepladder and race back upstairs, weaving a little, but arriving safely.

I cast aside my sweater and sneakers and set up the rickety wooden stepladder beneath the post for the ceiling fan. When the lodge was built, this entire level was one open space, and when they divided it into staff rooms, they built them fairly carelessly. Each room has a window and a light, but not necessarily in the center of the room. In the case of this room, both the light and the fan are at the end of the rectangle, in front of the door.

At length I get the fan assembled. I heave the contraption onto my shoulder and climb the shaky ladder until I can reach the ceiling. I’ve got the screwdriver clamped between my teeth, and it takes all my strength to heave the fan onto the post. Once it’s centered I climb even higher so I can hold it up with one hand while attempting to screw it in place with the other.

The combination of the heat, my proximity to the light, and my unaccustomed exertion makes me sweat even more. I can feel rivulets of water creeping down my back and between my breasts, and my armpits are damp. Much more of this labor-intensive work and I’ll—

I shriek as the door flies open and crashes into the ladder. I pitch forward, leaving the ceiling fan dangling precariously from its two screws, and topple onto the massive stranger. He’s huge, but thanks to the ladder I’m taller, and when I fall my slick armpit smashes straight into his face. I feel his nose press into my skin, his muffled shout of surprise, and then my entire limp, sweaty body slides down his front until I crumple to the floor. He falls backward, landing on his ass with a thud and a grunt, and then a faint creaking sound has us looking up, just in time to see the ceiling fan come loose and fall to the ground, cracking into several jagged pieces.

Breathing hard, I sit up to stare at the man glaring back at me. Clad in a black T-shirt and cargo pants, he’s got tousled dark hair and even darker eyes. He’s not beautiful like Brandon, but there’s something powerful about him. The smooth plane of his nose suggests it’s been broken, there’s a hard line to his jaw. Something south of the border clenches instinctively.
What?
It must be the alcohol. And the heat.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he finally asks, dusting himself off and standing. Almost as an afterthought he reaches down and grips my arm, pulling me unceremoniously to my feet.

I jerk away and check myself for injuries. With the exception of my wounded pride and a few bruises, I appear to be fine. “I’m not hurt, thanks for asking,” I reply. “And I’m here because this is my room. A great question would be what the hell are
you
doing here?”

His eyes flash, and he reaches into his pocket, pulling out a handful of small papers I recognize as requisition notices. “I came back to this,” he says. “Apparently someone named Kate is in
dire
need of a ceiling fan.”

Thanks, Brandon.
“You’re Shane.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Do you normally walk into rooms unannounced in the middle of the night?”

He smirks. “Never been a problem before.”

What an asshole. I gesture to the broken fan. “Well, it’s a problem now. I need a new fan. And I need you to knock before you come in to install it.”

“Seems like you know what you’re doing.” He shrugs. “I don’t think I need to come back at all.”

“Are you always an asshole?”

He raises an eyebrow. “I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me. You barge into my room, nearly kill me, break my fan, and apologize for nothing.”

His dark eyes rake me up and down. I suddenly remember I’m not wearing a bra. And I’m pretty sure I’m gleaming with sweat.

“You look all right to me.”

“Fine. I’ll fix the fan myself. Where do I get another one?”

“I’ll bring it up. Put some clothes on.”

He’s gone before I can reply, but as soon as his heavy footsteps fade down the hall, I dig through my bags for a bra and a top that provides a little more coverage. I don’t have a huge chest, but it’s enough to make a statement in the tiny shirt I have on. Goddammit. I spent the past hours making a good impression on everybody else, and when I finally meet the guy I’ve been searching for all day, I slam a sweaty armpit in his face and fight with him.
Oh no.
Speaking of which…I duck my head and covertly sniff under my arm, even as I wonder why I’d care if he thinks I smell. He works in a barn, for crying out loud.
And he
deserved
it
, I remind myself.
He didn’t even apologize!

A few minutes later I hear work boots thump up the steps and Shane pushes open the door—again, no knocking—with a new fan under his arm.

“Thanks,” I say, reaching for it. “I’ll take it from here.”

He ignores me. “I’ll do it. It’s the last one we’ve got. I can’t have you breaking anything else.”

“Nothing would be broken if you’d knocked!”

“I thought you were at the bar. I knocked when I brought the fan up, but didn’t get an answer. When I came back with the ladder I assumed you were still out.” Behind him I can see a ladder propped against the wall in the hall.

“With the light on?”

“I’m not a detective, Kate. Now move so I can get this hung up.”

He uses his foot to clear space on the floor, then crouches down to assemble the new fan. I stand awkwardly for a second, then gather up the broken pieces of the first fan and toss them into the garbage. That takes all of one minute, however, so then I just watch him, and he eventually shoots me a look.

“What?” he asks.

I shrug. “What am I supposed to do? Do you want some help?”

He tries not to scoff. “No.”

“I’ll go brush my teeth.”

“Good idea.”

I grab my toiletries bag and squeeze past him out the door. When I’m in the bathroom, I shut—and lock—the door, then lean against it. My hairline is damp with sweat, my heart is beating fast, and my mouth is dry. I tell myself again that it’s a combination of heat and alcohol, but something within me has come alive for the first time in a long time, and I don’t know how I feel about it. Actually, I know exactly how I feel about it: appalled. Men like Shane are not my type: huge, hulking jerks who don’t apologize when they’re wrong. I like the Kevin Drews of the world—polished, finessed, accomplished men who know how to order wine and fly first class.