Wolfe Wedding (6 page)

Love?

Remaining perfectly still, he examined the word that immediately sprang into his head.

Love?

He rolled the word around in his mind. He had been in love before, years ago. Yet it hadn’t felt anything near like what he had experienced these past days with Sandra. Never before had he experienced the roller coaster of sensations and emotions he had felt simply from being with her. Over the past week, his feelings had run the gamut, from the highs of euphoria, possessiveness, protectiveness and happiness, to the lows of anger, anxiety, frustration and hopelessness miring him now.

But did those varied and confusing sensations and emotions equate to love…or were they the natural response to an appreciation of really great sex?

God. Cameron was developing a headache. All this probing of his psyche was getting to him.

And none of his internal dialogue had so much as touched on the cause of his present dilemma, that of his need to get Sandra out of the cabin and harm’s way.

He sighed and raked a hand through his hair. She had stated adamantly that she would not budge. Furthermore, she had sounded as if she meant it. He was fresh out of ideas as to how to go about convincing her to leave, short of tossing her over his shoulder and physically removing her from the place.

Yeah. Right.

A grim smile played over his lips as he imagined himself playing Tarzan to her Jane.

Although it held sensuous appeal, he knew he could scratch that particular fancy.

Shaking his head in despair at his dearth of ideas, Cameron retraced his steps into the kitchen to set the half-full can of beer in the sink.

It was only then, standing so close to the window above the sink, that he became aware of the wind picking up speed, and what was now mostly sleet sweeping across the deck and against the pane.

Oh, hell. What was he racking his brain for? he thought irritably. From the sound of the wind and sleet, they were going to be iced in and unable to go anywhere, anyway. Might as well try to get some sleep.

Cameron did try. He just didn’t succeed too well. The couch wasn’t long enough for his tall frame, and the cushions suddenly felt lumpy. Besides, Sandra wasn’t curled up next to him. And, in addition to the physical discomforts, the concept of
love, romantic love, the forever-after concept of love, persisted in dancing around the fringes of his mind, tormenting him with the hopelessness of a man like him, already made wary of females, falling for a blazing feminist like Sandra.

How was a man to sleep under those conditions?

Had she reacted immaturely?

The question loomed ever larger throughout the dark hours in Sandra’s alert consciousness.

When it first slithered into her head, she had made a snorting sound of rejection, then flipped from one side to the other in the seemingly tooroomy bed.

But the inner probe proved impervious to rejection, continuing its stabbing forays into her attention.

By somewhere around two-thirty or three, Sandra gave up evasive tactics. Flopping onto her back, she stared into middle distance, as if expecting an answer to magically materialize, written in bold letters against the darkness by a fiery finger of illumination.

And, to a certain extent, her expectations were realized. Dawn came to Sandra’s consciousness hours before it grayed the eastern horizon.

Heaving a tired sigh, she bravely faced the truth: Of course she had reacted immaturely, simply because
she had reacted emotionally instead of intellectually.

Women in love were known to do that occasionally—or so Sandra had always heard.

It was a bit of a shock. Sandra had never considered herself one of the typically portrayed helplessly emotion-driven females.

Love did really strange things to people—Sandra had heard that maxim more than once, as well.

And here she was, flat on her back in bed, staring into the darkness of the predawn house, vigorously engaged in an argument with herself.

Strange indeed.

The really hard-to-take part was, she was losing the damn argument!

Having always judged herself a thoughtful and rational being, capable of stepping around emotions to examine the cold, hard facts, both in her private and professional life, Sandra now felt challenged to live up to her own intellectual capabilities.

So then, had she reacted immaturely to Cameron’s marching orders?

Of course she had.

Once she’d admitted the obvious, the emotional trigger was easily identified. In point of fact, Sandra acknowledged, she loved Cameron more than she valued her own physical safety and well-being.

But, naturally, she couldn’t tell him that, Sandra realized with a sinking sensation. She very much feared that, should Cameron sense even a hint of her true feelings for him, he’d back away in an instant. He hadn’t been tagged the Lone Wolfe by his contemporaries without reason. In a nutshell, despite the occasional indulgence of the senses, he preferred being alone.

By the time a weak and sickly light had somewhat brightened the room, Sandra had resolved her inner conflict. In essence, she would continue as she had begun, even if that meant maintaining to Cameron what he perceived as her position of immaturity and feminist militancy.

Resigned to the role, she pushed back the covers and dragged her tired body from the bed. She had little choice but to maintain her position, she reasoned. Because there was no way in hell she’d allow him to remove her to a safe place, then return to face the danger alone—even though he was trained and paid to do precisely that. Besides, there would very likely be the nearest thing to a platoon of law officers swarming around the cabin.

