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I feel my cheeks flush. “Uh, okay?” Because I’m a terrible liar who clearly needs to pray? I’ve been in the Trading Post a few times and on one trip, she asked me how my mother liked the coffee table. I balked at admitting the truth and instead told her that I hadn’t realized how expensive it would be to ship so I’ve kept it for myself.
She chuckles. “I’m nosy. I asked Toby what you were doin’ with all these old things you keep buyin’ from me. He said you use ’em around your house. You know, turning them into somethin’ else. He said you were really good at that sort of thing.” She shrugs. “Anyway, it’s a solid piece. Worn to hell and needin’ some cleanup, but I thought you might have an idea for somethin’ like that.”
I’ve seen church pews repurposed before, as benches, and I have to agree—there’s definite potential. “Thank you, for thinking about me.” And I genuinely mean it. “Maybe I can come by tomorrow and take a look at it?”
She offers me a toothy grin. Something tells me she enjoys finding treasures for people.
“Okay, everyone!” Muriel shifts her chair over to make room for me and then claps her hands. “Let’s get started. We’ve got a lot to cover tonight.”
I steal a glance around the table to catch the mixed expressions as everyone takes their seats—everything from eager smiles to a grim stare from the older gentleman. That could be his face, or it could be a reaction to the task ahead.
Or it could be Muriel’s abrasive, domineering manner. Toby said his mother feels a certain ownership over Trapper’s Crossing, that she has her fingers in every pot when it comes to how the town runs. She’s an elected official on the board—and reelected many times over—so people must respect her passion and fortitude.
But I wonder what all the other residents really think of her.
Muriel clears her throat. “First things first. Everyone, this is Calla. She’s new to the community.” Eleven sets of eyes land on me, and my cheeks burn with the attention. I do recognize some of the ladies from the Ale House, I realize. “Let’s do a quick round-table intro. Calla, this is John. He manages the overall budget. Gloria runs the volunteer schedule, you’ve already met Candace …” She goes around the table, introducing each person.
“Now that that’s sorted, how about we start with last month’s follow-ups. John, you were going to provide a sponsorship budget update and crunch some numbers so we could figure out how to make the fireworks show bigger …”
Muriel steers the meeting, rifling through last month’s minutes, each member giving their own updates while a small, mousy woman named Ivy takes notes. It reminds me of my corporate days, sitting around a table in a conference room, discussing projects and plans.
I listen quietly for the next sixty minutes as they talk, struggling to quell my simmering annoyance with Muriel for so swiftly dismissing my suggestion to h
elp with the marketing. Sure, this carnival sounds as hokey as I was suspecting it might be—from the pancake breakfast right down to the karaoke competition—but so far, the only marketing that’s been discussed is Emily’s thrilling, hand-drawn poster and a quarter-page advertisement in the local newspaper a month before the event.
I’m trying to come up with a plan for how to broach the subject with Muriel again later when I feel a jolt in my chair, followed a moment later by a shake that grows more intense by the second. Muriel’s voice drifts midsentence, and everyone moves at once, shifting out of their chairs to dive under the tables.
“Come on!” she beckons me, easing her stout body to the floor. I follow her, dumbstruck, and soon, the group of us are huddled beneath the bank of tables, John’s wary gaze on the ceiling tiles above us.
The shaking subsides about fifteen seconds later to a chorus of nervous laughter, before people slowly crawl out.
“That one was close,” someone says.
“I guess we better go and find out what kind of damage that caused.” Muriel wipes her hands over her jeans as if dusting dirt off them. “What do ya think? Five point six?”
“Four point three.” John nods to the clock on the wall. “It’s barely crooked.”
“Wager the first catch of the season?”
His jowls lift with the first smile I’ve seen from him as he offers his hand, and they shake on it. “Let’s hope you catch another thirty-pounder.”
They’re betting on the magnitude of the earthquake that just shook the ground like we’re at a race track on a casual Sunday afternoon.
I stare at them, trying to make sense of their cavalier attitude. There’s one explanation I can think of. “Are earthquakes normal around here?” I ask.
Chuckles and sympathetic looks answer me.
* * *
I stir as the mattress sinks beneath Jonah’s weight. Moments later, his hot, naked body is molding itself against my back. His lips graze my neck, and his hand slips into the front of my panties.
“The ring of fire,” I mumble, letting my eyes adjust to the faint glow of the bedside lamp he turned on.
“What?” Humor laces his tone as one talented finger slips inside me to caress my core.
I roll over to face him, checking the clock on his nightstand. It’s almost one a.m. “Why didn’t you tell me that we live in the ring of fire?” That’s what the horseshoe-shaped line of volcanos in the Pacific Ocean is called. “And that Alaska has 11 percent of the world’s earthquakes and that there are on average 10,000 measured earthquakes each year, and we literally live on a fault line?” I spent hours watching the news and then reading articles about Alaska’s history with this natural disaster.
Jonah sighs, removes his hand, and flops onto his back, whatever moment he was trying to stir effectively doused. “Is there a way to block you from accessing Wikipedia?”
