“He’s been a thorn in our side for years. Stubborn old goat just laughed at my dad’s offers, which were, by the way, more than generous. So it’s time to try something new.”
“Meaning public humiliation.”
Cameron gazed at him. “Whatever works. That overlook is a security threat and I’m tired of worrying about it. I will get that land. In any case, I have to go now. Good luck with your talk.”
“Thanks.” Roarke couldn’t argue that the Gentrys needed to own that promontory. A pack of Weres required privacy. He thought again of the redhead and hoped to hell she wouldn’t become a problem.
Three hours later, when she walked into the Rotary Club luncheon in the banquet room of a downtown hotel, he had a hunch she was going to be a very big problem, because the first thing he noticed about her was the way she smelled. Scent was all-important to a Were, and this woman’s aroma filled him with a longing so deep he lost his place in the conversation he’d been having with a couple of club members.
Absorbed as he was by her scent, he wasn’t immune to her visual appeal, either. A tiara of raindrops glittered in her bright red hair, a white trench coat was belted around her tiny waist, and her stiletto heels drew his attention to her shapely legs.
As she unfastened the coat to reveal an emerald-green knit dress, his gaze traveled back upward and he felt a visceral tug. It wasn’t that her figure was spectacular, but something about the fit of the dress made him long to peel it off. Not good. He wasn’t in Portland for any sexual conquests, no matter how much a woman appealed to him.
Other members greeted her politely, but no one acted as if they knew her, so she must not be a regular member. She leaned close to someone as if asking a question. Then her gaze swept the room and she headed directly for Roarke’s table, bringing all those lovely pheromones with her.
He stood, noticing that he didn’t tower over her the way he did with most women. Even taking her heels into account, she had to be at least five-nine in bare feet. Thinking of her in bare feet was an erotic exercise in itself.
God help him, he did favor tall women. They were built for so many interesting sexual positions that weren’t possible between a tall man and a short woman. Not that he needed to be thinking about sexual positions in the middle of a Rotary Club luncheon.
Her blue-eyed glance traveled over him and her freckled cheeks grew pink as if she liked what she saw, too. He’d have to be made of ice not to react to that kind of obvious feminine approval. Roarke was a lot of things, but stoic he was not. He gave her his best winning smile.
She smiled back, revealing an adorable little gap between her two front teeth. Then she held out her hand. “Dr. Wallace, I’m Abby Winchell.”
The name wasn’t familiar, but her hand in his felt perfect—warm, soft, and slender. He breathed her in and barely kept himself from groaning with pleasure. “When someone calls me Dr. Wallace I always feel as if I should be wearing a stethoscope,” he said. “Plain old Roarke’s fine.”
She beamed at him. “All right, Roarke. I’m looking forward to your talk.”
Despite struggling with sensory overload, he managed to say something halfway appropriate in response. “So you’re interested in cryptozoology?”
“I was as a kid.” She glanced down and gently extricated her hand from his.
Great. Apparently he’d held the handshake longer than the socially acceptable two seconds. At least he hadn’t hauled her into his arms. “Would you like to sit down?” Would you like to leave with me right this minute and check into a hotel room upstairs?
“I’m afraid your table is already filled.”
He glanced at the head table and sure enough, every seat but his was taken. He should be glad of that because he needed to nip this instant attraction in the bud for many reasons.
He wasn’t forbidden to have a romantic liaison with a human, but he had to be careful about it. If a woman got too close and began to suspect that he was not quite the man she’d bargained for, that was a potential security breach for the pack. Roarke’s brother, Aidan, had landed in exactly that fix and there’d been all kinds of trouble, even if he was now married to a human.
Roarke had no intention of following in Aidan’s paw prints. He didn’t believe Weres should mate for life with humans. It was just too complicated. That issue aside, Roarke had two important assignments here in Portland, and allowing sex to overrule duty was frowned upon in the Wallace pack. Translated, that meant he didn’t have time to fool around on this trip. He had a mated Bigfoot pair to find, and no telling how long that would take.
“I’d better find a seat before they start serving the meal,” Abby said. “I just wanted to introduce myself and see if you’d be available after your talk in case I have some questions.”
