by Linda Turner
She could have spent the entire dig just watching him, but she couldn’t, of course…not without him and most of the class noticing. So she forced herself to concentrate on her own task, but even when her back was turned to him and he was at the opposite end of the site and totally wrapped up in helping other students, on one level or another she was somehow aware of everything he did.
She’d thought she knew what it was like to be in love. She’d fallen in love with Derek when she was seventeen and had spent every waking and sleeping moment thinking of him. But this was different. That had been an innocent love that she’d naively thought would last forever. This was passion and love and a need that seemed to pull at her very soul…and all she would ever have of Max was this moment in time. She wanted to touch him, to kiss him, to disappear into the woods with him for hours at a time. Instead, she couldn’t do anything but act as if the last two nights she’d spent in his arms had never happened and she was nothing more to him than another one of his students.
Preparing meals, however, was another matter. The minute she headed for the camp kitchen area, he was always there. “What’s for lunch?” he asked Saturday as he joined her at the hand wash area.
“Actually, I thought we’d just have some subs. No, we’re not having bologna sandwiches,” she said when he started to grin, “or Pop-Tarts for breakfast. I was thinking of something a little more expensive than that.”
“Are we going to Quiznos?”
“Cute,” she retorted.
“My mother thinks so.”
She tried not to laugh and failed miserably. “You’re outrageous, do you know that? I bought deli meats and cheeses and some great hard rolls. If someone wants Quiznos, you can heat up one of the campfires and they can stick their subs on the grill. Okay?”
He lifted a masculine brow over twinkling eyes. “Are you saying you want me to light your fire?”
“Max—”
At her warning tone, he only chuckled and began helping her set out everything for lunch. Within a matter of minutes, it was time to eat. Max grabbed the dinner bell and held it out to her with a grin. “Would you like to do the honors?”
For an answer, she took the bell and rang it like a schoolmarm. “How’s that?” she asked with twinkling eyes.
“You can ring my bell anytime you like, sweetheart,” he murmured, playfully leering at her as the rest of the students came running. “Just knock on my tent.”
Laughing, she could feel the heat climbing in her cheeks and prayed that the other students wouldn’t notice. She needn’t have worried. All they cared about was eating. Shooting Max a look that promised payback, she turned away to make her own sandwich.
With her back turned, she didn’t notice that he’d moved to join her until he reached past her for a hard roll and his hip bumped hers. When her eyes flew to his, he gave her an innocent look that made her laugh all over again. What was she going to do with the man?
You can ring my bell anytime you like, sweetheart…just knock on my tent.
Long after Natalie retired to her tent after supper that night, Max’s teasing words echoed in her head. The rest of the camp was quiet—everyone had called it a night with the setting of the sun—but she was wide-awake. And it was all Max’s fault. She couldn’t forget the look in his eyes when she’d quietly wished him good-night. It was the same look he’d given her last night when she’d retreated to her own tent when everyone else had turned in. She knew Max probably thought she was being foolish—they were both adults and could certainly share a tent if they chose—but she couldn’t just blatantly walk into his tent with all of his students watching. So she’d slipped into her own tent—there were an odd number of girls, so she had a tent to herself—and waited for the camp to grow quiet.
Last night he’d come to her. Tonight it was her turn. He probably thought she didn’t have the guts. He just didn’t know.
The decision made, she waited for the camp to grow quiet, then peeked outside. A crescent moon hung low in the night sky, giving just enough light to see Max’s tent in the trees. Her heart beating like a drum in her chest, Natalie soundlessly made her way through the camp and was amazed that no one woke up. Surely someone in one of the tents had to hear the crazy beating of her heart.
But she made it to Max’s tent without mishap, only to hesitate just outside. How did you knock on a tent? Was he still awake? How would he feel if she just slipped inside and woke him up?
She was trying to decide when she thought she heard a sound inside the tent. Suddenly weak at the knees, she whispered, “Max? Is that you?”
“No, it’s the big bad wolf,” he growled softly. Pulling back the tent flap, he reached for her hand and tugged her inside. A heartbeat later she was in his arms. “I didn’t think you would come,” he rasped, and kissed her hungrily.
When he finally let her up for air, her head was swimming, her body was humming, and all she could think of was how short her time was with him. How was she going to bear to walk away from him? Fighting the need to cry, she buried her face against his neck. “I wanted to go with you the second everyone called it a night, but this isn’t easy for me,” she said quietly. “I guess I’m more old-fashioned than I thought. I just can’t be as bold as the kids are today.”
“You’re bold, sweetheart.” He chuckled as she planted a soft kiss just below his ear and set his heart tumbling into a free fall. “You just do it behind closed doors. Or maybe I should say closed tent flaps.” His chuckle turned into a groan as she slipped her hands over his bare chest, heating his skin with just the brush of her fingers. “Did I happen to mention that I like a woman who knows what she wants and goes after it?”
