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“What the hell is wrong with me?” she whispered into the empty bathroom. “What the hell is wrong with me?”

***

It took Emerson a long time to pull herself together.

She was not a crier. She’d tempered that long ago, before her teens. Her father had taught her early on that crying would get her nowhere on the slopes, and if the cameras or reporters caught her teary-eyed, they’d use it to their advantage and she’d end up being the Skiing Crybaby or something equally horrifying. As young as she was, it had stuck, and she’d trained herself to tamp down her emotions, to stay stone-faced during a race. So much so that people had made comments about how stoic and expressionless she was for somebody so young.

Of course, she’d carried that into adulthood, more than one relationship ending with her partner tearfully accusing her of being emotionless.

“Thanks, Dad,” she muttered now from the toilet seat, reaching behind her to grab a tissue and blow her nose. She stood and checked herself in the mirror, the red in her eyes and the puffiness of her cheeks unfamiliar sights. She leaned her hands against the counter and studied her face in the mirror, closely. Her eyes were an icy blue (another thing that solidified the stoic look she’d perfected all those years ago). She studied them. Were they cold? She supposed if you didn’t know her, you might think so. But it was a pretty blue, a light sky blue color. And she wasn’t always cold. She could be warm. Sometimes. She grimaced and moved on to her skin. She had great skin. This, she knew. She took care of it, used copious amounts of sunscreen in L.A., and had just enough of a tan to make her look healthy. No blemishes. One mole, a small one just under her left eye. That was courtesy of her mother, who’d had one in the exact same place. Her light blonde hair came from the Swedish side of her family. She liked the short cut, liked that it was no-muss, no-fuss, and that had come from her skiing days as well. It was so much easier to wear a helmet when she didn’t have a pound of hair to shove up into it. She looked closely. She was pretty sure she had a few more years before it started to fade, as blonde hair tended to, and perhaps begin to gray. Then she’d have to think about color or letting it go brassy and dull.

She stepped back, studied her entire presence from the shoulders up, and for the first time in ages she wondered what people thought when they looked at her. Did they find her attractive? Approachable? Standoffish? Intimidating? She was tall. She had those eyes. Her face was often expressionless. Intimidating seemed to be the best choice, which didn’t necessarily make her happy.

What did Cassie see?

That thought immediately yanked her from her reflection, and she stepped out of the bathroom as if the tile floor had just become excruciatingly hot. In the middle of the living room, she sighed and looked out the window. The sky was gray. The trees were losing leaves like crazy, many of them already bare. Even the lake water looked cold somehow. Winter was coming.

Almost unconsciously, Emerson rubbed her hands over her upper arms, goosebumps breaking out along her bare skin. She’d already rummaged through her mother’s clothes, but with the size difference, her mother’s sweatshirts had sleeves that ended in the middle of Emerson’s forearms. No, if she was going to be here for a while longer, she’d need some warmer clothes.

She knew exactly where she could find some.

***

Emerson had decided to walk to The Sports Outfitter for two reasons. One, she planned to buy some things—including a pair of hikers—and didn’t think trying to carry them back to the cottage on her bike was a smart idea. Two, if she drove her mother’s car, by the time she found a parking space, she’d have to walk almost the same distance anyway.

It was cold. Emerson’s phone said it was in the low forties, dropping down into the thirties tonight. The thought of the fireplace and a nice glass of red wine later was incredibly appealing as she made her way along the cobblestone sidewalk. Up ahead, she could see a tiny bird of a woman struggling with her garbage can, which seemed to be about three times her size. Emerson hurried forward and took the handle of the can from the woman who, up close, seemed to be in her seventies and must have weighed about ninety pounds on her heaviest of days.

“Here, let me help you with that,” Emerson said, using her foot to kick the can back onto its wheels. “Where would you like it?”

“Oh, you’re so sweet. Why do they make them so big? There’s only me, for crying out loud. How much garbage do they think I create in a week?” She turned and headed down her driveway. Emerson grinned and followed her, pulling the can behind her.

“Right here would be great.” The woman pointed to a corner of pavement next to her small garage.

“There you go.” Emerson turned the can so the lid opened easily from the front.

“Thank you so much.”

“Sure.” Emerson started back up the driveway when the woman spoke again.

