Gabrielle found her heart beating harder again. She had a feeling that Seth O'Connor knew a lot about staying alive and that his quiet "damn good job" was high praise indeed. It warmed her in a way that Hollywood's empty compliments and fulsome endearments never had.
She studied his profile as he drove with a non-flashy style, handling the old truck with a competence that was reassuring. He'd managed to overtake the Mustang on curves that scared most tourists, at a speed that had probably tested this truck to the limits. For a long while, the silence stretched between them, warm and comforting. She let it stay that way, enjoying the warmth. Then, knowing she had to deal with it, she sighed and asked the question.
"You never asked me for my name," she said.
He glanced at her, the blue eyes raking her up and down in one sizzling glance.
"No," he agreed.
"Then you recognized me," she said, feeling a bone-sapping weariness that had nothing to do with the immersion into the icy water, or the harrowing loss of brakes in mountainous terrain.
"You're a household name, Gabrielle Sherborne. You're going to get upset because people recognize you?" His tone was neutral, possible even uninterested.
She swallowed. "Not recognized, no. But boast about the fact that they got to strip me naked. That's something the tabloids would pay a lot to know about, Seth O'Connor."
"Don't read 'em," he said easily. He turned the truck off the highway onto a well-ploughed road, overhung with old trees with gnarled boughs, bare now, and holding up thick layers of snow.
Ahead, there was a clearing with a big, well-founded cabin nestled under the trees at the back of it. The cabin had a wide verandah, window boxes, a big river stone chimney and a solid lean-to that looked like it served as both a garage and wood store. A gangly Irish red setter was bouncing around at the approach of the truck, its tongue lolling out of the side of its mouth.
"You don't have to read them," she said. "They'll pay you anyway."
"I already have a job and they pay me more than enough to live on." He halted the truck with a sharp jab on the brakes, throwing her forward against the seatbelt. It should have been warning enough, she knew. She opened the door, unlatched the belt and climbed down and discovered her mistake. She stepped into snow and almost immediately felt the cold bite into her socked feet.
Seth rounded the truck. "Goddam, couldn't you wait?"
"You don't have to look so pleased about it," she shot back. "They're your socks."
He scooped her up and threw her over his shoulder like a bag of potatoes and she drew in a breath, shocked beyond words. The recent emergency aside, people didn't touch her. Not without negotiation and permission. It wasn't done. It tended to make security people unhappy, media people far too happy and speculative and rumors rife. She had put a general ban on people touching her even casually years ago. She had learned all the signals and motions that squashed even the most touch-happy people's tendencies to reach out.
She clutched at Seth's back, staring at the Irish setter trotting happily after him, as Seth marched up the steps to the cabin, and wondered if Seth was just one of those people who completely lacked any sensitivity and rode roughshod over other's feelings.
The inside of the cabin was warm and comfortable, surprisingly neat and tidy, and not nearly as rustic as she had been expecting for a cabin on the edges of the national park. She struggled to get down, but he was still moving.
"Hey, I've been using my own feet since I was three," she protested, pummeling her fist into his back.
He dumped her onto a bed and she landed with an 'oomph!' and brushed her hair out of her eyes, after sliding the oversized sleeve of the coat down her arm. She looked around. The bedroom was probably his, she reasoned. There was a door to the right that revealed an en suite.
Seth O'Connor stood at the side of the bed, his arms crossed over the thick chest. A furrow dug between his brows. "Take a shower, get warm," he said, his voice rumbling in his chest. "While you're there, think about who you want to contact first. I have a land line here, so you don't have to use a cell phone. There's towels in the cabinet next to the shower. And I'll find fresh clothes you can put on while you're in there. Something closer to your size."
He turned to go.
"Seth."
He looked over his shoulder, the single blue eye all she could see of his face.
She took a deep breath. "I'm sorry. I've spent three years trying to off-load some of the crap I landed myself in over the years. This...felt like I was in it all over again. I prejudged you and I was wrong."
