Читать книгу In Search Of Dreams - Ginna Gray - Страница 11

Just over a month later Kate felt foolish for having worried at all. She rarely saw J.T.

Apparently the muse had him firmly in its grip. Every day, all day and late into the night, he was either in the library with his nose buried in a book or holed up in his room, tapping furiously on his laptop keyboard. Thanksgiving came and went, but J.T. hadn’t seemed to notice.

He showed up for meals only occasionally, and though it pained her to do so, she put his food in the refrigerator as he’d requested. Sometimes he got around to eating it and sometimes he didn’t.

Kate tried to tell herself it was none of her concern. If the man wanted to starve himself, it didn’t matter to her.

But it did. Like it or not, she was a born nurturer. A mother hen, her father and Zach used to call her, just like her mother. Which was why they had both taken so well to running a B&B, Kate supposed.

Taking care of people, seeing to their needs and comforts was a pleasure to her, and it came as naturally as breathing. Try as she might, she simply could not go about her business without worrying that J.T. wasn’t eating right.

In mid-December, when he failed to show up for dinner the third evening in a row, she could take it no longer. It simply wasn’t healthy to skip meals, she told herself as she marched up the stairs. For all she knew, he could be passed out on the floor from hunger at that very moment.

Pausing outside his door, Kate listened, but there was no click of the laptop keyboard from the other side, only silence.

Could he be asleep at seven in the evening? Oh, Lord, what if he really had passed out? Or was ill?

She raised her hand to knock, then hesitated. Shifting from one foot to the other, she chewed her bottom lip. Maybe she should leave him alone. After all, he had been emphatic about not wanting to be disturbed. But then, the Do Not Disturb sign wasn’t hanging on the doorknob.

Taking a deep breath, she tapped lightly on the door. When nothing happened she knocked again, louder this time. She waited for what seemed like minutes, but still the only response was silence.

Concern began to bubble up inside her, filling her chest. Kate looked around, as though help would appear out of nowhere. Should she go in? He could be ill. Or hurt.

“J.T.? J.T., are you in there?” She knocked again, then pressed her ear to the panel and listened.

Nothing.

Panicked now, she pounded the door with the side of her fists. Her hand was poised to deliver another round of thumps when J.T. snatched the door open and barked, “What?”

“I…I—”

He didn’t look anything like the cheerful man who had invaded her kitchen only six weeks ago. J.T.’s face was thunderous, and his eyes had a wild look, as though he’d just been jerked awake from a dream or a trance. Exhaustion had smudged dark circles under his red-rimmed eyes. His rumpled clothes looked as though he’d slept in them, his hair hadn’t been touched by a comb in Lord knew when, and at least three days worth of beard stubble shadowed his jaw. He looked untamed and fierce.

And dangerous.

“I, uh…I came to tell you that dinner is ready.”

“Dinner?” He stared at her. A low sound started deep in his throat and rumbled up. When it reached a crescendo he clapped a hand against his forehead and dragged it slowly down over his face. Against his palm, his beard stubble made a scratchy sound like course sandpaper.

He opened his eyes again, and they fixed on her like twin blue laser beams. “You interrupted me to tell me that dinner is ready? Dammit, woman, I’m working in here!” he roared. “I specifically told you not to disturb me when I was working except for an emergency. And by that I mean there’d better be fire or a helluva lot of blood involved. Got it?”

Kate’s first instinct was to take a step back. Instead she raised her chin and pointed to the intricate copper doorknob. “You said not to disturb you when the sign was out. It’s not. I thought perhaps you’d fallen asleep.”

He bent toward her until they were almost nose to nose and snarled through clenched teeth, “If I had been and you woke me I wouldn’t be any happier than I am now, I promise you.”

Any trepidation she felt evaporated in the face of his obnoxious attitude. Kate’s spine stiffened and her voice turned as frosty as Wisconsin in winter. “I was simply concerned. Breakfast was hours ago, and you didn’t show up for lunch. I thought you would be hungry by now.”

“If I was I’d have come down to dinner, now, wouldn’t I? What I am is busy. Just stick the food in the fridge like I asked. I’ll eat it later if I get hungry. Now good night.”

He stepped back and slammed the door before she could reply. Astonished, Kate stared at the wooden panel just inches from her face. Before she could moved or even react, the door jerked opened again partway.

A beady eye glared at her through the crack. J.T.’s hand shot out, hooked the Do Not Disturb sign over the outside doorknob, withdrew, and the door snapped shut again.

The sound was followed by the sharp click of the lock.

Kate stared at the swinging sign with disbelief, her temper coming to a boil. Never in her life had anyone slammed a door in her face!

She was so angry she was tempted to haul off and give the door a hard kick. If she hadn’t valued the old paneled walnut—and her toes—she would have.

Teeth clenched, her eyes narrowed into slits, Kate stood there for several seconds, glaring at the intricate grain of the wood and debating with herself about banging on it again and giving him a dressing down that would blister his ears.

Finally, though, she huffed, spun on her heels and stomped back down the stairs. See if she would ever try to be nice to him again. From now on the obnoxious oaf could starve for all she cared.

And to think that she had been worried about falling for him. Ha! Fat chance.

Kate didn’t see J.T. again that evening, nor all the next day, but she would not allow herself to worry about him. He could hole up in his room and rot for all she cared. If she’d known he was a Jekyll and Hyde she would never have agreed to let him stay in the first place.

The second morning after their run-in she entered the kitchen to find dirty dishes in the sink. Kate gave the mess a sour look and loaded it all into the dishwasher, determined not to feel relieved that he’d finally eaten something.

After a solitary breakfast, Kate spent the morning finishing the outside winterizing. Though the sun was shining, the wind had a bitter bite, a reminder that the first storm of the season was bearing down on the mountains. As soon as she went back inside she telephoned Lewis Goodman for the third time in as many days, and got into a heated argument with him over the firewood he had been promising to deliver for over a month.

Lewis, like everyone else in Gold Fever, hated doing business with Kate, but not enough to turn down her money. Particularly since she ordered more firewood than anyone else in town. However, he always made the transaction as difficult for her as he could.

“You’ll get your firewood when I’m ready to deliver it,” he barked.

“Lewis, the weather service is predicting snow by the end of the week. I need that firewood. I’m warning you, if you don’t deliver it soon, I’m going to call a woodcutter in Durango or Ouray.”

He gave a confident snort, and she could almost see his smirk. “You won’t do that. It’ll cost you three times as much if they have to haul the wood all the way up here.”

“It’ll be worth it not to have to put up with your rudeness and game playing!” she snapped, and hung up the telephone before he could argue more.

Between her maddening boarder and Lewis, Kate’s mood was less than serene. Needing an outlet for the fury churning inside her, she attacked her inside chores with a vengeance.

First she gathered all the laundry and lugged it down to the basement—all, that is, except what was in J.T.’s room. Which was just one more thing that was getting under her skin. She would probably have to muck out his room with a shovel if he didn’t surface soon.

When the washing machines were chugging away, she returned to the kitchen, where she cleaned out the refrigerator and scrubbed the oven, stove top and vent hood, but even when the jobs were done she was still simmering.

Hoping to work off the rest of her anger, she spent the entire afternoon cleaning out the kitchen cabinets and putting in new shelf paper. In between chores she made several trips to the basement to transfer washing to the dryers and fold and put away the clean laundry.