A Chance Encounter

by Lindsay McKenna

  Grimly, he set his coffee down, his anger at war with his guilt. Before he could say a word, Katie had whirled from the office, the door swinging widely in the wake of her exit. Cursing, he followed her out and saw her heading toward the small parking lot. He caught up with her just as she reached a beat-up, black Volkswagen Beetle.

  “Katie—wait, dammit!” He grabbed her arm and gently pulled her to a stop.

  “Let me go!” she cried, jerking out of his grasp.

  Taylor’s heart wrenched in his chest as he saw the tears rolling down her flushed cheeks. “Look,” he began haltingly, “I didn’t mean—”

  “Oh, yes you did! Big-time reporter moves to a small town to make a name for himself at other people’s expense. Well, you’ve done it, Mr. Grant. Now live with it while I try to deal with all the crank calls!”

  “I didn’t mean to hurt you. But dammit, you left me no alternative when you wouldn’t cooperate!” She flattened herself against the Volkswagen as he came within inches of her. Her heart was pounding furiously in her breast, but in spite of her rage, she was wildly aware of him as a man. She saw the anguish in his gray eyes as he groped for words to appease her. Angrily, she brushed the tears from her cheeks. “Cooperate? Aren’t I entitled to my privacy? What remains of it,” she added bitterly.

  He gave her a wary look. “I’ve received ten phone calls in the past hour. About half have been in support of you,” he admitted, his voice strained. “For your information, I tried to interview people who knew you, Ms. Riordan, but they all refused to comment.”

  Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “As well they should. My private life belongs to me—not to you and not to that damn newspaper you sell your soul to for a living.”

  Grant felt his anger stirring. “Let me tell you something, lady. I’ve learned what life is like in the dank streets of some of New York’s toughest neighborhoods. Your flaky attitude wouldn’t allow you to survive in the real world for five minutes! So don’t judge me and don’t criticize my ethics.”

  Her nostrils flared and she pursed her full lips. “I don’t judge anyone. Your actions speak for themselves!”

  “The blame for this article rests on your shoulders, not mine,” he said ominously.

  She was trembling visibly. “I don’t want to argue any further,” she said, backing down a little. “I’d just like to know what to do about these anonymous phone calls, Mr. Grant. I’ve lived here for five years and gotten along fairly well with everyone. Now I have one caller threatening to set fire to my bookstore and another threatening to throw a Molotov cocktail through the window. Thanks to you.”

  Taylor’s anger faded as the cold reality of what she was saying hit him. There was no way he wanted to see her hurt. She was too special—and too naive. And something about her brought out the protectiveness in him. Cursing softly, Taylor held up both hands in a gesture of peace.

  “Look, I’m sorry about the calls. I certainly didn’t want that to happen.” The look she gave him said she didn’t believe him, but he went on anyway. “Let me talk to the police. We’ll get your phone tapped so that any future calls can be traced.”

  Stubbornly she crossed her arms, her eyes blazing with deep blue fire. “I’m surprised you would offer. If someone bombed my bookstore, that would make the front page, too—probably under your byline! And isn’t that what you’re really after? No, thanks, I’ll take care of this in my own way. You’ve done enough damage.” Her features were still taut with anger. “It’s your job to destroy people, isn’t it?”

  Taylor reared back as if he had been struck. Dumbfounded, he watched her slide into her car and drive off. Mary Ann had asked almost the same question: Do you always destroy everything? Anguished, he bowed his head, trying to think clearly amid the seething emotions Katie had unleashed.

  “Damn you, Taylor!” Mary Ann had screamed. “You’ve destroyed our marriage! You’ve turned your life upside down for your damn career! And now look at you.” She sobbed. Y’ou’re ready to break. Why couldn’t you have compromised? Why did you have to destroy everything? Why?”

  Taylor dragged in a deep, steadying breath, vaguely aware that he had been gasping. Slowly he walked back to the newsroom. It had been a year since the divorce. A year of living alone and burying himself deeper into his job. His eyes darkened with pain as he admitted to himself that he had indeed destroyed his marriage. What was it within him that drove him over the brink time after time? Why couldn’t he ever be moderate in his actions? And now he had done it all over again. But the outcome was the same. Somebody had ended up irrevocably wounded. In this case, Katie Riordan. Guilt surged through Taylor. Damn his journalistic standards. Why couldn’t he have tempered the article? He had, as usual, gone for the jugular. And who was bleeding because of his uncompromising stance? Katie. Sweet, harmless Katie whose honesty was a breath of fresh air to his darkened soul.

