Page 16 of Last Call at the Doghouse

“That was almost a year ago,” she said. “I don’t remember…”

Brittany was back with the coffee carafe, but Duncan waved her off then placed cash on the table for their meal. Armi tried to protest. She could pay for her own eggs and grits! But he waved her off as he had the waitress, stood, and took her hand.

Her first instinct was to shake him off, but she didn’t. She stood when he tugged on her hand. She followed him, her hand still in his, out the door and to his pickup truck where he opened the passenger door for her and closed it behind her once she was situated.

They were heading down the road toward Angel Lake before he spoke again.

“Really, nothing?”

“Not that I can recall,” she said honestly. “The divorce was just final. I was at loose ends, my brain was constantly spinning. If anything had happened, I don’t know that I’d remember.” She’d awakened one morning to find that she had an alarming streak of silver in her hair, but she’d written that off to age combined with stress. She’d tried to dye that abnormal section of gray more than once, but it never “took.” One or two washings, and there was that silver streak again. Could that mean anything?

“Did you ever…” He hesitated, sounding uncertain for the first time. “Have you ever dreamed about me?”

“No!” she said vehemently. Maybe too vehemently.

He looked at her. Hard. The sun was setting straight ahead, bathing his face in warm light. “Don’t lie to me. I’ve been dreaming about you for almost a year. You nagged me, you called to me, you… you damn near pestered me to death.”

“You probably dreamed about some generic woman nagging you. It wasn’t me,” she said defensively. “It wasn’t me at all, so you shouldn’t hold anything you dreamed against me. Eyes on the road, please!”

He sighed and obeyed. “Nothing,” he grumbled. “Nothing at all…”

Armi looked out the window, taking a break from all the testosterone Mitch Duncan was oozing. She mentally thumbed through a calendar of last year. It had been a hellacious year…

“It might’ve been mid-October when I decided to leave Knoxville.”

“Might’ve been?”

“I woke up one morning and just knew I needed to start over somewhere else.”

“Just like that.”

Had that been the same morning she’d awakened with a silver streak in her hair? That couldn’t have anything to do with anything. Could it? “I had so much to do. Things to get rid of, a house to sell. Lots of stuff to take care of.”

“You’ve always wanted a bar and a crappy motel.”

“If you do your job, it won’t always be crappy,” she said defensively.

“Why Angel Lake?”

She closed her eyes, looked back, tried to remember… “I came down this way with friends. Stella and Mary both came with me. It was an impulsive girls’ trip. I didn’t go to Mystic Springs, not that time. I knew I didn’t want to live there, but I was drawn to the area. We looked around Eufaula for a couple of days. There are some great old houses around here, but nothing seemed quite right. Then we got in the car and headed down a road looking for a particular listing and…”

It had turned out to be the wrong road, she remembered now. Some internet direction app had led them astray. She’d been to Angel Lake before, many years ago, and had remembered it as being a beautiful area, so they’d kept going. They’d driven past The Doghouse and the motel behind it and had laughed about moving there.

The next morning the place had still been on her mind. Yes, she’d thought about how embarrassed Andrew would be, how furious he’d be that her generous divorce settlement had been spent in such a foolish way. It was more than that, she realized now.

“And?” Duncan prodded.

“I was led here,” she admitted.

“As was I.”

“The girls and I made another trip down this way, not long after that first, impulsive visit. I signed papers making The Doghouse and the motel mine, and since we were so close we all went to the summer solstice festival in Mystic Springs. I’ve hated that town over the years, I never felt like I belonged there, but they do know how to throw a party.”

He made a turn. The wrong one.

“Where are we going?” she asked sharply.

“My cabin. You’ll like it.”