CHAPTER THREE
The morning sun gilded the steep slopes of Mount Prosperity as Melanie again met Jan at Ridge Lodge Resort. She turned from the view of the mountain to the old rambling cedar and shake lodge. She wished she could be anywhere other than here.
“It’ll be over soon,” she muttered under her breath.
“What will?” Jan asked, approaching her car.
“This interview.”
“You want it over? But why? This has to be the most interesting story we’ve done all year!”
“Is it?” Melanie asked, leaning inside her warm Volkswagen and snatching her camera case and tripod.
“What is it with you?”
“I don’t like Doel’s attitude,” she replied, starting across the path leading to the front door of the lodge.
“Give him a chance. My bet is he’ll grow on you.”
“You’ll lose your money,” Melanie predicted.
They started towards the building, but Jan suddenly stopped short. “Okay, Melanie, are you going to hold out on me forever or are you going to tell me what’s going on between you and—” she cocked her head toward the lodge “—our infamous new neighbor?”
“There’s nothing going on.”
“Didn’t look that way yesterday.”
“We got into an argument, that’s all.”
“And it looked like a doozy,” Jan exclaimed. “You know you’re going to have to tell me the truth about all this. You grew up with him.”
“It wasn’t all that interesting,” Melanie lied, but Jan simply smiled as they headed up the path leading to the main doors.
Gavin was waiting for them.
Lounging at one of the tables near the bar, his leg and cast propped on the seat of another chair, he looked up as they entered but didn’t bother trying to stand.
“So you didn’t change your mind,” he said, his tawny eyes moving from Jan to Melanie.
“Nope,” Melanie replied.
“News in Taylor’s Crossing must be slow.” The weight of his gaze landed full force on Melanie, but she tossed her bag onto the table and unzipped the padded canvas, pretending she didn’t care one way or the other that he was staring at her.
Jan slid into a chair opposite him. “Ready?” she asked.
“As I’ll ever be.” He glanced down at his stiff leg and the plaster cast surrounding his ankle. Grimacing, his jaw rock hard, he added irritably, “Rich isn’t here right now.”
“But he’ll be back?” Jan asked.
“He’d better be,” Gavin growled.
Jan looked smug. “We can manage without him.”
Melanie set up her tripod near the bar and adjusted its height, then double-checked the camera’s settings.
Frowning, Gavin muttered, “Let’s get the damned thing over with.”
“That’s a healthy attitude,” Melanie shot back, and Jan stared at her as if she’d lost her mind.
Scowling, Gavin reached behind him, grabbed his crutches, stood and made his way to the other side of the bar. Rock-solid muscles supported him, though he slouched to fit the tops of the crutches under his arms. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything,” Jan replied brightly, reaching into her oversized bag for her pocket recorder, notepad and pen. “The reopening of Ridge Lodge is big news. But then, everything you do is news.”
“If that’s true, then the world’s in worse shape than I thought,” Gavin remarked, setting out two glasses and his favorite bottle on the top of the bar. “Join Melanie and me for a drink?” he asked.
“A drink?” Jan’s brows rose. “At eleven in the morning?”
“Right. Kind of a celebration, eh, Melanie?”
“Don’t ask,” Melanie advised Jan as she set her camera onto the tripod.
Gavin was already searching for another glass, but Jan held up her hand. “It’s too early for me,” she said, curiosity filling her gaze.
“Melanie?” he asked, motioning to the two glasses already placed on the bar. “Another smooth one?”
Jan shot her a look that said more clearly than words, what’s he talking about?
Shrugging, Melanie found the lens she wanted and screwed it onto the camera. Then she checked the light with a meter. “Not today,” she replied.
“Too early?” he mocked, pouring himself a hefty shot.
“I’m working.” She moved to the windows with her light meter.
“All work and no play?”
“Oh, you know me, nose to the grindstone all the time,” she flung back, unable to help herself. Why was he baiting her?
