Christie Ridgway - Take My Breath Away

Walt’s big belly had yet to make it halfway to her when the door swung open again and twelve-year-old Erin Frye walked through, a letter clutched in her hand. She had a pen pal across the country, someone she’d linked up with through Scouting, and Erin enjoyed perusing the binder of stamp choices to pick just the right one to paste in the right-hand corner of the envelope intended for her buddy in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Charlie stifled a little sigh. Stamp-shopping could take the middle-schooler past closing time.

Oh, well. Given that Erin’s pen pal was a Boy Scout, Charlie got a little kick out of imagining an innocent romance was blooming in the mailbags that crossed the country. It spiced up the mundane routine of her days as the winter doldrums had yet to be replaced by spring fancies.

She was reaching for Walt’s carton of glossy leaflets when the door squeaked a third time, bringing with it another cool draft of moist air. The small hairs on Charlie’s exposed nape stood up, an instant before her gaze lifted to take in the newcomer.

Her palms went damp.

Charlie’s rite of passage had returned.

In haste, she refocused on the pamphlets and pasted on a smile for Walt. “Hey, you just made it in under the wire,” she said, raising her voice. “Don’t know that I’ll be able to take care of all the customers before closing time.”

Behind Walt, Erin let out a little bleat of distress. Feeling guilty, Charlie looked around Walt’s rotund form to meet the girl’s eyes. “Don’t worry,” she said softly. “Your letter will go out today.”

The man still loitering by the entrance didn’t get any of her attention. Why, oh, why, was Linus here? She’d never expected to see him again; had made it clear that theirs had been a short-term summer romance. No way was she onboard with a replay.

Walt was his usual jovial self. She would have chatted him up longer, hoping that Linus might get bored and leave, but Erin was shuffling her feet and appearing anxious. So Charlie finished business with her current customer, then dragged out the fat binder of loose stamps as Erin stepped up to the counter. From the periphery of her vision, she saw Linus hold open the door and say “Good day” to Walt.

Why couldn’t he follow the other man out?

Her gaze returned to the plastic sleeves that displayed the available offerings. The young girl studied them with deep concentration. “Can I choose more than one—as many as I like as long as it adds up to first class postage?”

“No problem,” Charlie assured the girl. “I’ll hand-cancel them myself.”

Erin turned the page to inspect the next sleeve’s contents. Her fingernails were painted a glittery purple and she had a unicorn-embossed elastic bandage wound around one knuckle—both accessories seemed at odds with her almost-grown-up demeanor.

Had she been so serious at twelve? Charlie wondered. Maybe it took a love interest from far away to turn a girl solemn. Though Charlie’s out-of-towner hadn’t shown up for over a decade, the instant the tall, charming flatlander had strolled into her post office last August she’d recognized the momentous occasion.

Many young mountain women went through the ritual event of a summer fling with one of the area’s wealthy visitors. Opposite attraction was clearly a potent force. By the age of nineteen or twenty, females who grew up in the small, insular communities surrounded by peaks and pines had usually dated all the local guys they found attractive. Working as waitresses or shop clerks, in the high tourist season they often came in contact with So-Cal men who came from a higher social strata. Dates were made, fun was had.

Sometimes hearts were irrevocably lost.

But she’d been clear with him, with herself, that hers wouldn’t be one of them.

“These,” Erin said, stabbing at two different stamps. Her coins clacked on the countertop.

Aware of Linus leaning against a row of post office boxes six feet away, Charlie slowly completed the transaction. With Erin just turning from the counter, Charlie reached high and grabbed the grilled security screen. As Linus stepped up, she slammed it into place.

His head jerked back at the loud clang. Through the metal bars he peered at her. “Uh, Charlie?”

Last summer, he’d often called her “Sal,” in a tone of casual affection. Sure, the Peanuts characters Linus and Charlie Brown had been buds, he’d told her early on, but it was Charlie’s little sister, Sally, who’d carried a torch for her brother’s striped-shirted best friend. When she’d inquired where was his blanket and why wasn’t he sucking a thumb, Linus had grabbed her hand and—

“Charlie?”

His voice broke through her reverie. Stepping back, she crossed her arms over her crisp blue uniform shirt and tried quelling the sense of panic that was squeezing her lungs. “Sorry, we’re closed for the day.”

Linus frowned at her. The expression didn’t mar the absolute even perfection of his features. So, her imagination hadn’t exaggerated how great-looking he was in those dreams she’d had the past six months. They were what she’d had to rely on, because she’d made herself delete from her phone every picture she’d snapped of him during their brief interlude as a couple.

“I’m not here to buy stamps,” he said now, moving closer to curl his fingers over the metal rails separating them.

She stared at his hands, remembering them stroking flesh that was heated by mountain sun—and her body’s fiery reaction to that touch, this man. Just a fingertip tracing the vein in her throat could make her mad with desire. Her lungs squeezed again and she dropped her gaze to her black Oxfords. They were unsexy but comfortable, all that she’d felt about her life since Linus had gone back to L.A.

Missing him, wanting him once more by her side, hadn’t been an option since it was she who had laid out the rules of their short-lived affair. Coming from such different places, she’d known the magic between them couldn’t last.

Her head came up and she forced herself to meet his eyes. “Why are you here?” she asked, trying to keep her tone civil. “Why have you come back?”

He shrugged one shoulder in that elegant way of his. “You know my brother has the house at Blue Arrow Lake—”

“Why are you here, Linus?” She lifted her arms to indicate the post office.

“Let me tell you about that,” he began, leaning against the counter and beaming that sunny, seductive smile of his.

“I don’t have time for the tale,” Charlie responded, her voice firm. “I have to lock the front door, finish my duties.”

“Then dinner—”

“Absolutely not.”

He frowned. “Why?”

“I can’t do this twice, Linus. Go away.” She kept her gaze steady on his face. “Please go away.”

“Charlie—”

“I can’t do this to...” She couldn’t catch her breath.

Linus’s expression hardened and his brown eyes turned to polished stone. “To who?” he demanded.

To myself. But instead of revealing any inner turmoil, Charlie forced her chin to lift. “Goodbye, Linus.”

It wasn’t regret coursing through her, or anything close to it, she promised herself as Linus stomped out. The tears stinging the corners of her eyes were from mere relief.

Right?

* * *

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS AFTER the first leak had sprung, the storm had at last subsided to a soft, intermittent drizzle and the pots and bowls set out to catch the dozen unexpected overflows needed emptying much less often. Ryan poured the contents of a coffee mug into a bucket and walked the half-full container into the kitchen.

The contents gurgled down the drain’s sink as Poppy entered the room. She held up her cell phone when he glanced over. “Good news,” she said.