Nadia Nichols - Sharing Spaces

First, though, she wanted to make some connection with her grandfather, whom she hadn’t seen since her father’s funeral and would never see again. Besides, in this northern latitude the sun was still high. She had plenty of time to find her way back to Goose Bay. She kicked a Labatt can out of the way as she walked up the path, climbed the weathered steps and opened the screen door, entering onto the porch and peeking through a window that could have stood a good polishing. It was dark inside, and gloomy. Senna hesitated before trying the front door, glancing around and trying to imagine her grandfather living like this. The porch was littered with pizza boxes, paper napkins, cigarette butts, more beer cans and bottles. The boy had mentioned that the wake had been a good one, but it would have been nice if they’d tidied up afterward.

She knocked sharply at the door and predictably received no response. The doorknob turned easily and she stepped into the entry hall. To her left was a living room with four big double-hung nine-over-six windows looking out on the lake and a handsome stone fireplace. A staircase in front of her ascended presumably to the second-floor bedrooms, and she glimpsed a large kitchen through the doorway to the right. She closed the door on the whine of mosquitoes and almost immediately became aware of another noise, far deeper and much more ominous than the frantic hum of hungry insects. Senna stood quietly for a moment, analyzing the rumblings, which sounded very much like loud snoring being rhythmically and robustly delivered from upstairs.

She hesitated again. Could she possibly be in the wrong house? Could the smaller cabin belong to her grandfather? She glanced around furtively while upstairs the snores resonated like thunder. There was only one surefire way to find out. Senna crept into the living room, feeling a bit like a criminal, opened a corner desk, riffled through a stack of papers and spied several bills and correspondence with her grandfather’s name on them. She breathed a silent sigh of relief. At least she was in the right place, but if this was her grandfather’s house, then who was upstairs? Could it be that John Hanson had drunk so much hooch at the wake that he’d been unable to make it back to his own cabin?

She stood at the foot of the stairs and thought about calling out, but couldn’t bring herself to deliver more than a tentative, “Hello?”

Her voice sounded woefully feeble, and she got no reply. If the snoring was being generated by the admiral’s business partner, a man probably well into his seventies or better, he might be completely deaf. She crept up the stairs. At the top were two bedroom doors, one opening to the left, the other to the right. She froze with uncertainty, heart hammering against her ribs, then peeked cautiously around the left-hand door from whence the hearty snoring noises emanated. Senna noted the small bedroom, the double bed with a brightly colored Hudson’s Bay candy-stripe wool blanket laid atop, dormered window that looked out on the lake. Pine bureau, mirror, chair, braided rug. There was a simple, rustic charm to the room. On the bed, sprawled upon its side, was an enormous furry dog. Some kind of northern breed closely related to a wolf, by the looks of it, old and grizzled, paws twitching in the midst of some lively dream, and snoring with deep and absolute contentment.

She backed quietly out of the room, relieved, and drew a deep breath. The lawyer hadn’t mentioned animals, but that husky certainly looked like it belonged on that bed. Senna peered warily around the other door, preparing herself for another wolf-like creature, and nearly gasped aloud when she saw what was lying on the bed in the second bedroom.

Definitely not a dog, and most definitely not her grandfather’s elderly business partner. A man was sprawled crosswise on the mattress. He was face down, head and shoulders hanging over the edge, arms dangling, knuckles brushing the floor. Naked to the waist, blue jeans, bare feet.

Silent and unmoving.

She took a step forward, studying his form for any signs of life even as the newspaper headlines flashed through her imagination.

Executor Discovers Body in Bedroom of Deceased Grandfather’s House.

But no. There was movement. The man was breathing. Not snoring, like the dog, but sleeping with the same deep stupor. This bedroom, however, in stark contrast to the first, was a mess. Beer cans were strewn on the floor, clothing was flung everywhere. The bureau drawers were ajar, the top cluttered with more trash and paraphernalia, and the mirror so plastered with pictures that hardly any glass remained exposed. She studied the chaos for a moment in disgust, then glanced back at the unconscious man, unable to squelch her curiosity.

She couldn’t see his face, but his hair was dark, glossy and tousled. His back, shoulders and arms looked strong; smooth well-knit muscles tapered into a lean waist. In spite of the fact that the man was completely relaxed in sleep, she sensed enormous power, the same power she’d once witnessed in a mountain lion dozing in the sun on a rock outcrop in the mountains of Montana. Senna swallowed a nervous laugh. What a thing for her to be doing, standing here staring at a strange man sleeping in her grandfather’s house and comparing him to a mountain lion. What on earth was the matter with her?

More to the point, what was she to do? This man could be a mass murderer, for all she knew, and this place was remote enough to make her uneasy at the thought of confronting him without some means of defending herself. She backed out of the room, returned to the kitchen, and picked up first thing she saw that would qualify—a cast-iron frying pan on the stovetop with about an inch of bacon fat solidified in the bottom. Returning to the second floor, she cleared her throat and knocked briskly on the door frame, neither of which had any effect in rousing the man.

“Excuse me,” she said in her most professional Do-not-argue-with-me-I’m-the-sales-director voice—which had an equal lack of effect.

“Excuse me,” she repeated, louder this time.

One dangling arm twitched and she tensed for the ugly confrontation, but all the man did was shift slightly, groan as if the effort cost him, and then resume his sleep.

Senna lifted the frying pan and rapped it against the door. The sharp gunshot of noise was impressive. “Hello!” she said. “You need to wake up, please. Tell me who you are and what you’re doing in my grandfather’s house.”

The man thrashed weakly, moaned and rolled over. One arm flung out, hand groping blindly for the pillow to bring it over his face to shut out the daylight…but not before she caught a glimpse of a dark, unshaven jaw and a rugged profile. “Goway,” a deep voice rumbled, muffled beneath the pillow.

On his back now, baring his broad chest, flat stomach, dark line of hair disappearing into the belt line of his jeans. Arms and shoulders definitely well-defined with muscle, hands strong and calloused as if he worked hard for a living. Sexual, in a very primal way—not that she was noticing.

“Look, mister, I’m warning you right now, you’d better vacate these premises. This is Admiral Stuart McCallum’s house, I’m taking possession of it, and if you don’t leave right now I’ll call the police, or the Mounties, or whatever you call them up here.”

“Goway.” The man’s second gruff utterance was an echo of the first.

Senna heard a noise behind her. A stealthy sound, soft and menacing. As she turned her head she saw that the large and grizzled husky, who moments before had been snoring quite loudly on the bed in the other room, was now standing in the doorway behind her. Its eyes were yellow and its stance was rigid and threatening. Senna realized that in the great beast’s eyes she was the stranger here, the trespasser, and she remained very still.