by Lisa Jackson
“Why now?” he muttered. He didn’t want to deal with any latent feelings he might still harbor for her. And he wouldn’t. Just because she was in the same neck of the proverbial woods didn’t mean he had to fall all over himself chasing after her.
No, he decided, his lips compressing thoughtfully as the dust from her car settled back onto the asphalt, this time he’d be in control. This time Melanie Walker Brooks wouldn’t get close to him. No matter what.
* * *
“. . . he might be the rudest man I’ve ever met!” Jan charged. Her eyes were bright, her cheeks flushed at the memory of her interview with Gavin. “And, unfortunately, maybe the best looking.”
Melanie couldn’t agree more. She’d heard the tail end of the conversation between Jan and Guy as she returned to the office. “I take it you’re talking about the new owner of Ridge Resort?”
“You got it,” Jan said. “And I’m not kidding. I’ve met some jerks in my time—good God, I’ve dated more than my share—but this guy takes the cake!”
“What exactly did he say?”
Jan puffed up like a peacock. “I just mentioned that he’d been linked to several famous models and I brought up Aimee LaRoux’s name.”
“And?” Guy prodded.
“And he asked me who I’d been linked to. I, uh, said, it was none of his business and he said, ‘Precisely.’”
“That doesn’t sound so bad to me.”
“It gets worse,” Jan assured them. “I kept bringing it up and he finally asked me why, if I was so interested in Aimee LaRoux’s love life, I just didn’t call her and ask her out. Then he had the audacity to scribble a phone number on a book of matches and toss it to me.”
Despite her foul mood, Melanie laughed. “You’re right,” she said. “Doel’s obnoxious.”
Jan glared at her. “He’s got one dismal sense of humor!”
“You think it’s really Aimee’s number?” Guy asked, his eyes bright.
“No, I don’t!” Jan snapped. “Quit drooling.”
Guy made a face. “Is it that obvious?”
“Very.”
Melanie said, “Just be glad the interview’s over. We won’t have to deal with Doel again.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” Guy disagreed. “Brian seems to think that stories about Gavin Doel and Ridge Lodge can only increase circulation. I think he’s planning a series of articles about Mount Prosperity and the lodge and guess who?”
“Goddammit,” Jan said, grimacing.
Melanie sighed inwardly. She didn’t think she could face Gavin again. And the thought of Gavin’s personal life being ripped open put her on edge. “I think Brian’s putting too much emphasis on Doel.”
“Yeah, it’s almost as if he has an axe to grind with him,” Guy agreed.
“An axe? What’re you talking about?”
Guy shook his head. “Just a feeling I have. I don’t think there’s any love lost between Brian and Doel.”
“Do they know each other?” Melanie asked.
“Beats me.”
Jan’s purse landed on her desk with a thump. “Well, Brian better get himself another reporter,” she declared flatly. “I’m not going to put myself through that ringer again. Doel guards his privacy as if there’s something dark and dangerous in his past.”
“Maybe there is,” Guy said, throwing a leg over Jan’s desk and tapping the side of his face with the eraser end of his pencil. “After all, what do we know about the guy—really?”
Jan turned thoughtful eyes on Melanie. “We know more than most,” she said, her mouth curving thoughtfully upward.
Melanie steeled herself. Obviously Jan thought she could get information on Gavin through her. Well, she could guess again. For now Melanie’s lips were sealed.
“He grew up around here,” Jan told Guy. “Melanie went to school with him.”
“Did you?” Guy was impressed.
“Well, not really. He’s five years older than I am,” Melanie countered. “He was out of high school before I entered.”
“But you said you knew him,” Jan persisted, “and he concurred. In fact, I’d be willing to bet you two knew each other better than you’re letting on.”
“Oh really?” Guy asked, his lips forming a slight smile.
Melanie decided it was time for evasive tactics, at least until she knew just how far Jan was willing to dig. “Jan’s exaggerating. I knew of him,” she corrected, her palms beginning to sweat. “Everyone in town did.”
