by Diana Palmer
Mrs. Meyer caught her breath. “What a marvelous idea. Karina, you are amazing!”
Karina chuckled. “No, I’m not. I’m just observant. I very much want you to succeed. There must be many aspiring skaters who would be disappointed if they had to drive all the way to Jackson Hole to skate.”
“I must agree. That was one reason I bought the property.” She nodded. “I will consider the changes. If you will consider getting back on the ice,” she added.
Karina let out a breath. “It’s going to be very hard.”
“Most worthwhile things are. You have a wonderful gift, that poise and grace on the ice. I would hate to see you forfeit it, out of fear.”
“Perhaps you’re right.” She hesitated. “It was another matter I actually came by to discuss. I’m working with a young girl. Her father hired me to be a live-in babysitter because he’s out of town so much. She wants to learn to skate. Her father’s fiancée has been teaching her the old compulsory figures. She knows none of the preliminaries that she’ll need to be able to do in competition, if she sticks with it. She needs a coach. I can show her the moves, but I’m not really good at training anyone else.”
Mrs. Meyer laughed. “So it’s a very good thing that my coach candidate comes next week, ja?”
Karina smiled. “Yes. Then all I have to do is talk her father into paying for lessons. But that won’t be much of a problem, he’s wealthy.”
“A good thing, if the child truly wants to go into competition.”
“Tell me about it,” Karina sighed. “When Paul and I went to the World Championships, we were paying over $150,000 a year for equipment and travel expenses and skates and costumes. It’s so expensive in the higher levels of competition. My parents took out a second mortgage to pay my way when I was rising with Paul into senior championship and then Nationals. Even with the Envelope, it’s a sport that costs far more than most people can pay.”
“This is true,” came the reply. “But as to coaching the child, who better than a world champion to teach her, really? At least, until my coach is working here.”
Karina was troubled. “I’d have to get on the ice to do it. And Mr. Torrance’s fiancée might resent my interference.”
“The child is Janey Torrance, yes?” the owner asked quietly. “Yes, I know her. Her father’s fiancée started bringing her here two months ago. They only come one day a week.” She shook her head. “She yells at the child for any mistake. It is not the way to teach. And what she teaches her, also not good,” she added. “The child has had several falls because of the so-called instruction.”
“I’ll see what I can do to teach her correctly,” Karina said. “She loves the sport, but not everyone is cut out for it. I want to see what she can do before I encourage her. If she really has the talent, and the drive, I’d be happy to work with her temporarily.” She grimaced. “But I’ve never coached anyone.”
“It’s only for a week or so,” Mrs. Meyer said with twinkling eyes. “Then you can turn her instruction over to the coach.”
Karina sighed and smiled. “Okay, then.”
And just like that, she made the decision.
* * *
IT REQUIRED HER to drive back down to Jackson to get her own skates. She’d watched Janey on the ice during her tedious first few swizzles. The child did fairly well going forward. Backward was another matter. Karina had to teach from the sidelines, something that was very difficult at best.
She waited until Mr. Torrance came back from his business trip and asked for a few hours off.
“What for?” he asked curtly. “Bored already?” he added in a snarly tone.
“I have to go to my apartment to get my ice skates,” she said. “The local rink doesn’t rent them.”
His eyebrows went up. “How does she expect to stay in business without offering rentals?” he wanted to know.
“I asked. She says she’s thinking of doing that.”
“I hope she can make the business pay. The last owner just let it slide. This new one doesn’t seem to understand how to run it.”
“It’s a learning curve,” Karina said. She hesitated. “Janey wants to learn, but if she’s serious about skating, she’ll need a coach. Mrs. Meyer is interviewing one next week and she thinks he’ll do.” She looked up at him with soft, patient eyes and felt a jolt as he looked back at her. She lowered her eyes at once, shocked to feel her heartbeat going into high gear. “If Janey really wants to compete, she’ll have to belong to the ice skating club at the rink. They won’t let you take the tests unless you belong to a club. She also needs membership in the United States Figure Skating Association. It gives great benefits to members.”
“They don’t have a coach at the rink,” he said curtly, ignoring the other comments. “I asked. That’s why Lindy’s trying to teach her.”
She grimaced.
He moved a step closer. “Spill it,” he said shortly.
She bit her lower lip.
“Okay, obviously Lindy’s doing something you don’t like, but you’re afraid to tell me in case I blow up and fire you.”
Her eyes widened. “Are you psychic?” she blurted out.
He shrugged. “I never lose a hand in poker. Maybe so. Spill it. What’s Lindy doing wrong?”
“She’s teaching Janey how to do compulsory figures,” she said. “That hasn’t been part of competition since the late ’90s. It’s not required anymore. Not that it’s a bad thing to teach. It’s good for discipline. But if Janey wants to compete at all, she needs to learn swizzles and crossovers and loops and flips...”
“Obviously you know something about skating,” he said.
“I’ve been skating all my life,” she replied simply. “I had a friend who competed,” she lied.
“So why can’t you teach her?” he wanted to know.
She looked up at him with all her insecurities visible.
