by Janet Dailey
During a moment of quiet, Shannon was caught smothering a yawn with her hand. “The jet lag has finally caught up with you,” Noah Steele announced. “It's time you were calling it a night."
“It's early yet.” Her watch indicated that, but it was set according to this time zone. Her system hadn't made the adjustment yet.
“Dad's right.” Cody surprised his father with his agreement, and pushed his chair away from the table to stand and assist Shannon. “It's time you were turning in.” His hand cupped her elbow, firm in its grip. “I'll see you to your room,” he stated. There was a complacent gleam in his eyes when he met his father's startled look. “Take care of the check, will you, dad? I'll meet you downstairs in the lobby."
Before his father could stammer a protest, Cody was guiding Shannon away from the table. A sideways glance noticed the smile that lurked at the edges of his mouth. Sensing her gaze, Cody glanced down at her, and the suggestion of a smile became more evident.
“What self-respecting man would want his father with him when he walked a beautiful woman to her door?” Cody asked in defense of his bit of maneuvering to be alone with her. The glint in his eye showed he viewed the situation in a humorous light, insisting Shannon should do the same. She was beginning to realize that Cody rarely treated anything too seriously—at least not on the surface.
“I am engaged,” she replied in a tone that laughingly prodded him.
He winced in a feigned grimace. “Please don't remind me.” He punched the button for the elevator, and a set of doors obligingly opened, without making them wait. Once they were inside, the doors closed and Cody pushed her floor number.
“Your father is a remarkable man,” she said as they began their descent. “I like him."
“So do I, but don't tell him that,” he grinned. “Ignoring the fact that he's my father, he's also the best pilot I've ever known.”
“Does he still fly?"
“He was grounded this spring—couldn't pass his medical,” Cody explained with a grim lift of his mouth. “He hasn't quite figured out what to do with himself yet, which is why he tends to get himself involved in matters that don't concern him."
Like this evening, appointing himself as her chaperon, Shannon thought. The elevator stopped on her floor. Cody's hand was at the back of her waist, providing unobtrusive guidance as they started down the hotel corridor.
“He's become my self-appointed guardian, determined to keep me out of trouble.” His glance swept over her face. “It's difficult to tell him to butt out of my personal life without hurting his feelings."
“I imagine it would be. It can't be easy for either of you,” she sympathized.
“Don't feel sorry for him. He's as cagey as a wolf and five times as smart,” Cody assured her.
She paused in front of the door to her hotel room to extract the key from her purse, and glanced at him through the sweep of her lashes. “Like father, like son?” she guessed.
There was a hint of a smile, but Cody didn't respond as he took the key from her and unlocked the door, pushing it open. He pressed the key into her left palm and held onto her hand, turning it over to study the diamond ring on her finger. His attention drew Shannon's gaze to it.
“You're really going to marry this guy when you find him?” His remark seemed to challenge her.
Her head moved in a nod as she stared at the ring Rick had placed on her finger. “My parents were going to fly here this weekend for the wedding, but we may not be able to make the necessary arrangements in time. It's possible we'll have to postpone the ceremony until next Saturday,” she conceded.
His hand cupped her cheek and jaw, forcing Shannon to lift her chin and look at him. The disturbing intensity of his gaze held her attention while his thumb rubbed her cheekbone in an absent caress.
“You say it's been six months since you've seen him?” his low voice was challenging.
“Six months,” Shannon admitted, aware of the quickening rush of blood through her veins.
His thumb slid down to trace the outline of her lips while his light blue eyes studied the action. “Six months without a man's caress,” he mused. “For six months these lips haven't been kissed. That's a crime."
His head bent to bring his mouth against them. A sense of loyalty to Rick kept Shannon motionless beneath the warm pressure as his mouth moved over her lips with sensually exploring ease. The kiss made no demand for a response, but she realized that six months of abstinence had made her hungry for the touch of a man, not just that of her fiancé. She was enjoying the feel of his mouth against hers, the male smell of him filling her lungs.
