She snorted. “Lovers? That implies an intimacy we don’t share.”
Her dismissal was like a burr beneath a quarterhorse’s tail. “Nothing wrong with the pleasure we’ve shared. And which we could continue to share.” If she stopped being so darned pigheaded. But he didn’t add that.
Nor did he point out that for someone as risk-averse as Avery claimed to be they’d taken a hell of a risk last night. It had been out of character for him—not because he feared risks, but because he took responsibility for his actions. All his actions. Last night was the first time in his life that he’d had sex without a condom—he’d never done that even in his most reckless teen years.
While he knew from their past that Avery protected herself against pregnancy, he’d risked his own health.
It wouldn’t happen again. Ever. He didn’t need the kind of consequences that might flow from such spur-of-the-moment stupidity.
But damn, it had been good….
Instead of looking at him, she tipped her head back. The early morning sun turned the ends of her eyelashes to gold. “I don’t need to experience life from up there,” she said, changing the subject. “I can do it perfectly well with both feet on the ground.”
“Then you’ll never see the fields rolling out under you, never touch the leaves on the treetops, nor see the elk grazing on the mountaintops—and that’s losing out as far as I’m concerned.” From the set of her chin, he could see he didn’t appear to be getting anywhere. “If you tried it, you might find it worth it. The view is fantastic from up there—a whole different perspective. You can see for miles in every direction.”
“Sounds like you enjoy it.”
“I go every year during the festival.” Except that wasn’t true. Not anymore. “At least, I used to take a ride every year,” he amended. “I haven’t been home for a while.”
At last she looked at him, her scrutiny intense, making him shift uncomfortably.
“I was busy.” The unspoken question in her eyes caused him to prevaricate. “Come on, the chase crews are on the move.”
Striding across the concrete, he reached in his jeans’ pocket for the keys to a black SUV with the name Jarrod Ridge emblazoned on the side. Once they were both inside he started the vehicle and pulled in behind the second minivan that contained the catering crew.
Avery was perched on the edge of her seat. The tight lines had left her mouth and he could sense her rising excitement. “Is the landing spot pre-arranged?”
Guy laughed. “If only! The crew in the first vehicle are in radio contact with the pilots and have a rough idea where the balloons will come down. But it’s never exact because the pilots are at the mercy of the winds.”
She snorted. “And that’s supposed to reassure me about going up there?”
“The pilots are very experienced—they’re also in touch with air traffic control at the local airport.”
Avery fell silent for a few minutes. When she spoke again it was to sigh and say, “It is beautiful out here.”
Guy had to agree. The sun was rising quickly, illuminating the meadows in the valley and the jutting mountain peaks. “Just wait a few weeks until fall arrives and the aspens turn gold—it’s spectacular.”
“I’ll be gone by then.”
Not if he had anything to do with it. Avery owed him—and he wasn’t going to let her go until he was good and ready.
“We’ll see,” he growled. “I’m still holding my breath.”
There was an uneasy pause.
Finally Avery broke it. “You clearly love it here. What kept you from returning all those years?”
So she intended to avoid the tension that bristled between them? Guy was itching for a confrontation…one that might explode into passion. Make her say yes. Maybe her course was wisest. For now.
Keeping his focus on the road, he said in the most even voice he could muster, “Work. After leaving school I studied haute cuisine in France, then worked for several years in London, before returning to the States to open Baratin. There wasn’t time to come to Aspen.”
“‘The finest French restaurant on the east coast’. Or at least that’s what Cuisine magazine called it.”
The accolades didn’t ease Guy’s guilt. “This past month was the longest I’ve spent home in almost two decades.”
Home, funny that he still thought of Jarrod Ridge as home. Yet he’d only returned because of the terms of his father’s will. If he and his brothers and sisters didn’t stay, they would lose out on their inheritance.
None of them were ready to forfeit that.
Her hand brushed his leg, hovered, then settled on his thigh. Oh, hell. His muscles clenched involuntarily under the tantalizing pressure of her fingertips.
“Guy, your father knew you loved him.”
Her words wiped out the pleasure her touch had bestowed. Unerringly, she’d honed in on the crux of his guilt and pain. “Did he? I’m not so sure.”
“You saw him before he died?”
“I was too late.”
And not for the first time.
He couldn’t stand to see the pity in Avery’s eyes. God help him if she saw all the way to his soul and the festering regret. If only…
“But you spoke to him while we were—” she hesitated “—together. I even took a message for you to call your dad.” She sounded rueful. “You know what? I never even realized I was talking to the legendary Donald Jarrod.”
Just as well.
