Wilderness Passion

by Lindsay McKenna

  He drove the Jeep off the last foothill and they entered a small grassy valley. It was warmer there, and the sun-dappled meadow waved with patches of blue lupine, foxglove and larkspur. Desperately Libby concentrated on keeping back her tears. She couldn’t cry! Not there and especially not in front of him! She compressed her lips and waged an internal battle with her feelings. Why couldn’t she hate him? It would be so much easier that way. But she didn’t hate him. She liked him, dammit!

  Libby was in such turmoil that at first she did not hear him speak. The instant his fingers touched the cotton fabric over her shoulder, she whirled, gasping. His brows drew down in displeasure at her reaction and he removed his hand. “You don’t have to act like you can’t stand my touch,” he growled. “I don’t hate you. I’ve never hated a woman in my life and I’m certainly not going to start now.” And then he smiled slightly. “Besides, you’re too beautiful and vulnerable to hate, Doctor. Let’s get one thing straight, shall we? Above everything else, I admire honesty. The people who live in the mountains come by it naturally. We don’t play games. Sometimes we say things that hurt others, but basically our intent cannot be misconstrued. You were born in the city and grew up where games are played to give and take what you want Out here you’ll get nowhere with that kind of screwed-up diplomacy. You started to ask me questions because you wanted something else of me. All you had to do was ask the real question straight out.”

  Her brown eyes darkened with pain as she held his steady gaze. Anger and humiliation flooded her and she snapped, “I’m hardly ‘vulnerable,’ as you put it, at age twenty-nine, Mr. Wagner!”

  He shifted the Jeep into higher gear range as they began to pick up speed over the flat dirt road that stretched toward a small group of office trailers in the distance. “Call me Dan,” he said, the hardness gone from his tone. It wasn’t a command but a request. “I called you vulnerable because every emotion registers so clearly in your golden eyes. You’re transparent. That’s what I like about you. You can’t hide a thing.”

  She didn’t know what to do or say. His voice was suddenly caring, and that threw her even more.

  “So, what do they call you at the office? Elizabeth? Betty?” he asked.

  “No. Libby,” she answered, her voice toneless.

  He nodded, his eyes narrowing as if he were thinking about it. Finally he murmured, “That fits you. It’s not a weak name, but it isn’t a totally independent one, either. A nice blend of femininity and strength.”

  She stared at him, her brows knitting. “What?” she asked.

  “Names. Haven’t you ever rolled a name off your tongue and noticed that it sounded strong, weak, soft or whatever?” He looked at her for a moment and then returned his gaze to the road.

  “N-no, I can’t say I have,” she answered tentatively, thinking about the concept. She was amazed at the way he looked at the world.

  “What was your ex-husband’s name?”

  Libby sat there for a second, saying the name to herself. Then a small smile edged her mouth. “Harold.”

  She began to laugh and he joined her. The tension eased between them as she sat back, enjoying the shared moment. Dan’s eyes were softer now, and she marveled at the azure intensity of them.

  “I’ll refrain from making any observations about that name,” he intoned dryly.

  Libby managed a quiet laugh. “Yes, I think you should. I’ve probably covered most of them myself.”

  “How long did it last?”

  Suddenly she didn’t mind answering his questions. “Five years. About three too long, if you want the truth,” she admitted.

  “You’ve been free for a couple of years, then?”

  “Yes, two years.”

  “Like being single, Libby?”

  She shivered inwardly as he spoke her name, his voice husky. It sounded incredibly beautiful. “Most of the time, yes,” she answered. “Sometimes...” She shrugged her shoulders. “It gets lonely.”

  Dan pulled the Jeep to a halt at the first trailer. The office had once been white, but now it was coated with a thick coat of yellow dust He switched off the engine, leaning back and turning his gaze to her. His eyes seemed to drink in each facet of her face, and Libby experienced a frightening thrill and a sense of danger about his frank perusal. Finally he turned away and climbed out.