“Then you’re going to be a very happy man tonight,” she replied, and pulled her sweatshirt over her head. A heartbeat later, the zipper of her jeans growled softly in the darkness. Before the rest of her clothes even hit the ground, she was reaching for the waistband of the flannel pajama bottoms he slept in. He sucked in a sharp breath, and in the darkness her eyes met his and she asked, “Do you mind?”
When her fingers slid lower, taking the rest of his clothes before he could manage a single word, his low laugh changed to a strangled groan. “Not at all,” he rasped, spreading his arms wide. “I’m totally at your mercy, sweetheart. Do whatever you like.”
What she liked was kissing him until they were both breathless, caressing every hard male inch of him until he was mindless and shuddering with need. And then, when she didn’t think either one of them could stand the pleasure another second, something in him seemed to snap. Growling her name, he kissed her fiercely, desperately, wonderfully and stripped what was left of her clothes from her. Then he was rolling her under him and his hands and mouth were rushing over her.
Gasping, her heart slamming against her ribs, every nerve ending in her body attuned to him, she was the one who was at his mercy, and she loved it. With his hands alone, he brought her to one peak, and she’d hardly caught her breath before he surged into her and his kiss caught her cry of surprise. Moaning, she tried to tell herself that she had to remember this, that when she was old and gray and he’d long since disappeared from her life, she was going to remember what it was like to make love with a man she absolutely adored, but he moved with her, in her, driving her crazy from the inside out, and she couldn’t think. Her brain fogged, her senses blurred, and there was only Max. Kissing her. Loving her. Driving her over the edge, making her shatter.
What was left of the weekend passed in a blur. The lost mine was still buried somewhere in the mountains, but Max couldn’t have been more pleased with the artifacts the students had found in the dirt that had once been the Utes’ summer camp. There were dozens of bags of pottery pieces, arrowheads, cooking utensils and beadwork to take back to the university lab to be analyzed, and that was just scraping the surface. He would bring students back next semester, then have an extensive dig in the summer, and there was no telling what they would find as they dug deeper.
He didn’t have a clue how she’d done it, but she’d somehow found a way to slip past his guard and grab a place for herself in his heart. And for the first time in his adult life, he understood how his father felt when he lost his head and heart to a woman. It was wild, crazy, exhilarating…and scary as hell. The problem now was…what the devil was he going to do about it?
The question nagged him all day Sunday, but he had no ready answers. And long before he was ready to say goodbye, it was time to break everything down, pack, and head back to Eagle Creek. Everyone helped, and for the next hour, the dig site was a beehive of activity. Doing his share of the work, Max hardly noticed. Staying within touching distance of Natalie, he couldn’t take his eyes off her. He’d seen his father do the same thing with every single woman he’d married.
Alarm bells didn’t just ring in his head—they blared like a thousand sirens all going off at once. For no other reason than that, he should have put some distance between them until he could get his head on straight. But she needed help with the kitchen stuff, and he was right there. And she knew how to pack the bus in a way the other students just didn’t understand. It was a mother thing, he told himself, but he was the teacher and he had to supervise. And then when everything was loaded and they were the last two to climb on the bus, it just seemed natural to sit together as they had on the trip up.
Yeah, right, that irritating voice in his head drawled. You sat with her because you couldn’t stop yourself, because it’s the only place on the whole damn bus where you want to sit. At least be honest about it, dammit!
Okay, so he wanted to sit next to her. He wanted to make her laugh, make her sigh, make her call his name in the dark with a longing that set him on fire. But most of all, he wanted her.
He was in a hell of a mess.
They hardly spoke all the way back to Eagle Creek, but there was a quiet contentment between them that he’d never felt with another woman. And then all too soon the bus was pulling into the parking lot where they’d all left their cars and it was time to unload. Troubled, Max could literally feel time slipping through his fingers, and he didn’t like it one little bit.
Natalie and the other students were laughing and joking as they helped transfer the treasures they’d collected from the bus to a van Max had left there to transport their finds to the climate-controlled storage units where they would be stored until they were examined in the archeological lab. He was usually in a great frame of mind after a dig, but he could find little to smile about this time, and it was all Natalie’s fault. And she didn’t even seem to notice.
Irritated with himself—he was acting like a two-year-old!—he tried to shake off the blue funk that had fallen over him, but without much success. Needing some time to himself, he retreated to the bus so that he could deal with his emotions in private. Checking for items left behind, collecting trash, he didn’t realize he was no longer alone until Natalie said quietly, “We finished transferring everything to the van, Max, and all the camping gear’s in the storage unit. Does anything else need to be done? Beverly and some of the others were wondering if it’s okay to leave now.”
“If it’s all cleared out, then they’re free to go,” he said gruffly. “I’m just making sure everything’s picked up in here. The bus company will give us a break on the cleanup fee if we return the bus in good order.”
“I’ll help you,” she said. “Just give me a second to tell everyone it’s okay to leave.”
