Books by Maggie Shayne (13 page)

But there was no more sign of the path, and she wasn't sure whether she'd have known it even if she'd somehow stumbled onto it again. She only knew she wasn't on the path now. Somehow she'd veered into the forest. That was obvious by the trees that loomed into her vision with every few steps. Panic crept in again, chilling her even more deeply than the cold wind. But she fought it. There had to be a way to get through this.

She squinted in the snow, trying to see something, anything that would give her a clue, but to no avail. She decided at last to backtrack.

She'd either find her way back to the fire trail, or perhaps all the way to the camper if she just followed her own tracks. Turning in place, she bent low, searching for the footprints she'd left in the snow. She had to bend almost double, hold the light only inches above the ground in order to see them. Loose snow swirled and whipped around her lower legs Like the ghostly mist in a horror movie. Only more deadly. She finally found a shallow indentation in the snow that marked the place where she'd stepped. Then another.

Slowly 'she started back.

She was shivering now. Shaking so hard her teeth rattled and her muscles burned and the light jerked and danced in crazy patterns. She pulled her hands up into the sleeves of Torch's jacket and wrapped her arms around herself, bowing into the wind that screamed in her ears as she forced herself to keep moving and tried to. keep the flashlight's beam focused on the tracks in the snow.

But in only a few yards, the footprints she'd made when she'd come out here vanished. The blizzard had already filled them in. And now just what on earth was she going to do?

Keep moving. Just keep moving, Alexandra, or you'll die out here.

She tried to obey the voice of reason, did for a while. Until it became impossible. Because the asthma came on full force, shutting her bronchial tubes down. She gasped, forcefully sucking minuscule breaths of freezing air into her lungs, but she knew it wasn't enough to sustain her. It was like trying to suck air through plastic. She felt as if she were suffocating. Felt as if, nothing, she was suffocating, But she fought, used every ounce of strength-in her body to try to inhale. The effort cost her, and the reward was a dismal squeak.

Dizziness came as she'd known it would. She groped for a support, her hand sweeping through the falling snow, finding nothing to grasp. And then the snowy ground reached up to surround her face. Its cold was an icy slap, an injection of awareness. She managed to pull herself up again. But her rally didn't last. She staggered forward a few more st~s only to collapse against the skin-scraping bark of a massive pine.

Her stinging face pressed to the trunk, and she tasted its fragrance with every desperate, insufficient gasp.

Torch knew which way she would havi gone. He-left the headlights on, which helped a LITTLE. God knows their beam was a good deal more powerful than that of the pathetic flashlight she was depending on.

As soon as he stepped out of the camper, the cold bit right through every layer of clothing he wore. Damn. It was frigid, killing cold, with this wind behind it. She wouldn't last long in cold like this.

No one would.

He thought about her lungs, the frequent asthma attacks and the way they were instigated by fear. She'd be afraid right now, if she was out in this storm. If she was lost, she'd be terrified. He felt sick to his itomach thinking about how afraid she'd be.

"Ducking into the camper, he checked the glove compartment and found her inhaler there.

His heart sank. She didn't have it with her. What would she do if she had an attack out there, and no inhaler on hand?

Torch snapped himself out of his panic by mentally insisting she'd made it to the house. She was inside right now, and she was warm arid dry and safe. He envisioned her wrapped in a blanket, warming her feet by one of those fireplaces that littered the place. Only the ever-growing knot in the pit of his stomach kept insisting that wasn't the scene he was going to find.

He managed to stay on the fire road. He was soaking wet and shivering before he'd reached what he judged was the halfway point, but the extreme cold only drove him on. Maybe he even picked up his pace, calling her name now as he went. And it seemed to Torch that the storm abated a little. That the wind eased and the snowfall slowed as he moved on. Or maybe he was just going numb and his senses were dulled.

But no. He'd made it.

Torch stopped and stared off into the gloom at his right. There was a glow, very pale,~ but there. It was like trying to~- see a streetlight through heavy fog, as he squinted and started toward it The light led him off the fire trail, into the forest, but it remained visible, even grew clearer as he went. And then the trees he'd been hiking through came to an end. And he was seeing AI exandra's house beyond the veil of the storm, the outdoor light glowing like a beacon, and he run toward it.

