by Nancy Warren
“Hard to say. And the current’s swift.” He scanned the riverbed. “Let’s try going upstream, maybe there’s an easier way.”
She nodded and they followed the river’s edge. He rejected a series of rocks that would involve jumping about three feet from one wet rock to another. “We’ll come back if we have to.”
After another couple of hundred yards he said, “Aha!” and pointed. A fallen tree made a sort of bridge across the river. He climbed up first, then reached for her hand and helped her up. The downed cedar was solid and wide, but branches and dampness meant they had to step carefully. He kept hold of her hand all the way across. Once they’d climbed down again, he grabbed her close and kissed her. Then, once more, they hiked west.
Today’s hike wasn’t a lot different than yesterday’s except for the knowledge that she and the man hacking through bush ahead of her were now intimate.
Instead of imagining what he looked like naked, she knew. Her hands had caressed the lines of muscle in his back, she’d clutched at those shoulders that were bunching and flexing with the effort of widening their path.
They were together. Somehow, they’d make it.
* * *
THEY HIT THE logging road around two in the afternoon. Claire was so tired she was putting one foot in front of the other automatically and barely registered the change of terrain from narrow, root-and-rock-studded path to wide-open gravel until Max yelled, “We did it!”
She looked up and they were on an honest-to-goodness logging road.
A smile of relief bloomed on her lips. “We did it!” she yelled back at him. She forgot how tired she was as she ran over and threw herself at him. Laughing, they kissed and hugged and she knew they’d made it.
“I have no idea how long we’ll have to walk to get to civil—” She stopped talking when she heard a sound so wonderful she thought she might be dreaming. It was the whine of a big engine working hard.
Within minutes, a logging truck appeared, trailing dust clouds. She had no idea if hikers ever came this way, but so there’d be no doubt that they were in need of help, she ran out into the road and waved crazily. The truck geared down, crested the hill and stopped on a flat stretch of road just ahead of them.
They ran to the cab window. Two sunburned guys in ball caps looked out at them.
“Do you have a phone?” Max asked.
“You the two that went missing in a small plane two days ago?”
She and Max exchanged glances. “Yep.”
“Welcome back. There’s a whole heap of people looking for you.”
After that, it was less than half an hour before a chopper was landing on that flat stretch of gravel road.
They scrambled into the helicopter and she discovered she knew the pilot. His name was Steve and he worked for a helicopter company called Mountain Wing Adventures.
“How’s Grandma?” Claire said as soon as she climbed on board.
“Lynette’s fine, apart from worried about you, of course. Anybody hurt?”
“No.”
“Good.” And he handed them both bottles of water.
Even though Steve had reassured her about Lynette, she could not rest until the chopper landed and she saw that familiar and much-loved figure standing outside the office watching the landing. Lynette wasn’t the only one, Claire realized. Almost a dozen pilots and mechanics stood with her. Pretty much the entire staff of Polar Air was here.
As soon as it was safe, she tumbled out of the chopper and ran for Lynette. She realized that the assembled staff were all cheering.
Her grandmother reached for her. They hugged and hugged. She felt a tremor running through Lynette and realized her grandmother was crying.
Tears were something she’d witnessed from her grandmother maybe three times in her life.
“It’s okay. I’m safe. You’re safe. We’re fine.” To her shock she realized her own cheeks were wet.
“I was so scared I was going to lose you,” Lynette said when she could finally speak.
“You didn’t.”
“Are you all right?” Her grandmother ran her hands down Claire’s arms as though checking for damage.
“I’m fine. Tired and sick of these clothes, but fine.”
She turned to accept hugs and backslaps from the crew. Max was being welcomed home in the same fashion, though there were fewer hugs and more backslaps in his case.
She realized that he’d already become part of their team, more so now that he’d endured this ordeal with her and they’d both emerged unharmed. He’d gone from being the new guy, the one who still had to prove himself to gain acceptance, to a man who’d earned the respect of the crew at Polar Air.
He’d obviously cemented himself in Lynette’s esteem, too, based on the huge hug he was receiving from her grandmother.
After the hugs and congrats, she noticed Tom Richter, a reporter from the local paper, was waiting to talk to her.
“Hi, Tom,” she said.
“Glad to see you home safe,” he said. Tom was in his late twenties. He’d come to Spruce Bay as an intern at the Spruce Bay Sentinel after getting a degree in journalism. Jobs were scarce in the field and Tom was clearly never going to be New York Times material. He’d stayed in town after his internship, made Spruce Bay his home. As tired as she was, she understood he had a job to do.
“Thanks. Glad to be home.”
“I’d like to do an interview with you and Max Varo when you get a minute.”
“Sure. Of course. But give me a day, will you? I need to take a shower, eat some decent food that isn’t fish and sleep in a real bed first.”
“No problem. Can I get a picture now? For the front page of this week’s paper?”
She understood that, like it or not, she was news, but she had her vanity. “I’m a mess. I don’t want my photograph in the paper looking like I just spent three days in the bush.”
