Suite Embrace (2 page)

“D
eena, it's all so strange. Suddenly being rich,” Skylar confessed to her sister over the phone. At one time she and Deena had been content to talk to each other on the phone a few times a year and send e-mails back and forth now and then, but since Skylar's hospitalization last year, the two had grown very close, chatting almost daily.

As soon as Deena learned about her sister's accident she had flown in from Colorado and stayed with Skylar until she had been out of danger and able to manage on her own. Now, she was back in Colorado and back to managing the ski school that she and her husband ran.

“Yesterday, I met with Mr. Ray and settled everything with the bank,” Skylar went on. “My money is properly invested and my checking account is flush. And Mr. Ray was so nice. He really helped me figure out what I needed to do.”

“And what
are
you going to do with yourself now that you don't have to worry about holding down a job?” Deena asked.

“I don't know, but I do know it feels damn good not to have to jump out of bed and hit the freeway in the morning.”

“Nothing stopping you from going to law school then,” Deena prompted. “You put it off after college because you had to get a job and support yourself, but why not do it now? Seems like the perfect time to go for it.”

Skylar let the phone remain silent for a long pause. After graduating from the University of Tampa with a degree in business economics, she had wanted to go on to law school, but hadn't had the funds. After she was hired as a paralegal with the county court system, she became comfortable with her position and accustomed to a regular pay check. Even though she had the money and the time to study law full-time now, did she really want to take on such a demanding academic challenge?

Finally, she told Deena, “I do want to study law, but something like that takes time and planning. Maybe down the road, I'll go for it, but not right now. For the first time in my life I have no one to answer to, so I ought to be in heaven, but I'm feeling kind of at loose ends. Too…free?” She thought about her remark and then asked, “Does that sound strange?”

“No, I'm not surprised,” Deena replied. “Who wouldn't feel lost after all you've been through? Weeks in the hospital. Then months at that rehab place. A crazy legal battle with Dorchester. And then all that mess with Lewis.” When Skylar didn't say anything, Deena went on. “Please tell me it's over with him, Skylar. You can't even think about taking him back.”

“I know, I know,” Skylar murmured into the phone. “It's over. Don't worry.”

“But I do. You hung on to him way too long to begin with. He never was right for you. I'm just sorry that it ended with you getting hurt.”

“We had some good times,” Skylar defended, while knowing her sister spoke the truth. Now that the relationship was over, Skylar could look back and see that she and Lewis had never been really compatible. In the beginning, he had been attentive, charming, great in bed. But as the months passed, they had settled in to a routine that was satisfying and safe. She had known what to expect from him, and it had been easier to hold on to the man she was with than strike out to find someone new. Stick with what you know, her father had always told her, and now she guessed that was what she had done for most of the important decisions in her life.

“Skylar, you got dumped by a man you loved and trusted. While you were in the hospital, too! No way can he ever justify that.”

“You don't have to remind me,” Skylar tossed back, imagining that Deena was leaning into the phone, eyes wide with anger as she lectured her baby sister.

Deena wasn't finished. “Lewis has a way of charming people to get what he wants. He's fine, he's intelligent and he's slick. I know how much you wanted the relationship to work out, but I'm glad you found out what kind of man he was before you said, ‘I do.' So, don't even talk to him. Don't give him an opportunity to work your emotions.”

“All right, Deena! I hear you. Give me some credit, okay?” Skylar suddenly snapped, now irritated as hell that her big sister dared lecture her on men. What does Deena know about the dating scene in 2005 and how hard it is to find a good man? Skylar silently fumed. Deena had married her high school sweetheart at nineteen and moved with him to Colorado. She had no earthly idea of what a single, black, thirty-five-year-old female faces every day while trying to find love, Skylar thought.

“No need to get snippy,” Deena tossed back. “I worry about you, that's all. With Mom now living in Brooklyn with Aunt Clara, you don't have any family nearby.”

“What's that got to do with anything?” Skylar wanted to know. It wasn't as if she had ever consulted her mom about her love life when she lived across town in Tampa.