"You did, and you were," he said evenly. "Not everyone wants to use you, Gabrielle. Some people are actually human beings."
"I'll only believe that when I see them bleed," she shot back. "Some of the people I deal with don't even have a pulse."
Seth turned to the door, gripped the handle. He didn't look at her when he said softly, "I've bled plenty." He shut it quietly.
Chapter Two
Seth let her make the call she was dreading in complete privacy. Perhaps he sensed the fear building in her. He stepped outside to take care of something in the outbuildings, he said.
She was dressed in a pair of jeans that were only three sizes too large and had to be rolled up at the hems by four inches and belted in at the waist by six. She wore a well-washed and faded tee-shirt and fleece shirt over that, also rolled at the sleeves. She felt like a six year-old in her daddy's clothes, except she had never once dressed up in Cameron Mackenzie Sherborne III's Italian designer handmade suits. He'd have flayed her alive if she had dared.
Gabrielle dialed her father's cabin's direct line, hoping he was in it. She didn't want to use his cell phone number if she didn't have to.
Thankfully, Darlene, his executive associate, picked up. "Darlene, it's Gabrielle. I need to speak to Dad. Is he there? It's urgent. I mean urgent."
Darlene understood the family code well enough. "I'll get him," she said smoothly. There was a five second silence.
"Gabrielle?" her father said. He was the only one in the family to use her full name. "What has happened?"
She took a breath, determined not to cry. Not this time. Not anymore. She had done that too often with her father. "There was an accident on the Yellowhead, Daddy. The brakes failed on my car as I was driving to Pocahontas—"
"You're alright?" he said quickly.
"Yes, but the Mustang is a write-off, Daddy. I had to ditch it into the river to stop."
Silence. She drew a shaky breath.
"You did?" he said at last. "You pulled yourself out of the river?"
"No, there was a man, Seth O'Connor. He helped me get the car off the road and get me out of the river. I'm at his cabin now, Dad. This is his line." She looked around the room again, to make sure she was still alone. "You might want to check into his background. He's Canadian and I'm pretty sure he's military, but he doesn't wear dog tags. He saved my life, Dad. If he hadn't come along, I wouldn't have been able to control the car long enough to get it into the river."
There was a short silence. Her father would understand what she had not said as well as anyone in Hollywood, for he was a major player in that world. Depending upon which biography the tabloids used, Cameron Sherborne was either the eighth or tenth richest man in Hollywood, and certainly one of the most powerful. He was a film producer and entertainment entrepreneur and because he was independently wealthy, with vast family fortunes invested around the globe, he answered to no one. That meant he could make the films he wanted to make. And Cameron Sherborne was in the business because he liked movies, not because he liked making money. He already had enough of that. His artistic sense, though, was good enough that he continued to make money—lots of it.
Gabrielle listened to her father's short silence and knew he was thinking the same thing she was. He would look into Seth O'Connor's background because he had the unique resources to do that. It was worth finding out about the man who happened to be there just when Gabrielle's
brakes failed.
"I'm going to have to sneak back into the lodge, Dad. I look like I've been pulled through a hedge backwards. Any media around?"
"Some," Cameron responded. "Can this O'Connor fellow bring you in?"
"I'll ask."
"And you're really alright?"
"I'm fine," she told him. "A mild headache." She waited.
"Make it soon, Gabrielle," her father said and hung up.
Gabrielle put the phone back in place, staring at it, feeling almost winded.
"What's wrong?" Seth asked, behind her.
She swiveled the desk chair around to face the main room again. Seth stood at the front door, easing his feet out of his boots. He was carrying a big armful of sawn logs that he stacked on the tiled fireplace and bent to push one at a time into the fire. He glanced at her. "You look like the call didn't go so well."
"That's just it. It went fine." She bit her lip.
He picked up an iron poker from a tub of fire tools and pushed at the logs, arranging them precisely. The flames leapt, illuminating the planes of his face and the strong, tanned neck inside the open collar of his workman's shirt. There was a scar on the corner of his jaw, a small one, that was white with age, just where his strong jaw line began.