She should probably just tell Jan part of the truth right now and get it over with, but she couldn’t. Where would she stop? How would she explain that she married Neil to protect Gavin from the burden of a wife and child? Gavin didn’t even know that she’d been pregnant. She certainly wasn’t going to tell Jan or Guy or anyone else.
And beyond that, she didn’t want the scandal of her mother’s death raked up all over again.
“What was Gavin like as a kid? Doesn’t he have a deadbeat father?” Jan asked, the wheels turning in her mind.
“I thought you weren’t interested in interviewing him again?” Melanie said.
Jan shook her head. “You know me. I was just mad. I let the guy get to me. It was my problem, not his. But it won’t happen again. Besides, Barbara Walters wouldn’t have let Doel intimidate her, would she? Nope, I’ve just got to fight fire with fire. So, what was Gavin Doel like before he became famous?”
Melanie thought for a moment, remembering Gavin as he had been. “He was . . . determined and ambitious. Dedicated to being the best skier in the world.”
Jan sighed and blew her bangs out of her eyes. “I know all that. But what about the man behind the image? Did you know him?”
Better than anyone. Melanie lifted a shoulder. “Not well enough to be quoted. Besides, the way he is about his private life, I think the Tribune would be better off if we asked him. That way there’s a chance we won’t get sued.”
“He won’t sue us,” Jan said.
“Why not?”
“Bad publicity. He can’t afford it. But right now he won’t tell me anything.” She smiled slyly. “This is going to call for some research. What’s in the files?”
“I checked yesterday,” Melanie said, walking briskly to her desk and knowing there was nothing the least bit damaging in the envelope she snatched from her cluttered in-basket. She tossed the packet on Jan’s desk and waited while Jan quickly flipped through the stack of photos as if it were a deck of cards. “Nothing else?” she asked, looking disappointed.
“Nothing interesting.”
“You checked the copies that went along with these?”
“Yep.”
“Damn!” She pursed her lips and eyed the photographs again. “Well, these are good—” She picked up a glossy black and white of Gavin poised at the top of a ski run. His face was set, his body tight, gloved hands wrapped around his poles, every muscle ready to spring forward at the drop of a flag. “But I think it would give some dimension to our story if we knew a little more about him.” Tapping a long fingernail on the photograph, she said, “Privacy or no privacy, I think we should dig up everything we can find on Mr. Gavin Doel. We can check with the high school, find out who he dated, if he was ever employed around town.”
“I think most of his relatives moved away a long time ago. And as for his employment, he worked at the lodge before it closed down,” Melanie offered, hoping to steer Jan away from Gavin’s love life.
“Well that doesn’t do us a lot of good. Unless he bought the damned thing for sentimental reasons. But we’ll find out. The next time I interview him, I’ll be ready with a little personal ammunition to get him to talk.”
“It’s your funeral,” Guy said, straightening from the desk.
And just possibly mine, Melanie thought inwardly. “I’ll do the research,” she offered, hoping that she could circumvent any old news story that might prove uncomfortable for Gavin or herself.
“Good.” Jan checked her w
atch. “Look, I’ve got to run over to the school and talk to the principal about the new gym. Melanie, you coming with me?”
“No, I’ve already got the pictures. They’ll be on your desk tomorrow.”
“Good. Thanks.” Jan grabbed her bag and headed out of the office.
Melanie was left with the sinking sensation that Gavin’s personal life—as well as her own—was about to be splashed all over the front page of the Taylor’s Crossing Tribune.
CHAPTER FOUR
Brian Michaels did indeed want to do a series of articles on Ridge Lodge and he wasn’t the least bit concerned with Gavin’s desire for privacy. In fact, he had his own reasons for wanting to see Gavin’s life plastered all over the newspaper. But he kept those to himself.
“He’s a public figure, for crying out loud,” Brian said the next afternoon as he shook a cigarette from his pack. Jan and Melanie were seated on two worn plastic chairs near his desk. “And on top of that, he’s rebuilding a lodge that will turn the economy of this town around. Doel’s a fool if he expects to have a private life.”