  “Well, three weeks in these mountains are either going to make you feel loneliness like never before or a wonderful sense of contentment. I don’t know which.”

  She slid out the door, glad that she had worn her casual shoes as the dust settled on the tops of them. Eagerly she looked around at the mountains that embraced the valley. The vivid blue of the spruces mingled with the darker color of evergreens. She spotted a small stand of white birch halfway up on a mountain opposite the road down which they had come. Everywhere the colors seemed vibrant, alive. It was as though the forest were inviting her to reach out, touch and enjoy. Looking across the hood at Dan, she grinned. “Somehow I think I’m going to love it.”

  3

  LONG INTO THE evening Libby worked on the business at hand in the command trailer. Large topical maps of the state land-grant area lay sprawled out over roughly hewn work desks as they went over the details of the coming exploration. Dan glanced at his watch and then over at her. She stood at his shoulder, elbows planted on the map, a notebook in front of her with scribbled notes in it.

  “It’s nearly eleven o’clock,” he said.

  Libby’s eyebrows moved up in surprise. “Already?” Where had the time flown? She stood, suddenly finding that she had been in one position far too long. She pressed her fingers against the small of her back, arching to ease the tension in her muscles. “I guess time goes by quickly when you’re having fun,” she murmured, picking up the notebook and closing it.

  He snorted, rolling down his sleeves. The trailer had grown cold and he walked over to a stool, dragging his denim jacket off of it. “I don’t exactly call this fun,” he growled. “A lot of time is going to be wasted because of the damn licensing demands.”

  “Modern-day chess game, I’m afraid,” she responded, meeting his gaze. “I know you don’t like games. Now I can understand why you were so angry when you came to my office.’’

  “I’m still angry and I still don’t think this is necessary.”

  She leaned over, picking up her newly purchased coat, which had an inner lining of goose down. In one of Dan’s brief letters he had included a list of items she should buy before coming to the mountains. She was grateful now for his instructions. “I wonder if I’ll ever get used to being unessential,” she commented dryly, suppressing a smile.

  Dan walked to the door, opening it for her. “Lady, as far as I’m concerned, these next weeks will be like a vacation. I play tour guide and you do the work. Come on, let’s get you bedded down for the night.”

  Libby stepped past him, barely brushing against him as she slipped through the narrow door. She was wildly aware of the heat radiating from his body. It was as if he were a rock that had been warmed by the sun all day and now, in the darkness, gave off the heat in return. She took the steps one at a time and stood at the bottom, watching Dan come down. Her attention was drawn to the sky, and a gasp of pleasure broke from her lips.

  “Oh,” she said softly, turning to catch the panoramic view above them.

  “What?” Dan halted at her shoulder, looking down at her.

  “The sky,” she whispered in reverence. “Look at the stars! They’re so much closer.” She raised her arm, fingers extended upward. “I’d almost swear I could touch them from here. Isn’t it beautiful?”

  Libby felt a thrill. The stars hung like scintillating crystals on a blue-black velvet background. The shadowy shapes of the mountains were black silhouettes against the sky, adding a sense of grandeur to the scene before her.

  “What I’m looking at is beautiful,” Dan returned huskily. He felt pleasure course through his body, taking delight in her discovery of a world he lov
ed fiercely. Dan gave Libby a quizzical look: was his imagination playing games on him? She looked like an ancient Celtic druidess instead of a city woman. Her darkly golden hair paled beneath the starlight, an almost incandescent glow touching the untamed tendrils that framed her ethereal features. He had to stop himself from reaching out to see if Libby was real or a figment of his imagination.

  She was too enthralled to catch the inflection in his words. “I’ve never seen stars like this before! Oh, they never look like this in San Francisco,” she bubbled.

  “You are a child,” he mused quite seriously.

