Aces High (7 page)

“Nothing. The park will open in an hour; we don't have time to go over the pirate ship or the circus tent today.”

“There's no hurry. But since you've got the day off, why don't you show me around the park?”

“You've seen it,” she objected somewhat weakly.

“Not with you.” He smiled. “I promise to be good.”

Katrina wasn't sure she trusted his smile, but she wanted to be with him and couldn't deny it even to herself.

For the next three days Skye kept his promise, and Katrina's wariness soon eased. He didn't bring up the past or push her in any way, and since he was an extremely charming man when he put his mind to it, she was quickly disarmed—and was aware of the ease with which he'd accomplished it.

She had refused to abandon her duties for more than one day, though, and Skye hadn't protested. Instead, he turned up often during the day, joining her for meals and spending a few minutes talking to her in her office. Some of the talk was of business, but for the most part the conversations were casual and friendly. He took her to dinner each night, danced with her, and left her at her door with a light kiss.

“Biding his time, isn't he?” Gigi, amused, asked as she passed Katrina in the lobby one morning just after Skye had been talking to her.

Katrina had to smile, because Skye's determined patience was so obvious it was almost funny. But she felt no impulse to laugh; she was grateful to him for giving her time, especially when she could sense the strain lurking just under his composure.

And that it was a strain on him she didn't doubt; it was in his voice sometimes, and in his face there was a finely honed look. He was an impatient man by nature, so the fact that he was forcing himself to be undemanding said a great deal about his determination to develop a new relationship with her.

She appreciated that deeply, but it was a strain on her too, because she was no closer to sorting out her own feelings, and the pull of physical attraction was growing stronger with every passing day. She was afraid that desire was clouding her judgment, and she didn't know how to cope with it.

She could feel his presence the instant he entered a room, even if her back was to him, and when he was with her she found it almost impossible to look at anything but him.

On the third day it occurred to her with devastating simplicity that she was falling in love with him.

She was sitting at her desk, conscious of the faint smile that Skye had left her with just minutes before, and when the realization dropped into her mind it did so with the clarity of total certainty.

I'm beginning to love him.

She put her pen down with unnatural care and folded her hands on her neat desk blotter, conscious of her heart beating like a drum in her ears. She felt both hot and cold, eager and fearful, delighted and hurting. She hadn't meant to love him. He had crept into her heart with charm and patience.

And she couldn't let him know, because she was still afraid of giving him her heart.

Despite his careful patience these last days, Katrina knew only too well that the power of his desire for her was an all-consuming thing, stark and possessive. Whatever his feelings for her now, he wouldn't be content with only a “loving and passionate” woman in his bed. He would demand a total surrender this time, driven by his own doubts about the depths of her feelings before to be certain of them now.

Beginning to understand him, Katrina knew that his harsh demands on that first night had not been uttered only with the desire to exact revenge for what he had gone through after Germany. There had been a certain amount of truth in his avowed intention to purge himself of her.

She wondered if he realized himself what he was after this time.

He had gone through hell after Germany; she didn't doubt that. In all truth, he had been more deeply hurt than she had, because the shallowness of her own emotions had protected her somewhat, and because she had known there had been no betrayal. For six years Skye had remembered her, his own feelings eating at him. Then they had met again, against all odds, and he was bent on a “second chance.”

Katrina couldn't help but believe that whether or not Skye knew it himself, what he wanted was to get her out of his system once and for all. So she couldn't very well tell him she loved him.

She
couldn't.

Teddy Steele began to push herself into a sitting position on the bed, but then turned somewhat green and hastily fell back onto the pillows. The very powerful arm of her husband reached out with perfect timing, and a cracker was placed between her lips. Teddy didn't waste time with thanks, but munched the cracker with her eyes closed, willing her stomach to settle.

Zach raised himself on an elbow and looked down at his wife's pale face with a worried frown. “Better, honey?”

