Page 11 of Load Bearing
Trixie squinted at him, trying to decide if it was a cop out, a weird suck-up, or just a coincidence. The waitress topped off his coffee and left with a chatty observation about the weather.
“So why did you really come to Alaska?” Trixie wanted to know.
“My family owns Grizzly Protection Services. We bought out Snafu River Security and sent my kid brother, Orson, to run the place. He found it capably managed by Alex Vex and is now answering phones for her. I came up to make sure he hadn’t been led around by his libido and fix any mistakes he’d made.”
“Had he? Been led around by his libido?”
“No, he’d met his soulmate.”
Trixie held her breath. Hunter didn’t say it like he thought it was a joke or an exaggeration. He said it like he believed it, and he was looking intensely atherwhile he said it.
Not that he looked particularly smitten. Trixie wasn’t sure the man had an expression beyond scowl. Was he attracted to her andmadabout it?
Trixie honestly wasn’t sure what to make of him. “So, did the two of you grow up in Colorado?” she asked, instead of following that particular line of thought.
The waitress brought their drinks, and Hunter only grunted. Trixie suspected that she was not going to draw childhood stories out of him easily. “I grew up in the Bush,” she offered. “Out in the wilderness off the road system. Went to a few years of college in Minnesota, but came back and went into trade school instead of finishing.”
She waited for Hunter to ask what she’d studied, and when he didn’t, she volunteered, “I was studying economics. Thought I could solve the world’s financial problems when I was young and naive. But you can’t fix greedy people, so I thought maybe I could change the world by building useful things. And here I am, making impractical houses for people with more money than morals.”
Trixie had hoped that opening herself up would invite Hunter to do the same, but he didn’t offer any help. “Did you go to college?” she prodded. “I usually get a resume with that kind of information to start from at least. I’m kind of at a disadvantage here.”
“Degree in business. U of M.”
He didn’t even bother to tell her which M it was. Montana? Missouri? Maine?
“And your family owns a string of security companies, I guess?”
“Yup.”
“Oh, there’s our food.”
Still unsettled by Hunter’s unexpectedsoulmaterevelation, Trixie was delighted to have food to distract her.
Hunter ate his salad and burger with the same grace and precision that Trixie had come to expect from him on the job site, and she watched him curiously, not sure how he managed not to get food in his beard. In her experience, that was the major inconvenience to a face mop.
Once they had settled into the point of the meal where conversation was possible again, Trixie asked, “Is there anything I can do to help your investigation?”
“I’ve got some ideas,” Hunter grunted. “But first, who might want the project to fail?”
“You don’t honestly think it’s anything more than casual theft and vandalism, do you?” The idea surprised Trixie. “I mean, there are a lot of people who might target this guy; his ex for one. He’s not popular in the area, and there’s been some negative gossip about him. You don’t move into a relatively poor rural area and build a mansion without getting some sour press. Hiring locals for my crew helped, but he’s also got an environmental group all up at arms. You probably saw the signs.”
“Does the house threaten salmon streams?”
He’d seen the signs. “Not even close. There’s a seasonal draw that we rerouted that a few loudmouths are screaming about, but we’re filed with all the appropriate agencies. They aren’t navigable waters or wetlands. It’s just peoplelookingfor things to be outraged about.”
9
HUNTER
The food at Fast Eddy’s was better than Hunter had expected from the aged facade.
The company was even better.
He knew that he wasn’t doing a great job of keeping his end of the conversation up, still wrestling between his instinct that Trixie was the woman he’d been waiting for and his long-time certainty that he was better off without any kind of relationship to weigh him down. Trixie did the lion’s share of the exchange, and supplied him with all the answers he could want.
He loved watching her eat. She was so expressive, and she didn’t care who knew that she was enjoying her food.
When their hands met at the ketchup, she startled back and blushed, adorably uncertain before she picked the conversation again.
