Intimate Surrender

He owed them everything. His heart, his blood, his soul. When they read that damn tabloid article, he could just picture the disappointment in Terrence’s eyes, the hurt in Leslie’s. The knot in his stomach kinked a little tighter.

No. He had worked too hard for too long proving to his parents he was capable of running the Fortune 500 company they had built from the ground up. He refused to let a Crosby ruin everything, especially not this particular Crosby.

“Don’t you think you’re being a little paranoid, Peter?” she said now. “I never touched your desk.”

Against his will, he had a vivid memory of her naked and flushed the second or third time they made love, her luscious skin glowing with perspiration and the soft little noises of arousal she made as he took her against the nearest surface, which at the time just happened to be the top of his antique walnut desk.

Throughout that incredible night of passion, there had scarcely been a corner of his loft they’d missed in their hunger for each other.

He raised an eyebrow but said nothing. He knew the instant her own memory clicked in. A rosy blush spilled over her cheeks and she dropped her gaze.

“Well, besides that time,” she mumbled, looking so charmingly disconcerted he wondered how she could possibly be so deceitful.

“I’ve tried to think about what I might have had lying around about our NPIR project but I’m coming up empty. Why don’t you refresh my memory? What did you find?”

“Nothing! I wasn’t thinking about NPIRs or anything else computer related. I didn’t go anywhere near your stupid desk, except that time with…you.”

“Yet the note you left was written on my own personal stationery, which I just happen to keep in the top drawer of that stupid desk.”

She stared at him for a long moment, then she drew a deep breath. When she spoke, her voice sounded weary. “What do you want, Peter? Why follow me out here to the middle of nowhere? You could have yelled at me over the phone.”

He refused to let himself be sidetracked by how fragile she suddenly looked. “I want some answers. What did you learn about our project?”

“I didn’t learn anything! I told you that. I never even gave work a thought that night. If you’ll remember, you didn’t give me time to think about much of anything but you.”

They stared at each other for a moment and he remembered again the wild passion they had shared. Or at least he thought they’d shared it. Had it all been feigned on her part? All those long kisses, her sighs and moans, the way she acted as if she couldn’t seem to get enough of him?

That was the part that he was finding most difficult to accept, he finally admitted to himself. He had been enthralled with her, completely entranced. He had wanted her with a fierce hunger unlike anything he’d ever known before.

While she had been as cold-blooded and calculating as an asp.

“Did your brother tell you to sleep with me?” he asked.

With a swift intake of breath, she stared at him, her brown eyes huge in her pale face. In any other woman, he might have almost believed she looked hurt. But he obviously couldn’t trust anything his instincts told him about Katherine Crosby.

“That’s insulting to Trent and to me. I shouldn’t even justify it with a response but I will tell you that he knows nothing about this, about the two of us and that night. If he did, he would be livid.”

Peter slapped the folded tabloid at her. “Hate to be the one to break it to you, sweetheart, but there’s not a person in Portland who doesn’t know by now.”

She gazed at the paper for a moment, nibbling her lip again. “Okay so everyone might know we kissed. As for the rest of it, no one else has to know anything about that. We were both carried away by the champagne and the night and the whole thing. Matters never should have gone so far. We should both just forget it ever happened.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“Oh, you have no idea,” she murmured.

At her words, another wave of anger washed over him. The intensity of it had him jumping to his feet and stalking to the fireplace. He hated that she could just dismiss the night they had spent together. Forget it ever happened. Right. As if he could just forget the most erotic night of his life.

He turned back to her. “A smart man never forgets his mistakes. And, sweetheart, this was one hell of a mistake.”

“For both of us.”

“The difference is, you knew exactly what you were doing—and who you were doing it with.”

“That’s right. I set out to seduce you from the moment I walked into that ballroom. It was a brilliant strategy, wouldn’t you say? All I had to do was convince you to take me home with you, make love all night until you fell asleep, then comb through your office on the chance—slim to none though it was—that I might find some tiny snippet of information in your loft about your super-router that we could use at Crosby Systems. Right. You caught me. That’s me, Katie Crosby, corporate spy. Trent sends his little sister out to sleep with all his business rivals.”

