Hagen Page 2

  The older woman’s eyes stayed on Rhea as she stepped past into the large room. Courtesy of her flaming red hair, Rhea had years of experience standing out in a crowd so the added attention was something she was used to. Not necessarily appreciative of, but at least used to.

  And decent at ignoring.

  The room was stunning. A large four-poster bed dominated the space. Thin cotton blankets in shades of green and yellow were layered across the king-size mattress with rows of coordinating pillows lined along the headboard.

  The bed itself was breathtaking. The deep mahogany wood was etched with beautifully carved scrolls and...

  “Is that a lion?” Rhea squinted at the centerpiece of each seven-foot post.

  “It’s the beast.” Gail’s voice was low beside her, more cautious than the mysterious inflection Rhea had to guess the woman was going for.

  This was their bread and butter after all.

  “You mean Bigfoot.” Stewart stepped closer to inspect the surprisingly humanoid depiction of the town’s imaginary cash cow. “I’ve dated worse.”

  “Yeah you have.” Rhea shivered, rubbing her arms as a sudden oddness tightened her skin into gooseflesh. “On a few occasions.” She turned away from the bed, hoping the strange feeling would pass more quickly with it out of sight. Reaching to take her bags from Gail, Rhea gave their hostess an appreciative smile. “The room is lovely.”

  “I’m glad you like it.” Gail studied her for a second. “I hope you’ll be very happy here.”

  Stewart fell backward onto the bed and sprawled out across the mattress, his legs hanging off the side. “You and me both Miss Gail.”

  Gail backed toward the door. “Dinner’s at six. I’ll check in on your friends before I go downstairs. Make sure they have what they need.”

  Stewart rolled his head to the door. “I hope Heath didn’t puke on your pretty house.”

  Gail crossed her fingers and held them in front of her ample bosom. “Me too.” She gave Rhea one last look and stepped into the hall, pulling their door shut as she left.

  Rhea blew out a breath.

  “Don’t you start with that.” Stewart’s eyes were closed and his hands were folded across his chest. “We have been here five minutes.”

  “It just feels weird here.” She dared a peek up at one of the faces carved into the bed. “You don’t think it feels weird?”

  “No.” Stewart rolled to his side, propping his head up with one hand. “I think it feels way better than a tent in the woods which is what I was expecting.”

  She was going to kill him.

  “You thought we were staying in a tent in the woods?” Rhea marched to the side of the bed. “You convinced me to come here thinking we would be camping in the middle of nowhere and didn’t give me a heads up?”

  “You wouldn’t have come with me then.” Stewart grabbed the front hem of her t-shirt and pulled Rhea down on the bed beside him. “I need you Re-Re. You are the best camera operator I know and I need to impress Chauncey.”

  Rhea glared at Stewart for a second before rolling to her back and staring up at the billowy drape of the canopy. The room really was very pretty and the mountains were something she hadn’t been able to experience enough of during her life. As much as Rhea wanted to be mad at Stewart she was finding it difficult to be too upset with him.

  But she wasn’t going to tell him that just yet. He deserved to sweat it a little bit for bringing her here thinking they would be sleeping in tents and pooping in holes in the woods.

  She bit back a laugh imagining Stewart trying to survive in the backwoods under normal circumstances, let alone while he was trying to woo a new love interest. Rhea let her head roll toward her best friend.

  “Were you really going to camp for this guy?”

  “I would fight off Sasquatch myself for this man.” His eyes were wide and serious. “I’m not saying I wouldn’t pass out afterward, but I’d give that hairy bastard a run for his money.”

  “I don’t think that’s anything you have to worry about.” She looked back toward the canopy. “Bear maybe. Or a rabid raccoon.” She snorted. “Then again maybe we’ll catch Yeti, a chupacabra and Bigfoot playing freeze tag.”

  “There’s a lot we don’t know Re-Re.”

  She turned back to Stewart. “You don’t really believe in this whole Bigfoot thing do you?”

  Stewart shrugged. “I’m not sure what I think is out there.” He tucked his hands behind his head. “But I know we’re gonna try like hell to figure it out.”