“Well, for starters, you're a very rich woman now, and your settlement was publicized in the paper. Men prey on women like you, so it's important to stay close to people you can trust.”

“I assure you, I have enough sense to stay away from financial predators, con artists and low-life types. Including Lewis Monroe.”

“I'm sure you do, Skylar. Sorry for the lecture,” Deena meekly offered. “Just feeling a bit overanxious.”

Skylar paused before saying anything else, struck by the timbre of worry that had crept into her sister's usually perky voice. Something more than Skylar's love life was on Deena's mind.

Deena and her husband, Jerome Simpson, owned Scenic Ridge, a private lodge and ski school nestled in an unincorporated area of the Roaring Fork Valley, northwest of Aspen, Colorado. The nearest town was Woody Creek, and it was linked to Deena and Jerome's property by a narrow winding road that ran high into the mountains, which no one traveled unless they were going to Scenic Ridge. With ski season in full swing, it was no surprise that Deena sounded as if she were under pressure. She had a staff of twenty to manage while dealing with demanding guests whom she treated like royalty. “Overanxious?” Skylar repeated. “What's going on, Deena? Problems at the lodge?”

“Yeah, but more so with Jerome,” Deena slowly volunteered. “It's his father.”

“Mr. Simpson is kind of up in years by now, isn't he?”

“Eighty-two.”

“And he still lives in Oregon?” Skylar clarified, recalling having met her brother-in-law's father only one time—at Deena and Jerome's wedding twenty-one years ago.

“Right, and he's set to undergo surgery for prostate cancer day after tomorrow. Jerome's an only child and he
has
to be with his dad. I want him to go, but the timing is awful. While Jerome is away,
everything
he usually takes care of will fall on me for God only knows how long.”

“You'll have to run the ski school in Jerome's place?” Skylar asked, aware that Deena was only an average skier, but hell on the slopes when it came to snowboarding.

“Oh, no. We hired a guy last fall…Mark Jorgen, you ever heard of him?”

“No, should I recognize the name?”

“He's a former Olympic gold medalist. He's our new ski school director and head instructor. He's great. Especially with the younger skiers and he's really boosted our bookings, too. But the biggest problem is that Jean-Paul, our long-time, trustworthy guest relations manager…or concierge, as he preferred to call himself, quit yesterday. Lured away by a Hyatt Regency in Utah. I need a new concierge now.”

“That's a bummer. Call an employment agency.”

“Not so easy. I've tried. No one I approve of is remotely interested. I've got to find someone I can absolutely trust. Not just some stranger to come in and play the role. You know?”

“So what are you going to do?”

“Well, I was thinking. Skylar…”

“What?” Skylar interrupted, suspicious of the ingratiating tone her sister was now using.

“I was hoping that you might consider coming up to Scenic Ridge to help me out. Just until I can hire someone else?”

“Me? A concierge? I don't think so, Deena. I'm a paralegal, remember? Guest relations are not remotely related to my chosen field of work, and I know zilch about the Aspen area. Thanks, but no thanks.”

“Think about it, Skylar. Please. You've worked in hotels before.”

“Front desk duties while I was in college.”

“So? You can do it. I've got to have someone I can absolutely trust,” Deena pressed the issue. “Information on local entertainment, attractions, restaurants and transportation is prepackaged and ready to hand out to anyone who wants it. Not being from this area won't be an issue. What I need is a personal link to the hotel. You know…a discreet person to take care of sticky issues and unusual requests.”

Skylar flinched. “Do you get a lot of those?”

“Well, you never know what can come up when people are on vacation and out of their usual element. My motto is ‘Give the guests whatever they want.' It'll be easy, trust me. You'll be out of Tampa and away from Lewis. He may have been fine as hell, but he was also a dog. Trust me, Skylar, you can do better.”

“Girl, you know I hate cold weather and I don't even ski,” Skylar said. “It's January and it's seventy-nine degrees here in Tampa today. I'm very happy right here, thank you very much. I'd rather spend my days at the beach than freeze my ass off in a lodge in the mountains…even though I know your place is as gorgeous as any five star hotel. However, I don't think it's where I ought to be.”

