Nobody's Business (Nobody Romances) (22 page)

Doug squirmed as if a hundred fire ants suddenly crawled
across his flesh. Would she think him such a hero if she knew
about his ulterior motives? Doubtful.

For the rest of the ride, he preferred to stare out the window
at the ski chalets, snow-covered tree branches, and storefronts
they passed. He needed to regroup, reanalyze, reconsider.

"A penny for your thoughts," Lyn whispered.

Gaze still fixed out the window, he murmured, "Trust me.
They're worth a lot more than that."

"So are mine." On a sigh, she leaned closer, squeezed his
hand. "I'm sorry. You seem to be deep in thought, and my interrupting you could be interpreted as rude. I really don't mean to be. But the truth is . . ." She toyed with the cuff of his jacket.
"I want to tell you something and-"

"Here we are!" Larry bellowed from the driver's seat. "That'll
be six dollars, if you please. And even if you don't please."

The fact his passengers didn't find him quite so amusing
never registered on Larry as he burst into raucous laughter.

On a sigh, Doug pulled out his billfold and removed the
bills from inside. As he passed them over the seat, Larry clutched
his wrist. "You be good to my girl there, you hear?"

"I'm doing my best," Doug said and slid out of the cab behind Lyn. When he turned, his jaw dropped to chest level.

Under row upon row of halogen lights, the angel arch glittered like a prismatic rainbow. At the entrance stood a locked
wooden box mounted on a pike with a hand-painted sign asking for a recommended donation of five dollars per person. A
line of people waited with fistfuls of five-dollar bills. He and
Lyn joined the line and when their turn came up, Doug surreptitiously slipped a fifty into the slot in the box.

He had to admit the scene was even more impressive than
she'd boasted. Somehow the angels' wings managed to have
golden tips, and the faces were so intricately carved, they looked
real enough to believe in. Up ahead, the diamond spires and
turrets of a castle pierced the starlit sky. Adults and children
marveled, oohing their delight as they pointed out one unique
item after another, from the reindeer to the sleigh full of toys,
all detailed and realistic, yet created from nothing more than
frozen water.

"Isn't it beautiful?" She pulled him along with her, gaping
at the glittering snowflakes, giggling at the lifelike penguins
in their formal attire.

The more animated she became, the more his resolve to dig
out the truth faltered. He had to get back on track before she
charmed him into forgetting. And what exactly had she wanted
to tell him in the cab, before loudmouth Larry ruined the moment?

At the end of the exhibit sat a dilapidated double-wide
trailer covered in pale blue aluminum siding, circa 1965. A dirty plastic sign next to the frost-coated sliding window listed
hot beverages and several varieties of beer for sale. Doug
bought them each a hot chocolate with a whipped-cream crown.
At five bucks a cup, the beverages should have been dusted with
gold flakes. But he smiled, handed over the ten, and pointedly
ignored the glass fishbowl with the taped cardboard sign for
TIPS.

With their evening quickly coming to a close, he decided to
stop tap dancing around his questions and go right for the
jugular. "Where did you learn to ski?"

She never batted a lash, but took a casual sip of her chocolate
before replying, "My parents. Mom and Dad had a house in the
Adirondacks and we'd spend every winter vacation there from
the time we were babies. Mom got us started on the bunny
slopes and the easy trails when we were still toddlers. Once we
were skiing the challenging stuff Mom didn't like, Dad took
over. How about you?"

At last. An opening he could use. No way would he let this
opportunity pass him by. "I fell in love with an Olympic skier
when I was a teenager. Major league crush. Decided to take
up the sport on the off chance she'd show up in West Virginia
looking for a skinny, awkward sixteen-year-old ski novice with
acne and braces to share slalom races and bad pizza." He exhausted his meager acting abilities on one overdramatic sigh.
"She never showed up though."

She looked up at him, a dollop of whipped cream framing
her upper lip. "What was her name?"

He leaned over and kissed her. Soulfully. The sweet cream
danced on his tongue. Nuzzling her neck beneath her jacket
collar, he murmured, "Back then, she was known as Brooklyn
Raine."

