How to Flirt with A Naked Werewolf (5 page)

I exclaimed something like “Oof!” and looked up. It was the eyes that stunned me into silence—the same electric blue-green that had stared out at me from the woods the night before. I shook off the sleep-smeared memory and tried to smile politely.

“Mo, meet Cooper Graham. Cooper, this is my new friend, Mo,” Evie said in a bemused voice.

With a gulp, I swallowed the drool puddling in my mouth. You noticed the eyes right off the bat, wide and bottomless blue over sharp cheekbones, and a slim, long nose that had obviously been broken when he was young. His hair seemed both dark brown and black, not long enough for a ponytail but too long to keep under that faded maroon baseball cap he was wearing.

Cooper was exactly the type of guy I would have sex with
before
the first date back home. Dark, rough, athletic. Here I was faced with my own personal sexual kryptonite, and I’d abandoned my contraception.

Cooper offered me a brief view of brilliantly white teeth as he set me on my feet. He had the biggest hands I’d ever seen. I wondered how they would feel on my skin, whether his fingertips would touch if he had both hands on my hips. Whether he was that big everywhere—

I was snapped out of my subconscious ogling when Cooper looked to Evie. “Vacationing?” he asked in a husky, no-nonsense tone.

Apparently, he wasn’t bothering to address me directly.

“New blood,” Evie said wryly, shaking her head. “Mo’s renting the Meyers place. With an option to buy.”

“I’ve heard that song before,” Cooper rumbled. His smile was sharp and not terribly friendly. He pressed his lips together and exhaled. With lips quirked, he told me, “Try Evie’s apple-raisin pie. It’s a life changer.”

My eyebrows shot up as he turned and walked toward the end of the counter without another word. I noticed that while most of the diners were greeted with slaps on the back and manly jokes about work ethic or penis size, Cooper was left unscathed. It wasn’t a cold shoulder, exactly. In fact, several people acknowledged his presence with a nod. But there was a distance, a pointed lack of familiarity with the other Grundians. Except for Lynnette, who scurried over to drape her bone-thin frame beside his stool under the pretense of taking his order.

I turned to Evie. “Did I do something to offend him?”

“Oh, Cooper’s just . . . well, he’s surly as all hell, but he’s family, so I put up with him, even when no one else will. He’s a cousin on my mother’s side, so we sort of grew up together over in the Crescent Valley,” she said, shaking her head. “He’s got a thing about outsiders moving up here. Just don’t let him hear you say the words ‘commune with nature,’ or the top of his head will pop right off.”

While I’d experienced little of it so far, I’d read about the Alaskan feelings toward outsiders, a general attitude of distrust and exasperation for people who came to their home looking for the peace and fulfillment of living off the land. You could live there for twenty years and still be considered an outsider. I’d been warned by Mr. Gogan that the local postmaster, Susan Quinn, wouldn’t bother delivering my mail until I’d made it through my first winter. I’d have to pick it up at the post office myself. Susie Q, as the natives called her, was a bit of a character in a town full of them. Platinum blond by the good grace of Miss Clairol, with a countrified ’do that would put Dolly Parton to shame, she wore tight western shirts on her heavily endowed frame and drew a little beauty mark on her cheek every morning. But when it came to running the post office, she was all business, save for the fact that she kept her beloved dachshund, Oscar, in the mailroom for company.

I eyed Cooper again, trying to discern exactly where the territorial bubble he seemed to have established began. No one got within a foot of him, everyone shying around him to place orders at the counter, reach for ketchup. Again, except for Lynette, who couldn’t have communicated her eagerness to burst that bubble any more clearly if she’d been wearing a sandwich board that read, “10 Seconds from Naked!” So far, Cooper hadn’t responded to her overtures with more than a few disinterested grunts.

He was a charmer.

“If you stay past the first big snow, Cooper might actually speak to you without rolling his eyes,” Evie offered, her voice full of hope.

I muttered, “Well, woo-freaking-hoo. And you know, we had winter in Mississippi.”

Evie gave me a pitying shake of her head.

“We actually had to wear long sleeves,” I told her, but she seemed unimpressed.

“Shit fire!” I heard Buzz yell from the kitchen.

My eyes went wide, but everyone else seemed too occupied with their food to respond. Evie read my expression, smiled to herself, and rolled her eyes. “My husband, the poet.”

