“Hmmmph? I just insulted your ability to cope with life on the last frontier, and all you can say is ‘hmmmph’?”
Alex sighed. “You got me on the hair dryer, but hey, you have to be flexible about these things. You have to be brave and resourceful.” She smiled at him. “Anyway, this can’t be nearly as tough as trying to find a parking place in Manhattan.”
Casey smiled. “Yup. This is going to be a piece of cake for a tough cookie like you.” He fluffed her sleeping bag while she stood watching. He chucked the bag and her backpack into the tent and zipped the front flap.
“Don’t worry,” he said gently. “You bought a good tent. If you keep it zipped shut, you shouldn’t be bothered by mosquitoes or critters. And if you don’t eat peanut-butter crackers in your tent, you won’t have to worry about the bears and raccoons.” He pointed to the trees. “If you look through the trees, up toward the top of the hill, you can see part of a building. That’s my house. I’ll leave the door unlocked. If you get frightened—”
“I won’t get frightened.”
“Uh-huh.” He stood with one hand at his hip, looking down at her. The line of his mouth tightened. “Dammit, I don’t like leaving you alone down here.”
“I’m not alone. I have Bruno.”
“Bruno is about a thousand years old. He’s obese, and he has a foot fetish.”
Instead of responding, Alex unzipped the tent opening, went in, and sat down cross-legged on her sleeping bag. Wondering if Casey was serious about the bears and raccoons, she opened her mouth to ask, then decided against it. If he’d been teasing her, she would feel stupid. And if he wasn’t teasing her… maybe it was best not to know.
Casey peered in at her through the screened window. He didn’t want to leave. What was it about this woman that kept dragging him into dangerous waters? He felt a ridiculous compulsion to protect her, when it was painfully obvious she didn’t need any protecting. Go home, he told himself, never come back, and she’ll take her search for a husband elsewhere.
He cleared his throat and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “Well, good night.”
“Good night.”
Alex watched him walk toward the tree line. When he disappeared into the woods, she waited, listening for his footsteps to fade. In a short time a golden light appeared through the trees at the top of the mountain. He was home. And he had electricity, the rat.
Alex concentrated on the blackness that surrounded her. It had a velvet texture, a thickness that was almost tangible. There wasn’t so much as a sliver of moon in the sky. Nothing stirred in the forest. The birds had long ago finished singing their night songs. There was no hum from a refrigerator, no drone of cars. She gazed out the screened window at the wooded mountain and shivered in the cold Alaskan night. She might have given her heart to Alaska, she thought, but her body still belonged in New Jersey.
She zipped the window shut, removed her shoes, and slithered fully clothed into her sleeping bag. She lay rigid, listening to the eerie stillness of the wilderness, and contemplated Casey’s offer. He was up there in his house right now, all snug in a soft, comfortable bed. One without rocks under it.
“He probably even has a pillow,” she said out loud. “Why didn’t I think to bring a pillow? I can’t sleep without a pillow.”
She shifted uncomfortably and closed her eyes, but the vision of Michael Casey refused to be erased. She was sort of stuck on him, she admitted. Who wouldn’t be? The man was a hottie. And he was funny and sweet at the same time. Too bad he was all wrong for her. The man oozed excitement. And besides, he shot bears. “Ick,” she said, with an involuntary shiver.
An owl hooted in the woods behind her. “Hear that, Bruno? That’s an owl. Boy, it really is neat being in the woods, isn’t it?”
She tried to read her watch, but it was just a blur in the blackness of the night. Stars hovered over the small tent, illuminating the earth only enough to differentiate trees from sky. “No flashlight,” she murmured. “I bought nine hundred dollars’ worth of camping junk and didn’t think to get a flashlight.”
She had lost track of time; she didn’t know if she’d been lying there for hours or minutes. She huddled deeper into her sleeping bag, trying to avoid the cold that clung to her face.
“How can anyone sleep like this?” she practically shouted. “I’m a sprawler. I can’t sleep in this dumb thing.”
Bruno opened one eye. The skin on his forehead wrinkled in what might have been construed as anxiety. The anxiety passed quickly, and the eyelid drooped closed.
