Cabin Fever

by Karen Rose Smith

  The hum surrounding her and Brad in its erotic field wasn’t coming from her laptop. She licked lips, which had suddenly gone dry, and couldn’t break eye contact.

  A nerve in Brad’s jaw worked. His voice was husky as he said, “I did learn a few things about Amos Douglas from Mickey that I didn’t tell you about on the phone.”

  Trying to follow the thread of conversation, she made her lips form the word, “What?”

  “It’s not going to help us any, but I learned he might have been a scoundrel. There’s a possibility he mistreated his wife.”

  “That would have been Catherine Douglas.”

  Brad nodded. “I’ll have to take you to the Hitching Post some night. It’s an interesting place—part old-time saloon, part new-time grill.”

  “That’s the place Juliet mentioned last night. She’d waitressed there. That’s where she met Mark. It must have been hard for her, being pregnant, having to work with no family around.”

  “I think that’s why she and Mark connected.” Studying her again, he asked, “Do you often think about the baby you lost?”

  Emily guessed Brad was remembering holding Marissa. Maybe he was thinking about Suzette Brouchard and her child. Maybe he was contemplating the idea of really becoming a dad. He’d already missed two years of that little girl’s life, according to the article in the newspaper. She wished she could put Suzette out of her head. She wished she could put Brad’s lifestyle out of her head and pretend he was just an ordinary guy and they were here together getting to know each other.

  Her thoughts had scrambled to another direction because the miscarriage was still painful for her to remember. “I think about that baby every day. I wonder if it would have been a boy or a girl, if he or she might have had my brown hair or my eyes, been born tiny or big.” Tears came to her eyes as she shook her head.

  Clearing her throat, she quickly changed the subject. “I overheard Caleb and Riley talking.”

  After a moment of studying her, he asked, “About what?”

  “The mine. Caleb is vowing to keep it one way or the other.”

  “I wonder how he intends to accomplish that if I find out someone else owns it.”

  “I don’t know. But Riley’s on his side. I get the feeling he’d do anything to please his father.”

  “Parental approval,” Brad said with a grimace. “It can be a driving force.”

  “Has it been for you?”

  “Wanting my father’s approval has always been in the back of my mind. When I was younger, I purposely took a different road so I didn’t have to deal with earning it.”

  “But you came back to Chicago to work with him.”

  “Yes, I did. My mother wanted me to. I don’t think she liked me being so far away and she simply pushed the guilt button several times, reminding me my father wouldn’t be around forever.”

  “Are you sorry you came back?”

  He ran his hand through his hair. “No, I’m not sorry I came back. I think she was right. I should get to know him before it’s too late. But working with him, trying to fit into the vision of what he wants me to be, that’s something else entirely.”

  After a few beats of silence, without warning Brad took her laptop from her lap and closed it.

  “Brad, I have to—”

  “What you have to do is give that wrist time to heal.” He took her hand in his and lifted the bandage. “Did you rewrap this this morning?”

  His fingers on her skin started a burning heat that didn’t stop at her hand.

  “No,” she somehow managed to say, even though her mouth had gone as dry as cotton.

  “Do you want me to rewrap it? It’s kind of hard to do one-handed.”

  Yes, it was. If she let Brad do it, it would only take a couple of minutes, maybe not even that long.

  Already Brad was slipping the small clasp out of the fabric, laying it on top of the laptop computer. Then he was gently holding her forearm, unwrapping the stretchy bandage.

  Searching for a coherent thought, Emily finally settled on saying, “What are you going to do this afternoon?”

  “I thought I’d go into Old Town to the historical society and poke around.”

  “Want some help?”

  “Sure, if you feel up to coming.”

  “There’s nothing to do here. And if I don’t think about my wrist, it doesn’t hurt.”

  “Mind over matter?” he teased.

  The bandage undone now, Brad put her hand on his thigh. Every nerve inside her rioted because she had touched him intimately there. Mind over matter, she repeated inwardly, as if the mantra could make his touch less volatile.

  As he probed her wrist gently, he said, “It doesn’t look as swollen.”

  “The doctor said I should only keep the bandage on a couple of days.”

  Brad proceeded to tuck the end of the bandage into her palm. When he began wrapping, Emily tried to pretend he was the doctor doing it. That didn’t work at all.

  Taking care with her and the bandage, Brad wrapped it over and under and around her wrist. Although he did it methodically and expertly, she noticed every graze of his thumb, every touch of his eyes on her, every change of expression on his face. There were tiny lines around his eyes. His black brows drew together once when the bandage buckled, but then he smoothed it and finally attached the small metal clasp.

  “There you go.” His words were light, but when his gaze held hers there was no lightness there.

  “Emily,” he murmured as he leaned forward.

  She loved the sound of her name on his lips. She loved his claiming purpose as he stood and then pulled her up, too.

  When his arms wrapped around her, he said, “I don’t understand this chemistry between us any more than you do.”

  What made them want each other? What made her eager to catch a glimpse of him? What made her want to feel him inside her again? She knew this could only be temporary. She absolutely knew it.

  Yet sometimes it simply didn’t matter. His kiss was possessive and took her breath away. Brad took her breath away.

