The instant his tall, bony frame disappeared around the corner at the far end of the hall, Dara rounded on Zach. “I’ll thank you never to put me in that position again!”
Zach grinned and placed his hands on his hips, mocking her indignant stance. “Most certainly, madam.” Then he relaxed and leaned toward her, his voice lowered to a rough whisper. “Just tell me what position you prefer. I aim to please.”
I’ll just bet you do, she thought darkly. Not daring to say another word, she turned and marched down the hall.
Zach caught up to her as she turned the corner and swiftly moved in front of her, blocking her path. She tried to go around him, but he shifted and blocked her again.
“Haven’t you played enough sophomoric games for today?” She raised her hand in defeat at his smile. “Never mind. Stupid question.”
“I wasn’t playing games, Dara. I’m sorry your boss is such an old prune, but you have to admit—”
“If you were so sorry, why didn’t you say something?”
“Because,” he answered immediately, “you don’t strike me as the kind of woman who’d appreciate interference when it comes to doing her job.”
He had her there. Damn. How dare he get all perceptive on her just when she had the upper hand? “You’re right. I can handle Mr. Cavendish.”
Zach grinned and moved next to her as she determinedly stepped around him and continued down the hallway. When he remained silent, Dara breathed a small sigh of relief. She’d never had her emotions so jumbled up so quickly, or so often, and she relished the chance to get herself back on track.
She stopped in front of a large oak-paneled door and reached for the knob. Before she could swing it open, Zach leaned down and whispered in her ear.
“But I have to know, were those eyebrows of his real?”
The laughter she’d repressed earlier burst out without warning at the same instant she opened the door. The sound died on a choked gurgle as the ongoing conversation inside the room fell into a hushed silence and the silver-haired heads of ten distinguished men sitting around the large boardroom table swiveled as one in her direction.
“Is there a problem, Miss Colbourne?” the man at the head of the table inquired.
She swallowed hard and offered the gentleman, who just happened to be the head of Dream Foundation’s board of trustees, a weak smile. “No, sir, not at all. I’m sorry to have interrupted.” Dara quietly backed out of the room and softly clicked the door shut, then groaned to herself. That made twice in less than five minutes.
She was going to kill him.
She whirled to find Zach holding open the door several feet farther down the hallway. “Is this the room you were looking for?” he inquired with all the innocence of a choirboy.
Fighting a smile, she walked past him into the file room. “Yes, thank you.”
By the time the door shut behind her, she was halfway down the aisle between the tall rows of file cabinets.
A shadow fell over her as she pulled a drawer open, followed by his warm breath on her neck.
“I’m curious,” he said, his voice impossibly deep. “While you’ve been busy playing fairy godmother, has anyone … you know, changed your pumpkin into a carriage?”
Zach watched with increased interest as Dara’s shoulders tensed, the fine line of her neck straightened slightly. He curled his hands into fists to keep from touching her. She was easy to tease, quick on the defensive, and she still gave as good as she got. She was also fighting tooth and nail to hide her response to him. Zach was totally captivated.
He should care that his reaction to her was far more intense than he ever expected, but he didn’t. Fifteen minutes with her was equal to the high he got climbing the wall of an ice glacier. Or, more aptly in her case, a dangerous descent into a still-active volcano.
He knew. He’d done both. But Dara Colbourne was simply an adventure unto herself. The appeal of which he didn’t entirely understand, but was finding almost impossible to ignore.
“If you’re asking whether I’m seeing someone, the answer is, it’s none of your business,” she said, without turning.
He grinned. Damn, but he was enjoying this. “Just wanted to make sure that when I take you up on that mountain, I’m not sending inappropriate signals to someone.”
The file drawer snapped shut with a solid thwack. She spun around and plastered the files against his chest.
