“D-do you like his name?”
“Travis McGee, John D. MacDonald’s character?”
Grinning, Meg nodded, feeling as if she’d at last done something right. Ian had loved the old pulp fiction of John D. MacDonald and his freewheeling P.I., Travis McGee. The name had been at the top of Meg’s list.
“I like it.” Ian clasped his hands awkwardly in front of him as if he didn’t know what to do with them. Then he folded his arms across his chest, tucking his hands beneath his arms.
Did he think she was going to thrust Travis into his arms for some instant father-son bonding? Even for a child Travis’s age, these things took time.
“Umm, I guess we’d better get going. I’m sure you have work to do, and I have a hike to lead tomorrow.”
Ian pushed open the door and held it for her and Travis. “I don’t think it’s a great idea for you to be going on any more hikes for a while, Meg.”
“Pfft. It’s my job.” She snapped her fingers. “I doubt if I’ll have any more terrorists posing as tourists on my hike.”
“How do you know?”
Meg crouched to retrieve the car seat Felicia had left by the front desk and almost toppled over at his words, a chill snaking along her spine. Ian snagged the car seat from her grasp.
“I’m sure if Hans Whatshisname returned to my hike I’d recognize him.”
“We don’t know if Hans is involved.” He hoisted the car seat and trudged through the automatic doors. “We don’t know if he’s working with partners.”
Meg straightened her shoulders, and Travis adjusted his head. “I think it’s best that I carry on as if I don’t know anything…which I don’t.”
“You have a point.” He ducked into the backseat of the car. “How do you hook this thing up?”
She grasped Travis beneath his armpits and peeled him off her body. “Here, take Travis a minute.”
Meg’s heart skipped several beats as she pressed her son against Ian’s solid, unyielding chest. Would he refuse?
Ian opened his arms and wrapped them around Travis, his right arm supporting his bottom and his left securely pressed against his back. Travis was in no danger of falling out of Ian’s protective embrace.
Meg bent forward and slid the seat belt through the anchors at the bottom of the car seat. She twisted her head over her shoulder. “Okay, hand him over. Time to get strapped in for takeoff, buddy.”
Travis seemed as reluctant to leave his perch as Ian was to relinquish him. Before her heart leaped out of her chest, Meg cautioned herself. Easy, girl. Baby steps.
She settled Travis into his car seat, snapping the buckle between his legs. Then she kissed him on the chin. Yep, a daredevil—just like his father.
IAN GLANCED BETWEEN the road and the rearview mirror, adjusting it to get a better look at Travis…his son. He looks like me. The thought sent a shock wave through his body clear down to his hiking boots. Although, why should it surprise him? He’d contributed half his genes to the pool.
Occasionally, a pair of familiar green eyes met his in the mirror and Ian gave an encouraging smile. The boy had felt comfortable in his arms, like he belonged, just like holding his mother had always felt right.
After he’d gotten over the initial shock of discovering he had a two-year-old son, and after he’d finished excoriating himself for not being there for Travis, a seething rage bubbled to the surface. He’d kept a lid on his anger because he had no clue where it would lead, once uncapped.
His own father’s anger had turned into abuse quickly enough, and Ian had always feared one followed on the heels of the other. Genes didn’t lie.
At first, the thought that he’d missed his son’s birth and the first two years of life shamed him so much he’d been willing to accept any excuse Meg laid at his door. Willing to cop to any attribute she threw at him. Then the anger settled into every fiber of his being. It didn’t help that he knew her reasons had as much to do with her own messed up childhood as his own.
How could the two of them raise a child? His gaze stole to the mirror again and the brown-haired boy rewarded him with a toothy grin. Seemed like Meg had been doing just fine.
They cruised back into the small town of Crestville. “Did you leave your car at the foot of the trail?”
“Yes.” She fiddled with the zipper of her jacket. “Do you want to join me and Travis for dinner tonight? Or…or are you too busy with the case?”