He put the poker back with the rest of the tools. "If it went well, then why the frown?"
The lashes around Seth's eyes were thick and black. She hadn't noticed them before. She gripped the edges of the chair. "Conversations with my father never go well." Then she dropped her gaze and grimaced. "Sorry, that's probably too much information."
She heard his soft exhalation and looked up again. He tilted his head slightly. "You think the world doesn't know that you have a rocky relationship with your father?" He said it almost apologetically.
Gabrielle smiled. "You said you didn't read the tabloids."
"I don't. I never have. But for a while there, it seemed like you were everywhere. A person couldn't turn around and you weren't plastered on billboards, the internet, call waiting, TV, radio...everywhere. You and that scuzzball that wouldn't leave you alone and did the dirty on you in the end, and—"
"Scuzzball?" She started laughing.
"What?"
"That's a new one. Is it Canadian?"
He shrugged. "You don't like it? I got plenty more for jerks like that. Dickwad. Fu—"
"It's okay," she said quickly. "I get the general idea." She stared at him. "You sound...almost angry about it."
He frowned. "He was an asshole who treated you like dirt," he said flatly. "What ever did you see in him?"
She sighed. "And this is why I get tired of people recognizing me. That was three years ago, but the entire world seems to feel they deserve an explanation for my actions whenever they demand one. What were you doing three years ago, Seth? Any mistakes you made that you're glad you've put behind you? How would you feel if, everywhere you go, someone came up to you and told you what an idiot you were back then, just to make sure you got the point, good and proper? Think you'd get a little tired of it after the first fifty or so times?"
He sat on the edge of the fireplace. "I never said you were an idiot, Gabrielle. I was talking about him. Now I've met you, I really don't get it. I'd like to skip back three years and tear the guy a new one for treating you the way he did."
He spoke quietly, with no emphasis, his big hands hanging between his knees, but Gabrielle shivered, because she knew with sudden certainty that if he had a mind to, he could tear Adrian a new one. He could do things to another human body that would terrify most people.
She knew that she had to be honest. "I was different then, Seth. I've cleaned myself up a lot since then. Adrian was the last straw, really. My father made me promise to keep out of trouble, after that."
Seth lifted a brow. "Or what? He'd cut you out of the will or something?"
She smiled. "This isn't Peyton Place, Seth. He made me see that the path I was on was self-destructive. So I agreed to try and change. And so far, in three years, I'm doing okay."
"'Okay' doesn't sound like much fun," Seth observed.
She grimaced. "You should have seen me before. It looked like fun on the outside. It looked like a laugh a second. But if you compare my life these last years with what went before, these three years are a joy." She rubbed her temples, suddenly realizing what she was saying. "God, listen to me," she breathed. "Seth, I'm sorry. I don't normally inflict this upon a total stranger."
His gaze didn't waiver. "Who do you inflict it upon?"
No one. She carefully changed subjects. "My father was wondering if you would be kind enough to sneak me back into Jasper Park Lodge. There's media people hanging around and I really don't want them to see me like this."
"Of course," he said evenly. She mentally sighed in relief. He wasn't going to pursue the question. She had a feeling that if he persisted, he would eventually dig whatever answers he wanted out of her. That was a novelty, for she had spent years honing her verbal evasion skills with the media. Yet in three minutes she had blurted out more to Seth about her true feelings than to a single other soul on the planet.
She stood up abruptly, annoyed with herself. It was just the accident. Adrenaline aftermath. She'd get it together and be just fine, once she was back with the family at the lodge. And after Christmas, when they were back in the States and a long way from here, she'd be even better.
She looked at Seth. He was watching her again, very still, the painted blue eyes framed by the black lashes taking in every detail. She cleared her throat, suddenly feeling awkward. "Can we go now?"
