The Baron (32 page)

As soon as she followed him inside, Zach knew the guided tour was a mistake. The closeness inside the wagon conspired to make him more conscious of her than when they’d been standing toe-to-toe in the rain. He found himself wondering what shade of
brown her hair would be when it dried, and whether she ever wore it loose. If she’d been wearing perfume, the fragrance was gone, replaced by the crisp scent of rain and meadow grasses.

She didn’t say a word when he leaned across to flip open one of the built-in cabinets, accidentally pressing against her, and he didn’t think he could have said anything if he’d tried. The electric hum that pulsed through his veins at the contact startled him. Their wet T-shirts were little more than second skins, and the shock of feeling her softness against him robbed him of words.

By the time he’d managed to list the food stocked in the wagon, he knew he was fighting a losing battle. Every time he moved, he touched her, but he’d be damned if he was going to apologize for the size of the wagon! Abruptly, Zach slammed the cabinet and moved away.

“If you need it, just look for it. Chances are it’s in here somewhere.” He stepped down to the ground and added, “Use the water in the big barrels strapped to the sides of the wagon.”

The intimacy of the wagon had been torture on Niki’s nerves. Trying to pretend nonchalance when she could almost feel the beating of his heart against hers had been impossible, and she exhaled a sigh of relief when he left. The rain had stopped, Niki noted as she watched him through the oval opening in the canvas. He struggled with the knot he’d tied in the reins. Obviously, the intimacy had affected him too.
Good. She was secretly glad to see a chink in his armor.

As she leaned out of the wagon he looked up and asked, “Any questions?”

“Only two.”

“Shoot.”

“Who does the dishes?”

Zach pointed at her. “Next question.”

“You
do
work for the ranch, don’t you? I mean, you’re not a cattle rustler?”

Zach, who was leading his horse, did a double take. “A
what?
”

“A cattle rustler. One who rustles cows and chuck wagons.” Shrugging her shoulders, Niki said, “I thought I ought to ask.”

“I work for the ranch,” he assured her, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.

“What do you do?”

“Whatever needs to be done. Like going back for the buffet table we left on the ground.” He walked his horse a few more feet and then mounted in a swift, practiced motion. Once he was in the saddle, he looked back at her and said, “I’d hurry up with those sandwiches if I were you. First shift’s going to be here any time now.”

“What about the coffee?”

“I’ll be back.”

That’s what worries me, Niki admitted silently. Inside the wagon she found a bucket-sized jar of peanut butter, a quart of grape jelly, and two loaves of
Whole wheat bread. Rain pattered against the canvas while she smeared peanut butter and jelly on slice after slice of bread and reminded herself to keep her distance from Zach. That Was one man she had no business encouraging. She tried to tell herself that part of her attraction to him was the cowboy mystique that she and every other young girl had been spoon-fed from infancy.

Unfortunately, Niki couldn’t convince herself. New York had its share of urban cowboys with expensive alligator boots, ten-gallon hats, and tight, button-fly jeans. She’d never been remotely attracted to them, which meant her attraction to Zach had nothing to do with cowboy mystique.

Quirky hormones. That was her problem. Her brain and her libido couldn’t seem to agree on the right time and the right place, much less the right man. They never had and, she suspected, they never would.

She was here to gather material for her syndicated column “Heartbeat.” Nothing else. Especially if the
else
was Cowboy Zach from Cutter’s Creek. What was his last name? Had she forgotten it already? She didn’t remember his perfect profile from high school, which meant he had to be a newcomer. He must have moved to Cutter’s Creek sometime during the past eight years.

Why anyone would want to move to a small town like Cutter’s Creek, full of narrow-minded, mean-spirited people, was beyond Niki’s imagination. She’d
spent the last year of high school dreaming of nothing but getting out … getting away from the hushed conversations and painfully understanding stares. Niki smiled grimly to herself as she cut the sandwiches into triangles.
There’s nothing like a painful past to shape a better future
. She had no intention of allowing herself to become involved with a hometown cowboy, despite quirky hormones.

A man was running across the hilltop, a bare, beautiful man racing against a red sky. His body was gleaming with sweat, the muscles rippling across his chest and back, the long, hard muscles of his thighs tightening and stretching with every swift stride. His hair was black as night, a wild mane flying behind him. His heart was pounding, as if every evil in the world were chasing at his heels. Fleet-footed, he reached the edge of the cliff … and yet he ran on, magically leaping up into the sky, his body transforming from muscle and flesh to feather and talon. He was an eagle, dark and powerful, soaring against the endless blue. And she … she was left far below, a small figure wandering through a maze of old ruins. In the dimness she bumped against a cold stone wall, stumbled on the crumbled rocks covered in the dust of centuries. But she couldn’t leave. She was searching for something, something she’d lost so long ago. She was weeping,
her heart broken. When she fell, she could not get up again. Then an old man appeared, an old Indian in a ceremonial robe with feathers and beads, bits of glass sewn on the buckskin. She saw herself reflected there in a hundred tiny mirrors, each image shattered. He reached for her, and it was as if she could hear the words: “Stand. Take off your jacket. Take off your dress, your shoes. Untie your hair. Stand, and take off your skin, your bones, your sorrow. Take the stone out of your heart. Here …” His palm lay open. “Place it in my hand.” But she was too frightened, her arms and hands weighted down with fear. Her body was paralyzed, her feet had taken root. Yet suddenly she was balanced at the very edge of the cliff; there was only air and sky behind her, and the old man moving toward her, closer and closer, his hands outstretched. This time he chanted aloud words that her heart somehow understood:
To fly with the eagle is to reach for the stars
. And then his hand touched her—

“No! No, stop! Don’t push me!”

