Born to Be Wild Page 7

  Dara placed her sneakered foot on the running board and hiked herself up into the cab of Zach’s truck. George Thorogood blared from the speakers.

  “Born to be wild and bad to the bone.” She shot him a tentative look. “How appropriate.”

  Zach turned the volume down to a level that wouldn’t damage their hearing, pulled a U-turn in the middle of her quiet neighborhood street and headed back out to the main highway.

  “Nice house,” he commented once they were heading west on Route 50. “When did you buy it?”

  Dara smiled at his automatic assumption that she wasn’t a renter. “About four years ago. I shared a condo in Fairfax while I was in college.” She paused, not sure how much she wanted him to know. It was obvious Dane had never spoken of that time in her life to Zach. “Eventually I bought out the other half,” she went on carefully. “I liked the place and hadn’t really planned on moving. But mortgage rates dropped and resale values finally went up, so …”

  “A sound investment.”

  Dara glanced over at him, unsure if he’d meant that as a jab. “So, you never got a place of your own?” He darted her a quick look. The shadowed memories fled as she smiled sweetly. She could still parry with the best.

  He didn’t seem the least embarrassed. “Well, you probably remember that my folks were a bit older than most. Dad’s asthma and Mom’s arthritis sort of hit an all-time low when I was in college. They decided to retire to New Mexico right after I graduated, so I took over the house.”

  “Dane never really said much.” She didn’t say that she’d spent a good part of that time of her life sitting beside a bed in the intensive care unit of the hospital, wondering how life could be so incredibly unfair, for once not too interested in what was happening in her brother’s life. She forced the memories back into their dark corner. “How are they doing?”

  “Better than ever,” he said. “Mom finally edged Dad out of the top three at the golf club.” He glanced over at her briefly. “They started letting her play with the men when she beat the club pro. The ex-club pro.”

  Dara laughed. “Now I know which half of the gene pool you came from.”

  His laughter joined hers. “Yep. And damn proud of it. How about you? Your mom and stepdad still living in North Carolina?”

  “Yes. Retired life seems to suit them. Mom is heavily involved in community projects, and Stan seems content to putter around the house and garage.” Yes, her mother was truly content. And who wouldn’t be with a man like Stan? Dependable, always around when you needed him. The riskiest thing he did was to climb onto the roof once a year to put up Christmas lights.

  “Another dream come true,” Zach commented.

  Dara stared out the window, past the fields to the blue-purple shadow of the mountains on the horizon. “Yeah,” she said after a moment. “I guess you could say that.” Her thoughts skipped past the endless heartbreaking cases she dealt with on a regular basis and returned again to that hospital ward. And all those dreams she’d watched die, day after day, including hers and Daniel’s.

  The bump of the tires over gravel brought her head up and thankfully gave her something else to think about. They had pulled off into the parking lot of an old boarded-up gas station. “Why are we stopping?”

  “We’re here.” Before she could question him, he’d switched off the ignition and hopped out of the truck. Seconds later her door swung wide and Zach held out his arms to her. She reached for his hands. He reached for her hips, and he lifted her down.

  He captured her mouth for a quick, hard kiss just as her feet touched the ground. He was gone, moving to the back of the truck before she could call him on it.

  She knew she should put a stop to that sort of hit-and-run behavior right from the start. But she let it go for now as she followed him. What the hell, it was just a kiss.

  Zach chose that moment to wink at her. Bad to the bone.

  And what bones they were. She stifled a sigh. Just a simple kiss, huh?

  He lifted a huge cooler from the back, his muscles rippling and bunching with the effort.

  “Call me crazy,” she said a moment later, resisting the urge to fan her skin, “but I don’t think camping in a parking lot under the shade of the ol’ diesel pump is exactly what the kids had in mind.”

  Zach started across the lot, the cooler bouncing against his thighs.

  “Oh, ye of little faith,” he said.