  Miserably, Katie set the phone in its cradle—for what seemed like the hundredth time that day. Maud put a cup of herb tea in front of her and gave her a motherly pat on the shoulder.

  “Come on, Katie girl, drink up. It’s chamomile. Good for the nerves. Let me take the next few calls. You just go upstairs to your apartment and call it a day,” she soothed.

  Katie took the mug and sipped at its golden contents. “I’ll be okay, Maud. Really, I will. It’s just so upsetting. All these horrible calls.”

  Maud’s brown eyes narrowed ferociously. “Well, if that Grant fella hadn’t painted you as some sort of—of—”

  “Sorceress,’” she muttered grimly. “I suppose I should be grateful that he didn’t say ‘witch.’”

  “Humph! Might as well have, for all these silly calls! Witch, indeed! Since when is healing and helping sick animals and people a sin or a crime! What’s this world coming to?” Maud moved slowly from behind the desk to pick up a stack of books that needed to be shelved.

  Katie’s blue eyes grew warm as she watched Maud. What would she do without her? When both her parents had died in an airplane crash, a large part of Katie died with them. And yet, the cosmos—in all its infinite wisdom—had provided Maud as her new mother only days after their deaths. Warmth flowed through Katie, and she relaxed momentarily, dwelling on the love Maud gave so freely to everyone. She glanced at her watch. It was only noon. Katie wished it were closing time….

  “Look at this,” Maud exclaimed. She shut the door to the bookstore and held out a copy of one of the largest newspapers on the West Coast.

  Despair washed over Katie as she saw her photograph on page three, along with Taylor Grant’s story. Groaning, she shut her eyes.

  Maud watched her worriedly. “Does that mean more phone calls than what we’ve been receiving already?”

  “I’m afraid so,” Katie said, tossing the paper on the desk. It was eight o’clock, time to close the bookstore. The last of the curiosity seekers had left. She turned, rummaging through several drawers to find the key. “Why don’t you go home, Maud? It’s been a very long day.”

  “And a busy one. I guess all that publicity wasn’t entirely negative. We’ve had record sales today. That should help with the mortgage payment you were so worried about.”

  “Always a silver lining, right?” she mused, getting up to give Maud a quick hug. “Go on home, Maudie. You’ve put in too many hours today, and you’re looking tired.”

  “Humph! At eighty-four I can still work a twelve-hour day without flagging.” She waggled her finger in Katie’s grim face. “You close this store up right now. And then you get yourself a nice hot bath and just relax. And no stayin’ late to balance the books.”

  Katie smiled as she walked Maud to the front door. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll see you at noon tomorrow. Good night.”

  Maud’s round face drew into a beatific smile as Katie leaned over and gave her a peck on the cheek. “Good night,” she said.

  The April evening was turning cooler and Katie decided to leave the door open and welcome the fragrant smell of spring flowers. Her b
row wrinkled in a worried frown as she approached the desk and picked up the accounting book and the box of unpaid bills. The fresh country air was far preferable to the lifeless chill of air-conditioning. And right now she’d rather be taking a long walk in the hills that surrounded the quaint town, simply allowing nature to lift her depression.

  “Why the hell did you leave the door open? Didn’t you say you’ve been receiving threatening calls?”

  Katie whirled around, the cigar box flying out of her hands and scattering the mass of unpaid bills on the floor at her feet. Taylor Grant’s huge figure blocked out the overhead light and brought a startled cry from her lips. Her heart pounded wildly at the base of her throat, and automatically her hand went to her breast.

  “You scared me to death!”

  Grant’s scowl deepened. “You have no business leaving a door unlocked when it’s dark outside—let alone wide open.”

  She took several deep breaths. And then, to her annoyance, registered all the bills on the floor. Dropping to her knees, she began to collect them. Grant crouched, too, and helped her with the task.

