Love Untold

Love Untold: Chapter 43

Love Untold: Chapter 43

Early the next morning, he took off across the field to the neighboring cabin at least four times, and every time, he turned right back around, losing his nerve.  What was he supposed to say to her when he met her?  “Hey, I saw you in the bar and again last night...I’ve been watching you...”

He’d sound like a stalker.

Or...”I know you don’t know me, but I know you because I’ve been having these really vivid dreams about you...”

Yeah, she’d call the police on him for that one.

When he did finally figure out a way to introduce himself, he clenched a trail map in his sweaty palms and paced off the distance between his place and hers.  He’d just say he heard she was the owner’s daughter and ask if she knew of any great trails for hiking or biking, and then he’d strike up a conversation and ask if she wanted to join him.  Fool proof.

Except, she wasn’t there.  

Reese stuck a hand on his hip and stared down the path toward the main resort.  It was barely sunrise.  Where the hell did she go?

And he smiled.  He could never get used to a woman that liked to sleep late.  Already, Chrissie Hill inched her way into his heart...as if she hadn’t been there already.  A female that rose with the sun...unless he kept her up all night.  And of course, the thought of keeping her up all night gave him a whole other set of things to think about.

He had to find this woman.

*****

Reese checked his compass and glared at the cedar tree in front of him.  He could have sworn he passed that ten minutes ago.  He’d never been lost in a forest, and he wasn’t about to start now.  

That morning after not finding Chrissie Hill anywhere on the property, he joined David and Jennifer for breakfast, and he’d been confused ever since.  Reese told his brother about seeing Chrissie at the bar and wanting to meet her, all the while holding his breath for the lecture on getting involved with someone and “look what happened last time you tried to get hitched.”  But David smirked -- after he reattached his hanging jaw -- and asked, “Chrissie Hill?  She’s here?”

“Yeah,” Reese said, frowning.  “Do you know her?”

David and Jennifer shared a look, and then David said, “We’ve met.  She’s the one that suggested this resort.”

“Is this the one that Jennifer said jumped you in your office?” he asked.

David narrowed his gaze at Jennifer.  “You told him that?  She didn’t jump me.  She was just curious about...something.”

Jennifer shrugged.  “I didn’t tell him everything,” she said.

“Didn’t tell me everything about what?” Reese asked.

David spoke to his wife.  “Woman, when are you going to listen when I tell you to stay out of it?”

“Stay out of what?” Reese asked, looking between them.

Jennifer calmly replied to David, “There was no harm done, and I was curious about how he’d react.  And you’re the one who stuck your nose into this mess first and sent that note, which by the way, was a bastardly thing to do.  She’s going to think this whole family is nuts.  Chrissie Hill sounds like a fascinating woman, and I can’t wait to meet her.”

That made two of them, Reese thought, but he raised his voice and asked, “What note?  React about what?”  Neither paid him any attention.

“Well, now you know,” David said, pointing a fork laden with scrabbled eggs at his wife.  “I already tried that route, and he didn’t want to know anything.  I was just trying to stir things up a bit without getting involved.”

“Oh, you’ve stirred it up alright,” Jennifer retorted, jabbing her spoon into her yogurt.  

“Hello?” Reese shouted.  “What do you know about Chrissie Hill that you’re not telling me?”

David and Jennifer looked at him.  “Nothing,” they said in unison.  Reese dropped his head to his hands and groaned.  It that was a glimpse of married life, maybe he should stick with being single.  Those two could frustrate the Pope.

“Okay, whatever,” Reese replied grudgingly, raising his head to watch his brother and his wife curiously.  Jennifer was smiling secretly, and now he was more wary than ever.  Something was going on here -- something to do with Chrissie -- but before he could further the discussion, David’s phone rang, and he had to rush off to a meeting.  So, he raised an eyebrow at Jennifer.  She only shook her head and veered the conversation toward those nasty potions of hers.  Reese left as quickly and as politely as he could manage.  

Did those two think that Chrissie Hill was the woman from his dream?  If so, they should have told him.  They knew how crazy his dream woman made him, and now he regretted ever saying anything about it to them.  But because of that baffling conversation, he sought out Chrissie with a tenacious drive, seeing glimpses of her in his mind, juxtaposing her profile over the one from his dream, and the two matched perfectly...or was he forcing himself to believe that?  

