Completely Smitten

by Kristine Grayson

  She was shaking her head even before he finished speaking. A plane was going to be expensive enough. She had researched that before hiking into the wilderness area and had opted not to hire one to get her in or out just because of the cost. A helicopter, sent to rescue her at night, would be even more expensive. And Idaho, like other Western states, made people who put rescuers at unnecessary risk pay for their rescues.

  Better to wait for the morning.

  “I don’t mean to put you out,” she said. “If you don’t mind helping me one last time, we could pitch my tent near your airstrip and you wouldn’t have to see me again.”

  He raised his head. Those blue eyes met hers and she felt a jolt of electricity shoot through her. “You don’t need to do that.”

  She shrugged. “I was planning to camp the entire time I was here. I wouldn’t mind.”

  “But your ankle—”

  “That’s why I would need your help,” she said. “After we get the tent up, though, I’d be fine on my own.”

  And then she remembered. She hadn’t seen her pack since she woke up.

  Her expression must have changed because he frowned.

  “My pack,” she said. “Did you manage to lever it off the ledge as well?”

  His frown eased. This time he seemed pleased with himself. “Your pack is in my living room. It seems no worse for the wear.”

  She let out a small sigh. She had spent more money than she had spent on her first racing bike to outfit that pack. Even though she wasn’t going to finish this hike, she didn’t want to lose all the equipment—the lightweight pots and pans, the dehydrated food, the tiny fold-down tent and air mattress. She had even splurged and gotten herself a Palm Pilot so that she could read at night. All of it had been in that pack.

  “Great,” she said. “If you don’t mind, I’ll finish cleaning up and then we can set up the tent.”

  “No.”

  The word seemed a bit harsh. “No?”

  He shook his head. “You don’t have to leave. I’ve got the extra bed and I’ve made dinner. I’d feel terrible if you were outside, injured like you are. I think you need someone to keep an eye on you.”

  For some reason that phrase made her bristle. She’d never needed anyone in her life. Ever. “I’m fine.”

  He raised his eyebrows and looked at her ankle. “You’re not fine, and we’re still not sure about the extent of your injuries. The last thing I want is for the plane to arrive and find you in even worse shape than you are now.”

  She bowed her head. Even that movement hurt. It was amazing that nothing else seemed to be broken. She didn’t feel weak either, which would happen with internal injuries. And she hadn’t peed blood. But he was right: it was better to have someone around, just in case.

  “Whatever you’re making does smell heavenly,” she said.

  He smiled. It was a relaxed, joyful smile, and it transformed his face. If she had thought he was as handsome as a man could be before, she had been wrong. He was even more handsome now.

  “I’ll get you something for that ankle,” he said. “I think we should try to splint it and then ice it.”

  His hand extended again, and then he clenched it into a fist. She wondered what that movement meant.

  She bit her lower lip. He was right, of course. She had helped splint a tri-geek’s leg at one of her early races—a small one without any backing or medical facilities. The splint always prevented the injury from getting worse, but putting it on was extremely unpleasant for the injured.

  “I think I have something,” he said, before she could respond. Then he hurried into the hallway.

  “Um—” she started to call after him, then stopped herself. She didn’t even know his name. He had risked his own life rappelling down a cliff face to save her and she hadn’t even asked him who he was. Maybe she was hurt worse than she realized.

  A light flashed in the hallway, almost as if a flashbulb had gone off. Then he returned, carrying bandages and small pieces of wood. “This should work.”

  It certainly looked like it would. She stared at all of it, wrapped in his long fingers.

  “Are you a doctor?” she asked again.

  “No,” he said as he knelt beside her leg. “I just play one on TV.”

  Her eyebrows rose. She never watched those doctor shows. That would explain everything: his looks, the house, the need for privacy.

  He glanced over his shoulder. “It was a joke.”

  “Oh,” she said. “It’s just that you’re—”

  She stopped before she embarrassed herself by saying he was gorgeous enough to be an actor.

  “I’m…?”

  She shrugged. “Familiar somehow.”

  “You were sort of conscious when I brought you up here.”

  “That must be it then,” she said. But it wasn’t. It didn’t explain that sense of duality she’d felt from the moment he entered the bathroom, the way he seemed to say one thing—convincingly—when she thought he was going to say another.

  They were staring at each other again. She felt like an awkward schoolgirl.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “You’ve done all this for me and I never even asked your name.”

  He smiled, his gaze not leaving her face. “My name is Darius.”

  And then the smile faded, just a bit, as if he had surprised himself.

  “That’s unusual,” she said. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard the name before.”

  “It’s Greek.” And with that, his smile fled completely, as if his words had chased it off his face.

  She nodded. “I’m pleased to meet you, Darius.”

  “Dar,” he said.

  She raised an eyebrow. “What?”

  “Dar. Call me Dar. It’s less of a mouthful.”

  “Dar.” She tested it. The shortened version suited him better. The fact that he had an unusual name fit him. He seemed like an unusual man. “I’m Ariel.”

