Fire in the Wind Page 8

  "I must go," she said. "My body clock is still on New York time, and I'm dropping." It wasn't true. She felt wide awake... and regretful. She had wanted to tell him about how Sergeant Preston of the Yukon had saved the day again.

  Jake's eyes were intent on her, and he was as still as a cat. "Be careful, Vanessa," he said softly as she stood up. "When you're always running there's always a risk that you'll trip."

  He walked with her to the door, and she could still sense the stillness in him. He wasn't angry, as men so often were when she refused them. He wasn't even insulted. He was merely... watchful. He was like a chess player. His opponent's queen had moved out of danger, but the game was not over.

  * * *

  She slept late and was only awakened at nine by a knock on the door. Outside was a waiter pushing a damask-covered table laden with breakfast dishes.

  "I think there's been a mistake," she said, involuntarily stepping back as the table came through the door. "I haven't ordered anything."

  The waiter stopped, plucked a cardboard check from the table top, glanced at it, glanced up at the number on the door. The numbers obviously matched, and the man, who appeared to be of Italian descent, cocked an eyebrow and turned the check over.

  "Mrs. Standish?" he queried, reading the name scrawled at the top. Vanessa nodded. The little man shot her a look. "Perhaps someone ordered it for you," he suggested, with a trace of romantic innuendo in his voice designed to let her know that he did not disapprove of whatever she had done last night to warrant this.

  She smiled coolly, refusing to acknowledge the unstated assumption. "Yes, perhaps," she said tonelessly, standing back again and holding the black robe close over her naked body. "Please bring it in."

  It took him five minutes to lay out the meal to his satisfaction, during which time Vanessa stood at the window gazing out. There was a mist on Grouse Mountain this morning, and the sky was overcast. Her balcony looked wet; it must have rained during the night.

  "Bon appétit, madame," said the waiter and she turned to smile her thanks as he let himself out.

  "Oh, just a moment," she called, recollecting herself and reaching for her handbag. The waiter held up one pudgy hand to stop her.

  "No, thank you, madame." He smiled. "Everything has been taken care of." He inclined his head and closed the door after himself.

  He had laid two places, she noted with wry amusement. Did he imagine she had someone skulking in the bathroom?

  The meal looked delicious. There were covered dishes filled with Canadian back bacon, eggs and sausages; there was buttered toast with pots of honey and jam and Scottish marmalade; there was a basket of fresh fruit and a huge steaming pot of coffee.

  There was also a little white envelope in one of the coffee cups. Inside on the card was a black angular full-looped scrawl: Spend the day with me? Jake.

  So she had been right last night: it was a game to him, and Jake was still playing it. What was it he wanted from her? What did it mean to him to become her lover for what—and she realized this with a confusing stab of regret—could only be a very brief time? Why were one or two nights so important to him?

  She looked down at the breakfast table, and involuntarily she remembered Jace. Jace had ordered breakfast to the room after the night they had spent together—a breakfast like this, rich and appetizing. And she had looked into Jace's eyes and loved him with all her heart, and what she ate was nectar and ambrosia.

  "They say a woman never forgets her first lover," Jace had said, his voice roughened with emotion. "Don't forget me, Vanessa. Don't ever forget me."

  "Never," she had promised, tears in her eyes, knowing that soon he would be leaving her. "I promise."

  Did Jake know that, too? He seemed to know everything. After last night's setback, was this his new gambit, perhaps—if he couldn't succeed as Jake, to try as Jace?

  Into her thoughts came the sound of a knock, and Vanessa stood still in the centre of the room, biting her lip. She might pretend to Jake, but there was nothing to be gained by pretending to herself. She was in danger from Jake Conrad, and she didn't know whether that was because he reminded her of Jace or because she was falling for Jake himself.

  And Jake wanted her, but was that because he was falling for her or was it for some other unfathomable reason?

  This situation, she suddenly saw very clearly, could get very complicated—and someone just might get hurt. Slowly, slowly, Vanessa went to open the door.

  Jake walked in, smiling, cool and confident, wearing casual pants and an open-necked shirt.

