at the back of the bus, she studied his profile and wondered if she’d been wrong to dismiss him as merely a player.
HAGAN STARED STRAIGHT ahead as the bus made its way up the mountain road to the resort. He was glad the crowd had separated him from Maddie. He needed the distance. Standing in the cold with her just now, watching the play of emotion on her face, he had been surprised by how much he wanted to kiss her.
He had kissed a lot of women in the past few years, slept with almost as many. The experiences had been pleasurable pastimes, things he had wanted to do. But never had he felt the need to reach out to someone that he felt with Maddie.
The idea disturbed him. He was not a man who needed other people. He enjoyed being with friends, and he liked the women he dated, but he didn’t depend on them to make him happy. Investing too much of oneself in another person was a sure road to disappointment.
He got off the bus at the first stop and walked past rows of condos to the parking lot where he kept his truck. From there it was another five miles up winding roads to his cabin on forest service land. It was a rustic two-room affair originally designed as a summer retreat, but he had added a woodstove and insulation, a king-size bed and new appliances, turning it into comfortable bachelor quarters.
He shoved open the door he seldom bothered to lock and was greeted by a fat gray striped tomcat, who wove around his ankles and demanded supper in a loud voice. “Hush,” Hagan said with no malice in his voice. The cat, dubbed Fafner after a dragon in Norse legend, had showed up two years ago and refused to leave.
Hagan opened a can of the gourmet food the feline preferred, then turned on the computer that sat on a fold-down desk in one corner of the main room. A galley kitchen and a loft bedroom and bath completed the living quarters. He added wood to the stove and shed his coat, then poured a beer, made a plate of cheese, sausage and crackers and carried them to the desk.
Moments later, he was engrossed in the software program he had been tinkering with. Occupying his free time with software design was a holdover from his previous life. But where once it had been his passion, now it was merely a hobby no one knew about. A thing he did only for himself.
When he was satisfied he could do no more with the program for now, he sat back and sipped the beer and studied the cabin. Over the door was a pair of old-fashioned wooden skis, the kind they had still used when he was a boy, skiing to school in Fredrikstad. On a shelf by the stove was a Norwegian ceramic stein his sister had sent him two Christmases ago.
He liked this place. It was his alone, a sanctuary where his friends seldom visited and he never brought women. It was orderly and comfortable, like his life. He had work he enjoyed, and though he was not prosperous financially, he had savings put away. He had good friends in town and never had to sleep alone unless he wanted to. He was satisfied.
But lately he had been restless. When Maddie had left the Eldo this evening, he had been ready to depart himself. He had decided to call the number on the slip of paper Julie had handed him that afternoon to see how she was doing. Maybe offer to stop by her place and bring a bottle of wine.
Instead he had found himself distracted by this newcomer to town, this graceful, intense young woman who fairly burned with some unnamed anger and passion. He was drawn to her, curious and more than a little wary.
Something about Maddie Alexander affected him in a way no woman had in a long time. He did not necessarily like it, but he wanted to understand it. If he could figure out why she made him feel this way, he would know better how to handle it—and better how to avoid allowing this fascination with her to turn into something more.
Chapter Three
Maddie woke the next morning to temperatures near zero and snow coming down hard. The kind of conditions when races would have been canceled and she would have been able to stay in bed and sleep the day away. But ski patrollers didn’t have that luxury, and she was on duty this morning. As she padded about the kitchen making coffee, she looked with envy at Andrea’s closed door. Her roommate was off today. Too bad the two of them couldn’t trade places.
At least she wasn’t on the avalanche control team. Those guys were on the mountain at dawn, setting off charges to loosen unstable deposits of snow. Of course, they were all adrenaline junkies who relished the opportunity to legally play with explosives. Testosterone in action.
At the patrol shack near the top of the Silver Queen lift, she checked the duty roster. “Shouldn’t be much happening today,” Scott said, coming up behind her. “It’s a weekday, and the weather is keeping in everyone but the hard-core skiers, boarders and vacationers determined to get every last dollar’s worth from their passes. Main thing is to watch for people getting in over their heads.”
“We should have good skiing with all this fresh powder.”
At the sound of the familiar accent, she turned and saw Hagan filling the doorway of the shack. “I am heading over to Peel.” He nodded to Maddie. “Will you come with me?”
Peel was a lift-served run in the extreme terrain on the front side of the resort. She’d toured the area during her orientation, but had avoided it after that. “That’s okay,” she said. “Find someone else.”
“I do not want to go with anyone else,” he said. His blue eyes offered a silent challenge. “Is it the terrain you do not like—or me?”
After their conversation last night, she could no longer claim to dislike the man. He unsettled her, intrigued her and sometimes surprised her, but she also trusted his skill as a patroller. He was one of the senior members of the team, a man others called upon in the toughest situations. If she was going to venture onto extreme runs, he was the person to do it with. And hadn’t he said last night people could overcome their fears by facing them? It was one of the things she’d joined patrol to do. And it wasn’t as if she hadn’t skied worse in her years on the racing circuit.
“All right,” she said. “I’ll go with you.”
“Be careful,” Scott said. “It’s really nasty out there.”
Wind-driven snow hit them like needles when they stepped out of the patrol shack. Maddie ducked her head and zipped her parka to her chin. Any sane person would be sitting in front of a fire with a cup of hot cocoa now instead of outside on a pair of skis.
“It will be better when we get down in the trees,” Hagan called over the howling wind.
She nodded and followed him down a narrow run between the trees. As promised the wind was blocked here. The heavy dump of snow had buried all the rocks and snags visible the day before and transformed the run into a gentle roller coaster. Maddie relaxed. This wasn’t so bad after all. And they had the run all to themselves.
But as soon as they left the shelter of the trees, they hit whiteout conditions again. Sky merged with ground and it was difficult to tell up from down. Maddie slowed, and fought stomach-churning vertigo. She reminded herself of all the techniques for overcoming this phenomena—bend her knees more, ski close to the trees, focus on landmarks—in this case the back of Hagan’s red patrol jacket barely visible ahead in the swirling snow.
They skied over to the high lift and grabbed hold of the T-bar. They were alone up here today, with the exception of the bored attendant in the lift shack. The normally busy runs were deserted; they might have been the only skiers on the mountain. Ordinarily she’d love the solitude and the chance to fly through the powder. But right now her muscles were rigid with the effort to keep her thoughts focused and