Jan eyed them both. “You two do know each other,” she said speculatively while casting Melanie a look that could cut through steel.
“You could say that,” Gavin answered evasively.
“How well?” Jan’s eyes were full of questions when she turned them on Melanie.
“Gavin and I went to school together—grade school,” Melanie replied quickly, silently cursing Gavin. What was he doing firing up Jan’s reporter instincts? He was the one who wanted his damned privacy.
Gavin’s jaw grew tight. “Small world, isn’t it?”
Jan reached for her pen and paper. “Then you’re family friends?”
Melanie’s heart began to thud, and she felt sweat gather along her spine.
Gavin didn’t answer, and the silence stretched long. “Not exactly,” he finally said.
“Then ‘exactly’ what?”
“Acquaintances,” he clipped. “Nothing more.”
Melanie, wounded, nodded. “That’s right. Acquaintances. Mr. Doel is—”
“Gavin, please,” Gavin drawled. “No reason to be so formal.”
Melanie bristled. “He’s a few years older than I am.” Jan lifted a brow as Melanie suggested, “Maybe we should just get started.”
Gavin forced a cold smile. “I can’t wait.”
“So you went to school at Taylor High?” Jan began, but Gavin cut her off.
“Nothing personal, remember?”
You started it, Melanie thought.
“Okay, okay,” Jan said amiably. “We can begin with the lodge. When is it going to reopen? Is it going to be changed in any way? And tell me why you think you and your partner can make it work when the last operation went bankrupt?”
Jan’s questions were fair, Melanie decided. Her ear tuned to the conversation, she busied herself with her equipment. Now that Gavin had steered Jan to safe territory, she was sticking to questions Gavin could answer without much thought. Leaning on the bar for support, he ignored his drink and answered each question carefully. No more spontaneous remarks—just the facts.
Melanie focused the camera on Gavin. He didn’t seem to notice, and the lens only magnified his innate sexuality, the hard slope of his jaw, the bladed features of his face, the glint of his straight white teeth and the depth of his eyes, cautious now and sober.
She clicked off a few shots, and he glanced her way. Her heartbeat accelerated as he smiled—that irreverent slash of white against his tanned skin that had always caused her heart to trip.
“You want a tour?” he asked, flicking his gaze back to Jan.
“That would be great!”
Melanie watched him maneuver to the main lobby. Beneath his shirt his shoulders flexed, straining the seams of the white cotton while his hips shifted beneath his shorts and his tanned thighs and one exposed calf strained.
Even though Gavin was on crutches, Jan had to hurry to keep pace with him. Melanie grabbed another camera, double-checked it’s battery and switched on the flash as she followed.
Gavin moved quickly across the main lobby, gesturing to the three-storied rock fireplace, scuffed wooden floors and soaring ceiling. Around three sides of the cavernous room, two tiers of balconies opened to private guest rooms. The other wall was solid glass, with a breathtaking view of Mount Prosperity. Now the ski runs were bare, the lifts still, the pine trees towering out of sheer rock. Dry grass and wildflowers covered the slopes.
Showing off the office, kitchen, exercise room and pool room, Gavin explained how the lodge was set up, when it was built and how he planned to restore it. Eventually they returned to the main lobby, and Gavin stopped at a group of tables with chairs overturned on their polished oak surfaces. Balancing on his good leg, he yanked three chairs down and shoved them around a battered table.
Jan plopped down immediately. Gavin kicked a chair Melanie’s way, but rather than sit so close to him, she said, “I think I’ll look around.”
“Not interested in hearing about the lodge?” Gavin baited.
“I can read about it,” she tossed back. “Fascinating as it is, I’ve got work to do.”
Jan, sensing the changed atmosphere, said, “Melanie’s the best photographer on the paper.”
Melanie shot Jan a warning glance. “Right now I think I’m the only photographer.” Just let me get through this, she prayed silently, wishing she could be aloof and uncaring when it came to Gavin Doel. She unzipped her bag and sorted through the lenses, cameras, light meters and memory cards.
