Wild Man Creek

Colin had an attack of conscience because he was being difficult, as usual. Bad stuff had happened to him, his brothers had all come running, stuck by him for six months while he tried to get his head and body back and here he was, just being an asshole. He threw Luke a bone. “Hey, any chance you have a little time this week? I got permission to install a satellite dish at that cabin. I can pick it up, but the installation is going to require some climbing.”

“You don’t want to be climbing,” Luke agreed.

“No,” Colin said, shaking his head. “I hear the only thing worse than getting a titanium rod shoved into one femur is when they do it to the other one.” He grinned. “But, I think I’m going to need internet. Stuck out in the woods, it’s my easiest way to stay in touch and buy things I need.”

“Sure. Just say when,” Luke said, clearly pleased to be allowed to do something to help.

“And with all my stuff in storage, any chance you have an extra gun? Mine are with my household goods.”

“Worried about bear?” Luke asked.

“Not necessarily. Might be a little worried about growers. I heard there are pot growers around.”

“Been a long time since we’ve had any trouble with pot growers—they tend to stay away from Virgin River and hang closer to Clear River. But, you should have a gun—bear are coming out with the cubs. Man, you get between a bear and her cub and it isn’t pretty. I have a rifle I never use.”

“Um, any chance you have a high-caliber handgun?” Colin asked, trying to stretch out his left arm and wincing at the pain.

“Still can’t get the best out of that arm, huh?” Luke asked, nodding toward the affected limb.

“It’s coming along. It’s the elbow, man. It might never be right. The breaks in the humerus seem okay now, but I went through a shoulder problem from—never mind all that. I’ll take the rifle if that’s all you have.”

“I have a Magnum locked up, but the thing is, if you shoot a bear with it, you might only piss him off.”

“The noise could scare him away, though,” Colin said.

“Hmm, yeah,” Luke said with a tilt of his head. “I haven’t fired it in a while. You’ll have to clean it, fire it, make sure—”

“Great, thanks, uhh …” Colin said. Then he smiled a bit lamely and said, “My buddy Brett seems to be very relaxed, sitting here on my lap. I think he’s going to need a little change. You might want to brace yourself.”

Colin had rented himself a pretty good little cabin. Furnished, but not fancy; electricity and indoor plumbing. It was lacking a few things—good, natural light, for one. When Colin had looked at it with Aiden the previous month, he lamented the dark shadows in the cabin, but he could live with that. He brought bright lights with him to illuminate the place for those days when it was too wet to paint outside. He looked forward to taking his painting, his easel, canvas and paints to a higher spot outdoors, to a clearing, and taking advantage of the good, natural light when the weather permitted. What the cabin did have was a quiet, secluded space in the forest with a creek. Or brook. Or whatever you called a baby river. That meant wildlife. And wildlife was what Colin wanted.

Colin had always been a gifted artist, but it had never interested him as much as flying and sports. He’d always doodled; in high school he was the one stuck with all the posters, signs, lettering, even chalk renderings of team players. High school counselors and art teachers wanted him to go to college to study art, but he’d been after something a lot more exciting.

It was ironic that Colin had wanted to fly since the first time he looked into the sky and saw aircraft above him, and yet Luke was the first in their family to do it. Luke always remarked that Colin followed him into Black Hawk helicopters, but that was not so. Luke had gone into the Army ready for any assignment from artillery to KP when he was offered a Warrant Officer School slot and from there flight school. Luke had stumbled into a flying career. Colin had dreamed of flying jets or helicopters since he’d been about six years old; he had enlisted with that as his single objective. He couldn’t wait to get off the ground!

Art was his sideline, just as it had been in high school. He was good at caricature and entertained his Army buddies with his drawings. He’d done an oil portrait of the five Riordan boys, ages ten to eighteen; he’d copied it from a photo and given it to his mother. He’d painted a huge, wall-size mural of a Black Hawk in a house he’d owned about ten years ago and when the new owner bought it he swore he’d keep it on that wall forever. But all that had been for fun. While in treatment—all kinds of treatment—he’d been drawing and painting. Ballroom dancing or squash certainly weren’t options for rehab.