“First of all,” she said, her hazel eyes turning a very intoxicating shade of green, “if there was someone to send inappropriate signals to, he would trust me implicitly, so there would be no need for your concern.” She ducked neatly under his arm and marched to the door. With one hand on the doorknob, she pivoted back to face him. “And secondly, you are assuming quite a bit if you think you’ve got this job in the bag. I’ll expect a full report on every detail of the weekend trip before I decide whether to go with you or not.”
Zach closed the distance between them in three easy strides. Chin tipped up, brown hair dancing in soft waves around her small face, eyes blazing, and back ramrod straight. He took in every detail, unsure what it was about her that had him more turned on than he could ever recall being. And he’d had a lot more provocation from a number of far more willing partners.
Maybe it was the coffee stain peeking out from behind the lapel of her genderless foundation blazer; maybe it was seeing those irises change color again and knowing he was the one responsible for it; maybe it was the whitened knuckles of her fist gripping the doorknob that announced she was far less composed than she’d like him to believe.
And maybe it was some genetic predetermination that mandated he couldn’t be around Dara Colbourne for any length of time without finding his control completely pushed to the limit. Only the limits he was pushing as a man had entirely different consequences than those he’d pushed as a boy.
Whatever it was, it was damn exciting. And challenging. And he’d never been one to walk away from a challenge.
He braced his hand on the door above her head and leaned in close, unable to keep from pushing, testing. From discovering for himself where the margin of safety ended and the temptations of risk began.
“You’ll go up that mountain with me, Dara. And you’ll approve the trip.” Her lips parted as if she were about to speak, but Zach proceeded, his body tightening, recognizing and enjoying the thrill of walking the fine line between safety and danger. “And you’ll have the best damn time of your life doing it too. That’s a Brogan guarantee.”
She took an audible breath, her chest brushing ever so slightly against his. Feeling a distinct wobble in the high wire he was balancing on, Zach knew it was time to pull back. Past time. He laid his hand on hers, turned the knob and pulled the door open.
She tugged her hand from beneath his, but he instinctively caught it and curled his fingers over hers, enclosing her fist in his.
Her skin was soft, her fingers strong. He rubbed his fingertips lightly over the pulse on her inner wrist. The rapid pulse. He grinned. “It was good seeing you again, Dart. Call me after the board meeting.”
He shot her a wink, then laughed as she yanked her hand away, the tempest in her eyes warning him to retreat for the day before he was nursing a black eye. Or worse.
He was whistling as he approached his truck, breaking into a smile as he eyed the words slashed in vivid red along the shiny black side of his pickup. Born To Be Wild.
“Some days more than others,” he said, then chuckled as he climbed into the cab, the fatigue from his thirty-six-hour trek from Chile to Virginia suddenly a distant, nonexistent concern. He slapped the folders down on the seat, dug out his Steppenwolf cassette and punched it in the tape deck as he revved the engine. Oh yeah, seeing Dara Colbourne again had been mighty fine indeed.
“Yes,” Zach repeated into the phone the following afternoon, “that’s exactly what I want. Four big wheels, good on average to mildly rough terrain, average inclines, completely hand operable.”
Z
ach doodled another parachute in the margin of the yellow legal pad, his attention only half on the conversation. The other half was wondering how Scotty and Cortinez were doing in Chile while he sat in the stifling confines of the office in his house. He spent more time planning trips now than running them, but the ones he did take on personally he hated like hell to miss.
“Good,” he said a few moments later, “that sounds fine. I’ll be out on Thursday to look at it. Thanks, Frank, I really appreciate you doing this on such short notice.”
Zach hung up the phone just as Beaudine strode into the room. Her silver-white hair was caught up in a tight bun covered with a net—deep purple today, the exact shade of the slogan scrawled across the white apron she wore over her sleek black nylon jogging suit. It read: Cajuns Give Deep South A Whole New Meaning.
He smiled, not caring that his slumped position gave away just how tired he was. He nodded at her attire. “Does this mean you finally asked Frank for a date?” Yesterday her apron had read: Kiss Me or Die a Slow Painful Death.
