Casey looked at her curiously. “You’re still in love with Helmsly, aren’t you?”
It was all Erin could do to keep from gagging. “No, Casey,” she said with great control and patience. “I’m not still in love with Marc.”
Her tone seemed to strike a note of remorse in Casey, but for all the wrong reasons. Casey bit her lip and lowered her lashes in nervous misery. “Oh, Erin, I’m so sorry. I know you must keep telling yourself that, and don’t you worry, soon enough it will be true. It must be so hard for you! Being rejected by a man like Marc Helmsly, just where does one go from there? But there are other men, Erin …”
Erin wasn’t sure whether to laugh, scream, or cry. If anyone else had offered such off-base solace, she would surely have been offended and furious. But Casey was Casey, and Erin was well aware that all she meant was the best.
“Casey,” Erin said softly, controlling a growing agitation, “please don’t worry. When I feel the need, I’ll worry for myself about reentering the dating world!” Erin suddenly rose. The day had been long—too long—and she still had too much to do in too little time; she had a five o’clock call in the morning. And just talking about Marc had made her nervous, in a hurry to retreat to the security of home. “Come on, Casey,” she prodded. “Let’s get home. It’s late.”
“Ummm. I guess so.” Casey yawned as she collected her handbag and trenchcoat. Erin began to thread her way quickly through the pub, excusing herself hastily. She knew Casey. Even if Casey were in love, she would lag behind to flirt if the right man was available, and Erin would be stuck whistling away more time.
“Are you coming, Case?” Erin turned her head to watch her friend.
With a twisted brow and pursed lips, Casey replied, “Yes, yes! I’m right behind you.”
Erin turned to watch where she was going just in time to collide with what felt like a brick wall near the door. Except it wasn’t a brick wall. Not unless walls were wearing charcoal gray suits and blue silk shirts these days … blue silk shirts and fine pinstriped ties literally doused in vodka or gin or whatever it was she had just managed to spill all over the man with the force of her collision.
“Oh, Lord!” Erin gasped, stepping back. “I am sorry!”
She looked at the damage she had done and then glanced at his face, only to step back another half step. She had never seen such eyes, blue and piercing and relentless, set in a grim face of ruggedly angled granite. Damn, Erin thought, I did crash into brick.
The strangest tickle of chills raced down her spine, chills that touched like mercury until they felt like a wave of electric heat.
“I’m sorry,” she repeated as he continued to stare at her, only reaching into his breast pocket for a handkerchief to brush at his shirt and jacket after she apologized again. He recognized her, she realized, as a subtle change took place in his icefire gaze, but it wasn’t the recognition she was accustomed to. He seemed totally unimpressed, and actually irritated!
“It’s all right,” he said curtly. So this, Jarod thought, is Erin McCabe up close. Beautiful, yes, that she is, but—graceful?
The irritation suddenly left the stranger’s face. His left brow raised slightly, and one corner of a firm mouth curled as if with an inner amusement.
“Really, I’m terribly sorry—let me pay for the cleaning—”
“It’s all right!” he repeated, and though low, his tone was a velvety murmur that Erin suspected few ever challenged. But her own lack of coordination served to irritate her. She wouldn’t have been the recipient of such a tone if she’d been paying attention, and she would have been paying attention if it weren’t so late, if Casey hadn’t made her nervous, if she didn’t have a five o’clock call…. She opened her mouth to insist, but his tone was final.
He turned, and the strange interlude was over. Erin gave herself a mental shake. She felt as if she had suddenly been released, and yet she had never been held. With a touch of bemusement she hurried on toward the door and the night air, forgetting the incident entirely as she saw a taxi she was determined to flag down. At this hour, if she didn’t attract the cab, they could wait hours for another one.
“Oh, thank you!” Erin gasped as she crawled into the cab and shimmied over for Casey to join her. Breathlessly, she gave the address of their apartment building and leaned back into the seat with a sigh, closing her eyes.