“Skylar. Help me out. We haven't spent any real time together in years. When I was there after your accident, you were too sick for us to do anything together. I'd like to have you here with me for a nice long visit.”

“Visit? Sounds like work to me!”

“Okay, but you know what I mean,” Deena pressed her case. “You always said you enjoyed working front desk duties while you were in college.”

“It was a motel near the campus and I got to meet a lot of guys who came there to party.”

“Well, for your information, Aspen is going to be the site for this year's Black Winter Sports Reunion. Starts at the end of the month. There'll be brothers…and sisters from ski clubs all over the country here for the fun—ice skaters, snowboarders and skiers. I'm already booked solid for the entire ten days.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

Skylar's arched brows slowly began to settle lower above her smoky black eyes as she mulled Deena's comment. The Black Winter Sports Reunion was going to be in Aspen? While confined to her bed, she'd been flipping through cable channels one day and had come across last year's reunion, filmed at Steamboat Springs, on Black Entertainment Showcase. She had been impressed with the crowd and knew what kind of people were about to descend on the area. Fine, well-toned brothers who were about something. Fashion conscious sisters who looked good on and off the slopes. Solid professionals who enjoyed the finer things of life. The change might be exactly what she needed in order to move on.

I've played it safe for so long. Why not take a risk on this? Might be just what I need to take my mind off my troubles and get Lewis out of my system. Plus, I can help Deena out and maybe have a little fun, too,
she told herself, looking forward to being around people who knew nothing about her past or her wealth. “Okay, Deena. Only for you and Jerome. I'll do it. On one condition.”

“Just name it.”

“Absolutely no one knows that I'm newly rich,” Skylar requested.

“You know, I think that's a very good idea,” Deena agreed. “Attractive, single women with money can be magnets for shady men looking for meal tickets and scam artists on the hunt. They've been known to hang around places like Aspen. And you'll fit in better with the staff if they think you're simply my sister, in need of a job. Your secret will be safe with me,” Deena promised. “Now go pack your bags and get on a plane.”

“Pack what? I don't exactly have the kind of clothes I'm gonna need up there.”

“No problem. You can go shopping when you get here. The salespeople in town are friendly and will be very happy to help you pick out everything you need.”

And I'm gonna need all the help I can get, Skylar thought, hoping this unexpected adventure would not turn into an absolute disaster.

“O
kay. Let's try this again. Find your balance. Stand still and concentrate,” Mark Jorgen patiently instructed as he gently placed one gloved hand on Goldie Lamar's left shoulder.

“I'm trying, really I am,” Goldie whined in exasperation. She sucked in a loud breath and lifted her chin. “This is a lot harder than I thought it would be.”

“You're doing fine. Stand tall in your boots until the pressure from the tongue of the boot feels equally distributed from shin to calf. Most of your weight should be felt between the heel and the arch of the foot.”

With a shrug, Goldie pulled back her shoulders, pressed her bright red lips together in a hard pucker and stared out across the snow-covered slope. “All right. All right. I think I feel it.”

“Good, now gently slide your right ski ahead of your left,” Mark told his student before letting go. He stepped back to watch Goldie try, for the fifth time, to push off the hill and head down the beginners' slope, praying she would be successful. She was a terrible student with no sense of balance, but she was also the mega-wealthy daughter of one of Colorado's finest jewelers and had paid quite a premium for the deluxe ski package. He had to make sure she got her money's worth.

He had been working with Goldie for two days without much progress at all, and was beginning to wonder if she had signed up for lessons only to spend time alone with him. That was not unusual, especially among the women he recruited while hanging out at the Ridge Rover bar in Woody Creek, where he often went to mix and mingle with the locals and guests from nearby resorts. His “impromptu” appearances always generated lots of excitement, leading to talk about his Olympic career, his worldwide travels and his methods of training. By the end of the evening, if he was lucky, he might have five or six new students lined up for classes at Scenic Ridge.

Now, with a jerk, Goldie moved one leg forward, hesitated and then let out an ice-shattering scream. Swaying unsteadily, she toppled to the left, clutched Mark, and collapsed against him, pulling them both to the ground.