He rose to his feet. "I'll need to get the truck warmed up first. I won't let you sit in a cold cab. So have a seat for a few minutes. Here." He picked up a cushion from the sofa and dropped it onto the tiles where he had been sitting. "Have a seat. I'll be right back."
She sat with her back to the fire and listened to the sounds of Seth tying his boots, pushing open the front door and striding across the verandah. The Irish setter's toenails scratched as she followed him eagerly across the verandah. He murmured reassuring words to her as he stepped down to the ground. A few seconds later, the truck started up.
Gabrielle realized with a start that she could hear all that detail because of the profound quiet around the cabin. They were utterly alone out here. There were not dozens of personnel a few hundred paces away, working to make their lives more comfortable. There were no paparazzi lingering in bushes or cars down the lane.
Gabrielle looked around the main room of the cabin. It was a house really, for it had the bedroom and en suite, central heating, a decent kitchen area...only the rustic cabin exterior and the huge stone fireplace made it cabin-like. It was comfortable. Peaceful. No people scurried here, or threatened to.
She stretched out her feet, encased in their freshly laundered borrowed socks, only five sizes too big for her, feeling tension ease from along the full length of her body. She could easily curl up and go to sleep right now. Astonishing. Had to be post-stress related. Normally, she couldn't sleep anywhere but her own bed, with all the doors and windows double-locked, the phone parked for the night and security alerted. Even then it sometimes took hours for her to fall asleep.
She wriggled her toes in the oversized socks, as the door of the truck slammed outside.
The realization dawned on her with an impact that stole her breath, although she didn't know why.
Seth was going to have to carry her back to the truck.
* * * * *
Seth scratched Lucy's head and sent her back to the shed with a short command. He considered picking up another load of wood to bring into the house. Then he canned the idea. If they were leaving, building up the fire was the last thing he needed to do.
He glanced at the front door. What was he afraid of? A diminutive strawberry blonde with eyes the color of toffee. Even without an arsenal of makeup artists and fresh out of the shower, she looked gorgeous. He just hadn't expected her to look so small and delicate. On the
movie screen, she looked bigger. And blonder. And much tougher.
But the toughness was still there despite her real size. The toughness was very real. Beneath the surface was titanium. Sheets of it. Forged, he suspected, a layer at a time, each time some jerk like that Adrian guy dumped on her, or Hollywood pushed her around.
So...she was a natural strawberry blonde. He liked that. And he liked that she had let her hair revert back to her natural color. It swung around her waist in distracting waves, now.
Seth realized where his thoughts were and stomped up the steps to the front door, gritting his jaw. There was probably some movie stud waiting for her back in L.A....he was so way out of line to even linger on what had happened today. She was right, he was a jerk and worse for trying to use it in any way, shape or fashion. He pushed open the door and shouldered his way into the cabin.
She looked up, startled, her eyes wide like a doe.
His shirt was just about sliding off her shoulder, despite the fact that she had buttoned it properly. Creamy flesh showed and her shoulder blade, then the neck of his tee-shirt, resting right on the edge of her shoulder.
"You were a while. Is the truck okay?" she asked. "You must have had to push it hard to catch up with the Mustang."
"It's fine," he said. "I was just checking on Lucy."
"Who's Lucy?"
"The dog. She was fretting because I normally let her into the house. I didn't want to confuse her, though, with you being in my clothes."
And Gabrielle blushed clear up to her hairline. Seth suppressed his grin. It was astonishingly endearing, that blush. He took a breath. Let it out. "I don't know if you've figured it out, Gabrielle, but I'm going to have to carry you out to the truck."
She nodded, her big eyes on his face. "I can't get my feet wet again," she said softly.
He cleared his throat. "Ready?"
She nodded.
He took a breath. This was harder than a night drop into hostile territory. With an almost convulsive movement, he bent and scooped her up into his arms. She weighed almost nothing, but contrariwise, he was hypersensitive to the fact that she was in his arms.
Tracy Cooper-Posey Page 2
