by Ross, Carol
“Janie, I’m not—” He couldn’t bring himself to deny it, but he couldn’t quite admit it, either. Because what would that say about him as a person if he could fall in love with someone and yet not be totally honest with her at the same time? But would he even be willing to try to make this work with her if he wasn’t? Being away from her for the past few days had made him see things differently. He had missed her. It had made him want to take advantage of whatever time they had, regardless of the outcome. It had prompted him to kiss her again, and this time he knew he could never take it back....
He leaned against the wall. But along with that, he realized he couldn’t avoid things much longer, either. What was she going to do when she found out the truth? And what was he going to do when she left him? He wasn’t sure which would come first, but both were inevitable, and both filled him with dread.
CHAPTER TWELVE
BERING WAS QUIET when, almost two hours later with Emily stuffed full of pie and carrying a take-home container full of more pie, they finally left. It was as if admitting—by not denying—his feelings to his sister, he had brought emotions that had been only simmering beneath the surface to a full rolling boil. He’d never been in love before, so along with the joy of that emotion, there was also fear. He was scared of loving her because he was afraid of losing her and he couldn’t see any scenario now where that wouldn’t happen.
The drive to his house was quiet, both of them seemingly absorbed in thought. Bering opened the door for Emily, and they walked in and removed their coats and boots.
Emily turned toward him. “Bering, are you okay?”
He had intended to talk to her about everything—about their relationship and this situation with Cam-Field. He had wanted to reassure her, and himself, that they could work something out. But now as he stared down at her, he realized that his silent admission of love had changed everything. Suddenly it seemed as if so much more was at stake. How could this have happened? All he’d wanted to do for months was to save Rankins from the evil grip of Cam-Field, but now it seemed that in order to do that he had to surrender his own chance at love.
He stared at her for a long moment and then reached out and wrapped a hand around the back of her neck, entwining his fingers in her hair. “Emily, I—” he began, but he knew that he couldn’t say the words to her. He couldn’t complicate things any more than he already had. For all his bold talk, he knew that by doing what he was doing with regard to Cam-Field she would never forgive him. And if he told her he loved her first, it would only make it worse. As Tag had suggested, it would all seem like part of some ploy. He was overwhelmed with the thoughts and feelings that were colliding within him.
“Did something happen on your trip?” she asked, her eyes wide and questioning.
A strangled sound emerged from the back of his throat. “I missed you,” he whispered, skimming his fingers lightly over her shoulders and down her arms. He bent and covered her lips with his own. He poured every bit of himself into the kiss and into his touch. He loved her, and he wanted her to love him back. And if he couldn’t say it, then he was going to show it. Even though he knew it was irrational and impossible, he wanted her to love him back so that when it was all said and done none of it would matter because they’d still have each other.
“Okay,” he finally said against her lips. “I’m going to stop kissing you now.”
“Why?” she said. “You just started again.”
He took a deep breath and looked into her eyes. “Emily, first of all—I’ve never not wanted to kiss you.”
She smiled tentatively. “Really?”
“Yes,” he said shakily. “And this means yes.” He kissed her again. And again, and then his mouth began to travel slowly toward her ear....
“Bering,” she gasped as his teeth nipped at the creamy skin of her neck.
His hands slid up from her waist and encased her rib cage, and he was struck by how tiny she really was. She seemed so much bigger when she was talking—larger than life, actually, and the thought brought a smile to his lips. He kissed her once more and then wrapped his arms around her and held her close.
* * *
A SHORT TIME later, they were browsing through Bering’s vast movie library and he was voicing his astonishment at how few Emily had actually seen. He set the ones she had seen off to the side and Emily agreed it was a pitifully small pile. Then he started a must-see stack that he insisted they would watch together.
Emily didn’t mention that they couldn’t possibly watch that many movies if she were to remain in Rankins for another year, much less the few weeks or months of time they had remaining. Their lack of time was way too depressing and one she refused to allow herself to think about.
They agreed on a movie and eventually settled on the sofa.
“I can’t believe you guys get together like that every Sunday.”
“Not every Sunday, but a lot of them.”
“How fun that must be.”
“It is,” he said. “Tell me more about your family.”
She frowned. “There’s not much to tell.”
He dipped his head down and kissed her. “Please,” he urged.
Emily sighed. “Bering—”
“Please.”
“What do you want to know?”
He had one arm curled around her shoulders and he slowly began to trail a finger up and down her arm. “What’s your dad like?”
“My biological dad died when I was a year old. He already had Aidan with Aidan’s mom, Stephanie. Then he married my mom and had me. He died a year later—Aidan was four. We both look like him from the photos that I’ve seen.”
“Your mom remarried?
“She did. When I was three, so the only dad I’ve ever known is my stepfather.”
“So...a mom, a stepdad and a half brother—if I remember correctly?”
“Yep, that’s it.”
“What’s your brother like?”
“He’s great—supersmart, like Reagan. He’s very easygoing and laid-back—not like me. He’s a scientist, a botanist.”
