Chapter 20

Part 2: Like Bunnies

"Are you sure you don't want company up at the cabin?"

Ostara Holiday looked up from her desk at her sister Summer's concerned expression.

"No," Star said, shaking her head with a fond smile for her older sister's mother-hen tendencies. "I really, really just need some time to myself."

"But Saturday is your birthday. You shouldn't be alone on your birthday. A girl only turns thirty once."

Star shuddered. "Don't remind me, please." She didn't know why she dreaded the big three-oh quite so much, but she did.

"Infant," Summer scoffed from her own point of view at the advanced age of not-quite thirty-two. Her sky-blue eyes studied Star carefully. "If you're sure you'll be okay, honey, I'll back off. But if you need anything, promise us you'll call."

Star gave her sister a three-fingered salute. "Scouts' honor. Now let me double check those Halloween card proofs then get the hell out of here for my long weekend."

"All right." Summer was the director of marketing and sales for the Holiday Greeting Card Company while Star was the head writer for the actual card line. Star could practically see the wheels turning in Summer's dark head as she considered and discarded various strategies for dealing with Star's recent restless unhappiness. "As long as you call when you get there, I promise, none of us will bother you unless there's an absolute emergency."

"Thanks." Star lifted her cheek as her sister leaned down to kiss it. "Love you too. Now beat it."

The next afternoon was Friday, and Star was rethinking her plan to head up to her grandparents' old cabin for a long weekend of blessed isolation.

The storm that had been a light rain back in Charleston had turned into a deluge just a few hours inland, near the Sumpter National Forest.

Lightning flashed, striking the gravel road right in front of her car just as she hit a patch of slick mud. Her little compact skidded out of control, sliding inexorably into the ditch.

It hit the bottom with a jolt that took Star's breath away, followed a fraction of a second later by the added shock of an airbag deploying in her face. Ouch!

She gasped for breath and took a quick stock of all her extremities. Despite a sore nose - yeah, that was a tiny tickle of blood on the back of her hand after she wiped her upper lip - she seemed to be all in one piece. Fingers and toes worked, her vision was fine, and she was rapidly getting pissed. She should have been at the cabin by now, damn it. One stupid delay after another this morning had kept her from leaving on time, and now look what had happened.

She pressed against the airbag, deflating it enough to clear the area in front of her face, then scrabbled in the passenger seat for her purse. Pulling out her cell phone, she swore again. No signal. Of course. Didn't it just fucking figure?

Oh well. The cabin was just a mile or so up the road. She'd be soaked, but she was young and healthy - a walk in the rain wouldn't kill her. If she were still out on the main highway, she'd have been confident of someone coming by, but she'd veered off onto little-used country roads, so there was no guarantee of other vehicles anytime soon. Friday afternoon wasn't high traffic time around here.

Star snagged her nylon anorak off the seat beside her and slung her purse over her shoulder. At least she had clothes and canned food stashed at the cabin, so she could wait a while for her luggage. She could send a tow truck for her car once she got warm and dry.

Slipping and sliding with every step, she made it up out of the ditch and onto the gravel shoulder of the road. Water squished between her toes inside her canvas sneakers as she trudged toward the cabin, swearing under her breath. Finally, after what seemed like forever, she rounded the last curve and saw the cabin in the distance. Almost there, girl. You can do it.

Another bolt of lightning flashed to the ground so close she was blinded. Star felt herself falling back into the ditch, her ankle turning beneath her. As the crack of thunder boomed in her ears, echoing through her head, she lost consciousness.

"You're kidding me, Sam." Theo Morgan growled into his cell phone as he screwed the gas cap back onto his SUV and rehooked the nozzle onto the gas pump. "Star's a big girl. She's going to be pissed as hell at you sending me to check up on her." Especially me, he added silently. One thing Sam Holiday didn't know was his best friend and his youngest sister had had a hot and heavy thing going for about two months last summer. Just when they might have gotten to the point of bringing their relationship out in the open, they'd ended it - and not nicely. No, Star was not going to be pleased to see Theo showing up at her cabin door - especially since that cabin had been the site of a good number of secretive trysts.

"Come on, dude. It's only a few miles out of your way."

Shit, why had Theo mentioned to Sam he was driving up to Greenville to see his parents this weekend? But Sam was right - the Holiday family's cabin was just about ten miles off the highway, and if Star had left Charleston this morning, she really should have reached the place long before now, considering Theo hadn't left until he'd closed his clinic at five.

"Fine. I'll stop by and remind her to call you," he agreed. "Though I'm guessing this storm has the phone lines down - that's probably why she hasn't called."

"Appreciate it, pal." Some of the tension in Sam's voice eased. "Say hi to your parents for me."

The two men had been roommates in college and friends ever since, despite Sam's artistic bent and Theo's scientific one. Theo's parents practically considered Sam one of their own, just as Nick and Josie Holiday had taken Theo under their wing when he'd opened his vet practice in Charleston. As Theo headed up the road, he felt another pang of guilt for having slept with their youngest daughter. Not that she wasn't a grown-up and everything - he just hadn't felt right about sneaking around.