Forbidden Spirits (27 page)

"No, I'm in charge of Spencer Wildlife Park," Zak replied. "I help at the winery some, but my work at the park takes priority."

"I don't understand," Tess said, looking up. "You always intended to work at the winery."

"My degree's in wildlife management," Zak replied.

Tess found that puzzling. Before, he'd had no interest in college. He'd grown up working in the winery and was expected to take over someday. But she also remembered Zak being at odds with his father that summer. According to Zak, everything was either his father's way, or no way. Zak told her back then that moving into the cabin and signing on with Timber West was an escape. Maybe college had also been an escape...

"Have you been here long?" she asked, an attempt at casual conversation, when what she wanted was to fire a barrage of questions at him:
Why did you leave me without a word? Where did you go? Why didn't you come back? Why did you let me marry a man I didn't love?

"About six weeks," Zak replied, "when I was appointed head of the wildlife park." He lifted the bottle she'd been clutching in her hands and tipped it toward her glass while saying, "We're in the process of reinstating the bald eagle in the Channel Islands. We'll be taking chicks from nests with twins and transporting them to California, but first I have to fly over established nests to see if they're occupied." He looked at her, curiously. "Do you still fly?"

"Yes," Tess replied. "I no longer have a plane though. My husband got custody of it when we divorced, but my dad still has his. He said I could take it up if I wanted."

"Then you're still certified?"

Tess nodded. "That doesn't mean I fly. Right now Timber West is operating in the red, and flying costs money, so it will be a while before I go up again."

"How about Sunday?"

"What are you talking about?"

"The park plane's in for an engine overhaul and I need to fly over some nests before the chicks fledge, and time's running out. Maybe you could take me up. The park has funds. I'd make it was worth your while."

"Where do you want to go?" Tess asked, although she didn't know why. She had no intention of taking Zak up in her father's plane.

"Just around the area," Zak replied. "I have nests pinpointed on a map. But I'd also like to touch down at the Pine Mountain ranger station and talk to the park ranger there. Do you know Ralph Tolsted?"

"No," Tess replied, "but I know where the Pine Mountain station is. My dad and I flew over it a few times, even landed there once. Dad didn't like the landing strip though... said it was the shortest strip he'd ever used. Why Pine Mountain?"

"I want to check a nest there and talk to Tolsted about others in the area," Zak replied. "Timing's everything right now. Most of the chicks are ready to fledge. It's pretty important work we're doing."

Tess eyed him with indecision, then caught herself. There was no way she'd take him up. Zak now living in the cabin where her father found them was bad enough. Taking him up in her father's plane would set her relationship with her father back years if he found out, and she was home to try and close the rift between them...

"It shouldn't take more than an hour... two at the most with a short stop at Pine Mountain," Zak said. "Besides, it will give me a chance to be piloted by the grown up version of the fourteen year old scrap of a girl who bragged years ago that she could fly a plane."

Tess couldn't help smiling, which brought a smile from Zak, a smile she'd tried to hold in memory over the years. A smile that still made her heart flutter and her breath quicken. "I suppose it would be all right if it's not more than a couple of hours," she found herself saying, and refused to analyze why.

"Good," Zak replied, "I'll owe you dinner when we get back."

"Just pay for fuel and flying hours and we'll call it square," Tess said, wanting to make sure he understood her position with him now. No dinners. No cozy evenings in his cabin, or hers. No... nothing. Setting her wine glass aside, she stepped over to the dining table where she saw a map rolled out and held flat with four coffee mugs, and said, "So, show me where the surveyors claim the line runs."

Zak stood behind her, so close, his chest brushed against her back and his breath wafted against the side of her face. Reaching around her, he said, while dragging his finger over the map, "Your cabin's here and this is the road that runs between your cabin and the camp." Moving his finger over, he said, "This is where one designated marker is, and the other is here." His finger stopped precisely on the grotto.

"But our Ada... that is, the... old oak tree is a line marker," Tess said, "which puts the grotto clearly on Timber West land." In an instant, she was flooded with memories of hands exploring bodies, and toes curling against cool moss, and flesh against flesh, and forbidden desires. Forbidden because Zak had been twenty-one while she was only seventeen...

After a stretch of awkward silence, Zak said, "According to the survey, Timber West land stops ten feet this side of the... oak. The trees your father cut are over here on our land." Zak moved his finger from the grotto.

Tess released the breath she'd been holding and ducked from under Zak's arm, then stepped around the table, away from the distraction of having his arm around her, and his chest against her back, and his breath against her face, to where she could study the map more closely. As she did, to her dismay, she saw that the trees cut had clearly been on de Neuville land.