“And you said he lives in Oregon?”
“Well, when he’s not traveling he’s usually there. He goes all over the world to study plants. He’s passionate about endangered plant species.”
“Wow, that’s really cool.”
“It is,” she said with a proud smile. “I’d love for you to meet him.”
“What about your parents?”
“What about them?” she asked soberly.
“Why don’t you want to talk about them?”
It felt strange hearing that spoken aloud. Why didn’t she like to talk about them or her relationship with them? “Um...”
He reached over and picked up her hand. He began to gently rub the palm. The contact was incredibly soothing and for some reason she decided to tell him. He was so easy to talk to. She inhaled and then blew out a long breath. “We’re not close. I love my mom, but we’re very different. She has these really specific ideas about what being a woman means—staying home and taking care of her husband. She’s very dependent on my stepfather for everything and I don’t like it. I don’t understand it. She doesn’t think my career is going to find me a husband. She doesn’t understand my choices. It’s a source of tension between us.”
“So what does she do with her time?”
“She gets lots of facials, laser procedures and plastic surgeries. She shops and gets her nails done. She does do some charity work but honestly I think she does it more to socialize than anything else. We don’t have anything in common and we don’t have much to talk about.”
Bering pressed a kiss to her temple. “What about your stepdad?”
Emily thought for a minute about how to describe someone she had such complicated feelings for. “My
stepfather is a good man. He’s a great provider and a good husband to my mom. But he’s also a difficult-to-please workaholic. Now that I’m an adult things are better—or they were until recently—because we have this driving work ethic in common. But we don’t talk about anything personal. We aren’t a family unit in the traditional sense—nothing at all like your family.”
* * *
BERING LIFTED HER HAND and kissed her fingertips. He felt bad because although she relayed the information impassively, he could tell she was feeling anything but. What Emily described was the polar opposite of his family. He couldn’t imagine functioning without the cohesive love and support of his family. He wanted Emily to have that; he wanted her to be a part of a real family—a family like his.
“I’m so sorry,” he said.
She shrugged. “It is what it is. I do have Aidan, and his mom is really great to me, too. I think of her like an aunt. She always made sure that Aidan and I had as much of a brother/sister relationship as we could. It’s because of her that I saw so much of him growing up.”
Bering decided to ask her the question that had been nagging at him since he’d met her, and especially since his conversation with Tag. “Why are you here, Emily?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why did you come to Rankins? I mean, I can deduce that you are obviously pretty high up in the ranks of Cam-Field, so you must have some discretion about the jobs you work on, so why here? I know for a fact Cam-Field is working on projects in Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas and North Dakota right now—to name a few.”
“Someone has done his homework, I see.”
Bering smiled and squeezed her hand.
“I requested it,” she confessed.
“Really?” That was not what he expected her to say.
“Yep,” she said. “I, um, I sort of had an issue at work a few months ago.”
“An issue?” he prodded.
“I was passed over for a promotion,” she said. “I had broken up with this guy.” She shook her head as if to convey his unimportance. “He got the promotion instead of me—undeservedly so, but that’s another story. I was more upset about the promotion than the guy. And, as this is Cam-Field’s first attempt to establish business up here in Alaska, I impulsively jumped at the opportunity to take it on.”
He nodded. “Because you thought it would serve the double purpose of showing your boss what you’ve got that he missed out on and getting away at the same time?”
“Exactly, but unlike you, I did not thoroughly do my homework. I was unprepared for both the hostile environment and the hostile community.”
Bering leaned over and kissed her. “I’d be willing to bet it’s probably the only time in your entire life that you have neglected to do your homework.”
“That’s probably true.”
“I’m so glad you chose this particular time to become a slacker.”
“Me, too,” she answered with a grin. She reached out and threaded a hand around the back of his neck, pulling his face close to hers. “Bering?”
“Hmm,” he said.
“My turn.”
“Oh? Okay. I thought you were going to kiss me.”
“I may, but first, thank you, Bering. Thank you very much. Now tell me all about it.”
“What?”
“The scarf—I thanked Janie for it tonight, but she let me know that I should really be thanking you. So tell me.”
He grinned and sat back, but entwined his fingers with hers. “Oh...well, I kept watching you at all these events—freezing like crazy—and I kept wondering why you didn’t dress appropriately. So, I had my sister knit you the scarf. You probably aren’t even aware of it, but you go like this a lot.” He pulled at the collar of his shirt, bunching it up beneath his chin.
“Bering, that is so sweet. But what about the wolf button? It’s absolutely gorgeous—a little work of art.”
“That’s a piece of whalebone that Kella Jakobs scrimshawed for me. I used to wear it to bring me luck. I love it and I, um, I wanted you to have some small bit of Alaska with you when you went home.” He smiled slowly and hoped the feeling in his heart was showing in his eyes. He admitted, “And I liked the idea of you wearing something that had been mine. So I asked Janie to sew it on. I hope you don’t mind that I gave you a used button....”