“I wouldn’t put anything past the Crosbys.”

Something flashed in her dark eyes, something that looked like anger and hurt and maybe even a little sorrow. “Okay, that’s enough,” she snapped. “I would like you to leave now. I’m sure you don’t want to spend another moment in the belly of the beast.”

She rose as if to show him out but as soon as she stood, what little color remaining on her face drained out like wine spilling from a tipped glass and she swayed. Peter reached out instinctively to keep her from toppling over, then helped her back onto the couch.

“What’s wrong? Are you ill?”

Her chin lifted. “What do you care?”

“I don’t,” he snapped. “Maybe I just happen to be fond of these particular boots and don’t want you yakking all over them.”

She glared at him. “Your precious boots are safe. I’m not going to yak, as you so charmingly put it. I stood up a little too soon but I’m perfectly fine now.”

He only had to take one look at her to know she was lying, but then why should that surprise him? The woman wouldn’t know the truth if it jumped up and bit her in the behind. With hollow eyes, her skin three shades past white and her mouth pinched like a shriveled apple left in the bottom of the bushel, she sat there and expected him to believe everything was fine.

“I didn’t see signs of anybody else when I arrived. Who else is out here with you?”

She paused as if she didn’t want to answer him, then she finally shrugged. “Usually the ranch foreman and his wife live in quarters at the rear of the house, but they’re away for a few days.”

“You’re alone?”

“Not if you count two dogs, six barn cats, a dozen horses and two hundred head of cattle.”

He studied her pale features again, suddenly chagrined at himself for bursting in on her, guns blazing. She might be a lying Crosby but she didn’t look well at all.

Crosby or not, he didn’t like the idea of her being out here alone. A thousand things could happen to an ill woman on her own at an isolated Wyoming ranch, especially with the storm percolating out there.

“If you’re done yelling at me, I really would like you to leave now.” Somehow she managed to inject regal condescension into her words, even with her pale features.

“I really think I should stay,” he found himself saying.

Her eyes widened and he didn’t miss the way her hand clenched over her stomach, as if just the idea of spending another moment with him was enough to make her insides churn.

“No. No, you shouldn’t. The weather report said a nasty storm is heading this way. You’ll want to fly back to Portland before it hits.”

“It’s already here. Can’t you hear that wind? The reports I heard before I landed said this area was due for at least two feet of snow. I won’t be flying anywhere tonight.”

“If you heard the storm reports before you left, why fly out here in such a rush? Acting on a whim like that hardly seems like typical behavior for the cold, ruthless CEO of Logan Corporation.”

Nothing he had done since he’d seen her in that hotel ballroom had been typical behavior for him. He had seen the reports of an approaching storm in this area before he left Portland, but not even flying into the eye of a hurricane would have kept him grounded.

He had known he was foolish to leave but he had been so angry he hadn’t cared about anything but running her to ground, after three long months of searching.

“It doesn’t matter why I left,” he answered. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I’m not in the mood for your macho posturing, Peter. I don’t want or need you here.”

“Fickle little thing, aren’t you? Three months ago, you certainly wanted me around. If my memory serves—and believe me, it does—you couldn’t get enough.”

She glared at him, though he saw yet another blush heat those cheeks. “Which am I? Ruthless corporate spy or sex-crazed nymphomaniac?”

“Good question. One I would certainly like to know the answer to myself.”

Before she could give voice to the heated response he could see brewing, a powerful gust of wind rattled the windowpanes and moaned under the eaves of the log ranch house.

The two lamps burning in the room flickered in unison then went out, pitching the room into darkness lit only by the fire’s glow.

Two

“That settles it. I’m not going anywhere.”