Either way, he knew he had to find her and discover for himself if he’d finally become delusional.

He saw her again earlier that afternoon, wearing a short sun-dress with black swimsuit straps tied around her neck and a wide-brimmed, straw hat that sheltered her features, but he knew it was her.   He’d recognize those tanned legs anywhere.  However, she left the resort with another woman, and they disappeared into the woods.  Reese wanted to talk to her, to find out what it was about this mysterious woman that appealed to him and if she was “the one”, who created a stir in David and Jennifer, yet he did not want to meet her with an audience.

Because it it wasn’t his fantasy woman, he’d rather fight off one female rather than two.

Therefore, he was now officially a stalker...and crazy.  Or crazier.  Keeping a safe distance, he followed the two women, but after about twenty minutes of keeping to a well-worn hiking trail, they vanished into the trees.  It took him almost another twenty minutes to discover the hidden footpath, and thinking they used it, he set off down it.  But now...  He sighed and tapped on his compass.  Surely not.  They didn’t go this way.  There was nothing over there -- according to the terrain map he picked up in the resort’s lobby -- but more trees and underbrush.  The two women were obviously going swimming, and the closest lake resided in the other direction.

He pushed forward a little while longer.  If he didn’t come across them after another half mile, then he was turning back.  He’d have to catch her later that evening, maybe stake out her cabin and wait for her on her porch.

Topping a low ridge, he saw their private haunt and grinned.  It was a small lake about as long and as wide as a football field with a circle of rocks jutting out of the water right smack on the fifty yard line.  And there they were, two figures splashing in the clear liquid, one wearing a bright pink bikini and the other in a modest black one.  Reese knew exactly which figure was Chrissie.  He just couldn’t picture her in something flashy like the other woman wore.  It barely covered her feminine parts, and he felt his gag reflex act up, as though he was seeing his sister-in-law in that skimpy swimsuit.  Weird.

Now that he knew where Chrissie wondered off to, he figured he could turn around and find his way back to the resort, but his feet moved down the ridge to a place where the women dropped their towels and bags, and he felt uneasy about being so close.  He backed into the trees a ways, sat down on a cropping of rocks so he could see them -- if just barely -- but they couldn’t see him.  And he wished he thought to bring a pair of binoculars with him.

Talk about disgusting behavior.  Reese grunted at himself.  He shouldn’t be here to begin with.  But he couldn’t make himself leave...not just yet.  So, he reclined on the rocks, stuck a grass blade in his mouth, and enjoyed the view.  The two woman swam and laughed and enjoyed the sunshine, and Reese saw him and Chrissie swimming there in the future, alone, him holding her as the water tickled their skin or making love on those rocks in the middle...and he bolted upright, startling a group of flycatchers.

He didn’t even know the woman, didn’t know if she was who he thought she might be, and already, he was fantasizing about an intimate relationship with her.  This was crazy thinking...and creepy.  No woman wanted a man who’d been stalking her like a pervert.

Chrissie turned in his direction, alerted by the birds scattering overhead, and he stared at her.  Would he ever get close enough to truly see what she looked like?  From this distance, she was just a blur of features on a heart-shaped face.  And for that moment, he placed his dream woman’s face over hers again, and it fit.  It truly was like they were the same woman, and that was more of his crazy thinking.  

Surely, he hadn’t been dreaming of a real person this whole time.  No, his heart wanted something so bad that his mind was creating the reality for him.  He was sure of it.  His dreams were only points of reference, telling him that there was someone out there, and he only had to find her.  

Reese was fairly sure he had.  Now, if only he could get her alone so they could meet.

Thus, when he heard her scream from the middle of the lake as if her heart called out to him to save her, he stood up, ready to fly down the hill to get to her and protect her, but he only saw her standing on the rocks in the middle of the lake with the other woman staring up at her.  Reese could relate.  Sometimes he felt like screaming like that, too, and he closed his eyes, convinced he finally found his soul mate.  Determination guided him, to meet with her, to be alone with her, to finally put an end to his insanity, and he hiked the three miles back to the resort.  He sat down on the rocking chair of his cabin’s porch and waited for her.

****

A flock of birds flew out of the trees next to the swimming hole.  Chrissie and Dena looked in that direction, but there was no one along the shoreline.  “Wonder what scared them,” Dena said, gliding through the water.

