by Amii Lorin
Except for the clerk at the desk—a young woman this morning—the lobby was deserted. The combined hum of voices and activity from the direction of the dining room indicated that quite a few of the motel guests were up and about.
Standing before the swinging doors into the room, Jen moved her eyes slowly from table to table. Although she saw several of her fellow bus passengers, including Terry and Lisa, there was no sign of Ted and Liz, or of the only one she really wanted to see—Adam.
Sighing softly, she backed away from the archway and almost into Bill Wakefield. Bill's staying hand on her arm stopped her retreat and prevented a collision.
"Good morning, Miss Lengle," Bill said, smiling brightly.
"Good morning." Jen returned his smile, hesitated a second, then glancing around, asked, "You haven't seen Mr. Banner this morning, have you?"
"Adam?" Bill's smile deepened. "Sure. He's out in the parking lot digging out his car."
"Oh!" Spinning around, Jen headed for the stairs. "Thanks, Mr. Wakefield." Flashing a wide grin, she ran up the stairs. Within minutes she came running back down again, wearing the bright red jacket with the hot pink stripes, a white knit cap, and matching mittens. At the bottom of the stairs she came to a full stop, soft laughter shaking her shoulders. Bill Wakefield, grinning broadly, stood waiting for her at the entrance doors, leaning on a large snow shovel.
"I thought you might want to give him a hand," he chuckled.
"If I can find him out there," Jen laughed as she walked to him.
"Oh, he'll be easy enough to spot once you get around that bus." He nodded his head at the large vehicle that blocked their view of the parking lot. "I've had men out there over an hour."
"Has there been any news on the road conditions?" Jen asked, taking the handle he held out to her.
"The road crews have been out since it stopped snowing around dawn. They were out last night but had to pack it in when it started snowing again." Bill shrugged. "The wind was blowing the roads closed as fast as they could clear them."
"Frustrating," Jen murmured. "Well, I'm no help to Adam standing here. See you later, Mr. Wakefield"—she indicated the shovel—"and thanks."
As Bill had promised, Jen had no difficulty locating Adam after she walked around the bus. The gold Formula, now cleared of its white cover, gleamed dully in the watery sunlight. Beside it, wielding his shovel with smooth precision, Adam was making noticeable inroads into the snow around his car. And Adam's labors were not the only ones showing results.
With surprised eyes Jen surveyed the cleared area around her. Off to her left a man in a Jeep with a snow-plow attached to the front was making steady progress in clearing the parking lot.
Toting the shovel, Jen walked to Adam and, without saying a word, set to work. As she straightened to dump her first shovelful of snow, an arm snaked around her waist.
"Good morning." Adam's quietly caressing tone sent a tremor down Jen's back. "You didn't sleep very long. Did you sleep well?"
"Yes." Turning inside the circle of his arm, Jen glanced up at him, feeling her breath catch at the warmth in his eyes. "Did you?"
"Not very." A rueful smile curved his lips. "I kept waking up, wishing you were with me."
"Oh, Adam. I'm—"
Adam's mouth, covering hers, silenced her. His lips were cold but every bit as exciting as the night before, and Jen responded eagerly. Adam began to deepen the kiss, then pulled back sharply.
"We're not going to get the job done this way." His eyes gleamed teasingly. "Even though I wouldn't be surprised if the snow is melting around my feet." Dipping his head, he stole another quick kiss before asking, "Have you had breakfast?"
"No," Jen exclaimed softly. "You said we'd have breakfast together."
"And we will," Adam chided at her reproachful look. "If and when we get the car dug out." Removing his arm, he stepped back. "So get to work, woman, I'm hungry."
Working silently, Jen matched Adam's pace until the area around the car was completely cleared of the heavy snow.
"I'm going to move the car closer to the entrance." Handing Jen his shovel, Adam slid behind the wheel and started the engine. "Go on ahead, I don't want to take the risk of having the thing slide around and slam into you."
Carrying a shovel in each hand, Jen walked to the front of the building, wincing at the stiffness in her back muscles caused by her unusual activity.
Adam carefully maneuvered the car into the part of the lot scraped clean by the snowplow, then joined her at the entrance doors. Relieving her of the shovels, he propped them beside the doors.
