Nobody's Business (Nobody Romances) (10 page)

"Doug," he corrected, and faced the front of the boarding area.

Inside the booth, the teen hung up the receiver and flashed
a thumbs-up.

Clumping forward on his skis, Doug asked the woman beside him, "How'd you do that?"

"Do what?" For a moment, she looked genuinely puzzled
by the question. Her finely arched brows peaked, and her eyes
crinkled in the late afternoon sun. "Oh, you mean the lift?"
She shrugged. "I know people."

"Yeah," he murmured, biting back a smile. "I bet you do."

One of the chairs in the line made the turn, and Lyn deftly
maneuvered to the right side for Mr. Sawyer's benefit. She
pushed forward with him now on her left, allowing him the
use of his one arm to board the next triple chair as easily as
possible. When she craned her neck, she caught a glimpse of
her companion's profile. Despite the helmet with the goggles
once again askew on top-a look that would make even Arnold
Schwarzenegger seem like a helpless wuss-Mr. Sawyer gave
the impression of a man of great strength. Probably in personality as well as in physical stature.

Those gorgeous hazel eyes she'd seen flash in anger and
amusement sat perfectly above razor-sharp cheekbones and a
well-defined jaw. He towered over her, maybe stood as tall as
six and a half feet, and even with the padding of his ski jacket
and pants, she discerned a broad upper body, tapering to slim mer hips. All in all, she sensed a man accustomed to going
after life with both hands.

How would such a man react to the sudden loss of a crucial
limb?

Not well, she figured. After all, how would she react if she
were in his boots? That old photo of the H-bomb's dust cloud over
Hiroshima filled her imagination. Yeah. Something like that.

The chairback hit her knees, and she collapsed into the hard,
cold seat as Mr. Sawyer did the same. When they were settled,
she raised her hand to lower the overhead bar. He couldn't
help-not if he wanted to keep his grip on his ski pole, but he
made the gesture anyway.

"I've got it," she assured him.

He lowered his hand, and she pulled the rail to slowly sink
the bar into place. Clunk!

She set her skis on the footrest, and he followed suit. Silence
reigned, broken only by the whoosh of a snow gun on some
trail beyond the tree line, and the creaky sound of the chairlift
as the overhead cables wound through the flywheels.

The overwhelming heat of self-consciousness flared in Lyn's
cheeks, then steamed up her hairline. God, she was an idiot. No
good at small talk, never had been. But she had to say something to the man.

"Umm..."

Oh, excellent start. This whole sorry episode kept getting
better and better.

When she turned to face him, he smiled. "Am I making you
nervous?"

Someone shoot me. Shoot me now. "I ... umm ... I don't
usually invite strangers to ski with me."

He didn't laugh at her. Score one point in the sensitivity column. In fact, his expression reflected genuine concern. "Should
I be flattered?"

Despite her nervousness, a giggle escaped. "Take it any
way you like. But honestly? I'm terrified."

"Of me?" His tone registered disbelief. "Why?"

"Because I don't know you. And since you don't know me,
let me tell you. I don't do this."

"Do what? Share a chairlift with someone you don't know?
Let me make it easier for you. My name's Doug. I live in New
York. Oh, and in case you haven't noticed, I'm missing my
right arm."

"Yeah, I got that." Tension eased from her neck and shoulders. "Can I ask ... ?" She looked down at the trails below, the
white swaths like satin ribbons in an expanse of spiky trees
and lumpy gray rocks. "What happened to you?"

"Car accident ... well, more like a Jeep accident. Me and a
couple of buddies rolled over an embankment."

"I'm sorry. Were your friends all right?"

"Died on impact, I was told. I don't really know what happened. I woke up in a hospital with no arm and no memory
beyond getting into the ride at the start of the day."

"They say that's for the best," she replied.

"Do they?" He arched a brow in her direction, but the easy
grin never left his lips.