  “You don’t seem ethereal to me,” he said.

  Had he misheard her? “What?”

  “Your name,” he said. “It’s Hebrew for ethereal.”

  “Actually,” she said, “my aunt had a dictionary with name meanings in the back. That said my name was Hebrew for divine feline.”

  “Divine feline.” He grinned. “You like that better?”

  “I’ve always hated it. I don’t even like cats.”

  His grin faded. “You don’t?”

  She shook her head. “Why? Is there one here?”

  “No,” he said, “but there should be.”

  She frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “Never mind.” He laid out the bandages and the pieces of wood. “I think you should trust me on this one. The name means ethereal, not divine feline.”

  It took all of her strength not to pull her leg away from him. “And you’re sure of this because…?”

  “Because names are a hobby of mine.”

  “So what does Darius mean?” she asked.

  “It means incredibly stupid and arrogant.”

  She laughed. “Surely no parent would name anyone that knowing the meaning.”

  “Who says they knew?” He looked up. “I have a hunch sitting on the side of the tub while we do this is a bad idea.”

  She looked behind her. The medical kit sat in the middle of the porcelain like a portent of things to come. She didn’t want to fall for a second time that day, third if she counted the way she’d crumpled out of the log bed.

  With a sigh, she raised herself on her hands and was going to lever herself off the tub edge, when he said, “No.”

  She froze.

  “Let me.” He came over to her and braced her leg as he eased her down. Even that hurt. She couldn’t imagine how it would have felt to do it on her own.

  Still, his arms were as strong as she had remembered, his embrace as wonderful as it had been in her dreams. Her face was only inches from his, and for a moment, she thought he was going to kiss her.

  Th
en he set her on the tiled floor and moved his face away as if she had burned him.

  “All right,” he said with false heartiness. “This should only take a moment.”

  He set up the wood around her ankle. A piece brushed her skin, sending rivers of pain up her leg. She gasped, and he gave her another guilty look.

  “This would probably be easier if you closed your eyes,” he said.

  She shook her head. “I’ve been injured before. I can watch.”

  “Yeah, but you might anticipate my movements and flinch. I’m sure real doctors are used to that, but I’m not. So let’s just see how quickly we can get this done, all right?”

  She usually didn’t trust anyone so readily. But he had already seen her unconscious and he hadn’t done anything untoward. He hadn’t even known she had scrapes under her blouse.

  “All right.” She closed her eyes and leaned against the tub, listening to him move in the small enclosed space. The bandages rustled, the wood shifted, and he cursed once, softly. Then she didn’t hear anything at all.

  She didn’t feel anything either. The room was eerily silent. In the distance, she thought she heard violins. How strange was that? Violins in the wilderness?

  Then she felt a pressure on her leg, some pain that magnified and receded before settling down to a dull throb.

  “There,” he said. “You can open your eyes.”

  Her leg was beautifully splinted. His work had been so delicate that she hadn’t even felt his touch.

  “You’ve got a gift,” she said.

  He smiled. “Yes, and I only ply it on female hikers.”

  They stared at each other for another moment, then he eased himself off his knees.

  “I, um, should get you some ice,” he said.

  She nodded.

  “And maybe move you off the bathroom floor.”

  “Find me a cane,” she said, “and I’ll move all by myself.”

  “I think I might be able to do better than that,” he said, and hurried out of the room.

  Again, she saw flashing lights. She pressed the back of her hand to her eyes, wondering what was causing that, and hoping it was nothing too serious.

  He was back a moment later with ice packs and a pair of crutches.

  “Crutches?” she said. “Are you sure you’re not a doctor?”

  He smiled. “I’m sure.”

  “Then why—?”

  “I’m a klutz,” he said.

  But she didn’t believe it. He was too graceful for that. He moved like a professional athlete. He was built like one too, all muscle and sinew.

  Maybe that was why she recognized him. Maybe he played for some pro team somewhere and she’d seen him on television. Or maybe she had run with him in the handful of charity races she’d run last year.

  “Let me help you,” he said, bending down to pick her up.

  “No, I’ve got to learn to do this myself.” Without waiting for his response, she levered herself onto the tub. She didn’t want to become too dependant on his help.

  On anyone’s help.

  Other people’s help usually disappeared when she needed it most.

  He handed her the crutches, then put his hand on her back to lever her upward. She didn’t protest this time, but she would in the future. This was something she was going to have to get used to.

  He was still holding the ice. “We forgot this.”

  “I guess I’ll have to find a place to put my feet up,” she said.

  “The couch,” he said. “It has a lot of pillows and it’s close to the kitchen.”

  “All right,” she said. “Lead on, McDuff.”

  “I never was McDuff,” he muttered. “I was always too short.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing,” he said. “Inside joke. I’m probably the only one left who remembers it.”

  She frowned at him, but he didn’t explain. And somehow she knew better than to ask him again.

