Chance Encounter (14 page)

E
ACH TIME
A
LLY HAD
been to see Lucy, her aunt had seemed fresh, happy and full of spunk. And each time, Ally had left the hospital with a niggling feeling that she was somehow missing something.

Things were no different on this early, foggy morning as she made her way to Lucy’s room. She hadn’t called first, but
she’d
been the surprised one.

The traction was gone.

In fact, there was no sign of an invalid at all. And though she knew Lucy had been progressing wonderfully, that she was close to being healed, it was still a shock.

As Ally entered the room, Lucy and a nurse were laughing over a joke that the doctor had just told—the doctor that had released Lucy.

Ally stood rooted in the doorway, dividing her gaze between the grinning nurse and Lucy. “You’re getting out of here?”

Lucy went utterly still, then plastered a smile on her face. “Darling, how lovely to see you! What a surprise! You shouldn’t have driven all this way just to see little, old, rickety me.”

“Why do I have the feeling you’ve never been little, old or rickety?” Suspicious, and feeling as if the joke
was on her, Ally moved closer. “How come you didn’t let any of us know you were coming home today?”

“Well…I…”

“Lucy, have you been faking all along?”

“No!” She sent her nurse a pleading look. “Tell her. Tell her I was helpless in traction, lying around for days in agony.”

“Agony, yes,” the nurse said, smiling fondly at Lucy. “Helpless? Never.” And with that, she left them alone.

Ally waited for an explanation that didn’t seem to be coming. “Lucy?”

“I’m thinking, dear.”

“About?”

“How to best approach this.”

Ally let out a disbelieving laugh. “How about starting from the beginning? Now, please.”

Lucy grimaced. “Are you this tough with your sisters?”

“I am now.”

“Well…I guess that’s a good thing.” Lucy sighed dramatically. “You’re not going to like this, you know.”

Ally already knew that by the way her heart was drumming. “Try me.”

“Okay, well, I really did hurt myself.” Lucy slid the sheet aside, revealing the bottom half of her legs, one of which was still in a cast. “See?” She wriggled her purple polished toenails. “Definitely broken.”

“Skip to the part I’m not going to like,” she suggested tightly.

“You mean where I confess I’ve been matchmaking this entire time?” Lucy smiled sheepishly, looking twelve instead of sixty something. “Is that the part you mean?”

“You…
what?
”

“I’m sorry.”

“But that’s—” Ally sank to the bed in shock, the breath swooshing out of her lungs. “How? You didn’t even know for certain I’d come here. And you
couldn’t
have known that I’d fall for Chance, much less even like him—”

Lucy gasped. Her eyes lit up and she brought her hands to her mouth. “Oh darling! It worked? Really? You fell for him?”

“I…” Even as the trap surrounded her, as the noose tightened, Ally refused to go down without a fight. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Lucy let out a dreamy sigh. “It’s too late, I can see it in your eyes.”

“That’s bad temper!”

“It’s love.”

“I can’t believe this.” She felt dazed, railroaded. Mortified. “What a rotten thing to do!”

“Oh, no. No, I didn’t mean it that way,” Lucy said urgently. “I just thought—”

“What? That it’d be fun to mess with my life?”

“No, of course not. Ally…”

But she didn’t want to hear it. Not when the implications of everything were just setting in. She stalked the length of the room to the door, then whirled back. “It was all a ploy? The letter, the job? Everything?”
She waited for the denial that couldn’t come because it was all true. “You never really needed me at all.”

“No! I—”

“You were bored? You wanted to amuse yourself, and contrived a way to put my
entire
life on hold? Is
that
it?”

“Oh, honey…” Lucy wrung her hands. “This is not going as I planned.”

God, she felt so foolish.
Humiliated.
“You played on my sense of family loyalty to get me out here. I can’t believe how I fell for it. And all this time I thought I was helping you.”

Lucy lifted a hand and pointed at her. “Now you stop right there, Ally Wheeler! True, yes, that’s all this family ever does—lean on you. I know that, and it’s wrong. I just thought it was time you got something back for once, and I know for a fact you
did
get something back by running Sierra Peak, so don’t you tell me otherwise. You learned to trust yourself, you learned just how strong and independent you can be.”

Ally sank to a chair and let out a little laugh.

“And you know what else? I think you learned a whole hell of a lot more than that. Not that you’ll admit it to me right now, but I think you learned how to
receive
love as well as give it.”