A woman’s got to do what a woman’s got to do. A wry smile flickered over her lips as Sandra repeated the catchphrase to herself.

Her smile fading, she pulled on her robe and pulled tight the belt around her waist, literally
girding herself to approach the Lone Wolfe in the living room.

He wasn’t there. Sandra found Cameron in the kitchen, sitting at the table, hunched over the cup of steaming coffee cradled in his hands.

“Good morning,” she said, wincing at the tone she had deliberately hardened to conceal her trepidation.

“Oh, you’re speaking to me again,” he muttered, glancing up at her without raising his head. “You can afford to be gracious, I suppose, now that the weather has settled the issue of contention between us.”

Weather? Sandra frowned and moved to gaze out the window above the sink.

“Oh!” she exclaimed in a surprised murmur.

The scene beyond the pane was again one of a winter wonderland, every surface locked in ice, glittering in the pale light of morning.

“Yeah,” he said disgustedly. “Even if you agreed to go, I couldn’t take you down that road. The Jeep’s great in snow, but it don’t do diddly on ice.”

“But then.” Sandra swung around to look at him. “It works both ways, doesn’t it?”

It was Cameron’s turn to frown; he produced more of a beetle-browed scowl.

She rushed on. “I mean it stands to reason that if you can’t get down the road, then that man, that criminal, can’t get up the road, either.” She fought
to keep the note of triumph from her voice; she didn’t quite succeed. “Isn’t that right?”

“Sure,” he readily agreed. Then he delivered the pinprick that burst her balloon. “That is, of course, unless he is already up here.”

Sandra grimaced; she hadn’t thought of that.

T
he day dragged even more than the previous night, and was fraught with tension.

Cameron was moody and mostly silent, deflecting her few innocuous remarks with growled monosyllables, which in turn sparked a fire of anger and discontent inside Sandra.

At regular, almost predictable intervals, he prowled to the window to glare out at the road, as if willing the ice to melt from the heat of his angry stare.

Not only did the ice not melt, but by late afternoon the temperature had plummeted, ensuring
that the frigid conditions would last through the coming night and into the morning.

And throughout the day, whenever a branch creaked from the weight of the ice, or a window rattled from the gusty wind, he went stock-still and alert, eyes narrowed, muscles taut, as if readying for action.

In those moments, he was more than unnerving; he was flat-out frightening.

While preparing dinner, Sandra surprised herself by suddenly wishing for a warming trend and thaw that would set her free from her confinement inside the cabin, even if it meant being hustled back to Denver.

Being caged with a restless, disgruntled Wolfe was not her idea of a relaxing vacation.

“What are you cooking?”

Though Sandra started, she managed to hold back a yelp of surprise at the unexpected and almost human sound of his voice so close behind her. Composing herself, she slowly turned to look at him.

“Snails and puppy-dog tails?” he went on, in a peacemaking, cajoling tone.

“I’m fresh out of those,” she rejoined dryly. “You’ll have to settle for meat loaf.”

“I love meat loaf.” He gave her a tentative smile; she didn’t return it.

“Most men do.” She turned back to peeling potatoes. “So do I,” she said, leaving him under no illusions that she had chosen the meal to pacify him.

“You’re really ticked, aren’t you?”

“Me? Ticked?” She swung around again, this time brandishing the paring knife. “Why ever would you think that I’d be ticked?”

Eyeing her warily, Cameron took a satisfying step back. “Careful with that thing,” he murmured in warning.

“This thing?” She held the knife aloft, relishing the moment as she examined it, before giving him a droll glance. “Afraid I’ll peel you along with the potatoes?”

“Feel inclined to take a strip off my hide, do you?” Amusement laced his serious voice.

“I feel inclined to tell you to go—”

His beeper sounded, overriding her need to vent her anger and resentment. Frustrated, hating the damn beeper, and pretty close to hating him at the moment, she watched him stride into the living room to where he had left the dratted thing on an end table.

Swinging around, she rinsed the potato, quartered it, placed the pieces in the roast pan with the other chunks of potatoes, carrots, onions and celery arranged around the meat loaf, then shoved the pan into the oven.

When she turned again, Cameron was standing propped against the kitchen wall, his back to her, talking softly into the phone.

More trouble? she wondered, heaving a sigh. Not wishing to appear at all interested, she took off for the bedroom, to shower and change before dinner.

She lingered beneath the shower spray, half believing Cameron might join her there.

He didn’t. Nor did he enter the room while she was dressing. Optimistically hoping his call had been good news—like the information that the escaped criminal had been apprehended, thereby allowing them to resolve their differences, if that was possible, and get on with their vacation, should they still be on speaking terms—Sandra left the bedroom with her fingers crossed.