"Okay, so maybe the survey's right," she conceded, "but I don't want to upset my father over four trees. I'll pay your father for them and make sure no more are cut. Just don't let your father do anything right now."

"It's not that simple," Zak said. "My father's talking about stretching a fence along the line. He wants to graze sheep here, and this has to be resolved."

"Can't you stall the fence work, or at least leave that area for later?" Tess asked. "My father's health it frail right now and I don't want this upsetting him."

Zak sighed. "I'll see what I can do. Meanwhile, have your men haul the trees back to our place, and I'll tell my father that your father inadvertently logged on our land and no more trees will be cut. With luck, my father will drop the issue." He removed the mugs and rolled up the map and offered it to her, saying, "Show it to your father so he can see where the line runs. That should settle it."

Tess shook her head. "I'll pay for the trees and make sure no more are cut."

"I suppose," Tess replied, "but I don't want my father to know. It would only upset him."

Zak started slowly around the table, and she found herself standing planted to the floor and not moving as he said to her, "I won't say anything, and it shouldn't take more than a couple of hours." As he continued toward her, Tess realized he intended to kiss her. The years hadn't dimmed her memory of the look he got. It started with his eyes. Dark. Intense. Focused on her mouth. Then his nostrils flared. And the muscles in his jaws bunched. And his lips parted as he moved toward her. And his hands came up to take her arms...

"Don't," she said, turning her face away. "Before I take you up in my father's plane, I want to make sure we understand each other."

Zak removed his hands from her shoulders. "I was just trying to break some ice," he replied, and took a step back.

Ignoring his comment, Tess said, "I'll pick you up around two on Sunday." Turning from him, she grabbed her flashlight, clicked it on and dashed into the darkness.

As she made her way back to her cabin, she considered the ramifications of taking Zak up in her father's plane. He'd be furious if he knew, but it would only be for two hours, so she'd keep it from him. He didn't need that stress.

She also knew that Zak had the same effect on her as in the past. Nothing had changed. But after Sunday's flight, there would be no more dealings with him. He'd left her once. He'd leave her again. There was no place in her life for Zak de Neuville now.

CHAPTER 3

The following day, Tess walked up the bank of stairs leading to the front porch of the house in Baker’s Creek where she grew up, and when she stepped into the living room, she detected the unmistakable aroma of cinnamon and warm yeast. Her Aunt Ella met her at the door. "Hi, sweetie," she said. "You'd better go into the kitchen and assure your father that you got through your first day at camp in one piece. He's been in a stew all morning waiting to hear from you."

"How's he doing otherwise?" Tess asked.

Ella pursed her lips. "He's as cantankerous as an old dog. I only put up with him because I know underneath that crusty exterior he's soft as a kitten."

Tess laughed. "Did you give him what for, for going to the camp yesterday?"

"You better believe I did," Ella said. "I turn my back for a couple of hours and he's off. Well, he's not getting away today and I let him know."

Tess followed her aunt through the dining room. "How is he taking it?"

Ella glanced back. "He grumbled something about domineering women, and I reminded him it was a matter of survival of the fittest." She tapped her brother's shoulder on the way to the stove. "Tess is here." She set a platter with scrambled eggs and hash browns in the middle of the table, then slipped on oven mitts and lifted a tray of fresh baked cinnamon rolls out of the oven and set them on a hot pad beside the platter of eggs and hash browns.

Tess kissed her father on the forehead, and said, while pulling out a chair adjacent to him, "Well, I survived my first day at Timber West."

"Did you have any problem with Jed Swenson?" Gib asked, while serving himself from the platter.

"No, he never showed up," Tess replied. She reached for a cinnamon roll. "Am I supposed to put up with behavior like that, or can I fire him?"

A worried frown creased Gib's brow. "Don't be too quick to do that," he said. "Swenson's a good worker... knows logging and equipment, but he can be kind of stubborn at times."

Ella let out a chuckle. "If that's not the pot calling the kettle black."

Tess winked at her aunt, then said to her father, "Swenson wasn't at the meeting in the cook shack or at my office later, as I requested. He's openly defying me. Do you put up with that?"

"I haven't been around him that much," Gib said. "I hired him a few weeks before my heart attack and I was lucky to get him. Before you fire him, you'd better have someone in mind who'll step in. Word's out that Carl Yaeger's about to buy the tract between Timber West and the ridge, and if he does, he'll be hiring. If you get rid of Swenson you might find yourself without a woods boss, and no one to take his place."