One of her big brown eyes opened cautiously, then the other, and she sighed in relief as her stomach behaved. Blinking away the morning dryness of her contact lenses, she answered, “Yes, but it's the pits.”

“Why don't you sleep in today?” he suggested casually.

Teddy eyed him with loving understanding, her gamine smile quirking her lips. “I'm fine, Zach.” She reached up a hand to his lean cheek, stroking gently. “I'm not going to lose this one.”

Zach had a great deal of faith in his vivacious wife's peculiar psychic certainties, but he had too much experience with the vagaries of fate to share her confidence. He also remembered far too vividly Teddy's miscarriage months before, and the terror he'd gone through at almost losing her. Not all her assurances—or those of the doctor who was still astonished by this second conception—could allay his fears. He caught her hand and held it firmly to his face, his free hand moving to push the sheet aside and cover her very slightly rounded belly. “You should have stayed in New York,” he said a bit harshly.

“What, and miss our final hurrah?” she said, deliberately light. “It isn't a jungle this time, remember? There's no danger at all, Zach.”

He shook his head slightly. “Honey, there's always danger in a scheme like ours. We've covered all the bases, sure, but it's impossible to plan for the unexpected element. And Hagen's such a wild card, God only knows what could happen.”

“Well, you're with me,” she said serenely, her faith in her big warrior absolute.

His lips twisted, but his gray eyes gleamed with sudden wry humor, and she grinned at him. Zach bent his head to kiss her, his hand still moving gently over her stomach. After a few moments he muttered huskily, “We should have waited, given you more time to recover.”

Teddy, perfectly aware that his mind was never long distracted from her unexpected pregnancy, slid her arms around his neck and laughed softly. “After you and the other guys came back into the country on that flying visit, I was so happy to see you that birth control never crossed my mind. Or yours, for that matter.”

Remembering the very passionate reunion with his wife, Zach silently admitted that his lifelong control had never stood against Teddy. Thank heaven. Aloud, he said, “Are we going to tell her she was conceived in a Jeep?”

Solemnly Teddy said, “Well, if I'd known neither of us could wait until we got home, I would have borrowed the limo to pick you up at the airport. Then she could have been conceived in style.”

He chuckled softly. “And I probably wouldn't have given a damn about the driver either.” He caught his breath suddenly as her hand wandered, and added somewhat thickly, “Didn't the doctor say we should be careful?”

“I plan to be extremely careful,” Teddy said. “We have a couple of hours before we meet the others in Josh and Raven's suite for breakfast. That's long enough to be careful, don't you think?”

Zach, no longer unnerved by his inability to think at all where his wife was concerned, growled and pulled her petite body into his arms.

Skye walked briskly along the paved pathway leading to the Old West section of the park. The gates hadn't opened for the day, but he could hear the usual morning noises, and employees in costumes wandered about talking and laughing. From the section Skye was nearing came occasional gunfire as various characters practiced the tricks they'd be called upon to perform later.

Stopping to watch two costumed characters perfecting their sharpshooting, Skye waited for a pause in the gunfire and then said dryly, “Funny how many of you have managed to act out your own personal fantasies.”

Lucas Kendrick, in the guise of Wild Bill Hickok, chuckled as he reloaded his rifle. “My ego's suffering,” he told the other man, and nodded at the slim brunette at his side who wore the costume of Annie Oakley. “She's so much better than I am.”

Kyle's turquoise eyes gleamed briefly at her husband, and then she looked at Skye. “Something up?”

He shook his head. “Not really. But I've settled on the Ferris wheel as the most likely spot.”

Lucas turned to look in the direction of the Ferris wheel, his sharp blue eyes narrowing as he picked out the tall structure in the distance. “Good,” he murmured thoughtfully. “It's fairly central, so we can all get there quickly.”

“Will you tell the others?” Kyle asked Skye.

“Yeah.” Skye listened intently as the sounds of gunfire echoed, and added, “If you two see Raven and Josh, tell them, will you? They're the only ones who wander all over the park, and I may not see them anytime soon.”