“He was gorgeous, in the weirdest way!” Casey began muttering. “I mean, he isn’t handsome—not like Christopher Reeve or Michael York or Richard Chamberlain—but there’s something about him. Those eyes … so compelling! Or maybe it was his chin—I love a strong jawline. He certainly wears his clothes well.”
Erin slowly and warily opened her eyes. “Casey—who or what are you talking about?”
“Him!” Casey supplied incredulously. “Come on, Erin, you’re the one who stumbled into him!”
“Oh,” Erin muttered, frowning as she tried to recall the face. Surprisingly, she found it easy. It is his eyes, she thought. But she certainly wasn’t going to say so and add fuel to Casey’s fire. Besides which, his attitude was a little blunt. No, crude. She had certainly apologized.
“Suave but ruggedly tough,” Casey was continuing. “A man’s man. And a lady’s man! Maybe he does look a little like Christopher Reeve. Those blue, blue eyes, and. that dark hair! Except his has some silver streaks here and there. He must be a little older. I think I’m in love.”
“Really?” Erin queried with cryptic amusement. “What happened to Bob?”
“Well, I love Bob!” Casey said demurely. “But good heavens, Erin, that certainly doesn’t mean I don’t have eyes anymore!”
Casey continued to chatter. Erin closed her eyes again, praying they would soon reach home. Her head was pounding, she needed to sleep, and she was so eager for her trip that her work days already seemed merciless. Casey was a wonderful friend, but Erin was afraid she’d scream and throttle her if she listened much longer.
Nor did the remaining two days before Erin’s trip improve any. On the morning before her flight, she found herself finishing up a commercial after being warned by her agent that failure to do so might result in a lawsuit. With barely an hour to spare, she nervously gave up all attempts to hail a cab and pulled her little Mazda out of the garage, deciding that at least she could park it at JFK. As luck would have it—she seemed to be following Murphy’s law to a T, everything possible was going wrong—she, who never inched over fifty-five, was stopped for speeding. The policeman, apparently charmed by her nervousness, magnanimously decreed he would not give her a ticket but a warning. However, as his “warning” escalated into a full-scale lecture, Erin began to wish he had given her a ticket.
By the time she had acquired long-term parking for her car, she was next to positive she was going to miss her flight. But the Scandinavian Air Systems baggage attendant informed her that she still had a chance to make it if she hurried. With renewed hope spurring a revival of energy, Erin began to tear through the airport toward the Scandinavian Air gate.
But Murphy’s law still applied. As she quickened her pace with the appropriate gate in view, she discovered herself blocked—too late to prevent her from plummeting straight into a pair of broad, darkly suited shoulders and from sending the tall stranger to which they were attached stumbling forward for several feet before he regained his balance. Erin teetered to regain her own balance, watching in horror as the contents of the file folder the man had been holding billowed about him in wild disarray, scattering papers about his feet as they wafted back to the ground.
“Oh, Lord!” Erin gasped. “I am sorry!”
The stranger turned to her slowly, brows raised, piercing blue eyes registering both irritation and amusement. Erin’s jaw lowered in weak astonishment and she gasped once more. “You!”
It was the same man. The same jet hair with silver-streaked temples, the same ruggedly hewn bone structure angled around the same hawklike nose, full-grim mouth, and impenetrable icefire eyes.
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Graceful? Jarod queried himself once more with incredulity. Definitely not. Erin McCabe was apparently a grade-A klutz.
“Yes, me,” he replied dryly, bending to retrieve his papers.
Erin saw the man wince slightly at the smudges that marred his crisp white pages. Of course, she thought a bit resentfully. His appearance was fastidiously neat—surely he would never allow business correspondence to be anything but. She stooped to help him, bemoaning the fact that she would surely miss her flight, her resentment blossoming to irrational anger. If he hadn’t stepped before her, she wouldn’t have collided with him, wouldn’t now be scurrying around on the floor while her plane readied for takeoff.
“You know,” he began to mutter, accepting a handful of papers and grimacing with reproach at the dirt that smudged them, making her feel like an errant adolescent, “there are, miss, a good ten million people milling about New York. Do you think you could possibly select one of the other nine million, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine with whom to collide next time?”
