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I didn’t see Luka much at all after the party. Okay, I avoided him. After I told Kathy that Luka scared me, a remark that had surprised me as much as it did her, I only talked to Luka in brief little snippets about work that needed to be done.
As August rushed toward its finale, tourists jammed the Ranch until Labor Day exploded on the scene, a big weekend full of people and kids and laughter and noise. Ingrid and Ryder and the horses were fully booked every day. Day trippers dropped in for meals. The staff held up well, but I could see tiredness creeping into us all.
Then September arrived. Kids had to go back to school, and most colleges started up, so tourist visits slacked off. Ingrid and Greta were scheduled to leave the second week of the month. I would miss them. They had both surprised me. I had worried they wouldn’t last a week with their pampered backgrounds. But they had not only made it all summer, but they also had each done very well at their jobs.
Autumn always felt bittersweet. The end of summer felt like losing my best friend. Summer romances which burn so brightly with the heat have to come to an end, like Greta and Otto. Maybe like me and Luka, although you could hardly call our relationship a romance.
I welcomed autumn, when the population of Stehekin deflated, the locals breathed a sigh of relief, the weather cooled, and some semblance of peace returned to the forest.
In the afternoon, I rode with West down to the landing to pick up a few supplies while he picked up passengers from the Lady of the Lake. After I placed my groceries in the van, I stood on the dock and gazed out at the water.
In September, the lake was usually flat as glass, but not today. A wind shot the gap through the Cascades and whipped up whitecaps on the water. There would be no kayaking this morning.
I’d been processing reimbursements to tourists off and on for the last several weeks as their kayaking trips were canceled due to weather, the lake too rough and dangerous.
West joined me. “Hey, look,” he grinned, blond hair tousling in the breeze. I followed his gaze. “Luka’s surfing.”
Sure enough, Luka was in his kayak, paddling hard, head-on into the rolling waves, cresting a wave, and riding it as long as he could before sliding down the back side and plunging headlong into another wave.
West laughed out loud. “Holy cow, would you look at that? Those waves gotta be four feet high. The lake’s churning today.”
Luka plowed into the impossible waves, and to me he looked reckless, as if he were daring the lake to drown him. “What do you know about Luka?” I asked quietly. “About his past?”
“Other than his two Olympic golds and two national championships you mean?”
“Yeah.”
West went uncharacteristically quiet, gazing out at Luka. “I know he was in some kind of awful prison during the war, and engaged to be married, but she’s gone now. I’m not sure where or why. He doesn’t talk about his past.”
Luka’s fiancée gone, and no one knew what happened. I shivered as the wind penetrated my light jacket.
The Lady of the Lake appeared, a dot on the horizon, churning through the waves as it headed to the dock. I felt relief when the Lady sounded her horn and pulled into the dock. We got busy finding and loading our guests. It took my mind off what happened to Anya.
***
That evening, I returned to my room after dinner, unable to dislodge the image of Luka ramming into the waves. Haunted by the mystery of his fiancée’s disappearance. I had slept with him so eagerly, knowing nothing, really, of his past.
I began to change into pajamas when a knock sounded on the door. I buttoned my shirt back up and went out through my small living room to the door and downstairs. What HR disaster could have befallen someone at this late hour? Maybe the girls had decided to go off to college a few days early and wanted to be paid, or perhaps Sam had an emergency and needed to stop cooking for a few days so he could travel back to civilization to take care of it.
When I opened the door, Luka stood there. With his ruddy complexion and rusty hair, he looked like a Viking. I had watched a show several years before about Vikings, seafaring warriors who raided, pirated, and terrorized Europe for hundreds of years. Good Lord, where did that come from?
“Luka,” I said stupidly. “What can I do for you?”
He ducked his head as if trying very hard to look harmless.
My gut twisted into a knot.
“After the other night,” he began, “telling you about my past, about my arrest.” He stopped, eyes taking in the empty room behind me. “I’ve never shared that with anyone before, and it brought up old ghosts.”
“Like the ghost of your fiancée?” I asked, instantly horrified that those words had slipped out. He looked shocked. I might as well have slapped him.
His expression turned hard. He shook his head and studied the floor. “This was a mistake,” he mumbled, then fled down the stairs. I waited a few minutes then descended the stairs myself, went to my office door and turned the deadbolt lock. I stood there for a long time, breathing hard in the dark. When my heart stopped hammering, I returned to my apartment, closed the door, and flipped the deadbolt on that door, too.