“I can't do this, Mark!” Goldie loudly complained. “I'll never learn to ski!” She snatched off her goggles and hurled them across the snow where they shattered against a shaggy pine tree. Next, she yanked off her red knit cap and pressed her head hard to Mark's chest, slumping dramatically against him. “I guess I'm not cut out to be a skier,” she groaned.

“Don't give up so easily,” Mark encouraged, starting to push her away.

Quickly, Goldie leaned back and smiled up at him, shaking out her hair to release a cascade of tangled platinum curls that framed a startling, beautiful face. Her alabaster skin was flushed pink from the cold and her eyes were a cool aquamarine, now narrowed to half-mast in mock-anger. “And I wanted so much to have a successful lesson today. Maybe this whole ski vacation idea was not so great, huh? Maybe I ought to go home before I break something.”

Mark shrugged, and then sat in the snow to calmly listen while Goldie continued to whine about her clumsiness, her disappointment in herself and the cold weather. He knew she was putting on an act, and that she was picking up the tab for three deluxe ski packages for herself, her sister and her mother-in-law, dropping a bundle of cash for their one-week stay at Scenic Ridge. There was no way he was going to encourage her to cancel her plans and leave. After all, he was more than a ski instructor at Scenic Ridge: he was part of the team, and as such, he had to make sure that each guest was a satisfied customer, which sometimes took some doing.

“Don't be so hard on yourself. We'll get there. It takes time,” he reassured Goldie, taking in the scent of her perfume, which he recognized right away—Electric Orchid—two-hundred-fifty dollars an ounce. He also recognized a bored, rich, spoiled young woman eager for an affair with her ski instructor when he saw one. How many women like her had he dealt with over the years? Too damn many to count.

“Come on. Let's try again,” Mark urged as he began to untangle himself from Goldie's clutch, convinced that she was much more interested in holding on to him than her two ski poles, which lay scattered in the snow a few feet away.

“No. Not now,” Goldie decided, snuggling deeper into her instructor's arms, as if settling in for a chat. She zeroed in on Mark, adopting an expression that told him she was not going anywhere, anytime soon. She grabbed hold of the front of his jacket and pushed her face even closer to his. “Can't we just sit here and talk?”

Holding his breath, and desperate to mask his growing irritation, Mark eased her fingers off the zipper of his jacket. “No, I don't think so. It's getting late and I'm already way behind schedule.” Somehow, he managed to stand and then help Goldie to her feet. Luckily her skis were still intact. “Okay. Assume the same position as before. Take your time.”

Goldie started to do as Mark asked, but then suddenly stopped and whirled around. “My goggles!” she shouted, pointing to the broken glasses at the base of the pine tree in the distance. “I can't see a thing without them. I won't do this without my wrap goggles. I'll ruin my eyes.”

Mark shot Goldie a dagger of exasperation, fully aware that her designer goggles had cost at least three hundred dollars and he knew she would not settle for a generic pair that he could pull from his equipment bag. “You're right,” he acquiesced, scanning the bright, white blanket of snow spread across the gentle slopes and glazing the tall mountainsides. “You need to protect your eyes. Let's quit for today. We'll start again tomorrow. Ten o'clock.”

“Thank God,” Goldie agreed. “But what will I do about goggles? Mine cost…”

“I know,” Mark interrupted. He certainly didn't need her to tell him what high end ski accessories cost. He'd bought and worn only the best goggles, jackets, boots and sports clothing—purchased from the most fashion conscious retailers in the world—throughout his entire career. If there was one thing Mark Jorgen knew, besides how to ski, it was how to dress to impress on the slopes. “I'm going into Aspen in the morning to pick up a package at the post office,” he went on. “I'll be happy to get you another pair while I'm in town. I know
Gorsuch
carries them and they'll be compliments of Scenic Ridge. How's that? We'll try again tomorrow afternoon.”

“Fine with me,” Goldie decided, her annoyance quickly fading. “And if you're going into town anyway, I'd love to tag along. There's this gorgeous set of hand-carved….”