She’d turned his world upside down this afternoon and now she expected him to calmly have dinner with the son he’d just discovered? “Sure, I’ll join you. Colonel Scripps sent an agent down from Denver to take care of Kayla, so I’ll be meeting him later at the hospital we just left.”
“Kayla was there?” She covered her mouth with a trembling hand.
“That’s where they took her body.”
“Did she have children, a husband?”
He closed his eyes briefly. “I don’t know, Meg. She didn’t reveal anything about herself other than her loyalty to Jack Coburn.”
“Were they lovers?”
“I doubt it. Jack didn’t mix business with pleasure, unlike Buzz. And look where it got him.” Buzz had gotten involved with one of the translators who worked with Prospero. A beauty named Raven, whose name matched her glossy black hair. But they hadn’t lasted long.
“Did Buzz and that woman split up?”
“Occupational hazard.” He parked the car and jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “He’s out.”
She smiled and her entire face softened and glowed with an ethereal light—motherhood. “He must be exhausted after all the excitement. I’ll make sure he has a nice nap before dinner, so you can spend some time getting to know him. I have a lot of lost time to make up to you.”
“We all do.”
Meg indicated her car and Ian crouched into the backseat of his rental and scooped up Travis’s car seat with Travis still strapped inside and carried him to Meg’s car. He slid it onto the backseat of her SUV, next to the other car seat, without Travis even blinking an eye.
Meg straightened up after securing Travis, a rosy color blooming in her cheeks. She looked exactly as he remembered her on Everest the first time he saw her…minus the red nose and chattering teeth. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper. “Here’s my address. Will you be finished around seven?”
“Seven will work. Do you want me to bring anything? Wine? Dessert? Milk?” He pointed to the sleeping Travis, his dark lashes like tiny crescents on his cheeks.
Meg laughed. “I have everything covered. See you then.”
Meg drove off and Ian released the pent-up air in his lungs. Land mines dotted this unchartered territory—one false step and he’d turn into his father.
Ian returned to his car and slid open his cell phone. He needed to hook up with the agent from Denver and then play Hide the Covert Op from the Covert Operative. Colonel Scripps and all of the Prospero team members had agreed to keep their mission under wraps. One hitch in their plans could send the wrong signal to Jack’s captors. Until they knew more about Jack’s situation, they planned to be tight-lipped about this one.
After a few hours of playing footsie with the spook and exchanging glares with Sheriff Cahill, Ian returned to his hotel with a headache pounding behind his eyes. He shrugged out of his down vest, his hand skimming a hard object tucked in the inside pocket.
He withdrew Kayla’s camera with his heart thudding, making his head throb even more. He flicked the button on the back to the picture viewer position and the camera whirred to life—must’ve dried off. With his mouth dry, Ian clicked through the pictures, studying each frame on the small screen.
Kayla had managed to take a picture of every hiker on that trip. The German looked like any other tourist, eagerly taking photos of the impressive scenery and posing, smiling and unaffected, for Kayla.
Ian peered at the pictures of the waterfall and his breath came out in short spurts. She’d taken these moments before s
he went over. Had she seen something? He sucked in a breath. The last photo showed Kayla, laughing, holding her hands in front of her. The killer must’ve taken this shot. Why? To get next to her to push her over?
He pressed the button to close the camera and tossed it onto the credenza. He’d get prints of those pictures and blow them up. Something about that spot or Kayla’s activities had set this guy off.
Checking his watch, he slipped it from his wrist. He had another ordeal in front of him. Pausing in front of the mirror he moved in for a closer inspection. Dark lashes framed green eyes, brown hair cropped close to tame the unruly waves. Another face appeared superimposed upon his, one dark curl hanging above a pair of sleepy eyes.
No. His son would never be an ordeal. He’d manage. He’d figure it out somehow, even if he had to watch a million sappy TV shows to find the proper role model for fatherhood.
He’d spent a lifetime distancing himself from his father. He didn’t plan to travel the same road with his own son.