Ally stared at her. What would Lucy say if she told her she was right, she’d received lots of “love.” On her desk. Against a tree. In the kitchen. The shower… Her heart cracked and broke. “Chance was in on this, right? Give the city girl a thrill?” A man like him would never have given her a second look, why in the
world hadn’t she seen that? Because she hadn’t wanted to, she’d been too busy reacting with her hormones.

“I swear to you, honey. Chance had
nothing
to do with this.”

“I need air.” Desperate for it, she headed toward the door.

“Dammit—” Lucy fought wildly with her covers, trying to get out of the bed.
“Dammit!”
She flung up her hands in frustration. “If you’re going to leave, then help me up so I can follow you. We’re not finished!”

Ally stared at the door in front of her, knowing she should walk out, but she couldn’t. Miserable, she studied the white paint, but what she really saw was Chance lying sprawled out in her bed, rumpled and sexy from the night they’d spent.

Loving each other.

Her throat tightened. Her eyes burned.

“Ally. Oh, Ally, I’m so sorry.”

“Yeah. Me, too,” she told the door.

There was more rustling and more swearing. “Then get back here and let me shake you!”

Ally laughed a little, swiped at the silly tear that had escaped, and slowly turned to face her. “Don’t hurt yourself. Just stay put.”

“Not until you understand—”

“I do. I know that you care about me, and that—”

“I
love
you, dammit. And I
love
Chance. If ever there were two people who deserved to find each other more, I don’t know who they are. I just thought—”

“You thought wrong.” With a sigh, Ally moved back to the bed. She would not take her pain out on Lucy. “You should know you’ve been meddling in vain. I came to tell you it’s time for me to go. Now that you’re getting out of here, the timing is perfect.”

“Don’t tell me he found someone else, I know that boy too well.”

“No, that’s not it.”

“Good. Now tell me you love him again.”

“Lucy—”

“Tell me!”

Ally swallowed hard, but the truth came out. “Okay, fine. You win. I fell in love with him. But—”

Lucy’s eyes flared with triumph. “No buts needed.”

“
But,
whether Chance loves me back or not doesn’t matter.” She had to swallow hard. “Not when he doesn’t
want
to love me. That’s why I have to go. Please understand. If I stay, I’ll go weak again. I’ll take whatever pathetic scraps of attention he can give me, because I can’t resist him. I’ll take it and feel grateful for even that little bit.”

Lucy’s eyes filled. “Oh, honey.”

“It’s over, Lucy,” she whispered. “And I have to leave. I’m sorry.”

Lucy reached out a hand, and this time Ally took it. When Lucy tugged and gathered her in for a warm hug, Ally returned it with all her heart.

“I don’t want you to go,” Lucy murmured. “You’ve made a place for yourself here. Both in my heart and at the resort, and I know you may not believe this… I hardly believed it myself when I first realized it, but I
don’t want to work twenty-four/seven anymore.” She pulled back to stare into Ally’s eyes. “I want to cut back. I want to relax.”

Ally shook her head. “Don’t you dare add offering me a pity job to your crimes.”

“This is
not
a pity job. I swear!” Lucy was vehement. “I would never offer you or
anyone
a job out of pity. I respect hard work too much for that. I just really want to work less. A lot less. And I really thought you were meant for Wyoming. You’ve got stamina, willpower and a heart of gold.” She hugged Ally tight. “So think about it, okay? Think about staying here anyway.”

Ally squeezed Lucy tight and fought back more useless tears. “It’s ironic, how much I want to stay. How much I’ve grown to love it here.” The mountains, the trees, the silence, the inner peace it gave her…she didn’t want to lose it.

“Then stay.”

Ally closed her eyes. “I can’t.” Her entire life was in front of her. Surely she could do something with it, something worthwhile. “Besides, I have to go close out my apartment. The building was sold before I even came here.”

“I know.” Lucy pulled back, looking innocent.
Too
innocent. “Who do you think bought it?”

Ally laughed in disbelief.
“No.”

“Yes.”

“But the cost… I didn’t think you had—”

“Oh, I have the money. And before you ask, I’ve been trying to help your parents for years, but they have such pride, Ally. They’re wonderful people.”

Ally smiled fondly. “I know.”

“And you’re wonderful, too. I just wanted to pay you back for all you’ve ever done in the name of family loyalty.”

