She suddenly felt safe as the stranger pulled her back against him. “Whoa there,” he murmured by her ear as if soothing a skittish horse.
Kate felt the heat of his breath on her skin before he released her. The cold was there full force again and she quickly reached for the hood of the truck to steady herself. The throb of the engine vibrated under her hand in the warm, damp metal hood.
“You okay?” the stranger asked from somewhere behind her.
“Sure, fine,” she said, and meant it until she realized that both her hands were pressed palms-down on the warm metal—her empty hands. No purse and no pepper spray. “Oh, shoot, my purse and my…” She twisted around and saw the stranger hunkered down in the snow with his back to her. In the bright lights she saw a dark suede jacket pulled taut over broad shoulders and fur at the collar. A huge man.
Her pepper spray was all she had to protect herself. She’d never taken those karate classes she’d promised to take years ago. All she had for self-defense was that little cylinder of spray, and it had flown off into the snow when she fell. She moved toward the man in the snow, frantically looking around in the brilliance of the headlights, but not seeing anything but snow and more snow.
Suddenly the man was standing and saying, “Found it,” and turning around to face her. She knew he had her purse in his hand, but all she could do was stare at the man caught in the brilliance of the headlights. The harshness of the glare cut deep shadows at his eyes and mouth, the hat adding its own shadows, but for a second she was certain she was looking at a rough, unkempt version of Dr. Mackenzie Parish.
No Gucci loafers or Armani suits, but the lines and angles of the face were there the way she remembered from the photos. That frozen moment in time on the tape in James’s office. The same face, but different. There was roughness there now. Then again, maybe snow caused hallucinations. Maybe she’d been staring at his pictures so much on the flight out here that she was imagining it now.
Was she imagining this huge man was the famous, playboy doctor to the stars? She had to be. Those hands, large hands, blunt fingers. Not the fingers of a surgeon. She blinked into the driving snow, and the man moved. The shadows claimed his features again as he pulled his hat brim lower to hold the driving snow at bay. “Here,” he said, coming closer.
Hallucination. It had to be. She took the purse, the chilly dampness of snow all over the suede, and clutched it to her as she turned away from the man. A moment later she was startled by his touching her upper arm to urge her toward the side of the truck. She moved quickly, getting away from the contact, and wondered if she should just go back to her car.
She didn’t turn back. Instead, she slogged through the deepening snow, feeling the coldness go up the legs of her jeans and into the tops of her boots. Finally she got to the passenger side of the large truck, and the man was there, pressing against her back to reach around her, grab the handle and pull the door open.
He didn’t have to tell her to get in. She scrambled up and into the high cab of a very old, very used pickup truck. The plastic seats were cracked, the interior showing more metal then upholstery, but the luxurious wave of warmth from the heater was inviting. She slipped onto the seat and the door slammed shut behind her.
She watched through the windshield as the man walked through the beams of light. Dr. Parish? What a joke. She held her purse tightly to her chest. Nothing about the man matched the doctor. Not the clothes, not the ruggedness, not this truck. Parish’s last car in L.A. had been a Porsche, and not just any Porsche, but a prototype delivered straight from Germany. This truck had to be twenty years old and worth maybe a thousand dollars.
She turned as the driver’s door opened and the man climbed in behind the wheel, then turned and took off his hat. As he dropped it on the seat between them, whatever she’d passed off as a hallucination took on hard reality. She met shadowed eyes under a slash of brows, a strong chin and high cheekbones set in an angular face. Mackenzie Parish? Twenty pounds lighter, appearing older than his pictures, more rugged and weathered, with flecks of gray in hair that was carelessly brushed back without any attempt to style it?
Could she really be sitting next to the man she thought she’d have little to no chance of finding out here? Was this the famous doctor wearing the rough clothes of a stablehand? She tried to reconcile his appearance with the pictures she’d seen, but then the door slammed shut and the light was off before she could do so.
She turned, closing her eyes, but keeping that image in her mind. Almost, she could almost believe it was him. It was the right place, just the wrong circumstances. And far too much of a coincidence that he’d stumble on her in a storm. She exhaled a shaky breath. Far too unbelievable that the “doctor to the stars,” in a storm, in some godforsaken area of Montana, had found her.
Her mind raced. If it was him, she had to be very careful and figure this out before she said or did anything that could jeopardize her assignment. He couldn’t be a twin. There weren’t any relatives. The brother had died. She stared out at the night, instead of at the man a foot away from her. But she was totally aware of everything he did. The shifting on the hard seat, putting the truck in gear, carefully inching to the left and away from her car, which was slowly being covered by the drifting snow.
The logical thing to do was introduce herself. Then he’d introduce himself. Then she’d know. Simple. She braced herself, then turned and looked at him. “I’m Katherine.”
He twisted to look over his shoulder and away from her, then they were on the road and the old truck gained traction, along with some speed. The man didn’t say a thing. Maybe he hadn’t heard her? She cleared her throat and repeated herself. “I’m Katherine, but my friends call me Kate.”
His only response was an abrupt question. “What are you doing here?” He looked straight ahead as he spoke.
She blinked at his profile, and it never occurred to her to tell him the truth, that she was here looking for a man who looked remarkably like him. She’d thought about what to say, what her cover would be, and she went with the story she’d thought up on the plane. “I was going to go to Shadow Ridge, and I thought—”
“You’re hell and gone from Shadow Ridge,” he said. “You’re more than a little lost.”
She’d been going to say that she was going to Bliss to spend some time alone before heading out to the ski resort. People in a small town wouldn’t doubt that someone from the city would want to get away for a bit, to take a breather. But he’d made that part of the lie unnecessary. He thought she was lost. So she’d be lost. “I asked the man at the car rental at the airport for directions.” That was the truth, but the directions were for Bliss, not for the ski resort east of here.
“You should get your money back,” he muttered.
“I must have taken the wrong turn after I left the airport.”
That did make him cast a quick, shadowy glance her way, and for a minute she saw the man in the pictures. The softness of the dash lights hid the deeper lines on his face, the tightness in his mouth and eyes. Soft shadows etched the almost movie-star-handsome features, and in that moment she was stuck hard by the same innate sexiness she’d noticed in the freeze frame on the video. In a closed truck cab, that look was more disturbing than she’d imagined it would be. She’d found Mackenzie Parish, and judging from what she’d seen so far, there was plenty to write about him.
“You didn’t even make a turn,” he said, the image gone as he looked back to the road.
Her heart was racing. Luck was ninety percent of life, she’d always been told, and she’d just had a stroke of luck. Dumb, stupid luck, but she’d take it any day. “I guess I didn’t,” she said, trying to think of something to keep him talking so she could ask questions. “You live in Bliss?”
“No.”
A