Bound to Happen (3 page)

He gave no outward sign of his pleasure, however. As he finished his assessment, he finally pronounced, “You’re not blind. But you still have some explaining to do. Are you thirsty?” he asked absently, getting to his feet and walking off into the darkness.

As she watched his tall, lean frame move away, she had to admire the grace with which he moved. His shoulders were broad, and the plaid flannel shirt he wore couldn’t conceal the large muscles that bulged beneath it. His legs were long and thick and powerful, but they moved with a loose fluidity that Leslie found oddly fascinating.

Suddenly her view was obscured by a huge blue mound that went straight up in the air like a dome. Leslie gasped as she realized it was the skirt of her dress and that everything under it was completely exposed. She tried to push it down but only succeeded in causing it to bounce around and increase her embarrassment at looking like a fool.

“Relax,” the man said from somewhere beyond the cloud of pale blue silk and lace, “I can’t see anything from my side either. Your petticoat covers up everything but your feet. Are they cold?” he asked as an afterthought. “I only had the one blanket, and I wasn’t sure which end of you to cover.”

Recalling the low cut of her bodice, Leslie was grateful for his decision and began to wonder if this awful day would ever come to an end.

“I don’t have any aspirin with me,” he said, not really apologizing as he moved back into the low circle of light. “But I was about to start a fire. At least you’ll be a little warmer.”

He came down on one knee and bent over Leslie. She experienced a sense of relief as she recalled that he wasn’t as ominous looking up close as he was at a distance. Reluctantly she had to admit she liked his face. It wasn’t conventionally handsome, but it was interesting in a rugged, earthy way.

He offered her water from a canning jar. When her neck wobbled under the strain of holding her head up, he slipped a hand to the back of her head to help her. Leslie was surprised at how warm and gentle his hand was. Nothing else about this man seemed warm or gentle.

“I hope you appreciate the restraint I’m using here in deference to your headache,” he mentioned casually, his deep, thick voice devoid of humor. “It’s not every day I have a beautiful woman in a fancy dress drive me off the road, call me a trespasser, and then faint dead away, you know.”

Leslie tried to look surprised. “No?”

“No,” he confirmed, pointedly. “And I want your story as soon as you can think straight. And it better be good.”

The man put the water down beside the lantern, then turned his back to Leslie as he started the fire. She knew she owed him some sort of an explanation. Gruff and obviously put out as he was, he had taken care of her after she’d passed out. And she could feel that she was testing his patience sorely with every minute she remained silent. But how did one go about explaining to a stranger that one was an idiot.

Trying to find the best way of stating her case, Leslie found the events of the day as unbelievable as she was sure he would. Self-pity and spontaneous behavior were new to her. Leslie was normally calm, easygoing, and fairly certain there wasn’t much in the world that was worth getting upset over. Everyone had problems, but to Leslie it had always been just a matter of choices. She’d floated through twenty-eight years of life being bright, capable, and financially sound. When conflicts arose, she had simply examined them, determined the direction she wanted to go with them, and solved them. Her life was simple and logical … most of the time. And she liked it that way … most of the time.

Her particular character traits were also the reason she enjoyed and performed her job so well. She liked facts and raw data. They didn’t lie, they rarely changed, and there was nothing mysterious about them. They were simple and logical.

Those same traits, Leslie felt, were the sources of her greatest flaws. When something wasn’t simple or logical to her, a compulsion to twist and mold them to be so overwhelmed her. Take love, for instance. Where was the simplicity and logic in that?

So how on earth was she going to explain all of this to a stranger? Would he understand that she was scared witless that she’d never be in love, because she didn’t understand it, or that she’d never be loved, really loved, because it would wither and die waiting for her to recognize it? Should she tell him that she was terrified of discovering that the fondness she felt for Jeff Warner was actually love after all? That the friendly relationship they shared was as good as love got? That she was beginning to believe there were no such things as passion or deep abiding devotion or selfless giving and cherishing between two people?