  Dara followed him as he neared the side of the dilapidated building. She stumbled to a dead halt after rounding the corner. In an overgrown field was a large rainbow-colored hot-air balloon.

  As if sensing she was no longer behind him, Zach turned back to her. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” When she didn’t answer, he closed the remaining distance between them. “You don’t have a thing about heights, do you?”

  She finally pulled her gaze away and looked at him. “Heights? Me?” She looked at the balloon again, then back at him. “Nah.” Her attention returned to the balloon. “Ferris wheels, roller coasters, tall ladders, piece of cake.” Flying, on the other hand, scares me silly.

  “Great. Come on, I want to introduce you to a few of my crew. They’ll be part of the trip.”

  That managed to get her attention. Visions of making herself actually climb into that tiny basket were put mercifully aside for a moment. “Which trip? Today, you mean?”

  “No, today they’re just doing the setup, the tracking and the takedown at the end. I mean, the camping trip. These are the guys I’ll use.” At her frown, he smiled. “If you approve of the trip, Ms. Colbourne, ma’am,” he added.

  She couldn’t stifle the smile at his obeisant tone and slight bow. Zach was a man who bowed only to the direction of the wind and the ebb and flow of the tide.

  And, she thought with a private thrill, for the next week or so anyway, to her.

  “Shall we?” He nodded in the direction of the hot-air balloon.

  Her smug feeling vanished. She needed to tell him she couldn’t go up in that thing, and she needed to do it now, when she’d only humiliate herself in front of him and not half his crew as well. “I’m right behind you,” she heard herself say instead.

  She waded through the wake he created in the hip-high grass, trying to ignore the melancholy feeling that accompanied this most recent reminder of just how incompatible they were. It went beyond his day-at-a-time attitude and her need for long-term responsibility, beyond his endless search for the ultimate thrill and her need to establish stability.

  Oh, what the hell, she thought in disgust. If she got any more involved with him, fear of losing life or limb would probably keep her from going on half the dates he’d plan anyway, so worrying about the big picture was probably premature.

  A young blond man met them about ten yards from one of the thick ropes anchoring down the balloon. “Hi, I’m Scotty!” He took the cooler from Zach and flashed her a smile that would have put the entire Osmond clan to shame. “You must be Dara,” he said, putting the cooler down long enough to give her a brisk handshake.

  Scotty’s exuberance was a tangible thing—probably the result of an overdeveloped adrenal gland—but contagious nonetheless.

  Dara grinned and nodded. “Hi. Pleased to meet you.”

  “Stow that in the gondola, would you, Scott?” Zach asked, gesturing to the cooler.

  “Sure thing, boss.”

  Scotty loped away, and Zach put his arm lightly around her shoulders, steering her toward the Jeep parked near the balloon. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to the guys.”

  Dara’s feet remained rooted to the spot. As far as she knew, vertigo usually occurred looking down from a high place. Which did little to explain why she had a sudden wave of dizziness when she took in the full scope of the hot-air balloon. Her gaze lowered slowly over the massive billowing cloud of rainbow stripes and landed with a mental thud on the tiny wicker basket that dangled below it.

  “Uh, Zach, there’s something we have to talk about.”

  �
��If it’s about having the crew ready before I asked—”

  He started forward as he spoke, and Dara had to duck out from under his arm to keep from being literally dragged along. He swung around to face her, his confused expression blessedly distracting her from the flying thimble.

  “Dart?” He closed the distance between them until her line of vision was filled with his chest. “What’s up?” He lifted her face to his with a finger under her chin. “Are you worried about spending time alone with me? Is that it?”

  That he seemed so honestly concerned with how she felt about him didn’t help her case. She tried for a cocky smile. “Well, an hour or two with you in an overgrown picnic basket could give new meaning to the words ‘captive audience.’ ”

  He leered suggestively at her, but the expression quickly faded to a warm, gentle smile that made her want to retally their incompatibilities.

  “The appeal there is enormous, but I get the feeling this isn’t about playing footsie at five thousand feet.” He let his thumb drift over her bottom lip. “What’s really wrong?”

