by Pamela Toth
Blocking the memory of how clever those hands could be, how devastatingly intimate, Emma forced her attention to stay on his face. It, too, brought back painful memories of all the expressions she’d seen there when his privacy screen was lowered.
Desperately she focused on his question. “Believe me, I’ve been to those kinds of appointments with the boss. My radar can pick up the vibes.”
“I’d forgotten about your recent layoff,” he said with a frown. “It’s never pleasant from this side of the desk, either.”
“So you’ve had to fire employees before?” she asked curiously. He cared about people, so that must have bothered him.
“Of course. As the director, it’s my responsibility.” He spread his hands wide. “Did you really think I’d turn you out and expect you to thumb it home, just because of what happened?”
She shrugged, pressing down the bubble of annoyance at the way he dismissed the experience. Just a blip, no big deal. “Why did you want to see me?”
He leaned forward, his gaze intense. “I need to ask you a favor.”
Other than a declaration of love, it was probably the last thing Emma would have expected him to say.
“A favor, from me?” she echoed, caught totally off guard by his request. Was it possible that he was no longer angry at her, that he might actually be willing to listen?
“Sit down, won’t you?” His face was set in stone, impossible to read.
He’d be one hell of a poker player, she thought ruefully as she flopped into the chair. She was glad she’d taken the time to clean herself up. After their hike back from the lake, she had showered, shampooed her hair and changed into fresh clothes.
Morgan’s jaw was freshly shaved, his hair still damp, and he was wearing a striped shirt. If he had deliberately set out to erase the image of her impetuous lover, he’d done an outstanding job.
“I know that I made some bad choices.” She swallowed hard past the lump threatening to block her throat. “You have to believe that I changed my mind before we—” She dropped her gaze to her tightly clenched hands. “What happened between us wasn’t part of some grand scheme to manipulate you, I swear.”
“We have four more days to get through before the end of the session,” he continued, as though she hadn’t spoken. “We got along fine before we went to Johnson Lake. If we act like something is wrong now, the rest of the staff is going to start speculating about what really happened up there.”
He jerked his head in the general direction of the path to the Alpine meadow. “I like to think that this program that we put on every summer actually does some good. You may not have realized it, but we depend largely on private donations to keep the program going.”
“I know that.” Emma wanted to duck her head, but she kept her gaze on his blue eyes instead.
“Some of the people who give us money have a pretty conservative view of right and wrong,” he continued, tapping his finger on the scarred surface of the old desk, so different from the one in his office at the agency. “I don’t think they’d be the least bit entertained by gossip about the camp director and a staff member disappearing overnight so they could roll around together in the woods. Do you think so?”
Nausea slid around in Emma’s stomach like cooling grease. She hadn’t thought through all the repercussions and whom they might affect. She hadn’t thought at all.
“Do you want me to leave?” She hated the idea of running away from the situation like a coward. “I suppose I could plead a family emergency or something. That shouldn’t raise any suspicions.”
If she could hitch a ride to Sisters, perhaps there was a bus she could take back to Portland.
Morgan was already shaking his head before she was done forcing out the words.
“That won’t work,” he said. “Jeff has already made a couple of his joking comments about your fake injury and our real reason for going off alone together. He was just razzing me, of course, but your sudden disappearance would only add fuel to the fire.”
Deep down inside, Emma had hoped that her offer to leave would spur Morgan into admitting that he didn’t want her to go. Instead he had just made it clear as crystal that his sole reason for keeping her around was to prevent any threats to the camping program.
Emma struggled against the selfish disappointment that tightened around her throat like a steel band, making it difficult for her to reply. She longed to reach out and touch his hand, to see for herself if he was as cold as he appeared or warm, the way she remembered.
How could he think of the intimate connection they had shared as just a nasty little tidbit for gossip? His entire demeanor seemed so unapproachable as he sat across from her that she didn’t quite dare open herself up to more rejection.
“So what do you want me to do?” she asked, making her tone as devoid of emotion as his had been.
He put his elbows on the desk as he leaned forward. “I don’t think either of us has a choice. Try to act the same way toward me as you did before we took that damned hike. Just dial it back a bit, so no one thinks we’re actually flirting. Think you can do that?”
Her face went hot with embarrassment. Her subtle approach had made her a laughingstock.
“Okay. I’ll try to control myself.”
A muscle jumped in his cheek. “Pretend we’re still friends.”
She wanted to say something sassy, like “I’m not that good an actor,” just to shove some of the mortification she was experiencing back onto him. Instead she locked her hands together in her lap and tried once again to get through to him.
“I’ve seen how much the kids love coming here, and how good it is for them to feel special, even if it’s only for a few weeks,” she insisted. “The last thing I would ever want would be to cause problems for your program.”
She wished desperately that her sincerity would pierce his armor of icy indifference. She’d seen it earlier—that he felt a connection deeper than mere lust. She knew it!
His face remained immobile, his gaze flat.
“You may not think much of me,” she added, her eyes filling with tears that she refused to let fall, “but I’m good at my job. I can talk to kids and I care about them.”