  2

  Hagen finished counting the row of clamshell-packed bear spray hanging above the bottom shelf in aisle two just as the bell sounded through the general store. He glanced up to catch his younger brother’s reflection in the domed mirror at the end of the row, his tight black t-shirt tucked into a pair of faded blue jeans, the perfectly clipped blonde waves on his head parted to one side and smoothed in place.

  Flipping him off.

  “Thought you had something important going on.” Hagen stood up and glared at Jerrik across the top of the neat rows of metal shelving filling the only store in town.

  Or for miles.

  Jerrik grinned back at him. “I did.”

  Hagen looked down at the spreadsheet clamped to the clipboard in his hand and filled in the number of sprays on the floor. “Was it pissing me off?”

  Jerrik walked to the register and scanned the shelf of candy and gum below the wood counter. “That was just a happy by-product.” He pulled a chocolate-covered caramel bar free of its display box and tore the wrapper open. “I don’t think you’re the only one hacked off. Mom left me a five-minute voicemail.”

  Hagen cocked one sandy eyebrow at his brother. “Saying?”

  Jerrik shrugged. “Don’t know.” He took a bite of his snack. “Didn’t listen.” He chewed for a second, visibly working the stickiness of the caramel from his teeth. “Probably that you were an ass.”

  “I knew what she was thinking and I wanted to be very clear where I stood on the matter.” Hagen rounded the counter and set down the inventory list he’d been working on all day. Except for the time he spent being an ass.

  “I don’t think she is confused about where you stand. That’s why she called me to come help drag in their luggage.” Jerrik leaned into the high top of the check-out desk. “That’s also why I passed the job onto you. I figured you’d get a kick out of seeing the latest woman mom thinks Christine saw in her vision.”

  “Christine is wrong.” Hagen pulled a small notebook from the shelf above his head and flipped it open on the counter in front of him. “She’s as crazy as mom is.” He added the caramel candy bar to his brother’s never ending tab.

  “She cute?”

  Hagen ignored his brother’s question. It didn’t matter what the woman looked like any more than it mattered what color her hair was. Or how many tiny freckles dotted the smooth, fair skin of her cheeks. Even the flecks of gold breaking up the smooth chocolate of her irises were irrelevant.

  Jerrik let out a low whistle. “That good lookin’ huh?”

  He felt the growl before his brother heard it. Low and deep, it rumbled from the deepest part of him. A part Hagen spent most of his life learning to suppress.

  He could bite it back now. Should reign the beast back in. But his brother needed to know.

  This woman, the whole foretelling Christine gave his mother years ago, wasn’t up for conversation. Not now. Not ever.

  Jerrik stared back at him, his expression bland, appearing unimpressed with Hagen’s thinly veiled threat. “You just pull that out when it suits you now?”

  Hagen swallowed down the anger making his skin itch and his muscles tingle, giving himself a mental shake. “It never suits me.”

  “You keep telling yourself that.” Jerrik crossed his arms over his chest and sauntered to the large windows flanking the stores front door. “There’s no denying that one is there?”

  Hagen slid his brother’s list of consum
ed consumables back in place. “What are you talking about?”

  Jerrik said nothing, just stood at the windows staring out, shaking his head.

  “What?” Hagen tossed his pencil to the counter. “Don’t you have someplace to be?”

  Jerrik turned to him and wiggled his eyebrows. “No place I’d rather be right now.”

  The front door opened wide, the heat outside sucking all the air from the room.

  Or maybe it was the woman in the doorway.

  “Hey there.” Jerrik was on her before Hagen knew what was happening, his big meaty paw wrapped around the redhead’s small, delicate fingers. “You must be with the film crew.”

  Charm practically oozed from Hagen’s younger brother. Always had. No woman was immune to his charisma and clean-cut good looks. Old, young, married, single. Didn’t matter. They all loved Jerrik and ate him up like candy.

  But.

  It appeared maybe Red didn’t like candy so much.