“You broke your ankle and now you’re afraid to go back on the ice,” he said.
She flushed.
“When you fall off a horse, you get right back on or you’ll never lose the fear,” he said. “You’ll never ride again. When I was six, I took a bad tumble. A horse threw me during the summer, when I was home from boarding school, and I broke my collarbone. I was scared to get back on a horse at all, but this is a working ranch and everybody who lived here had jobs to do. Even at the age of six, I was expected to do my part. My father was a hard taskmaster. He put me back on my horse the minute my doctor released me and sent me out to help keep the branding irons hot while the cowboys branded cattle.” He smiled wistfully. “So I learned what to do about fear. It was a hard lesson, at the time. Fear must be faced. There’s nowhere to run that you can get away from it.”
“I guess so.” She looked down at her foot. “I’ll go get my skates and I’ll try to teach her, if your fiancée won’t mind.”
“She won’t,” he replied. “She’s not really good with kids and she’s impatient. Janey came home from practice one day crying because Lindy yelled at her.”
Inside, Karina was grinding her teeth. “It’s not a good way to teach.”
“I know that. You never yell, do you?” he asked gently, and his brown eyes twinkled as he smiled at her.
She laughed. “No. I never yell.”
“I’ll make it right with Lindy,” he said. “It’s not really her fault. I talked her into it, because Janey was so determined to skate. Lindy did win a medal in a regional championship, after all. She knows skating inside out.”
Karina could have argued about that, but she wasn’t going to blow her cover. She didn’t want anyone to know how well known she’d been before. She was tired of questions. Reporters had been persistent when the accident first happened, and some were cruel. She was done with all that.
“No comment?” he asked.
“Sorry. I drifted aw
ay,” she replied. She looked up into his soft, dark eyes curiously. “Why doesn’t she like children?” she asked impulsively.
“She’s a businesswoman,” he said. “We get along well because we’re not together much.” He chuckled. “I suppose she’ll mellow when we get married. I’d like more children, but she’s not into that. I guess one will have to do.”
“That’s a shame,” she said gently. She was thinking that he looked the sort of man who would welcome a houseful of children. She smiled, thinking about her own experience with little kids at the skating rinks where she’d practiced. “I’d like to have children one day. Lots of them.”
He frowned. “You’re what, twenty-three? Why aren’t you married or living with somebody?”
She just stared at him, surprised by the question. She didn’t quite know how to answer it. She wasn’t comfortable telling him why.
CHAPTER THREE
MICAH STARED DOWN into Karina’s soft gray eyes and got lost in them. That was a first. Even Lindy, as hot as she was behind closed doors, didn’t have that tenderness about her. Lindy was demanding, aggressive, passionate. But she wasn’t a nurturing woman, and she didn’t want babies.
This woman had a tenderness he’d rarely seen in his life. He’d married his late wife, Anabelle, on a whim, because she was great in bed and her family’s wealth equaled that of his own. It had been more a merger than a marriage, despite the unexpected and delightful event of Janey’s birth. Anabelle hadn’t wanted a child, but Micah had wanted the child badly when he knew his wife was pregnant. She’d tried to talk him into a termination, but he’d said that he’d take care of the child. She’d only have to carry it for nine months and he’d handle everything afterward.
So Anabelle had gone through the pregnancy, not happily, and they had a little girl. Janey was a joy to Micah from the minute she was born. He’d taken care of her, as he’d promised, with the help of a live-in nurse for the first few months while he took care of business. Anabelle had barely noticed the child. She went overseas on cruises with her friends and never seemed to care that she had a baby at home who needed two parents.
Not many years passed, there had been a catastrophe and Anabelle had been killed. Micah felt the guilt of her death. It haunted him. After the tragedy, his daughter became his great joy. He had a housekeeper, Burt, an older man of about sixty, who helped with her as she grew. But as his business prospered, and Janey became more interested in after-school activities, she got a little too much for the older man, who kept house and cooked for the family. It was difficult for him to manage the household and be required to drive Janey so many places, especially in winter, when the snow made driving difficult. Winter was coming on fast. He’d asked for help. So Micah had advertised and Karina had become Janey’s new caretaker.
He wasn’t sure he’d done the right thing when he saw the new babysitter in person. Karina was nursing an injury and she walked with a cane. Janey liked her. That was the important thing. But he was still concerned about having his daughter in an ice rink alone. People skated wildly sometimes, without considering that a child, new to skating, might be too unsteady on her skates to avoid collisions. Falls could do great damage. He knew that from Lindy, who’d told him stories about fellow skaters being badly cut by their own blades, much less someone else’s. Falls could result in bruising or even broken bones. He stared pointedly at Karina’s ankle. That injury was proof to him that the woman should never get on skates in the first place. Did she even know how to skate?
Karina grimaced when she saw where he was looking. She took a deep breath. “Mr. Torrance,” she said softly, “I know I don’t look competent enough to watch out for a child at a skating rink. But I can skate...sort of,” she amended, because she dreaded even the thought of going on the ice after the accident. “I’ll go out into the rink with her,” she added, gritting her teeth, because she was afraid. “I promise, I’ll take care of her.”
