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“It’s still dark,” Sam mumbled after turning over and blinking at the hall light Adam had switched on.
“It probably won’t be for much longer,” Adam replied, although he had no idea what time the sun actually rose. Still, given that it was summer, the sky was bound to show some light soon. Cripes, he had to hope so.
“I’ll have breakfast on the table by the time you wash up and get dressed,” he went on, and paid no attention to more mumbling that followed as he headed for the kitchen. A glance at his watch told him that by the time he figured out how to make coffee in the old-fashioned percolator sitting on a stove burner he wouldn’t have much chance to drink it if he planned to meet Jane at the office at five. Which he did. He had no intention of allowing her to be smug about his being late.
Not when she’ll probably be early, he told himself. Even on short acquaintance, he imagined that was a pretty sure bet.
It was still dark after he and Sam ate their twin bowls of cold cereal, mainly in a groggy silence, and left the cabin. Adam again used the flashlight to help him find his way, and they arrived at the office a few minutes before five. As he’d expected, Jane Pitt was already there. What he didn’t expect, however, was the smell of freshly brewed coffee that had his mouth watering from the moment his nose caught a whiff.
Jane sat behind the desk with a thick stoneware mug in hand, wearing a blue and white checked shirt and a frayed navy baseball cap that might have been older than she was. “I see you’re right on time.” She was chipper.
Way too chipper, as far as Adam was concerned. “Actually, we’re a little early,” it pleased him to reply, although he couldn’t match her tone. He doubted many people could at a godforsaken hour of the morning when even the birds weren’t up yet. Standing next to him, small hands shoved into the pockets of his new jeans, Sam only yawned a wide yawn that said he for one remained far from awake, never mind alert.
Jane gave the boy a small, knowing smile, then lifted her mug. “Want another dose of caffeine before we get started?” she asked Adam.
“Sure,” he said. He didn’t mention it would be his first of the day—or that a part of him less determined to let pride rule was urging him to get down on his knees in sheer thankfulness. Instead, he wasted no time in heading for the coffeemaker. He picked up another of the heavy mugs stacked beside it and poured himself a hefty helping of dark, fragrant brew. A few sips had his eyes no longer in danger of drooping.
“This is good,” he told Jane.
She met his gaze over the rim of her mug. “I can make coffee.”
“Mmm-hmm.” He had to admit that it tasted like some of the best he’d ever had.
“I pulled out some fishing poles and other equipment for you and Sam,” she added with a nod toward one side of the room.
He looked in the direction she’d indicated and saw two metal poles, one half the size of the other, leaning against the wall. A dented, dull green tackle box and a small white net he assumed was used to scoop up a fish once it was hooked rested on the floor nearby. Memories of the few times he’d headed for the large lagoon at Harmony Park as a young boy with a simple bamboo pole and the hope of catching something came back to him. He’d never had much success and had soon lost interest. If anyone had predicted only weeks earlier that he’d be making another attempt this summer, he’d have questioned their sanity.
He returned his gaze to Jane. “Are you fishing, too?”
She shook her head and rose to her feet. “I’ll be a guide today. We’d better get started. The sun should be on its way up any minute.”
After polishing off his coffee, Adam crossed the room, picked up the poles and handed the shorter one to Sam, who inspected it with clear misgivings.
“What do we put on the hook?” he asked Jane.
“We’ll start out with worms and see how it goes.”
Sam frowned. “Do we hafta dig ’em up?”
“Not today.” Jane shut off the coffeemaker. “I’ve got some in the refrigerator.”
Sam’s eyes flew to meet Adam’s. “Is she kidding?” he asked in a whisper as Jane started for the outer room.
“Trust me, she’s not,” Adam murmured in return. He bent to retrieve the net and passed it to Sam. “You take this. I’ll take the tackle box. And I suppose she’ll take the worms,” he added with a large dose of irony.
A FIRST FEW faint rays of light visible to the east guided their way down the path toward the lake. Jane had put several cans of soda and the coffee can holding the worms into an older, far smaller cooler than the one the Lassiters had brought with them. Swinging it by its short handle, she took the lead and held her head high.
The day was off to as good a start as could be expected, she decided. Nothing in her expression or her voice had betrayed anything of what she’d felt during that handshake the evening before. Thinking back over the past several minutes, she was sure of it. And that was the most important thing. While her consultant might look even more appealing in a dangerously male sort of fashion with a night’s growth of dark beard, he had no idea she thought so—and she planned to keep it that way.
Once they reached Quail Lake, Jane set the cooler down on the grassy shore a few feet from the water. “We need to try some casting before we take out a boat,” she said.
“Casting?” Sam repeated with a puzzled look.
That she’d have to start from scratch came as little surprise. “That’s what it’s called when you throw your fishing line into the water and reel it in—hopefully with a good-sized trout on the other end.” Jane reached up and tugged down the bill of her ball cap. “I won’t deny that a bit of luck doesn’t hurt when it comes to catching anything, but it helps—a lot—to know what you’re doing.”
Which they didn’t. That became as clear as glass when father and son attempted a trial cast after a few initial instructions. Sam’s hook plopped into the water scarce inches from the bank. Adam’s never made it that far. Instead, his fishing line wound up wrapped around the branch of a tall tree a few feet behind him.
Jane ignored what might have been a muttered oath too low to be distinct. “Good backward action,” she said dryly to the man at her side. “But you’re not supposed to let the line go until you snap your wrist to start your forward motion.”
He frowned up at the tree. “So you told me.”
She swallowed the urge to chuckle. “Just a reminder.”
“Point taken,” he replied after a beat. “Now, how the hell—” He glanced at his son. “How the heck do I get it out of there?”