“You already have.”

“No, I could never do that, you’ve given so much. Go, honey. I know you think you have to. But I’ll make you a little hopeful wager. That you’ll be back.”

“Don’t count on it,” Ally warned.

“Oh, but I will. You need to go back and see how little that city really means to you. Then you’ll come back. Back where you belong.”

“No.” Ally couldn’t. She couldn’t face seeing Chance every single day. “I’m sorry, Lucy.”

Lucy refused to hear it. “Make it a quick trip. I’m thinking about learning how to hang-glide.”

When Ally’s jaw dropped, Lucy hugged her again and laughed. “Just kidding.”

Ally wasn’t so sure.

T
WO TERMINALLY LONG
days later, Ally had nearly finished packing up her apartment, with a few days to spare on her lease.

Not that
that
mattered now, she thought with a renewed sense of amazement at how far Lucy had gone to get her to Wyoming. Thanks to Lucy, she didn’t have to rush, and she hadn’t yet decided on another place.

Exhausted but pleased with her progress, she sat on the floor, surrounded by a sea of boxes, all in various stages of packing.

And she yearned for Chance.

Outside her tiny window, cars honked, a plane buzzed by, a siren screamed…city sounds. She hadn’t slept well because of the noise, not when she’d gotten so used to the quiet and peaceful wilderness.

She wanted that soul-fortifying silence back.

And if she wanted a lot more than that, if she wanted warm, loving arms to hold her at night, if she wanted those arms to belong to T. J. Chance, then she could put that in the back of her mind.

He wasn’t that type of guy. Forever wasn’t his thing.

No matter that it had become hers.

She hadn’t slept a wink since she’d left, not because of the stupid city noises, not out of worry of closing up her apartment, but because she missed him.

She missed the way he saw so much joy in everything outdoors, and the way he made her see it, too. She missed his laugh, and how he made
her
laugh. She missed his touch. Only with him did she feel like a woman capable of bringing a man to his knees with a simple kiss. It was a power she relished, and wanted to feel again.

But most of all, she missed the way she felt when she was with him. Alive. As if she could do anything.

The knock at her door startled her. So did the achingly familiar male voice. “Ally.”

It’d been days since she’d heard him, and hearing him now rendered her a trembling, yearning wreck.

He knocked again, less politely. “Ally, open up.”

Before she could even rise to her feet, he helped
himself. In he came, larger than life, looking as if he’d just strode in from off the mountain. His hair was windblown, his bare arms and face tanned and rugged. He wore jeans and a T-shirt, his standard uniform, and just looking at him brought an ache of loneliness to her chest.

When he saw her sitting on the floor, he dropped his small duffel bag and strode toward her. Each step he took caused her heart rate to double.
Triple.

The boxes in his way were shoved aside, his dark and intense gaze never wavering from her face. “I have some questions for you,” he said.

It was hard to be casual with her heart in her throat. “I would have thought Lucy had covered any problems.”

He faltered, looking shocked. And…hurt? “You think I’m talking about the resort?” But before she could so much as blink, he hauled her up, her toes dangling off the floor, nose to nose with him, and gave her a light shake. “You think I flew all the way out here to ask you about the
job
you left?”

“Well, I—”

“You left my bed without a word,” he grounded out. “You left my
life
without a word.”

“Actually, it was
my
bed.”

He looked almost baffled, as if no one had every walked away from him before. “You were with me. In my arms. Soft and sated and glowing from what I thought was one of the best nights of my life.”

“It was,” she agreed, and completely upended his temper by laying her hand along his jaw. “It was.”

He resisted the urge to bury his face in her hair and beg her to come back, because he knew what he’d done wrong, knew how he’d lost her. Oh yeah, he knew exactly. And he had to face it, quite possibly making this the biggest adventure he’d ever been on. “You just vanished,” he whispered. “Just took your stuff and…left. Lucy was no help, she just told me I was an idiot and I’d figure it all out in good time, whatever the hell that means. Dammit, why didn’t you tell me you were leaving?” But he couldn’t bear it, couldn’t handle hearing he’d gotten only what he deserved—his solitude, which was what he’d always wanted before Ally. So he covered her mouth with his and kissed her for all he was worth. He kissed her and kissed her, heart roaring, body quaking, because given that he’d found her packing for who-knows-where, he might have missed her entirely.