“Okay. I got a few shots when you first got off the chopper.” He looked at his camera with dislike and she suspected he wasn’t too keen on the fact that he was a photojournalist whether he liked it or not. The Spruce Bay Sentinel couldn’t afford a photography department. “I’m not sure how good they are.”
“When you interview us tomorrow you can get a picture if you need one.”
“Okay.” He put away his camera. “I’ll interview the chopper pilot. Get his take on the rescue.”
“Good plan. I’m going to shower.”
Tom’s cell phone rang. He answered it and his voice sharpened. “What? Are you sure? He’s dead?”
He shoved his phone away. “Gotta go. Man, what a week for news.”
“What happened?” Lynette asked. “Who’s dead?”
The reporter turned. “Frank Carmondy. Car accident. He wrapped his vehicle around a tree. Must have been headed on a trip. He had a bunch of stuff in the back and the first person on scene said the car smelled like a brewery. There was an open bottle of scotch on the seat beside the um—Frank.”
Lynette wavered for a moment and both Max and Claire reached for her, but she held on. “Frank was on the phone regularly asking if there was any news of you. Honestly, he sounded as worried as I was. I know we’ve had our differences, but when you were in trouble he couldn’t have been more concerned. When I told him they’d found you and were bringing you home, he was so happy he couldn’t say anything for a full minute. He told me how glad he was that you were safe and his voice sounded so strange I think he might have been crying.”
“You talked to him what? An hour ago?” Max asked.
Lynette nodded, sadness showing in her eyes. “About that.”
Tom said, “Did he sound drunk?”
Lynette made a helpless gesture. “I was so happy I couldn’t say.”
“He must have left right away. His car was found fifty miles out of town, heading south. Wow. What a week for Polar Air. I better go, but I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Thank God Frank was alone,” Lynette said.
“What was he doing so far from town?”
“Such a tragedy,” Lynette sighed.
Max and Claire exchanged glances. “Sounds like karma to me,” Max muttered.
“Come on up to the house and let me get you something to eat,” Lynette said. “I’ll grieve for Frank tomorrow. Today, I will not have my happiness marred. My baby’s back safe and sound.” She kept patting Claire on the back as though she needed to feel that she was real and whole and truly unharmed.
“We need to see about retrieving the aircraft,” Max said.
“You need to see about a nap, young man,” Lynette told him, with a hands-on-her-hips stance that brooked no opposition.
“Okay. But I want back on the schedule tomorrow.” He gave her a steely-eyed stare that wasn’t a bad counterattack to the hands-on-hips thing. Claire watched with interest as two of the strongest wills she’d ever known butted up against each other.
“We’ll see what the doctor says.”
“No doctors,” she and Max said in unison.
Lynette made a rude noise. “Neither of you are flying anywhere until you are cleared by a physician.” She shook her finger at both of them. “And you know it.”
Because they both did they muttered but quit arguing.
“Now, I’ve got hot soup on the stove and as much food as you can eat.”
“Shower first,” Claire said.
Max nodded. “Me, too. I need some clean clothes, as well.” He grinned suddenly. “But I’ll take you up on the food. Give me twenty minutes.”
When she stepped inside Lynette’s home the smell of coffee was more than she could resist. She went straight to the pot, poured herself a fresh mug, added milk and sugar, and closed her eyes to fully enjoy the first sip. “You don’t know how good coffee tastes until you’re deprived,” she said.
“Take it with you.”
She did, thankful that she still kept spare clothes at Lynette’s place. She’d head back to her own small house on the property soon enough. For now she wanted to be fussed over.
When Claire returned to the kitchen feeling clean again and wearing a fresh shirt and a faded pair of jeans, Max was already there. Like her, he was sipping coffee.
He’d managed a remarkable transformation in a short time. The scruffy, unkempt man she’d been with for the past few days was once again the clean-cut, tidy Max Varo she’d first met. He was clean-shaven, wearing a crisp white shirt. She’d have assumed it was brand-new except that all his shirts appeared freshly ironed all day long.
His jeans held a suspicious crease that made her think he might have ironed them, as well.
Their gazes connected and she felt a slight shift occur, as though now that they had washed off the outer effects of their wilderness experience, some of their wild intimacy had washed off along with it. She felt his slight stiffness around her, a formality that they’d dispensed within the bush.
“Sit down,” Lynette said. “I’m dishing up soup and I’ve got sandwiches and fruit coming up.”
Max waited until Claire was seated before sitting beside her. As he settled their arms brushed and a rush of lust hit her. He shifted his chair farther away, probably afraid of burning his shirt from the heat they generated. She had to accept that they could try to put a little distance between them but their bodies weren’t interested in playing along.
13
MAX HAD A problem. In fact, he had several of them. And when he spent any time at all thinking about them he realized that all his problems were related.
To Claire.
To the bravest, most amazing woman he’d ever known. When the plane had started to go down he’d seen her face, watched the fierce battle she’d fought. She hadn’t panicked, not for a second. And she knew, likely better than he, how desperate their situation was. She’d kept her head and saved both their lives.
Was that the moment he’d realized he was in love with her?
Or was it later, when she’d cheerfully made the best of things on their hike out of the bush? With her plane underwater and her business in further peril.