Thank God! If the light was on, she must be. Halfway across the driveway, he paused, studying that outdoor light now that it was more visible. A huge halogen globe, very much: like the streetlights he'd likened it to. The kind of light that came on automatically at dark.

All by itself, with no help at all. .

He put his observational skills into gear and felt his heart sink into his feet. There wasn't a single light glowing from inside the house.

Only this automatic outdoor one.

He wanted to run up the front steps, slam the 'door open and yell her name. But he didn't. A lifetime of caution wasn't overcome that easily.

He drew the gun and moved slowly, his feet making furrows in the snow, Then dents when he walked up the three concrete steps. He stood be fore the dark wood door with its fan-shaped, snow-en-crusted panes of glass, and he listened.

The house was silent. Not a sound or a movement from within. He didn't think Alex was there, and the idea that she wasn't almost put him on his knees. They actually began to buckle. It was a sensation Torch Palamaro had only expefieneed once in his life.

He steadied himself, trying to focus on positive thoughts, trying to weigh his options. Fortunately, it didn't look as if anyone else was there, either. He tucked the gun under his arm and rubbed his hands together to warm them. - It didn't help much. Neither did blowing on them.

He turned to look behind him, just once. Just to be sure. No vehicles.

No tire tracks. No footprints. Then again, if there had been any, they'd have been filled in by now.

He tried the brass doorknob and found it unlocked. Then he pulled the gun out again with his right hand, held its barrel steady as he opened the door with his left.

In the bit of light that spilled in from outside, he saw the far wall.

The dark, empty fireplace, without so much as a glowing ember to attest to recent use. No one waited in ambush inside. As Torch made his way from room to room, upstairs and down, he found no sign that anyone had been here today. The place had been searched but not trashed. Scorpion's men had been methodical, careful. They hadn't charged through, emptying drawers and turning over chairs the way one saw on television shows.

You'd never find anything if you searched a house that way. Scorpion knew that. He'd taught his men well. An untrained eye might not even have known they'd been there.

But other than the signs of a painstaking search, there was not a hint of human presence. And the fact that the place was colder than a tomb was the clincher. If Scorpion's men had stayed, they'd have lit a fire in at least one of the hearths that littered the place. The power wasn't out, so Torch figured a blown fuse must be to blame for the furnace not working. If anyone had been here, they'd have needed heat.

 
So Alex had been right and he'd been overly cautious. No one was here.

Including her.

He replaced the gun and turned on some of the lights. The more light the better. He didn't care who else might see them right now. These were for Alex, in case he couldn't find her, to guide her in.

But he would find her. He had to.

He strode toward the front door. Something snared his leg with a low growl, and he damned near shot it. The cat released him when he whirled, and it crouched, 'hissing at him. Accusing green eyes blazed up at him from a furry black face.

"Not now, beast." He turned back to the door and headed out. He kept thinking of Alex, lying in the snow, dying. He kept picturing himself discovering her lifeless body out here, and it was tearing his insides apart. Dammit, she hadn't done a thing to deserve any of this. She'd been dragged into a situation beyond her control, and now she might die because of it.

No. No, she damn well wouldn't die, because Torch wouldn't let her.

He was going to do it fight this time. He wasn't going to lose another person he cared about. Not again.

Torch swallowed hard, realizing that he'd just admitted he cared for Alexandra Holt. Hell, he hadn't wanted to. But the woman made it impossible to keep a distance. She'd wormed her way under his skin, and yes, he'd let himself care. Combine that with the madness she stirred in his loins, and the woman was more deadly an enemy than Scorpion on his best day.

Didn't matter, though. Alex was out here, somewhere. He wasn't going to quit until he found her.

Alex had found the fire road again by mere chance, for what good it did her. She hadn't realized it at first, but the tree she clung to was right at the road's edge. She could see that now that the storm was easing a little. Or maybe it was just taking a break between rounds.

Finding the road, though, was no help whatsoever. Not now. She panted hdplessly, barely clinging to conscious-heSS. The strain of forcing air into her lungs was exhausting her. Her legs were stumps, numb to the knees, and she could barely stand, let alone walk. Her clothes were soaked now, her jeans frozen to her legs, her shoes caked in several layers of snow and ice. She leaned against the tree, wishing it could emit body heat, hugging herself and shaking violently, and she knew she couldn't go on. Once again her foolislmess had gotten her into trouble.