  Five thousand feet? She swallowed. Hard.

  “I didn’t lie about being able to handle amusement park rides and the occasional tall ladder.” She pulled back from his touch and looked down for a second. “Anything attached to the ground is no problem. Flying on the other hand …” she added sheepishly.

  She could feel the heat in her cheeks and hated it. She felt as if they were back on the playground and she’d just been forced to admit defeat to him. What was worse was the compulsion to turn and run for the truck. She took only minor satisfaction in conquering it.

  “Is it because of your dad?” he asked gently.

  She studied the individual blades of grass waving in the breeze around her hips. “I don’t know. Maybe. Probably. I’ve never really analyzed it.”

  “You? Not analyze something?” he teased gently. “I refuse to believe it.”

  She didn’t have to look up to know her halfhearted punch had landed squarely in his stomach. He didn’t flinch, neither did his abdominal muscles. “I tried once. I hated it,” she said, amazed that instead of crying, she was fighting the urge to laugh. How did he do that? “It’s never been an issue since, okay?”

  “Until now, huh?”

  She met his gaze. “Just the thought of getting even a foot closer to that thing makes me queasy. I’m sorry about this, Zach.” She waved her hand. “You went to a lot of trouble.”

  “Don’t be. It’s my fault. It just didn’t occur to me.”

  The melancholy wave threatened again. Not that he could have known. He still thought of her as the wild child he’d grown up with. But that didn’t keep her from wondering what else “just didn’t occur” to him in his zeal for making plans and chasing thrills. There was no denying Zach was a successful businessman. But his business was about taking risks, and consequences be damned. The kids she worked with already faced too many risks and had dealt with too many consequences. And frankly, so had she.

  A dull throb took up a slow tempo behind her eyebrows.

  “What do we do now?” she asked quietly.

  Zach read concern, worry, and fear in her eyes. He wished like hell he knew what was going on inside her head. He could almost hear the wheels turning. Somehow he doubted she was thinking about the balloon ride or the camping trip. He had the distinct impression her thoughts dealt specifically with him—as he related not just to her job, but to her personally.

  He could always just come out and ask. But he wasn’t particularly interested in having that fact confirmed.

  “What we’re going to do, is go on a picnic. That’s one promise I made that I can still keep.”

  “But you don’t have to—”

  “Yes, I do.” Zach saw she was about to argue and ended it the fastest way he knew how. With his mouth on hers. She stiffened at first, but only seconds later her lips softened, and Zach had to stifle a groan and the urge to pull her into his arms. While he still could, he broke off the kiss and leaned his mouth close to her ear. “I want to, Dara.” He dropped a kiss on the soft skin just below her earlobe. His heart was pounding. Her light scent filled his head, the rush finer than the thin air at twenty thousand feet.

  “Besides,” he added. “We need to go over the plans for the camping trip.” He barely waited for her to nod before heading across the field to Scotty and the rest of the ground crew.

  They were back in the truck and heading farther west, the soft outline of the Blue Ridge Mountains dominating the skyline ahead of them, when Dara finally broke the long silence.

  “It was really beautiful, Zach.” At his questioning look, she clarified, “The balloon, I mean. Is it yours? Your company’s?”

  “No, it belongs to a friend of mine. I rent it from him occasionally for trips with clients.” He shot another look at her. “Today was a loan from one friend to another, Dara, so don’t worry. I knew I was taking a chance.”

  “I still feel bad about it. I’m sure my fear of flying seems pretty silly to someone like you.” She glanced over at him, but his eyes were trained on the road. “We’ve set up a few balloon ride trips for kids at the foundation. I imagine it must be spectacular up there.”

  “It is.” He reached across the seat and laced his fingers through hers. “Don’t knock yourself for not liking to fly, Dart.” He squeezed her hand before letting go to downshift at a red light. “It’s not a fatal disease.”

  It wasn’t fatal. Unless of course she found herself falling for a thrill-seeker. And then the only fatality would be her heart.