"We'll leave these handy for anyone else who might want to dig out. Now, let's go have breakfast."
After shedding jackets, caps, and gloves, and hanging them on a coatrack just inside the dining room, they made their way to the same table they had sat at the night before. They were no sooner seated when Adam lifted his arm to wave beckoningly to someone. Curious, Jen turned, then smiled a welcome to a very sleepy-looking Liz and a very satisfied-looking Ted.
"You two just crawl out too?" Ted drawled as he seated himself after seating Liz.
Jen felt her cheeks flush pink at the clear implication in Ted's question. He was assuming that, in the natural order of events, she and Adam had spent the night together in the same manner he and Liz had. Not bothering to disabuse Ted, Adam chided him disdainfully.
"I'll have you know, Jennifer and I have been industriously employed for the last hour"—a little exaggeration there, Jen thought—"digging my car out of fourteen inches or so of snow."
"I humbly beg your pardon," Ted apologized dryly. "Who do you have to know to get a cup of coffee around here?"
At that moment, as if on cue, the same young waiter who had served them the night before came up to the table carrying a glass pot of coffee and four menus.
"Good morning," he chirped brightly. "Four coffees?"
As the table was preset with napkins, flatware, and inverted cups on saucers, the waiter had only to turn the cups over and fill them at their chorus of assent. After doing so he passed out the menus and promised, "I'll be back in a few minutes for your order."
Liz slowly came awake as they ate their breakfast, and by the time the waiter refilled their coffee cups she had joined in with the light banter. The meal finished, Ted indicated a third refill of their cups as the waiter cleared the table, and then, after passing a pack of cigarettes around—which Jen and Liz declined and Adam accepted —he held the flame of his lighter to Adam's, lit his own, and said smilingly, "Now I feel almost human. What do you think our chances are of getting out of here today, Adam?"
"Nil," Adam replied flatly. "The road crews are hard at it, but I doubt if we'll be able to go anywhere before tomorrow morning."
Liz frowned, then glanced questioningly at Ted. "I guess we may as well head for home, then."
"I'm afraid so." Ted shrugged. "I'll see what I can find out as to road conditions upstate, but I doubt they'll be any better than around here."
"Probably worse," Adam inserted.
"If we have to go home, we're going to have a very unhappy group of passengers," Liz sighed.
"We have no control over the weather, Liz," Ted soothed. Then deliberately changing the subject he asked, "What do you do for a living, Adam?"
"I work for the oil industry." He named a large company. "Out of the Philadelphia-office. I'm a sort of trouble-shooter."
Ted's eyebrows rose. "I'd have thought you a little young for that."
"Not really," Adam answered easily. "But the fact that I speak several languages, including Arabic, doesn't hurt."
That sent three pairs of eyebrows up, and Jen exclaimed, "Several languages? How many?"
"Japanese, Spanish, and Russian fairly fluently," Adam said. "And a smattering of Greek and Portuguese—plus the Arabic."
"You studied languages in school?" Ted inquired.
"The Russian and Spanish, yes, through high school and college. As I spent half of my formative y
ears in Japan, I picked up the Japanese as a matter of course." At the baffled expressions that had been growing on Ted and Liz's faces Adam explained briefly. "My parents are separated. My father lives in Japan, and I spent six months of the year with him while I was growing up. Also, as my father is in the export-import business, dealing mainly in Asian art objects, he made numerous buying trips to the Middle East. He always took me with him. At times those trips took up most of my six months stay with him and on several occasions included side excursions to Greece and Portugal." On noting the look of amazement on all three of the faces turned to him, Adam grinned. "Sounds like a very erratic way to grow up, I know, but at the time I thought it was perfectly normal." The grin widened. "I enjoyed every minute of it."
"I guess!" Liz exclaimed. "By comparison, my life seems very sheltered and awfully dull. I've never been any further away from home than Florida."
Liz had put Jen's own thoughts into words, except she hadn't even been as far as Florida.
"I was all the way to Virginia Beach once," she commented dryly. "How about you, Ted?"