Jan leaned across the table to Gavin and turned the questions in a different direction. Writing swiftly in her own fashion of shorthand, she asked about his career as an international skier, his bronze medal from the Olympics nearly eight years before, his interest in the lodge itself. Gavin answered quickly and succinctly, never offering more than a simple, straightforward answer.
He’s used to this, Melanie realized, wondering how many reporters had tried to pin him down, how many other newspapers had tried to dig into his personal life. Even though the Tribune had been known to downplay scandal in the past, especially about a local hero, there were other newspapers that wouldn’t have been so kind.
Seeing this as her chance to escape, Melanie wandered through the old rooms, and memories washed over her. She’d been here often, of course, before the last owners had filed for bankruptcy and closed the runs and the lodge for good. She’d even skied here with Gavin, but that had been ages ago. She’d been seventeen, sure of her love of him, happy beyond her wildest dreams. And he’d been on his way to fame and fortune. She sighed. How foolish it all seemed now.
Measuring the light through the large glass windows, she caught sight of her own pale reflection and wondered what Gavin thought about her. Gone was her straight black hair, replaced by crumpled curls that fell past her shoulders. Her eyes were still hazel, her cheekbones more exposed and gaunt following her divorce from Neil. She’d lost weight since Gavin had known her. But it didn’t matter. What had happened between Gavin and her was long over. Dead. She’d killed whatever feelings he’d had for her, and she’d destroyed those emotions intentionally when she’d eloped with Neil Brooks.
She glanced back to the table. Gavin was leaning back in his chair, answering Jan’s questions, but his eyes followed her as she moved from one bank of windows to the next.
She snapped off a few shots of the interior of the lodge, then, as much to get away from the weight of Gavin’s gaze as anything else, wandered down the hallways to the spaces where the shops and restaurant had been housed in years past.
In the tiny shops the shelves and racks were empty. Dust collected on display windows, and the carpet was worn and faded where ski boots had once trod throughout the winter. Bleached-out “Clearance” signs were stacked haphazardly against the walls.
The interior seemed gloomy—too dark for the kind of pictures Brian wanted for the layout. Maybe exterior shots would be better. Even though there wasn’t a flake of snow on the mountain, shots of the lodge, the craggy ridge looming behind its gabled roofline, would give the article the right atmosphere.
Outside, she snapped several quick shots of the lodge, a few more of the empty lifts and others of the grassy ski runs.
The mountain air was clear and warm, and a late September breeze cooled her skin and tangled her hair. The scents of pine and dust, fresh lumber and wildflowers mingled, lingering in the autumn afternoon.
“Get what you wanted?” Gavin’s voice boomed, startling her.
“What?” Whipping around, she squinted up and found him seated on the rail of a deck, his cast propped on a chair, his eyes shaded by reflective glasses. The deck, because of the lack of snow, was some five feet in the air and he stared down at her.
“What I wanted?” she repeated, shading her eyes with one hand and attempting to hide the fact that at that height he was incredibly intimidating.
“The pictures.”
“Oh.” Of course that’s what he’d meant. For a moment she thought he’d been asking about her life. You’re too sensitive, Melanie. He doesn’t give a damn. “Enough to start with.” She noticed his mouth turn down at the edges. “But you never can tell. If these—” she patted her camera fondly “—aren’t what Brian had in mind, then I’ll be back.”
Gavin’s jaw clenched even tighter. “So when did you take up photography?”
“I’ve always been interested in it.” You know that.
“But as a career?”
“It started out as a hobby. I just kept working at it,” she replied, not wanting to go into the fact that after she’d married Neil, she’d taken photography courses. She’d had time on her hands and empty hours to fill without the baby. . . . Neil’s money had provided her with the best equipment and classes with some of the Northwest’s most highly regarded instructors, and she’d spent hour upon hour learning, focusing on her craft. When she’d landed her first job, Neil had been livid. It was ironic, she supposed, that her hours of idleness and Neil’s money had provided her with her escape from a marriage that had been doomed from the start.