  Libby turned, lips parted, eyes wide and luminous. Her heart thudded as she saw the undisguised hunger and intensity in his look. She swallowed, suddenly very shy, lowering her gaze. The silence lengthened tensely between them. Finally, as if realizing her discomfort, Dan said, “The reason why the stars look bigger and brighter here is because of the elevation and the lack of pollution.” And then he added, “I can’t believe a doctor of biology would get so excited about this.”

  Libby gave him a wicked smile. “I suppose you think we only jump up and down when we look at microbes through a microscope?”

  He grinned, reaching out and capturing her arm. His fingers closed firmly about her elbow, leading her around the end of the trailer. “My contact with the biological field has been, let’s say, kept to the bedroom level, not the lab level.”

  She was thankful for the darkness because it hid the blush staining her cheek over his comment. “I don’t know if I’m ever going to get used to your honesty,” she admitted.

  He stopped at the door of the third trailer and opened it “Most city folks don’t get along with mountain people.” Giving her a half smile, he gestured toward the open door. “There’s an extra bedroom on the right—that’ll be yours for tonight. If you want to wash up, you can use the shower first. Just be sure to conserve the water if you can. We have a small heater and it runs out of hot water easily.”

  Libby gave him a stunned look. “This is your trailer?”

  “The company’s,” he corrected. “Go on in.”

  Shrugging, she entered the small, confined trailer. It was sparsely furnished with only the essentials, the linoleum floor well worn by time and many footsteps. After the desire she had seen in his eyes as he had looked at her, Libby wasn’t sure about staying there. But she had no choice and quickly accepted the reality of the situation. And a quick warm shower relaxed her to the point that when she fell into bed, she dropped soundly to sleep.

  * * *

  SHE AWOKE SLOWLY, vaguely aware of the warmth of a hand against her shoulder. Moaning softly, Libby turned onto her back, her hair spilling across her shoulders. “Libby, it’s time to get up,” Dan called. He gave her another, more insistent shake. “Come on, city girl, let’s get moving.”

  He had stood over her for a few moments before awakening her. Libby’s hair was a golden frame around her head. Dan fought a strong urge to run his lean fingers through it, to see if it was indeed as silken as it appeared. He was transfixed by the guileless quality of Libby’s face as she slept. Without the business facade it was the face of an innocent woman-child. A wild, wishful urge filled Dan. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Libby were his woman and they were simply taking a long hike in the wilderness to share the joy of the forest? He sighed heavily, frowning. How could she attract him that way? Dan knew that Libby Stapleton was touching him on many levels. Suddenly he didn’t feel as threatened by her credentials. And it made him breath a sigh of relief, because despite everything he was drawn to her.

  Dan removed his hand from her shoulder and she missed his strong, warm touch. Barely lifting her lashes, she looked through them. Dan stood above her, hands resting loosely on his narrow hips, a lazy curve to his mouth as he watched her. Rubbing her face with her hands, she mumbled, “W-what time is it?”

  “Five-thirty in the morning.”

  “Uhh, that’s impossible—I just fell asleep,” she murmured, her voice husky.

  He smiled, reaching down and caressing the crown of her head. “You have beautiful hair. Come on, Rapunzel, I’ve got hot coffee on.”

  Libby stumbled blindly out into the glare of the kitchen, dressed in jeans, a long-sleeved blue shirt and her hiking boots. Her hair, still uncombed, curled naturally about her oval face, making her look more like a young girl of twenty than a woman of twenty-nine. Dan stood against the sink, a cup balanced in one hand.

  “Here,” he offered. “It has cream and sugar in it.”

  Mumbling her thanks, Libby took it and sat down at the table, one hand against her head, closing her eyes. “My God, do we have to get up this early every day?”

  “You’ll get used to it.”

  Sipping the coffee cautiously, she muttered, “I doubt it.”

  Very little registered in her groggy mind during that first half hour. Libby was aware of the delicious smell of bacon frying and of bread being toasted. Dan placed before her a plate with three eggs, six pieces of bacon and two large slices of sourdough bread on it.

  Libby’s mouth dropped open and she gave him a shocked glance as he sat down opposite her with his plate.