“Sure.” Lucas gazed at him steadily. “You sound a bit jumpy.”

Skye managed a shrug. “Must be the gunfire. See you later.” He strode off.

Lucas looked at his wife with a lifted brow, and she said, “I caught it too. He's definitely on edge.”

Grimacing slightly, Lucas said, “I've noticed Dane's keeping a pretty close eye on him, and he wouldn't if he weren't worried about his brother. If Hagen sees those two together, he's going to start to smell a rat.”

“They're both pros,” she observed.

He nodded, but said, “Still, one thread too tight and this whole thing's going to unravel. Maybe we'd better talk to the others tonight.”

Kyle nodded agreeably, then took aim with her rifle and put yet another neat hole through the target some yards away. Lucas gave her a pained look, but laughed warmly.

Meanwhile, Skye found the others he sought gathered around the sheriff's office in the dusty main street of the Old West town. The sheriff, a tall, lean man with copper hair and tawny eyes and a lazy air that was somewhat deceptive, straightened from his lounging pose to offer Skye a cheerful hello.

Skye returned the greeting as he looked at him, then eyed the other three people. Both the ladies were tiny, and both were redheads, but the sheriff's lady had an expression of serenity in her sea-green eyes that perfectly matched both her husband's lazy calm and her own dignified costume of schoolteacher. The other redheaded lady, leaning back against the gunslinger who had both arms around her, had big, waiflike brown eyes that were bright with interest and a vivid face that made her as eye-catching as the scanty saloon girl costume she wore.

Looking finally at the powerful dark man who was playing the role of gunslinger, a menacing figure due to his size, the faint scar on his lean cheek, and the all-black costume, Skye shook his head ruefully. “You people didn't choose this park just because of Adrian's threat,” he said definitely. “You wanted the chance to play dress-up.”

Teddy Steele giggled engagingly. “No, because the guys would have worn commando outfits. It took me all of an hour to talk Zach into being the villain.”

A deep chuckle rumbled from the gunslinger, and his powerful arms tightened gently around his wife. “This isn't so bad,” he commented to Skye in an unexpectedly soft voice. “But I feel for Josh.”

Rafferty Lewis laughed as well, pushing his white hat to the back of his head. “Face it, we're all having fun with this. Even Josh. Better than a vacation. What's up, Skye?”

Skye repeated his decision to settle on the Ferris wheel as the site of the governor's attempted assassination, leaning back against a hitching post as he spoke to them. Their reaction was much the same as Lucas's and Kyle's.

“When does the balloon go up?” Teddy asked.

“A week from Saturday, if all goes well,” Skye answered. “Right on schedule.” He felt an unusually steady gaze on him, and looked at the schoolteacher, whose eyes were gentle.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

He managed a smile. “Fine, Sarah.” He knew his control was strained to the breaking point, but until he had talked to Lucas and Kyle he'd believed he was hiding it well. Obviously not. Before anybody else could mention it, he said, “I'll try to touch base with the others sometime today. Hagen said something about seeing the Wild West show, but I'll try to keep him busy. Better stay alert, though.”

“Thanks for the warning,” Zach said.

Skye saluted them casually and left.

There was a moment of silence after he'd gone, and then Teddy said reflectively, “Does anybody know if we're unintentionally matchmaking?”

Sarah looked at her. “It was that kind of tension, wasn't it?”

“I'd say so. And, according to Raven, Skye isn't the type to get nervous professionally. This operation has to be a piece of cake to him. So what other reason could there be?”

Rafferty sighed. “If we've learned anything by now, it has to be that where Hagen is, romance is. Against all odds. It isn't really any of our business, though,” he added carefully.

“No.” Zach's deep voice was slow and thoughtful. “But if that's the cause of Skye's tension, he isn't handling it well. And he's the linchpin of the entire plan. Dane could step in, I suppose, if it comes to that. Maybe we'd better find out what's going on.”

