The Meltdown Match (A Romance Novella) Read online

  Table of Contents

  The Meltdown Match

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About Rachael Anderson

  Other Books by Rachael Anderson

  © 2015 Rachael Anderson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form whatsoever, whether by graphic, visual, electronic, film, microfilm, tape recording, or any other means, without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief passages embodied in critical reviews and articles.

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, names, incidents, places, and dialogue are products of the author’s imagination, and are not to be construed as real. The opinions and views expressed herein belong solely to the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions or views of HEA Publishing, LLC. Permission for the use of sources, graphics, and photos is also solely the responsibility of the author.

  ISBN: 978-1-941363-11-9

  Published by HEA Publishing

  For my beautiful, talented

  and only slightly superstitious niece, Courtney.

  I love you, girl.

  The air smelled woodsy and fresh, exactly how Courtney remembered. A light breeze tickled her face as she walked. This was exactly why she loved coming home—to smell this smell and feel the wild, untamed feeling that made Heimel, Alaska the perfect place to return to for the summer.

  And only for the summer.

  An uncomfortable pit settled in Courtney’s stomach, the same way it did every time she thought of leaving again in a few months. Would she ever be able to stay?

  Hannah’s arm nudged hers as they headed down Main Street, sipping strawberry smoothies. “Glad to have you back, sis, even if it’s only for the summer.” She sucked the last of her smoothie with a slurp. “Where next? Oregon? South Dakota? What about Canada? You haven’t been out of the country yet.”

  “Who knows?” Courtney shrugged. “It all depends on the setting of my next book. Which is why I’m here—to get inspired. And to catch up with my favorite sister, of course.”

  “How nice to be an afterthought,” Hannah said dryly.

  Courtney laughed. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Hannah swished her long, ebony hair behind her shoulder and lifted her face to the sun. “If you feel so inspired here, why not move back for good?”

  It was a question Courtney had asked herself many times, but as much as she’d love to move back, she couldn’t. It would ruin everything. She sipped the last of her smoothie then tossed the empty cup in a nearby trashcan.

  Hannah would laugh and call her superstitious, but each of Courtney’s four published, and two soon-to-be published books were born in Heimel—but not until after she’d left and returned.

  The feeling of coming home was like magic, permeating her soul and leaving her rejuvenated. In only a matter of months, she could outline a story and pound out a rough draft. It was like gliding through the skies and seeing everything stretch beneath her in a large and beautiful, interconnecting pattern. But eventually, she’d inevitably find herself back on the ground, completely uninspired.

  So Courtney had developed a foolproof system to keep her writing going strong: Return to Heimel, outline and write a rough draft, and move to the place where the book was set for research and revisions. Several months later, after she’d handed over the completed manuscript to her agent, she’d return to Heimel and start the process all over again.

  Although moving around was exhausting, Courtney had lived in New York, Virginia, Texas, Colorado, Maine, and, most recently, California. She’d met different people, experienced new cultures, and had become a better writer. But every time she came home, Courtney couldn’t help but look around with a feeling of longing, wishing things could be different and she could finally stay put. What she’d once considered an adventurous life was getting old.

  With a sigh, Courtney pulled a leaf off a nearby bush and ran her fingers across the smooth, silky surface. “Maybe someday I’ll move back for good. Just not yet.”

  “I’ll believe it when I see it.” Hannah stopped to look at a banner that spanned the road in front of them and pointed. “Hey, you’re going to be here for the Solstice Days this year.”

  “So?”

  She turned to Courtney, and a slow, almost devious, smile spread across her face. “So... that means we can both enter The Meltdown Match.”

  Courtney shook her head.ann “No way. That contest screams desperation, and I’m not desperate. Neither are you. Don’t you already have a date lined up for Friday?”

  “And Saturday.” Hannah grinned. “But who cares? This isn’t about looking desperate. It’s about doing something spontaneous and having fun.” She grabbed Courtney’s arm, tugging her along, and Courtney’s gaze dropped from the banner to the empty field across the street, where a moose stood grazing—the first moose she’d seen since her return. A sign.

  Courtney smiled. Truth be known, she’d always thought of The Meltdown Match as a romantic, even magical, tradition. The so-called legend stated that on the day when the sun shined the longest, two unsuspecting hearts would be brought together in a union created by the universe. And if they later they married under the solstice sun, they were promised a lifetime of happiness.

  Or something like that.

  Every year during Heimel’s Solstice Days, on the morning of June 21, the first official day of summer and the longest day of the year, hundreds of vases made of ice, each holding a stick with the name of a man or woman between the ages of twenty-one and twenty-nine, were left to melt in the warm summer sun. The first male and female sticks to fall were then matched for a date.

  For Courtney, writer of romances with a magical twist, it sounded like a novel-worthy beginning to a wonderful love story. Who wouldn’t want to say they were matched by the greatest source of light? She’d always wanted to enter the contest and win, but one thing held her back. What if her vase didn’t melt first? What became of all the names the sun didn’t recognize as worthy of true love? She didn’t want to find out.