Erin flushed and angrily grabbed several more straying sheets of paper.
“Stop!” he groaned. “You’re cleaning the damned floor with them!”
“I said I was sorry!” Erin snapped.
“Fine, you’re sorry! Now please, just leave. I’d rather do this myself!”
Erin sat back on her heels, biting her lip. She wanted to help: she still had a minute chance of catching her flight.
“Go!” the man barked.
Erin was on her feet. He was rude and ridiculously arrogant, and for such an individual she certainly wasn’t going to miss her flight.
“I am sorry,” she said tightly. “And I certainly shall make sure we don’t collide again.”
Jarod watched her leave as he retrieved the bulk of his papers, thinking he should have had them clipped. Hell, if he’d known Erin McCabe wasn’t on the plane yet, he wouldn’t have been idly studying them to begin with. The woman was a walking disaster.
Woman! Today she looked like a slender waif. Too slender, he thought. With her blond hair loose and just waving over her shoulders, her silver eyes wide and luminous, her thin form clad in a beige corduroy pantsuit, she looked more like an adventurous teenager than one of the nation’s top models.
He smiled slightly as he watched her hurry in near panic. Pity she didn’t know her plane wouldn’t be leaving, not without him aboard. Jarod glanced down at his smudge-encrusted papers with a spurt of annoyance and uncharacteristic vengefulness. Pain in the …
His smile became grim. Good, let her worry about making her flight.
Erin was easily able to forget her unpleasant interlude as she discovered to her vast relief that she still had time to board the 747. When she was actually seated, she closed her eyes with grateful exhaustion, then reopened them to check the time on her pendant watch. The plane was leaving late, and for once in her life she was exceedingly grateful for the delay. She closed her eyes once more and sank her head back comfortably against the headrest, irrationally wishing then that the delay would last no longer. In her state of nervousness she was craving to be up in the air, lighting a cigarette, sipping on a long, cool vodka and tonic with heavy, heavy lime. She had actually made it! The next three weeks were hers, no work, no schedules, just the delightful fascination of new places and faces.
When she closed her eyes again, a frown knit her brow and a vision of ice-blue eyes set into a strong, arresting face suddenly chilled her memory and sent those strange, seemingly hot and cold shivers racing along her spine. Her eyes flew back open so that she could erase the vivid recall. Why did he return to her mind with such startling clarity? she wondered. In her haste, she had totally forgotten him. Why remember him now? Two freak incidents, both distasteful, should be forgotten. Still, Erin felt a squirming discomfort. She was so seldom blatantly uncoordinated, why the coincidence of both times occurring with the same rude and cold individual?
Coincidence?
He’s following me! Erin thought with a shade of panic. But she quickly brushed aside the notion with an inward chuckle. This man was certainly not following her. He had been totally indifferent toward her. If anything, he had been down right hostile! No, he wasn’t following her: happenstance was happenstance. And if she were remembering him, it was merely because he had the gift of making one feel impaled and touched by the force of those remarkable eyes.
Immersed in her thoughts and finally relaxed and comfortable in the plush space of her first-class seat, Erin didn’t notice that the stranger peculiarly filling her mind walked right past her. She noticed a scent, a very pleasant, woodsy and masculine scent, but she thought nothing of it. It belonged to the stranger, she knew: she must have brushed his suit while picking up his papers:
You’ll never see him again, she told herself, so don’t worry about him. After all, she amended silently, I wasn’t rude. Any harm I caused him was purely accidental. He was rude.
Yet still, as the mammoth plane shuddered, its engines thundering to takeoff, she was transfixed with her memory of the man. Why? she kept wondering. And then a shudder went through her with the force of those that riddled the giant jet. Because thoughts of him were not unpleasant, the heated chills that had coursed her spine had been exciting. The sense memory of his after-shave combined with a very masculine scent was nice.
Erin smiled to herself. It was strange, but the very rude man had made her feel very good about herself. Very normal. She laughed slightly aloud. He would probably resent it highly, but he touched chords she had thought silent forever.