The injuries Colin sustained from the crash led to addiction to Oxycontin, which led to being arrested for buying from a dealing doctor, which led to addiction treatment, which led to depression, which led to … Put all the pieces together and he’d been in one form of therapy or another for six months. Colin had been painting with oils, watercolors and acrylics for a few months now, one of the only parts of his past he’d been able to hang on to and something that was now part of his therapy. It slowed him down enough to let his mind move easily rather than crazily. He’d painted all the bowls of fruit and landscapes he could stand, but the thing that got his juices flowing was painting wildlife.

He was frighteningly good at it for a man who hadn’t been professionally trained. He could replicate some of the best wildlife portraits he found; then he discovered his own images through the lens of a camera.

He had taken one, and only one, professional art instruction in his life after high school and that was in the nuthouse. He went from the hospital to physical therapy to drug rehab to depression rehab—and it was in the third rehab that some wise guy counselor suggested a bona fide art instructor, since painting had become so crucial to Colin’s recovery.

The art instructor had said, “The hardest part of training a painter is showing him how to introduce emotion into his work, and you do it naturally.”

And Colin had said, “Don’t be ridiculous—I don’t have emotions anymore.”

After repeating this to his assigned counselor, they had decided to slowly reduce and eliminate the antidepressants and increase the group therapy sessions. To that idea Colin had said, “Can’t you just shoot me instead?”

It had worked in spite of Colin’s dislike of those touchy-feely group-hug sessions. He must have been ready to come off the antidepressants. Now he was glad; his senses were no longer dulled by drugs of any kind.

He’d never even considered art as a career. But why would he? He was into fast, edgy living; he was a combat-trained Black Hawk pilot who lived hard. He drove a sports car too fast, occasionally partied too much, played amateur rugby, had too many women, went to war too often. And then it all came crashing down on him, literally. In slowly learning to pick up the pieces of his lost life, he reclaimed his art. Art moved slow and exercised feelings he had been able to ignore for a long time.

Now, after many long months, he was released to pursue his continued healing and his art. He had a good digital camera with an exceptional zoom lens. Obviously wildlife couldn’t pose for him—but he could catch them in the wild, get several photos and work from them.

Though he wouldn’t admit it to anyone, Colin was looking forward to really getting into his art and to reclaiming the life he had nearly lost.

As promised, Luke helped Colin get the internet up and running, talking a little more than he used to. It was probably the influence of living with a woman. Colin recalled that most women had that talking gene hardwired.

Colin spent the next couple of days cautiously prowling around the forest, confirming to himself that he’d made a good choice. He liked the quiet; he enjoyed the sounds in the woods. He liked to sit on his rough-hewn porch at dawn and dusk, still and quiet, camera at the ready, and watch the wildlife that would gather at the creek—everything from a black bear fishing for trout to a puma looking for a drink. He caught a good shot of a fox; a distant photo of a buck; the head of a doe peeking out of the brush; an amazing American eagle in flight.

He went out exploring, rain or shine, but was careful with his hiking, and since spotting the bear fishing in his creek, never went out without the gun. He watched his step and moved slowly; he wasn’t kidding about the second titanium rod. He had no interest in breaking any more bones.

Being outdoors in the crisp March spring was energizing for him. It seemed to drizzle two out of three days, but although he couldn’t paint outdoors in wet weather, Colin certainly didn’t mind being exposed to the elements. And watching the new spring growth begin to emerge was a new experience for him. He’d never noticed things like new vegetation, the quality of the air and the perfect stillness of the forest before now. He’d never moved slow enough to take notice.

On a rare sunny day he took his easel and paints and drove up an old dirt road past a vineyard and a couple of farms. He set up in a meadow and went back to work on the eagle he had started a few days ago. He clipped his photo to the top of the canvas and found himself wondering, What does it feel like up there? Tell me what it’s like to know you can just step off a limb and soar …

Just then he heard a wild rustling in the trees not far away. He put down the palette and brush and pulled the .357 Magnum out of his belt at the small of his back. He took a stance in the direction of the noise, his pulse picking up speed, and aimed in the direction of the sound. But the creature who broke through the trees was not a black bear. It was a girl in sweatpants, red rubber boots, a dirty tee T-shirt and ball cap with her ponytail strung through the back. He knew it was a girl by her vaguely female shape and her deafening scream as she dived to the ground, facedown, with her hands over the back of her head.

