Let It Snow... (10 page)

1

One and a half years later...

K
NOX
SETTLED
Elsa’s designer suitcase at the foot of the bed in the Good Riddance Bed and Breakfast. For all the times he’d been to Good Riddance over the years, he’d never been inside the bed and breakfast situated on the second floor of the air strip center. It, like the rest of the town, offered a feeling of welcome and the sense of a place out of time.

Four, maybe five guest rooms shared a communal bathroom at the end of the hall. The walls and floor were all wood. Lace-trimmed flannel curtains hung at the window, a braided rug covered a portion of the floor and a handmade quilt decorated the white iron bed. An old-fashioned washbasin and water pitcher sat atop an antique stand with an oval mirror. A small artificial tree stood in the corner, its multicolored lights twinkling. Wooden ornaments hung on branches. Bull Swenson was a champion whittler. Knox was certain it was Bull’s work. His grandmother would’ve loved it. It was only in the last six months that he could think of Mormor without feeling overwhelmed by desolation.

Outside, dark was already descending on this December midday. Yet another thing that imparted a sense of the “olden days” was the absence of street lights. Years ago the citizens of Good Riddance had voted against them. Despite the impending dark, Chrismoose preparations continued in full swing. The sounds of barking dogs, kids’ laughter, snowmobiles, snatches of conversation and laughter drifted up. Bustle and excitement filled the air and a sense of homecoming filled Knox. Good Riddance had been something of a second home over the years, particularly at Chrismoose.

The celebration had become a regional draw for the small bush town. Years ago a hermit named Chris would ride his pet moose into town a few days before Christmas. Chris wore a Santa suit and always brought a sack of toys he’d spent the year carving and assembling for the kids in town. After Chris’s death, Merrilee, the town founder and mayor, kept the tradition alive in his honor. It had become a weeklong festival of winter games and competitions, a talent showcase of local artists, and a Miss Chrismoose pageant.

Being here was definitely bittersweet. Since he was twelve years old, he and Mormor had attended Chrismoose with Trudie and her parents. It had become a long-standing tradition.

Early on, it was simply the hermit on his pet moose and the two families had spent time ice fishing and cross-country skiing. Chrismoose had always been one of the highlights of his year. Even once he was an adult, he still showed up to escort Mormor to Chrismoose—and Trudie and her parents were always there as well.

Trudie... He just couldn’t think about her. He actually did a damn fine job not thinking of Trudie most of the time.

It had been nearly two years since he’d been in Good Riddance for Chrismoose. Last year he and Elsa had spent the week before Christmas skiing in Alyeska.... Well, he’d skied and Elsa had spent her time at the spa. She’d said they should start a new tradition, one a little more sophisticated and upscale.

There had been another change in his holiday tradition. He’d never told Elsa about the custom he and Trudie had started as kids and continued until Mormor died—they exchanged gifts for the twelve days before Christmas instead of after. As kids they’d drawn each other pictures illustrating the verses of the song. As they’d grown older, it had morphed into a gift for each day. But there had been no gifts last year. And he had switched the damn radio station every time that song had come on.

It was ironic that Elsa had dubbed Chrismoose hokey and provincial. Once she’d pointed it out, he did kind of see it that way. But they were here this year so Elsa could preside as a visiting “dignitary.” She had been heavily involved in the pageant scene since she was a teenager and had served as a judge for Anchorage’s Miss Snow Queen; she’d been dubbed the long-standing Miss Snow Queen even though she no longer officially held the title.

Knox was only accompanying her as a favor. He’d told her they were done and she’d asked him to see her through this as her “date.” He didn’t think it was such a big deal for the Snow Queen to be escort-less but she’d asked him this favor as a parting gift, so they were here, ostensibly “together.” And it was an opportunity for him to “run into” Trudie. He’d missed her—her sunny smile, her sense of adventure, her insight. But it had been so damn long, calling would be awkward. Running into her at Chrismoose would be inevitable.

“Thanks, you’re a doll,” Elsa said, bussing him on the cheek rather than really kissing him—she didn’t want to smear her lipstick. She twirled around, her white-fur trimmed dress swirling around her. “How do I look?”