  Granted, only a handful of the matches had ever ended in a lasting union, but a part of her couldn’t help believe that the sun didn’t make mistakes—only people did.

  Lost in her thoughts, Courtney didn’t realize where they were headed until Hannah opened a door and pulled her inside the musty-smelling city office building. Courtney immediately planted her feet and tried to tug her hand free.

  “Are you deaf? I told you, I’m not entering the contest.”

  “Are too,” Hannah countered.

  “Are not.”

  “Too.”

  “Not.”

  “Well if it isn’t Salt and Pepper arguing in public,” said a deep voice behind Courtney. “Some things never change.”

  Courtney grinned as she turned around to meet Mitch Winter’s teasing eyes. Only a few years older and a good friend, he’d made a habit of giving Courtney a hard time over the years.

  “We hardly ever argue, especially in public,” said Courtney. “You just have bad timing.”

  Mitch chuckled as he engulfed her into one of his signature hugs, making Courtney feel warm, cozy, and more than content to stay there forever. Yet another reason she liked leaving and coming
home. Mitch only hugged her like this when she came back.

  “Welcome home,” he said.

  Courtney breathed in the clean, outdoorsy scent that always seemed to surround him. Not for the first time, she found herself wishing she were Mitch’s type—willowy, classy, and a brunette—not average and blonde, something he loved to point out with the annoying nickname he’d given her of “Salt.”

  She reluctantly pulled free and studied his handsome, mischievous face. Green eyes. Dark, curly hair that hung just over his ears. A teasing smile that often taunted her. She slugged him lightly on his arm. “What’s it going to take to get you to stop using those awful nicknames? Dying our hair?”

  “Speak for yourself,” Hannah said. “My hair rocks, and I like being called Pepper.”

  Mitch tugged on a lock of Courtney’s straight, blonde hair. “Dye it red, and I’ll start calling you cinnamon instead. But I like Salt better, so I hope you’ll leave it alone.”

  “Someday I’m going to think of an equally lousy nickname for you, and you’re going to rue the day you ever started calling me Salt.”

  “I look forward to it.” Mitch grinned and glanced at Hannah. “You home for the summer too?”

  Hannah rolled her eyes. “Always the afterthought. And yes, I am home for the summer, maybe even for good. I’m all graduated, or haven’t you heard?”

  “Already?” Mitch shook his head. “No way you’re old enough to be a college graduate.”

  “You’re just bugged because it makes you feel ancient. What are you now, thirty?”

  “Twenty-nine,” Mitch returned.

  A large smile spread across Hannah’s face as she shot her sister a meaningful glance. “Hear that, Court? Looks like Mitch can enter The Meltdown Match too.”

  He leaned against the wall and folded his arms. “No I can’t, and neither can you, if that’s what you’re here to do. Deadline was yesterday.”

  Hannah cocked her head and gave him a sultry smile as she moved closer and adjusted the collar of his navy and grey plaid shirt. “I’m sure Mr. Big-Wig City Engineer can find a way to sneak our names in.”

  “Leave me out of this,” Courtney said. “I don’t want my name anywhere near those ice vases.”

  “She’s lying,” Hannah said. “Ignore her.”

  “If I could get you in?” Mitch said. “What’s in it for me?”

  “A plate of my mother’s to-die-for-cinnamon rolls,” Hannah said. “Straight from the oven.”

  Mitch nodded as if mulling over the offer. “Consider it done.” He pushed away from the wall and pointed a finger at Hannah. “But those rolls had better be hot.”

  “They will be.”

  He moved to walk away, but Courtney stopped him with a hand on his arm. “If my name ends up on one of those sticks, there’s going to be a lot more than cinnamon in those rolls.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like, I don’t know, salt maybe? You do like it better than cinnamon, right?”

  Mitch leaned close, giving her one of his mischievous smiles. “Actually, I like salt better than a lot of things.”

  With a wink, he was gone, leaving Courtney’s heart beating like a flock of geese taking flight. He always had been a flirt and she’d always liked it.

  Mitch jogged up the stairs, feeling like his day, and possibly summer, had taken a turn for the better. Courtney was back in town and had handed him a golden opportunity.

  He rounded the corner, stepped into a small cubicle, and planted his hands on Alyssa’s desk. As the administrative secretary, she had the unlucky responsibility of being in charge of The Meltdown Match and wasn’t too happy about it.

  “Hey, Lys, I have a few more names to add to the contest.”

  She continued her typing without a glance at him. “Sorry. Deadline’s passed. They’ll have to wait until next year.”

  “But I’ll be thirty and can’t.”

  Her stubby fingers stopped typing, like Mitch knew they would. She looked up and studied him through thick, black-framed glasses. “I’m sorry, did you just say you want to enter?”

  “Sure, why not?”

  “Because last week you called The Meltdown Match an embarrassment to Heimel.”

  Mitch shrugged. “Let’s just say I’ve had a change of heart.”

  Alyssa pursed her lips as she continued to watch him. Although she only had about five years on him, the way she peered at him made him feel like he was back in elementary school, in trouble with his teacher.

  “You said a few names. Who else?”