Otherwise he might never have discovered that all Avery wanted was a man made of gold. She would’ve taken care to hide her avaricious streak from him, would never have gone after Jeff. He didn’t voice the cynical thought. Instead he swung the SUV left into a lane lined with poplars.
“I saw my father not long before I met you. He came to New York.” Because Guy had refused to go to Aspen. “He wanted me to take over running all the bars and restaurants at Jarrod Ridge.” He gave a crooked smile. “I refused. Then he died. Now I’m doing what he asked, anyway.”
“And you wish you’d told him yes while he was alive.”
Bull’s eye.
Guy swung the wheel, pulling the SUV onto the shoulder of the road, then turned in his seat to face her.
The understanding and empathy that glimmered in her eyes nearly undid him. He forced out a shuddering breath, and a heartbeat later he hauled her into his arms.
“Your father knows you loved him,” she murmured against his parka.
That uncertainty lay at the root of Guy’s guilt. He’d resisted all his father’s calls to return. Deep down he’d blamed his father for driving them apart after his mother’s death. “I doubt it—even though I tell myself that one day we’ll meet again, I’m not even sure that I believe that either. But thanks.”
With a sigh, he set her away from him.
Then, narrowing his gaze until he located the minivans in the distance, he put the SUV back into gear and trod on the gas to close the gap.
“Guy, my parents died in a boating accident when I was a two-year-old.”
“I didn’t know that.” She’d never told him that—he wondered what other vital, formative information she’d withheld.
“Uncle Art used to tell me I carried them with me, in my heart. They were with me all the time. But that worried me—I didn’t want them in my heart, I wanted to know they were up there.” Avery pointed through the windshield to the blue sky overhead. “It’s so perfect, so blue, so clear. How could there not be heaven and angels? I used to tell Uncle Art that one day I’d go there to visit them.”
So she still believed in angels and ever-after. How’d he missed this softer, more idealistic side to her? Guy wondered what other illusions she still clung to. “You wanted to visit them up there even though you’re scared of heights?”
A quick sideways glance revealed her smile and the dimple in her cheek. “You know, I never gave that a thought—I told my Aunt I could catch a plane from LAX.”
Guy couldn’t help himself, he gave a shout of laughter.
High above where the balloons floated sunrays glinted off a plane. “Matt is somewhere up there,” Avery said suddenly.
He sobered. “Matt?”
“My cousin.” There was an odd note in her voice. “You’ve seen him.”
He couldn’t remember meeting her cousin. One thing his father’s death had brought home was it was often better to say nothing than to mouth an inane bunch of platitudes at someone’s loss. First her parents, then her cousin, Matt. He decided to keep it factual.
“I don’t remember meeting him. Was it in New York?”
“No, last night. In the sky lounge.”
Confused, he slowed and turned his head to stare at her.
“Dark hair. Tall.” She held her hand above her head, almost touching the roof of the SUV. “We shared a drink. You came in. And left before I could introduce you. He was at the champagne-and-oyster party the previous night, too. He flew home today.”
Her cousin. He switched his attention back to the road. The man who’d hugged her…was her cousin Matt. Not dead.
And not her lover.
Guy felt himself flush. After a moment of feeling like a complete idiot, he laughed. “You should have told me.”
“And ruined your fun?”
The agony of emotion that had stabbed him when she’d embraced Matt last night had been anything but funny.
“Not nice,” he said reprovingly.
Avery sounded unrepentant. “Serves you right for jumping to conclusions.”
“When you said he was up there, I thought you meant he was dead. Like my father.”
He nosed the SUV through an open gate into a field and came to a stop beside the chase vehicles. By the time he got to the passenger door, Avery was already on the ground.
“Guy—” she touched his arm “—I’m so sorry.”
Guy wished he’d kept his mouth shut. He didn’t want her feeling pity for him. He wanted her teasing humor back. Everyone had been p**syfooting around the family since his father’s death almost six weeks ago.
“There’s a lot to do,” he said gruffly. “And almost two dozen hungry people who have just come off the high of a lifetime to feed.”
Guy was right. It was hectic.
After the balloonists landed the pilots shepherded them together for a celebration ceremony. Avery was conscious of the wonder on the faces of the new initiates, but there was no time to watch the ceremony as Guy and members of the Jarrod Ridge catering crew whipped up a scrumptious gourmet breakfast.
Mimosas—the orange juice and champagne fizzing in tall glasses, slices of melon, eggs Benedict, and bagels with smoked salmon and cream cheese were among the delicacies spread out on the tables that had been set up and laid with white linen and gleaming silver cutlery.
“How artistic it looks.” Avery stood back to admire the effect. “I don’t know why you think the menu needs overhauling. It’s perfect.”