  “What do you want? Haven’t you done enough damage in one day, Mr. Grant?”

  “I came to talk to you.”

  Her heart thumped in response to the velvet tones of his voice. Katie looked up from her position on her hands and knees and stared directly into his face only a few feet away. Her anger dissolved as she perceived the exhaustion in his gray eyes. Wetting her lips, she sat back, slender hands resting on her thighs. “I suppose I owe you an apology, too.” She gestured gracefully. “In fact, I tried to call you. I said something I shouldn’t have and I’m sorry, Mr. Grant. But the sheer volume of people calling and visiting the Unicorn has been overwhelming. I couldn’t get away.” She smiled. “I couldn’t even get an outside line on the phone. And I hate cell phones.”

  Grant grunted, eyeing the bills as he continued to collect them. “I tried to call you a couple times, too.”

  Her expression softened. “You did?”

  Taylor looked into her puzzled face. How was it that she had grown lovelier in twelve hours’ time? he wondered. When he saw the shadows of fatigue skirting her lovely blue eyes, he experienced a twinge of conscience. “Yeah. I wanted to confess. A syndicate picked up the story, and now it’s being printed in every major newspaper on the West Coast.”

  Katie made a frustrated sound. “Oh, no!”

  “Don’t be so glum. It’s not going to hurt your career.”

  He studied a couple of the bills and then handed them to her. Their fingers met briefly, and he was conscious of the warmth and softness of her hand. He wondered if the rest of her was as warm and responsive, quickly realizing that she was. “That’s no longer important to me. You are.”

  A thrill raced through Katie’s heart at these words. She pulled over the battered old cigar box, dropped the bills into it unceremoniously and forced the chipped lid closed. There was an undeniable magnetism about this man, and suddenly Katie had the wild urge to reach out, throw her arms around his neck and bury herself against that massive chest. There was a protectiveness about him radiating toward her. He’s probably feeling guilty, she thought, trying to dismiss the heated awareness of her body.

  “I don’t understand.”

  Taylor managed a smile and rested his arms on his well-muscled thighs. “Something told me to talk to you once more before I released that story, but I didn’t do it.”

  “You didn’t listen to your intuition.”

  “No, I didn’t.” He sighed heavily. As he stood, Taylor offered her his hand.

  Katie lifted her chin. Her lips parted as she stared up at him. He was so tall and masculine. Without even thinking, she placed her hand in his and watched as it was swallowed up. Taylor pulled her to her feet and reluctantly released her fingers. Momentarily dizzy, she took a few steps backward and bumped into the desk.

  “You had dinner yet?” he asked.

  Katie shook her head. “No, I usually make something in my apartment after I close the bookstore.”

  “Let me buy you dinner. It’s the least I can do.”

  Katie’s heart wrenched as she heard the fatigue in his deep, mellow voice and saw it in the planes of his face. There was something boyishly vulnerable about him in those fleeting seconds, and Katie responded to what she felt. “All right,” she murmured, setting the bill box back on the desk.

  Taylor managed another smile. “Thanks.”

  She retrieved her shoulder bag and walked toward the entrance. Taylor followed her, halting as she began to search through the purse.

  “I think you left the keys on the desk.”

  “Oh? Oh, yes. Dumb of me!” She whirled to retrieve the keys. Smiling, she joined him outside. “I do this all the time. Maud swears she’s going to put a ball and chain on my leg to slow me down, so that I don’t get ahead of myself.”

  Taylor tested the locked door. Satisfied, he slipped his hand beneath her elbow and led Katie around the brick building to the parking lot in back. “A ball and chain?” he murmured dryly. “Somehow I don’t think that would work. How can you stop a butterfly from flitting about?” He gazed down at her, aware of the blue highlights in her hair brought out by the soft light of sulfur lamps that stood like sentinels in the parking lot.

  Katie felt heat rush into her cheeks. So there was some sensitivity to him after all! “I’ve been called distracted, terminally forgetful and several other less flattering things, but never a butterfly.”

  “You’re a butterfly, Katie Riordan,” Taylor assured her, opening the door of the door to the Camry for her. “You’re a willful free spirit in a day and age that doesn’t encourage such individuality. And that,” he said, his voice a low growl, “is what has gotten you into trouble.”