He expected her to gasp, or rattle off denials, but she didn't.
Instead, she drew a finger down his scarred cheek to his jawline. "So you know. Thank God."

He was the one to pull back in surprise. "You're not upset?"

"No." She flashed that blinding smile he recalled from his
adolescent fantasies. "Honestly? I'm relieved. I've been trying
to figure out how to tell you."

"Ace said it was a great big secret."

"It is. But you and I..." Her voice trailed off, and she broke
eye contact to stare at the turrets of the enormous ice castle. "I
can't play shy, Doug. I've never been good at head games. Not
even on the circuit. The truth is I like you. A lot. And I couldn't
in good conscience continue to pursue whatever the attraction is
between us while holding on to a lie."

Guilt stabbed him behind the eyes. His own conscience,
sounding remarkably like Ace's voice, chastised, Tell her,
idiot.

"There she is!"

Doug turned at the outburst and froze. Flashbulbs lit up the
night, reflected off the ice and fractured into prisms of blinding color. An ocean of people raced toward them.

"Brooklyn!" Someone shouted-Lorenzo Akers.

Where had he come from? Doug ducked inside his collar,
prayed the cockroach didn't recognize him. Apparently, though,
the buzz was reserved for Lyn alone, and not her companion.

"Why have you been hiding out all these years?" Akers asked.

"How do you feel about April stealing your spotlight?" a
woman chimed in.

A microphone popped out of nowhere and brushed across
her nose. "Will you be at your sister's wedding?"

"Can you turn this way please?" The flashing lights popped,
sizzling his retinas. He blinked, but his vision remained pixellated.

"Is your mentally handicapped nephew involved in the SkiHab program at Mount Elsie?" Akers pestered. "Is that why
they're here?"

Holy...

Doug couldn't even finish the swearword that came to mind.
Like locusts, the crowd swarmed, buzzing with questions and
jostling to get closer to their prey.

Beside him, a shivering Lyn folded in on herself, shrinking
as if to hide inside his jacket pocket. The color in her cheeks
had bleached away, leaving her chalk white. Her breath came in
quick spurts, close to hyperventilating. Her pupils had shrunk
to pinpoints. Good God. He had to get her out of here.

"Doug!" Somewhere beyond the clamor, Ace shouted his
name. "Doug!"

"Ace!" he called back. "Get us outta here."

Wrapping his real arm around Lyn's waist, he used his prosthesis to push past the first ring of screaming humanity. Someone in the crowd shoved back, and Doug tightened his grip on
Lyn. God, now he knew how shark bait felt. The frenzy around
them grew more physical, more violent.

Suddenly, from the outskirts of the crowd came half a
dozen men brandishing brooms and hockey sticks.

"Here now!" a bald man with a round pudgy face beneath a
New England Patriots knit cap exclaimed. "Get out of here,
you vultures!"

"Let them through!" Another man, this one short and thin
and wearing a black hunting cap, shouted as he held a hockey
stick like a guardrail, dividing the crowd down the middle.

Doug continued to elbow and shoulder his way through the
throng, but the bizarrely armed force of men gave him a wider
berth to use. At last he spotted Ace and dragged Lyn in a
straight line to him.

"What's going on?" he demanded as he reached Ace's side.
"Where did all these people come from?"

"My fault," Ace said with a grimace. "Come on. Let's get to
the car and I'll explain everything."

Once they'd reached Ace's Escalade, Doug yanked open
the back door and shoved Lyn inside, then slid in beside her.
Shuddering and ghostly pale, she huddled against him.

Ace got behind the wheel and started the engine. "Where to?"

"Home," Lyn said through chattering teeth. "Take me home.
Please."

"Umm..." Over the black leather headrest, Ace flashed an
uncertain glance at Doug. "I don't think that's such a hot
idea."

The headlights shone on the crowd surging toward them,
flesh-eating zombies from some B horror movie.