Her blonde hair appeared casually piled atop her head in a cascade of curls. However, Knox had been privy to all the preparations and knew just how much effort went into the end result. The casual style was a carefully constructed illusion. The white, fur-trimmed suit and matching mukluks with off-white, intricate beading did set off her luminous porcelain skin, though. “You’re stunning.” And she was. He was constantly struck by her beauty. Unfortunately, it only ran skin-deep. “You are the perfect Snow Queen.”

She smiled, revealing her perfectly straight teeth, whitened to a gleaming sparkle. “Oh, you’re so sweet.”

No. Knox wasn’t particularly sweet, but he had the drill down by now. And oddly enough his veterinary training had helped. Elsa was high-maintenance—kind of like dealing with a high-strung horse.

“Okay, gotta run. Duty calls.”

“Have fun,” he said as she sailed through the door.

Elsa took her duties as a visiting dignitary very seriously. She was booked in here at the bed and breakfast while Knox was at the cabin where he and Mormor used to stay. The Knudson brothers, sons of one of Mormor’s friends, had a very basic cabin for hunting and fishing in the summer and had always made it available to Knox and his grandmother. Trudie and her folks stayed in a similar cabin about a mile away.

The place would truly be fraught with memories of Mormor and Trudie and her family coming and going. He hadn’t broached Elsa about sharing the cabin with him. As a guest “celebrity” she needed to be accessible, which meant in town at the bed and breakfast. That made sense. And it was just as well. While Elsa’s company would’ve kept his loss at bay, he wouldn’t have to listen to her go on about how pedestrian the accommodations were. Hell, it was a hunting and fishing cabin.

Knox gave her a few minutes’ head start and then he and Jessup made their way downstairs to the airstrip office where Merrilee Danville Weatherspoon Swenson sat at her desk. She’d been elsewhere when he and Elsa had arrived and Tessa Sisnuket had shown them to Elsa’s room.

“Knox Whitaker! Jessup! It’s so good to see you both.” She enveloped Knox in a hug and then ran her hand affectionately over Jessup’s head. The dog’s tail thumped against the ground.

“Hi, Merrilee. It’s good to see you again, as well.”

As a young teen, he’d sort of had a crush on Merrilee for a season. Even though she had to be hitting her late fifties or early sixties, she was still a pretty woman with sparkling blue eyes, a ready smile and a generous warmth that nonetheless cut straight to the chase.

He’d considered her the coolest of the cool. Damn, the woman had founded the town of Good Riddance nearly thirty years ago and turned it into the charming haven it was today. The town greeting, compliments of Merrilee, was “Welcome to Good Riddance, where you get to leave behind what ails you.”

Knox had been ailing and out of sorts for so long it had simply become his state of being. He doubted that even Good Riddance could cure what ailed him since he wasn’t sure what was wrong. How did you accurately treat something undiagnosed?

“I’m sorry about your Grandmother. She was a fine person.”

“One of the best.” It had been nearly two years and some days he still forgot she was gone.

“Well, I’m glad you’re joining us again. We missed you last year, although I understand it would’ve probably been too painful to be here.”

Knox just offered a quick, hard nod.

“Coffee?” she said. “Straight-up, right?”

“You remember.”

“Of course. I’m not totally senile yet.” She laughed and he laughed along with her. She wasn’t remotely senile. “Here you go.”

He took the proffered cup. “Thanks.”

“So, how’s Trudie?”

Now that was the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, wasn’t it?

“I...uh...I haven’t talked to Trudie lately.” He’d never called her. Everything inside him knotted at just saying her name aloud.

They hadn’t spoken, emailed, Facebooked, or Tweeted since that evening she’d walked as the summer sun sank behind the distant mountains. She’d accused him of becoming a stranger, but she was the one who’d changed. She’d been critical of him, critical of Elsa, and hadn’t seemed to understand when she, as his best friend, should have understood.

He’d felt so numb, so anchorless when Mormor had died.... And Elsa had been there to fill the void. She’d seemed to wrap herself around his numbness.

Trudie had had a problem with Elsa, had seemed totally oblivious to the need Elsa filled. Elsa wouldn’t have wanted him calling Trudie, but Trudie knew where to find him and she hadn’t bothered. Neither had he. It had just been easier that way.

“Hmm,” Merrilee said, her look full of speculation.

