by Dani Collins
“Profoundly. But my father was a self-involved ambitious CEO. Remind you of anyone?” His smile was flat and self-deprecating. “If Vivien hadn’t been in the picture, he would have sent me to boarding school after my mother died. I asked him to, more than once, but Vivien insisted we were a family. Dragged herself out of bed to dress up and drive my ass to practice, watched every race.”
“Acted like a supportive parent? What a nightmare for you.”
“You see my predicament.” He sipped, watching her brush color onto her eyelids.
She was probably going to like Vivien, once she got past the airs. She definitely liked this side of him where he provided insight into the people who had shaped him. She forced a casual tone as she asked, “What about your wife?”
“What about her?”
“How long were you married?”
“I’m thinking I should have gone with sex on the edge of the sink.” He went to refill his drink.
He came toward her with the bottle, but she’d barely touched hers. He left the bottle on the night table and sat down again.
“Not up for discussion?”
“There’s not much to say. She was frustrated that I was always training, wanted more commitment. I thought that meant marriage and surprise, surprise, it made no difference to my schedule. The only thing that changed was, when I was away, she thought I was cheating. I would never do that to a woman. Not after my father and Vivien.” His finger tapped the edge of his glass. “I said that if she couldn’t trust me, we should get a divorce. She took what was hers according to the pre-nup my father had made her sign. I don’t hate her, but I don’t have any affection for her, either.”
She paused in applying blush, thinking about him saying that he had ignored texts from women he knew while he was away because he was with her now. It made her feel funny. Squiggly. Like things realigned themselves inside her, locking them closer together, which conversely made her feel more vulnerable.
“What about you?” he asked. “Have you been married?”
“No!”
“Just because it wasn’t reported online doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. We’ve covered my significant relationships. Tell me about yours.”
“Your ex-wife and Ilke are your significant relationships? Why do I feel like you’ve skipped a few?”
No reply.
She sipped her drink, feeling it burn away some of her nerves. “Starting with losing my virginity?” she asked, pretending to be blasé about it. “That was freshman year at college. Bradley was a virgin, too. Came from a small town and a really conservative family. Hadn’t had a lot of options with dating and neither had I.”
High school had been so crappy after the journal incident, she had only kissed one guy in the stock room at the coffee shop by the time she started college.
“What kind of name is Bradley? Sounds like a tool.”
“He was nice. A science major, but we had a communications class together. He had a lot of questions about how women’s bodies worked and I was dying to know what sex was like. We weren’t in love, but we were friends. Shared some graphic conversations. Fooled around, which turned into practical demonstrations like masturbating for each other—”
“What now?” His leather shoes hit the floor with a clap.
“—because we were not getting it right when we messed around. I mean, how funny is that? We were like a pair of kids playing doctor.”
“Why haven’t you and I done that? We can do that. I want to.”
“Because it’s so hot?” She rolled her yes.
“It’s very hot. I’m serious,” he insisted as she shook her head.
“It paid off in the long run. By the time we did the deed, it was actually pretty good. For a first time. In my opinion. But we fizzled right after. All we really had was friendship and curiosity, not…” She shrugged. “We still catch up online sometimes.”
“I’m serious. We should do that. Tonight.”
“Let it go.” She talked around applying lip-liner and lipstick. “I didn’t do that with my one other boyfriend, and things seem to be working out even better here, so…”
“One?”
“Pathetic, right? After Bradley, I dated a bit. Tried to be a party girl for about five minutes, but I couldn’t bring myself to sleep with idiots. I was more interested in guys who had something intelligent to say. Those ones didn’t have much of a social life, too busy studying, but by fourth year, I had a really nice boyfriend. Stephen. We used the l-word and everything.”
“Stephen,” he repeated, as if trying it out, then rejected the name with a curl of his lip and a shake of his head. “Sounds French. What happened?”
