The Eye of the Wolf (7 page)

Regardless of her desire to
keep all historical artifacts intact, the desire to see what treasures had been
hidden long ago was stronger. She hadn’t been disappointed. Heavy leather-bound
books stacked on one another, covered in fine Irish linen with perfect Celtic
knots embroidered in brown, but once had probably been a beautiful sunny
yellow. Most people wouldn’t have found this an exciting find, a treasure to be
protected, but to Mikayla, it was greater than the brightest jewels in the
British crown.

Mikayla wistfully trailed her
fingers along the glass of the case. What would it be like to be royalty,
adored by all? Her reflection peered back at her, blue eyes clear. A crease
between her eyebrows were the only outward sign of her thoughts about Amor’s
hidden history, lost in legend and folklore. Mikayla rubbed absently at the
crease in her forehead, willing it away. As her reflection gazed back at her,
she focused on her hair, hanging in limp, messy curls ringing her too pale
face. Mikayla sighed as an image of Will danced in her mind. His smiling gray
eyes and boyish grin warmed her throughout, a tingling in her toes. He was
there in her mind again.

Mikayla caught her reflection
again in the glass, a silly, wistful smile teasing her lips. Mikayla
straightened and frowned. She sighed heavily and shook her head. It wouldn’t do
to be fantasizing about someone, someone who was not her type, not her
anything.

She shook her head and moved on
towards the Hall of Records, leaving romantic, royal day-dreams behind, encased
in cold glass, preserved and protected.

Mikayla pushed open the heavy
oak door to the Hall of Records. She stepped into the darkness and ran her hand
over the stone wall to her left until her fingers found the light key.
Expertly, she turned the key, and the room was flooded with light. Stacks of
book littered the roughly hewn table inside the door and beset the floor and
chairs surrounding the table in confusion. To her, the organization was
obvious, but to her dedicated, and annoying, assistant, William Chambers, the
room was chaos.

Mikayla pulled her legal pad
from her battered, navy blue backpack, the backpack that had criss-crossed
Europe and the Middle East many times. The backpack had been the carrying case
for illuminated manuscripts, marble statues, and other oddities discovered in
the rubble of monasteries, castles, and other buildings long destroyed.
Although many historians she worked with looked down their noses at her casual
attire and more casual use of the backpack, notepads, and a laptop computer,
Mikayla believed she should go with what worked. It hadn’t caused any damage
yet. Most historians packed up the artifacts and transported them back to
sterile, air-tight laboratories where they can be studied under microscopes
with latex gloves protecting the items from the oils in the skin. Mikayla felt
it was more important to look at the items while immersed in its surroundings
that were all part of the picture. History was, after all, the story of people.
It wasn’t just an artifact.

She settled herself in one of
the hard wooden chairs that circled the table and opened the book in front of
her. She thumbed through the vellum pages until she came across the document
she had been working her way through the day before. Her finger skimmed along
the page until she found the word she had left off on. Keeping one finger on
the word, she reached into her backpack and pulled out a well-thumbed Greek
dictionary. She flipped through the pages until she came to the word that had
perplexed her so much.

Will leaned against the
doorjam. He watched her tuck a stray strand of hair behind her ear to join the
rest of the auburn hair that cascaded loosely down her back. Her faded jeans fit
snuggly against her nicely rounded physique as she sat on one of her bare feet
lost in thought. Her over-sized white cotton blouse hung loosely over her slim
frame, untucked. It slid seductively to the side revealing a pale shoulder and
a lacy strap that denied the practical nature of the woman whose shoulder it
caressed. The comfortable outfit, the practical glasses, and the lacy strap
were all contradictions, just like the contrary nature of the Dr. Mikayla
Knight.

Will shifted his weight so he
could get a better view of her profile. The subtle, rosy lips. The gentle rise
of cheekbones and the impossibly pointy nose that gave her an aristocratic air,
an air of royalty. Her blue eyes were shielded by the tortoise shell glasses
and long, luxurious eye lashes. Her slim, unadorned fingers wound through her
loose hair that strayed across her forehead in a charming, distracted manner.
He knew if he got close enough, the subtle, warm scent of vanilla would engulf
him and pull him in.

Will sighed. He had been involved
with women around the world during his travels, but none had ever pulled at him
like she did. There had never been a woman that he had felt comfortable just
watching from a distance or whom he enjoyed watching from a distance.

There also had never been a
woman who was quite so prickly and annoying as Dr. Mikayla Knight. He couldn’t
explain it, but she irritated him. She drove him nuts with her insistence that
he arrive at the Hall of Records at 8 am sharp. With her insistence that he
call her by her formal academic title instead of her first name. With her
incessant use of ‘Mr. Chambers’ instead of his name. With her obsessive
organization of documents and the need for everything to be returned to its
proper place once he was finished with it. With her snotty tone that suggested
she believed she was better than he, that he was some island low-life. With her
cold, patient smile that told him she was merely tolerating his presence and
his winsome ways because she had no other options. She made him want to prove
himself to her when he knew deep inside that he had nothing to prove. She made
him simply want when there should have been no wanting involved.

“Are you going to stand in the
doorway for the rest of day watching me do all the work or are you going to
come in and get started?” Mikayla’s cool voice cut through Will’s reverie. She
never turned but she knew he was there. She had known since he had first
stepped into the doorway. She always knew when he was near. His scent enveloped
her: salty and fresh, like a breeze bringing the ocean to her, clearing her
thoughts.

Will stepped into the room, but
stopped behind her chair. He studied her bent head and wondered what
experiences could possibly make someone as brilliant and intriguing as Mikayla
turn so cold, so determined to be the best. He tried to shrug it off and
pretend that it didn’t matter that she hadn’t turned and flashed him one of her
rare, inviting smiles that could stop a heart and heat the loins at fifty
paces. It shouldn’t matter, but it did, even when it shouldn’t have.