If he had wanted to, Cody could have overcome her passivity and aroused a response, but he pulled slowly away. Shannon believed it was out of deference to her engaged status, but she wasn't sure. She should have felt relieved that he hadn't pressed home his advantage, but instead she felt vaguely disappointed.
Satisfaction glinted in his look when he surveyed her upturned face. “Don't mention this kiss to dad, will you?” he said. “If he found out about this innocent little kiss, he'd probably take a belt to me."
He was dismissing the kiss as being of no importance, which was the way she had decided to regard it. So why was she sorry that he considered it to be insignificant? Was it ego? The desire to conquer even if she wasn't interested in the victory? It troubled her that she wasn't treating the kiss casually as it should be treated.
“It will be our secret,” she agreed, smiling in an attempt to make a joke of it.
“Good.” He appeared pleased with her answer. “It's been a long day. You'd better get some rest. It's time I was heading downstairs—before dad shows up with a shotgun."
“Thanks for dinner,” she remembered as he moved away from the door.
“I'll be sure to pass the message on to dad,” he promised with a saluting wave.
Inside her room, Shannon leaned against the closed door. “This is crazy,” she murmured after a second. “If he had kissed me with passion, I would have been outraged. Now, because it was a friendly, innocent kiss, I'm wondering what's wrong with me. He respected me and I'm wishing he hadn't. Oh, Rick,” she sighed, and looked at her ring. “Where are you?” she whispered, suddenly desperately needing to see him again.
Chapter Four
BY MIDAFTERNOON of the following day, the clouds had blown away and the sun had come out to shine its warmth on the city. The tan corduroy blazer was all Shannon needed in the way of a jacket as she wandered aimlessly through the downtown business district.
She'd been on the telephone all morning and the bulk of the afternoon, calling the various charter and flying services to see if Rick was employed there. Some recalled that he had applied for a position, most had no recollection of him at all, and none of them had him listed on their payroll.
A sense of defeat had driven her out of the room to walk off some of her frustration. She kept searching the faces of the people on the off chance that by some miracle she'd find Rick among them. She paused at a crosswalk and glanced around to get her bearings. Across the street was her hotel. She'd come full circle. There was no place else for her to go.
Crossing the street, she entered the hotel through the revolving doors. As she walked through the lobby, she thought she heard someone call her name and stopped to look over her shoulder. Her mouth curved into a smile that didn't lighten the defeated dullness of her eyes.
“Hello, Mr. Steele,” she greeted the older man, and half turned as he approached. “I didn't expect to see you today."
“Noah,” he corrected.
“Noah,” she repeated in acknowledgment. “Is Cody with you?” Her glance made a brief sweep of the lobby in search of his dark-haired son.
“No, he's busy,” Noah explained, and Shannon felt a slight letdown at the answer. “I had some free time, so I thought I'd stop by to see if you had any luck finding your boyfriend."
“No.” She shook her head, the corners of her mouth drooping. “I called ever
y company in the telephone book. A couple of them remember talking to him, but Rick isn't working for any of them.” Her shoulders lifted in an expressive shrug. “I just don't know what to do next."
“Let me buy you a cup of coffee.” He winked as if he knew the remedy. “Nothing is ever as bad as it seems."
“That's what I keep telling myself,” she sighed, and let herself be led to the coffee shop off the hotel lobby. “At this point I'm open to any suggestion."
“Two coffees,” Noah Steele ordered as the uniformed waitress brought glasses of ice water to their table. He waited until she returned with a pot of coffee and the two brown mugs were filled before he responded to her earlier statement. “Maybe you should go to the police and file a missing-persons report on him."
“I've been thinking about that.” She measured a spoonful of sugar into her coffee and stirred. “Except that I don't know that Rick is missing. I just don't know where he is. I'd feel pretty foolish if it turned out to be a false alarm."