But then someone called in a stage whisper, as if not to disturb the customers, “Evie! I need some help back here.” A lanky Asian teenager in a stained white apron stepped around the corner, pulling a pale Buzz in his wake. Buzz’s hand was wrapped in a white dish cloth already soaked with blood. Evie’s expression changed to one of alarm.

“What happened, Pete?” she asked, concern roughening her voice. I quietly stepped around the bar and helped Pete steady Buzz. We took him back into the kitchen and sat him down on a case of canned chili beans. I gently lifted Buzz’s arm over his head so Evie could pull the cloth away. I saw enough of the wound that I thought I might have to sit down, too.

“Just a little accident,” Buzz mumbled, wincing with pain.

Poor Pete had worked himself up into a fine froth. Whether it was panic from the sight of blood or fear of losing his job, I had no idea. He babbled, “We were waiting for the fries to finish, and we got a little bored. And you know, Buzz just got these new knives, and he was bragging on them and trying to tell me that they were sharp enough to cut through a beer bottle, and I said, ‘No way.’ And he said, ‘I’ll prove it to you . . .’”

“John Matthew DuChamp, are you trying to tell me that after getting through two tours of duty unscathed, you’ve maimed yourself trying to cut a beer bottle in half?” Evie demanded.

Buzz was looking rather sheepish at the use of his full name . . . and green.

“It’s pretty bad,” Pete told her. “We need to get him to the clinic right now.”

“I’ll take him,” Evie said, whipping her apron over her head and reaching for her purse.

“It’s the middle of the lunch rush,” Buzz protested queasily. “You two can’t leave. I’ll drive myself.”

“You can barely stand,” Evie told him. “I’ll take you. Pete can handle the counter.”

“Alone?” Pete squeaked, sounding panicked. “You know what happens when you leave, Evie. Homer Perkins picks apart his food, yells that I got his order wrong, and throws stuff at me.”

“Oh, it was one time,” Evie said, patting his arm.

“It was an ax handle!”

Evie kissed Buzz’s forehead. “Fine, I’ll stay here, but Pete’s going to take you to get that looked at.”

“Well, if I take Pete with me, who’s going to cook?” Buzz asked.

Evie chewed her lip.

“Evie’s a disaster in the kitchen,” Pete explained to me, a conspiratorial note in his voice. “She started a fire boiling eggs once.”

“But Cooper said to try her pie,” I whispered. Evie was too distracted with Buzz to pay either of us any attention. “He said it was a life changer.”

“Well, being trapped on the can for a week probably would change your life,” Pete conceded. My jaw dropped, and I glared at Cooper. Well, that cinched it. He was an asshole. I was definitely going to end up sleeping with him.

From what I recalled of the menu, it was very basic all-American diner food with little embellishment. Burgers. Fries. Pancakes the size of hubcaps. Bacon. Eggs. Steak, steak, and more steak. I’d done all that and more manning the stove at the Tast-E-Grill.

“I can do it,” I told Evie. The words had left my lips before the implications of taking on such a task settled heavily in my chest. I scanned the kitchen and saw hamburger patties already shaped, veggies already chopped. There were several orders close to burning on the grill. “I worked my way through school at a drive-in. It looks like most of your prep work is already done. And I can do short-order stuff.”

Evie’s face flooded with relief. “Would you?”

Buzz was not so eager to relinquish control of his grill. “Really, Evie, I think I’ll be fine in just a—” He stood up, turned two shades paler, and little beads of sweat popped out on his forehead. He leaned heavily on Pete and said, “Yeah, I need to go to the doctor now.”

Cooper, who’d had difficulty getting around the determined Lynette to help immediately following the accident, managed to steal around the counter before Buzz slumped to the ground. He caught Buzz’s elbow and held him upright, sort of dangling by his good arm.

“You want me to go along, Evie?” he asked in his gruff baritone. “Pete won’t be able to hold Buzz down when they try to stitch him up.”

Evie chewed her lip. “Would you, Cooper?”

“Buzz is scared of needles,” Pete confided in me. “Just about loses his mind over getting shots. He threw Dr. Gordon halfway across the room when he had to get a tetanus booster.”

Cooper ignored Pete, shrugging in Evie’s general direction. “Sure. Otherwise, I’d just end up bailing Buzz out of jail later, after he tears up the clinic.”

