A Brambleberry Summer Read online

  Rosa threw on her rain boots and coat and found a flashlight, then hurried down the stairs.

  When she reached the bottom step, the door to the ground-floor apartment swung open suddenly. Startled, she almost stumbled but caught herself just in time.

  Wyatt stood there, silhouetted by the light coming from inside the apartment. He looked rumbled and gorgeous, his hair messy as if he had been dozing.

  He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and was barefoot. Through the open doorway, she could see a television on inside with a baseball game playing.

  Logan was nowhere in sight, which led her to believe he must be sleeping.

  Her mouth felt dry suddenly and Rosa had to grip the railing of the stairs to keep her balance.

  Ridiculous. What was wrong with her?

  “Sounds like trouble out there.”

  She nodded. “Nothing major. I believe it is the door to the garden shed. It is not latching the way it should.”

  “You’re not going out in that, are you? Some of those lightning strikes seem close. That’s nothing to mess around with.”

  “I know. But I cannot let it bang all night to disturb everyone.”

  He gave her a long look, then nodded. “Give me a moment to throw on some shoes, then I’ll come with you.”

  “That is not necessary,” she protested. “I can wedge it closed with a rock if I can’t fix it.”

  “Wait. I’ll only be a minute.”

  She really could handle it by herself, but didn’t want to be rude so she waited. A few moments later, he returned wearing tennis shoes and a raincoat with a Cannon Beach Police Department logo.

  Together they walked out of the house. The temperature had cooled down considerably. Rosa shivered a little at the wet wind that blew through the porch.

  Her eagle-eyed neighbor didn’t miss her reaction. “I can handle this, if you want to stay here on the porch, where it’s dry.”

  She shook her head. “You should stay here where it’s dry. Taking care of the house is my responsibility.”

  “Fine. We’ll both go.”

  She pulled up her hood and hurried down the steps toward the garden shed.

  When they reached it, she was grateful for his help. The door was heavy and the wind made it hard to move. She wasn’t sure she could have wrestled it on her own.

  “I don’t think you’re going to be able to fix the latch tonight. Where’s the rock you were talking about so we can keep it closed until the weather is a little better?”

  “I will have to find something.”

  Lightning flashed again, followed almost immediately by thunder. It was one thing to enjoy the storm from the comfort of her easy chair. It was something else to be out in the middle of it, with the wind whipping raindrops hard at her face.

  She fumbled to turn on the light inside the shed. Wyatt joined her in the small space and she was instantly aware of him. He smelled delicious, some sort of masculine scent that reminded her of the mountains around Moose Gulch, covered in sagebrush and pine.

  His gaze landed on a heavy concrete block. “That should do it for now.”

  He reached down to pick it up and brushed against her. Rosa quickly took a step back, though there wasn’t much room to escape.

  He didn’t appear to notice, much to her relief.

  He left the shed again. She took a moment to draw a steadying breath, then turned to follow him. As she reached to turn the light off, her hand caught on something sharp inside.

  Pain sliced through her and she couldn’t help her gasp.

  “What is it?”

  “Nothing,” she said. “Only a scratch. I am fine.”

  In another lightning flash, she saw he looked doubtful but he didn’t argue with her.

  He muscled the door shut, then wedged the concrete block in front of it.

  “That should do it, barring a hurricane tonight.” He raised his voice to be heard over the storm.

  “Let us hope we do not have a hurricane. I had enough of those when I was a girl.”

  He gave her an interested look but didn’t ask questions. Another lightning bolt lit up the sky, followed by the loudest thunder yet, a rumble that seemed to shake the little garden shed.

  “That one was too close.” Wyatt frowned. “We need to get to shelter. We’re too exposed here.”

  He led the way to the closest entry to the house, the door to his sunroom.

  This was one of her favorite parts about Brambleberry House. If she was ever tempted to leave her third-floor sanctuary, it would be to move to this floor so that she could have the sunroom, with the glorious view of the ocean.

  Rosa could spend all day every day here. She would probably put in a bed so she could sleep here on long summer nights with the sound of the sea and the breeze blowing through.

  She liked the idea of it but the reality probably would not be as appealing. She would feel too exposed here. Anyone could walk up from the beach, climb over the beach gate and break a window to get in.

  She would have no defenses.

  That was the reason she had not given this apartment to Jen, though both had come vacant at the same time and this apartment was larger. Jen needed to feel safe, above all else.

  Security wasn’t an issue for Wyatt. Something told Rosa the man could take care of himself in all situations.

  “Now,” he said when they were inside, “let’s take a look at your hand.”

  Rosa tensed, suddenly aware of how cozy this sunroom was in the middle of a storm.

  She should not have come in here with him. Not when she was fighting this unwanted attraction.

  “It is fine. I only need to put a bandage on it. I can take care of it upstairs.”

  Wyatt frowned. “It’s your right hand, which is always harder to bandage for someone who is right-handed. Let me take a look.”

  How had he noticed she was right-handed? Something told her Wyatt was a man who did not miss much.