In her side vision she caught a glimpse of a tall figure entering the coffee shop. When the man started walking toward their table, she turned her head to cast a curious glance in his direction. Recognizing Cody, she sent a startled look at his father.
“I thought you said Cody wasn't with you,” she said.
A fleeting expression of guilt crossed his features when he looked around to see his son approaching them. “No, he didn't come with me,” Noah Steele insisted.
“Hello, Shannon.” Cody smiled at her, then turned a speculative look on his father. “Dad, this is a surprise. What are you doing here?"
“I thought I'd stop by to see Miss Hayes and find out whether she'd had any luck locating her fiancé.” His features were almost too bland. “After all, she doesn't know a soul here, so it can't be easy on her, being alone with no one to turn to for help."
“Strange,” Cody murmured, tipping his head to one side. “Those words sound very familiar. I believe I expressed a similar thought about an hour ago when you asked me what my plans were tonight."
A redness crept up his father's neck, and Shannon realized Noah had known all along that Cody intended to see her today. That's why he'd arranged to be there first, so Cody would be the one intruding this time. The only problem was that Cody had exposed his father's hand and revealed his intention.
“Why don't you sit down and have a cup of coffee with us?” his father invited.
“Why, thank you,” Cody mocked the invitation, pulling an empty chair away from the next table. "Did you have any luck, Texas?"
“No. I called everyone. I don't know where to go from here,” she repeated her earlier frustration.
“Maybe he got a job doing something besides flying,” Noah Steele suggested.
“No.” Shannon was positive about that. “He would have come home before he'd done that. Wherever he's working, you can be sure it's associated with flying. He wouldn't have settled for anything less than that."
“There are any number of companies that have their own fleet of planes.” Cody filled an empty cup with coffee from the insulated pot on the table, his remark raising her hopes and offering her another avenue to pursue in her search for Rick. “He could have hired on as a copilot or navigator for one of them, to gain some experience in this kind of country."
“Say, now that's an idea!” his father declared, showing approval of the suggestion. “Wade Rafferty is a good friend of yours. Why don't you check with him?"
Shannon glanced from one to the other, her brown eyes dark with confusion. “Who is Wade Rafferty?” The name meant nothing to her, and certainly not in connection with Rick.
“Wade is Cody's fishing buddy,” Noah Steele replied, which meant even less.
“Wade heads up the Alaskan operation of a petroleum company with interests in the pipeline.” Cody's explanation made more sense. “He would know or could easily check to see if your fiancé is flying for any of the oil companies."
“Would he?” She was almost holding her breath as her gaze clung to Cody.
“If Cody asked him, I'm sure he'd do it as a personal favor,” his father insisted.
“I believe he would,” Cody verified his father's statement. Her anxiously eager expression seemed to ask what he was waiting for. He studied it, one corner of his mouth lifting in resignation. Then with a little push he shoved himself away from the table and straightened from his chair. “'I'll call him right now."
“Thank you.” A glowing smile of gratitude brought a shine to her features that caught his attention. The light color of his eyes gave an intensity to his look as he searched her face, probing for the source of her emotion. For a brief second he uncovered something. Shannon didn't have a chance to identify the feeling deep inside before some inner mechanism shut it out of her conscious mind, but it left her a little shaken.
A jet-black brow was arched in her direction. “Are you sure you want me to find your fiancé, Texas?” It was a low question, quietly issued.
Before she could clear her muddled thoughts to assert her assurance that she did, Cody's father sharply reprimanded him for the question. “Why did you ask a thing like that? Of course she wants him found! She's going to marry him, for heaven's sake!"
There was an invisible shrug as he relented in his demand for an answer from her. “I'll phone Wade and get the search in motion on his end,” he said, excusing himself.
His long, deceptively lazy stride carried him quickly out of her sight toward the public phones in the hotel lobby. Shannon sipped her sweetened coffee with a preoccupied air, her thoughts swelling with Cody and his question, which shouldn't have disturbed her.