Alex sighed. “Things will be much better in the morning. Tomorrow we’ll get to work on the cabin. And tomorrow we can go in to College and see the store.”
A stick cracked not far off, and there was a scuffling in the underbrush. Every muscle in Alex’s body tensed. Her breathing slowed as she listened. Bears? Her heart skipped a beat. There was more noise. This time it was definitely closer to the tent. This was it! she thought. There was an animal out there, a bear or a rabid raccoon. She remembered nightmares she’d had as a child. Monsters chased after her to tear her apart limb by limb, and she couldn’t run away because her legs were paralyzed. She would open her mouth to scream, but no sound would emerge. It was like in the dream, she thought wildly. It was coming to get her, it was going to be terrible.
Her teeth chattered uncontrollably. She should do something! But what? She narrowed her eyes at Bruno, sound asleep in the middle of the tent. If she pitched him out, the bear would eat him, then wouldn’t be hungry enough to eat her. She was immediately seized with guilt. How could she even consider such a thing? He was Grandfather’s dog, for goodness sakes! Her friend and protector. Alex gulped air and tried to calm herself. Open the tent flap, she ordered. Maybe it wasn’t a bear, maybe it was something small and cuddly.
The tent shuddered as a large form brushed against the front flap, and Alex felt a scream lodge painfully in her throat.
The zipper slid down, and Casey peeked in. “I couldn’t sleep,” he said. “I kept worrying that you’d go off looking for an outhouse and never be seen again.”
He set down a large flashlight and tossed a pillow in her direction. He stepped in and zipped the tent shut behind him. “You look kind of pale. Are you feeling okay?”
“I feel fine. Bruno and I have been having a good time here.”
“Not afraid?”
“Not me. Bruno was a little worried for a while there, but I calmed him down.”
“Yeah. I can see Bruno’s just a bundle of nerves.” Casey grabbed the dog by the legs and attempted to haul him across the tent floor. “Damn, I can barely budge this beast. What the devil have you been feeding him?”
“Everything. The dog is a compulsive eater.”
Casey finally rolled Bruno into a corner and threw a sleeping bag on the floor beside Alex.
“What are you doing?” Alex asked, cringing at the hint of hysteria in her voice.
“I’m sleeping here. I didn’t think my chances were very good at getting you up to the house, so I came down here.”
“I don’t want you down here.”
“Don’t give me a hard time. I’m trying to do the right thing.”
Alex made a futile attempt to sit up in the zippered bag. “I appreciate your concern, but I’d prefer not to share my tent with some strange man.”
“I’m not strange. A little frustrated from time to time, but not strange.”
Alex frantically worked at the zipper on her sleeping bag, only to get it stuck in the fabric halfway down. “Dammit. If I could just get out of this thing!”
She was flailing her arms in the dark tent, and Casey was shielding his nose with his hand.
“Watch it,” Casey said. “Last time I tried to rescue you I got my nose broken. I don’t need a repeat performance.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Think about it.”
Alex looked at him. The new scar. The bruise. The voice. “Oh, no.” It seemed impossible,
but it was him! She was surprised she hadn’t immediately recognized the voice. She didn’t think she’d ever forget that husky whisper. And she’d romanticized their meeting in her mind, assuming that she’d mystically sense the presence of the man who tried to rescue her. Now here he was, standing in front of her, and not only hadn’t she recognized him, but she wasn’t even sure if she trusted him.
“I suppose I should thank you for saving my life,” Casey said.
“No, I should be the one thanking you. It was stupid of me to go after Bruno like that. I didn’t realize the water would be so cold.” She gestured at his Band-Aid. “I’m sorry about your nose.”
“It’s okay.” It wasn’t his nose he was worried about, he thought. It was his mind. It wasn’t listening to reason. He kicked off his hiking boots and zipped himself into his bag. “I don’t know why I have this insane compulsion to rescue you. Lord knows you’re perfectly capable of taking care of yourself.”
“Exactly. So you see, it’s really not necessary for you to stay here with me.”
