LITMIR.BIZ

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man can set a float plane down in a puddle, her brother had claimed, and take off in winds strong enough to knot a plane’s wings.

      Since Sam was a bush pilot himself, a job that had prematurely grayed their mother and probably his wife, that was undoubtedly high praise.

      She had also heard that he was divorced. That, she’d learned from Tina because her sister-in-law had once mentioned how often Zach showed up for meals at their house. It had been Tina, too, who had mentioned that the man was like a brother to Sam, which, Lauren supposed, accounted for his familiarity with the house and his lack of hesitation entering it.

      “It’s not in there.”

      Lauren whirled around from where she stood by the sofa. It didn’t seem possible that a man his size could move so quietly, but she hadn’t heard a single board squeak when he’d walked back up the hall.

      With his hands jammed on his lean hips, his wide brow furrowed, he scanned the toy-cluttered surfaces in the room. “Have you seen it?” he asked, not bothering to look at her before turning away to check the credenza behind him. “What I’m looking for is in a file. Manila. Eight-by-ten. There’s a green label on it that says To Be Shipped.”

      “I haven’t seen anything like that. Why is this so important?” she asked, leaning down to check through the stack of newspapers, magazines and children’s books on the coffee table. She was more than willing to help. The sooner he found what he was looking for, the sooner he would leave.

      “Because we have a pilot who can’t take off without it. We’re losing money every hour that plane sits on the ground.”

      His hurried search of the credenza proved fruitless. Though he didn’t swear, he looked as if he were about to when he turned to the kitchen to check the table and counters in there.

      “I can’t figure out why he even took it with him,” he muttered, stepping through the doorway. “The man isn’t paying attention to anything he’s doing anymore.”

      Lauren’s spine snapped straight. He was talking to himself. Not her. But she couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. “I would imagine that if Sam is preoccupied it’s because he just lost his wife.”

      The sound of movement in the kitchen came to an abrupt halt. In the sudden quiet, she heard nothing but the rattle of a loose vent as the furnace kicked on and the methodical tick of the antique grandfather clock guarding the wall beside the front door. Her heart bumped to that heavy rhythm as Zach’s imposing frame filled the kitchen doorway.

      He stood like a dark sentinel, unmoving, ready to challenge. “There is no one more aware of that than I am,” he informed her tightly. “And his preoccupation is only getting worse, which isn’t helping any of us right now.”

      “Isn’t it us who should be helping him?”

      The quicksilver gray of his eyes turned chill. “I’m doing what I can,” he informed her, his tone heavy with restraint. “I’ve covered for him as much as I can. But I’m not in a position to cut him any more slack.” His voice dropped like a rock in a well. “Until he gets himself together, I’m going to have to ground him.”

      Lauren stared in disbelief when he left her standing there to resume his search of the kitchen. She knew that the only things holding Sam together right now were his children and his job. Sam loved to fly. He lived for it. It was all he’d wanted to do since he was five years old. She didn’t understand his obsession at all, but she didn’t have to understand it to know how much of an escape it could offer. No one knew better than she did how pain could be anesthetized by the demands of work. And she was unable to imagine how her brother would cope if his arrogant, insensitive, stone-for-a-heart partner denied him the lifeline his work provided.

      The heavy ache in her chest was for her brother as she headed through the kitchen doorway. The pressure behind it was caused purely by the man who’d just managed to push every protective button she possessed.

      “I was under the impression you were his friend.”

      He stood with his back to her at the white-tiled counter bisecting the high-beamed room. Beyond the counter, the small family room was occupied by an old pot-bellied stove, a round oak dining table, a high chair and a playpen. The side with the modern electric range was bright with hanging copper pots, yellow curtains and Jason’s artwork papering the fridge.

      All she really noticed when Zach turned was that he had the nerve to look insulted.

      “I am his friend.”

      “It doesn’t sound like it.”

      His eyebrow hitched. “Do you want to explain that?”

      “If you were a friend,” she told him, more than ready to comply, “you’d be more concerned with how difficult things are for Sam right now than with how his preoccupation is affecting business. You’d be trying to make things easier. Not take away all he has left.” She understood corporate concerns. She also understood that things happened to people and that temporary adjustments had to be made for their circumstances. Even Andy, who often acted as if compassion were spelled with four letters, grasped that concept. Mostly, she understood that a friend did what he could to help. Not hurt. “You might not care about anything but planes and profits, but Tina was everything to my brother.”

      Something dangerous washed over Zach’s carved features as he took a step closer to where she’d stopped near the middle of the polished pine floor. He took two more, forcing her to either tip her head back to see his face or retreat.

      Every instinct in her body screamed for her to back up. Years of having to claw to stay in place allowed her to hold her ground.

      “How do you know what I care about?” His voice was deceptively calm, dangerously so. “How could you possibly have any idea how I feel about anything? We’ve never even talked to each other before.”

      The line of his jaw was as sharp as a blade, the cut of his mouth blatantly sensual. She was aware of the heat and tension radiating from his body, the fresh air in his clothes, and the scent of something spicy and decidedly male clinging to his skin. Mostly, she was conscious of the bold male confidence that had allowed him to step uninvited into her space.

      Everything about him seemed to taunt, unnerve or disturb her, but she was too concerned about his heartless attitude toward her brother to worry about how easily he overrode the air of calm control she managed to present to the rest of the world.

      Her voice low in deference to the child sleeping three doors down the hall, she purposefully ignored the trip-hammer beat of her pulse. “I don’t need to have talked to you before to know what…or who…you care about. I believe you just made it obvious.”

      “The only thing obvious is that one of us has no idea what’s going on here.”

      “And that would be you.”

      A muscle in his jaw twitched.

      In response, Lauren felt her stomach knot. She couldn’t believe she was challenging this stranger. He was ex-military, a jet jockey—a test pilot, she reminded herself, thinking his old occupation spoke volumes about the sort of man he was. He had actually strapped himself into what amounted to an untried, controlled explosion and blasted himself through the atmosphere at speeds that broke barriers she couldn’t begin to fathom. A man like that would have to be utterly confident, disciplined, fearless.

      Totally insane, too, in her admittedly unadventurous estimation.

      He would also have to believe that he would always come out on top.

      That thought threatened to have her add a couple of inches to the charged space separating them. Confrontation wasn’t her style at all. If anything, she was known among the people who worked under her for her coolness under fire, her fairness, her tact. But she didn’t get a chance to wonder at how swiftly this man had stripped her sense of diplomacy. She didn’t have the opportunity to see if he would attempt to defend himself, either—not that she could imagine any possible,

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