  He flipped on the light inside the sunroom and held out his hand. Unless she wanted to run through the apartment and up two flights of stairs in her awkward rain boots, she had no choice but to show him the wound.

  The cut on her palm was about two inches long, shallow but bloody.

  Rosa felt her knees go weak at the sight of those streaks of red. To her great embarrassment, the sight of blood always left her feeling as if she would faint.

  Her mother used to be a healer of sorts and people would come to their small house for care. Maria Elena had even delivered a few babies.

  Rosa had never liked seeing blood or having to help her mother clean it up. It was a weakness she despised in herself, but one she couldn’t seem to help.

  “Sit down and I’ll go grab my first-aid kit. Normally, I keep one in the kitchen but it burned up in the fire. Lucky for you, I’ve got another one out in my vehicle.”

  Was she lucky? Rosa would have liked to argue but she was trying too hard not to look at the blood dripping off her hand.

  After he left, she tried to focus instead on the storm still rumbling around them.

  He and Logan had already left a mark on this room. It was obviously well-used. A couple of children’s chapter books were stacked on the table and she could see some small trucks on the floor.

  Wyatt returned a moment later with a red case. “Come into the kitchen, where we can wash off the blood. I should have had you do that while I was getting the first-aid kit. Sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”

  She followed him, trying to come up with the words to tell him again that she could take care of her very minor injury on her own.

  No words would come to her other than the truth—that she was afraid to let him touch her.

  Since she couldn’t tell him that, of course, she followed him into the kitchen.

  Here, again, he and Loga
n had made the space their own. A couple of art-class projects had been stuck with magnets to the refrigerator and homework was spread out on the table.

  Hank, his cute little dog, wandered into the room and stretched in a dog-yoga pose as Wyatt pulled a few paper towels off the roll.

  “Come over here by the sink.”

  Keeping her gaze fixed away from the cut, she followed him. He turned on the sink and ran his hand under it for a few moments to gauge the temperature, then carefully gripped her hand and guided it under.

  Rosa held her breath. Why did he have to smell so good?

  He turned her hand this way and that to rinse off the blood. “I don’t think you need stitches. It’s fairly shallow.”

  “That is what I thought also.”

  “We can clean it off pretty well and I think I have a bandage big enough to cover it.”

  She didn’t see any point in arguing with him when he was trying to help her. “Thank you.”

  Why did her voice sound so breathy and soft? She had to hope he did not notice.

  Lightning flashed again outside, followed almost immediately by a loud clap of thunder. She managed to swallow her instinctive gasp.

  “How does Logan sleep through such a noise?”

  He smiled softly and she felt those nerves sizzle inside her again.

  “He can sleep through just about anything. It’s a talent I wish I shared.”

  “I, as well.” She was unable to resist smiling back. He seemed a different person when talking about his son, much more open and approachable.

  He looked at her for a moment, then seemed to jerk his attention back to her hand.

  He patted it dry with a bit of gauze from the first-aid kit. “I didn’t see what you scratched your hand on out there.”

  “A nail, I think. I am not sure. I will have to look more closely in the daylight.”

  He nodded. “Any idea when your last tetanus shot was? If it was a nail, it might be rusty. This is the coast, after all. Everything rusts.”

  “I had the shot only a few years ago after I stepped on a rock at the beach and needed a few stitches.”

  It was a good thing she had been with friends that time. Her foot had bled so much, she probably would have been too light-headed to walk to her car.

  “Good news, then. You shouldn’t need a second shot. I’m just going to put a little first-aid cream on it. If it doesn’t start to heal in a few days, you will probably want to see your doctor.”

  “Yes. I will do that.”

  She missed having Melissa Fielding living in this apartment. Melissa was a nurse and was great at patching up scrapes and cuts. Now she was happily married to Eli Sanderson, who was a doctor in town. Eli was a wonderful stepfather to Melissa’s daughter, Skye, and they had a new baby of their own, Thomas.

  Wyatt squeezed out the antibiotic cream on the bandage before sticking it onto her skin.

  “That is smart.”

  “A little trick my mother taught me.”

  “She sounds like a very wise woman.”

  He smiled a little and she again had to order her nerves to behave. “She is. She’s a judge in Portland. That’s where Carrie and I grew up.”

  “I thought your mother was friends with Abigail.” She frowned a little, trying to make the connection.

  “She was, sort of. It was really our grandmother who was best friends with Abigail. My mother grew up here, in a house not far from Brambleberry House. Her parents lived there until they died several years ago. I can remember visiting Abigail a few times, back in the days when the house was all one unit, with no apartments.”

  The curtains suddenly fluttered and Hank, who had just settled down on the kitchen rug, rose again to sniff at the air. Rosa could swear she suddenly smelled freesia.

  “Do you smell that?”

  He sniffed. “What?”

  “Flowers.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I smell vanilla and berries. It’s making me hungry.”

  She could feel herself flush and was grateful he probably could not tell with her brown skin. That was her shampoo, probably.