Ian hit the shower and positioned his shoulder blades under the spray of hot water. Kids had to be similar to animals—instinctive, feral, unpolished by society’s constraints. Show a kid a face of fear, and he’d sense it and go in for the kill.
Once out of the shower, Ian pulled on a pair of jeans, a long-sleeve T-shirt and a flannel shirt. He stuffed his feet into a lighter pair of hiking boots and grabbed his wallet. He still had time to stop by the little shop next to the hotel to find something for Travis.
He was not above bribery.
He picked out a toy train that clacked when you pulled it as the wheels went around. The store clerk wrapped it in tissue paper and Ian set off for Meg’s house and the most important dinner of his life.
He drove through the downtown of Crestville and switched on his brights when he hit the country road leading away from the town. He could picture Meg out here, but the nights must get lonely.
Not that he’d mind easing her loneliness. Did she still feel their attraction as strongly as he did? Every touch of her hand today, every whiff of her sweet scent caused indecent thoughts to charge through his brain and his libido.
Her bombshell today about Travis had tempered most of those thoughts…for about an hour. Who was he kidding? He’d bed the woman ten minutes after she stole all his money and left him for dead. She was in his blood.
He slowed at each mailbox, picking out the addresses with his headlights until he saw her house number reflecting in the dark. He pulled into the gravel driveway and parked behind her silver SUV. Her porch light created a golden arc in front of her house, where more light glowed from the windows. She’d created a homey setting for Travis—unlike her own upbringing in cold, palatial mansions and boarding schools.
He cut the engine and leaned across the seat to retrieve his gift for Travis. Then he slid from the car and froze.
The quiet of the night stole over him, but the hairs on the back of his neck stood at attention. He strained his ears to hear the sound again, his nostrils flaring.
Then he heard it. Twigs snapped and crispy fall leaves crunched beneath stealthy footsteps. He zeroed in on the dark underbrush past the lights and warmth of Meg’s house. A bush rustled.
It could be an animal. Ian took two steps toward the porch and the noises grew closer together as if something…or someone had just picked up the pace of its retreat.
The foliage crackled and snapped, acting like a prod on Ian. He launched forward, blindly running toward the back of the house. He halted at the edge of the underbrush, his eyes growing accustomed to the darkness.
For such a short sprint, his breath burned his lungs. He cocked his head, only his ragged breathing and a few displaced crickets answered him. He must have terrified that animal. He shook his head and turned toward the house. Then something caught his eye.
He leaned forward to pinch between his two fingers a piece of crimped, black yarn dangling from a twig. He wrapped the yarn around his finger and held it close to his face.
If that was an animal, it had just lost a handmade scarf.
Chapter Six
Meg tweaked the final lily in the vase and inhaled its languid scent. She’d prepared for this dinner as if it were a first date instead of an appointment to introduce a father to his long-lost son.
Would the flowers scare off Ian? Would the candlelight? Would the look of unabashed desire in her eyes?
Dusting her hands together, she turned to Travis who was idly turning the pages of a picture book, still sleepy from his nap. She had to focus on the real purpose of this dinner. She leaned forward and blew out the two candles flickering on the table.
A movement at the kitchen window caught her eye. The yellow curtain floated over the sink, and she scuffed to the kitchen in slippers to close the window. She slid the window across its track and jumped when it snapped shut.
Her own wide eyes stared back at her and she puffed out a breath, fogging the glass. She thought she’d seen a face at the window, but it must’ve been her own. There would be no reason for Ian to come to the back of the house when she’d put the porch light on to illuminate the front door.
She opened the fridge and grabbed a chilled bottle of wine. She could use a glass before Ian showed up on her doorstep. A rap at the door, and the sweating bottle almost slipped from her hand. This visit had her on edge.
Glancing at her fuzzy slippers, she gasped. Maybe she didn’t want to go overboard with candles, but she didn’t want to dress down too much for the occasion.
Travis peeked over the top of his book. “Door, Mommy.”