Colin calmly engaged the safety and tucked the gun back in his belt. “It’s all right,” he said. “I’m not going to shoot you. You can get up.”

She lifted her head and looked up at him. “Are you crazy?”

Now there were some pretty big brown eyes, he thought. Very pretty. “Nope. Not crazy. I was expecting a bear.”

She lifted herself up slowly, sitting back on her heels. “Why in the world were you expecting a bear?” she demanded.

“They’re starting to come out of hibernation now, with cubs. I’ve seen a couple. Thankfully at a safe distance.”

She huffed. “Don’t you know they’re more afraid of you than you are of them?”

He smiled lazily. “Better to be safe. On the off chance I’m not that scary,” he offered with a shrug. He bent to pick up his palette and brush.

“Amazing,” she said with an irritated tone. “I have yet to hear anything that sounds like an apology!”

She was really pissed, and for some reason, it made him smile. He tried to keep it a small smile, asking himself why he found her so amusing. He gave a half bow, partly to conceal his grin. “Sorry if I startled you,” he said. “And sorry you startled me. You weren’t in any danger—I wouldn’t shoot something I couldn’t positively identify.”

“Very lame attempt,” she said. “What are you doing here?”

All right, he was standing in front of an easel, holding a paint palette and brush. “Taxidermy?” he responded with just a touch of his own sarcasm.

She stood and brushed at her dirty sweatpants. “Cute,” she said. “Very cute. I mean, on my property?”

“Oh, this is yours? The roads were open and there were no signs. The light’s good here. My place is buried in the forest where it’s pretty dark—all I have is artificial light. If this is a problem, I’ll move on ….”

“But how did you get here? Where is the road? Because this is my—I mean, I don’t own it, but I rent that house back there,” she said, pointing over her shoulder where the top of a large Victorian could be seen above the trees. “And aside from cutting down some trees, I couldn’t figure out how to get to this clearing back here. I could see it from the widow’s walk, but there didn’t appear to be any access.”

“And yet, here you are,” he pointed out with a smile. “Posing as a bear.”

She brushed at her cheeks, which only moved the dirt from her hands onto them. But Colin was taking closer stock of her and starting to see things he’d missed when she first burst through the trees and threw herself to the ground. Like a very delicious female shape—lean and sexy but with curves in all the right places, and a lot of chestnut-colored hair that was escaping that ball cap to fan her face. Her lips were full and peachy; her skin like ivory with a few light freckles across her nose; those eyes were amazingly large and deep and shadowed by thick lashes. He had a sudden urge to taste that mouth, that smart, sassy mouth.

“It wasn’t easy,” she said. “I plowed through those trees and bushes to ask you how you got here with all your stuff.” She turned up a palm; it was bleeding. “See, the last owner let the trees and shrubs between her backyard and this clearing grow in, and I wanted to get back here with gardening equipment, but I couldn’t see how …”

He looked at her palm, looked her up and down and asked, “Was it really dirty coming through there?”

“Huh? Oh!” she laughed. “I’ve been gardening. I mean, farming—you can’t call what I’ve been doing gardening. I’ve gone a little nuts. See, stuff is already coming up. I’ve looked up the planting cycle online and if I hurry I can catch up. I have to get all my seeds and starters in the ground before April, and that actually puts me a little behind. Vegetable seeds should be in the ground early March; tomatoes should be started. Except the squashes and melons—there’s time for them yet. And I’ve already had birds, deer, rabbits—”

He took a step toward her. “What are you doing about them?” he asked.

She shrugged. “I have a horn. A cow horn. It’s loud. The birds fly, the deer run. But I hate it. I don’t hate scaring off birds so much, but the doe come with their fawns and I don’t really want them to go, but if I don’t scare them off and they dig up the garden, all my work is for nothing. And the only reason to garden is to watch it grow. Deer trampling my new plants isn’t going to get me—”

“Don’t you garden to eat it or sell it?” he asked.

“Honestly, I haven’t thought that far ahead. Right now I garden to garden.”

He took a step toward her. He stuck out a hand. “Colin Riordan,” he said.

She looked down at her bleeding palm.

