Libby watched him stretch like an awakening feline and walk lithely toward the door. He hadn’t said it by way of apology, only as a flat statement of fact. More than one logger had had a few choice words to say about impact studies and biologists getting in the way of logging operations with their bureaucratic drivel. But none of them had regarded her the way he was doing as he turned and studied her in the gathering silence. Right now she felt like one of those bugs under a microscope.
“So when are you coming up to initiate the study, Doctor?” he asked, and then a cruel smile drifted across his features. “Or will it be one of your city-bred assistants?”
She managed a cutting smile. “No, I’ll be coming.”
He pursed his lips, leaning lazily against the door. “You look pretty athletic. Nice, strong legs. You’re taller than the average woman, so you ought to have a decent stride on you. What do you weigh, around one hundred and thirty pounds, Doctor?”
Libby felt her face growing warm again and she shifted uncomfortably in the chair. Dan Wagner had a way of making her feel naked before his scrutinizing eyes. “Close to that,” she murmured, confused by his cryptic question. “Why?”
Wagner threw her an acid smile of contempt. “You ever backpacked?”
“No.”
“I could be a real bastard and make you find your own equipment, but I won’t. I want to get in and get out of that study area just as fast as we can. I don’t have time to play nursemaid to a tenderfoot. You’re going to be excess baggage on this trip, and I might as well get you outfitted as best I can.” He seemed to be thinking out loud more than talking directly to her. “What’s your shoe size?”
“Eight and a half B.”
“Ever walk more than a mile anywhere?” he drawled.
A glint of fire flared briefly in her brown eyes. “On occasion,” she replied, stung.
“Then you’d better start walking at least a mile every night and build up to the point where you can walk four miles in about an hour.”
“This isn’t some sort of marathon!” she shot back, sitting up in the chair.
Dan scowled. “Oh, yes it is, Dr. Stapleton. It’s my race you’re calling and I aim to have you in shape to take the punishment of a hundred-mile trek and still be able to take your damn samples of soil, water, insects and God knows what else.”
Libby tried to ignore the sarcasm in his tone. She flipped open the pages of her calendar appointment book. “All right,” she muttered, “name the day, Mr. Wagner.”
Without batting an eye he replied, “Three weeks from now, Doctor. I’ll pick you up at the Challis, Idaho airport at noon. Be there.” He yanked open the door and then turned. “Oh, one more thing—get some antivenom serum from your physician and bring it along with you. If you get bitten by a snake, I’ll be damned if I’m going to haul your body out of the interior.”
Libby opened her mouth and then snapped it shut, her brown eyes glittering with anger. He was so damn tough and uncompromising! She wearily touched her brow, reminding herself that one never got cooperation from others by lobbing insults back and forth. “I will do my level best not to become an albatross around your neck, Mr. Wagner.”
Dan gave her a measuring look. “You hungry?”
The unexpected change in his tone and the question caught her off-guard. “Hungry?” she repeated stupidly. Why was she acting like an unsure teenager around this threatening male! It galled her. Perhaps it was the lateness of the hour, or her increased workload, or both. She wasn’t sure.
His face lost some of its initial hardness as he studied her. “Yes, hungry.” He consulted his watch. “It’s after 9:00 p.m. and I haven’t eaten anything since noon.” He slowly appraised her from head to toe, liking what he saw more than he should have. At that moment Dr. Elizabeth Stapleton looked vulnerable, and it moved him from his implacable stance. “My hotel is right around the corner, and they have a coffee shop that’s open all night.” He gave a slight shrug of his shoulders. “Besides, there’s a list of things you should draw up that you’ll need for this backpacking trip. I don’t want you coming poorly equipped.”
Libby detected the thaw in his voice and in his eyes. Her shoulders, drawn up from the tension, relaxed, and she forced a slight smile.
“All right, Mr. Wagner, I’ll join you for a late dinner and we’ll discuss the details of my trip to Challis.” Her voice sounded wooden, even to herself, and she saw his eyes narrow. With a wave of her slender hand she murmured, “I’m sorry, it’s just been one very long day. Let me get my purse and attaché case and then we can leave.”