  Totally engrossed in their kiss, Emily jumped when the phone beside her bed rang. Brad ignored it. He knew Tess always answered it. His hands were under Emily’s top now, and she anticipated the feel of his fingers on her breast. It was a delicious anticipation. Their bodies weren’t quite touching, and she wanted that, too. She wanted everything from Brad.

  She was pulling his shirt from the waistband of his jeans when there was a knock on her door. “Miss Emily?”

  Brad swore, rested his forehead against hers and then leaned away.

  “Yes, Tess?”

  “Telephone. She says she’s your sister.”

  “How does she know you’re here?” Brad asked, his voice deep, desire still simmering in his eyes.

  “I called home after we arrived. When they can’t get in touch with me, they worry.”

  Instantly she guessed that was a foreign concept to Brad.

  His face was unreadable now as he tucked his denim shirt back into his jeans and then went to the door. “You’d better get that. Until you’re ready to go, I’ll talk to Tess to see if she has those notes for me on her daughter.”

  Then he was leaving Emily’s room and she was picking up the phone, hoping the sound of her sister’s voice would bring her back to the real world, remind her that she was Emily Stanton, secretary, that Brad was her boss. When they got back to Chicago, nothing would be the same as it was here in Thunder Canyon.

  Chapter Nine

  When Emily skipped breakfast on Thursday morning, Brad wondered why. Her wrist seemed to be better. She’d taken off the bandage now and was using it normally. But she’d been quiet the past couple of days and he was concerned about her. Did she just want to go back to Chicago and her life? Did she want to get away from the tension between them as they slept in their rooms at night? He was aware of her, just a bathroom away, and that awareness gave him insomnia, as well as dreams he couldn’t act on. />
  For the past two days he’d tried to learn everything he could about Tess’s daughter. He’d made calls to contacts on the West Coast and he’d made local calls, too. But Annie Littlehawk’s best friend hadn’t wanted to talk to him. In fact, she’d hung up on him. He wouldn’t stop there, of course, but he would give her a few days to think about it, to think about helping him in the search. At the moment he felt stymied on all fronts, waiting for Tildy Matheson to return, waiting for the mayor to return. Today he’d decided to see what all the fuss was about at the Queen of Hearts mine itself.

  Since Emily hadn’t appeared at breakfast, he went looking for her and found her in her bedroom working on her laptop at the small reading desk.

  “Still organizing notes?” he asked after he’d knocked on the door and she’d called for him to come in.

  “Not for the case,” she said with a frown.

  He saw numbers on the screen and joked, “That looks more like a budget.”

  Smiling, she turned away from the computer. “It is.”

  “Yours?”

  “Unfortunately, yes.”

  She seemed deflated somehow, and that wasn’t like Emily. Their last kiss had put another wall between them, had warned him again to keep his distance, had made him search out ways to work alone instead of working with her, but he realized he still cared what she was feeling way too much.

  “What’s wrong, Emily?”

  Avoiding his gaze, she looked as if she was about to brush off the question, but then her shoulders squared and she pushed her chair back. “Lizbeth called me on Monday.”

  It was the call that had interrupted their kiss that could have led straight to the bed. “Bad news?”

  Emily pushed her hair behind both ears, as though somehow straightening it could straighten out her life. “She was supposed to graduate this month.”

  “And now she’s not?”

  “She wants to change her major and go another year.”

  Beginning to see where this was headed, he took a step closer. “If she does that, you won’t be able to start school.”

  “Not for another year.”

  “There’s no way around it?”

  After Emily glanced at the computer screen again, she shook her head. “Lizbeth already has more school loans than I’m comfortable with. She’ll be paying for them the rest of her life. She’ll have to try to get more financial aid, of course. I can’t subsidize the whole year. But before she started, I told her I’d help her as much as I can, and I can’t go back on my word.”

  “Even if that means putting your life on hold again?”

  “Even if it means that.”

  Her expression was so troubled, he asked, “Something else is bothering you, isn’t it?”

  Standing, she avoided his gaze and went over to the window that looked out over fenced-in grazing land. “I’m wondering when it is going to be my turn. And that makes me feel so selfish.”

  Emily was probably the most unselfish person he’d ever met. “You expect too much of yourself. Blazes, Emily, you’ve been putting your own life on hold for how many years now? Resentment has got to go along with that no matter how much you love your sister.”

  Her eyes glistened as she murmured, “I don’t want to resent it. I don’t want to be jealous of Elaine finding a career and Lizbeth looking for hers. If I give, I want to give freely…with no strings and no regrets.”

  That’s exactly how she’d given herself to him. But he was afraid she did have regrets.

  In the course of their conversation, Emily had wrapped her arms around herself in a defensive posture, as if she expected judgment from him.

  He crossed to her and gently clasped her shoulders. “You’re Lizbeth’s sister, not a saint. Don’t beat yourself up for being human.”

  Dropping her arms to her sides, she sighed. “I was just trying to figure out if it was possible for me to go to a community college and at least start that way since my budget’s going to be tight.”

  Before he realized what he was saying, he offered, “Let me pay for your college courses.”