  "Good morning," he said, closing the door and taking in the details of her tousled appearance in a glinting admiration that tingled over her body like a touch.

  "You haven't brushed your hair this morning," he said, following her over to the table. "If you'd been in my bed looking like this I wouldn't have let you get up." He cupped her head in his hand and bent and kissed her, and just as her body burst into a flame of need he gently lifted his lips from hers.

  "Very nice," he said, looking down at the table, so that she wasn't sure whether he meant the kiss or the meal.

  "Shall we relive that special breakfast, Vanessa?" he asked softly, and she knew she had been right. Jake Conrad was going to stop at nothing to—

  "My God, Jake," she whispered to cover her thoughts. "Did he tell you everything?"

  He looked at her distantly for a moment. "Everything," he said softly, and she felt herself blushing for the second time in as many days. She hadn't blushed for years, but Jake Conrad seemed to have the knack.

  "I can't believe Jace would have talked about such private things," she said, feeling that Jace had somehow betrayed her by this. "How could he have told you all that?" When she thought of the intimacy they had shared, she could have wept.

  "I should have told you," Jake said. "Jace was on powerful drugs for a while before the operation. Sometimes he was raving. I was with him almost constantly, but he didn't always know I was there. Sometimes he thought he was talking to you. Sometimes he thought he was holding you. After he got your letter he spoke to you a great deal in his ravings. He pleaded with you, and once he... spent some time reminding you of how you had responded to his touch, to his lovemaking. He said it was because you loved him. But I remember thinking how highly sexed a woman you must be."

  "No," she protested weakly, her eyes on the floor, memory and heartbreak flooding over her. "No, I'm not. It was because... because I was so in love with him. I guess every woman is highly sexed with the man she truly loves. I realized that later, after—"

  She was startled to hear the rasp of his indrawn breath. "You mean, you didn't have it with your husband? You weren't like that with him?" he demanded, his voice harsh with suppressed emotion.

  Her silence gave him his answer.

  "Then why did you marry him, Vanessa? Why? If it wasn't for money and it wasn't for love, what the hell was the reason?" He grasped her arms as though he wanted to shake her, and his eyes blazed.

  There was a long, tension-filled pause while her thoughts swirled in confusion. Why was it so important to him? Out of loyalty to Larry she had never told anyone, but it seemed so important to Jake, and Larry was dead....

  "Vanessa, I want to know!" His voice was low but commanding, and suddenly she was afraid of what power the knowledge might give him over her.

  "Jake," she said, "it had nothing whatever to do with you. Larry is dead, and so are my reasons for marrying him."

  She sat in the large easy chair the waiter had pulled up to the table, but it was too low for the height of the table. She sank down until her plate was almost at chin level. After the overloaded emotion of the past few moments the humour of the situation was a welcome relief, and she giggled.

  "I feel like a five-year-old." She began to laugh in earnest, half-hysterically, uncontrollably. Well, it was better than crying. She leaned over on one arm of the chair, the laughter that shook her making her weak.

  "Vanessa!" Jake st
ood over her, gripping her arm with an almost painful clasp, his jaw set. "Enough." Obediently she stopped laughing. "Sit in the other chair," he said.

  That was the one she'd wanted to sit in, she thought, giggling as she stood. But she would have had to push by Jake to get to it, and she'd had a funny feeling that wouldn't be healthy. She sat down on the straight-backed chair and watched as he threw some pillows from the bed into the stuffed chair and sat down opposite her. She hiccupped on a giggle and then sobered.

  "I think the chair was trying to tell me something," she said. "I think I'm out of my depth with you."

  Jake smiled his half-smile and raised an eyebrow. "You're not even in the water yet," he said. "Stop worrying." That crooked half-smile could pack an enormous wallop when he chose. Vanessa wondered how consciously he used it, even while it relaxed her.

  "What would you like to do today?" he asked as they began to eat.

  "I don't know, do I?" she said, wondering why it was she wasn't trying harder to say no. "I don't know what there is to see and do."