  “This can’t be mine! I’ve never eaten this much before in my life.”

  “Eat as much as you can, Libby,” he advised between bites. “We’re going to be hiking most of today and your body is going to be needing the carbohydrates, believe me. Come on, dig in.”

  “I’ll get fat!”

  He gave her a knowing grin. “No, you won’t. The first week you’ll probably lose weight.”

  Running out of excuses, she picked at the food. “I don’t normally eat breakfast,” she confided. “I never have.”

  “You’re not in the city now. The oxygen is sparser because of the altitude and you’re going to burn up the sugar in your body a hell of a lot faster. You don’t have any fat on you to use as excess energy, so you’ll get hungry even faster,” he promised grimly.

  How did he know there was no fat on her body? She shot him a disgruntled look, trying to remember that this outing was not a vacation but work. Somehow she was too excited to consider it work. And despite Dan’s warnings, she was anxious to get started and sample the fare that the mountains promised.

  As the first rays of the sun slid across the peaks of the range, Dan pulled the Jeep to a halt. Throughout the two-hour drive Libby had listened attentively to his instructions on the gear they must carry. Two large backpacks were in the rear of the Jeep. He seemed pleased that she had worked up to five miles a day in her hiking boots, and she felt a glimmer of pride. Getting out, he laid a map of the region on the top of the dusty hood.

  “We’ll be taking a logging road from this point to forty miles northwest of here. We’re at sixty-five hundred feet now and will be climbing steadily to about seventy-three hundred before we crest that ridge yonder and go down into some of those valleys that hold the mature stands of timber.” He glanced over at her. “Ready?”

  She nodded, a smile forming on her lips. “Let’s do it.”

  Libby was amazed at the amount of patience he took with her as he fitted the thirty-pound backpack to her body. He stood close, fingers running the length of her shoulder straps and adjusting the hip padding to ensure a snug but comfortable fit Stepping back, he looked her over critically.

  “Well, how does it feel?”

  She walked around a little bit. “Fine. Are you sure this thing weighs thirty pounds? It doesn’t seem like it”

  “It will in a couple of hours,” he promised. “Bend over,” he instructed, “as if you were tying a shoelace on your boot.’’

  Libby gave him a puzzled look but obeyed his command. The nylon strap at her waist cut into her stomach and she rose quickly, frowning.

  “That’s what I thought,” he muttered, quickly loosening the buckle and easing the strap tension slightly. “Do it again.”

  This time she did it with ease. She came up smiling. “Feels good.”

  Dan turn
ed, shrugging into his pack, which seemed a great deal larger and bulkier than her own. “Remember the procedure, because I’m not going to be checking on you every time you put that pack on.”

  She ignored his derisive tone, too excited about actually beginning the climb up the gentle wooded slope in front of them. Keeping her notebook and pencil handy, she made a few preliminary comments about the immediate area and then tucked it away. She had tied her golden hair back in a ponytail to keep it out of the way. Wispy bangs lay across her forehead, barely brushing her wheat-colored eyebrows.

  “Here, another gift for you,” he said without preamble. He handed her a red bandana.

  “Thanks. What is it for?”

  “Put it around your forehead. You’ll be working up a sweat real soon.” He tied his around his darkly tanned throat and gave her an expectant glance. “Okay, let’s get this EPA show on the road.”

  The morning was young, with sparkling beads of dew clinging to the knee-deep buffalo grass as they walked through it. Libby tried to notice everything surrounding her as they walked at what she thought was a very slow pace. The dew coated her lower legs, the jeans turning a darker blue where the water soaked in. Within twenty minutes they were on the first slope, winding through the trees.

  At first she didn’t notice her leg muscles tightening. But by the end of the first hour she was gasping slightly for breath, her cheeks blazing with color from the high altitude. She didn’t complain, realizing Dan would probably chide her cruelly for being weak and slowing down their pace. The muscles of her calves were protesting already. Resolutely she lowered her head, concentrating on each step.