Clearing her throat, she looked up and found Gavin staring at her, looking intently, as if he could read her thoughts. “So you took your ‘hobby’ and started working for the Tribune.”
“In short, I suppose.” Why explain further? “Where’s Jan?” she asked, changing the subject as she packed her camera back in its case.
“She took off.”
Melanie was surprised. “Already?”
Gavin’s lips twitched as she started to climb onto the deck. “She asked one too many personal questions, and when I objected, I guess she thought I was being rude.”
Melanie skewered him with a knowing look as she crossed the deck. “Were you?”
“Undoubtedly. She asked for it.” Wincing, Gavin swung his leg back to the decking and balanced on his good foot while he scrabbled for his crutches. “Shit,” he growled when one crutch clattered to the cedar planks. He twisted, and his face grew white.
“I’ll get it.”
Melanie started to pick up the offending crutch, but Gavin bent over and, swearing, yanked it out of her hands. “Leave it!”
Melanie’s temper flared. “I was only trying to help.”
“I don’t need any help.” He didn’t say it, but from the flare of his nostrils she expected him to add, “Especially from you.” A few beads of sweat collected on his upper lip, but his skin darkened to its normal shade.
“You know, Gavin, you could relax a little. It wouldn’t kill you to let someone lend you a hand once in a while.”
His lips thinned. “I learned a long time ago not to depend on anyone but myself. That way I’m never disappointed.”
Her throat went dry and she felt as if he’d slapped her, but he wasn’t finished.
“As for these,” he said, shaking a crutch, “I can handle them myself. And I don’t need your advice, or your help, or any goddamn pity!” By this time he was standing, leaning on his crutches and breathing hard as he glared at her through his mirrored glasses.
“Then I’m out of here,” she said, forcing an icy smile. “If you don’t want my help or my advice or my pity, then there’s no reason for me to stay.”
“No reason at all.”
“And I’m sure the shots I’ve taken will be good enough for the paper. You won’t have to worry about me intruding again.”
“Good.”
“Goodbye, Gavin,” she said, swinging her camera case over her shoulder, “and good luck with the lodge.”
“Luck has nothing to do with it.”
“I’ll remember that if we don’t get any snow until next February,” she said sweetly, turning on her heel and marching through the lodge to the main doors. Her footsteps rang loudly on the weathered flooring, and her fists were clenched so tightly her fingers began to ache. How could she have loved him? How? The man was an arrogant SOB and carried around a chip on his shoulder the size of a California sequoia! Muttering under her breath, she shoved open the doors and escaped into the hot parking lot. Heat rose from the dusty asphalt in shimmering waves, only adding to the fire burning in her cheeks.
How could he have changed so drastically? He was unbearable! She unlocked her car door and climbed into the suffocatingly hot interior. Rolling down the windows, she wondered if somehow she were to blame for this new cynical, horrible beast named Gavin Doel. Had she wounded him so badly by marrying Neil—or had he, at last, shown his true colors?
Her father had always warned her that Gavin was cut from the same cloth as Jim Doel, but she’d never believed him. Now she wasn’t so sure, and it worried her. Twice in two days Gavin had poured himself healthy doses of Scotch before noon.
But she hadn’t seen him drink any this morning. It had just been a game. He’d been baiting her again.
“Well, he can drown in his liquor for all I care!” she grumbled as she rammed a pair of sunglasses onto the bridge of her nose and glanced in the side-view mirror. In the reflection she saw Gavin standing in the doorway of the lodge, leaning hard on his crutches and frowning darkly.
She ground the gears of her battered old car and sped out of the lot. Maybe, if she were lucky, she’d never have to deal with him again.