  “How did you get into doing what you do?” she asked, hoping the answer would give her the strength she needed to resist him. Lord knew nothing else had.

  “It was after you moved away. You know I loved sports, anything that demanded a physical challenge. In high school, none of the organized sports really did it for me.”

  “Not a team player? Now, why doesn’t that surprise me?” She’d meant it as a joke, but a quick look at his face told her he’d taken her seriously.

  “It wasn’t that, Dara. I wondered about it though, being an only child and admittedly liking to be the center of attention. But there were solo sports too. None of them jazzed me. I tried it all. Football, basketball, tennis, golf.”

  “Golf?”

  “Hey, I’ll have you know I swung a mean five iron.”

  She laughed, certain he could have been captain of the team if he’d wanted to. “So what changed?”

  “My parents took me snow skiing for the first time.”

  “Skiing?”

  “Yeah, I was sixteen, and we went up to Vermont for Christmas break. I hit that first chairlift and zoom, I felt like I’d been launched into outer space. Scared me to death, but it pumped me too. Then coming down the hill. I don’t know. I took to skis like I’d been born in them. Something about the speed and the wind and feeling like you were riding on the edge. One day, one mountain, and I was hooked.”

  “An adrenaline junkie is born. And here I thought you would’ve been more at home as quarterback or star pitcher, something where thousands would chant your name and stand and cheer.” Like Daniel, she thought silently. Only he’d been hooked on the rush, too, just like Zach. Daniel tried it all. Nothing was too crazy. He was invincible.

  Or so he’d thought.

  Zach looked unrepentant. “Yeah, me too. But I wasn’t. Testing myself, relying on myself that way—mentally, physically—did it for me.”

  “So why aren’t you living in Colorado or the Alps?” she asked, purposely comparing him to Daniel, trying to find her way back to that nice, safe place she’d carved out for herself.

  “Well, I didn’t get to ski often, and around here it was a limited sport, anyway. So I began to hunt down other things that held the same excitement. I took skydiving lessons as soon as I was eighteen. Then hang gliding from a friend in college.”

  “I bet the bungee jumpers just loved you.”

  He laughed. “I
switched my major to business management,” he went on. “I started organizing trips for my frat house, and eventually one of the alumni took an interest and invested in me. The Great Escape just sort of blossomed from there.”

  “Well, you’re obviously not alone in your addiction.”

  He slowed for the next light and looked at her as he came to a stop. “True. And I managed to turn it into a job I love and that I’m good at. I never planned it, but I don’t regret a single minute of it.”

  She remained silent, his continued stare finally making her shift her gaze to the side window. “And you’re still alive to say so.” Dara bit her tongue at the sharpness of her words. The last thing she wanted to think about—talk about—was her past.

  “You don’t think much of me—personally, I mean—do you?”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Sure it is. You can’t stand it that I’m not dedicating my life to a more worthy cause. To something of importance.”

  “You make it sound like you resent what I do. Isn’t that reverse snobbism?”

  “That’s just it. I don’t. It’s obvious you love what you do. But so do I. And isn’t that what’s most important?” When she didn’t answer, he added, “Do what makes you happy, hope it pays the bills. That’s my motto.”

  She folded her arms. “And to hell with how it affects anyone else, right?”

  Her heated response left him speechless. After a moment he shook his head. “Boy, lady, you’re tough.”

  Dara looked away. “I don’t always think so. But I’d like to be.”

  “What’s wrong with enjoying your job, whatever it is? Would it be easier for you to accept me if there was some deep psychological reason for why I do what I do? Like some tragedy in my past I’m trying to escape from?”

  Dara’s wince was automatic and uncontrollable. The next thing she knew, Zach had zoomed through the intersection and pulled off the road onto the wide grassy shoulder.

  He shoved the emergency brake on and propped one knee on the seat and draped his arm along the back. “Hey listen. Dara, whatever I said, I’m sorry.”