Nothing But Time (12 page)

Kicking a stone out of her path, Kate heard a plop into the water that had nothing to do with her actions and looked up to find a young boy standing at the side of the
lake
with a fishing rod in hand.  A look at the gear at his feet told Kate that either he hadn’t been there long or he wasn’t having
much
luck.  As she watched him awkwardly reeling in his line, Kate figured it had to have been the latter.

“Hey, there,” Kate called softly to catch the boy’s attention.  “Whatcha doing?”

The boy looked up and Kate saw that he was a boy of about
eight or nine
, the same age as her
nephew, Nate, or close to it. 
And if she wasn’t mistaken, he was also Harrowby’s nephew.  She’d seen him from a distance a time or two when they were cleaning the
fourth
floor where the nursery was located but hadn’t actually seen him up close before.  She tried to recall if anyone had mentioned his name, but didn’t think anyone had. 
However,
h
e was blond and adorable, just like
her nephew
and Kate couldn’t stop the smile that came to her lips when he just shrugged and looked back at the rod.

“You’re going to knot th
e line if you keep reeling it in
like that,” Kate offered
, her smile sliding away when she noted the sad expression on his face
.

He looked skeptically at the line and back at her.  Kate could see he was interested in what she said, but still he offered no words.

“I could show you if you like.”

He raised his brows in an expression of such doubt that Kate almost laughed.  “I know what you’re thinking,” Kate said
amicably
coming to his side.  “Girls don’t fish
.  Am I right?”

His lips twisted just a bit in a shadow of a smile.

“
I must say that
I beg to differ
with that opinion
,” Kate
went on
.  “When I was growing u
p, I went fishing with my dad
most every weekend even in the winter.”
  Again, his brows went up and she could see that he wanted to say something but still he remained silent.  “Yes, in the winter. 
Where I am from, we go ice fishing all the time. 
Do you ice fish here?
”

He shook his head.
 

“
You carve a hole through the ice and fish right through it.
  You’d think that would be pretty cold, right?
”

He nodded and Kate chatted on,
“No, you see we’d
tow
our own little house right out there on to the
frozen
lake with us to stay warm
in and fish through a hole in the floor
.”

Silence still
but astonishment
and disbelief
shone
in his wide eyes
.

Kate laughed in amusement
and held out her hand.  “May I?”

After a moment, he handed her the rod and she took it
,
testing the reel for a few moments.
 
Dad would be agog, she thought as she examined the brass reel
and saw the name engraved on the side
– J.
F. & B.
F. Meek
. 
It was a beauty of a Kentucky multiplying reel and worth quite a lot where she came from.  Her dad had a collection of old reels, scouted for them fanatically at antique shops
and trade shows.  He had one that was a M
eek & Milam from about the 1860
s but these older ones were rare and their price tag showed it.
  Of course, now this one showed little age though she knew, thanks to her dad, that they had stopped making them with that mark around 1850.

“Nice reel,” Kate told the boy
and
checked the bait before she
drew back her arm and expertly cast the line far out into the pond.  From the corner of her eye, she caught the awed expression on the little boy’s face and bit back a smile. 
Reeling it slowly in, careful to avoid the tall weeds that edged the shore, Kate drew out the line and cast it in again.

It went on that way for nearly ten more minutes before she said casually,
“My name’s Kate.  What’s yours?”

“Nathan.”

Kate swallowed deeply, her own smile wavering for a moment.  What were the odds?  “I have a nephew with the same name and
I bet
he’s
about
your age, too.”

“Really?”
His voice was a little hoarse and Kate wondered if he had a cold.

“Yea
h
, but we call him Nate, though…sometimes.”

“My mother calls me that sometimes, too,” he admitted as he watched carefully how Kate slowly reeled in the line before casting it back into the water.  “You can,
too,
if you
like
.  Did you go fishing with your father a lot?”

“Yup,
like I said,
every weekend
almost
. 
I’m from Minnesota in America
and it’s called the land of 10,000 lakes
although there are a lot more than that
.  There are lakes everywhere. 
Mostly
we’d
just
head
up
to
Lake Minnetonka or
Mille Lacs because
they were
close
by
, but during summer vacation
we’d go up to where my grandparents lived and spend
a week or two up at Lake Winnibigoshish.”  Before he could say anything to that, Kate added, “And before you
ask, I am not making that up.  It’s an Indian name, most of the lakes up there are
– l
ike Pequot,
Wayzata
.”

The boy mouthed the words trying to repeat the
m and Kate grinned.  “Sometimes
we’d go fly fishing in the Big Fork River
when the water wa
sn’t to
o
high
…”

“What is fly fishing?”
Nathan
interrupted.