She was back almost immediately and started picking up the front of the bus while he started at the back. Aware of her every move as they both worked toward the center, he asked, “Well? What’d you think of your first dig?”
“It was incredible,” she said simply, her eyes unusually somber as she faced him. “I hate that it’s over.”
“Coming home is always the hard part,” he said ruefully. “It doesn’t have to end immediately, you know. We could go back to my place and have something to eat, maybe figure out a way we could have done some things better while it’s still fresh in our minds.”
He’d never asked a woman back to his home. Afraid of making the same mistakes his father had made and letting a woman get too close, he had, over the years, been very careful not to cross that line with the women he dated. Natalie, however, was different. She had been from the first moment he’d met her, and he couldn’t let her go—not yet. He wanted her with him, in his arms, in his home, in his bed.
“I’m sorry. I can’t,” she said regretfully. “The boys will be home in thirty minutes from their trip. Susan’s going to bring them straight home, so I have to be there.”
Disappointed, he understood. “I’m sure they’ve missed you. We can get together another time. I need to get these samples over to the lab, anyway. So I guess I’ll see you in class.”
Her eyes searching his, Natalie couldn’t believe the most incredible holiday weekend of her life was ending this way. Had the time they’d spent in his tent, making love, meant so little to him that he was willing to just let her walk away without so much as a “Take care”? He hadn’t mentioned the future or how he felt about her, and she had no reason to believe he ever would. Pain squeezed her heart, but she knew she had no one to blame but herself. She’d known from the beginning that he was a man who wanted nothing to do with commitment, so she’d gone into their relationship—or whatever it was they shared—with her eyes wide-open. She couldn’t complain now because he wasn’t the kind of man she wanted and needed him to be.
Fiercely holding back the tears that burned her eyes, she forced a grimace of a smile. “I guess I’ll see you on Tuesday then,” she said stiffly. “Good night.”
Later, she didn’t remember making her way off the bus…or loading her things into her car. She turned right, out of the parking lot, and was three miles down the road before she wiped away her tears enough to see that she was going the wrong way. With a soft sob she turned at the next corner and headed back in the direction she had come.
Long after she’d disappeared down the street, Max stood in the parking lot, fighting the need to go after her. The boys would be home soon, he reminded himself, and it had been three days since they’d seen her. They would need some time with her. And it wasn’t like he wasn’t ever going to see her again. In less than thirty-six hours she’d be walking into his classroom. He should have been able to find some satisfaction in that, but he already missed her.
Natalie had just enough time to carry her things inside and wash her face with cold water before Susan pulled into the driveway and the boys burst out of her minivan with huge grins stretching across their freckled faces. “There’re my baby boys! Did you have a good time?”
With a screech of pure joy, they launched themselves at her. “Mom! We saw a bear!”
“And an eagle. It flew right over our heads!”
“I caught a fish—and Tommy fell in the water.”
Instantly concerned, she glanced sharply at Tommy. “Are you okay? What happened?”
“It was an accident,” Susan said with an easy smile as she, too, hugged Natalie. “He wanted to see the fish Harry caught, but the grass along the bank of the stream where we were fishing was wet. The next thing we knew, he slipped and he was in the water. It couldn’t have been more than ten inches deep. His pants and shoes got wet, but he was fine.”
“Susan dried my clothes by the campfire,” Tommy said, beaming. “I smelled like smoke all day!”
“I’ll bet you did, sweetheart.” She laughed, ruffling his hair. “So you had a good time, even with the du
nking?”
“The best! Wait’ll you see what we brought you!”
“I picked it out!”
So excited they could hardly stand still, they jerked open one of their bags and pulled out a beautiful crocheted poncho that glistened with beadwork. “Do you like it, Mom? Huh? Susan said you would!”
Stunned, she touched it with fingers that weren’t quite steady. “Where did you get the money for this? All you had was your allowance, and that was your spending money for the trip in case you went somewhere fun or you ate out.”
“They were really tight-fisted with it,” Susan said, grinning. “They only spent what they had to until this morning, when they pooled everything and bought you the poncho. Tommy was sure pink was your color. I think he was right.”
Tears welled in her eyes as she scooped them both up for a fierce hug. “You guys are so sweet! Thank you!”
“We really wanted to get you a stuffed porcupine,” Harry added, hugging her back. “But it costed too much. It was cool!”
“Thank God for that!” She laughed, and hugged them again.
Wound up like clocks, they were still talking long after Susan left, and Natalie found herself wishing time and again that Max was there to hear their wild stories. Why couldn’t he be the man she needed him to be? she wondered as she finally got them to bed. It had been over five years since Derek had walked out, and in all that time she hadn’t even looked at another man. Until Max. She wanted to share her life with him, her children, all the ups and downs of their future that made life such a roller coaster…and he wanted nothing to do with that kind of commitment. What was she supposed to do now?