The only reply he got was a snort.
His grin broadened. “At least you’ve stopped playing hard to get.”
“Hard to get!” She slapped a small stack of folders on his desk, and set a tall glass of iced tea next to them. “Bon Dieu, cher, but I’m about as easy to get as today’s paper.” Without a break in movement, she scooped up the small plastic pitcher she’d left on her last pass through and watered the plants lining the windowsill. “The Fujimora deal is there.” She nodded at the manila folders. “Montague will call next week to set up the helicopter thing. And you have two faxes coming in later this afternoon with quotes from the Nepalese and Tibetans on the permits for that Himalayan trip. Drink your tea, cher.”
“Did Frank say yes or no?” was Zach’s only response.
The plants done, Beaudine whipped a dust rag from the deep pocket of her apron. Tackling the closest book-shelf, she roughly wiped the dust from the surface. “That man, what he doesn’t know would fill the Bayou Teche, don’t I know.” Her grumbled curses quickly slipped into her native Cajun dialect.
“What was that?” Zach prodded, unable to resist. “You wouldn’t be casting some old voodoo spell on Frank, now would you, chère?”
“And it’s not like I’d give this body to just any ol’ coot, I tell you what!” She straightened the rolled-up maps that filled the antique umbrella stand in the corner. “And that ol’ coot knows it. If he thinks I have time to wait for him to get around to making the first move … At this rate I could be dead a year before I get his clothes off.”
Laughing in earnest now, Zach held up his hand. “Enough, enough. I don’t think I want to know any more.” He let her settle down a moment, before asking, “She here yet?”
“Mais non, cher. She called on the other line a few minutes ago and said she was stuck behind some accident on 29. She’ll be here soon.” Beaudine walked over to the fern hanging from the ceiling behind Zach, knocking his feet off his desk to the floor as she passed.
She deftly snapped the dead fronds from the bushy plant. “You too tired to sit straight? You go to bed early.” She aimed a disparaging look at the floor and the desk that were littered with chunks of dried red clay from his heavy hiking boots. “Dusting is one thing, cher, but I draw the line at lifting the vacuum cleaner onto the desk.”
“Ah, an ol’ gator wrassler like you?” he shot back. “You could tilt this big wooden desk over with one hand and be done with it. You don’t fool me.”
“Don’t tempt me.” She rattled the back of his chair as she passed by, making Zach grab the edge of his desk to keep from falling over backward. She was tall, lean, and faster in her Reeboks than a woman her age had any right being. Although exactly what age that was he had never determined. In the six years she’d worked for him, he’d narrowed it down to somewhere between sixty-five and eighty.
The swishing sound of nylon stopped abruptly as she turned in the doorway. “And the only fool I see is you. Why you making Miz Colbourne drive all the way out here when she’s so busy is none of my business, but if you ask me—”
“Dara dragged me all the way home from Chile.” Zach tilted his chair back again, smiling at Beaudine’s scowl. “She can drive as far as Field’s Corner. Besides, she probably hasn’t been back to Madison County in ages.” Knowing he would never win the battle but loving the challenge nonetheless, he adopted a dead-on Cajun accent and added, “And someone who works as hard as Miz Colbourne deserves a nice quiet afternoon in the country, don’t you think, ma pichouette?”
Beaudine’s mumbled, “Little girl, my—” degenerated into Cajun swearing that had him laughing again as she left.
Zach propped his feet back on the desk and returned his attention to the legal pad in his hands.
He sighed deeply, absently rubbing at a tight spot in his chest as he went over the notes he’d made on each of the four children scheduled for the trip.
Teddy, age ten, paraplegic, wheelchair bound, had use of arms, hands, and neck. Brandon, age nine, advanced case of multiple sclerosis, also wheelchair bound, limited coordination of arms and hands. Jonas, age nine, muscular dystrophy, leg braces on both legs, but could walk with crutches and had full function of his arms and hands. Andie …
Andie. Zach closed his eyes and rubbed his thumbs across his eyelids, not having to look at his notes to know what they said. Andie, age ten. Cancer. Wheelchair bound. Frail, but full use of her arms and hands. Probably wouldn’t see age twelve.