“You’re Caroline’s daughter, aren’t you?”

Emerson turned, nodded.

“She was a good woman, a real nice lady, your mom. Shame, what happened.” She waited a beat, then held out her hand. “I’m Joan Norris.”

Emerson took the offered hand, which felt like a child’s in hers, the skin papery soft, the bones delicate. “Emerson Rosberg.”

“Caroline talked about you all the time, you know.”

That damn lump was back, and Emerson swallowed hard.

After a moment, Joan Norris waved a dismissive hand. “Bah. Life. Anyway. Thanks for helping me, Emerson. You’re a good girl, just like your mom always said.” With that, she turned and moved toward the front door of her small waterfront house.

“Any time,” Emerson replied, not sure if Joan heard her. She followed the driveway back up to the street and continued on her way, hands jammed in her pockets, shaking her head at the surreal feeling that seemed to engulf her so often lately.

Main Street wasn’t terribly busy today. If she remembered correctly, this was sort of between seasons. The summer was gone, the leaf-lookers were tapering off, but it wasn’t quite ski season yet (though they’d be getting ready to make snow on a couple of the mountains if they had to). It was nice to walk down the sidewalk straight instead of sideways to dodge the throngs of people moving from shop to shop.

The Sports Outfitter was on the left hand side of the street right on the lake, and it sat side by side and shared a building with a small, classy-looking boutique called, fittingly enough, Boutique. The building was a nice, solid brown brick and looked to be three floors. A driveway led to the back and when Emerson curiously followed it, she found a surprisingly large parking lot.

“Huh. Could’ve driven after all,” she muttered. Her eyes tracked the dock that stretched out into the water and as she reached the bottom of the sloping driveway, she saw the bank of windows that lined one side of one floor of Cassie’s store. Through those windows, she could see brightly colored kayaks, life preservers, and various water equipment.
Impressive.
She headed for that door.

Emerson hadn’t realized how large Cassie’s store was. She only vaguely remembered being inside maybe once or twice when old man Bickham had owned it. This bottom floor seemed to have everything a customer could possibly want for working on or playing on the lake. She wandered aimlessly up an aisle of flippers, goggles, and wetsuits, touching them randomly. There was only one customer on this floor, and he was looking at kayaks. An attractive older woman manned the counter, alternating between glancing down at the paperwork in front of her and up at Kayak Man and Emerson. She looked somewhat familiar, but Emerson couldn’t place her.

After a few minutes of browsing, Emerson headed for the stairs and climbed up to what was essentially the first floor. The front door spilled onto the sidewalk of Main Street, and a neon sign hung from the window next to it, blinking “Open” in red and blue letters. This floor was busier. Not busy, but there was a handful of customers wandering around, fingering clothing, gazing at the shoe display on the back wall. Something cold and wet touched Emerson’s hand, startling her. She looked down and saw Gordie, tongue lolling, mouth open wide in what could only be described as a smile.

“Hey, buddy,” she said quietly and scratched his head. “What’s going on?”

Rather than answering her, he sat down and allowed her to scratch him some more. Luckily, they were next to a rack of sweatshirts, so Emerson scratched with one hand and shopped with the other. She found two she liked, tossed them over her arm, and looked down at Gordie.

“Okay. Shoes next.” They walked to the back wall of the store and Emerson studied the larger-than-expected selection of hiking boots and shoes. She had a Merrell brand in her hand when a soft voice issued from behind her.

“Good choice. Those are my favorites.”

Emerson turned to meet Cassie’s brown eyes, warm as usual, but slightly less so today. She had her hands clasped behind her back and seemed to be purposely standing a bit away from Emerson. “Hi there,” Emerson said, unable to keep the smile off her face. “Just the woman I was looking for.”

“Really.” Cassie arched a skeptical eyebrow.

“Yes.” Emerson held up the shirts, then the shoe. “I’m shopping. For warm clothes. Because I’m freezing my ass off.”

Cassie craned her neck, made a show of looking around the store. “Where’s your…friend?”

It was that moment that Emerson realized she hadn’t even introduced the two women. She closed her eyes and shook her head, irritated with herself. “She’s gone.”

“Gone?”

“Yeah. Gone. Home. Back to L.A.”