Now there was a really bad idea, but his libido trumped his brain. “Sure, I have some spare time.”
“Great. There’s a quaint little bar called Flannigan’s in this hotel. I’ll buy you a drink.”
He heard himself agree to that suggestion, too. But it was only one drink. One harmless drink with a beautiful redhead. A beautiful, tall redhead with eyes like sapphires, who had spied him roaming the Gentry property as a wolf.
Maybe having a drink with her was actually a good idea. He could plant some story about the Gentrys offering to dog-sit for a friend. That would solve any lingering issue over what she might have seen this morning. So meeting the willowy, wonderfully scented Abby for drinks was okay. Provided, of course, that he kept his libido under control.
But as he watched her walk away, her h*ps swaying gently, he realized his libido had been in charge all along.
Chapter 2
She was in luck. Under that cheesy getup, Dr. Roarke Wallace was one hot guy. Give him a surfboard and a wetsuit and he could be a California surfer dude, complete with the sun-streaked blond hair and killer green eyes. She’d love to see what those eyes looked like minus the wire-rimmed cheaters.
Even better, Roarke had reacted well to her quickly created outfit. She’d packed only jeans and sweatshirts, her usual Portland gear. Consequently she’d had to spend the morning on a power shopping spree at Pioneer Place, change in a public bathroom, and then stash her other clothes in Grandpa Earl’s pickup.
But Roarke’s expression as she’d walked into the meeting had justified all the trouble plus the damage to her credit card. Here she’d expected to work her wiles on a pudgy, middle-aged scholar with an attitude, and instead she’d been blessed with Roarke.
Spending time over a drink in Flannigan’s would be no hardship at all. And unless she’d read him wrong, he’d be willing to listen to what she had to say about Grandpa Earl and his dedication to the Bigfoot myth.
She found a seat at a table populated mostly with real estate brokers. First she identified herself as an insurance claims adjuster visiting her grandfather, and everyone was fine with that. The conversation flowed easily through the salad course and the main entree.
But right before dessert, someone thought to ask whose granddaughter she was. The name Earl Dooley apparently left them all at a loss for words. Abby guessed that they’d bought into the current theory that her grandfather was a kook.
Abby pushed aside her chocolate cake, no longer hungry. “I don’t know what he saw, but he’s studied Bigfoot for years. I’m willing to believe this was the real deal.” She wasn’t quite as convinced as all that, but Grandpa Earl deserved to be defended and nobody else was volunteering for the job.
A balding man in a gray suit cleared his throat. “I’m not calling your grandfather a liar, Abby. But everyone’s eyesight gets worse as they get older. Earl’s what . . . seventy-eight?”
“Seventy-seven.” Abby’s jaw tightened. “But the picture proves that something was out there, and whatever it was stunk something terrible. No hiker would smell that bad, no matter how many days they’d skipped a shower.”
“But maybe a skunk was in the area,” said a blond woman in a purple turtleneck. “When our dog flushed a skunk, I thought we’d never get rid of the smell.”
Abby didn’t want to admit she’d thought of the skunk angle. Or that Grandpa Earl’s fierce yearning to see Bigfoot might have influenced his description of the sighting. “All I know is that my grandfather has lived in this area all his life, and I think he’d recognize the smell of a skunk.”
A brunette dressed all in black with silver jewelry frowned and started to say something, but the table was spared her opinion when Roarke was introduced. Abby didn’t expect Grandpa Earl to get any better treatment from Roarke’s lecture, but at least he was yummy to look at. She was digging those broad shoulders and his square jaw.
He needed someone to dress him, though. His lack of a wedding ring and the dopey outfit suggested he wasn’t married. His corduroy jacket wasn’t bad, but the plaid vest and bow tie were ridiculous. If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was channeling Professor Henry “Indiana” Jones Jr.
“The idea of a mystical creature living in the Pacific Northwest originated with the indigenous tribes.” Roarke touched a button on his laptop and the screen behind him lit up with a crude drawing of Bigfoot. “Humans have always fantasized about megafauna cryptids like the Yeti and Bigfoot.”