Doug stifled his own shudders as Ace turned around again.
"Why don't you tell us what's going on? Who are all those
people?"

"Reporters, mostly. A few rabid fans." Ace's worried face
reflected in the rearview mirror. "They know."

"Who knows?" Doug pressed. "Knows what?"

"Me," Lyn murmured into his chest. "They know about me.
Who I am. Or was." She drew in a sharp breath. "Or am. I guess."

Doug's heart sank. Yeah, he'd figured as much when they
started screaming questions and calling her Brooklyn. But
he'd kinda hoped they were there because Lyn won the Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes. "How exactly did this
happen?"

"My fault," Ace said again.

Great. The story of a lifetime had just slipped away like a
greased eel. He'd been thisclose to not only rejuvenating his career, but reintroducing the sports world to an amazing woman. Until Ace blew those plans to dust. Doug recalled all the arguments and debates about the article he planned to write. Had
Ace orchestrated this disaster intentionally?

Thump! A hand slammed against the window, and Lyn
screamed. Curling into a tight ball, she cradled her head in her
folded arms and murmured, "I hate this, I hate this, I hate this,
I hate this."

"I don't care where we go, just get us outta here," Doug
growled as he pulled the shivering Lyn against him.

"Richie's," Lyn said from inside Doug's jacket. "Take me to
Richie's."

"That," Ace replied, "I can do."

Sounding the horn in short blasts, he drove slowly away
from the grasping hands and rapid-fire questions. Once they
reached the open road, he hit the gas and barreled toward the
highway.

Doug kept his real arm around Lyn while his prosthetic
hand gripped the door handle to keep from crushing her on
the road's curves. Under normal circumstances, he'd pause to
marvel at his prosthesis' almost instinctive motions yet again.
But in the wake of disaster, a little finger curl barely registered
on the Oh-My-God scale. "Okay, Ace, what's going on? What
was all that about? What happened? How'd they find out?"

"Someone recognized Becky."

"Becky?" Lyn sat up. "My niece?"

"Yeah. My fault. I totally admit it."

Lyn sighed, the sound of an exasperated parent with a disobedient child. "You couldn't just leave her alone, could you?"

"Look, I'm sorry, okay? Becky and I hit it off. I mean, I really like her. She's funny, smart, and not bowled over by all the
fan frenzy. So we spent the last few days together. But you
know how it gets when I'm here."

"You mean, when you draw attention to yourself?" Lyn retorted.

Right hand upraised, he turned in the seat to face her. "I
swear. If I'd known who she was, I wouldn't have drawn so
much attention to us. Nobody told me she was anything more
than your niece."

The Escalade drifted out of the left lane, into the center.
From behind them, a car horn blared.

"Turn around and drive!" Lyn exclaimed.

"Whoa!" Ace faced the road again, both hands on the steering wheel as he muttered, "Sorry. You know, now that I think
about it, that's probably why she wasn't impressed with the
crowds around me. She's used to it from that television show
with her mom and Jeff-"

"Oh, for God's sake, Ace, shut up!" Lyn snapped. "This isn't
about you."

Doug cupped her hand in his. "Easy, sweetheart."

With a deep breath, her tone calmed. "I have to think. What
happened next, Ace? Don't look at me. Keep your eyes on the
road and just tell me."

Ace shrugged. "Next thing I know, your sister shows up at
the base lodge with that Jeff guy. The crowds are going nuts,
and Michael starts to freak."

"Oh God, Michael." Gripping the headrest, she leaned forward. "Is he okay?"

"Yeah," Ace replied. "April got him calmed down, but not
before he said the name `Aunt Brooklyn' in front of Lorenzo
Akers. Old Buzzard Beak put it together instantly."

Doug sucked in a breath. Poor kid. Even in the dim light of
the parlor the other night, he'd noted the telltale eyes of a child
with Down syndrome. If the crowd at the lodge was anything
close to what they'd just experienced at Winter Wonderland,
Michael had every right to freak.

"Oh God," Lyn repeated, this time with a groan.