* * *
Gavin swore roundly and stared after the car. “You’re a fool, Doel,” he growled, furious with himself for noting that Melanie was more beautiful than he remembered. Her black hair shimmered blue in the sunlight, and her eyes were round and wide, a fascinating shade hovering between gray and green.
So what? Her beauty meant nothing. He’d loved her more than any other woman and she’d betrayed him as callously as if his feelings hadn’t existed. So why should he care?
“Why now?” he muttered. He didn’t want to deal with any latent feelings he might still harbor for her. And he wouldn’t. Just because she was in the same neck of the proverbial woods didn’t mean he had to fall all over himself chasing after her.
No, he decided, his lips compressing thoughtfully as the dust from her car settled back onto the asphalt, this time he’d be in control. This time Melanie Walker Brooks wouldn’t get close to him. No matter what.
* * *
“. . . he might be the rudest man I’ve ever met!” Jan charged. Her eyes were bright, her cheeks flushed at the memory of her interview with Gavin. “And, unfortunately, maybe the best looking.”
Melanie couldn’t agree more. She’d heard the tail end of the conversation between Jan and Guy as she returned to the office. “I take it you’re talking about the new owner of Ridge Resort?”
“You got it,” Jan said. “And I’m not kidding. I’ve met some jerks in my time—good God, I’ve dated more than my share—but this guy takes the cake!”
“What exactly did he say?”
Jan puffed up like a peacock. “I just mentioned that he’d been linked to several famous models and I brought up Aimee LaRoux’s name.”
“And?” Guy prodded.
“And he asked me who I’d been linked to. I, uh, said, it was none of his business and he said, ‘Precisely.’”
“That doesn’t sound so bad to me.”
“It gets worse,” Jan assured them. “I kept bringing it up and he finally asked me why, if I was so interested in Aimee LaRoux’s love life, I just didn’t call her and ask her out. Then he had the audacity to scribble a phone number on a book of matches and toss it to me.”
Despite her foul mood, Melanie laughed. “You’re right,” she said. “Doel’s obnoxious.”
Jan glared at her. “He’s got one dismal sense of humor!”
“You think it’s really Aimee’s number?” Guy asked, his eyes bright.
“No, I don’t!” Jan snapped. “Quit drooling.”
Guy made a face. “Is it that obvious?”
“Very.”
Melanie said, “Just be glad the interview’s over. We won’t have to deal with Doel again.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” Guy disagreed. “Brian seems to think that stories about Gavin Doel and Ridge Lodge can only increase circulation. I think he’s planning a series of articles about Mount Prosperity and the lodge and guess who?”
“Goddammit,” Jan said, grimacing.
Melanie sighed inwardly. She didn’t think she could face Gavin again. And the thought of Gavin’s personal life being ripped open put her on edge. “I think Brian’s putting too much emphasis on Doel.”
“Yeah, it’s almost as if he has an axe to grind with him,” Guy agreed.
“An axe? What’re you talking about?”
Guy shook his head. “Just a feeling I have. I don’t think there’s any love lost between Brian and Doel.”
“Do they know each other?” Melanie asked.
“Beats me.”
Jan’s purse landed on her desk with a thump. “Well, Brian better get himself another reporter,” she declared flatly. “I’m not going to put myself through that ringer again. Doel guards his privacy as if there’s something dark and dangerous in his past.”
“Maybe there is,” Guy said, throwing a leg over Jan’s desk and tapping the side of his face with the eraser end of his pencil. “After all, what do we know about the guy—really?”
Jan turned thoughtful eyes on Melanie. “We know more than most,” she said, her mouth curving thoughtfully upward.
Melanie steeled herself. Obviously Jan thought she could get information on Gavin through her. Well, she could guess again. For now Melanie’s lips were sealed.
“He grew up around here,” Jan told Guy. “Melanie went to school with him.”
“Did you?” Guy was impressed.
“Well, not really. He’s five years older than I am,” Melanie countered. “He was out of high school before I entered.”