“Probably just a wild animal,” Chrissie said, but she bit down on her lip.  She got the strangest feeling someone was watching them.  Maybe that guy she kept seeing all day.  Every time she turned a corner, he was there, his back to her, and she went another way.  He looked a lot like David Elliot from behind, though she couldn’t picture Mr. Elliot in cargo shorts and a ball cap.  Chrissie didn’t want to see him, so even if it wasn’t David, she wasn’t taking the chance that it was.  

When Dena arrived and settled in the largest suite of the western wing, they packed up a picnic and headed out to their private swimming lake, what people in the south would call a pond, really, with a small jutting of rocks in the middle.  But the water was clear and cool, fed from the snowcapped mountain tops, and so peaceful, Chrissie could spend all day here.

Dena splashed her on the face.  “Hey, come on.  Race you to the rocks.”

Chrissie’s heart seized up at the word race, but she breathed through the pain and set off after her sister.  She pulled up on the sun-drenched rocks behind Dena and strained the water from her hair.  “God, I’ve missed this place,” her sister said, leaning back on her elbows and stretching her legs out to flick the water with her toes.  “But I guess you’ll be coming here more often, huh?  Mom told me you were thinking of moving back.”

“I decided last night,” Chrissie replied, staring off toward the distant peaks rising above the pines.  The contrasting warmth from the sun and the gentle breeze over the cool water caused goosebumps to pebble her skin.  Once those died down, layers on layers of the irritating prickles coursed up and down her arms.  Chrissie’s gaze drifted down to the far side of the small lake.  She had an urge to swim over there and investigate.  Something was there that she wanted, but all she could see were their towels and the hard-sided cooler hanging from a high branch where they stored their lunch.

Hands flashed in her face.  “Hey,” Dena said, waving to get Chrissie’s attention.  “Are you even listening to me?”

“Sorry, what?”

“I was saying that I think it’s great you wanting to move back to Denver, but what about your house and your business?”

Chrissie forced herself to look away from the trees.  “I’m going to relocate my business and sell my house,” she said.

“In this market?” Dena groaned.  “You’ll never get full value out of it.”

“I don’t care,” Chrissie replied, picking up a loose rock and throwing it across the water.  It felt good.  She tossed another...and another, until she was standing up on the flat surface of the lake boulders and hurling rocks at the rippling water as if it had been the reason Race was gone.  When her arms were shaking from the strain and she knew she was too tired to swim back to the shore, she opened up her mouth and screamed out every ounce of breath in her lungs.

“Feel better?” Dena asked with a smirk as Chrissie collapsed next to her.

“Yes, I do,” Chrissie said with a smile.  “Much better.”  And she did.  With that scream, she released some of the pain, washing it clean of her system, and she wanted to do it again and again, until every bit of heartache and regret was gone.  But she didn’t want to scare Dena.  They might be here all night.

“Good, think you can get back?  Or do I need to carry you on my back?”

Chrissie laughed.  “I’ll stick to the shallows,” she said, dipping her body into the water and wading around to the side of the boulders where an underwater ledge led over to the side of the lake.  She’d have to walk around the rim of the lake to get to their stuff, but it was better than risking drowning because she could barely lift her legs.  Dena walked with her, not saying anything, and Chrissie smiled at her.  

A flash of orange through the trees made her stop.  But then it was gone, and she figured it was probably a red fox or a squirrel.  Chrissie’s skin prickled again, but she ignored it.  Dena splashed water on her back, “I’m not getting any younger here.  And I’m hungry.”

Chrissie picked up her speed, and an hour later, she said good-bye to Dena at the path that led to the Love Nest, thinking of only a good long soak in a bubble bath and a nap.  Her steps were lighter, her heart was lighter, and she felt better than she had in the last four months.

Race might not be a real person, but she knew what she had to do now.  No more looking for him.  No more obsessing over a man she might not ever meet.  If Fate or Destiny or God wanted her to fall in love, then she’d let them guide her to him.  She just had to be patient.

Smiling to herself and thinking of Race learning patience in her dream, she chuckled as she trotted up the porch steps and fished out her key.  Then she wondered if that book from her dream was real and if she could read it again.  It had some good advice in it.

A throat cleared behind her, making her drop the key.  “Um...hello?” a man said.  Chrissie turned around.