“No one’s saying that you aren’t,” he replied, sounding weary. “It’s your morals I find troubling.”
She felt as though she’d been slapped.
His chair squeaked as he shifted restlessly. “What’s your answer?” he demanded.
“I’ll do whatever you want.” She conceded defeat. “I can pretend that we’re friends.”
Two long days later Morgan was making a pretense of checking that the boats down at the dock were properly secured. He desperately needed the few moments to himself where his only company was a family of ducks swimming among the cattails.
The strain of pretending a casual friendship with Emma along with the nights spent tossing and turning because he couldn’t stop thinking about the feel of her wrapped in his arms were taking a toll. More than once since their return to semicivilization, he’d barely stopped himself from tearing someone’s head off when a joking remark was made.
One of the older boys got a laugh at the campfire when he walked behind Emma with an exaggerated limp. The rush of anger Morgan felt at the boy’s clowning was a dismaying surprise.
Normally he handled pressure well. But lately it had been coming in droves. A possible huge threat to the agency’s reputation had been eating at him since before he came to the mountains. Children’s Connection worked with an orphanage in Russia to place babies with American families. An attempt had been made very recently to abduct one of those babies right from the adoptive parents’ hotel room.
Morgan had learned of a possibility that the unsuccessful kidnapping attempt had been the work of an organized ring. If the news were to leak out, the resulting publicity could damage the agency’s reputation and jeopardize the financial support by its wealthy patrons.
As if that wasn’t weighing heavily enou
gh on his mind, he now had the incident with Emma to deal with. He worked with Heidi, a caseworker, at Children’s Connection, while two other counselors, Derrick and Jeff, worked at the hospital next door. Normally Morgan trusted their discretion completely, but he was also well aware of the overactive employee grapevine winding through the complex.
Perhaps Morgan was being entirely too paranoid, he realized as he stepped onto one of the boats. It rocked back and forth, sending ripples out over the calm water.
He had worked damn hard to build up the agency’s spotless reputation and he didn’t intend for a thoughtless remark or a bit of juicy gossip to alter that. His facial muscles ached from smiling whenever both he and Emma were around anyone else. She, too, appeared to be making the effort.
Was Morgan the only one able to read her face well enough to see the strain at the edges of her smile, the shadows in her eyes? How unfortunate for them both that they hadn’t decided to loathe each other before the hike.
How he wished, as he inspected the oarlocks, that he could wipe from his memory bank the intimacy they had shared. How long would it take to forget her scent and taste, her touch and the feel of her slick, moist skin sliding against his?
He straightened, listening to the gentle lap of water against the old wood pilings. Thinking about her, despite the way she had used him, still made him as hard as the anchor in the nearest boat. He had dated a fair share of women, come close to marriage once or twice, and wouldn’t have called himself naive, but Emma’s eagerness to spend time with him, her soft purr in his ear and her eager kisses had fooled him completely. Had blinded him to reason and shattered his common sense like a Chihuly glass sculpture.
What Morgan needed was a return to real life where he wouldn’t be constantly reminded of one night spent at the edge of the forest near a mountain lake—with a woman who had made him think, for a few hours, that he had discovered a treasure.
No, what he needed, he thought grimly as he climbed back onto the dock, was a vacation from his vacation. He allowed himself one last look at the peaceful scene laid out before him with the beauty and serenity of a postcard. Giving the nearest boat an impatient push with his foot, he resisted the urge to wrap the anchor around his fool neck and jump.
When Emma finally, finally got home, walking through the front door of her apartment, relief swelled over her like a welcoming wave.
“Hi, baby,” Emma cooed, dropping her purse and suitcase as Posy stalked disdainfully in her general direction. Emma knew from experience that the cat would eventually forgive her.
Closing the gap between them, Emma crouched down to stroke the soft cream-colored fur. After a few more moments of feigned disdain, Posy relented. She arched her back and began to purr.
“That’s a girl,” Emma murmured. “Sorry I was gone for so long, but I know Ivy was good to you.”
Finally Posy’s manner thawed completely. She butted Emma’s hand with her head as her rumble of pleasure grew louder.
When Emma straightened back up and walked over to the table to sort through her mail, the cat tagged at her heels, meowing repeatedly.
Ivy had left a note next to the stack of bills. “Call me” was all it said.
Emma wasn’t yet ready to admit to Ivy that her dire predictions had been right. Not only had Emma failed big-time in learning anything more about her birth parents, but she’d fallen hard for Morgan, just as her know-it-all friend had predicted.
Emma planned to call and thank her just as soon as she unpacked and started a load of laundry. Or maybe she would wait until after she wrote up a shopping list and went to the store.
Meanwhile, Emma glanced over at the answering machine on the kitchen counter. There were several messages, the first two from the Wrights. Even though she deleted them both without listening first, she felt a spark of reluctant warmth at their persistence. As she had recently learned, trying repeatedly in the face of rejection was damned hard.
Head bowed, Emma drummed her fingers on the worn Formica countertop. She had gotten nowhere in her apologies to Morgan, even though she spent the remainder of her time at camp trying to show her remorse.