“But you said you knew him,” Jan persisted, “and he concurred. In fact, I’d be willing to bet you two knew each other better than you’re letting on.”
“Oh really?” Guy asked, his lips forming a slight smile.
Melanie decided it was time for evasive tactics, at least until she knew just how far Jan was willing to dig. “Jan’s exaggerating. I knew of him,” she corrected, her palms beginning to sweat. “Everyone in town did.”
She should probably just tell Jan part of the truth right now and get it over with, but she couldn’t. Where would she stop? How would she explain that she married Neil to protect Gavin from the burden of a wife and child? Gavin didn’t even know that she’d been pregnant. She certainly wasn’t going to tell Jan or Guy or anyone else.
And beyond that, she didn’t want the scandal of her mother’s death raked up all over again.
“What was Gavin like as a kid? Doesn’t he have a deadbeat father?” Jan asked, the wheels turning in her mind.
“I thought you weren’t interested in interviewing him again?” Melanie said.
Jan shook her head. “You know me. I was just mad. I let the guy get to me. It was my problem, not his. But it won’t happen again. Besides, Barbara Walters wouldn’t have let Doel intimidate her, would she? Nope, I’ve just got to fight fire with fire. So, what was Gavin Doel like before he became famous?”
Melanie thought for a moment, remembering Gavin as he had been. “He was . . . determined and ambitious. Dedicated to being the best skier in the world.”
Jan sighed and blew her bangs out of her eyes. “I know all that. But what about the man behind the image? Did you know him?”
Better than anyone. Melanie lifted a shoulder. “Not well enough to be quoted. Besides, the way he is about his private life, I think the Tribune would be better off if we asked him. That way there’s a chance we won’t get sued.”
“He won’t sue us,” Jan said.
“Why not?”
“Bad publicity. He can’t afford it. But right now he won’t tell me anything.” She smiled slyly. “This is going to call for some research. What’s in the files?”
“I checked yesterday,” Melanie said, walking briskly to her desk and knowing there was nothing the least bit damaging in the envelope she snatched from her cluttered in-basket. She tossed the packet on Jan’s desk and waited while Jan quickly flipped through the stack of photos as if it were a deck of cards. “Nothing else?” she asked, looking disappointed.
“Nothing interesting.”
“You checked the copies that went along with these?”
“Yep.”
“Damn!” She pursed her lips and eyed the photographs again. “Well, these are good—” She picked up a glossy black and white of Gavin poised at the top of a ski run. His face was set, his body tight, gloved hands wrapped around his poles, every muscle ready to spring forward at the drop of a flag. “But I think it would give some dimension to our story if we knew a little more about him.” Tapping a long fingernail on the photograph, she said, “Privacy or no privacy, I think we should dig up everything we can find on Mr. Gavin Doel. We can check with the high school, find out who he dated, if he was ever employed around town.”
“I think most of his relatives moved away a long time ago. And as for his employment, he worked at the lodge before it closed down,” Melanie offered, hoping to steer Jan away from Gavin’s love life.
“Well that doesn’t do us a lot of good. Unless he bought the damned thing for sentimental reasons. But we’ll find out. The next time I interview him, I’ll be ready with a little personal ammunition to get him to talk.”
“It’s your funeral,” Guy said, straightening from the desk.
And just possibly mine, Melanie thought inwardly. “I’ll do the research,” she offered, hoping that she could circumvent any old news story that might prove uncomfortable for Gavin or herself.
“Good.” Jan checked her watch. “Look, I’ve got to run over to the school and talk to the principal about the new gym. Melanie, you coming with me?”
“No, I’ve already got the pictures. They’ll be on your desk tomorrow.”
“Good. Thanks.” Jan grabbed her bag and headed out of the office.
Melanie was left with the sinking sensation that Gavin’s personal life—as well as her own—was about to be splashed all over the front page of the Taylor’s Crossing Tribune.