Libby bridled beneath his watchful stare as she went through the process of picking up the necessary items. She had never been made to feel so uncomfortable and yet thrilled by any man. And whether she wanted to admit it or not, she was glad of the invitation to dinner. It would give her a chance to try to establish a more congenial working relationship with this cougar of a forestry manager. She chose to ignore the second reason why she looked forward to the dinner: Dan Wagner was a breed of man she had never encountered, and she was fascinated by him. He reminded her of a thunderstorm: constantly changing and master of everything that he touched. A slight smile pulled at her lips as she switched off the office lights.
“I hope you’re a little quicker about gathering articles in the field, Doctor.”
Libby’s heart sank, her head snapping up, meeting those glacier-blue eyes once again. Why was he continuing to snipe at her as if she were his enemy? She had an option: meet him head-on in a clash of words or call a truce. The truce was infinitely more appealing.
“All right, Mr. Wagner, since you insist upon being frank and to the point, I’m going to be also.” She walked to within a foot of where he stood out in the dimly lit hall. His face was shadowed. A sense of danger coupled with excitement washed over Libby. “I’m very tired tonight. And although your observations are well intended, I’m just not up to coping with your brutal assessments.”
Dan studied her in the half light, his eyes glittering with newfound interest. “Honesty,” he murmured. “That’s a rarity at the corporate-management level.” He tilted his head. “Tell me, Doctor, how do you manage the politics around here if you’re this honest all the time?”
Libby heard the genuine surprise in his voice, and she saw it reflected in his eyes for just a second. Either Wagner was paranoid or he had gotten shafted and shuffled around too many times by corporate people. He was a blunt man, but not as cruel as she had first thought. It was his way of getting to the heart of a problem. “I don’t play politics very well, Mr. Wagner.”
“That’s obvious.”
Libby met and matched his stare. She had to suppress a growing smile. “Thank you for the compliment. Now, do we have a deal? Will you keep your observations for another time when I’m better prepared to handle them in a positive way?”
Dan smiled. He slid his large, callused hand beneath her elbow, guiding her down the hall. “It’s a deal, Doctor.”
Dan had to remind himself to stop staring at her. Beneath the overhead fixtures of the stylish coffee shop, her golden hair blazed in a halo of light. The skin was drawn tightly across her cheekbones, showing her fatigue. Again he felt a prick of guilt over his abruptness with her. But dammit, Cascade Amalgamated had put him in an impossible position. His anger was aimed at her because she would be the millstone that he would have to wear during that journey into the interior. Still... Dan savagely quelled feelings that had been aroused simply by her quiet presence. He wrestled with those emotions, not having felt them in almost fifteen years. Grimly tightening his lips, he forced himself to tear his gaze from her and study the menu.
After ordering their meals, Dan rested his elbows on the table, meeting her gaze. “You ever been out in the forest?”
Libby shook her head. “If you call Golden Gate Park a forest, then I can qualify. Otherwise I’m afraid not.”
He liked her sense of humor. It became her. What the hell was he doing ke
eping a list of what he did and did not like about her? Frustrated with himself, Dan continued to assess just how much of a problem she was going to be to him out in the forest.
“You’re a biologist. I thought all of your kind hung out in the lonely, isolated edges of civilization.”
“I’m a city biologist. All of my environmental-impact studies have been on suburban and city sites.” Libby knew she should have kept that information to herself because his face tightened.
“The bug men I know prefer isolation to the city,” he growled.
She smiled at his reference to biologists as “bug men.” It was true: many biologists spent untold hours out in the wilderness, setting up highly detailed studies to seek out nature’s balance in a given area. “City-born and city-bred, I’m afraid, Mr. Wagner.”
He gave a doleful shake of his head. “Then it makes you even more of a liability on this trip than I first thought. How in the hell do you expect to know what to look for out in the forest if you have no previous experience in that field, Doctor?”