Even though the only light in the room came from the snapping flames in the fireplace, Katie could see the determination in Peter’s eyes and she wanted to weep. Just when she thought she had hit absolute rock bottom in her life, somehow she managed to cartwheel down another few feet.

She suddenly wanted nothing in the world more than to curl up on that couch in front of the fireplace, wrap herself in her grandmother’s wedding-ring quilt and sob.

What had she done to deserve this? Okay, maybe she hadn’t been exactly forthcoming to Peter Logan three months earlier. In retrospect, she knew she should have told him her real name the moment he struck up a conversation with her, at the first sign of flirtation.

She wasn’t sure why she had kept that important little detail to herself—maybe because she had been so shocked that the gorgeous and sought-after Peter Logan could actually be flirting with someone like her—boring, quiet Katie Crosby.

Who could blame any woman for being caught up in the magic of the evening? With a glamorous makeover, a new hairstyle, the designer clothes, she had felt like someone else. A stranger alluring enough to catch the interest of one of Portland’s most wanted bachelors.

The champagne she had overindulged in hadn’t helped any. She hadn’t been thinking with a clear head but she did know she hadn’t wanted the night to end. She also knew that the moment Peter found out her last name that flattering desire in his eyes would have changed to contempt and coldness faster than she could blink.

Okay, so she had perpetuated a tiny deception on the man by keeping her identity concealed. Was that really such a hideous crime that someone felt the need to take her calm, organized world and shake the dickens out of it as if she was stuck in some nightmarish live snow globe?

She thought things were bleak before when she was just pregnant and alone. Now she had the delightful added bonus of facing the reality that she was pregnant and alone and heartily despised by her baby’s father.

The real hell of it was, seeing him again like this only served to remind her vividly of the heat and astonishing wonder of that night. Of kissing his hard mouth and touching those muscles underneath his clothes and burning only for him.

He hated her, she knew he did, but still she couldn’t control the way her insides trembled and sighed just seeing the firelight wash across those gorgeous, masculine features.

“Looks like we’re in for a long night,” he said abruptly and rose to his feet. “While you round up a flashlight and some candles, I’ll go bring in some extra firewood.”

Of course he would take charge, she thought. As Logan Corporation CEO, he was no doubt used to giving orders and having his minions obey without question. She should have been offended by his whole master-and-commander routine but she had to admit a tiny part of her wanted to let him throw his weight around a little, to let someone else carry the burdens of her worries for a while.

She sternly squashed the tempting impulse, ashamed of her weakness for even entertaining it for a second. “You don’t need to do that. Clint loaded several days worth of wood on the back porch for me before he left. There’s also a gas-fired generator out back that will juice up the appliances until the power kicks back on.”

“You act as if you’ve been through this before.”

“A few times. The power can be unreliable at best out here, especially during winter storms. I’ve had enough experience with outages that I should be perfectly fine. Believe me, you can head into town for the night with a completely clear conscience.”

She might as well have been talking to the river rocks on the fireplace. His only answer was a raised eyebrow and a challenging stare.

Katie sighed. It was worth a try. The idea of spending even one night in such close quarters with Peter Logan was enough to send her into major panic mode.

He was staying, though, and she realized grimly that no amount of arguing would change his mind. The same man who had the kindness as an eighteen-year-old college student to rescue a fat, awkward adolescent from the ugliness of her peers more than a decade earlier would never leave a woman alone out here in the middle of a blizzard.

“I don’t suppose you know anything about generators, do you?” she asked. “I’ve seen Clint start it but never done it myself.”

“Between the two of us, we should be able to figure it out, don’t you think?”

Relieved that he seemed willing to put aside his animosity, even temporarily, she nodded. “Sure.”

He cocked his head. “Are you sure you’re up to it? You’re still looking a little green around the edges. Maybe you should just take it easy and lie down here by the fire. I’m sure I can handle starting up a generator on my own.”

She refused to let him see how very much she would like to do exactly that, just curl up on this couch and let him handle everything. Trying her best to conceal the greasy nausea writhing around in her stomach, she mustered a small smile.