Rafferty eyed his large friend. “Well, you ask Skye, then. You're about the only one of us big enough to take him on if he doesn't like the question.”

“Raven,” Sarah said in her soft, serene voice. “She knows him better than we do. Leave it to her.”

Teddy nodded quick agreement. “We can talk to her about it tonight.”

Zach looked at Rafferty and nodded as well. “It might be best. And she may know what's going on already.”

They all heard the loud whistle announcing the imminent opening of the park's gates, and Zach added wistfully to the sheriff, “Can't I shoot you today?”

Rafferty pulled his white hat firmly back down and adjusted the gun on his hip. “Don't be ridiculous. I'm the good guy.”

“Shyster,” Zach said rudely, and took his giggling wife's hand to lead her toward the saloon.

Skye decided to keep Hagen busy for the day by getting Gigi's help, and she listened to his suggestion with lifted brows and a tiny smile.

“And why should I?” she asked.

Grinning suddenly, Skye said, “Because he's wandering around the hotel like a beaten hound, that's why. I never thought I could feel sorry for Hagen, but I do. You're a cruel woman, Gigi.”

She chuckled. “He needed a lesson. However, that's quite beside the point. Just what are
you
going to be doing while I keep Hagen's mind off visiting the park?”

Skye cleared his throat. “Double checking a few things.” And when she continued to gaze at him with perceptive eyes, he forced himself to sit still in her visitor's chair.

Gently she said, “Today is her usual day off. Did she tell you?”

“No,” Skye said a bit grimly.

Ignoring the tone, Gigi explained, “She wanted to work since she took the other day off, but I thought not. Not quite her usual calm self, my Trina; I ordered her to rest.”

Skye rose from his chair abruptly but then paused, looking across the desk at the older woman. “Tell me something,” he said a bit jerkily. “Am I bad for her?”

“What would you do if I said yes?”

“I don't know.”

After a moment Gigi said seriously, “I can't answer your question, Skye. Only Trina can.”

He didn't intend to ask Katrina about that, but when she opened her door to him ten minutes later, it was the question uppermost in his mind. She had been less wary these last days, but it seemed to him that whenever he tried to step closer she moved elusively away from him. And both his determined patience and his control over his own desires were wearing thin.

He greeted her abruptly. “We have to talk.”

Caution crept into her amber eyes, but she stepped back to allow him to come in. She was in her usual off-duty clothing, jeans and a casual shirt, barefooted and with her glorious hair flowing loosely down her back. He was reminded again of the paradox of her, her innate composure warring with the outward suggestion of wildness.

It has to be there!
he thought with more than a hint of the savagery she always inspired in him. It had driven him half mad years before, that conviction of his that locked somewhere inside Katrina was an intensity to match his own, a fiery spirit crying out to be freed. And he had tried to touch that part of her. But although she had responded to him with loving passion, he had been unable to find the vital woman he sensed beneath the calm, smiling eyes.

He was no closer now, and it was still driving him mad. The desire between them was sharper than ever before, but he was all too aware that Katrina was holding herself aloof from him. He looked at the wariness in her eyes as they moved into her den, and he wanted to demand,
Where do you go when you hide from me? Why can't I find you?

“Is something wrong?” she asked.

He forced a laugh. “Well, since I've had several people who barely know me point out that I'm jittery as hell, I suppose I can't deny it.”

“I'm sorry,” she said uncertainly. Her arms moved in what seemed a conditioned response, folding over her breasts.

Skye ignored the body language, refusing to be warned off. He took two quick steps to stand before her, pulling her abruptly into his arms. “I can't take much more of this,” he said in a voice that grated. “I've tried, Trina, I swear I have.”

Her arms had moved by instinct around his waist, and Katrina gasped when the heat of his body pressed against hers. “You—you said we had to talk,” she managed to say unsteadily.