Page 13 of Spark
She sighed and knew she had to tell himsomething. “All right, you win.” Shifters could always tell when someone was lying, so what could she say that would be the truth, but yet not reveal what a pathetic loser she was?
“My job kept me really busy and traveling around the countryside. So, no serious relationships and no secret fiancés stashed away. I went out whenever we were at AIMM headquarters in Pontevedra, but there was never anything serious.” She put her hands on her hips. “Happy now?”
His grin returned, and something fluttered in her chest. “Yes, as a matter of fact. Happier than you know, actually.”
She raised her brows, trying to ignore the flutter of hope that maybe he reallywasflirting with her. Because if there was one thing she’d learned over the past few years, it was that she was the Queen of Wishful Thinking and she couldn’t trust herself. “Okay, your turn. Did you and Matt actually end up moving in together after I left? Are you guys still BFFs, or did something change?”
“Nope, no change. And yeah, we’re living in Aunt Margaret’s old house on the ranch. After she married Uncle Dan, and Kayla married my dad, Grandma Elle decided not to rent the place out to guests anymore. I guess it was too much of a pain to have someone drive breakfast all the way over there in the morning. Besides, Aunt Margaret and Grandma Elle ended up building all those new vacation cabins near the river, and they hired a cook to handle feeding all the guests.”
Sophie knew it was a bad idea, but she couldn’t help herself. “And how about you? Got any girlfriends or boyfriends stashed away? Or did you sign up for ShiftMatch to find a nice sabertooth mate somewhere?”
She really hoped not.
To her relief, Chris shook his head. “Nope. No one serious. And no ShiftMatch, either, though Dad and Kayla have asked about it a couple of times.” He shuddered. “Now that Ryan’s about to head off to sixth grade, I think they’re starting to contemplate marrying me off and getting some grandkids.”
Sophie laughed at the mental image.
Chris continued, “Anyhow, Matt and I don’t do a lot during the week, since I get home from the restaurant so late, and he gets up at the buttcrack of dawn to do his chores. We do try to go out on Friday nights, especially if there’s a band playing somewhere in the area, and we've gone on a couple of road trips together to visit people in Seattle and stuff.”
Chris doesn’t have a girlfriend! And it sounds like Matt doesn’t either!Sophie tried and failed to suppress her feelings of relief…and hope.
They arrived at the hotel registration, a long, curving counter of dark wood carved with a bas-relief of forested mountains, birds, deer, and bears, and topped with a polished marble slab veined with pale gold and light gray.
There, a tall, graceful Latina in her thirties walked over to greet them. She wore a tailored forest-green suit with a Bearpaw Springs Resort badge on the suit jacket’s lapel. Her shoulder-length dark hair was woven with gold highlights.
“Hey, Ariela,” Chris greeted her. “¿Cómo estás?”
“Bien, gracias,” she responded with a brilliant smile.
Ever since high school, Chris had been able to spark that kind of reaction in every woman he met…including Sophie.
Ariela continued in English: “Glad to hear that you’re keeping up with your Spanish lessons.”
“Not as much as I probably should,” he admitted. Then, to Sophie’s pleasure, he put his arm around her shoulders. “Hey, have you met my friend Sophie, from the Grizzly Creek Ranch? She just got back from working in Todos Santos, and I bet her Spanish is better than mine.”
Alarmed, Sophie’s eyes widened. She shook her head in panicked denial. “Oh, no! I learned enough to say ‘thank you,’ order a meal, and buy a bus ticket, but I’m not conversational at all.”
That was not quite true—by the end of her internship, Sophie had gotten to the point where she could understand almost everything that people were saying to her, and could usually respond appropriately, if haltingly.
But having Chris put her on the spot to make conversation with a complete stranger made her freeze up and forget every word of Spanish she’d learned this past year.
“I totally understand. I feel that way whenever I visit Mexico—and it’s worse because everyone there looks at me and expects me to be fluent.” Ariela’s smile never faltered. “Pleased to meet you, Sophie. I’m Ariela Ornelas, and I’m the Front-of-House Manager here at the lodge.”
She extended an elegantly manicured hand. Several thin gold bracelets looped around her slender wrist, and she wore a diamond engagement ring paired with a wedding ring on her other hand.
“Hi, I’m Sophie Markidis,” Sophie said, forcing down her usual shyness as she shook hands with Ariela. She couldn’t afford to be shy if she was going to be interviewing the hotel’s staff about the ghost. “Pleased to meet you.”
“Hey, is Esperanza around?” Chris asked. “Do you think she might have a minute to talk to us?”
“Why? Is there a problem?” Ariela’s smile faded, and was replaced by a concerned look.
Chris shook his head. “Nah, not really. Sophie’s working on a story about the resort, and we were hoping to interview Esperanza.”
“Oh, I see. It’s my aunt’s day off,” Ariela explained. “But perhaps I could help you. What do you need to know?”
Chris turned and gave Sophie an encouraging look.
“Well, um, I’m a summer intern atMythtrust News,” Sophie began, her stomach fluttering. “And I was at the restaurant last night when Javier, um, collapsed.”