She blotted her lips. “Mom. I needed to move home. I couldn’t hold him back waiting for me when he was graduating and starting his career so we broke it off.” She had. He had wanted to keep seeing her and cried when she insisted they were over. “He’s married now, has a little girl.” Buckets of money, too. A life that could have been hers, if she hadn’t been worried about settling down too soon, before she had done everything she wanted to do.
“And then I accidentally fell into bed with a Viking with an attitude…” Also a doomed relationship, but she was happy to row this ship until it sank.
She dropped her robe and walked to the bed where she had left her dress.
His gaze followed her, taking in her lacy blue thong. There was plenty of heat in his gaze, but puzzlement, too. “Are you serious that you’ve only had two lovers? Or did you skip some that aren’t worth mentioning?”
“Three counting you, so I guess we’re tied?”
“Why would you do that to yourself? You’re very sensual.”
“I’m picky.” She pulled her dress over her head. It was a long, body-hugging T-shirt dress in dusky blue silk that fell to mid-thigh, deceptively casual-looking until it was on. Then it became ridiculously flattering, always making her feel sexy, yet not over or under-dressed.
She flicked her hair free of the collar and stepped into silver gladiator-style heels. She was already wearing silver hoops and slid two silver bangles onto her left wrist, then struck a pose with her hand on her hip. She pivoted so her back was to him, showing him the cut-out down the back from the top of her spine to her tailbone. She came back around to shift her weight to the other hip.
“Will I do?”
“Perfekt.” He stood, set his glass aside, and took her hand to guide her through another slow spin. “How is it possible you’ve only taken three lovers? Are you being straight with me?”
“Does it matter?” She met a gaze that was decidedly hungry and possessive, putting delicious tension in her abdomen and heat in all her erogenous zones.
“No. Yes. If I can’t be number one, I want to at least be on the podium. Don’t make me find out later that I was fooling myself. I want this.”
That made her laugh. What an idiot. “Take your victory lap then, champion.” She leaned her hands into his chest and lifted her mouth.
He made a face at the clock, fingertips grazing the bare skin of her back before he set a rather chaste kiss on her forehead. “Later. Eat fast.”
Chapter Eighteen
Rolf had trouble resisting Glory when she wore jeans and an oversized cardigan, hair poking every direction from a messy clip. With her eyes made up so they were the depthless blue-green of glacial melt against her snowy complexion, and her braless breasts moving erotically beneath her dress, and her pert ass accentuated by heels that made her legs look endless…
“I expected better of you, Rolf.”
“Hmm?” He dragged his gaze off Glory’s exposed spine and out of the filthy plans he had for that dress. He had sent her to join Vivien and Ilke on the patio while he veered toward the bar only to be confronted by Marvin’s bushy eyebrows scribbled into a knot over disapproving blue eyes.
“I had to hear through Vivien that you’ve taken up with Glory and, frankly, she’s still quite vulnerable.” Marvin set out a frosted mug
with a dismayed clunk and flicked the cap off of one of Rolf’s preferred import beers, setting it beside the mug with a firm enough tap that foam started climbing out the top. “If I thought you were serious, it would be different. As it is…”
Since when was he anything but serious? Did he look like Trigg?
Marvin briskly polished a wineglass and set it on a tray. A bucket of ice held two bottles, both sweating and ready to be opened.
“Is that some of your wife’s wine?”
“Yes. Why?” He paused in setting another polished glass on the tray.
“Do you know it upsets Glory when you serve it to people who didn’t know her?”
Marvin frowned. “But what’s the sense in keeping it for… This isn’t the investment wine. That’s cellared in Seattle. This has already been shelved a few years and is ready to drink.” He picked up another glass, polished the hell out of it. “She told you that?” Marvin made a noise halfway between indecision and consternation. “She didn’t say anything like that to me.”
“Dad,” Glory said, coming through the empty lounge toward them with long strides that had her dress clinging and shifting across her naked skin. “We’re dying of thirst out here. Is that the Côte d’Or?”
