Always Valentine's Day. Kristin Hardy
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sheet of ice.”
“I guess I’ll just have to keep an eye on you.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Trust me, it won’t be a hardship,” Carter assured her. “Keeping an eye on you will be the easiest day’s work I’ve ever done.”
Molly blinked. “Oh. Well.” The pink that crept over her cheeks had nothing to do with cold. Flustered, she turned to the steep peaks that rose behind city.
“How do you like Alaska?” Carter asked, amused.
“Gorgeous,” she said. “It’s even more beautiful than home, and I never thought I’d say that.”
“Where’s home?” “Vermont.” “Well, how about that? I’m from your neck of the woods.”
“Really? Where?” She pulled out a pair of sunglasses.
He rubbed his chin. “Manhattan.”
“I’m not sure that qualifies as my neck of the woods,” she said, sliding the glasses on.
“Are you kidding? It’s the Northeast. We’re practically neighbors.”
Her lips twitched. “I see. Well, next time you need a cup of sugar, feel free to stop by.”
“I’ll do that. So is anybody else coming?”
“Christopher should be along in just a minute.”
Christopher, Larkin thought, gritting her teeth. Of course.
“What about the rest?” Carter asked.
“Gabriel and Jacob and their families just left to go dogsledding. The kids have been talking about it for weeks. Lainie and J.J. decided to do the zip line.”
“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