Buzz was packed off to the clinic with another kiss and a stern look from Evie. She returned to her place behind the bar with a fresh apron and a serenity I wouldn’t have thought possible just a few minutes before.

Except for the pooled blood, the kitchen was meticulously clean. I got out the rubber gloves and disinfectant and carefully wiped down any area that might have been affected by Buzz’s accident. I washed my hands carefully and turned the heat down on the monster griddle, hoping I could save most of what Buzz had been cooking. In keeping with his haircut, Buzz also had a military eye when it came to organization and ordering. In bulk. So it was easy to find my way around the kitchen.

I eyed the waiting tickets and turned out two plates of steak and eggs and a tuna melt. The next few hours were a blur of filled plates and pleasantly popping grease. It was funny how quickly my hands recalled those summers at the grill. The sounds and smells hadn’t changed. Only now, there was a murmur of conversation, which had been contained behind car windows at the drive-in. Several customers praised their lunches and asked Evie about “that new girl behind the stove.” Occupied by constant orders, I was able to keep my head down and pretend I couldn’t hear.

Pete called to report that Buzz had severed a tendon in his finger and would have to go to the nearest hospital, 127 miles away in Dearly, for surgery. Evie took this in stride, considering, and asked me if I wouldn’t mind working through the dinner shift. They ran a brisk business for lunch, but Evie said the crowd would lull from two to four before the dinner crowd came in. The grill was scheduled to close around six, when the lunch counter became the bar. The nighttime regulars were far more interested in booze than in burgers.

By the time Ben, the night bartender, arrived to relieve me, my feet ached, my sweater was ruined by splattered grease, and I was up to my elbows in dishwater. Evie sank against the pallet of chili beans, took a bottle of iced tea out of the stock, and sighed. “I love Buzz, but honestly, what the hell do men think when they do things like this?”

I grinned, wiping down the counter. “I don’t know if thought is really part of the ‘this is going to be so cool’ planning process.”

Evie smiled and closed her eyes. They popped back open a few seconds later when the phone next to her head rang.

“Buzz?” she said, an edge creeping into her voice, as if she were finally allowing herself to absorb the panic of seeing her husband injured. I turned my back and let her have her moment. I heard the soft rush of conversation, the endearments, the threats against Buzz’s most delicate manly parts if he ever did anything like that again. I smiled to myself but focused on washing the dishes. Evie hung up the phone with a sigh.

“They’re staying in Dearly for the night. Buzz is good and looped on pain meds. The doctor told Cooper it’s going to be months before Buzz has full use of his hand.” Relief and worry were stark on her straight, even features. “He’s not going to be able to dress himself, much less cook.”

“Oh, Evie, I’m so sorry. But I’m sure Pete can handle the kitchen until Buzz is ready.”

“Pete’s a good general dogsbody. He can crack eggs and chop vegetables, though considering today, I’m thinking about taking all sharp objects away from both of them. But he can’t run the kitchen by himself,” she said, a faint line creasing between her eyebrows. “He’s not consistent. He gets flustered when there’s a rush of orders, and he’s been known to walk out of the kitchen crying.”

I shrugged. “Well, maybe if Buzz is there to direct him . . .”

“Buzz’s style of direction is why Pete has been known to walk out of the kitchen crying,” Evie told me. “Mo, do you think you might like a job here? Full-time, while Buzz is out? Maybe take over the baking?”

“But you barely know me,” I protested. “You just met me this morning.”

“And I like what I’ve seen. You don’t faint at the sight of blood. You’re willing to help out a near stranger. You’re a solid, consistent cook. And you had several opportunities to swipe tips out of the jar and you didn’t touch a cent, which is more than I can say for a few of my employees.”

I pressed my lips together and considered. Despite my plans for an idle life in Grundy, I’d had a good day. I liked being in the kitchen. I felt like a part of the room, but I wasn’t in it. I had privacy. And I liked the saloon. I liked the friendly voices, the chatter. I liked being near Evie. It felt as if I was taking a baby step into the community.

My mother had always told me that everything happens for a reason. Of course, she’d also told me that dyeing my hair and using commercial laundry detergent would mutate my chromosomes. But I’d embraced her resistance to the possibility of coincidence. Maybe I was supposed to be in Grundy. Maybe I was supposed to be sitting at the lunch counter when Buzz pulled his bone-headed Ginsu demonstration. Maybe this was my place.