Always Valentine's Day

“Just what the heck is a zip line, anyway? Larkin’s pushing me to do it.”

Molly patted his arm. “Better not to ask,” she advised.

“Is this something I should know about?”

“Probably best that you don’t.”

He glanced suspiciously at Larkin, who gave him her most innocent look. “It’s a sad day when you find out that you can’t trust your own child.”

“She didn’t say you wouldn’t have fun,” Larkin pointed out.

Carter glanced over to the transportation apron where the excursion buses were lined up, then turned back to Larkin. “There’s supposed to be a van here to take us to the airstrip. We’ll go find it and check in with the driver. You wait for Christopher. We should be down at the far end, past all the buses.” He held out his arm for Molly. “So tell me what you do with yourself all day up in Vermont.”

Larkin watched them walk off and resisted the urge to sigh. If Carter wanted to have a shipboard romance, he would. Being an adult was about learning to release what you couldn’t control, and she couldn’t control Carter any more than she could the tides. If he was set on pursuing Molly Trask, Larkin had no business trying to dissuade him.

Christopher Trask, now, she definitely had business with him.

She’d spent a long, sleepless night being rocked by the motion of the ship while she imagined wreaking detailed vengeance on him. The death by paper cuts scenario had pleased her most. Unfortunately, no matter how furious she was with him, down beneath it all the wanting still thrummed. And it was for that that she cursed him most of all. He’d made her yearn, taken her to surrender, and they both knew it.

And despite it all, she still wanted him.

Where was a voodoo doll when you needed one, Larkin wondered, jamming her hands in her pockets. Even something to throw would make her feel better. Especially if it was at Christopher Trask’s head.

She pulled out her BlackBerry to check messages.

It was a testament to the depth of her hostility that she knew, somehow, when he was approaching. Definitely hostility, for all that it felt like a buzz of anticipation. She turned back toward the Alaskan Voyager.

It was that easy stride that gave him away. He walked with the relaxed, confident self-possession of an athlete. He wore a leather bomber jacket over jeans and a thick cream-colored fisherman’s sweater. A navy-blue watch cap sat atop his head. When he saw her, he gave that killer smile. Larkin found herself responding reflexively before she could remind herself that she hated him.

“Hey,” he said as he stopped before her. “Where’s everybody else?”

“Carter and Molly went to look for the van.” She stood there with her arms crossed before her, shoulders square and stiff. “They told me to wait for you. Lucky me.”

His smile was very wide. “No. Lucky me.”

She was seriously ticked, Christopher thought. Every movement of her body shouted it. Fair enough. He’d been pretty ticked off himself. The clash of wills had drawn blood—and heated it—on both sides. The question was, what happened next?

She stood in her long black coat and jeans, along with one of those round white fur hats that made her look like some expatriate czarina. Silver teardrops swung at her ears. The wind tossed around the honey-gold strands of her hair and brought out a flush of cold in her cheeks. And maybe the sparkle in her eyes was at the thought of telling him to go to the devil, but he’d take it as long as she kept looking like that.

Anyway, he was betting he could talk her out of being mad.

“So this is Juneau, huh?”

“Feel free to stick around and explore,” she said. “We’ll just head on out to the airfield.”

“No way, we’ve got glaciers to see. Where’s the bus?”

“Down near the end, Carter said.” She started walking without looking to see that he followed. He saw her smother a yawn.

“How did you sleep?” he asked.

She shot him a venomous look. “Never better. And you?”

“I kind of liked it.” Even if it had taken him a couple of hours to drift off. “Sort of like sleeping in a hammock, with all that swaying. And then I wake up and there’s someone knocking on the door and bringing me coffee. I mean, what’s not to like?”

“I’m sure if you went back to your cabin right now, someone would bring you coffee again. Why don’t you go on board and find out?”

“I’d say nice try, but that wasn’t even a very good one. What are you pissed off about,” he added, “that I kissed you last night or that you liked it?”

“Does the caveman routine usually work for you?” she asked pleasantly.

“It’s not my usual MO, but I figured you deserved something special.”

“Pardon me for not appreciating it.”

“You wanted a demonstration. I figured the least I could do was oblige.” And it hadn’t been a hardship he thought, watching her now and remembering the scent of her skin. Walking away when she’d been heated and avid against him had been one of the hardest things he’d ever done. And she remembered it, too. He saw those green eyes darken before she shook her head and turned away.

“I don’t know why I’m even bothering talking to you,” she muttered.

“Because it’s a gorgeous morning. We’re in an incredible place. You’re too smart to spend the day pouting.”

“I don’t pout,” she returned in outrage.

“My mistake,” he said. “Isn’t that the van?” He pointed toward the minibus where Carter and Molly waited, already inside.

At the airstrip, they pulled up to an unprepossessing vinyl-sided building with a green sign that said Taku Glacier Excursions. As soon as the minibus doors opened, a staffer who looked like she was fourteen—if she was lucky—stepped on board. “Hi, everyone,” she said as they rose. “I’m Amy.”

Carter rose. “I’m Carter Hayes, the one who rented the plane. We’ve brought along a couple more people than we were planning, but it shouldn’t be an issue. There’s room.”

“Actually,” she shifted uncomfortably, “we’ve sort of got a problem.”

“We?” Carter repeated. “What kind of problem do we have?”

“Uh, the plane’s not here.”

Carter’s brows lowered a fraction. “I had my assistant pay for it a month ago. What do you mean it’s not here?”

The girl coughed. “A couple of climbers got lost on Denali. There’s a big search under way, and the, uh, plane that was supposed to take you to the glaciers is part of it. We’ve got a substitute, though,” she rushed to add. “A local ’copter pilot, Buck Matthews, is going to take you up.”

Buck Matthews, Larkin thought, looking out on the pads where the helicopters crouched like metal and Plexiglas dragonflies. Perfect. “Dad, maybe we ought to skip it.”

“I think you’ll really like the helicopter,” Amy told her. “It’s better than the plane because you can hover over anything you want to see. And Buck’s been flying for years. He really knows the area. Oh—” she paused “—you don’t have any problems with animals, right?” Puzzled, they shook their heads and Amy exhaled in relief. “Great, let’s get you into some glacier boots, and then you can follow me out to the helicopter pad.”

The boots were black and puffy and slipped over their regular shoes. Larkin sensed rather than heard Christopher sit on the bench beside her as she strapped hers on.

“It’s a good look for you,” he said. “Very stylish.”

She scowled at him and rose to follow Amy out to the helicopter pad.