“A man who’s made several million dollars in five years isn’t a fool,” Jan argued.
Brian ran his fingers through his hair, letting his head rest in his palm. “Look, I want to do several articles, one every other week until snow season. Front page stuff.” He glanced at Melanie. “I want to see the workers rebuilding the lodge, the furniture being moved in.
“I need photos of the lifts beginning to run, the first snowfall, that sort of thing. Then, find out about the ski school programs and add some schmaltzy stuff, you know, five-year-old kids on skis with their dads helping them.”
“Then you don’t really need anything on Doel.” she ventured.
“Wrong!” Brian was just warming to his subject. “He’s going to open that lodge with a huge celebration of some kind. I want a copy of the guest list. Find out if any of the skiers he’s competed against are invited and check to see who will be his personal date. If any of his old flames are going to show up, we have to know about it ahead of time.” He stared straight at Melanie, waving his hands for emphasis. “And I’ll want you at that grand opening with your camera. We’ll want every bit of glitz on our front page!”
Melanie’s throat went dry as Brian kept talking. “That’s not all. I want to know everything about Doel—inside out. His old man’s a drunk—why? Didn’t he do some time years ago? What happened, and where is he now?”
Evenly, Melanie replied, “I don’t see that Jim Doel’s tragedies have anything to do with the lodge reopening.”
“Like hell. The man raised Gavin alone, didn’t he? He shaped the kid. What happened to his mother? Is she still alive? Remarried? Does he have sisters or brothers or an aunt or uncle or cousin around here? You’d be surprised how easy it is to get people to talk about their famous relative. It makes them feel important, as if a little of that fame will rub off on them.”
“This series is starting to sound like something you’d find at the checkout counter,” Melanie said.
“Why?”
“Because you’re more interested in finding out any dirt there is on Doel than reporting about the lodge.”
Beside her, Jan drew her breath in sharply, but Brian didn’t miss a beat. “I’m not interested in anything of the sort. I just want to sell papers. Period.”
“No matter the standards?”
“I didn’t say that, but listen, don’t knock the tabloids. They make plenty!”
“And they’re trashy. They’re always getting sued.”
“Hey—we won’t print anything false. But we’ve got to generate interest in the lodge, interest in Doel, interest in the Tribune! You may as well know that the owners are putting pressure on us. Circulation’s down, and we’ve got to do something about it.”
“And that something is throwing Gavin Doel’s life open for public inspection?” Melanie challenged.
“You bet.” Brian took in a breath before continuing. “Look, he’s the one who decided to come back to the small town where he was raised and reopen a resort that had gone bankrupt—a resort that represents a lot to the economy of this town. I can’t help it that he’s news—in fact, I’m thrilled that he jet-setted around the world and hung out with the rich and famous. All the better for the Tribune.”
“How would you feel if it were you?”
“Listen, if I had Doel’s money and his fame and I was interested in selling lift tickets, you can bet I’d grab all the press I could get my hands on!”
“No matter what?” Melanie asked.
“No matter what! Do you have a problem with that?”
Melanie could feel her color rising. “I’d just like to think that we were working with the man rather than against him.”
“His choice. The way I see it, we’re doing him a favor.” Clasping his hands behind his head, Brian leaned back in his chair and squinted his aquamarine eyes. “So, let’s not let Doel’s sensitivity about his privacy bother us too much and get down to business. I’ll call his partner, get the go-ahead for the articles and we’ll take it from there.”
Melanie left the meeting with a sense of impending doom. Brian could whitewash his intentions all he wanted, but Gavin, when he discovered that his life was going to be thrown open and displayed for every reader of the Tribune, would be livid. And Melanie didn’t blame him. It occurred to her that she could tell him what was happening, but he’d probably lay the blame at her feet. Besides, nothing had been written yet. Maybe she could help edit the story. Crossing her fingers, she hoped Brian would have a change of heart.