Or was it later still when their bodies had joined and he’d felt something he’d never felt before in all his years of dating and enjoying women?
He couldn’t pinpoint exactly when it had happened. All he knew was that he had fallen for the woman whose company he was planning to buy and return to profitability.
Which was great except for the small fact that he hadn’t bothered to tell her why he was really working for Polar Air.
Had he become arrogant? Rich enough that he did whatever the hell he pleased without considering how his actions might affect others?
He’d gone to Spruce Bay on a lark, planning to find out what was going on at Polar Air without revealing his true reasons for being there. His undercover operation had never seemed underhanded to him, but when he looked at the situation through Claire’s eyes he had a bad feeling she wouldn’t agree. Especially now. She was still reeling from the knowledge that she’d been betrayed by one man who worked for her.
He didn’t want to be the second.
Betrayal.
Disloyalty.
He didn’t like the way either notion sat like lead in his gut.
The burning continued as he visited Doc Bouton, with his gray hair in a ponytail and toenails that needed cutting hanging over his well-worn Birkenstocks.
“You hit your head on the way down?” Doc demanded as he shone a light into Max’s eyes.
“Nope.”
“Hmm.” He tested reflexes, asked a lot of questions. After twenty minutes he said, “You were damned lucky.”
“I was damned lucky to have Claire Lundstrom in the pilot’s seat.”
Doc cracked a grin. “That’s what I meant.”
“So? Am I cleared for takeoff?”
“You really want to fly right away? After nearly getting killed out there?”
It was Max’s turn to grin. “Hell, yeah.”
But the grin faded when he returned to Polar Air to find Claire with an expression of worry on her face.
“Everything okay?”
She forced a smile. “It will be. It’s not helping the bottom line that we’re down a plane, and I’ve got a ton of paperwork to fill out. There’s an insurance claim. And the plane’s got to be salvaged and the cause of the crash investigated.” The smile turned to a comical frown. “I hate paperwork.”
“I know.”
“Plus, the mine still wants that piece of equipment.” She drummed her fingertips against the counter beside the computer. “I need to fly to Anchorage, get a replacement and deliver it up to them.”
“You’re planning to fly that route again?” He was a pretty hardy pilot but the thought of doing that very route again so soon made his stomach feel a little woozy.
“Gotta get back on the horse, Max.”
He suspected that she was putting on a tough act. “Let me go,” he said impulsively.
She shook her head. “I need to do this.” Her gritted teeth confirmed his theory about the tough act. “We need to keep the mine’s business and I need to get back in the air. It’s like lightning striking twice. Doesn’t happen.”
“Statistically, that’s not actually true. Lightning has no memory of where it’s struck. It can and does strike the same place twice.”
Her stare was wide and long. “Are you trying to scare me?”
“No. Sorry. Sometimes I let my geek side take over from my common sense. Tell me what you want me to do.”
She nodded briskly. “I need you to pick up a pair of ice climbers. It’s a prearranged pickup. Then you deliver them to Anchorage for their flight home.”
His gaze never left her face. He didn’t want her to fly up to the mine. It was stupid, he knew, but when you loved a woman, he discovered, logic wasn’t always the strongest force. “How long will you be gone?”
“Couple of days. Don’t worry. I’ll be back in time for the funeral.”
“Funeral?”
> “Frank’s.”
“You know he tried to kill you.”
She looked so sad he wished he hadn’t mentioned it. “Innocent until proven guilty.” She glanced out the window to where their small fleet of aircraft lived. “And whatever happened to him, he was part of our lives for a long time. I guess I want to say goodbye to the man he once was.”
He was moving before he even realized it. He stepped close, pulled her to her feet and kissed her.
Her cheeks turned pink and he saw her glance around to make sure no one had seen the kiss. “What was that for?”
“Because I—”
He was interrupted by the door banging open. “Claire, I can’t find black stockings. Do you have any?” It was Lynette and she sounded winded, like she’d been hurrying.
Max put an extra step’s distance between him and Claire. He’d been about to blurt out that he loved her. Right in the operations center of an airline. What had happened to his legendary smoothness around women?
The woman he loved turned until her back was to him. “I don’t think so. I can get you some in Anchorage.”
“Oh, good. I haven’t worn a dress in damn near twenty years, but I think Frank would like it.” She looked at Max. “Glad you’re cleared to fly. We need to show everyone, from our clients to our competitors, that it’s business as usual.”
“I’m off now to pick up some ice climbers.”
“For God’s sake don’t crash the plane.”
He paused on his way out. “Not planning on it.”
* * *
HE RETRIEVED THE ice climbers without incident, then transported a new camp cook and fresh supplies out to a logging operation.
As he flew over craggy, glacial peaks reaching icy fingers toward him, he realized he was falling in love with this place. It had snuck up as quietly as his love for Claire. He tried not to worry about her. She knew what she was doing. Frank wasn’t around to hurt her or her aircraft. He had to trust she’d be fine.
Still, after he’d cooked himself dinner, he was glad he’d planned an online visit with his buddies.