Her expression only flickered a little, but Rolf watched for Marvin to catch it and he did. His mouth firmed.
“What are you doing, champion? You two have met. Quit dawdling and get out here to carry your share of the conversation.” She picked up the tray of glasses and Rolf brought the wine bucket. Marvin followed with two more mugs and a pair of longnecks.
Trigg already had a beer dangling from his fingers. He had his elbows slouched on the rail while Ilke stood next to him, gaze on the pond. Nate was down there with his son, throwing sticks into the water for Murphy.
“You got a three-year-old babysitting your dog now? You’re shameless,” Rolf drawled.
“I guess he’ll be sleeping in your room again, starting tomorrow.” Trigg pressed his bottle to his smug grin.
Rolf made a mental note to ask Nate if he wanted to earn some extra cash.
“Let’s have a toast,” Vivien said as all the wineglasses were filled. “Is everyone aware that Ilke deserves some congratulations? She just received a silver sponsorship, thanks to her performance last season. I was going to get after you to sponsor her, Rolf, but she won’t need it now. We’ll also wish both Trigg and Ilke safe training and success with their upcoming qualifiers. Marvin, you and Glory are to be commended on your wonderful new enterprise here. Of course, I’m proud of all of you, taking on this exciting new venture. And Rolf, you’re a darling for bringing us together with this wonderful meal you’ve arranged.”
Glory smirked at him as she sipped. He did what he’d been dying to do—splayed his hand on her bare back, feeling her shiver and watching her blush under his light touch.
“What is your timeline?” Ilke asked. “Will you open this season? People will be asking.”
“Did you talk to the police chief today? What did he say about the fire?” Trigg asked.
“Lack of evidence to arrest the brothers, but I’ve had a call from their employer.”
“Dirk Basco? Fuck that sounds like a failed country singer, doesn’t it?”
“Trigg!”
“Sorry, Mom.”
“Him, yes,” Rolf said. “He fired them.”
“Oh, that’ll help.”
“Exactly what I said. Now they’ll have a grudge. He said with the downturn after the avalanche, all the good employees left the area. That’s how these clowns wound up on his payroll. With things picking up, he wanted to replace them anyway.”
“Good luck.”
“Me or him?” Rolf asked dryly.
“That Basco guy is quite the topic at Suzanne’s,” Glory said. “He’s buying up all the houses he can, then flipping them to out-of-towners who are speculating that once the hill is running, real estate here will go through the roof. Locals who finally have jobs and can think about buying are worried they’ll be priced out of the market before they have a down payment saved.”
“That explains why he’s firing the guys he thinks are responsible for slowing down construction,” Trigg said.
“Cutthroat,” Glory muttered.
“Business,” Rolf countered.
“You didn’t answer Ilke,” Vivien said. “Will you be open this season?”
Rolf exchanged a look with Trigg. On this point, they were in sync. “The board wants us to install a T-bar and open the bottom of the bowl this winter. As far as we’re concerned, that sets the wrong tone.”
“Branding is important,” Glory said.
“I know it is.”
“I said open the top for heli-skiing and let the cross-country folk come in this year, but wait to open after we put the gondola all the way to the top,” Trigg said.
“We can spend the summer putting in the tower footings to the top, or setting up the T-bar to midway, then spend half of next summer tearing that down before moving forward on the gondola. Financially, I don’t see the T-bar being a big enough draw to pull in more than enough to break even. I’ll know better after Nate and I go to Switzerland to talk to suppliers. Figure out if it will be a chair lift or gondola or combo.”
“Blue Spruce Lodge will be ready either way,” Marvin interjected with a magnanimous smile.
“Dad. Devon’s good. She’s not bionic. They have to get all the outdoor work done while the weather holds and we need staff quarters before we can open guest rooms so we have people here to serve our guests. Your room is the closest to finished,” Glory told Vivien. “I’m sure you’ve noticed there’s still cosmetic work to be done. We’re hoping for a functioning lobby and a soft-opening of some first-floor rooms by October.”