  "How about the cable car up Grouse Mountain? We can have lunch at the top." He paused, chewing. "If you had more time I'd like to take you up into the interior, but it would be too much of a rush trying to do it in a day."

  "What's in the interior?" she asked.

  "Mountains," he said. "The canyon of the Fraser River, the Squamish Valley—B.C. has extremely varied scenery. Some people say you can find any kind of scenery you want here. It's worth seeing."

  She sighed unconsciously. She would love to spend more time in this province....

  "I've got a ranch up in the Fraser Valley," he said. "I'll be flying up there this weekend." He was pouring coffee, speaking almost too casually. "If you'd like to come along—"

  She cut in, "I'm flying home Saturday morning."

  "Flight bookings can be changed."

  "No," she said, fighting the knowledge that she wanted to stay. "I have to get back."

  Jake shrugged. "All right," he said easily. "You'll have to be satisfied with Grouse Mountain, then."

  * * *

  There was snow on Grouse Mountain. As the cable car moved slowly up the mountainside, Vancouver became visible below and beyond them, but finally a thick grey mist enveloped them and all Vanessa could see was evergreens and snow. Jake had told her to bring a warm jacket, but the best she could do was a sweater, so when he returned to pick her up after she had dressed he had brought her a bomber jacket to wear. Vanessa was glad of its comforting warmth as they stepped off the red cable car into the decidedly nippy air of the mountaintop.

  "Thank you for the loan of the jacket," she said as he led her through the arrivals lodge, which housed several restaurants and tourist shops. When they were in the cold again she snuggled into its folds.

  He smiled. "I told you I like seeing you wear my clothes."

  "So you did. Does this mean I have carte blanche on your closet?"

  "How about starting in my bureau?" He was smiling, but she could not follow his train of thought.

  "Your bureau? Why, what's in your bureau?"

  He looked sideways at her. "My pyjamas," he said softly. "Now, you would look very good in those."

  She caught her breath, and his eyes glinted with the victory, but she wasn't letting him win as easily as that. "Pyjamas?" she drawled. "I'm surprised to hear that a man as sexual as you are sleeps in pyjamas."

  His eyelids dropped, giving him a sleepy dangerous look. "Don't worry," he said. "When I have you in my bed, I will not be wearing pyjamas."

  Her heart kicked against her ribs. "What makes you imagine you'll ever have me in your bed?"

  They were tramping on the snow up toward the skiing area, but now he stopped and turned her ever so gently toward him. "Shall I show you?" he asked lazily, his eyes still hooded.

  Vanessa drew a deep breath, realizing that she had deliberately provoked this sort of conversation because she wanted just what he was offering now: she wanted him to kiss her. The knowledge shocked her rigid. If she wasn't careful, she would soon be out of control with this man.

  "No," she said, turning away from him. "Can we eat now? I'm starving."

  Since they had eaten the large breakfast only three hours ago this was not strictly true. Jake made no comment on it until she added feebly, "Cold air makes me hungry."

  Then he laughed. "If a few minutes on Grouse Mountain has made you hungry it's lucky you don't live in northern Saskatchewan. You'd be as fat as an egg."

  "Is northern Saskatchewan cold?" she asked with interest. Nine and a half years ago Jace had disabused her mind of the idea that everything north of the forty-ninth parallel was Eskimo country, and certainly Vancouver's climate was milder than New York's. But still this country extended well into the Arctic and owned islands running right to the north pole, so some of the myth had to be fact.

  "In the winter it is," Jake said succinctly. "Too bloody cold."

  "Have you been there?"

  "A few months ago, in the dead of winter, I went to have a look at some land I wanted to acquire an oil lease on. Couldn't see any land, of course; it was under six feet of snow."

  "Is there oil in Saskatchewan?"

  "Could be." He shrugged. "More likely not."

  "But you bought the oil lease?"

  He shrugged again. "It's easier to be wrong than right."

  Vanessa looked around. They seemed to be right on top of the mountain, and she wrinkled her forehead, puzzled. "Is this Jasper?" she asked him.