Libby put a tight rein on her temper. “That’s a fair question,” she said. She rested her chin on folded hands in front of her, holding his burning blue gaze. “I’m coming in to set up the management guidelines for the environmental-impact project. My job isn’t actually to go out and do the studies; we’ll get bids from firms who hire themselves out for that purpose. So, you see, my lack of experience isn’t really a consideration in this case.”
She was smart, Dan grudgingly decided. And she was unlike any woman he had ever met. “If you think on your feet this well, there may be some hope for you after all.”
Libby smiled tiredly. “What are some of the items you wanted to discuss with me?” The waitress brought their orders, and between bites Libby made a list of what she needed. Later, over coffee, she pondered her growing list
“So, what is the most important item here?”
“Boots,” Dan answered emphatically. “Matter of fact, when you finish your coffee, I’m going to measure your feet. I’ll get you the boots. I can’t risk a tenderfoot buying the wrong pair and ending up with blisters the first day of hiking.”
She raised one eyebrow in question. “Measure my feet?”
He barely nodded his head. “Yes. I have a tape measure up in my room. In Challis there’s a good boot store. I’ll take the information back and then send you a pair.”
Libby hid a smile. Despite his gruffness, he seemed to be concerned—even if it was in his own defense. “I never realized that a boot could be that important.”
“When you’re carrying thirty to fifty pounds of gear on your back, Doctor, those boots had better feel just right to you. Otherwise you’re either going to blister or bruise your feet.” He pulled out some money to pay for the meal and then rose. “And like I said before, I’m not going to carry you into or out of the interior.”
Libby rose, her heartbeat quickening. She wanted to say, “Just being around you is an adventure.” It struck her as amusing that he was inviting her up to his room just to get fitted for a pair of hiking boots. She felt his hand on her elbow, gently guiding her out of the restaurant and into the plush lobby toward the bank of elevators. His body brushed against hers and she experienced a thrill of pleasure.
The hotel room was lit by one small lamp on a coffee table. Dan reached over, flipping on the main switch.
“Have a seat, Doctor. I’ll be back in a moment.”
Libby sat down on the small couch, her purse resting in her lap. She watched with interest as he brought an oversize notebook, a pencil and a small cloth tape measure. As he knelt at her feet he met her interested gaze.
“First things first.” He reached over on the dresser and picked up two large pairs of gray socks. “Put these on,” he ordered.
Libby leaned over, gently removing her high heels. Heat flowed from her neck up into her face as Wagner came within inches of her. She tried to disregard the hungry look that glittered in the depths of his eyes as he watched her struggle with the heavy socks.
“Why socks?” she protested.
“You always wear two pairs with any boot to protect your skin,” he answered patiently. She had damn nice legs, he decided. But then, he had known that from the moment he had met her. There was something childlike in her struggles with the socks that brought a wry smile to his face.
Libby sat back. “There,” she sighed. Her laughter was infectious as she looked down at them. “I must say, this doesn’t look like the height of fashion.”
Dan found himself returning her laughter. How could this woman who exhibited the elegance of San Francisco society suddenly lapse into self-deprecating humor? He liked people who could poke fun at themselves. He placed the notebook beneath her right foot, carefully drawing the outline of it.
“You like to laugh, don’t you?”
Libby gave him a startled look. “Why, yes. Doesn’t everyone?’’
“No.” He raised his head, drinking in her puzzled features. “Especially very beautiful, well-bred women who were raised with all the finer things of life.”
Her honey-brown eyes took on a look of devilry. “Just because you see me as a cosmopolitan snob, that doesn’t mean I can’t laugh or enjoy life, Mr. Wagner.”
Dan grinned, maintaining a grip on her foot. He rested it on his long, well-muscled thigh. There was something primitive and stirring about touching her. He slid his hand down over her shapely calf. “Maybe there’s hope for you after all, Doctor,” he said blandly. “You know, you aren’t in as bad shape as I thought,” he said, more to himself than for her benefit, running his hand more firmly across her calf.