Maybe it would do her in this time.

Her legs gave out and she sank into the snow at the tree's base. God help her, she didn't think she was going to survive this.

Her father wouldn't have been surprised.

He thought she was dead when he found her. He'd been meandering into the woods along either side of the road, checking out every snow-covered clump of deadfall that even remotely resembled a body.

And then he'd glimpsed a pinprick of faint light on the ground in the distance. He'd raced toward it. The flashlight lay half-covered in snow, right beside Alexandra. And she was utterly still, cold as a stone. A thin layer of snow coated her face and clothes. His heart did things he hadn't thought it was still capable of doing. Like breaking, for instance. He hadn't believed anything could break what had become a hunk of lifeless granite, but the sight of her shattered it to dust.

He fell to his knees beside her, choking on the words he tried to shout at her, brushing the snow and frozen hair away from her face and eyelashes.

"Alex! Dammit, Alex, talk to me! Come on!"

Her answer was a low moan, but the sound of it shot adrenaline directly into his veins.

"You're alive!" He pulled her limp body against him. Her arms and head hung like a mg doll's, but he held her all the same.

"You're alive, Alex. And dammit, you're going to stay that way." He had to release her just long enough to wrestle the inhaler from his jeans pocket. He held it to her lips, squeezed two sharp bursts of medicine into her mouth, hoping she'd managed to inhale some of it. Then he tucked it back into his pocket again to free his hands.

It was closer to the house than hack to the camper. Torch was all too aware that just because Scorpion's men hadn't been there didn't mean they weren't watching the place from somewhere else. Or checking in on occasion. But he had no choice at the moment. Her life was in the balance, and Torch was already responsible for more deaths than he'd ever atone for. He wasn't going to add Alexandra's to the list.

He took the blanket from around his shoulders and wrapped her in it.

Then he lifted her into his arms and began trudging back the way he'd come. She didn't move again, didn't make another sound. But he couldn't stop to cheek her, didn't dare stop to cheek her, terrified beyond reason that he'd find her heart had stopped.

She wasn't gasping. He told himself her muscles would relax when she was unconscious and that her breathing would ease, but he had no idea if it was true. Seemed to him she ought to be in the midst of an asthma attack at a time like this: Why the hell couldn't he hear her breathing?

He looked down at her as he walked into the light outside the house, at her pale skin, the frozen lashes resting on her cheeks. The stillness of her. She looked like an icy angel, a frozen princess under an evil spell.

Why did it hurt this much?

He shouldered the door open, kicking it shut behind him, and headed straight up the stairs to her bedroom. Damn, it was cold in here. A little warmer than outside, though. At least here there was no wind.

He lowered her to the bed, and only then did he dare to lay his head against her breast, to listen. When the soft, slightly wheezy sound of her breathing reached him, he closed his eyes tight.

"Thank God. Still alive," he whispered.

He tucked the blanket more tightly around her, knowing she might not stay that way long if he didn't act fast. -But damn him for a fool, he didn't know what to do first.

He straightened away from Alex, looking around the room, and the hearth in the corner seemed to whisper an answer to him. A fire laid ready, just as it had when they'd left the house. A stack of wood standing neatly to one side. It only took a second to find the matches on the mantel and to light the fire in the fireplace. Torch closed the bedroom door, to keep the heat inside. Then turned, frowning. as he realized the window had been closed. And the rope ladder. He had no idea what Scorpion's men had done with it. He hoped to God they didn't end up trapped here with no way out.

But that worry had to take a back seat for now. For now, his only concern was Alex. The room would be warm in a while. He returned to the bed, pulling the snow-damp blanket away from her. Her clothes were wet, frozen. They were doing her no good whatsoever. He needed to warm her, and he needed to do it fast. Kneeling on the bed, he gently removed the leather coat, then the sweatshirt she wore beneath it.

She didn't move as he worked, didn't make a sound, just lay there limp.

Lifeless. His throat tried to close off, and his eyes burned inexplicably.