  “I thought I smelled freesia. That was Abigail’s signature scent.”

  “Why would it still smell like her?”

  “My aunt and her friend who own the house think Abigail still wanders through the house. Do not worry. If she is here, she is a kind spirit, I think.”

  “Do you buy that?”

  “Not really. Sometimes I must wonder, though.”

  He seemed to take the news of a ghost in stride. “I suppose I’m a big skeptic. I haven’t noticed anything in the time we’ve been living here.”

  “Did you not see Hank standing in the corner, looking at nothing? Fiona sometimes does that. She makes me wonder what she can see that I cannot.”

  “I hadn’t really noticed.”

  She studied him. “Would you mind if Abigail were still hanging about?”

  “Not really. I remember her as being very kind when I was a boy. She always gave me butterscotch candy.”

  He smiled a little at the memory.

  “As long as she doesn’t watch me while I sleep, we should get along fine.”

  Rosa had a hard enough time not thinking about him sleeping a few floors below her. She didn’t need another reason to picture it.

  “I do not know if you can tell a ghost she is not welcome in your bedroom.”

  He smiled. It wasn’t a huge smile and certainly not anything as overt as laughter. She still found it enormously appealing.

  She wanted to stare at his mouth, will his lips to lift again into a smile as heat soaked through her.

  After an awkward moment, she forced herself to look away. She slid her hand back and pressed it into her stomach against the silly butterflies dancing there.

  “I should go,” she said. “Thank you for your help with the door and with this.”

  She raised her hand and, as if she had waved a magic wand, another bolt of lightning lit up the kitchen and an instant later the lights flickered and went out.

  “Oh, dear,” she exclaimed. “I was afraid of this happening.”

  “It would not be a storm along the coast without some kind of power outage.”

  He went to the window of the living area that faced out to the street. “I don’t see any lights on in the whole neighborhood. It looks like the power is out everywhere.”

  Rosa knew that was not unusual. Electricity often went out during big storms in the area.

  She knew there was nothing to fear. Still, she could feel herself begin to panic. Full darkness always did that to her. It reminded her too much of hiding in the back of a pickup truck, afraid she would not see another day.

  “Where is my flashlight? Did I leave it in your sunroom?” She looked around the dark kitchen, as if she could summon it with her will, and tried not to panic.

  He must have sensed some of her unease. Wyatt reached out a comforting hand and rested it briefly on her arm. Heat radiated from where he touched her and she wanted to lean into his warmth and solid strength.

  “I’ll find it. Stay here. I don’t want you to hurt yourself again.”

  She leaned against the kitchen sink, breathing deeply and ordering herself to be calm.

  A moment later, he returned with her flashlight on, pointed to the ground so he didn’t shine it in her eyes.

  “Here you are.”

  “Thank you.”

  She felt silly at her overreaction, wishing for a different past that wasn’t filled with moments of fear and pain.

  “Thank you again for your help. Good night.”

  She turned to leave and somehow wasn’t surprised when he followed closely behind her.

  “I’ll walk you up the stairs to your place.”

  She shook her head slight
ly. “That is really not necessary. I can find my way. I am up and down these stairs all the time.”

  “Maybe so. But not in the dark. I would hate for you to fall on my watch.”

  She didn’t want to argue with him. Not when he was being so helpful. She gave an inward sigh as she headed for the apartment door and out to the main foyer.

  Wyatt followed her up one flight of stairs. When she saw Jen’s door, Rosa immediately felt guilty. She had been so busy trying not to become stupid over Wyatt Townsend, she had not given a thought to her friend and how nervous Jen and Addie might be in the dark.

  She was a terrible friend. The worst.

  She paused outside the door and turned to face him. “I should probably check on Jen and Addie.”

  “They might be asleep.”

  “I do not believe so. I saw lights on inside earlier, when we were out by the shed. She might be nervous with the power outage.”

  “Good idea.”

  She knocked softly on the door. “Jen? This is Rosa. Are you all right?”

  A moment later the door opened. Jen held a candle in one hand and a flashlight in the other.

  Rosa couldn’t see her face well, but her blue eyes seemed huge in the dim light.

  “Everything is fine here,” Jen said. “Thank you for checking.” She suddenly noticed Wyatt and seemed to freeze. “Oh. I thought you were alone.”

  Rosa shook her head. “Wyatt helped me fix the banging door on the garden shed and now he seems to think I need his help or I will fall down the stairs.”

  “How nice of him to help you.” Jen smiled a little, though her anxiety still seemed palpable. “Quite a storm, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. But do not worry. The power should be back on soon. I see you have a flashlight. Do you need anything else?”

  “Only for the power to come back on.” Jen’s gaze shifted down the stairs behind them, as if she expected someone else to come racing up any moment.

  Oh, the poor thing. She had been through so very much. Rosa’s heart broke all over again for her.

  She knew very well what it felt like to be so afraid of what might be lurking around every dark corner. Rosa had seen plenty of real boogeymen in her life and knew that reality could be worse than any horror movie.