“Wrong. I have to get up early tomorrow morning and fly to Juneau. I’ll never make it if I have to spend the night worrying about you.”
Casey took the pillow and tucked it under his head. In one swift movement he reached out and grabbed her sleeping bag and pulled it to him, wrapping her in his arms. Much better, he thought. Now that she was safely beside him, he could relax. “Go to sleep.”
Go to sleep? Was he kidding? She was wrapped in the arms of a man she’d known approximately four hours, and he expected her to sleep? She made a halfhearted attempt to shift away from him.
“Stop wriggling around,” he said, drawing her even closer. “Relax.”
Relax, she told herself. After all, this was the man who jumped into the freezing water to save her and her dog. This was the man who put her tent together. Besides, Harry would have told her if Casey was an ax murderer or a serial rapist. Harry wouldn’t have sent her up here to die.
She listened to the steady beat of Casey’s heart and his even breathing, and she knew he was already asleep. She squinted into the darkness in an attempt to see his face, but the only thing visible was the shiny Band-Aid.
Alex awoke slowly, struggling through drowsiness and wondering vaguely about the cool temperature of the morning air. She stretched within encircling arms and instinctively snuggled next to the warm figure beside her. What a glorious morning, she thought, her nose encountering stubble on a chin. Stubble? Alex opened one eye and groaned. She was sleeping with what’s-his-name.
“Damn!” she exclaimed, jumping to her feet, still wrapped in the confining bag. “Oh, no!” She swayed back and forth for a full minute trying to regain her balance before toppling headfirst onto Casey.
He propped himself on one elbow, letting Alex sprawl across his lap. “Most of the women I’ve slept with haven’t been in such a hurry to leave my bed.”
“I’m not most women.”
“I’ve noticed that.”
Alex ungracefully wiggled out of the sleeping bag, feeling annoyed at the idea of other women in Casey’s bed. Not that he mattered to her, but she had a strong inclination to take a hatchet to all those nameless other women. She tugged her shoes on, searched her suitcase for her sweatshirt, and looked to Casey with a hopeful expression. “Do I have a bathroom?”
“You have a hand pump next to the cabin and a clump of highbush cranberries to hide behind if you’re the modest type.”
“Jeez.”
“Are you still planning on living here?”
Alex slipped the sweatshirt over her head and stepped out into the chilly air. She took a moment to appreciate the pungent aroma of damp moss and pine and to look at the sun sitting huge and pale over the Alaska Range, coloring the sky yellow and gray and making the tiny ponds glitter. “Of course I’m going to live here. Just look at this. Boy, this is the life.”
“Honey, you don’t even have an outhouse.”
“I’ll build one.”
“In a month the first snow will be falling. An average winter temperature is twenty to thirty degrees below zero.” Casey waved his hand toward the cabin. “How are you going to heat that thing?”
“How did Harry heat it? I assume he used that monstrous cookstove.”
“That monstrous cookstove takes wood. Lots of wood. Can you chop wood? They don’t deliver logs to your doorstep up here, you know.”
“Then I’ll get a kerosene heater. I think I can manage to pour kerosene.”
“You have no electricity. How are you going to plug in your electric rollers?”
Alex plucked a handful of hair and held it up for his inspection. “I don’t use electric rollers.”
“Looks like you use an electric eggbeater. Where are you going to plug in your electric eggbeater?”
“Abe Lincoln didn’t have an electric eggbeater, and I don’t need one either.”
Casey closed his eyes and thumped his forehead with his fist. “Oh, no.” He looked at his watch. “I haven’t got time to stand here and argue. I have to shower and get to the airport.”
“You have a shower?” It wasn’t fair. The man had everything.
Casey raised his eyebrows. “Does that interest you?”
“Not in the least.”
“Uh-huh.” He slung his sleeping bag over his shoulder. “I’ll leave you the pillow and the flashlight.”
He turned and walked toward his house, stopped short, muttered an expletive, and returned to her. The expression on his face was an incongruous mixture of pain and laughter. He traced a line along her cheek with one finger and lowered his mouth to hers.
The kiss was gentle, a meeting of warm lips and fragile emotions.