She’d followed his request that she pretend in front of the others that there was nothing wrong between them. Every time she saw him, right up until the arrival of the bus and van this morning, she had hoped to see a hint of genuine forgiveness in his cool blue eyes.
Before their departure from Camp Baxter, he had thanked each member of the staff with a handshake or a hug. She’d been afraid that a quick squeeze of his hand was all she would get, but she should have known he would play his part till the end. When his arms closed around her for a brief moment and she pressed her cheek against his heart, it nearly killed her to let him go.
When she did, his gaze was already on Sarah, next in line.
“I’ll see you all later,” he’d said with an impersonal wave before he stepped on the bus with the kids.
As it pulled out of the parking lot with a throaty engine roar and a belch of diesel smoke, she’d had to fight back tears.
Heidi noticed, misinterpreting her reaction.
“Oh, don’t start that, girl, or I’ll cry, too,” she whispered with a sympathetic wink. “I always miss everyone so much. We try to get together at Christmas. Be sure to give me your number so I can call you.”
Heidi’s warm gesture had made Emma feel like an even bigger fraud. She doubted she would see her fellow staffers again, not if Morgan had a say. She had lost some friends after her divorce from Don, either because she was no longer part of a couple or they preferred not dealing with divided loyalties.
All of the women had hugged and cried after the van dropped them off in the employee lot for Portland General, where they’d left their cars. Dutifully, Emma had accepted the cell numbers that were thrust at her with good-luck wishes on her job search. She’d promised to stay in touch. Everyone had things to do, so the goodbyes had been mercifully brief, but she’d still felt drained when she drove away. Hands gripping the wheel, she’d stared at the street through her tears, missing them already.
Now her hand hovered over the telephone receiver. She regretted deleting those first two messages without listening to them first. The last one was a call from a temp agency where she had registered for work. Grabbing a pen, she wrote down the number.
Morgan was in the middle of a staff meeting at Children’s Connection, trying hard to remain focused with only partial success. The report that Heidi was giving was routine, the couple she had interviewed eager to adopt after repeated fertility treatments had failed.
“What’s your recommendation?” Morgan asked when she finished and no one else voiced a question.
“They’re willing to adopt a Russian orphan if one becomes available,” she replied, closing the file that was thick with papers, including a background screening, credit reports and personal references. “I see no reason not to proceed with a home visit.”
Morgan glanced at the circle of faces. They were all wondering how badly their overseas program might ultimately be affected by the threat of a baby-stealing ring.
“Go ahead with it,” he told Heidi. “We can’t cease operation based on unfounded rumors.”
Last night he’d given in to her hounding. He’d met her and Derrick at a local watering hole for beer and a pizza. The place had been crowded with people they knew from the hospital, including a smorgasbord of attractive and available single women.
He had chatted with a redheaded nurse and a long-legged X-ray tech. Neither they nor the busty blonde who sent him a drink had sparked his interest past mild appreciation of the fairer sex in general.
It had nothing to do with Emma, he insisted to himself, nor the feeling of sinking into her heat with her legs wrapped tightly around him and her soft little moans tickling his ear.
A business meeting was the last place to be mooning about great sex. Quickly he shifted his focus onto the business at hand.
“Anything else?” he asked
impatiently, pushing back his chair.
Several pairs of eyebrows rose, their owners probably irked at his tone. Just yesterday, Cora had asked him if something was wrong. She had accused him of being testy.
“I do have other work to do,” he added, “as should all of you.” He heard the sarcasm in his own voice, but couldn’t work up much remorse.
“There is one other item,” Heidi replied hesitantly. “With Sasha leaving next week, I wanted to suggest that we consider Emma Wright for her position. She’d be well qualified to screen applicants. I think she’d fit in well here.”
“Who?” asked one of the other caseworkers as Morgan bit back a snarl of immediate refusal.
“Emma worked with us at Camp Baxter,” Heidi babbled enthusiastically. “She was a school counselor until recently when she got laid off.”
Heidi’s patently innocent gaze shifted to Morgan. “What do you think, boss? Wouldn’t Emma be perfect?”
His normally sharp mind went blank. “Uh, I don’t think her experience would be a good fit,” he stammered. “She’s been working in a different field.”
His face grew hot as Heidi continued to stare with a puzzled expression. What was wrong with him, he thought. He never blushed.
“But Emma’s got a Master’s. She could learn the job,” Heidi argued.
“I can train her before I leave,” Sasha offered, oblivious to Morgan’s resistance.
“I have her number,” Heidi said. “Shall I find out if she’d be interested in filling out an application?”
Morgan felt like a steer being herded into a tight corner. “You’re a caseworker, not a headhunter,” he pointed out. “It’s not your job to round up job applicants.”
Heidi’s eyes widened and her face went pale. “Uh, I understand.” She returned his gaze with a resentful glare.
He felt bad. She didn’t deserve his annoyance.
“Is the meeting adjourned?” she asked. “I, too, have other work.”
She must give Derrick one hell of a run for his money, Morgan thought distractedly.