"Well, Swenson's not any use to me right now," Tess said. "If he doesn't show up soon, I'll have to let him go." She licked warm icing from her fingers, then said to her father, "If Carl Yaeger buys the tract, do you think he'll allow us to cut through his land like we always have?"

"I hope so," Gib replied. "If he doesn't we're in trouble. There's no other access to the pole timber, unless de Neuville lets us go through his land, and we know the answer to that."

"Have you ever had our property surveyed?" Tess asked, jumping at the opportunity to broach the subject of the cut trees.

"There's no need," Gib replied. "I know where the line runs."

"How do you know if you've never had it surveyed?" Tess asked. "You could end up accidentally cutting timber on someone else's land. It just seems like a good idea to make sure."

Gib eyed Tess with annoyance. "I'm not going to pay some half-wit to come with his fancy equipment and try to tell me what I already know."

"Then I'll do it for you," Tess said. "That way we'll find out exactly where the line runs so we won't have to worry."

"I'm not worried," Gib said, "and I don't want to hear any more about surveys."

"If you don't want to hear about it from me, you'll be hearing from Jean-Pierre de Neuville," Tess said, her voice rising with her frustration, "because he did have a survey done and it shows that the property line runs forty feet from where you think it is."

Gib said nothing, his means of ending the discussion, and Tess knew better than to pursue the issue. But after he finished eating and left to work on his truck, Ella said, "He gets more stubborn as he gets older, so you might as well save your breath about those trees. How was the cabin? I'd hoped to get out there and scrub it down before you moved in."

"It was in pretty good shape," Tess replied. "A little sweeping and it was livable."

Ella sighed. "I don't know why your father's holding onto the place. Everything needs painting or fixing. He'll work himself to death out there."

"He'll die quicker if he sells and does nothing," Tess said. "It would be like admitting to himself that he's old and washed up, and he's not ready for that, and when he does decide to sell, I know he'll hold out until he gets what he
thinks
the business is worth, whether it is or not."

"You're right about that," Ella agreed. "But it'll be years before the timber industry recovers from the slump, and running the camp's not a life for you."

"I don't plan to run it forever," Tess said, "but I do want to get the business out of the red and Dad through this period."

"Well, I don't like the idea of you out there in the cabin with no one else around," Ella said.

Tess gave Ella a confident smile. "The men are five minutes up the road at the bunkhouse."

"You don't know those men," Ella said. "A pretty woman alone out there can be a real drawing card. I just wish there were permanent neighbors in the area. With all the woods around the cabin, someone could be hiding out."

Tess eyed Ella with uncertainty, and said, "Zak's next door."

For a moment Ella said nothing. Then her forehead puckered, and she looked at Tess with skepticism, and said, "Zak de Neuville?"

Tess nodded. "He's the one who brought up the subject of the survey. Dad told one of the men to thin the trees along the strip of land between the dirt road and the de Neuville's property, and those trees are not on de Neuville land. Four trees have already been cut."

Ella eyed Tess over the rim of her cup. "I'm sure Gib knows where the property line runs."

"That's the problem," Tess said. "He thinks he knows, but he's wrong. Zak showed me the survey map. He said his father's threatening to sue us for cutting the trees."

Ella looked directly at Tess and said, in a guarded voice, "Have you been seeing Zak de Neuville again?"

"No," Tess replied. "Well, after work yesterday I saw him briefly, but only for him to show me the survey map, but I'm not... seeing him."

Ella drew in an extended breath. "Does your father know he's back?"

"No."

"Then you'd better not say anything about it," Ella said. "It'll just get him riled again."

Tess toyed with telling her about taking Zak up in the plane, now that she knew Zak was back, then discarded that idea. Aunt Ella had enough on her mind, worrying about her stubborn brother, without brooding about his reaction to learning Zak was back.

***

The next day, as Tess pulled up to Zak's cabin to pick him up, she was surprised to find an old car, in the process of being restored, parked beside Zak's truck. The car's body was covered with gray primer and the rear end was jacked high with oversized tires, and inside, a grouping of beads and feathers hung from the rearview mirror. With mounting curiosity, she stepped onto the porch. But before she could knock, Zak opened the door, and said, "Come on in. Vince was about to leave. You remember my brother."

Tess looked beyond Zak at a young man wearing a black leather jacket, faded jeans with holes in them, and dirty sneakers. Where the jacket gaped open, she saw the grotesquely contorted face of a rock star on a tight black T-shirt. Vince's mouth was planted in a slash, and his dark eyes shone with irritation, though she sensed it wasn't aimed at her. "Yes," she replied, trying to assimilate the change from a bright-eyed youth of thirteen to this angry young man of twenty. "It's nice to see you again, Vince."