As if reading her mind, his father spoke up. “Don't you be letting Cody put doubts in your mind."
“He isn't,” she assured him, and thus convinced herself.
“That's a relief.” Noah sat back in his chair, relaxing a little. “Once that boy makes up his mind that he wants something, he has the devil's own persuasion to get it. I have my hands full just keeping him in line sometimes."
“Are you hinting that Cody wants me?” There was a thread of amusement in her voice, prompted by his staunch protection of her engaged status.
Noah Steele looked briefly uncomfortable, then bluntly admitted, “He's made it plain that he's attracted to you. I saw it in his face when you walked into the office the other day. I don't want you getting the wrong idea about Cody. He wouldn't make any move unless he had a signal from you that you wouldn't object.” Lest she think that he was casting any aspersions on her character, he hastened to assure her, “I don't normally interfere in my son's private matters. It's just that with your fiancé missing and all, you're in a kind of vulnerable position."
“I think I can take care of myself,” she suggested gently but firmly.
“Maybe so.” He conceded that it was possible she could. “But it seems to me that since your fiancé isn't here to look after his interest, somebody should do it for him. Once we find him if Cody wants to make a play to win you away from him, then it would all be fair and square."
“I appreciate what you are saying, Mr. Steele. But I hardly know your son—and he barely knows me.” Shannon resisted the way he was taking it all so seriously.
There was a determined shake of his head, dismissing her argument. “You can know a person for twenty years and not know him any better than a stranger on the street. Or you can meet a stranger and twenty minutes later feel as though you've known him all your life. Time isn't a measure."
Shannon was forced to agree. Within minutes after meeting Cody, there had been a purely instinctive feeling that she had known him a long time. It was not something that could be explained. But the subject was shunted aside when she saw Cody approaching the table.
Before she could ask whether he had been able to reach his friend, Cody was relaying the results of his phone call.
“I talked to Wade and he's going to check his employee files.” Cody sat down in the chair he had vacated earl
ier. “He suggested that if we stop by his house around seven this evening, he may have some answers for us.” His glance stayed with Shannon, not straying to his father.
“That would be nice,” Noah endorsed the suggestion. “I haven't seen little Molly in almost a month. I'll bet she's grown an inch."
“Molly is Wade's and Maggie's daughter. She's two months old,” Cody explained for Shannon's benefit.
“Yeah,” his father agreed, and elaborated on the explanation. “Molly is Cody's goddaughter."
“Really.” Her interested glance ran back to Cody and the glinting blue of his eyes.
“Do you have trouble picturing me as a family man?” It was a low question, with a suggestion of intimacy in its tone.
After only a second's consideration, Shannon shook her head. “No.” She was faintly surprised to discover that she didn't have any difficulty visualizing him with children. There was a part of him that was almost boyish, allowing him to play children's games and create new ones. There was also an iron discipline behind those rugged and smiling features that would stand him in good stead as a parent.
“That's good,” he murmured and there was something in his look that sent a hot warmth through her veins.
Shannon attempted to change the subject away from her. “You must have known Wade Rafferty and his wife for a long time."
“Wade and I got acquainted about six years ago when he first came to Alaska.” Amusement glittered in his eyes; he was aware of her ploy.
“Almost seven,” his father corrected, and Shannon was relieved to have him take part in the conversation again. “We haven't known Maggie, his wife, that long, of course."
“Have they recently married?” she asked.
“You could say that,” Noah Steele agreed with a broad hint that there was a great deal more to the story. “You see, they were divorced when Wade moved up here. He went back to Seattle about a year ... year and a half ago. It was really an unusual set of circumstances. You see, Wade was engaged to Belinda Hale, the daughter of the president of his firm. He'd gone back to break the news to his son, Mike, and get married. He got married all right, but to his first wife, Maggie.” He paused, a grim expression dominating his rough features. “It was too bad about Belinda."