On second thought, maybe she should just stick to the facts, she decided. He’d never believe she drove all the way up there to see something as powerful and moving as God’s handiwork in the mountains just to prove to herself that she was capable of feeling something.

“I was supposed to be in a wedding this afternoon,” she offered in a soft, tentative voice.

The man turned to look at her. He considered her for several long, tense moments before he arched a dark brow and asked, “Your own?”

“No. My sister’s. I was supposed to be the maid of honor.”

“I take it you didn’t get to the church on time.”

“Well, yes. I was there … but then I left.”

“And came up here,” he finished her story for her in a dry tone of voice that normally would indicate it all made sense. They both knew it didn’t.

Still, Leslie realized the man wouldn’t care about all the events that had taken place between her arrival at the church and their accident on the mountain, so she said, “That’s about it. Except that I haven’t eaten all day. That may be another reason why I fainted. I’ve never fainted before, so it’s hard to tell why I did today.”

Again the man studied her face intently—and again Leslie felt like an open book. His eyes moved down her blue-silk-and-lace-clad body and back again. Finally he spoke. “You ever thought of writing short stories for a living?” he asked, his tone cynical but with the addition of his humor not biting. He smiled briefly, more to himself than at Leslie, and when she refused to comment, he said, “I suppose all the details are grossly personal and highly painful, and to recite them would have you in tears in seconds, so I won’t ask for them right now. But for our survival, I need to know if someone’s going to come looking for you when you don’t show up tonight.”

“I doubt it,” Leslie said without hesitating. “Even if they called, they wouldn’t think it out of the ordinary to get my answering machine, and tomorrow … well, I was supposed to be leaving town in the morning. I’m afraid it’ll be at least two weeks before anyone misses me.”

“Great.” There was a long-suffering sigh. “I guess that settles that, then.”

“What settles what?”

“I was hoping there’d be a husband or boyfriend waiting for you. Someone to start a search. In which case it would be easier for everyone if we stayed close to the cars so they’d find us faster. As it is, I guess I’ll have to take you with me.”

“Take me with you where?” Leslie asked, more than a little distracted.

“Home.”

Leslie knew it would take several days to hike out of the mountains. Even if this charming fellow could find it in himself to loan her some more appropriate clothing, she was sure she couldn’t endure the hardships of spending days on end alone with the man.

“I wouldn’t want to put you out that way,” Leslie said. “I could stay here. There’s water at the creek, and I’m sure I could find some berries or something to eat. You’d make much better time without me. You could call my family and tell them exactly where they can come to get me. We wouldn’t even have to bother with a rescue team.”

“I don’t have a phone,” he said, watching her curiously. “And it’s still a little early for berries.”

“What about your neighbors or a gas station along the way or something. I could even give you the money for a pay phone,” she said, grasping at straws, not worried about the berries.

“My nearest neighbor is twenty miles away and after that it’s thirty more to the nearest ranger station. And frankly I don’t have time to go visiting either one of them on foot.”

“Where do you live?” she asked with a gasp as hopelessness and despair settled over her for the second time that day.

“A little more than ten miles that way,” the man said, indicating with his dark head that he lived higher and deeper into the mountains.

“But—” Leslie stopped herself. She turned her head away from the man and looked straight out into the night as tears began to blur her vision.

“But what?” His question was more like a command for her to finish her sentence.

“I don’t want to spend two weeks with you,” she admitted with her usual grace and tact, her voice quivering slightly for emphasis.

“Aw. Cheer up, beautiful. By the time they get around to searching this far into the mountains and find our cars, then track us down through my truck’s registration papers, we could be looking at months here. But if it’ll make you feel any better, I’m not real crazy about this myself.”

“That’s quite obvious, thank you.”

“Good. I don’t want us starting off on the wrong foot,” he said in a deceptively affable voice.

He turned back to his fire, which had started to glow and snap noisily as it consumed the dry leaves and twigs. Depressed and feeling vulnerable, Leslie wanted to stand up to this pompous, obnoxious man. Never had anyone treated her so badly. He wasn’t even pretending to be civil. And people thought she was unfeeling, she ruminated with an ironic half laugh. Well, she had plenty of feelings now, and not one of them was pleasant.