  “Courtney and Hannah Spaulding. I ran into them downstairs.”

  The wariness in her eyes disappeared, replaced by a slight, knowing smile. “Ah. Everything just got a lot clearer. You do know we have over 100 entries, right? Your chances of getting matched with Courtney aren’t that great.”

  Mitch pushed off the desk regained his full height. “I was thinking we could increase my odds.”

  A brown eyebrow lifted. “And how are we going to do that?”

  “With salt, obviously.”

  “To you, maybe.”

  Mitch smiled, more than a little satisfied with himself. “You should have paid more attention in your chemistry classes. If you had, you’d know that salt lowers the freezing point of water.”

  Realization dawned in Alyssa’s slightly magnified eyes. “Well, aren’t you a regular Einstein.”

  “You mean Pasteur. Einstein was a physicist, not a chemist.”

  “Whatever.” Her expression turned calculating, making Mitch suddenly wary. “I’ll help you on one condition.”

  “What?”

  “I need you to take the burger-flipping shift from eleven to two tomorrow.”

  Mitch hesitated. It would be much less complicated to pick up a phone, ask Courtney out, and avoid the hassle of burger duty and frozen salt water. But there was a reason he’d always kept things at the teasing, just-friends status. Something about her intimidated the heck out of him, and he’d never been able to bring himself to say, Hey, I like you. Want to go out sometime?

  He’d much rather let the sun take the risk, and if flipping burgers for three hours is what it took to make that happen, so be it.

  “Count me in,” he said.

  The clock on Courtney’s nightstand registered 4:20 AM. She blinked sleepy eyes at it as sunlight filtered its way around the outer corners of her blackout blinds, daring her to go back to sleep and miss the dawning of a wonderful, unique day. Today, the sun would shine down from its highest annual altitude, creating the longest day of the year. For those in Heimel, sunset wouldn’t come until close to midnight.

  Courtney’s arms stretched high over head as a small smile touched her lips. She rolled out of bed and opened her blinds, allowing the sun to wash over her face for a few moments. Then she reached for her laptop and plopped down on her bed, tucking a few pillows behind her back. The air felt charged with creativity, as if inspiration waited for the perfect moment to strike.

  She stared at the blank computer screen, her mind whirring with possibilities for a new story. What about something set at a dilapidated castle surrounded by enchanted woods? Ireland, maybe? Hannah had always said Courtney should go for an international setting.

  Then again, that sounded too much like a fairytale.

  What about a story involving The Great Wall of China, or those mystical islands off the coast of Vietnam?

  Courtney’s fingers fluttered against the keys, not hard enough to make letters appear on the screen. Her expression brightened. What about New Zealand? She could write about a filmmaker who goes there to shoot a documentary about snow skiing then meets a mysterious woman who can control the weather.

  She bit her lower lip. That could work—cool setting, lots of potential for intrigue and romance. Yes, that could definitely work.

  For the next three hours, Courtney thought, typed, deleted, typed some more, and deleted some more. Something was wrong. Off. The story refused to come together the way he
r stories usually did. Was it the setting? The plot? The characters? All of the above?

  Ugh. She frowned at the sun outside. So much for inspiration.

  When the smell of bacon wafted into her room, she highlighted the remaining text, clicked delete, shoved her feet into her slippers, and headed downstairs with an attitude much less optimistic than it had been a few hours earlier.

  “Hey, Mom, something smells good.”

  Dressed in a rose-colored floral apron, with matching curlers in her hair, her mother poured pancake batter onto a skillet. “You’re up early. I figured you’d sleep in today and I’d have to keep your breakfast warm.”

  Courtney move to the stove and stirred the homemade syrup that simmered there. “I think it’s going to take a few days for my body and mind to acclimate to the early sunrise. I’ve been up since 4:30.”

  “Good grief, what have you been doing?”

  “Writing,” Courtney said. “At least trying to. I woke up feeling inspired, only to come up with a whole lot of nothing.”

  “Sorry to hear it.” Her mother flipped over a pancake. “Maybe getting out will help. You and Hannah are going to the June Solstice Days aren’t you? That might trigger something.”

  Courtney turned off the stove and moved the pan to the counter. She dipped her pinky in the syrup and licked the sweet liquid from her finger. “Let’s hope so. I promised my agent I’d have a rough draft ready by the end of the summer.”

  Her mother smiled and patted her cheek. “And you will; I’m sure of it.”

  Courtney returned the smile, feeling slightly encouraged. Her mother was right. She was in Heimel, after all, and sooner or later, something solid would come to her. It always did. She just hoped it would happen sooner than later.

  Courtney eyed the dozens of cylindrical ice vases that lined the tops of several tables—probably about one hundred in all, and not much to look at shape-wise. But the way the light sparkled off the glossy surfaces made for an impressive sight. In this central, roped-off section of the fair grounds, throngs of people milled about, watching and waiting, as if staring at the vases would somehow make them melt faster. Courtney, on the other hand, knew the vases still had hours to go and cared more about whether or not her name appeared on one of the many sticks poking out the top.