  She looked down at her hand wrapped in his brother’s giant grip and then up at Jerrik. Her eyebrow cocked and the gold ribbons twisting through her dark eyes flared.

  Jerrik’s smile froze in place. Slowly, he slid his hand from Red’s, clearing his throat.

  Hagen smirked as he watched his brother squirm. Getting to see Jerrik finally be shot down was worth all the hell he was going to catch from his mother while the redhead was in town. Hopefully it would happen more than once. Jerrik needed to be knocked down a couple of pegs. If for no other reason than to make him sweat.

  A loud sigh came from behind Red seconds before a stocky bald man pushed his way into the store. He swiped dramatically at his dark skin with the heel of one hand. “Quit blocking the doorway. You know I can’t handle this heat Re-Re.” The man stopped when he saw Jerrik and straightened his shoulders and thrust his right hand forward. “Well hello.”

  Jerrik took the man’s hand and shook it, settling back into his normal amiable manner. “At least somebody’s happy to meet me.” His brother gave Red’s friend a broad smile. “Jerrik. My mom runs the bed and breakfast.”

  Red gave Jerrik a once over. “You’re the brother who was supposed to show up and didn’t?”

  It looked like Red was going to give Hagen more than he could have hoped for as far as his brother was concerned.

  Jerrik dropped the man’s hand and straightened. For the second time in as many minutes his smile faltered. “That would be me.” He turned toward Red. “And you are?”

  She tipped her head back to look his brother square in the eye, her gaze narrowed as she studied the man in front of her. For a long minute her lips stayed pressed in a line, as if she couldn’t decide whether to give him the information he requested, or leave him wondering.

  It was fantastic.

  Her eyes flicked to Hagen, lingering for just a second. Long enough to answer his brother’s question.

  “Rhea.”

  Jerrik nodded as if everything made sense. “Rhea the red—”

  The man with Rhea held a finger up. “Nope.” He shook his head, eyes wide. “You’ll never recover from that one. She’ll shred you.”

  Rhea rolled her eyes and spun on a heel to walk down the first aisle. “I have never shredded anyone.”

  Her friend was nodding his head behind her back. Vicious. He mouthed the word at Jerrik then glanced Hagen’s way, leaning close to his brother. “That one likes it though.”

  Jerrik leaned closer to the man but kept his voice loud enough Hagen could hear. “You have no idea.”

  Her friend nodded in understanding before quickly changing the subject. “I’m Stewart by the way.”

  Jerrik relaxed, obviously much more at ease with Stewart’s warm, flirtatious personality. Birds of a feather.

  “What brings you two here to Greenlea’s finest shopping establishment?”

  Stewart glanced around the shop, scanning until his eyes landed on the top of Rhea’s head peeking over the shelves as she wandered the store. “Rhea the redhead needs some hairbands for that wild mane of hers.”

  “Heard that.”

  “Damn.” Stewart tipped his head their way, his brown eyes still glued to his friend. “Like a bat.”

  “Heard that too.” Rhea’s head disappeared as she dropped down to look at something.

  “Why don’t you go give your customer a hand?” Jerrik’s eyes twinkled at the challenge he threw Hagen’s way. “Don’t want to be a bad business owner do you?”

  Stewart’s well-groomed eyebrows lifted. “Big and scary owns this place?”

  Jerrik laughed loud and hard. “I have never heard anyone describe him quite so accurately.”

  Hagen let out a long, aggravated breath. “I can’t handle you two.”

  He left them at the front of the store and went to find the lesser of three evils. At least he hoped she was the lesser of the evils.

  Rhea was still where he’d last seen the top of her deep crimson head, crouched down, inspecting a row of puzzle books. Three were tucked in the crook of her elbow.

  “They’re in the next aisle over.”

  She stood up. “I was worried it might not be something you ran into much need for around here.” Rhea tipped her head slightly to one side as she looked up at him, her eyes first drifting over his face, then moving higher. “I guess I should have known better.”

  “Why is that?”

  She gave him a confused look. “Well, your hair.” She motioned at the top of her head then pointed at the length of blonde hair wadded into a band on his head. “Do you not usually tie it back?”