With great determination, she pushed herself into a sitting position and cried out in pain and alarm as her head began to throb, and at the same time, she felt the bodice of her dress fall away from her body. Quickly clutching the dress and the blanket over her bare breasts, she turned startled and accusing blue eyes on the man who was now facing her. He looked concerned until he saw the anger in her eyes, and then he frowned.

Before he could speak, Leslie attacked. “What have you done to me?”

“What?”

“I’m half naked,” she stated, the implications of which were clearly audible in the tone of her voice.

The man actually laughed at her outrage. “When someone faints, you loosen their clothing. Even twelve-year-old Boy Scouts know that,” he told her in a patronizing tone. “My intentions were honorable.”

“Oh,” Leslie uttered, somewhat mollified.

“But,” he said quickly, moving back to her side, covering the short distance on his hands and knees so that when he stopped and looked at her, their eyes were level, mere inches apart, “I can’t say I wasn’t tempted to peek,” he said, wickedly grinning and allowing his gaze to lower and take in all Leslie hadn’t managed to cover with the blanket.

Her heart began to pound harder and faster. Her skin grew warm, and her muscles began to tremble.

“Stop that,” she ordered him with great bravado, her chest heaving as she struggled to breathe.

“What?” he asked, his eyes round.

“Stop looking at me like that.”

“Why? Do I make you nervous?” he asked, enjoying himself.

“A little,” Leslie admitted, her eyes narrowed cautiously even while her chin tilted defiantly.

The strange man sat back on his haunches, resting his hands on his knees as he regarded Leslie with a great deal of humor sparkling in his eyes. Leslie, on the other hand, sat perfectly still, but she, too, was taking inventory with a leery eye.

His dark hair was wavy and thick, a little unruly, and he wore it longer than most of the men she knew. His skin was tanned golden, almost bronze, and there were little lines creased in his face that deepened when he smiled or thought something was amusing, as he obviously thought she was at the moment. Overall, Leslie had to admit, he was much better looking when he was happy as opposed to not so happy.

“Look, lady,” he said finally, merriment still gurgling in his voice, “I can’t even remember the last time I jumped an unconscious or unwilling woman. But don’t push me, because I’m not saying it hasn’t entered the realm of possibilities here. I didn’t give in to the temptation to peek while you were out, and even though I’ve found you provoking to an extreme since you ran me off the road, I haven’t attacked you yet. So, if you watch your step, I think you can feel reasonably safe with me. Do you want me to zip up your dress for you?” he asked, his eyes daring her to test his control.

Swallowing hard, Leslie took up his challenge.

“Yes, please,” she said, glad her voice sounded stronger than she felt.

Carefully, the man moved behind her. Leslie ground her teeth together and began to pray he wasn’t a crazed maniac when she felt his big hands come to rest on her bare shoulders. She refused to release the scream that was building inside her when he slowly and purposefully glided his fingers enticingly down her back. Her mind ran amok when he slipped his fingers inside her dress.

“You’ll have to stand up. I can’t get the little thingie to move,” he said with far less emotion than Leslie was feeling.

Performing the simple task of getting to her feet proved to be easier said than done. Hampered by the reams of material and the damnable hoop below the waist, she also had to contend with her aching head and precarious bodice. It was some time before a frustrated and exhausted Leslie gave up her efforts. She found her companion waiting patiently with his hands on his hips and an idiotic grin on his face.

“That’s one hell of a dress you got there, lady. You must feel like you’re living a nightmare from Gone With the Wind,” he observed, shaking his head in wonder. “You want me to help you up?”

Something deep inside Leslie snapped. No longer was she the slightest bit grateful to this man, nor was she afraid of him. No longer did she care what he thought of her or if he was indeed a homicidal maniac. He had gone too far, and Leslie was spitting mad.

“Yes,” she ground out through clenched teeth.

“Please,” he reminded her good-naturedly.