She relaxed even more and actually found her own smile.
"Well, yes. Supposedly, it helps with the healing process and
keeps you from dwelling on the injuries."

"And who exactly are `they'?"

The lilt he placed on that last word communicated how he
delighted in teasing her. All shreds of anxiety wafted away on
the crisp air. "The medical professionals," she replied loftily.
"Surgeons, physical therapists, even my ... the students here
all say that not remembering the details is often a blessing."

She'd almost lost control with her slip about her students.
Better to turn the subject far away from this place before she
made a major gaffe. "You said you live in New York?"

"Mmm-hmm. Manhattan. Upper East Side."

"Nice."

"Yeah, it was. Until my mother moved in."

"Your mother?" She couldn't shield her surprise if she'd
tried. The last description she would have used on this man
was Mama's Boy.

He nodded and rolled his eyes more dramatically than her
niece Becky on her best day. "Part of the trials of being the only child of a single parent. After I was discharged from the
hospital and sent home, she moved into my apartment to take
care of me."

A pang of regret struck Lyn's heart. "That's sweet." In the
last decade, her mother had refused to visit, always insisting
Lyn come to her. Even when Marc had passed away.

She and her mother had never been close. Of course, she'd
spent six months-sometimes more-of the year with her
father on the ski circuit. Mom, strong-willed, independent, and
often abrasive, seemed content with an absentee husband for
half the year. But was she really? Or had she just made the best
of the situation her husband had presented her? And did she
still resent her youngest daughter for causing a rift in their
marriage?

"She would have come on this trip if I hadn't brought Ace
instead."

Lyn blinked. For a moment, she'd fallen into memories better left unexplored. But Mr. Sawyer's statement came at the
right time to jolt her back to the present.

"Ace," she said thoughtfully. Now there was a conundrum.
"You do know he's got a competition in Canada, right?"

"I know. He's not staying much longer. He'll train as much
as he can here-"

"Here? At Mount Elsie?" Despite her best efforts, amusement
escaped with a snort. "With its twelve-hundred-foot vertical?"

Mr. Sawyer nodded. "I know. In competition terms, this is
like snowboarding down a residential driveway. Which is why
I've insisted he leave by the end of the week. He's got access to
a private course a few hundred miles from here. They're building up the terrain park to challenge him and get him completely
ready for next month's games."

She shot an inquisitive stare his way. "And you know all
this because ... ?"

"He told me."

Puh-leez. "And you believe him?"

"Ace would never lie to me." For the first time since they'd
sat on the lift, he frowned. "He knows better."

"What exactly is your relationship to him anyway?"

Doug stared at the approaching tower, almost willing the
chairlift to pick up speed. Good Lord, how many lies would
he have to tell in a ten-minute trip? He'd already skirted around
how he'd lost his arm.

Bitterness burned his throat. His roundabout tale minimized the loss of hero Giles Markham and five other brave
men to "a couple of buddies." Not only that, he managed to
make the tragedy of war sound like a bunch of drunks who'd
lost control during a joyride. Wow, there was something to be
proud of.

All the more reason, perhaps, why he had to tell this story
to readers of The Sportsman. Odd how the more time he spent
with Brooklyn Raine, the more he burned to return to his keyboard.

"Ace said you helped him when he got into trouble at JFK
two years ago," Brooklyn prompted. "Are you a lawyer?"

"No." Okay, deep breath. So far, he'd only omitted the full
truth, not totally reconstructed it. Could he continue to slip and
slide around the facts? Lying didn't come easily to him. Never
had. His tongue felt thick, and his lungs sputtered for air.

"So?" She arched her brows. "What's your story?"

Ha. And Ace thought she feared reporters? Why would
she? In fact, she'd make a great reporter herself. She had just
as much tenacity when it came to a subject that caught her attention.