Libby blushed and compressed her lips. His touch acted like a hot brand on her nylon-clad skin. She could feel the rough texture of his fingers as they slid over her ankle. She wanted to pull away. She wanted him to continue. A tumult of emotion momentarily silenced her, and all she could do was stare at him.
Dan forced himself back to the business at hand. Taking the tape, he measured her slender ankle, the ball of her foot and the instep. Carefully marking down the information, he released her right foot. “What do you do, work out at a health spa?” he asked, reaching for her left foot and placing it on his thigh.
Libby swallowed, her heart pounding at the base of her throat. His touch was electric, triggering a myriad shocking and pleasant sensations within her body. “I—uh, yes, I work out three days a week.”
He regarded her for a moment “A city snob working up a bit of a sweat? Doesn’t that go against your image, Doctor?”
There was a pleasant tension building between them, and Libby could sense the fragile bond of trust. Since he approved so highly of honesty, she felt it best to remain on that tack. “You must hate city women.”
Dan drew her foot on the paper. “Now, whatever gave you that idea?” he drawled.
“Your whole attitude, Mr. Wagner. Taking sniping shots at me because I do try to stay fit even though I sit at a desk all day long isn’t necessary.”
“It was a backhanded compliment. Most of the women I know are country-born and—bred. They’re used to working. They have calluses on their hands.”
Libby had the sudden urge to hide her hands so that he couldn’t see her palms. She didn’t have one single callus. “And city women are weak, lazy and snobbish in your book?”
He raised his head, his blue eyes darkening. “That was my general assessment until just now. You obviously aren’t a weak woman, Doctor.”
“Weak? In what sense of the word?” Why was she interested in what he thought of her?
“There aren’t many women who care to stand up to me. Or men, for that matter.”
She smiled wryly. “I can see why. The kitchen gets pretty hot where you’re concerned.”
Dan shrugged. “You even have some old-fashioned logic. I’m impressed, Doctor.”
He finished measuring her left foot, his hand remaining around her ankle.
Libby pressed forward with her d
esire to know something of how Dan Wagner operated. She was acutely aware that her foot was resting on his thigh, his hand nonchalantly curled around her ankle. “So, you see me as a feminist?” she probed.
Reluctantly, Dan released her foot “I have no qualms with a woman doing any job—provided she can do it”
“Then strong women don’t get under your skin?”
A sliver of a smile touched his eyes as he watched her struggle out of the socks. “Contrary to popular opinion, Doctor, I like a woman who can stand on her own two feet.”
Libby handed him the socks, her fingers brushing his momentarily. She felt the room getting warm. Or was it her? There was a dangerous tension lingering between them, and she was feeling flustered, unable to think as quickly as she might ordinarily. “You said you feel that city women are weak, lazy and snobbish. I just wanted to know how many of those adjectives apply to me, Mr. Wagner.” She picked up her shoes, slipping them back on her nylon-clad feet.
“Well, if you’re lazy, it will show up soon enough. Being out on the trail isn’t for anyone who doesn’t have stamina.” He gave her a dark look. “And if you do manage to come through this experience in one piece, you’ll earn my respect.”
She rested both hands on her thighs, her eyes sparkling with challenge. “Obviously you don’t see me finishing.”
Wagner rose, standing over her. “Let’s just say I’ll suspend my judgment of you, Dr. Stapleton. You’ve already shown you have a backbone.”
He walked over to the door. “Come on. I’ll walk you to your car.”
Libby picked up her purse. “You don’t have to.” She gave him a slight smile. “We strong women can take care of ourselves.”
Before she knew what had happened, she felt Dan Wagner’s fingers on her shoulder. In one deft, seemingly lazy move he had imprisoned her within his strong, work-hardened hands. She was wildly aware of his fingers caressing the fabric at her shoulders. Her heart soared, her breathing suddenly uneven at his masculine closeness. Her eyes lifted upward to meet his dark, appraising stare.
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