After one look at Cameron’s face as she entered the kitchen, Sandra uncrossed her fingers. So much for wishful thinking, she chided herself.

“Well?” she asked impatiently, when he was not immediately forthcoming.

“You can’t go back to Denver.”

Perplexed at hearing him state the obvious, Sandra stared at him a moment before replying, “I know, everything’s covered with ice out there.”

“Even if there were no ice, you couldn’t go back.”

“Why not?” she asked, in a reasonable tone that she hoped concealed the impatience gathering speed inside her.

“Whitfield’s back in Denver.” His taciturn response was, for Sandra, as good as no response at all.

“Back from where?” Her brow crinkled in a frown of utter confusion.

“Chicago.”

That terse tidbit of information meant nothing to her; she hadn’t even known Whitfield had left Denver, nor would she have cared if she had known.

“Uh-huh.” Her hard-fought-for reasonable tone lost ground to advancing irritation. “I don’t think we’re connecting here. What, exactly, whether or not he’s in Chicago, does Raymond Whitfield have to do with my returning to Denver?”

Cameron raked a hand through his hair, betraying his own fraying patience. “I think Whitfield was laying down a smoke screen by flying to Chicago.”

Sandra literally threw up her hands. “Well, that explains everything.” Controlling herself with effort, she took a quick breath, and tried again. “Cameron, I haven’t a clue as to what you’re talking about.”
“Whitfield,” he barked. “I put a surveillance team on him. He flew to Chicago last Saturday morning, but now he’s back in Denver.”

“So what?” she asked, more confused than before. “And why in heaven’s name put a surveillance team on him in the first place?”

“Because of the threats he’d made to you, that’s why,” he said, a tone usually reserved for slow learners. A tone, moreover, that she rather resented.

“But that’s ridiculous!” Sandra was barely hanging on to her temper. “I told you I thought Whitfield was only making noises.”

“Oh, yeah?” His blue eyes glittered beneath raised golden brown brows. “Well, you thought wrong.” He indicated the phone with a sharp head movement. “That call was to the operative I’ve got tailing Whitfield. He told me he followed Whitfield from the airport, straight to your apartment.”

Though she managed not to show it, Sandra was a little shaken by the news. “Still, that doesn’t mean he had anything sinister in mind,” she said, unsure whether she was trying to convince him, or herself.

“It wouldn’t, if he had gone about it in a normal way.” Cameron shook his head. “But he didn’t. He sat in his car until it was dark, then he poked around, not only at the front of the complex, but the back, as well. Then he returned to his
car. He was still there, just sitting and watching the place, when the agent beeped me.”

Really shaken, Sandra nevertheless put up a brave front. “That doesn’t prove he means me harm,” she said, hoping she was right, but fearing she wasn’t.

“No, it doesn’t, but—” he smiled in a feral way that raised the short hairs at her nape “—I’m not taking any chances, with either Whitfield or Slim.”

“Slim?” She frowned, having momentarily forgotten the escapee his fellow agents were certain was tracking Cameron. “The criminal?”

“The same.” Cameron paced to the window to peer into the darkness. Grunting, he flipped the switch that activated the trouble lights positioned at either corner of the house. “As soon as this damn ice melts, I’m getting you out of here.”

Sandra had gone to the stove and pulled open the oven door to check their dinner. His flatly voiced statement made her pause as heat poured over her from the open oven. “Getting me out of here?” she repeated in sheer disbelief. “But you just a moment ago told me I can’t go back to Denver.”

He shook his head. “I meant that you can’t go back to your apartment.”

“I don’t want to shock you,” she said with sweet reason, “but my apartment is in Denver.”

“Very funny.” He grimaced. “But you know what I mean. I won’t allow you to stay there alone.
Is there a friend you could stay with for a while? Maybe Barbara?”

“No.” Sandra gave a quick, sharp shake of her head, deciding she had had enough. Allow her, indeed! Who did he think he was, her keeper? “Listen carefully, Cameron,” she said distinctly. “I am not going anywhere. I am staying right here until I’m damn good and ready to leave. Now, have you got that?”

“Dammit, woman!”

“Stuff it, Wolfe,” she retorted, turning to peer into the oven. “And I told you not to call me ‘woman.’“

He was quiet while she spooned broth over the meat and vegetables. Ominously quiet, she thought, surprised that she didn’t detect the scent of brimstone emanating from him. But the only scent assailing her nostrils was the mouth-watering aroma of roasting meat and vegetables wafting from the oven. When she slid the pan back on the rack, then shut the door, he heaved a sigh that held the unmistakable sound of defeat—if only in this round of their ongoing argument.