Her smile faded. Thinking about the stranger made her think of Marc, and she didn’t want to think of either of them.
The Fasten Seat Belt and No Smoking Signs went off, and a pretty stewardess gave a safety speech. Erin kicked off her shoes, curled her feet beneath her, and lit a cigarette. Moments later the stewardess brought her a tall vodka and tonic. The seat beside her was empty, giving her the freedom of being in her own little world, which was nice since the flight was a long one, almost seven hours in the air.
Very comfortable, Erin squashed out the nerve-settling nicotine and slowly continued to sip at her drink as she drew out her guidebook on Russia. Determined to think of nothing else, she studiously considered what she wanted to see, managing to clear her mind of all the pain in her past. Time passed easily. After a champagne dinner was served, Erin allowed her book to drop to her lap as her eyes closed. She drifted into a doze as light and free as the white clouds they passed above.
It was late in the night when Jarod passed by her. While she slept peacefully, he was in turmoil.
In sleep she appeared entirely guileless. Her lips were curled in a small sweet smile, her slender elegant hands were curled beneath her chin. Her toes, covered in nylon, the nails painted the same fashionable maroon color as those on her long fingers, just peeked out from their curled position beneath her.
She was tall, Jarod noticed, hardly petite and delicate, and a klutz, he reminded himself. But as he stared at her, he strangely found himself touched by long-forgotten feelings. She looked like an angel … a rather sexy angel. Looks, he was well aware, could be highly deceptive.
He shrugged with accustomed professional indifference. Only time would tell if he dealt with heaven or hell.
He shifted to return to his seat, then paused; uncertain as to why. He leaned close to her face and whispered, “You should wake up, Miss McCabe, you’ll be able to see the fringes of the northern lights soon.”
She stirred slightly. Jarod straightened and moved away with sleek silence.
II
OSLO WAS REFRESHING, STOCKHOLM was marvelous with its Old Town and flavorful history, and even Helsinki, with its island of restored homes from another era, was utterly fascinating. Erin found the Scandinavians wonderfully polite, courteous, and helpful—and the majority of the people Erin met spoke English very well, sparing her from constantly having to comb through her language bo
oks.
But to Erin, her trip was just beginning—and perfectly so. Her week among the cultured and sophisticated Scandinavians had been just what she needed. As she stood in the Helsinki train station at the appointed time—“I’m EARLY!” she wrote in a quick postcard to Mary—she was sure she hadn’t felt better in years.
A sense of high excitement seemed to make her adrenaline race, and she felt incredibly alive. It was probably the cold weather, she advised herself, but whatever, it was marvelous. Ă faint mist hovered over the tracks, a pleasant tenor announced arrivals and departures in an impressive range of languages, whistles shrieked, and vital industry seemed to be taking place all over.
Her silver eyes alive with exhilaration, Erin watched everything that took place around her, wondering about the lives of the colorful people who came and went, some sad as they left loved ones, others laughing and glowing as they greeted husbands, wives, children, and lovers.
A soft smile curving her lips, Erin consulted her pendant watch. Her train was due to leave in thirty minutes, but it had yet to come in. Deciding to trust leaving her baggage on the platform, she adjusted the strap of her shoulder bag and returned to the station to post her card to Mary. She chuckled wryly as a copy of The New York Times caught her eye. She decided to buy the paper and a small stalk of brilliantly yellow bananas that were extraordinarily appealing. The cost of the fruit was ridiculously high: importing bananas to the winter bleakness of Finland must be a costly venture. “I don’t even usually like bananas!” she murmured to herself as she paid the pleasant clerk the Finnish equivalent of four dollars for three of the captivating fruit. “I have to come to Finland to develop a penchant for bananas.”
The Finnish concierge smiled at Erin, apparently aware she was dealing with an American. “You are crossing our border to the U.S.S.R.?”
“Yes,” Erin smiled in return.
“Then you must be sure to consume your purchase before you reach the border,” the woman advised. “Agriculture!” she reminded Erin. “The Soviets can be very … sticky … about such things.”
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