She took the long pole from him and gave it a practiced jerk that freed the line, then handed it back to him. A rueful grimace on his part wouldn’t have surprised her. Truth be told, she would have enjoyed seeing one cross his face.
Instead, he was staring over her shoulder with an expression far more engrossed than rueful. Following his gaze, she discovered what had captured his attention. The newly dawning sun was just skirting the top of the low mountain that rose to a gentle peak on one side of the lake.
For the next few minutes, she divided her attention between that familiar sight and her companions. She quickly saw that Adam wasn’t the only one who found the sunrise fascinating. For the first time that morning, Sam’s eyes were fully open as he stood stock-still and studied the tips of the trees being lit with a hazy glow.
In that moment, Jane felt surprisingly close to her guests—mostly, she supposed, because viewing that sunrise with wonder was a feeling she could understand, and share. Then the spell was broken as a fish jumped in the water and landed with a soft splash.
“Was that a trout?” Sam asked, eyes still wide.
“Probably,” Jane replied. “There are some bass in the lake, but more trout, for sure. And right now most of them are looking for breakfast. Once we get out on the lake, we’ll see if we can tempt a keeper to sample one of our worms.”
“A keeper?” Again Sam’s expression was puzzled.
“A fish that’s big enough to keep. If they’re returned to the water quickly enough, they usually swim off, no worse for the experience.”
“They probably just get smarter about taking a hook the next time around,” Adam ventured with a shrewd glint in his gaze.
“I’d say you’re right,” Jane allowed. She looked at Sam. “There’s one fat trout living in Quail Lake—Clever Clyde, we call him—who’s been outsmarting fishermen for quite a while. That’s what makes catching bigger fish a challenge.”
Soon both her guests were casting with better results—especially Adam. Watching how with each attempt his long arm and strong wrist sent the line snapping forward to fly on a straighter and farther path before it met the lake, she couldn’t deny he was a fast learner.
“I think I’ve got the hang of it,” he said with undeniable satisfaction.
Jane didn’t disagree, but she knew there was more to landing a fish than casting a line. A lot more. “Since you seem to be confident enough—” not to mention just a bit smug, she thought, “—I’ll concentrate on helping Sam once we take the boat out.”
He met her gaze. His swiftly narrowed, as if he’d caught the trace of a dare to go it alone in her matter-of-fact statement. “That’s fine with me.”
Realizing her words had indeed been a dare, one she hadn’t been able to resist, she said, “Great.” She bent to pick up the cooler resting on the bank. “First lesson when we get out on the lake is how to bait a hook,” she told Sam.
“Okay,” he agreed, sounding at least a bit more enthusiastic. After retrieving the net he’d been carrying, he fell into step beside her as they walked down the old wooden dock. “Why do fish want to eat so early?” he asked with the barest hint of a grumble.
“Beats me,” she replied. “They just do.”
“Are we gonna take a boat with a motor?”
She mulled that over for a moment, weighing the merits of using one of the ancient outboard motors against putting a pair of oars to good use. “The motors are pretty noisy and we’re not going all the way across the lake, so I guess I’ll row us out.”
“I can row,” a low voice said from behind her.
Jane aimed a glance back at Adam. “It takes some practice. Otherwise, you can wind up going around in circles.”
“I was on a rowing team in college,” he said, looking pleased to relay that information. “I can row—and not in circles.”
“He knows how to do everything good,” Sam murmured, just loud enough for Jane to make out. There was no resentment in those words, only what might have been a young boy’s yearning to measure up to the successful man who had fathered him.
She thought about simply pretending she hadn’t heard, and found she couldn’t. “He doesn’t know everything he needs to when it comes to fishing,” she murmured back. “If you stick with it and don’t give up, I’ll teach you as much as I can today.”
Sam said nothing, but the set of his jaw was enough. He appeared determined to hang in there.
And now it was her turn, Jane realized, to make good on her word. Fortunately, past experience made her confident enough in her abilities to deem her promise achievable. Too bad she was nowhere near as confident about being able to deal with the fact that three in a small boat would put her and her consultant in close contact. Maybe too close for comfort.
In a matter of minutes Adam took up the oars with practiced ease and whistled softly as he launched the weathered rowboat toward the middle of the lake with firm, sure strokes.
Okay, he could row, Jane had to admit. But she also had to wonder whether he’d be whistling so merry a tune on the way back.
“JUST GET THE damn—danged—hook out of my collar, will you?” Adam groused when the sun was well on its way to its noonday position high overhead. “I could do without having a slimy worm wiggling like crazy at the back of my neck.”
Jane leaned in to inspect the problem, something she would have been glad to avoid since it put her in even closer proximity to the man she’d been doing her best to pay little attention to. It didn’t help, not one bit, that for a startled moment she found her chest plastered to his back as the breeze ruffling the water suddenly picked up and rocked the boat under them.
She quickly tugged herself away. “I’ll try to take care of it if you’ll wait a double-darn minute for me to get the pliers from the tackle box,” she huffed before dredging up a more patient tone. “I know it can’t be all that comfortable, but I doubt the worm is having any more fun than you are.”
That Adam had unwittingly stood up to stretch his legs just as she’d whipped Sam’s short pole around to demonstrate how to drop a line into a shady spot was no one’s fault. Reminding herself of that, she refused to feel guilty about catching the back of his collar with the sharp point of the hook.
“How come you said ‘double darn’?” Sam asked as he joined her to peer into the dented metal box. “I never heard anybody say that before.”
Jane reached in and retrieved the small pliers. “Sometimes one darn isn’t enough,” she explained. She didn’t add that despite both her father and great-aunt having been known to swear like sailors, sometimes at each other, neither had ever accepted such language from a growing girl, and by the time that girl had become a woman, the habit of choosing alternatives had set in.
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