“Don’t worry about me.” Using the fire’s glow for illumination, she crossed the vast room to the hall storage closet. On the shelf near the door, just where she expected it, she found a large battery-powered lantern Clint and Margie kept available for exactly these kinds of emergencies. Wouldn’t she love it if the engineers on her R & D team were half as efficient as the Sweetwater caretakers? she thought.

“This should help,” she said to Peter. She led the way toward the utility porch off the kitchen. It seemed as if in just the few moments since the power had gone out, the temperature in the rooms away from the fireplace had dropped significantly. The Mexican tile floor in the kitchen was freezing, even through her thick wool socks.

All she could see outside the greenhouse window above the sink was thick blackness, but she could hear snow hurling against the logs and the wind moaning under the eaves.

It sounded lonely, mournful, and she shivered despite the sweater Ivy had sent her for Christmas from her new husband’s country of Lantanya, where Max was king.

The lantern gave off enough light that Peter must have seen her reaction. “Everything okay? Do you need to sit down?”

She knew the concern in his voice was just the courtesy he would show anyone but she couldn’t help being warmed by it. She had a feeling he wouldn’t be so solicitous if he knew the secret she carried under that sweater, though.

“No. The cold just took me by surprise, that’s all. The generator is this way.”

With the lantern held out in front of her, she carefully navigated through the mudroom to the utility porch that housed the home’s utilities—the furnace, water heater and the backup generator. The large room was vented with outside air for safety reasons and Katie found it even colder here than in the kitchen, so cold she could see her breath in the dim light she held in her hand.

“Any idea where to start?” Peter asked.

“Clint told me he left instructions.” She held the lantern up higher and scanned the room.

“This what you were looking for?” Peter asked, plucking a clipboard from a nail near the generator. He handed it to her and she saw several laminated cards secured neatly to it.

“I’ll say this for the man—he doesn’t have much to say but he’s an absolute genius at organization.” Katie leafed through the cards until she found guidelines for the gas-fired generator, beneath a page detailing how to relight the pilot on the furnace and one for checking the heating oil level on the outside tank.

“Here we go.” She studied the instructions, smiling a little at Clint’s meticulousness. “This doesn’t look bad.”

She reached to replace the clipboard on the nail but misjudged the distance in the dim light and stumbled a little against the wall. The back of her hand scraped across the nail, hard enough to break the skin, and Katie couldn’t contain a quick intake of breath.

“What’s wrong?”

It was silly, she knew, but she suddenly didn’t want Peter to know she was the world’s biggest klutz. She might have been blessed with brains by some genetic quirk, but she had definitely been passed over when it came to grace and poise.

She had always been the most accident-prone of her siblings. If there was one thing worse than being fat and ugly in a family of beautiful people, it was being fat and ugly and clumsy.

Peter already thought she had some deadly disease. He didn’t need to know about this.

“Um, nothing,” she murmured, tucking her hand against her side. “I’m fine.”

“You’re lying.” He sounded more resigned than angry, as if he expected nothing else. “You might as well tell me what happened.”

Her hand throbbed wickedly and she could feel blood beginning to drip from it. She wouldn’t be able to hide it from him for long and she suddenly felt foolish for trying. “Just a scratch. It’s nothing.”

“Let me see.”

She recognized the CEO in his voice, that unmistakable note of command. Her father had it and now Trent shared it in spades. She had spent her entire life surrounded by powerful men, she suddenly realized. With all that experience, why wasn’t she better at dealing with them?

With a weary sigh, she thrust out her hand. Peter took the lantern from her and set it on top of the furnace, then gripped her hand and tugged it under the circle of light.

“It doesn’t look very deep,” he decided after studying it for a few moments.

“I told you it was just a scratch.”

“Still, you’ll need to put something on it.”

“Can it wait until we’re finished here, Dr. Logan?”

“I hope your tetanus shot is up to date. That nail looked a little rusty.”