  Hagen tried to smooth the scowl tightening his face. His mother and Jerrik’s interest in the redhead and her potential was throwing him off. Making him even more standoffish than normal.

  But Rhea didn’t do anything to deserve his attitude. She’d done nothing more than end up in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  With the wrong hair.

  Hagen decided to ignore the fact that none of the other redheads who found their way to Greenlea and into the middle of an incorrect vision almost as old as he was made him act like this.

  Every other time this scenario presented itself Hagen was able to blow his mother’s ideas off. Laugh at her crazy belief in Christine’s premonition.

  This time he wasn’t laughing.

  Maybe it was just too much. Like the same joke told one too many times.

  Either way, it didn’t change the fact that the woman in front of him had no part in any of it. Not the aggravation and certainly not Christine’s overactive imagination. And he was being an ass.

  Hagen took a deep breath and tried to relax. “When it’s hot like this I do.”

  Rhea smiled at him for the first time. Not big and beaming, but soft and sweet. Reserved but not shy. But it still shined like a dimmer switch spun all the way open.

  She twisted her thick waves to one side and swung the rope of hair in front of her shoulder. “I understand completely.”

  The upbeat tempo of a hip-hop ringtone cut through the store. Stewart let out an excited yelp and held the phone up in the air. “Re-Re I’ll be back.” He spun and hustled toward the door, pressing the phone to his ear as he let out a breathy ‘hello’.

  Hagen looked at Rhea.

  She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “He’s in love.” She paused. “Again. You said the elastics are in the next row?”

  “Be right back.” Jerrik was gone before Hagen could stop him.

  And he and Rhea were alone. By design.

  He was going to kick Jerrik’s ass.

  “That’s your brother?”

  Hagen nodded. “He is.” At least until Hagen killed him.

  Rhea looked at the door Jerrik just escaped through, her eyebrows drawn together. “You two are very... different. Aren’t you?”

  “In more ways than I can count.” Hagen tucked his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “But in some ways we’re exactly the same.”

  Ways he hated. Ways that kept any chance
at real happiness far out of his reach.

  Those dark-brown eyes were on him and Hagen felt like they were seeing so much more than he wanted to show.

  Rhea barely nodded. “I’m very different from my sister too.”

  He wanted to ask about her sister. Find out more about her life. Find out more about her. Who she was. What she did. Where she was from.

  Try to find out why this particular redhead was different from the others.

  But that would be setting himself up for disaster.

  In spite of what his mother thought, Rhea and her unique hair was not his type of woman. His type of woman was fast and reckless.

  And fleeting.

  In the small amount of time he’d spent with her, Hagen knew enough to be positive the woman in front of him was none of those things.

  And damned if it wasn’t just a little disappointing.

  That was why he needed to get Red out of here and away from him as quickly as possible.

  He thumbed at the next row. “We should get you your bands so you can go see how your friend is.” Like a coward he turned and hurried to the next row over and grabbed a box of the thickest, largest bands he stocked. “These are probably the best option I have for you.”

  Rhea plucked the small plastic container from his fingers. He held his breath expecting her fingers to brush his. Was bothered when they didn’t.

  And that was why Rhea with the red-hair needed to go back to the bed and breakfast. “Is that all you need?”

  She tucked the bands on top of her stack of puzzle books. “I think I’m good for now.”

  Hagen hurried to check her out, ringing up the items in one fell swoop instead of entering each one individually. The transaction was done in record time and he was about to let out the air trapped in his lungs when, instead of turning to leave, Rhea pulled the box of rubber bands from the plastic bag he packed her items into. She popped open the pack and leaned back slightly, carefully twisting her hair at the back of her head.

  “Oh my goodness. This feels so much better.”

  Her words were said in relief. He knew that. But the soft way they swept through her lips they could have just as easily been said in pleasure. That coupled with the way her back arched as she twisted her hair into a knot, pressing her breasts against the thin tank top she wore, was enough to have him tight against his pants.