“I see.” Cassie glanced at the shoe. “You want to try those on?” With a quick squint at Emerson’s feet, she said. “Tens?”

Emerson nodded, and was about to say something about lucky guesses, but Cassie was off, Gordie on her heels. Emerson watched them disappear through a door in the back wall and pressed her lips together. It never occurred to her that Cassie would be so…chilly. Though after the way Monday night ended for them, she didn’t know how she could think Cassie would
not
be chilly.

“Ugh,” was the only thing she could think, and so she said it out loud. The woman shopping next to her gave her a curious glance.

Cassie was back in a few moments with a box. She handed it to Emerson without a word and went off to help another customer. With a sigh, Emerson sat down and tried on the shoes, which were a perfect fit and ridiculously comfortable. She put them back in the box, then went to the front of the store to grab a recyclable shopping bag in which to put her purchases. Her credit card was about to take a beating.

She wandered for nearly an hour, grabbing a few things here and there: a pair of warm gloves, a fleece hat, a blue V-neck sweater she didn’t need but couldn’t resist. The whole time, she kept watch on Cassie out of the corner of her eye. She was terrific with her customers. Fun, approachable, fair. She was just as kind to her employees, helping out when necessary, taking over in order to send somebody on a break. It was one of those breaks when Emerson made her move. She’d heard Cassie talking about the cashier—whose name was Frannie, Emerson had picked up—taking her lunch in ten minutes. So Emerson wandered for that long, but not too far. The second Cassie had relieved Frannie and sent her off to eat, Emerson headed to the cash register and plopped down her goodies.

Cassie’s eyebrows went up. “Wow.”

“Yeah, like I said. I’m cold.” Cassie chuckled and began ringing. There was no small talk, so Emerson jumped in. “I think I’d like to do the mountain path you mentioned.”

Cassie looked up at her, then back down at the purchases. “Yeah?”

“Uh huh.”

“It’s gorgeous. You can ride to the public access building where the parking lot is, then take the elevator the rest of the way up. It’s a stunning view.”

“I vaguely remember, but it’s been years. I’d like to see it again.”

Cassie gave a nod, focused on her work. “You should do it.”

“I could use a tour guide. Would you come with me?” The words were out before Emerson allowed herself any time to think about it.

Cassie’s head snapped up. “Excuse me?”

“Come with me. It’s been way too long. I don’t know the trail. And what if I hit a tree or ride over a cliff? Who will help me?” Emerson gave a half-smile to go with her half-shrug.

Cassie chewed on her bottom lip, clearly weighing the pros and cons. Emerson held her breath. She refused to analyze why she wanted to spend more time alone with Cassie, refused to think about it and what it meant. So she waited. Cassie chewed. Emerson waited.

“When?” Cassie said finally, scanning the last item Emerson was buying and giving her a total.

Emerson blinked at her. She hadn’t thought that far ahead. “Um, tomorrow?” She handed over her credit card.

Cassie glanced at the wall behind her, ran her finger down a sheet of paper taped there. “I’m free after two.” She then turned back to the register, swiped the card and waited.

“Perfect. I’ll pick you up here at two-thirty?” Emerson took the receipt, signed it, and gave it back.

Cassie handed the bag across the counter to her. As Emerson grabbed it, Cassie continued to hold it. “It’s a tough trail, not for the faint of heart. Sure you can handle it?” The challenge in her eyes was tough and daring and—
God help me
, Emerson thought—sexy as hell, and Emerson grinned at her while the air between them all but crackled.

“Oh, I can handle it.”

“We’ll see. Tomorrow then.” And with that, she let go of the bag, and looked past Emerson, done. “Can I help who’s next please?”

But it was okay. Emerson didn’t allow herself to feel dismissed as she left the store with her new stuff. Instead, she somehow felt like she’d done what she’d intended. Which was so weird because she had no recollection of wanting to ask Cassie out.

Wait. What?

Was that what she’d just done?

Thursday dawned cold and
cloudy and didn’t seem to be in any mood to warm up. But the sun shone brightly through the clouds here and there, which was helpful, and by noon, it was in the high forties. Emerson was glad for her new purchases as she tried to decide what to wear on the ride. More than two hours early.