Someone with her inherent klutziness would be foolish not to keep current with her shots. Her last tetanus booster had been the previous summer after an unfortunate encounter with a conch shell on her brother Danny’s Hawaii retreat.

“Don’t worry, you’re not going to be trapped in the middle of a blizzard with someone suffering from lockjaw.”

“Well, at least I’ve got that much going for me. I guess things really could be worse.”

His dry tone surprised a laugh from her. Not much of one, she had to admit, but a laugh nonetheless.

He smiled in automatic response, his teeth gleaming in the artificial light. They stood close together under the pool of light spilling from the lantern. He still held her hand, and his fingers were warm and hard on her skin.

His gaze met hers for a moment and suddenly she could think of nothing except their night together, how they had laughed at nothing and kissed and laughed some more.

Everything inside her seemed to clench at the memory, a long, slow tightening of muscle and nerves. She saw something kindle in his eyes, something hot and wild and dangerous.

Before she realized it, she swayed a little toward him, then caught herself just in time. Horrified at her response, she wrenched her hand out of his grasp and stepped back so quickly she nearly stumbled again.

“We’d better get this thing fired up.”

For a moment, he only stared at her with an odd look in his dark eyes—a combination of awareness and a baffled sort of anger. “Right,” he finally muttered. “The wind sounds like it’s kicking up a notch.”

To her vast relief, he turned his attention to the generator. It was a little trickier than Clint’s instructions had led her to believe, but soon they had it going and switched the power current over to the generator.

Despite the tension simmering through the room and the pain still throbbing from her finger, she felt like Benjamin Franklin with his kite and his key when the lights flickered back on.

She grinned. “Bingo.”

He gazed at her for a charged moment, that strange expression in his eyes again. She waited for him to say something but he continued to watch her, as if he couldn’t quite figure her out.

She cleared her throat. “Would you like something to eat? Margie left a pot of beef stew on the stove for me that’s probably still hot and she made fresh rolls this morning. It’s probably not what you’re used to, but she’s a wonderful cook.”

“Let’s take care of that cut of yours first.”

She absolutely did not want him touching her again, not when she couldn’t stop remembering how his body had felt inside her, how his mouth had explored her skin.

“I’ve got it. You could add another log to the fire, though, and turn off any lights and nonessential electronics throughout the house. We’ll need to conserve what generator power we have. Here, take the lantern. I’ve got another one in my bedroom.”

He nodded and held out his hand. Their fingers brushed as they exchanged the light, and tiny sparks jumped between them. Just static electricity, she told herself.

They returned to the kitchen together, then split up as she headed for her bedroom suite. She left the overhead light on long enough to locate another battery-powered emergency lantern in her closet, switched it off and carried the lantern to the bathroom to get first-aid supplies.

While she rummaged through the medicine cabinet for a bandage and antibiotic ointment and washed the blood off her hand, she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror above the sink. She looked horrendous. Her hair was spiky and windblown from her time outside earlier and she hadn’t bothered with makeup. Her eyes looked unnaturally huge in her pale face and her mouth had a pinched, sickly look to it.

No wonder Peter looked at her like he couldn’t quite believe Katie Crosby and the glamorous Celeste could be the same person.

She could scarcely believe it herself. She had been playing a part that night, a thrilling masquerade. Stuck alone here with her, Peter would see the real her. The boring, sensible Kate who wore long underwear and read dry technical manuals and who would never dream of going home with a handsome man and making love all night long.

Well, okay, she dreamed about it, she admitted to herself with a long, honest look in the mirror. She dreamed about it every night and remembered in exquisitely painful detail how she had come alive for the first time in her life that night.

Perhaps it was best that he see her for the person she really was. Not glamorous, not glitzy. Just Katie. That night she had been Cinderella at the ball, dressed up in borrowed finery. It had been wonderful and magical dancing the night away with Prince Charming, but midnight had come and gone. There would be no glass slipper for her—but she had been left with a magical, wondrous gift.