Emily opened her mouth but no sound emerged. She closed it, stared at him for a minute and then leaned toward him again. “Bering?” she whispered.
“Yes?”
“I am going to kiss you now....”
* * *
EMILY WAS DEFINITELY warming up to the place, she decided as she stepped out into the frozen morning air. Now that she was dressed for it, she hardly seemed to notice the cold anymore. Even the frigid wind that used to blow down the collar of her jacket had been waylaid by her scarf. She gazed around in wonder; Bering was right, there was a rugged kind of beauty about the place that she was beginning to appreciate, especially when she was out at Bering’s cabin watching the wildlife or, even better, out at Bering’s cabin watching Bering.
And he’d definitely made it his business to show her the finer points that Rankins had to offer. In addition to sightseeing around his cabin, they’d done more snowshoeing and gone sledding with his nephews. They also went on a double date with Tag and Amanda to the Cozy Caribou for the house sirloin dinner he had promised her. They’d spent more time with his family and she’d met some of his friends.
She had to admit to herself that he had a good life. But she certainly wasn’t going to confess these thoughts aloud. She’d already conceded enough to him as it was. Of course, just about anyone’s life would be easier if they were as popular in this town as he was. Even the people that she knew were on her side still loved Bering. Laurel had been right about that; it appeared as if the whole James family shared that beloved status, and there had to be close to a hundred of them if you counted up the entire extended family.
And even though she and Bering were clearly waging a battle professionally, they had all treated her with nothing but kindness and respect. So far, Bering had been right—business appeared to be just business where the Jameses were concerned. But Emily still believed that that would all change if—when—Cam-Field won the right to destroy their little town.
Destroy? When exactly she had started to think of this assignment in Bering’s terms she wasn’t sure, but as the days had passed, she acknowledged that was what she had begun to do. Though she didn’t believe it necessarily, she assured herself, she was just getting caught up in the passion and community pride that blazed in the town. It didn’t do any good to remind herself that in all her years with Cam-Field, she’d never gotten quite so caught up in it before.
For the most part, she and Bering had managed to avoid discussing the issue beyond a lighthearted teasing about who was winning the public favor. But underlying the new level they had reached in their relationship, the topic still simmered. Emily tried to tell herself that it didn’t matter, but the persistent ache in her heart reminded her otherwise.
Laurel had been more than fair in presenting Cam-Field’s side in the Rankins Press. She was going to be publishing her editorial in favor of Cam-Field’s development at the end of the week. Laurel had become a friend and Emily was sure that she was also a big part of the reason that they hadn’t been run out of town.
And that was why she had agreed to sit for an interview. Laurel thought it would help her case if people knew more about her as a person. But for some reason Emily was nervous. There wasn’t that much to know about her. She was afraid that people would see how uninteresting she really was, because compared to life in Rankins, hers seemed so mundane. Her plan was to try to stick to the issues surrounding Cam-Field’s presence in Rankins as much as possible.
“So, now that you have been here for a mo
nth or so, how do you like it in Rankins?” Laurel asked as she pushed a button on her recorder and set it on the desk.
“I do like it,” Emily said without hesitation. And she realized with a start that she really meant it. “And in spite of what some people may have you believe, Laurel, I want to preserve all the core aspects that make Rankins such a unique and special place. But let’s be honest here. Rankins hasn’t seen much growth in recent years. We’d like to change that—to help ensure that Rankins can continue to exist, and not just exist like it has been doing. We’d like to see it grow and thrive.”
“That’s a pretty strong assertion and the implication within that statement is that Rankins needs Cam-Field. But as I’m sure you’re aware, Rankins has existed since the gold-rush days.”
“Unfortunately, the gold is gone now, Laurel. But what is here is a wealth of oil deposits,” Emily pointed out. “And Rankins only stands to benefit from that. But without utilizing that resource, the projections for the future economic growth of Rankins for the next decade show little to no growth. But with Cam-Field’s help, those numbers head in the exact opposite direction.”
“The citizens of Rankins will have a chance to voice for themselves what kind of growth they’d like to see next Sunday at the town-hall meeting, correct?”
“That is absolutely true, and if the community involvement that I’ve seen since I’ve been here is any indication, we’re going to have a packed house.”
“You can count on that. But why is Cam-Field so concerned with what the community thinks? It’s really only the town council who votes on the permit approval.”
“That’s a really great question, Laurel. We, at Cam-Field, believe that what we do is more than just provide jobs and dollars for a community. Our goal is always to collectively improve a way of life. Economic growth doesn’t mean much in a town if the people aren’t benefiting from it. If Cam-Field intended to come in here and rob Rankins of its valuable resources, as some members of this community have been suggesting, then that would only be benefiting Cam-Field. We believe that business of this kind should be a give-and-take. That’s why we’ve pledged the millions of dollars that we have to improve this community—for the hospital, the school and in the construction of the community center.”