* * *
“Let me get this straight,” Gavin said, eyeing his partner angrily. “You agreed to do a series of articles about the lodge.”
“Sure. Why not?” Rich shrugged, opened the small refrigerator in the office and pulled out a bottle of beer. “I thought we agreed that we could use all the publicity we could get.” He shoved the bottle across the coffee table and yanked out another.
“We did,” Gavin said, trying to tamp down the restless feeling in his gut. “And I thought you were going to hang around and handle them. Instead you bailed out on me.”
“I already apologized. Besides, I had to be at the courthouse—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Gavin said grumpily. “I guess I’m just suspicious of reporters.”
“They’re not all out for blood.”
“No—just big stories.” He twisted off the cap of the bottle and took a long swallow.
“So?”
“I’ve been burned before.”
“The Tribune isn’t exactly a national tabloid. It’s just a little local paper with ties to the Portland Daily. And those ties—” he held up his beer to make his point “—are exactly what we need right now. We have to stir up public awareness and interest in Ridge Resort from Seattle all the way to L.A.”
Gavin scowled. There was a chance that Rich was right, of course, but in Gavin’s opinion, it was a slim chance at best. In the course of his career, he’d dealt with more than his share of reporters and photographers, but he’d never had to deal with Melanie before.
He took another long swallow and shoved all thoughts of Melanie aside. She’d showed her true colors long ago, and it was just too damned bad that he’d had the bad luck to run into her again.
“So when’s the next session?” he asked Rich.
“Next week. They want some pictures of the crew working on the lodge.”
He clenched his teeth. “So they’re sending up a photographer.”
“Mmm-hmm.”
Chest tightening, he asked slowly, “Which one?”
“As far as 1 know they only have one.”
“I think we should have our own photos taken.”
Rich’s brows shot up. “Why?”
“We’ll get what we want. No surprises.”
“You’re the one who wants to stay within budget, remember?” Rich shook his head. “Relax a little and enjoy the free public
ity, will ya? This is the best thing that’s happened to us so far.”
“I doubt it,” Gavin growled, feeling suddenly as if he couldn’t breathe. Swearing, he reached for his crutches and struggled to his feet. Only one more day of these wretched tools—then, at least, he wouldn’t feel like an invalid. Shoving the padded supports under his arms, he moved with surprising agility to the door.
“You know,” Rich’s voice taunted from behind, “if I didn’t know better, I’d say you were all worked up over some woman.”
“Well, you don’t know better, do you?” Gavin flung over his shoulder, and Rich laughed. Balancing on his good foot, Gavin unlocked the back door and hobbled onto the deck.
Rays of afternoon sunlight filtered through the trees, and the warm air touched the back of his neck where beads of sweat had collected. His hands were slippery on the grips of his crutches and his heart pumped at the thought of coming face-to-face with Melanie again. Melanie. He squeezed his eyes shut and willed her gorgeous, lying Jezebel face from his mind.
* * *
Melanie spent the rest of the afternoon going through the pictures she’d taken at Ridge Resort. Most of the shots were of the lodge itself, but a few of the photographs were of Gavin, his jaw hard and set, his mouth tight, his eyes intense as he studiously avoided looking at the camera.
“These are perfect,” Jan said, pointing to the most provocative shot of the bunch—a profile of Gavin, his hair falling over his face, his features taut, his mouth a thin, sexy line above a thrusting jaw. “Can you blow this one up?”
“Don’t you think a shot of the lodge would be better?”
Jan tapped her finger to the side of her mouth and shook her head. “Nope—at least not for the female readers.”
“And the male?”
Jan chewed on her lower lip, and her eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “I think even they would be interested in seeing what the enigmatic Mr. Doel looks like up close.”
“Maybe we should use an overview of the lodge and a smaller inset of Gavin.”
“Maybe,” Jan said, but the pucker between her brows didn’t go away, and Melanie realized she’d already made up her mind. “Or we could do it the other way around—a large profile of the man behind the lodge and a smaller shot of the resort itself.”