“Oh, damn, let me take care of that,” he said. He went to the opened hatchback of the Jeep and found a clean rag. When he got back to her, he wrapped it around her cut. Then he stuck out his hand again.

“Jillian,” she said, shaking his hand cautiously. “Are you related to Luke and Shelby?”

“You know them?”

“I stayed in one of their cabins until this place turned up and I rented it.”

“I’m Luke’s brother, also known as Uncle Colin.”

“Pleasure,” she said. “Now how did you get here?”

He turned around and she did a quick study of his back; she had another look at the big, scary gun in his waistband. She also couldn’t help but admire his broad, muscled shoulders, narrow waist and long legs.

“See that road?” he asked, pointing. “It’s a crappy road, bumpy and overgrown from lack of use, but the Rubicon can take it, no problem. And the road kept going up, past a vineyard, past a couple of farms, and I stayed on it. Up was my objective. Up was where the sun was.”

“How far did you have to stay on that road?” she asked.

“I’m not sure. Maybe as long as a half hour?”

She sighed. “Well, Uncle Colin, you can get sun a lot easier. My place on the other side of the trees is a couple of turns off 36. You can paint in my front yard or backyard. I don’t mind and you’d be a lot less trouble that way. You won’t need a gun and I won’t need to duck all the time. But I’ve been planting bulbs around the house and drive and walk, too, so try not to step on the new plants.”

“Jillian, when does all the wildlife pester the garden?” he asked.

“Dawn. In fact, right up till eight o’clock. They’re back again at dusk. They probably hang out back here. I’m sure they stay around the trees. They’re so cautious when they come out.”

“Show me your garden,” he said.

“It isn’t easy,” she said. “You might want to go down that road and around to 36 and come up the front way.”

“If you can do it, I can do it,” he said. “So? Let’s do it.”

She sighed, shrugged and turned to walk back into the trees. With the rag wrapped around her hand she carefully parted the growth. It wasn’t exactly a narrow copse, and there was no path, and because she was not totally familiar with the property she wasn’t entirely sure of the most direct route back to the house. She hadn’t been in the house long and the only part of the property she knew was what surrounded the house.

Finally they came through and arrived at the garden area. A large, rectangle portion of it was tilled, turned and planted. The place was huge. There were stakes along some rows, marking the plants. Then there was the house. Astonishing.

Colin took off his straw cowboy hat and rubbed a hand over his head. “Whoa,” he said. “Look at that house! You rent that?”

“Mainly for the kitchen window, back porch and yard. That part of the house reminds me of where I grew up.”

He took in the garden. “That’s quite a farm you got there. You been at this a long time?”

“Like I said, I was trying to catch up …”

He looked down at her. He lifted the brim of her ball cap. “How long?”

She shrugged. “Maybe ten days. Maybe a little less. A week?”

“Did you start from scratch?”

“Oh, no. I think that garden has been there for fifty years or so, but I can’t tell how much of it was used by the woman who used to live here. If she was an experienced organic gardener, she probably planted stuff in alternating sections just to regenerate the soil. I could see the established rows. I weeded, tilled, started planting seeds. I’ve planted less than a quarter, but I’m ready to plant more.”

He whistled. “No wonder you’re covered in dirt.”

She laughed at him. “There’s a tiller in the shed, but I like the hoe and shovel and trowel and cultivator. I like to get close to the garden. My nana used to say the secret to excellent gardening was to be close to the dirt and the plants. Besides, dirt washes off.”

“You’ve been doing this for a week?” he asked. “Jesus, girl, got a little OCD going on there?”

“Maybe a little,” she said with a grin. “When I get into something, I just really get into it. I bet it’s that way with your painting.”

Colin shook his head. “It’s not like that. I’m not obsessed.”

“Well, I’m not obsessed,” she returned, insulted. “It’s just when I take on a job, I like to do a good job!”

“Yeah,” he said absently, moving closer to the garden—the long, perfect rows, the stakes, the starter plants here and there. “Mostly seeds?”