The zipper of her jeans was caked with snow and ice, but he finally managed to undo them. He knelt beside the bed, wrenching the snow-coated shoes from her feet, peeling the socks and then the jeans away. Her skin was cold, clammy 'to the touch. He hoped to God he'd found her in time. He tugged back the covers and bent to pick her up, to settle her' beneath them, but realized his shirts were soaking wet and icy cold. He tugged them over his head, tossing them to the floor before bending over her again. He picked her up, naked and limp and cold in his arms, against his chest. He wanted to cradle her there, to hold her aRd rock her and speak to her until he drew some kind of response. But he couldn't, not yet. He tucked her into the bed, under the covers, then quickly searched the room, taking every blanket he found and spreading them over her.

Now what?

He turned in a slow circle. Frostbite, he realized, was a danger. Her hands and her feet. Still shirtless, he ran into the adjoining bathroom. The room where he'd sat on that tiny vanity stool while she'd tended his bleeding shoulder. He snatched several thick towels from tile shelf and returned to the fire He added more logs and then held two of the towels as close to the flames as he dared, warming them. When they were heated through, he went to the foot of the bed, lifted the covers and wrapped a towel around each of her icy feet. He repeated the process with two more towels, wrapping her hands this time.

At last, he heeled off his now-thawed shoes, shirnmied out of his jeans and stood naked before the fireplace to take the chill out of his own body. And then he slipped beneath the covers with Alexandra.

She was so cold after the heat of the fire. He flinched and sucked air through his teeth as he pulled her chilled body into his arms and held her tight against his own warm skin.

Gently he cradled her, willing his body's heat to move into hers, to warm her, to bring her back to him.

"Come on, Alex," he whispered, a harsh desperation in his voice making it seem like that of a stranger to his own ears.

"Come on, wake up. You're gonna be okay. Do you hear me? You're gonna be okay."

God, if only he could be sure of that.

She could breathe again.

It was the first sensation to filter into her awareness. She wasn't struggling and gasping anymore. She was breathing easily, though her lungs ached as if she'd run a marathon.

 
And she was warm, deliciously warm and wrapped in a wonderful contrast of hardness and softness. She inhaled nasally, and her eyes opened at the familiar, subtle scent. Torch.

He was behind her and beneath her and surrounding her. His body enveloped hers in its warmth. And she closed. her eyes, wondering if this was a dream, or some fantasy-based afterlife. Oh, but it felt too good to analyze. His arms, holding her, warming her. His chest, pressed to her back. His hair-rough thigh, resting atop her legs. HIS warm breath heating her nape.

She sighed deeply, hoping to stay just like this for several more hours.

He was naked. And. and so was she.

Alexandra came mole thoroughly awake. Had some thing happened between them? Had her waking fantasy come true and had she somehow managed to forget?

The last thing she remembered was clinging to a pine tree's rough trunk, gasping for air and shivering with cold and teetering on the brink of unconsciousness.

Torch must have 'found her. He must have found her and brought her. She blinked at the bank of windows with their somber blue drapes and rope fie backs She sniffed the air, scenting wood smoke and man.

He'd brought her home. She was in her own bed. And she was all right.

She was warm and dry and safe.

Torch Palamaro had saved her life tonight.

She rolled onto her back, better to see him in the dim light of predawn and post storm And he stirred. His eyes flicked open, blinked a couple times, then darted rapidly over her face.

"Alex... ?"

"I'm okay:" His eyes continued their search, filled 'with something like disbelief. One hand came up under the covers, to cup her cheek, run through her hair, trace the curve of her neck, as his head moved very slightly from side to side.

 
"I'm okay," she repeated, knowing he wasn't as sure of it as she was.

He dosed his eyes, his arms snaking around her, pulling her tight to him.

"Thank God," he said, and sighed.

"I was afraid .... " He stopped then. His hands had been sliding down over her back to pull her dose, and they'd paused now, cupping her buttocks. As if Torch suddenly realized what he was doing. His hips were pressed to hers, and she felt the unmistakable swelling, hardening of him against her. She lifted her chin, meeting his eyes, knowing he was going to draw away from her at any second, just by the hint of panic she saw in those sapphire depths.

But she saw desire, too. And she knew she didn't want him to pull away.