Knox shrugged off the question in her eyes. “Things change.” He glanced around. “There are more pictures on the wall than the last time I was here.” The log wall held an assortment of photos that relayed the history of Good Riddance and its inhabitants. “It still smells the same in here and welcomes the same—” the life-size moose replica in a Santa hat next to the decorated tree had been a staple for years
“—but there are changes.” He nodded toward the two men sitting opposite one another at a chess table. He didn’t have to say it. One of the old codgers who’d been a permanent fixture there had passed just as Mormor had. A grey-haired man who was something of a sophisticated dresser, especially for Good Riddance, had taken the spot.

“True enough, things change. I expected... Well, you and Trudie were always so close.” She shook her head as if clearing it. “Regardless, it’s nice to see you again. We’re glad you’re here. How’s the animal-doctoring business?”

“I can’t complain. I just took on a partner.” He’d known when he joined Mack Beasley’s vet practice a couple of years ago that Mack was planning to retire soon. He’d done so a year and a half ago and Knox had been so swamped with work he could barely breathe. He’d have been hard-pressed to attend Chrismoose if Luke Farmington hadn’t come on-board a couple of months ago. Relief vets were one thing but the real relief was having Luke to share the practice. “He’s a nice guy who moved to Anchorage from Denver.”

“That’s wonderful. You should’ve brought him to Chrismoose.”

The Twelve Days of Christmas started playing on the boombox over on the table. Damn—his and Trudie’s song. He could hardly change it.

Knox forced a grin and tried to focus on the conversation at hand. “Someone had to stay behind to take care of the business. It looks as if things are going well here. I noticed some new buildings when we were coming in.”

Merrilee nodded and was on the verge of saying one thing when something caught her eye. Like an internal alarm shrilling, the hair on the back of Knox’s neck stood at attention.

“Well,” Merrilee said, “you and Trudie are about to have the opportunity to catch up. She just walked through the door.”

He’d known it before she said it. He’d felt Trudie’s presence the way he always had. He could also feel her animosity. She was still pissed.

Damn, he might as well go ahead and get this over with. He turned.

He felt as if he’d been kicked in the stomach. It was as if he was seeing her for the first time. She was familiar, but had he ever really looked at her?

The curve of her cheek, the sensual line of her lips, the hug of her jeans to her hips. And her hair was different.

Trudie Brown was a beautiful woman.

* * *

S
HE
’
D
HEARD
he would be here since Elsa was coming in her capacity as Snow Queen. She’d known she’d see him. She’d thought she was prepared. She’d thought she was over him.

She wasn’t.

Knox. She stood immobilized. And that song... Seeing him was like ripping open an old wound. All the missing, wanting, hurting, surged through her anew. Yet she couldn’t stop looking at him, soaking up the sight of him. She’d cried and ranted and tried so hard to forget him. She had kept herself busy, throwing herself into work, joining friends for outings, dating. But busy hadn’t remedied the sleepless nights when she’d longed for him, ached for the sound of his voice, the magic of his smile.

So many times she’d thought about calling him and telling him she loved him. But their friendship hadn’t meant enough for him to salvage. Why would he possibly want to know she loved him like a woman loved a man? So, she’d kept that part to herself, not even sharing it with her girlfriends.

Now here he was in front of her, all sturdy six feet of him. His dark hair was a little longer. He was perhaps a bit thinner. There were a few lines bracketing his eyes that hadn’t been there before. He looked weary...but wonderful.

Thunk.
Instinctively she reached back and braced her hand against the wall, barely staying upright. Jessup, all eighty-something pounds of him, was on her, licking her neck. Obviously his joy at seeing her outweighed his obedience training.

She’d missed Jessup almost as much as she’d missed Knox.

“Jessup, down!” Knox commanded in his most censuring tone. The dog glanced back at his master, but just couldn’t contain his joy at seeing Trudie. She buried her face in the fur of his neck. “Hey, sweet boy. How’ve you been?”

Jessup licked her hand and her neck again as if to say he’d been okay but he was much better now that she was here.

Trudie straightened and dredged up a smile as she walked forward, Jessup glued to her side. “Merrilee,” she said by way of greeting as Merrilee enveloped her in a hug.