“Your injury,” he began gruffly.
“It’s almost healed,” she said quietly, hating to admit that. It had given her an excuse to avoid putting on skates again. “It will bear weight. I do my exercises and physical therapy every single day. The boot is a habit,” she confessed, lowering her eyes. “The cane helps stabilize me. But I can skate. My mother taught me how, years ago. I’ll be fine on the ice.” I think, she added mentally.
He knew she was prevaricating. She probably needed the job. His keen eyes registered that her clothing came from midlevel stores. Apparently that high-ticket outfit she’d worn on the day she applied was her best. Now she kicked around in jeans and sweaters. Her car, although well kept, was several years old. She wouldn’t be here if she could do something more than take care of a child. He could at least give her a chance, he told himself.
“All right,” he said after a minute. “But if you don’t feel capable of watching her at the rink, let me know. I’ll arrange for Lindy to go with her.”
Over my dead body, Karina was thinking. The last thing the child needed was someone yelling at her at every mistake. There would be lots of mistakes for a beginner, just learning the art. But she smiled and forced the words out. “Yes, sir. I will.”
“Headed out to the store,” Burt called from the kitchen. “Anybody need anything?”
“Not me,” Karina said, smiling.
“Me, either,” Torrance replied. “Be careful. There’s several inches of snow out there from last night. You’ll slide all over hell and gone in the snow.”
Burt made a face. “I’ll stay in the ruts,” he promised, and threw up a hand on his way out.
Karina liked him. She’d learned that Burt was the live-in jack-of-all-trades. A great cook, a chess master, a poet, he’d been the mainstay of the house for years. It was a big house. Once a week, a local company sent out people to make things spotless. They scrubbed and polished and cleaned. Burt kept the bed linen changed, the meals cooked and answered the phone, which rang incessantly. Between them all, the household was efficient.
Micah was still staring at her boot, as if considering another query.
“There’s one other thing,” Karina continued after Burt was gone, averting her eyes and hoping to distract the boss from more probing personal questions.
“What now?” he asked with resignation.
“It’s Janey’s skates. They’re hockey skates.”
“So?”
She looked up. “Mr. Torrance, if she’s going to learn figure skating, she needs skates with a toe pick. You have to have them to do jumps. She also needs to be professionally fitted, even if she’s only going to skate casually. The wrong skates can damage her feet. The new skates need to be heat molded so that they won’t make so many blisters when she’s on the ice.”
His lips made a thin line. “Well, according to you, we’ve done nothing right, have we?”
She flushed. Her eyes shot down to his broad chest. “Sorry,” she bit off. “I wasn’t criticizing. It’s just...”
“Lindy was in competition,” he pointed out. “She placed high in Regionals. I think she knows more about skates than you do, Miss...?”
She swallowed. Hard. He made her nervous. She shifted to her good foot. “Carter,” she answered.
“Miss Carter,” he obliged. He drew in a short breath. “I don’t have time to go running all over creation for hobby skates,” he muttered.
She clenched her teeth. She’d told him all she was going to. If he was that hostile, she wondered how she was going to hang on here.
“All right, damn it,” he snapped, infuriated by her lack of spirit. He was used to people who fought back. The girl’s attitude made him feel guilty and he didn’t like it. “I’ll take her to Jackson this weekend and buy her a pair of skates.”
She swallowed. “Thank you, sir.”
“If you’re going to Jackson, you’d better get moving,” he bit off.
; “Yes, sir.”
She felt that she should salute, but she kept her cool. She went into her room, got her coat and purse and headed slowly for the front door, leaning heavily on the cane.
“And just how the hell are you going to skate with that?” he demanded, pointing to the boot on her foot.
“I don’t know,” she said honestly. “But I’ll find a way,” she added with a hint of the steely determination that had seen her win a World figure skating gold medal with Paul Maurice.
That light of battle in her pale gray eyes made them sparkle like silver. She was pretty in a temper. It was the first show of antagonism she’d let past that cool control that hallmarked her personality.
“It’s your leg,” he said. “But if you injure it again...” He let the sentence trail away.
Chills ran down her spine. What would happen if she broke her ankle again? She didn’t dare consider that. She drew in a breath. “I won’t.”
“The roads are slippery between here and Jackson, and it’s mountainous,” he said, hating his own concern. “Be careful.”
“I won’t be long,” she promised.
“You’d better not be,” he returned. “I can’t hang around here more than a few hours. I’ve got meetings scheduled in Los Angeles.”
“I’ll hurry,” she promised.
“Skates. Heat molds. God, this little hobby of Janey’s is turning into my worst nightmare!” he muttered, stalking off before she went out the door.
Karina actually let out a sigh of relief when she was safely in her car and away from him. The longer he was away from home, the happier it made her!
* * *
KARINA WALKED INTO her apartment and went to her closet to bring out the skates she’d worn in the last competition, the one that had cost her a shot at competitions with Paul. She’d missed a jump when Paul threw her. It wasn’t even a hard one. But she’d landed wrong and broken her ankle.