“And some seedlings,” she said. “Some bulbs around the ends—she had some in her shed. I have no idea what they are, but we’ll find out. I suspect tulips, irises, daffodils and lilies. I put some along the front of the house, too. I have some new starters up on the porch, so I’m getting the bed ready. And I have some baskets to hang around the porch—it’s a new thing, cherry tomatoes that grow out of the bottom of the hanging basket.” She grinned at him. “Very handy for dinner—go pluck your tomatoes on the porch. I wanted to try it. And all the bushes surrounding the side of the house back to these trees? Rhododendron and hydrangea. And lots of lilacs. I love lilacs.”

He took in the house—enormous, wide porch, three stories. He nodded toward it. “That’s a lot of house. You live there alone?”

She leaned on one leg, hand on her hip and threw him a look. “Where I come from, gentlemen don’t ask questions like that. I have protection and very large locks.”

He grinned at her. “I’m rarely accused of being a gentleman, but I’m not dangerous. Besides, I didn’t ask because I intend to break in and steal your gardening tools, I asked because it’s a very big house. Where do you come from?”

“San Jose.”

“Then what are you doing up here, in this big house?”

She showed him her palms, one wrapped in a rag. “Taxidermy,” she said.

He chuckled at her. Smart-ass kid, he thought. “I can see that. Before gardening, how did you pass the time?”

“I was a corporate person. Software industry. It was too stressful, so I’m taking some time off. I … ah … oh never mind …”

“What?” he asked.

“I haven’t had a proper vacation in a long time so I’m relaxing and thinking about what I want to do next. I think while I garden.”

“A multitasker,” he said with grin. “What do you do when it rains?”

“Same thing, only a lot wetter,” she said.

“Well, if you see someone prowling around out here at dawn on a clear day, don’t get scared. And no horn, okay? If there are deer, I’d like to get some shots.”

“Pictures?” she asked.

“Exactly.”

“Why?” she wanted to know.

He turned and started to walk away from her. “Because animals won’t pose for me. Later, Jillian.”

She watched as he disappeared into the thick copse of trees behind her garden. And while he’d seemed a nuisance at best, she was suddenly sorry to see him go.

Jillian went inside, cleaned up her cut hand, bandaged it and covered it with a latex glove. She went back to her garden and worked through the afternoon, but it wasn’t quite the same. The painter showing up—it was like a little tease and she realized how much better it felt to have a little break in the day and some conversation. Then she remembered she had heard that Hope McCrea had gone to Jack’s every day for that end-of-day whiskey. Jillian didn’t crave a whiskey, but it might be nice to have a glass of wine and some dinner. And some company.

Risking the garden to the wildlife at dusk, she went inside to shower. Clean, hair dripping, dressed in her robe, she padded up to the third floor and looked out one of the bedroom windows. She could barely see over the trees, but she was able to make out Colin just now packing up the back of his Jeep. The sun was beginning to lower; his painting light was obviously dwindling.

She blew her hair dry, put on some of her nicer slacks, gave her short nails a whisk of clear polish and left the house.

Colin was sitting at the bar passing the time with a draft and a new acquaintance, Dan Brady. Colin learned that Brady worked construction for Paul Haggerty and could be found at Jack’s once or twice a week for a beer. As for Colin, this was exactly the third beer he’d indulged in since getting out of treatment. In fact, while he wasn’t particularly tempted to overindulge in beer, he never kept any at his cabin. He was on a completely different path these days.

He was just giving himself a silent pat on the back for how well he was keeping his messed-up life together when she walked in. Dan Brady was still talking but Colin didn’t hear a word he said. He didn’t even recognize her at first; he just glanced at her and thought she was one fine-looking woman when he realized it was Jillian, the gardener. She smiled right at him. In fact, she smiled like she was happy to see him. He almost glanced over his shoulder to be sure she was smiling at him. Except for the pink nose and cheeks and smattering of freckles, she looked almost entirely different.

First of all, she not only had a shape, it was an awesome shape. Oh man, that was a nice chest—not too big, not too small. She was kind of tall for a girl, but would still be small up against his six-three frame. Her chestnut hair fell to her shoulders in a smooth, silky curtain that called out for big, male hands. Narrow waist, firm butt, trim thighs. Her pink lips were heart-shaped and that smile cut right through him. Her smile almost brought him to his knees. She had a clean and classy girl-next-door look about her; not his usual type but he felt the kind of physical response that suggested he might like to make her his type.