Upon hearing this, Amy admitted to feeling somewhat relieved. The whole thing was innocent after all. Ryan wasn’t an intruder. He must have seen the water in the hall and come inside to check if everything was all right, just as she had suspected. Of course, she now felt a little bit embarrassed for reacting the way she had, hurling obscenities at him when it was obvious he was only trying to help. Still, what else was she supposed to have done? She’d awoken to find some strange guy standing in her bathroom! It sounded like he understood where she was coming from, though, and she had to admit she was pleased he hadn’t gone into any specifics with the bartender. The last thing Amy wanted to do was contrive an explanation for how she had flooded the room, let alone be unmasked as the guest responsible for cleaning out the entire upstairs laundry cupboard.

“He meant it all, he really did,” the bartender continued. “He made me promise to pass it on. Thank goodness I remembered. Oh, wait, there was one more thing.”

“Yes?”

“He wanted me to say that he hopes you’re okay.”

“That’s kind of him,” Amy said, a faint smile beginning to show on her face.

“If you want to reach him,” the bartender said, picking up on Amy’s favorable expression, “I can tell you how.”

“What? Oh, no, that’s okay.”

“You sure about that?”

“Next time you see him, tell him no harm done. All’s forgiven.”

Grinning to herself, the bartender leaned over the concierge desk and grabbed a flyer from the brochure stand. She thrust it into Amy’s hands, cleared her throat, and pointed to a photo of a young man standing outside a barn. “That’s how you can find him, just so you know.”

Amy couldn’t resist taking a quick look at the flyer. In the photo, Ryan was standing beside a horse, one hand holding the reins, the other shoved in his pocket. Broad shouldered and tall, he was wearing a blue-and-white plaid shirt, jeans, and an old-fashioned cowboy hat, the brim of which cast shade over his eyes, though not enough to hide his smile. As Amy studied the picture, she reflected on how different he looked from last night; she wasn’t sure she would have known it was him had the bartender not pointed him out. Below the image, in yellow writing over a blue background, was a message that said Horseback Riding, followed by a description of services and activities, then an address and phone number. Amy smiled and tried to hand the flyer back.

“Thanks, but I don’t need this. Like I said, it was just a misunderstanding.”

“Sounds to me like a little more than that.”

“It wasn’t, really,” Amy insisted.