  Emily’s eyes went wide and she looked at him as if he’d suggested she do a striptease for him. “You can’t do that.”

  He took a light tone with her. “Yes, I can. I’ll be investing in your future.”

  Pulling away from him, she went and stood beside the desk. “I can’t take your money, Brad.”

  “You haven’t given this enough thought.”

  “It only takes three seconds to realize it’s a bad idea. I don’t know when I’d be able to pay you back. What if I leave Vaughn? Besides, I don’t want to feel like I’m taking something from a man who—”

  “A man you slept with?”

  Her cheeks reddened. “Yes. I just can’t do it, Brad. Things are complicated enough.”

  “Complicated how?”

  When she didn’t respond, he demanded, “Tell me what’s going on in that head of yours, Emily.”

  She bit her lower lip, then finally blurted out, “I might be pregnant! You might already be a father and need to pay child support to Suzette Brouchard. Never mind this hum between us whenever we’re in the same room. That’s why I didn’t come to breakfast this morning.”

  His suspicion that she’d been avoiding him was confirmed. “Maybe we should alternate breakfasts so neither of us goes hungry.”

  If he’d been hoping for a smile, he didn’t get one.

  “What do you want to do about it?” he asked seriously. “I can finish here in Thunder Canyon myself if you want to go home.”

  “I won’t leave a job unfinished,” she protested. “That’s not the way I am. I want to know who owns that mine as much as you do. And I want to talk to Tildy Matheson. I think that will be fun. It’s just—”

  “It’s just that you don’t want to be in the same room with me.”

  Her lashes fluttered down and then she said very softly, “I want to be in the same room with you too much.”

  If he took her into his arms then, he could kiss her and maybe even lead her into bed. But that would confuse her even more and confuse him, too. They were in a world away here, but what would happen when they returned to Chicago?

  He wouldn’t take advantage of Emily. He wouldn’t pretend they had somewhere to go when they didn’t. She was the kind of girl who deserved a house in a neighborhood that had block parties. She deserved a princess-like wedding gown and a man who thought highly of marriage.

  Moving toward the door and away from her was one of the hardest things he’d ever done. For whatever reason, Emily Stanton was like a shooting star that had exploded into his life. He didn’t want either of them to get any more burned than they already had.

  At the door, he stopped. “I think we both need an excursion.”

  Now her lashes came up and she lifted her gaze to his. “What kind of excursion?”

  “We need to see this infamous gold mine that could put this town on the map. I also want to visit Annie Littlehawk’s best friend. Do you want to go with me?”

  She seemed to give the idea much thought. They’d still be together and that sexual hum between them would be ever present. But they would have the mine and Renée Bosgrow to focus on.

  A smile finally spread across Emily’s face. “That sounds like a great idea.”

  “How soon can you be ready to leave?”

  “I’m ready now.”

  Ten minutes later they were in the SUV, driving down Thunder Canyon Road. They were heading toward the access road to the mine when Brad’s cell phone rang.

  “Vaughn here,” he said as he kept his eyes on the road.

  “Brad, it’s Suzette.”

  The artificial sweetness in her voice turned his stomach. “You should be talking to my lawyer, not to me.”

  “Look, sweetheart, maybe the lawyers are the wrong way to go.”

  His jaw clenched when he heard the endearment. “Your lawyer started this whole thing.”

  “I realize t
hat now. But I understand what this must be doing to your reputation.”

  “It’s not doing anything to my reputation, Suzette. I’m not even in Chicago.”

  “Not in Chicago? Where are you?” Some of the sweetness had left her voice.

  “I’m on a case, and in a minute or so the static is going to interfere with our signal. So you’d better tell me why you called.”

  “I just wanted you to know we can settle this whole thing without the DNA testing or results.”

  “I had the DNA sample taken before I left Chicago.”

  There were a few moments of hesitation and then she went on. “Even so. You know those results can prove you’re the father.”

  He was about to protest heartily when she continued. “I’m sure we can come to an equitable settlement so you don’t have to go through the embarrassment of the whole process.”

  “There won’t be any embarrassment for me. I know what the results are going to say, and I have no intention of settling—not now, not later.”

  “But, Brad—”

  Brad didn’t know if the mountains were interfering with the signal or the weather or simply the particular location he was driving through. But one moment she was there, the next moment she wasn’t.

  After a futile, “Hello? Suzette?” and no answer, he reclipped the cell phone onto his belt.

  Knowing Emily had heard every word, he glanced over at her. “She wants to settle.”

  “And you don’t.”

  “That’s right.”

  He’d discovered that the man Suzette had lived with ever since Brad and she had broken up had gambling debts. He had a feeling Suzette had been bankrolling her boyfriend and now her modeling money had run out. He wasn’t going to be a ticket to the easy life for the two of them.

  After his call, Emily went silent. Brad wished she could trust him, could trust his word. But after what he’d let happen in the cabin, he could see why she was still in doubt. The thing was, the situation with Emily had never happened to him with another woman. He’d never before felt that overwhelming desire not only to be intimate with but to protect and look after a woman. He didn’t understand the inclination at all.