“Damn,” he whispered, the grittiness behind his closed eyes not entirely from lack of sleep. He massaged the back of his neck, doing little to ease the tension that had knotted there. He’d read the case histories last night before turning in, and the details had haunted him since.
Life’s inequities and the strength these kids had to have in order to face them day in and day out was sobering. Combined with the potent memory of those hazel-green eyes flashing at him, demanding that he let someone more qualified handle the job, had all but robbed him of any chance at sleep.
At some point, in the quiet hours long past midnight, he’d made a solemn vow to himself. Two, actually. One: To plan the most incredible trip for those kids he had within his power to give. And two: To pursue whatever it was that he’d felt with Dara.
Because, as Dara had observed and as those four kids understood on the most intimate level, life was just too damn short to waste wondering about what could have been.
The sound of gravel beneath tires jerked him from his thoughts. Beaudine’s congenial greeting of “How y’all are,” at the front door echoed down the hallway to his office. He listened to Dara return the hello, then go on to politely assure Beaudine she was fine, really, and no she wasn’t thirsty or hungry and that she was sure she could find the office all by herself and please not to go to any trouble on her account.
Zach glanced at the clock on the wall. Less than twenty seconds. Not bad. A world record for first-timers.
The clicking of heels grew louder as Dara approached. He was only vaguely surprised to feel his muscles, his entire body in fact, tighten in anticipation. The sensation was similar to the feeling the instant before jumping from a plane, or off a cliff.
He leaned back deeper in the chair and savored it.
Dara’s light rap on the door frame commanded and received his full attention. “Sorry I’m late.” She entered the room with a rustle of soft fabric and an even softer scent of perfume. She wore a muted red blazer over a jet-black skirt—a skirt that showed more leg than he thought someone as short as Dara could possibly have. And another pure white blouse, buttoned tightly at the neck and softened with a bow. Tasteful, understated, businesslike. He wondered if she realized it was still sexy as hell.
“I can’t believe I’m in this house again.” She smiled as she glanced around. “I haven’t been back in this area since I was a teenager. I forgot how beautiful the Shenandoahs were.” Her attention was on everything but him. “I see you’ve tu
rned your dad’s old study into an office.”
Her gaze strayed from the jam-packed floor-to-ceiling bookshelves covering two walls, to the multitude of overlapping maps thumbtacked all over the other two walls, to the clumps of red clay littering the top of his cluttered desk. “Of sorts,” she added wryly.
Zach’s chest tightened a notch, and his smile wasn’t as smooth as he would have liked. How did she manage that? He actually found himself resisting the urge to sit up straight and take his feet off his desk. It was a bit late for making a good first impression.
“Have a seat,” he said, motioning toward the chair on the other side of his desk.
She did. “I see you’ve gone over the case files.” She nodded toward the folders spread on his desk.
He started to speak, but she chose that moment to cross her legs, and all that came out was a mumbled noise he hoped she took for a yes. He was forced to lift his boots from the desk as the sudden need to find a more comfortable position overruled his determination not to let her dictate his behavior.
“I’ve already made a few preliminary calls to some friends of mine,” he began.
“Friends?”
He looked up. The smile came easier this time. “I do have some, you know.”
“Imagine that.” The lift at the corners of her mouth softened the sarcasm in her response. “What exactly do these friends have to do with the camping trip?”
“Well, after looking over the background and medical reports, I realized the most obvious problem we have is overcoming their limited mobility. I’ve got someone working on an idea I had to help fix that.”
“When I called to tell you that the board liked your idea Friday afternoon, I did make clear that until you’re fully approved, any expense you incur—”
Born to Be Wild Page 3