“I forgot to say good morning,” Casey murmured against her slightly parted lips.
Alex swayed slightly. “Mmmmmm.”
Casey grinned. “My cat sounds like that when I open a can of tuna fish.” He tugged at an auburn curl. “Listen, why don’t you come up to the house with me and have a cup of coffee? I really do have to get to the airport. You could start the coffeepot going while I take a fast shower.”
Coffee? That was playing hardball. She could find the strength to refuse a shower, but coffee… she’d kill for a cup of coffee. She could already smell the aroma, see the swirl of steam rising from the hot mug. Suddenly her very life seemed to depend on a cup of coffee. “Maybe a cup of coffee would be okay.”
Casey took Alex’s hand and pulled her toward his house. “After I leave, you can sit and have a nice quiet breakfast and take a hot shower.”
Take her clothes off in Casey’s house? Not a chance. She didn’t care if he was in Timbuktu; the thought of standing naked in Casey’s shower gave her goose bumps. “I don’t need a shower.”
He looked at the snarled hair and dust-smudged face and grinned. She was stubborn and independent, she still didn’t trust him, and she wanted to get married. Damned if he knew why he liked her so much.
Chapter Three
Alex followed Casey through the birches and found herself standing knee high in a broad lawn gone to seed. Last-of-the-season poppies struggled for sunlight amidst tall grass on a hill that sloped up toward a large log structure that seemed perfect for its environment. Built with massive yellow logs, it sat with its back to the hillside, its roof soaring toward the brilliant morning sky. Prowlike two-story windows faced the barely visible Alaska Range, and a redwood deck, cluttered with fishing gear and pots of flowers, encircled the building.
Alex stepped into the spacious house and looked around with a mixture of emotions, not the least of which was envy. The house had been built on one level, with vaulted ceilings and exposed log walls that glowed mellow gold in the sunlight. The southern wall was entirely glass, giving a spectacular view of the valley and faraway mountains. An ornate silver-and-black potbellied woodstove sat on a redbrick pad in the middle of the living-dining room area. It was flanked by built-in brick wood bins and backed by a floor-to-ceiling brick chimney
. The floor was covered by plush wall-to-wall beige carpet. The furniture was sparse—a large, comfortable-looking, plump couch, matching easy chair, and a massive coffee table. It was clearly a man’s furniture, but it was in excellent taste and suited the rugged sophistication of the room. The dining alcove held a round oak table and four intricately carved oak chairs, each different from the other. The small modern kitchen opened to the living-dining area, separated only by a butcher-block work island.
“It’s nice,” Alex told Casey.
“It’s a little messy. I wasn’t expecting company.”
Alex swallowed at the understatement. Newspapers lay strewn across the living room floor. Empty beer cans adorned bookshelves, wood bins, windowsills, and joined the loose change, used socks, and half-filled coffee cups on the coffee table. The kitchen counters were stacked with groceries that hadn’t been put away. They sat side by side with unwashed dishes and bowls of bloated cereal in curdled milk. Alex peered into an encrusted pot and shivered involuntarily.
“Macaroni and cheese,” he said. “I’m trying to decide whether to wash it or throw it away.”
“How long have you been trying to decide? There’s green furry stuff growing in here.”
Casey shrugged and dismissed the issue with a glance at his watch. “I’m running late. Could you make some breakfast while I shower?”
Alex gingerly pushed the clutter away from the coffeepot. “I suppose that would be okay.”
“Two eggs over easy, orange juice, coffee, English muffin.”
Alex warily looked at the refrigerator and wondered what surprises it held. More green furry stuff? Rotting chickens? Potatoes au slime? She opened the door cautiously and was relieved to find unspoiled food. She took inventory of her surroundings as she broke the eggs into the one remaining clean frying pan, dropped a muffin into the toaster and started coffee brewing.
Casey had good equipment. The appliances were all top-of-the-line—pot-scrubber dishwasher, a refrigerator that flashed digital messages and talked, a garbage disposal, trash compactor, food processor, gas stove with barbecue, and microwave. The man was loaded all right. And a slob.