  Katie snapped the seat belt across her lap and waited for him to get in the car. “What are you talking about, Mr. Grant?”

  “Call me Taylor.” The shadows played across his strong features as he turned to look at her. “I’ve thought a lot about you today,” he began, “and I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re one of those special people who exist for themselves, regardless of what society may think.” His gray eyes grew tender. “And I just clipped your wings by putting that article to press. I should have come back and gotten your side of the story.”

  The tension between then increased. Katie held her breath as he reached over, lightly brushing her flushed cheek. It was as if he were stroking a priceless gift, and a string of explosions occurred along her nerve endings, sending pleasure coursing through her body.

  “You don’t clip a butterfly’s wings,” he muttered, his brows dipping. “They’re too fragile.”

  Her eyes grew merry with mischief. “I’m hardly fragile, Mr.—I mean—Taylor. Just because I’m only five feet two doesn’t mean I can’t stand up on my own.”

  His laughter rumbled in his chest as he turned the key. The car purred to life. “I know that, Katie. Remember, I was on the receiving end of your anger.” He drove out of the lot and made a right turn onto the main street of Rio Conchos.

  “I wasn’t angry, Taylor. I was upset by the injustice of that story. You didn’t give me a fair shake.”

  He nodded, pursing his lips. “You’re right. And for some reason, I want to atone for my mistake.”

  “Just having you admit it makes me feel better,” Katie said. “You don’t have to buy me dinner, too.”

  His smile reminded her of a cat who had cornered its next meal. “This is the first time in my reporting career that I’ve allowed myself the luxury of admitting I made a mistake. Before, I would just rationalize it away and shrug it off.” His gray eyes held that same tender spark as he glanced over at her rapt features. “But a certain fey Irish princess brought this tendency to my attention, and I decided it was time to examine myself with the same ruthless objectivity I used to limit to the practice of my profession.”

  Katie shivered. “Everyone’s allowed to make mistakes, Tayl
or. That’s how we all learn. I know you didn’t print that story to deliberately hurt me. I don’t sense that you’re cruel by nature.”

  His mouth drew tight. “I’ve been accused of being very ruthless, Katie. And I’ve heard it from all corners, so don’t be so quick to let me off the hook.”

  She folded her hands in her lap and gave a shake of her head. “You’re opinionated, stubborn and single-minded. But you’re not deliberately cruel,” she repeated doggedly.

  He gave her a wry smile. “Do you always go to bat for the poor, maimed and unfortunate, Katie Riordan?”

  Her answering smile tore at his senses. “I believe that each human being is special and individual, Taylor. I try not to categorize people, but to treat each as a unique entity.”

  Parking the Camry, he shook his head. “How do you manage to stay alive in this world with views like that?”

  Laughing, Katie shrugged. “I don’t know. What’s wrong with treating each person as a rare and beautiful flower unfolding in your presence?”

  Drawn to her clear, effortless laughter, Taylor reached over, his eyes suddenly hooded and probing. “You’re wrong,” he said thickly, caressing her cheek, “you’re the rare flower, Katie. So delicate, so fragile…I find myself wanting to protect you from this ugly world we live in. I’m afraid that someday soon your pristine spirit will be crushed by reality….”

  Black lashes fanned out across her cheeks, and she trembled beneath his touch. Despite his powerfully masculine aura, his touch was gentle, making coals of yearning brightly burn to life, deep within her responsive body. Opening her eyes, Katie offered him a tender, tremulous smile. “I’ll be all right, Taylor. I’ve managed to survive for twenty-six years. Life’s been good to me.” She shrugged. “Or maybe I’ve been good to life and I’m merely reaping the benefits….”

  Taylor wanted to continue his exploration of the jade-smooth skin beneath his hand. He wanted to follow that stubborn jawline down to her slender neck and plant small kisses on her throat. He wanted to feel Katie respond to him. He noticed the hardening of her nipples through the soft muslin of her dress as he caressed her cheek. And her eyes were wide and languorous, telling him just how much he was affecting her. Her response made Taylor feel good about himself and he hadn’t felt that way in a long time. Reluctantly, he withdrew his hand from her face. She was indeed a butterfly: fragile, beautiful and free.