“How long until dinner is ready?” he asked, changing the subject. He inhaled, drawing in the tantalizing smell. “Do I have time to clean up?”

“Yes,” she replied, striving for a neutral tone, grateful for the cessation of hostilities, however brief. “I figure it’ll be another fifteen, twenty minutes.”
She shrugged. “Besides, it’ll keep in a warm oven. Go have your shower.”

“Right.” Cameron took two steps, then paused to slant a faint but conciliatory smile at her. “How about breaking out the last bottle of cabernet? I think we both could do with a glass with dinner.”

“All right,” she agreed without hesitation, tentatively returning his smile.

He didn’t move for a second, just stood there, staring at her. Then he nodded and strode from the room, leaving her to ponder on what he might be thinking.

Speculation ran swift and rife through her head. All sorts of unpalatable ideas came to mind.

It was now dark, heralding the approach of nighttime—bedtime. Was Cameron perhaps calculating his chances of later sharing the bed with her? Was he, by softening his voice and attitude, not to mention his request for wine, hoping to soften her, undermine her determination to remain steadfast to her principles?

Sandra loved Cameron. Although at this point in their relationship she was not prepared to admit that to him, she accepted it within her own mind and being. But loving did not blind her to the facts. She had been blessed by the sheer circumstance of birth with active intelligence, and expertly educated to dispassionately examine the facts of any matter or situation.

And so, by her very nature, she could not ignore or dismiss what she perceived as the facts in relation to her present circumstances.

The very fact that Sandra was now questioning Cameron’s motives was telling, in and of itself. And what it was telling her was that she harbored grave doubts about placing her trust in him, and her heart with him.

This was a fact that did not bode well for any sort of meaningful relationship between them.

Accepting this fact was difficult for Sandra, perhaps the most difficult thing she had ever had to do. But there was no getting around it—although on a purely emotional level she longed to circumvent it.

No. Shaking her head, as if to free it of the doubts assailing her mind, she moved to busy herself setting the table for dinner.

Her dodging maneuvers were an abject failure; the doubts and questions persisted, stabbing into her mind, and thus her heart, with unrelenting reason.

Sandra had been interested in Cameron in a personal way since the moment she met him. More than interested, if the truth was faced—and in her case, it always was.

There had been between them an instant spark, a sensual recognition, a chemical reaction—whatever. She certainly had felt it; she had believed then,
and believed even more strongly now, that he felt it, too.

It had been there from the first, a male-female thing, shimmering and crackling between them. That she had previously not indulged herself by exploring the intangible something had not altered or negated it. But, though she had not explored it, she had been receptive to every word spoken or murmured about the object of her interest. And the words she had heard over time about Cameron had not been encouraging.

Early on, Sandra had garnered the information that Cameron had been more than merely involved with a woman. That involvement, moreover, had progressed to speculation about an imminent announcement of their engagement. Then, abruptly, the speculation had ceased, replaced by an undercurrent of suggestion that the affair was over and, more to her interest, that Cameron had been left devastated by the perfidy of the woman, who had apparently dumped him for another, richer man.

Cameron had obviously been hurt in the process, and in turn, now she was feeling the pain.

Sandra sighed as she uncorked the wine to let it breathe.

Unbidden, she recalled hearing a scathing comment by a woman, somewhere, to the effect that the handsome and exciting special agent did not in fact
like women, but merely tolerated them when the demands of sexual appetites had to be appeased.

At the time, Sandra had dismissed the remark out of hand as the nasty barb of a frustrated woman.

Now she wondered. And the very fact that she did so said much about her state of mind.

She had now spent over a week in Cameron’s company. Day in, day out, to the exclusion of everything and everyone else, and at no time had she discerned so much as a hint indicating disdain for the opposite sex.

Quite the contrary. He had proved to be excellent and entertaining company, fun to be with, laugh with, make love with. especially to make love with.

But, of course, that was precisely what he had promised, wasn’t it? Sandra reminded herself. Great sex. A sensual sabbatical.

And he had delivered, above and beyond the call, beyond her wildest imaginings.

Until the call to duty had intruded, dousing the fire of sensuality with the blanket of cold reality. And now it was over. She was in the way.

But there was still tonight to get through. And Cameron appeared prepared—no, eager—to suspend reality for one more night of sensual heat.

Sandra stared at the ruby red wine in the bottle, sniffed the intoxicating scent.

Did she want to play along, close her mind to the hopelessness of the situation, lose herself in the allure of his mouth, his touch, his possession?

Yes. Sandra wanted this night with him, more than she had ever before wanted anything.