She didn't have to move much at all in order to press her mouth to his.

He shuddered. His entire body trembled, but he didn't turn away. His lips parted when she nudged them. He lay very still, allowing her to kiss him. To tast his mouth on her own. He didn't move when her hands kneaded his shoulders, or when her fingers threaded into his hair; he only grew harder.

It was an instinct as old as woman that made her hips arch against him.

And it was then he came alive.

As if electrocuted, he jerked: And then he held her. He rolled her onto her back and urged her lips wider, his tongue digging deep. She felt his body grow hotter, heard the rasping of his breaths. And she knew, without being told, that it had been a long tune for him.

Longer for her, though. Far longer for her.

A shiver of fear raced through her. He moved his hands between them, to cup her breasts, to capture her nipples and roll them and gently pull at them. And then his mouth left hers, to explore elsewhere, and he suckled her as if he were starving. His hips worked all the while.

And when him mouth took over tormenting her breasts, his hands moved downward, pressing her thighs apart, and cupping her.

She stiffened, a little afraid of what was happening.

He bit her nipple, and she gasped in surprise and exquisite pain and pleasure, which rolled over her in hot waves that drowned most of her fears.

He lifted his head very slightly, his fevered eyes probing hers.

"I'll stop," he rasped.

"If you want me to stop, I'll" -- "No."

She saw the fire in his eyes blaze brighter before he lowered his head again. Then his mouth worked downward. He sucked the skin of her belly, licked at her abdomen, dipped his tongue into her navel.

Her heart hammered in her chest, and the sounds coming from her throat were foreign, not natural. Animal, guttural sounds.

His head moved lower and she clamped her thighs together, but Torch's hands slid between them and forced them open. Wide open. And then he was bending to her, and his thumbs were opening her, and his mouth was descending and. She screamed aloud when he touched her with his mouth.

The sensation was too wild for containment. He covered her with his mouth, with his lips, and he sucked at her. And then his tongue was stabbing into her as if he couldn't get enough of her taste. Alexandra writhed against his mouth in helpless anguish, 'straining toward a fulfillment she'd never known.

His teeth scraped and his tongue ravaged, and then her mind exploded.

She melted and he moaned as if she were feeding him something he'd craved his entire life.

Slowly he moved up over her body, his mouth blazing a path over her torso, pausing to torment her breasts, burning over her throat and her chin. His hands held her thighs even wider, and he slid his hardness into her. Deeper, slowly and steadily deeper. He wasn't going to stop, not for any thing. She opened her mouth, only to feel it filled with his hot, salty tongue. His hands crept beneath her hips, and he held her tight to him, forcing her utter acceptance of his thrusts, his powerful, merciless forays into the very depths of her. He slammed into her, again and again as his mouth worked hers, and his hands squeezed and held her, and she liked it. She wanted it.

And then he exploded inside her. She felt the pulse of his orgasm, felt the way he shuddered, and the sensation drove her to the brink again, as well. Her hands clutched his buttocks, drawing him deep inside her as she climaxed, her body milking his until he trembled the way she did.

And then he collapsed on top of her. But he didn't withdraw. He simply rolled onto his back, taking her with him, and he started all over again.

What the hell have you done, you freaking idiot[ Torch looked at her, lying there with the cold morning sun bathing her naked shoulders, painting the soft smile she wore even in her sleep.

He'd had sex with her. He'd been wanting it for days, and damn it straight to hell, so had she. So he'd done it.

She wouldn't call it that, though, would she? No. She was female, and as such she'd claim that he had made love to her, which he hadn't.

That's the way she'd see it though. One look at that soft smile was all it took to know it. She'd think it had been some kind of fate thing.

Slle'd think he'd been so worried about her, so relieved to see her awake and alive and well that he hadn't been able to fight his hidden feelings any more.

But she'd be wrong. Because he had no hidden feelings for her. He was incapable of those kinds of feelings. His heart had been blown to microscopic bits ten months ago, and Humpty-Dumpty stood a better chance of heal Lug than that tattered organ.

She stirred a little, snuggling closer to him, one arm snaking around his waist. Thick black lashes whispering open, huge dark eyes gazing up at him. The image of the timid woodland creature was back.