Will twirled the lemon yellow
rose in his fingers. He had plucked it from the garden before heading over when
the dew had been sitting peacefully on the leaves, and the sun had just begun
to warm the air as it rose over the mountain at the center of the island. He
hadn’t known what possessed him to pick it then, and now, as he stood in her
presence, sensing everything about her, he still wondered what had made him
bring it. All he had known was that he needed to bring it to her. A peace
offering? A method to get her to smile in welcome? A romantic gesture? He
didn’t know.

Will set the delicate blossom
on the vellum sheets in front of Mikayla. Her hands stilled, but her head did
not rise. There was no movement, no acknowledgement of the gift before her. The
silence in the room was deafening. Will found himself shuffling his feet,
longing to be anywhere, his boat, the beach, the dentist’s chair getting a root
canal, but there.

Mikayla felt an incredible need
to move her hands to still her heart, as corny as it seemed to her. Her breath
caught in her throat and her heart beat faster and more intensely. She was
surprised Will couldn’t hear it or that it didn’t come flying out of her chest
from the strength of the beat. No one had ever given her roses before. Alex had
found them silly and a waste of money; he had preferred to buy stock in
lucrative investments in her name to the simple romantic gesture of a perfect
flower bloom.

This was wrong, very wrong.
This man, this stranger who had appeared just day before to annoy her was not
supposed to provide her with romantic gestures that no one ever had. This
stranger was not supposed to fill her waking moments when there was nothing
else to fill those moments, and some when there was work to be completed. This
stranger was not supposed to make her heart race. This wasn’t the way things
worked.

Mikayla gently traced a finger
along the petal of the rose before looking up. She knew Will was seated across
from her in his traditional spot. He had opened a book, and he was seemingly
focused on the task he had left off with the day before. It seemed she always
knew where Will was and what he was doing without looking, without listening.
It seemed as if he was a part of her, no matter how absurd that might seem to
anyone other than a romantic novelist.

Mikayla raised her head to look
across the table. Will’s head was bent, hair falling across his forehead. He
nibbled on a finger, unconsciously biting at the skin around the nail. An old
habit, she assumed, despite the neat manicure on each hand. An old habit that
was in a way endearing and warmed her heart even while it annoyed her.

Mikayla traced the rose across
her cheek and felt the silky petals caress her skin. A small smile escaped her
professional facade and lit her face. “Thank you.” She whispered.

Will glanced up as she traced
the rose across her cheek and wished for just a moment that he was part of the
rose, to feel that skin, skin soft as silk against his own. He returned her
smile with a brilliant one of his own. “You’re welcome.” He nodded and then
returned to the book before him. Although he appeared to be reading, his eyes
were unfocused. Words were blurry before him. He was only aware of his heart,
pounding inside of his chest, bursting to escape its cage. He swallowed and
then smiled again. Maybe she wasn’t so cold and maybe she wasn’t so annoying
after all. She had after all appreciated the simple gesture of friendship.

 Friendship, yes, that’s
what it was, friendship. He had never had many friends; people had never wanted
to be his friend simply because of who he was on the inside. There had always
been a reason for people wanting to be his friend; people had always wanted
something. Maybe this was what real friendship was supposed to be like. Or
maybe, he was insane. Maybe he was falling for a woman who exasperated him
beyond comprehension and aroused him into oblivion.

Will swallowed the lump that
clogged his throat and shifted in his seat. He couldn’t look up. He couldn’t
meet her eye. He couldn’t allow those new feelings to show to anyone. They
would be friends. There would never be anything else between them, despite this
sudden need to show her that exasperation that ate away at his brain and that
arousal that swamped him in sensations.

Mikayla set the rose aside, in
place where it could be seen as she worked. She glanced across the table as
Will shifted again in his seat. He was uncomfortable. It was obvious, but why?
Oh, wouldn’t it be fun to be the light-hearted type who could easily flirt and
take advantage of his obvious discomfort.

Mikayla frowned. She wasn’t the
light-hearted flirtatious type. She was the serious student type who had always
felt uncomfortable around men, even men she knew very well. She had always
watched with fascination and envy as her friends had flirted and teased with
strangers, friends and others who had passed through their clutches. She had
tried to be suave and sexy, but there was not a sexy bone in her body. There
was not a suave molecule in her make-up. She would always be the wall-flower
who was more comfortable discussing issues passionately that being the
passionate lover her friends had become.

Even if Mikayla was inclined
for an island frolic with the handsome man across from her, it wasn’t fair to
him or herself. To her, what ever occurred would never amount to anything more
than a mere love affair; she was only here for three months. But a part of her
still yearned for what she had given up with Alex, love and marriage. A home
with two loving adults, children, and a Golden Retriever. Mikayla knew she
wasn’t made for a life like that. She knew she would forever be flitting around
the world. She also knew that she couldn’t have a mindless flirtation with
someone she was just going to have to leave in the end.

But she wasn’t the type and he
would never look at her in any other manner other than a friend. A friend.
Mikayla tried to smile again. Friendship was a good thing. She had tons of
friends around the world. She could always use another friend. That’s what the
rose was, a gesture of friendship.

Mikayla cleared her throat and
turned the page to her book. “Let me tell you what I’ve found so far today.”
Mikayla pushed her notepad across the table. Then, she pushed her glasses onto
her head, where they were lost to a mass of curls.

Will took the notepad from the
table and scanned the hastily scrawled notes. He nodded a few times and chewed
at the nail that was irritating him. “I know this story. Where did you find
it?”

Mikayla pushed the book across the
table and took her notepad back. “What can you tell me about the Eye of the
Wolf?”