“It’s casting out over the water like this.”  Doing her best without a modern reel, Kate demonstrated the technique letting the hook arc over the water without dropping in.  “Fish eat flies and other insects, you know?  So
,
this is like tricking them into thinking there’s something up there for them to eat and they come to the surface to get it.  But we di
dn’t do that very often.  Dad i
s mostly a
‘
sit in the boat and wait
’
kind of guy.  So we did a lot of casting and trolling
.  Not for trout too much.  Dad’s not a trout guy.  Great big Muskie, that’s what Dad likes
.”  Kate squeezed her eyes shut for
a moment,
thinking about her dad before blinking the tears away.  “Dad just had girls, you see.  So Mom got my
older
sister and Dad got me.”

“You call your father Dad?”
Nathan
asked. 

“Sure, what do you call yours?” Kate asked absently.

“Papa
,” the boy whispered.  “But he’s
dead now.”

Kate l
owered the rod.  “I’m sorry.  I’d heard that.  I didn’t mean to upset you.
”  Kate studied the sadness on the boy’s face sensing that the loss was a recent one.  “Did he
used to
take you fishing?”

“Yes.
”
H
e shrugged in that way little boys do to show that they are manly and strong.  Sympathetically, Kate put an arm around his shoulder and gave a brief squeeze.  Long enough to comfort, but short enough not to embarrass him.  “We used to fish a lot together.  He
said he was going to give me that reel when I got older
, but he died
and my mother let me have it
.”

“So he never got a chance to show you how to use it then?” she asked.  “I could show you if you like.”  When he still looked skeptical, Kate reassured him.  “I was a pretty huge tomboy when I was little…I did all kinds of things that usually only boys like to do because my Dad didn’t have a son to teach all those things to, so he taught me.  I fished, camped and hunted since I was little. 
Mostly we’d camp in a tent, but o
n the longer trips, when my mom and my sister came along, we’d get a big cabin on Leech Lake with a nice beach for them to sit on while we fished.”

“Why did they call it
that
?  Were there leeches in
it
?” he asked wide-eyed, not even thinking of questioning Kate any more as he saw the skill in her casting.

“Yes, yes there were,” Kate shuddered at the memory but she enjoyed his renewed smile knowing the topic was gruesome enough for a little boy to enjoy.  “In fact, this one time when I was little I remember…”

A movement caught Kate’s attention from the corner of her eye and she turned to find Brand just a dozen feet away listening
with a
serious
expression on his
handsome
face
. 
Oh boy, the earl did not look happy, she thought.  He was as rigid looking as she’d ever seen him, strung so tightly, Kate thought a strong wind might snap him in half. 
Even so, her heart leapt at the sight of him, up close and personal for the first time in days.  Despite his
air of solemnity
, he still sent her senses reeling with awareness as wildly as they had each time she was in his presence.  Forcing the feelings away, Kate straightened and
solemnly handed the rod back to the boy.

“No, no, please don’t let my presence det
er you from finishing your tale.
”
Harrowby
shook his head and
waved a hand at her
.  “What happened?”

“Yes, what happened?”
Nathan
piped in.

“We were there for a family reunion and I was wading in the lake with some of my cousins,” Kate went on
, giving Harrowby a wary look
.  “When we came out, my legs were covered in
little leeches
from the knees down.  I freaked out and screamed like a little
baby
until my mom calmed me down enough to let them get them off.”

“Did they pull them off?”
Nathan
asked with a wrinkled nose.

“No, in fact, my uncle used
his cigarette to burn them off.
”
Kate couldn’t help the shudder that ran through her.  “I don’t remember much more than that except that I kept thinking
,
very strangely
,
that
th
ey looked like watermelon seeds
stuck to my legs
but,
I can tell you
,
I never went back in that lake again.”

Nate laughed wildly and even the earl bestowed a
slight
smile upon her.

“Will you show me again?”
Nathan asked
,
gesturing to the fishing rod
.

Kate raised a brow to the earl who nodded, his expression once again serious as he watched her with his nephew.  Kate stood behind the little boy and showed him how to hold the rod before wrapping her
hands over his.  Several
times,
she guided the movements of his arms showing him how to cast the line with a flick of his wrist.  Finally
,
she stood back to let him try
on his own
.  He cast a few times with Kate giving him mild feedback until he did it correctly and turned a beaming smile on her.
 

Kate returned the gesture though she could feel H
arrowby’s stare burning in her b
ack.  She
gave
Nathan
a round of applause
then caught
the earl’s frown from the corner of
her
eye. 
She was right, Brand had
his earl on
and was looking pretty unhappy. 
She’d overstepped again, Kate knew.  With it, there would no doubt be a price to pay.
 

“Uncle Brandon!” Nathan cried
, running eagerly to Harrowby’s side
.  “Did you see it?”

“I did, Nathan.
”
Harrowby worked up a smile and tousled his nephew’s hair
affectionately
. 
The unbending earl was gone again, if only for a moment. 
“Well done, w
ell done, but I fear I must cut your lesson short.  You
r
mother and grandmother will be here shortly and I’ll need you to go up for a bath before they get here.”