  He looked down at her with a little smile. "No," he said. "Jasper is about five hundred miles north-east of here, in Alberta."

  She said, "There are trees all over the place. But when Jace told me about the Canadian Rockies, I thought they went way above the tree line. Jace told me—"

  "That the Empire State Building only proved how puny all man's achievements were compared with nature," Jake finished for her, and she smiled at the sudden memory....

  "Oh, Jace, nobody goes to the top of the Empire State Building," she had protested, laughing.

  Jace had replied, "My darling Vanessa, hundreds of people go up every day, and it's time you did. I'll bet you haven't seen it since your public-school class outing, and how long ago was that?"

  So she had put on her Canadian accent and allowed herself to be dragged to the top of what had been the world's tallest building for so long. She had been surprised to find herself impressed, gazing at the city in all directions. She had felt as though she were standing on the bridge of an enormous ship that was Manhattan.

  "Someday I'll take you to Jasper," he had said when they were on the ground again, warming their chilled hands over a cup of coffee deep inside the building. "Right in the heart of the Rockies. That is truly something to see." And then he had said the words Jake had just quoted....

  "The Rockies do rise above the tree line," Jake was saying. "These are more like very distant foothills of the Rockies."

  "Could I fly to Jasper?" she asked.

  "I imagine there's a flight by one of the small airlines," Jake mused. "You might get there and back tomorrow and have a few hours in Jasper. It's a pity you're leaving Saturday. I could take you up on the weekend in the company plane."

  "Could you?" she breathed, suddenly desperately wanting to see what Jace had wanted to show her.

  A dark flame leapt in Jake's eyes, and he pulled her irresistibly to him and bent to kiss her. In the cold air his lips were warm against hers, and she surrendered completely to the kiss. His mouth was gentle and she was hungry for the indescribable comfort it gave her.

  After a long still moment, Jake drew back and touched a gloved finger to her pink cheek. "Stay the weekend, Vanessa," he said softly.

  But she knew what he was really asking, and she wasn't prepared to make that commitment, especially not when her brain was so fuddled by his kiss that she wanted to shout, "Yes!" and hear it echoing down the valley.

  She drew out of his arms. "I can't," she said. He smiled a
t her as though she were a charming coward, and she added defensively, "You're wrong."

  His eyes were black. "What am I wrong about?"

  She faltered. "You think I want to become your lover and I'm too afr—"

  His eyes darkened and he pulled her back into his arms. "You do," he said. "Don't try to deny it, Vanessa. It's in your eyes, every time you look at me. It has been right from the beginning."

  "No," she said levelly.

  He gave a crack of laughter. "No?" he asked, his eyes blazing at her. "You think not? Then you don't know yourself, lady. Because if I started to kiss you now we'd be making love in that snowdrift behind you in five minutes. And believe me, you would make no protest."

  She gasped in a breath of cold air and tried to step back. "Let me go," she demanded.

  He didn't move. "If I'm wrong," he suggested softly, "kiss me now. Let me kiss you the way you need to be kissed, and then, if you want me to, I'll let you go."

  Hypnotised by his eyes, by his seductive voice, she swallowed.

  "Kiss me," he repeated in a whisper, and there was black flame behind his eyes and she knew if she made the smallest move toward those chiselled lips he would let loose the passion she saw in him....She closed her eyes against the pleasure the thought gave her, then turned her head to the large snowdrift behind her that cut them off from the view of the lodge and the few tourists in the distance.

  He was watching every thought play across her face. "I do not want to kiss you," she said flatly. "Let go of me."

  With only the briefest convulsive tightening of his arms around her, he complied. The dark flame left his eyes. "Let's go get a meal," said Jake. "That's one appetite you don't deny, isn't it?"

  Over the adequate but by no means ideal lunch they were served in the lodge's main dining room, Jake talked lightly about a variety of things. He was as calm as if he had forgotten what had just happened between them, and Vanessa fought for a similar degree of calm.

  She asked him about Canada's political background, and he explained to her the difference between Canada's parliamentary democracy and the American democratic republic.