Vince nodded, and said nothing.

Tess lowered herself to the couch, and Zak sat in an overstuffed chair across from her, but Vince remained standing. From the somber look on his face, and the frustration on Zak's, Tess suspected they'd been having an argument. She was about to suggest she come back later, when she was distracted by movement and looked toward the hallway to see a young boy rolling a truck into the room. When the boy raised curious eyes to meet Tess's gaze, her lips parted in surprise. It was as if she were peering into Zak's gray-green eyes. The boy scrambled over to stand beside Zak, studying her from within the circle of Zak's arm. His young face was topped by a shock of wavy black hair, and in his chin was a small cleft.

Looking from the boy to Zak, Tess waited for Zak to explain.

Zak drew the boy against him, and said, "This is Pio, my son."

At first Tess stared blankly at the boy. Then she focused on his features. There was no question. This boy was indeed Zak's son. And the boy's mother, Zak's wife? Where was she?

Tess gave the boy a nervous smile, and said, "Hi."

The boy didn't smile back. Instead, he looked at Zak and said something in Basque. When Zak nodded, the boy scurried outside. Tess glanced out the window at the boy, who was pushing a larger truck across the ground. He appeared to be about six years old. Which meant... Zak must have either impregnated a woman or married her shortly after he left, seven years before...

"Father's damn traditions are straight out of another world," Vince said, his heated words punctuating the pounding of Tess's heart. "And I'll tell you another thing. I won't marry a Basque girl just because he's decided I will."

Zak looked at Tess, and said, "Excuse us a minute." He took Vince's arm and led him onto the porch then pulled the front door shut behind them.

Although their voices were muffled, Tess could still make out what they were saying...

"He's a proud man and the old traditions have been right for him," Zak said. "It's only natural he wants the same for you."

"That's fine for you to say, you're
etcheko primu
. Firstborn," Vince spat the words. "The winery will be yours, if you marry a Basque woman and fit into Father's mold."

Zak sighed. "You know you always have a place there."

"I'd die of boredom in Navarre."

The long silence that followed was broken by Zak. "You don't have to turn your back on all the values you were taught in order to be your own person."

"And I don't have to hang around here and listen to this crap either," Vince said. "I thought at least you'd understand, but you're no different from him. You'll do exactly as Father says. Marry a Basque woman, stay at the ranch, and live his life for him. I hope you enjoy it."

"I've been where you are, caught between two worlds," Zak said, "but there is a middle ground. You just have to find it and convince Father."

Vince gave a cynical snort. "Ever try moving a mountain?"

Zak ignored the remark. "Meanwhile, try not to irritate him."

"Which means, tell him what he wants to hear. I can't do that."

"Try," Zak said. "And thanks for bringing Pio along today, even if the visit's short."

Vince eyed Pio, affectionately. "There was no way I could get out of it. He had to tell you about the kittens."

Zak stepped off the porch and crouched in front of Pio, and said, "I'll be anxious to hear what you name your new pal."

Pio's face brightened. "When can I bring him here?" he asked in an animated voice.

"When he's six weeks old," Zak replied. "Meanwhile, I'll come for you next weekend and we'll go find some eagles, maybe do a nest climb. How would you like that?"

Pio grinned. "I'd like that."

After Vince left with Pio, Zak went back inside and collected several maps from the kitchen table, and they left in Tess's Jeep. But while they were driving to the airpark, he said to Tess, "I should have told you about Pio. I didn't expect Vince to come by with him today and I planned to tell you about him later."

"It doesn't matter," Tess said. "That was a long time ago." She was determined to ask no questions about Zak's past, or about the mother of his son. It would be too degrading. And maybe her father was right. Maybe Zak used her. Maybe what they had going that summer was nothing more than teenage hormones coupled with Zak's promises of forever to keep the sex coming. She'd definitely given him reason to come back for more. She liked having sex with him too, but what was more important for her was the aftermath of their lovemaking, when Zak talked about how it would be for them someday...

"To answer at least one of your questions," Zak said, "my wife died about four months ago so I have full care of our son."

Tess fingers curled around the wheel. The word
our
didn't compute. She'd never imagined a son of Zak's not being her son as well. But what was almost as troubling was that Zak, a widower of only four months, had come close to kissing her two nights before. Not exactly a grieving widower. But Zak was obviously not a one-woman man either. He'd proved that the summer he loved her and left her and married another woman shortly afterwards.