“I know, sweets. Give me a minute.” Meg scurried into her bedroom, kicked off the slippers and stuffed her feet into a pair of clogs.
By the time she returned to the living room, Ian was banging on the front door, calling her name. Travis had rolled off the couch and run to the door, hanging on to the doorknob.
What had gotten into Ian? Meg hitched Travis under one arm and peered through her peephole to verify the maniac huffing and puffing at her door was really her husband. She then clicked the dead bolt and opened the door.
Ian’s gaze swept the length of her body as if to make sure she was really standing in front of him and then ran a hand through his short hair. “What took you so long?”
“Uh, I was in the middle of something. What’s the matter with you?” She swung the door open and ushered him inside, placing Travis on the carpet.
“Nothing. Just seemed like you took a long time.” He shoved a hand in his pocket and withdrew it quickly.
He must be as nervous as she was about this encounter. Did he have a trickle of sweat on his forehead? It had to be below forty degrees outside.
“How are you doing?” Ian dropped to his knees and touched a gentle fingertip to Travis’s chin. “How’s that battle scar?”
Travis grinned and poked at his own cheek. “Babble scar.”
Ian laughed and the sound did funny things to Meg’s insides. For all of Ian’s fear of children, he seemed to have a handle on this.
“Babble scars? I think your mom has a few of those.” Ian opened and closed his hand in a yacking sign.
“Hey.” She kneed him in the back. “Don’t spoil Travis’s illusion. He thinks I’m perfect.”
Ian stretched to his full height and raised one eyebrow. “I used to think that, too.”
Meg felt the smile dissolve from her face. Ian would never forgive her. “I’m trying, Ian, right here and right now.”
He rubbed a hand across a freshly-shaved chin. “I appreciate that Meg, but you sucker-punched me. And you told me right here and right now because you didn’t have a choice. I stumbled back into your life and I overheard a telephone conversation.”
He had her there. She should’ve tried harder to reconnect, but her old demons had grabbed hold of her and whispered their warnings in her ear. She sucked in her trembling lip.
“Are you hungry?”
“Starving. Does Travis eat with us?”
> She waved a hand at Travis’s high chair pulled up to the table. “He’s going to graduate to a booster seat soon. He’s tall for his age.”
“Do you have some baby pictures to share?”
“I have tons, and I can give you a bunch.” She let the sentence hang in the air. Would she be giving him a bunch of Travis’s baby pictures when he left them?
“Oh, I almost forgot.” He held out the package he’d been clutching to his side since he walked into the house. “Something for Travis.”
Travis eyed the package and held out his hands. “Gimme.”
Meg rolled her eyes. “You’ll have to excuse Travis. We haven’t gotten to social graces yet. We’re still working on not throwing food at the dinner table.”
“One thing at a time.” Ian placed the gift in Travis’s outstretched hands while Meg reminded him to say “thank you,” which he did after a fashion.
Travis ripped through the filmy tissue paper and squealed when he held the little wooden train in his hands. He twirled the wheel with his finger and laughed at the clacking noise.
“That’s cute. Travis, you have to eat dinner before playing with your new train.” She took the toy from his hands. “I’ll put it next to you at the table.”
As she lifted Travis into his high chair, Ian sauntered into the kitchen after hanging up his jacket. “Need anything?”
“You can open that wine on the counter and pour a couple of glasses.” Once she secured Travis in his chair, she squeezed past Ian in the small kitchen and opened the refrigerator door. She slid the salad bowl from a shelf and plucked two bottles of salad dressing from the door. After placing them on the table, she scooped some chili from the pot on the stove into a ceramic bowl and carried it to the table.
“Do you have some matches?” Ian pointed to the two candlesticks on the table. “Unless that’s too dangerous for Travis.”
Meg suppressed a smile. “Matches in the first drawer on the right when you walk into the kitchen. Travis can’t reach these candles, especially strapped into his chair. Can you please grab that basket of cornbread, too?”
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