Carol Lawson sat bolt upright in bed, her heart pounding, her body wet with a cold sheen of sweat. She took a deep gulp of air and pressed her hand to her breasts, struggling to shake off the last strands of the dream that clung to her eerily. It had been so vivid, so real, so contradictory. She knew all too well that heartbreaking sense of loss, that grief she’d lived with so long. The pictures in the dream were terrifying:
Herself lost and searching amidst places and things she’d never seen or even imagined before.

She lay back down and pulled the covers up to her chin, a storm of emotions sweeping through her. Somehow the strange dream had opened a door to the old, terrible sadness, reminding her of a part of her life that she usually was able to keep deeply hidden, even from herself. But mixed with the fear and grief was an unexplainable excitement. There’d been
magic
in that dream, frightening her, but thrilling her too. How had
her
subconsious ever concocted such a wild and powerful vision? What did it mean?

Hugging herself, Carol searched for a sensible answer and found it in the moving boxes and suitcases piled around her bedroom. Anyone would be upset the night before starting a new job, a new life. That’s all it was; that’s all it meant. But even as she closed her eyes, her thoughts leapt ahead to the desert Southwest and what might be waiting there.

“Don’t touch that! Don’t touch a damn thing,” growled a deep voice from the dark corner of the lobby.

Carol stepped back quickly from the display of Indian artifacts she’d paused to admire.

The hotel lobby of the Ocotillo was almost empty at midnight, with the exception of the night clerk doing paperwork behind the front desk. The faint sound of a native flute came from the same shadowy corner as the voice, music so lyrical and mystical, it seemed to transform the quiet lobby into the far reaches of the desert itself.

Carol waited expectantly, peering past the glass cases into the darkness. Finally she shrugged. “Hello? I’m sorry. I was just trying to get a closer look.”

“Don’t. It’s closer looks and careless hands that destroy these ancient things.” As he spoke, a man emerged from the shadows, parting the darkness that
surrounded him. He was tall, lean, and ruggedly handsome in worn jeans and cowboy boots, the kind of man you had to look at twice. Riveting. Perhaps a bit dangerous. His eyes were masked by the darkness of the room, but Carol could feel him looking at her; she felt his gaze slide over her and linger like a touch.

Her whole body tightened, and for a second she felt something mysterious take hold of her—a jolt of emotion. But was it excitement, fear, or … recognition? She actually took a half step forward, her heart fluttering, before she caught herself and stopped, confused by her response to this absolute stranger.

He frowned, and narrowed his eyes warily as he looked into the blue depths of her eyes and saw his own pain and hunger mirrored there. His heart clenched in his chest. What had he seen? Who was this woman? But in an instant he became stone again, cold and distant. “I’ll be done in an hour. Come back then.”

Lifting her chin, she said, “I may if I have time. I’m the new assistant manager. I came in to do a little paperwork. I didn’t mean to bother you.”

“Good.”

She frowned. “Do you work for the hotel?”

“Occasionally.” Coldly he turned his back and placed a long hunting bow on the shelf next to a quiver of arrows.

“That’s beautiful,” Carol said, giving it one more try. “The whole display looks fascinating. Is it owned by the hotel or on loan from—?”

“There’ll be signs up in the morning. Right now
I’ve got work to do.” And with one last piercing look at her, he turned and disappeared back into the darkness.

Carol stared after him. If she had known how to use the bow and arrow, she might have. She wasn’t used to such rudeness … but neither was she used to being looked at in quite that way. Her skin actually tingled.

Jet lag, she thought, rubbing her hands up and down her arms. It was a long flight in from Atlanta, and now
she
had work to do too. With a shake of her head she went off to find her new office.

At dawn the next morning Carol was back in the lobby of the Ocotillo. In daylight, it had lost its strangeness; the arrogant mystery man was gone, and the art display was nothing more than a collection of old things sitting on shelves. She barely gave it a glance. What
she
noticed was the comforting similarity between this and the lobby of the towering Atlanta property she’d just left. There was the familiar Palm-Resort ambience of a four-star, world-class hotel: The pleasing sound of water tumbling over an indoor fountain; the well-modulated tones of the front desk staff; the soft talk and laughter of guests strolling toward the dining room.

Outside, of course, there was a world of difference. Gone were the city streets, the traffic, the crush of people, and the noise. Guests arriving at the Ocotillo thought they’d traveled to the edge of the world.
And in a way they were right. It was the edge of the ordinary world, the gateway to the strange and beautiful desert world of the Southwest.

The hotel sprawled across the valley floor, the main lodge surrounded by luxurious one- and two-story adobe
casitas
, elegant suites with bedrooms, Jacuzzis, beehive fireplaces in the living rooms, and private patios. Encircling it all were the red cliffs and sandstone mesas that made Arizona famous. It was a spectacular landscape etched against a vivid, sun-drenched indigo sky.