"I've known Ace since his first competition days." When the
then-thirteen-year-old lit the X-Games on fire with his signa ture big air trick, the Bump and Grind. In the first of many articles Doug would write about Ace Riordan, he'd forecasted
the kid's meteoric rise to the top of the snowboarding world
after that one amazing aerial flip.

"So," Brooklyn said, "you're like his agent or something?"

He hesitated. "I'm ... more like ... promotion." Oh, he was
skating on very thin ice right now.

Understanding widened her eyes. Since she was a former ski
champion, she must have recalled her own glory days and the
entourage of legal, promotional, and athletic personnel swamping her every move. Easy enough, based on the information
he'd provided, for her to assume he was just another face in a
sports superstar's crowd.

"Of course," she replied with a wry smile. "I would imagine protecting Ace's image is a twenty-four/seven job."

"There've definitely been some scary moments in the past."
Not much of a lie there. Ace was still a kid, dealing with the
type of fame that sent more highly experienced adults spiraling
into self-destruction. "But since my accident, I've been pretty
much unemployed."

"Ace fired you?" Her eyes narrowed in outrage.

He bit back a smile. Well, well. The Coyote really did have a
heart. Who knew? "No. Ace didn't fire me. Technically, I don't
work for him."

"So your company fired you? That's just as bad."

"No. No one fired me. I just haven't been able to do my job
since I left the hospital."

"Why on earth not?" Outrage transformed to confusion.

"You really need to ask?"

"Of course."

"Yoo-hoo." He flapped his empty sleeve with the intensity of
a hawk swooping in on a disabled mouse. Thwap, thwap, thwap.
"Does this little tragedy ring a bell for you?"

"Tragedy? Is that how you see your injury?"

"Don't." He held up his left hand, the ski pole punctuating the
frosty air like an exclamation point. "Don't try to force-feed
me any platitudes about challenges and life not giving me more than I can handle. I've heard them all, and I'm not buying any
of them."

"Okay, so wait. Let me get this straight. You think because
you're missing an arm you can't work anymore?"

"Yeah, I did."

Her narrowed eyes glinted steel in the surrounding twilight.
"Can't? Or won't work anymore?"

"Can't or won't. Doesn't matter."

"Wanna bet?"

On second thought, the Coyote must have had some barracuda DNA in her genetic makeup. "I said I did feel that way."
And for the first time since he'd sat beside her on this lift, he
gave her the full truth. "Until I met you."

She actually blushed, and offered a thousand-watt smile that
made him feel sixteen again.

More time. He needed more time with this snow siren who
both infuriated and charmed him. Oh sure, mainly for his article but also because-oh my God, she was Brooklyn Raine.

The love-struck teen he'd once been couldn't quite abandon
his awe in his idol's presence. How many people got this kind
of opportunity? Not many, he'd bet.

Now or never.

Doug seized his moment. "Would you have dinner with me
tonight?"

His question hung between them unanswered. Not that Lyn
hadn't heard him. In fact, she'd heard him all too clearly. At
least, until the words pressed a blaring panic button inside her
head.

Omigod, omigod, omigod. How on earth should she answer?

In a frantic attempt to find an escape, she noticed the sign
mounted on the tower as they passed. PREPARE TO UNLOAD.
RAISE BAR.

Thank God.

Feigning nonchalance, she gestured with a nod in that direction. "Put your goggles back into place, and take your skis
off the footrest," she directed. "We're about to hit the ramp."

"You didn't answer my question."

He noticed. The bottom dropped out of her stomach, hurtling her heart into freefall. Her gloved hand tightened on the
restraint bar as she looked away from his intense stare. "I-I
can't."

"Can't or won't?" The teasing lilt returned to his tone.

Can't, won't. What was the difference? The mere idea of sitting across from this man over an intimate meal, where he could
study her more intently, slipped an itchy sweater over her skin.
She pushed the bar up and out of the way, then sidled to the edge
of her seatmore from discomfort than in preparation to ski off
the chair. "Do you need help getting off the lift?"