"I've seen pretty much all of this country in the ten years I've been driving tour buses," Ted replied blandly. Then he added grimly. "After Vietnam I had no urge to ever leave this country again."
The very grimness of his tone cast a momentary quiet over the table.
"Sorry about that, guys." Ted grinned in apology. "I'm going to go and see what I can find out about the road conditions." Pushing back his chair, he smothered a yawn with his hand as he stood up. "Then, as I had very little sleep last night, I'm going to take a nap." He leered exaggeratedly at Liz. "Want to go with me?"
Although she blushed beet-red, Liz's "Yes" was prompt and clear. As she stood up Liz glanced from Jen to Adam. "What are you two going to do?"
Adam's quiet, serious "We're going to go play in the snow" drew surprised looks from both girls and a low chuckle from Ted.
"Each to his own games." Ted laughed and, grasping Liz's hand, he strolled away.
Finishing the last of her coffee, Jen studied Adam over the rim of her cup, a crawly sensation tickling the back of her neck. She had been longing to. go romp in the snow, but how had he known?
"You do want to go out"—Adam's eyes as well as his tone teased her—"don't you?"
"Will you help me make a snowman?" Jen teased back.
"I haven't had much experience in the man-making line," Adam said, smiling wickedly, "but I'll do my best."
"You always made snowladies?" Jen fluttered her lashes over innocently widened eyes.
"Well, ladies, at any rate." Adam's soft laughter did strange things to Jen's breathing, while at the same time his words, though teasing, sent a tiny shaft of pain through her chest.
Why should you care? she chided herself as she preceded him out of the dining room. Why should his none-too-subtle way of telling you he had made ladies bother you one way or the other? A sharp memory of the melting feeling his mouth and hands had induced was all the answer she needed. Suddenly Jen hated the thought of any other lady knowing the feel of his mouth, his hands. I'm jealous! she thought in wonder. I've known the man less than one full day, and I'm jealous of every other woman he has ever looked at with interest.
Surreptitiously watching as he donned his outdoor gear, Jen acknowledged her feelings for what they were. I'm in love with him. I barely know him and I'm in love. It's crazy. This doesn't happen in real life, does it? It's the situation, she argued silently with her emotions. The snow. The proximity. Her eyes ran hungrily over his athletic frame, lingered longingly on his strong facial features.
Fighting the urge to reach out and touch him, she zippered her jacket with trembling fingers. The feeling of possessiveness that gripped her made a mockery of her inner arguments. All her previous beliefs went by the board. Whether it was supposed to happen "in real life" or not hardly mattered. She did love him, and the very thought of being separated from him now was unendurable.
In a somewhat shaken and unsteady state, Jen followed as Adam blazed a trail through the virgin snow around the one side of the motel-building. The large, even expanse of pure white was a blatant invitation, and shrugging off the unfamiliar depression that had settled on her mind, Jen scooped up a handful of snow and tossed it at Adam.
Adam retaliated in kind, and that started a snow battle that soon had Jen shrieking with laughter and mock fear. The snowman was forgotten as the battle raged, wet and furious, for over an hour.
Stumbling away from Adam's too accurately aimed missiles, Jen came to a gently sloping bank near the rear of the motel.
"Oh, Adam, look!" Jen cried delightedly, staring at the bank. "A perfect place for angels in the snow."
"A perfect place for what?" Coming to stand beside her, Adam glanced at the bank then into her face in puzzlement.
"Angels in the snow," Jen repeated. "Haven't you ever made angels in the snow?"
"No." Adam shook his head. "How do you do that?"
"Give me your hand and I'll show you," Jen laughed up at him.
Ignoring the skeptical expression that crossed his face, Jen grasped the hand he held out and carefully lowered herself backward onto the smooth white bank. After extending her arms against the snow on either side of her body, Jen flopped them up and down while at the same time moving her legs in a scissoring motion. Then, jumping lightly to her feet, she turned to study the impression she'd made in the snow.
"Now, doesn't that look like an angel?" Jen indicated the effect of head, wings, and full skirt her movements had impressed into the snow.
