seen her in her field clothes: holey jeans, a turtleneck and the moth-eaten cardigan that had been her father’s favorite when he was alive. She twisted her two-carat diamond engagement ring inside her glove, imagining Crocker’s shock and her mother’s disapproval.
There was a whole side of her, come to think of it, that Crocker knew nothing about. They were to be married in New York in the summer. A big, traditional affair. Mother had it all planned, down to the last white rose and swath of expensive silk. Lauren supposed she should be grateful. Her commitment to her career left no time for such details.
Besides, Mother was wild about Crocker. Who wouldn’t be? As VP of finance for Tiger Petroleum, he was quite a catch, and one of the most respected oil company executives in the industry. Everyone liked him.
She was sorry, now, that they’d argued that morning. Crocker hadn’t wanted her to take on the Caribou Island assignment herself. He said he didn’t like the idea of her spending two weeks in close quarters with eighty guys—the type of men her mother called “oil field trash.”
Lauren had dismissed his concerns. The way she saw it, she had no choice. Caribou Island was one of her projects. Besides, the operation had been plagued with nothing but setbacks from the start. All the more reason for her to be on site herself.
“Roger that,” the pilot yelled into his communications headset.
She looked at him, her brows raised in question.
“It’s for you. Here.” He ripped the headset off and handed it to her.
“Me?” Who on earth was calling her out here? If it was Mother, Lauren would have a fit. She didn’t have time to discuss things like who was taking whom to Crocker’s birthday bash at the Fairmont next month, or what she was expected to wear to the latest charity ball.
Lauren’s life had changed radically after her father died and her mother remarried into the wealthy Fotheringay family. Mother had insisted her new husband legally adopt Lauren, so she might enjoy all the privileges associated with carrying the Fotheringay name. Sometimes Lauren wondered if her life had changed too radically.
Exhaling in exasperation, she pushed her hood back and slipped one of the earphones under the flannel lining of her hard hat. “Hello?”
“Hey, babe,” the choppy voice came back.
“Crocker!”
“Just checking on—” Static ripped the end off his sentence.
“Crocker, you’re cutting out.”
“—that everything’s okay.” His voice sounded a million miles away. Still, she’d know it anywhere.
“Everything’s fine, Crocker. Well, except for the weather.” She glanced out the window at the dry snow blowing across the ice. What little light there had been was now obliterated by the onslaught. She could barely see a dozen yards ahead of the chopper.
“Be careful out there, babe.”
“I will. And I’m sorry about this morning.”
“Me, too. It was my fault. Don’t give it another thought. Oh, and have Salvio call me on the satellite uplink as soon as you get there. Phones must be out. I want to—”
Another blast of static cut short his explanation. A deafening gust of wind blew the chopper sideways, and the connection was lost.
She handed the headset back to the pilot. “Guess we’re out of range.”
“Nope. It’s the weather. Damned dangerous to be flying. I’m droppin’ you and I’m outta here.”
“Okay.” She grabbed her duffel bag from the bench seat behind them, fighting a smile.
Crocker was likely going to ask Jack Salvio, Tiger’s “company man” overseeing the Caribou Island operation, to keep an eye on her. Make sure she didn’t run into any snags. Sweet of him, really. Crocker knew she was burned out and growing more and more disillusioned with the whole corporate scene.
Sometimes she wondered why she wanted the promotion at all. She’d even gone so far as to suggest that after they were married they stay in Anchorage instead of moving back to San Francisco like he wanted them to.
Crocker had not been very receptive to the idea, so she hadn’t even broached the subject of her leaving Tiger and the oil business altogether to do something more meaningful with her life. Like teaching, maybe. She could teach earth science to elementary school kids, just like her father had always wanted to do, but never did because of her mother’s objection.
She supposed it was a silly dream. And not at all in keeping with the ambitious edge that was her trademark. Oh, well. Maybe in the next lifetime.
She should make a point to spend more time with Crocker once this assignment was over. Between their two careers and his philanthropic commitments, they hardly had time to see each other. Crocker said all that would change once they were married, but she wasn’t so sure it was even possible given their manic schedules.
When it came right down to it, she wasn’t sure if they even had that much in common outside their jobs. Crocker had convinced her to push their wedding date up nearly a year. Lauren had wanted more time to get to know him, to make sure they were really meant for each other, but Crocker was insistent. He loved her, needed her, he’d said.
And she loved him, too. Didn’t she?
“There she is.” The pilot pointed a gloved finger to the north. Well, she guessed it was north, but couldn’t tell anymore with the blowing snow. “Altex rig 13-E. What a hunk a junk.”
Harsh sodium lights lit the site, bathing the island in a ghostly glow. Lauren’s lips thinned into a hard line as the rusted orange paint of the steel walls housing the tired-looking drilling rig came into view just ahead.
Nothing had changed in the three years since she’d seen it. The last field operation she’d worked had been on that very rig. Against her will, her eyes glassed. She swiped at the tears with a gloved hand.
“Still gets to you, don’t it?” The pilot shot her a compassionate look as he slowed the chopper into a wide arc skirting the site.
She focused on the line of beat-up Suburbans, their engines running to keep from freezing, in front of the prefab buildings that made up the camp. Ninety-foot stands of drilling pipe hung in the oil rig’s derrick, swaying in the near gale force wind. “Yes,” she said. “A little.”
Her father had been killed on 13-E when she was only eleven. He was a geologist just like her, working for a big oil company just like she did. But their reasons were different. He’d done it for the money. Her mother had nagged him incessantly about it. She remembered Mother’s tirades each time her father had talked about giving it up to teach.
Though the work was dangerous and the conditions harsh, there had been only a handful of serious drilling accidents in the few decades since Alaska’s North Slope oil fields were developed. It was a small, tightly knit community. Everyone knew about Hatch Parker and what had happened on 13-E. And everyone knew Lauren was his daughter.
“You’re sure, now?” The pilot set the chopper down smooth as glass on an ice pad built fifty yards from the camp. “Last time