Mark tuned Goldie Lamar out as she rattled on and on about some trinket she had seen in a quaint shop on Cooper Avenue, knowing he would probably have to take her with him tomorrow. Anything to satisfy a big-spending guest.

 

After escorting Goldie back to the lift, Mark waved her off and finished his classes for the day. As pale shadows began to form on the snow-covered slopes, he shouldered his skis and hopped a lift to head back to his private lodgings at the foot of the mountain, jumping off as soon as the car swung close to the ground. The crunch of hard-packed snow crackled under his fur-lined boots.

Mark lived in the Snow King Suite, the largest of four cabins, situated far from the main lodge, among the tall Aspen trees. Though referred to as suites, the cabins were especially designed for special guests who required privacy, luxury and who were willing to pay a handsome sum for it. Each cabin/suite featured handcrafted furnishings, carefully selected accessories, peaked pine ceilings, wood-burning fireplaces, full kitchen facilities and an outdoor hot tub.

As the head of the ski school at Scenic Ridge, he knew he was being treated more like a guest than an employee, and understood why: his competitive days might be over, but his name still had drawing power among serious ski aficionados. Why shouldn't Scenic Ridge benefit from their association with him if it could bring in more money for the resort and keep him on the slopes?

Drawing in a deep breath, Mark slowed his pace and filled his lungs with crisp mountain air, in no real hurry to get home. He loved to walk home when he had finished working for the day, when the silence of winter calmed him down and muted the lingering echoes of all the shouting, complaining and chatter that he had to endure on the mountaintop.

Coming to work at Scenic Ridge was one of the best decisions he had ever made and he was very appreciative of Deena's efforts to make him feel at home. She had insisted he move into private quarters at the lodge, which she could have rented for a thousand dollars a week. All of his meals were covered in his contract, and though his finances were not nearly as flush as they used to be, he was able to live in comfort while maintaining the illusion of success that befitted an Olympian.

Mark looked around. In the fading light, Scenic Ridge resembled a perfect luminous pearl nestled in the most beautiful section of the Roaring Fork River Valley. It was quaint, yet luxurious. Far enough away from the glitz and shine of Aspen to maintain its rustic ambiance, yet near enough to get to Buttermilk, Snowmass and the fancy shops and restaurants within an hour's drive. The resort was small, but not cramped. Isolated, yet accessible. Exactly where he wanted to be.

He shrugged, a cynical smile touching his lips as he realized how content he actually was. It had not always been like this. Only a few years ago, he would have balked at living so far from the celebrity-filled world he had moved in. Then, he would have been staying in the most lavish suite in the most expensive hotel in Aspen, eating personally prepared meals in the most posh of restaurants and being entertained by the most beautiful girls within a five mile radius.

For most of Mark's adult life he had lived the high-life as a celebrated Olympian, as the most famous black skier in the world—a title that had both plagued him and made him proud. As a world class competitive skier throughout Europe and the U.S., he had spent much of life either training under the keen eye of his manager-mother, Virina, or partying with a
nouveau riche
crowd. Oh, the times he had had while traveling the world and making love to any woman who turned his head: black, brown or white. European, African, Asian or Hispanic. Tall or short. At the height of his career it had not mattered to him what country a woman came from as long as she was gorgeous, belonged to the exclusive world of money and social standing that he moved in, enjoyed partying and loved lots of good sex.

But now, things were very different. He moved more slowly, was less concerned with money and social status, and was aware of how little it took to make him happy. He viewed the future as a clear sheet of ice on which he hoped to carve a beautiful future with the right woman, and until he found her, he was going to steer clear of women like Goldie Lamar, who in his opinion were shallow, self-absorbed snobs.

He was thirty-eight years old and knew he wanted children, stability, a wife and a home—preferably a rustic pine-log cabin high on a hill with a ski slope at his back door. Yes, it was time to find the right woman to settle down with, one with values, charm, a real work ethic and one who would not flaunt money in his face. He'd had enough of those bored, rich types to last him a lifetime. He might have to put up with them on the slopes, but he didn't have to share his private time with them. In his opinion, having too much money could do more harm than good.