“I was going to ask about that. I suppose I’ll have to vacate occasionally while that’s attended to?”
“Oh, I thought—” Glory lifted a perplexed look to him.
“Viv,” Rolf said mildly, while a mushroom cloud exploded over his head. “Won’t you be heading back to Berlin soon?” That might have come out flatter and harder than he meant it to.
“What’s there for me? If you and Trigg live here now, so do I.”
Trigg drained his beer and reached for another. Ilke pretended to be fascinated by Nate and his kid.
Glory shifted subtly against the dig of Rolf’s tense fingers into her waist.
“Oh, don’t act like this is a surprise,” Vivien huffed. “I was born here. Well, across the state. Only lived there until I was two, then we moved to California, but that’s how your father found this place. He brought me back to Montana for a visit.”
“I guess we’ll make finishing your room a priority then,” Glory said blithely.
“That would be helpful.” Vivien nodded as if Glory was offering to get it done tonight. “But to your point about staff quarters. You have quite a conundrum, don’t you? You don’t want workmen traipsing their filthy boots across your new carpets. How do you plan to address that?”
“Viv was our father’s P.A.” Rolf explained. “It’s not a stretch to say she helped make Wikinger what it is today.”
“Charmer.” Vivien blew him a kiss. “But I do have a love for organization.”
“We’re still discussing options,” Glory said in a rookie move of trying to put her off.
“I spoke with the rep from the portable office that Trigg brought in,” Marvin said. “He quoted me, but those modular crew quarters are uninspiring. Also, they’re one level, so a lot of sprawl.”
Ugly as sin and branding again.
“Devon seems to think she could bring in a colleague who built a rustic style bunkhouse for a backcountry lodge in Wyoming. It sleeps twenty,” Marvin continued. “I’ve sent the plans to our architect and the building inspector.”
Glory stiffened. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“We seem to be lacking on the communication front lately. We should work on that.” Marvin slid his gaze
from Glory to Rolf, then back to Glory.
Point to Marvin. Rolf gave Glory’s tense spine a caress with his thumb.
“So, what I’m hearing…” Vivien clattered her fingernails against her glass in exactly the way that put him and Trigg on alert. The beast was stirring. “Is a soft opening of the lodge when the first guest rooms are ready, some kind of activity on the slopes this winter—oh, if they’re planning to heli-ski, you’ll want in on that Ilke.” Vivien touched the woman’s arm. “Be sure she’s on the list, Rolf.”
Rolf bristled, but that was Vivien. Inclusive when she wasn’t being an impenitent snob.
“And a proper grand opening for both in a year or so,” Vivien summed up. “I imagine there will be some wrap parties and something to christen the crew quarters as well…”
Oh, fuck. Here we go. “Viv—”
“You don’t want to miss any opportunities. You know what you should do? Build a model of the proposed resort. It could sit in the lobby, so guests will know what they’re coming back for.”
Here we fucking go. He eyed Trigg. Rein her in, would you?
Trigg mouthed, Chile, and smiled his shit-eating grin. “You wanted to run with this, bro.”
“You know what you should do?” Glory wore a thoughtful expression. “A time-lapse of the construction on the hill. I thought about it for the lodge and took some ‘before’ photos, but it’s a stationary project and wouldn’t have the same impact. No one really cares about how the lighting in their room was upgraded, but watching the change of seasons and construction would make for interesting videos. That would draw interest in the hill, show the wilderness. People will start to see the conditions…”
Rolf lowered his beer. “We’ve already hung the hunting cameras and we’re recording what they pick up. Those are on motion detectors, but…”
“You know who would shit a brick—”
“Trigg.”
“Sorry, Mom. Quinn would drop a brick if I asked him to film this project as we bring it online.”
“Do it,” Rolf said without hesitation. “He films extreme sports,” he told Glory. “World-class events. Invite him to heli-ski this winter,” he said to Trigg, then hugged Glory. “Good idea.”