Even if Roarke was about to rain on Grandpa Earl’s parade, Abby thought he was unbelievably cute as he threw out terms like megafauna cryptids. She had a weakness for brainy guys who spouted jargon, especially when they looked like Roarke.
He showed the audience a few more slides reputed to be of Bigfoot. “We seem to have an innate need to imagine something larger than life.” He glanced at Abby.
She had the urge to laugh. There was no chance in hell he’d made a sexual reference just now, but that’s where her mind was at the moment. Although she had zero intention of seducing the bodacious professor, she amused herself by wondering what sex with him would be like and whether certain parts of him would be larger than life.
Roarke hesitated. “But wanting to believe in something doesn’t make it so. These creatures are not real.”
She met his gaze and had the craziest impression that he didn’t believe what he was saying. But that couldn’t be right. He was a man of science, brought here specifically so he could blast this myth out of the water. She must be imagining things.
“Purely in biological terms, the existence of Bigfoot is an impossibility, especially in this area,” Roarke continued. “Climate and food supply issues would preclude establishing a large enough breeding population to guarantee survival. And, as most of you know, no one’s ever found the remains of a Bigfoot specimen. That alone is enough to convince any thinking person.”
As Abby listened to him, logic warred with loyalty. His argument was convincing, and he looked damned good making it, too. If he’d come to Portland on his own, motivated by scientific curiosity, she might be more willing to accept what he was saying. But the Gentrys had sponsored his visit, so in her view, his argument was tainted by the Gentrys’ desire to get Earl Dooley’s land.
Nope, she was still going to believe in Grandpa Earl’s sighting. The kid in her wanted it to be true, even if the practical adult she’d become agreed with Roarke. Thinking of Bigfoot as real brought back the magic she’d felt as an eight-year-old walking through those mysterious woods.
Grandpa Earl was the dreamer of the family, and her parents used to worry that she’d take after him, partly because she was the only one who’d inherited his red hair, although his was now snow white. She hadn’t taken after him, though.
To the great relief of her mom and dad, she’d picked a solid career in insurance, one that fit in well with the rest of her relatives. Her mother and father ran an auto-parts store. Her brother, Pete, was an accountant. Her aunt and uncle owned several fast-food franchises and both her cousins were in business school.
Last year Abby had almost married an insurance agent she’d met through work. She’d broken up with him over what everyone else called a stupid reason. He didn’t think kids should be encouraged to believe in Santa Claus. Abby knew Santa Claus wasn’t an actual person who flew all over the world delivering toys, but for the first six years of her life she’d thought he did, and she wasn’t willing to rob her children of that innocent joy.
She wondered if Roarke had believed in Santa Claus when he was a kid, or if he’d been a child prodigy who’d always been as mercilessly scientific as he seemed now. He continued with his PowerPoint presentation by showing a photograph that looked very much like her grandfather’s, except that only one Bigfoot was pictured instead of a pair.
“The person who took this photo up in Washington near Mount Rainier was positive he’d seen Bigfoot,” Roarke said. “It was an honest mistake, not an attempt to defraud. But soon afterward a hiker came forward and identified himself as the one in the photograph. The hiker agreed to pose in the same area in similar weather and at the same time of day, and this is the result.” Roarke showed another shot almost identical to the first.
Abby noticed her tablemates sneaking glances at her, and she had to admit the evidence was damning. But what about the smell? Grandpa Earl had been very specific about the smell, and he wouldn’t confuse skunks with Sasquatch.
It was as if Roarke had read her mind. “Our local celebrity Mr. Dooley, who claims to have seen a mated pair, says the stench was unmistakable. Unfortunately for the veracity of his story, that stench could be any number of less exotic things—a skunk, a dead animal in the underbrush, even a colony of feral cats.”
With a sigh, Abby acknowledged that could be true. Roarke wasn’t destroying her grandfather’s claim with ridicule. Instead he was quietly dismantling it with clear and unassailable logic, which was much more effective. She’d been faced with that kind of reasoning all her life, which was why she’d given up on tales of unicorns, frogs turning into princes, and Bigfoot.