"Surprisingly it does," Adam admitted. Lifting his hands he caught the pointed ends of her upturned collar and drew her face close to his. "But I like my angels with a little more substance"—his cold lips touched hers— "and red hair"—the now warm lips trailed across her cold cheek—"and skin that's delicious even when it's been in the deep freeze."
"I'm no angel!" Jen exclaimed breathlessly.
"Any woman that has remained untouched until the age of twenty-three is either an angel or frigid," Adam laughed softly. "And after your response last night I think we can discount frigid."
"Adam, about last night"—Jen had a sudden, overwhelming need to explain her actions—"I've—I've never been like that with a man before."
"Do you think I don't know that?" Curling her collar more tightly, he pulled her against his taut body. His lips moved with shivering slowness from her temple to her jaw. "Lift your head—I want to bite your neck." The order was whispered in a reasonably good impression of every actor's idea of Dracula.
With a breathless, shaky laugh, Jen flung back her head and exposed her throat to his mouth. The touch of his lips was the trigger that sent her arms around his waist.
Locked together, indifferent to the cold, damp bite in the air, they clung: Adam to her collar, Jen to his jacket. The sudden movement of Adam jerking his head up and back startled a soft "Oh" from Jen.
"Your shirt collar is soaking wet," he growled softly. "You have got to be chilled to the bone. Why didn't you tell me?"
Without waiting for, or even allowing, her to answer, he released her collar and, clamping his arm around her shoulders, started toward the motel. As they approached the side of the building, an unmarked door opened and a motel employee struggled out with two large plastic trash bags.
Increasing his stride, Adam called, "Hold the door, please," then grinned a "Thank you" as they edged by the overstuffed bags. Within seconds they were standing outside the door to Adam's room. He inserted the key, then paused to gaze broodingly into her face.
"Okay?" he asked quietly.
Jen's hesitation was of a very brief duration, yet inside those fleeting seconds she became positive of two things. First, if she said "Yes" she would be agreeing to a total commitment, at least of a physical nature. Second, if she said "No," he would not insist but merely withdraw the key and escort her to her own room.
Without delving into her reasons, Jen gazed directly into his ey
es and answered clearly, "Yes."
The door swung open, and Jen stepped into the room with an outward calm she was far from feeling. She had never been inside a man's room before. Excitement, coiling inside like an insidious reptile, vied with fluttering nervousness.
The room was a smaller replica of the one she shared with Lisa and Terry on the floor above, except there was only one bed—a double. Jen stared at the bed as if she'd never seen one before. The sound of the lock being set on the door sent a quiver of uneasiness zigzagging through her body. The sound of Adam's voice, for all its cool practicality, dried up all the moisture in her mouth.
"You'd better get out of those wet clothes."
They were standing just inside the door, and following his example, Jen pulled off her sodden mittens and cap.
"Just drop them where you stand," he directed quietly. "We'll collect them when we're dry."
Like a well-trained soldier she obeyed without question, her mittens and cap falling to the floor from nerveless fingers. Her jacket followed a moment later, and bending over, her trembling fingers went into battle with the wet zippers on the sides of her boots. By the time that tug-of-war ended, Adam had scooped up the wet garments and was busy draping them over the back of the room's lone chair.
"If you'll bring me the boots," he requested softly, "I'll sit them in front of the register." With a wave of his hand, he indicated the long, narrow heating vent in the far wall below the wide window.
Jen carried the boots to him, then stood staring out the window while he lined them up along the wall. The window looked out of the rear of the motel, but the magnificence of the snow-covered, mountainous terrain was lost on Jen's unseeing eyes. Gazing in at the riot of conflicting emotions pulling in different directions, Jen blinked, startled when Adam's fingers, examining her collar, brushed her neck. Although impersonal, the physical contact made her shiver.
"You can't stay in these wet clothes," Adam stated flatly. "I think you'd better have a hot shower."
"A—a shower?"
Up until this point Jen had not spoken, nor had she looked directly at him. Now, hearing the faint, tremulous sound of her own voice and hating the timidity of it, she looked into his face—and melted. His eyes had that warm velvet glow, and a tender, understanding smile curved his lips. The hand at her collar slid around her neck, his fingers gently massaging the tension-tight muscles.