  FIVE

  DARIUS DROPPED THE noodles in the boiling water. The kitchen was still too hot, but he didn’t dare take off his shirt this time. Ariel was seated on his living room sofa, pillows against her back and under her injured leg. He’d wrapped the ice around it to reduce the swelling and found a few Advil to reduce the pain. But he didn’t dare help her any more.

  Too much would be suspicious, especially now that she was awake.

  He had to be careful, too. He felt guilty about missing that ankle. He had moved his hands over her legs to heal them, but he knew he had stopped short of the feet. He probably just missed the ankle.

  “This is a nice place,” she said.

  “Thanks.”

  “I read in one of the books about the Wilderness Area that they don’t allow people to live up here.”

  “They grandfathered a lot of us in.”

  “Really?” She frowned at him. “You don’t look old enough to be grandfathered in.”

  He had forgotten how he looked. He made himself shrug. “What I meant is that they don’t tear down existing buildings. They just don’t let anyone build new ones.”

  “Oh.” She leaned back against the pillow.

  He needed to change the direction of the conversation. “Want anything to drink?”

  “What’ve you got?”

  Anything she wanted, but he couldn’t tell her that. “Some pop, wine, beer—you name it, it’s probably here. But the refrigerator runs on a generator, so I really don’t want to hold the door open while considering.”

  “One generator?” she asked. “Doesn’t a refrigerator use a lot of power for that?”

  Caught. He had put in the regular refrigerator because he hated to be without one—refrigerators were one of the best things about modern civilization, he thought—and he maintained it with his own magic, without thinking much about it.

  “There’s more than one generator,” he said.

  But she didn’t seem to be paying much attention. She was tapping a forefinger against her lips. “I’d love a glass of wine. Do you think that would be a problem?”

  “Why would it be a problem?” he asked. “All I had to give you was Advil. Wine would probably be good for you. This place has a great wine cellar. Just tell me what kind you want and I probably have it.”

  She smiled. “I’m not a connoisseur. I just like it. So bring me something red, heavy, and cheap.”

  “Sorry, no can do, ma’am,” he said. “We don’t have cheap around here.”

  But he didn’t have to leave the kitchen to get her wine. He already had a nice cabernet breathing on the counter. Or he did the moment she said “red.”

  He poured them both a glass, then carried hers through the archway into the living room. He’d never appreciated the openness of the design of this place as much as he did right now. He wasn’t used to having company, so he had forgotten what it was like to entertain a welcome guest.

  He didn’t think of Cupid that morning as a welcome guest.

  Darius bent down to hand Ariel her glass and as he did, she looked up at him. A jolt went through him. In the depths of her emerald green eyes he saw something he didn’t want to see.

  Ariel had a soul mate.

  “Son of a bitch,” he said. The Fates had given him the ability to see whenever someone had a soul mate by looking directly in that person’s eyes. He hadn’t been looking before. He really hadn’t been looking now, but he had seen it.

  He didn’t know who her soul mate was. He just knew she had one.

  And that changed everything.

  She blinked and leaned away from him. He got the sense she would have stepped away if she could. “What?” she asked.

  He had to cover, and fast. “Don’t you smell that? I think dinner is burning.”

  She smiled and took her wineglass from him. “I’m sure it’s fine. Sauce usually only burns on the bottom.”

  It sounded as if she were speaking from experience. He hurried toward the kitchen as if he really thought something were burning, even thoug
h leaving her side was the last thing he wanted to do.

  He wanted to make certain what he had seen in her eyes was true.

  She had a soul mate. And he was required to find that soul mate.

  It was the last thing he wanted to do.

  * * *

  Ariel ate with gusto. She hadn’t realized how much she missed food made from fresh ingredients. Dehydrated meal packs took care of her hunger, but they weren’t satisfying like this meal was.

  She had never had spaghetti sauce this good. The tomatoes tasted fresh. The sauce had a number of vegetables in it, which she wasn’t used to, and it also had some kind of spice that she didn’t recognize.

  Darius had served her food to her on a lap tray, complete with a rose in a bud vase on one corner. When he had set the tray before her, he had smiled.

  “Such service,” she had said to cover her nervousness.

  “I normally make my guests do everything,” he had said, “but since you can’t stand, I thought I’d change my policies just this once.”

  She had laughed and then lit into the food. He probably thought her some kind of pig, the way she was eating. But it all tasted so fine. He’d even made fresh garlic bread. She couldn’t complain that the stove heated the building so much—not when it enabled the food to be this good.

  He had a lap tray too. He sat across from her in an overstuffed chair that looked as if it had seen better days. The upholstery sagged and one of the sides looked as if it had been scratched by a cat, even though there was no cat in evidence.

  In fact, he had said he didn’t have one—although he had also said that he needed one, a comment she had found strange at the time.

  He had his feet up on the coffee table and seemed completely relaxed. Not at all like a man who had rappelled up the side of a cliff with a limp body in his arms and then had proceeded to cook a delicious dinner on a wood-burning stove.

  “How long have you been hiking?” he asked.

  She swallowed, feeling self-conscious. Did he think she was eating a lot because she hadn’t eaten in weeks? “Five days.”