‘Good,’ Holly said self-righteously. ‘What made you figure you could bust in here, scare the life out of me and get away with it?’ She pointed at the door. ‘You turn around and get out of this house this minute, Nick. You got that?’
‘My head hurts.’
‘Good. Now, get out!’
‘I need a compress. And some aspirin.’
‘You need a night in a jail cell,’ Holly said coldly.
‘For what? Nobody’s going to arrest a man for using his key to open his very own door.’
‘What do you mean, your very own door?’ Holly slapped her hands on her hips. ‘Don’t tell me that realtor screwed up! I rented this cabin for four weeks of peace and quiet.’
‘You couldn’t have. This cabin isn’t—’
‘Isn’t what?’
Isn’t the realtor’s to rent, he’d almost said…but some inner voice warned him that now was not the time to tell her that, or to go into details about his ownership. Besides, there was always the faint possibility he’d screwed up, misread the date on which Brennan Resorts assumed ownership of North Mountain.
‘Isn’t what?’ she demanded again.
Nick shrugged. ‘It must be a mix-up,’ he said. ‘I, ah, I made rental arrangements, too. One of us must have gotten the date wrong.’
Holly stared at him. Nick had decided to spend time at the cabin? But why? She couldn’t think of a single reason. Nick Brennan was Brennan Resorts. He had half a dozen of the world’s classiest hotels to stay in, if he wanted to get away for a few days.
‘My company is thinking of buying property in the area,’ he said, as if he’d been reading her mind. ‘I decided to come up and take a look around. I figured I might as well arrange to spend the weekend in a place I knew rather than take my chances on some dinky motel.’
‘Oh.’ His explanation was logical, and yet it disappointed her…not that there was any reason it should have disappointed her. Nick wouldn’t be here to bury his ghosts. Why would he, when he didn’t have any? Holly smiled coolly. ‘Well, that makes sense. I mean, Mr Hotshot Brennan certainly wouldn’t want to spend his time in a place that wasn’t up to his standards, would he?’
‘Cheap shots used to be beneath you, Holly.’
‘And pretentiousness used to be beneath you.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake! What are we arguing about?’ Nick stalked across the room, then swung around and faced her. ‘Look, there’s obviously been some sort of mistake made.’
‘You can say that again!’ She bent and scooped the portable phone from the floor. ‘And you should consider yourself damn lucky. If this stupid thing worked, the sheriff would be here by now, clapping you in leg-irons.’
‘Leg-irons?’ Nick laughed. ‘You’ve been watching too many bad movies. Besides, the only guy liable to show up here this time of year is going to be riding in a sleigh pulled by eight tiny reindeer.’ His grin faded as he took a second look at the thing in her hand. ‘A phone? Dammit, Holly. You said you had a gun.’
‘What did you expect me to tell a lunatic who breaks into my home in the middle of the night? Stop, or I’ll shoot you with my portable?’ Holly tossed the telephone onto the sofa. ‘You’re lucky it wasn’t a gun, or you’d be complaining about a lot more than a teeny bump on your head.’
‘Yeah, well, you’re lucky I didn’t decide the only way to take out a guy with a gun was to beat the hell out of him.’ Nick put his hand to his head and winced. ‘And the bump isn’t teeny, it’s the size of a grapefruit.’
‘That’s a pathetic untruth.’
‘You’re right.’ Nick turned and marched away. ‘It’s really the size of a cantaloupe.’
‘Where are you going?’ Holly demanded, stalking after him.
‘To the kitchen, to get a cold compress for my lip before I bleed to death.’
‘Oh, stop being melodramatic. You’re not going to bleed to death.’
‘And to get some ice for my head.’
‘Didn’t you hear what I said before? I want you gone!’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ Nick said wearily. The long, difficult drive, the shock of the confrontation a few minutes ago—hell, the shock of finding Holly here—were all catching up to him.
He paused in the center of the kitchen. The room was dark but he could make out the hulking shapes of the stove, refrigerator and sink. If he remembered right, there was a paper towel holder just above the sink, and he headed for it. What he really needed was a shot of Scotch, assuming the bottle wasn’t shattered, but he had the feeling Holly wouldn’t appreciate waiting while he went back to the living room to find out.