River Rapture

  Dedication

  I’d like to thank the men in my life: Dick, Hank, and Ryan.

  Chapter One

  Michon Lycan slipped out of the bucket seat of her two-year-old compact car, locked the door, and paused to adjust the leather belt on her lavender jumpsuit. Even with her discount at Chantilla the outfit had cost a week’s salary. This was the first day she had worn it; shouldn’t she be facing the next eight hours with enthusiasm?

  But for some reason Michon could put no name to, which had been growing ever stronger for the past month, her feet in their white high-heeled sandals were dragging. Being in charge of the sportswear department for Chantilla was supposed to be one of the most glamorous jobs a woman in the southern part of Oregon could hope for. Hadn’t Michon given up the mind-draining secretarial job she’d held for two years to take advantage of a rare opening in the most exclusive dress shop in the city? Her friends could barely contain their envy when Michon told them. “Have you seen the women who work there? What exquisite creatures! They’re always being called to model at fashion shows. And the customers! You can bet they don’t worry about paying the gas bill.”

  Well, Michon had her job. In a year she’d worked her way into her present position through a combination of perseverance and acceptance of the undeniable fact that Chantilla maintained a certain image, and the employees who did the most to promote that image were the ones who were selected for promotions. Michon wore the proper clothes, drove a car with as much status as she could afford, had her hair styled professionally, even attended a workshop on makeup. True, her two years of college business background didn’t hurt, but she’d only be fooling herself if she believed her brain and not her form was her most valuable commodity.

  Come on, old girl, she admonished herself. You wanted to play the Chantilla game. You’re a member of the cast. Now get a move on.

  The morning started slowly, which did little to blunt the edge of Michon’s mood. If she’d been running she wouldn’t have had time to ask why the combination of expensive perfume and even more expensive fabric was setting her stomach to churning. But the summer line of designer sportswear was on the racks. No new shipments were due today. And although it was still spring, fall orders had already been placed. The few customers in the store this morning were being catered to by the other employees.

  That left Michon with little to think about except the state of her stomach. If she’d had some breakfast, maybe noon wouldn’t seem so far away, but Michon was on another of what appeared to be an endless parade of diets. The wisp of leather around her waist fitted loosely enough, but it wouldn’t stay that way if she allowed herself to eat the way she had when she’d been going to college and burning the candle at both ends.

  Michon was experimenting with some jewelry changes on a pair of mannequins wearing lace body suits in complementary pastels when Traci Black from lingerie wandered by. “How much are those little numbers?” Traci asked, nodding approval as Michon slipped a thin gold chain around a mannequin’s neck.

  Michon grimaced. “Don’t ask. How these outfits wound up in sportswear instead of lingerie is beyond me. Can you imagine anyone doing exercises in fabric that delicate?”

  Traci winked. “There’s exercise, and then there’s exercise. Besides, who are we trying to kid? The women who come into Chantilla aren’t looking for sweat shirts to pull on while they jog around the block. They have to look chic at the health club. Status. That’s what we sell.”

  “At this price they’ll get all the status their pocketbooks can stand. I sure as heck wouldn’t waste money on that worthless fabric—if I had the money to throw away. What are you doing here?” Michon asked. “I thought you were waiting on Mr. Wilkins.”

  It was Traci’s turn to grimace. “The distinguished attorney purchased the required garment necessary to take care of his responsibilities for his wife’s birthday. He also picked up a satin nightgown with a slit that comes clear up to the hipbones. Something makes me think that little number isn’t for Mrs. Wilkins.”

  “Traci!” Michon gasped in mock horror. “You have a suspicious mind.”

  “Just being honest. All I can say is Jim better not ever buy nightgowns for anyone but me.” Traci dropped her eyes to gaze at the diamond on her third finger. “Three more weeks. I don’t know if I can wait. I want to be married so badly I can taste it.”

  Michon listened politely while Traci went on about how the wedding plans were developing. She was happy for Traci, although she was a little concerned that Jim didn’t seem to know what he wanted to do with his life. A couple of years ago Michon would have been a little envious, a little sad that it wasn’t she wearing a ring. But that was back in the days when all her friends were getting married and she was afraid she’d be left at the starting gate. Now, at twenty-seven, Michon was comfortable, knowing that her identity as a person didn’t depend on whether there was a Mrs. in front of her name. Someday, she hoped, there’d be a man to fit into her life. But she wasn’t going to spend her days in a state of suspended animation waiting for that man to arrive. Prince Charmings were a nearly extinct breed. Would-be princesses were better off if they dug in and made their lives as full and rich as possible.

  “Are you going to go on working after you’re married?” Michon asked during a break in Traci’s monologue.

  Traci wrinkled up her nose. “Until we decide to start a family. And maybe after that. Jim isn’t making that much money right now, and I know what it costs to buy a home these days. But it depresses me to think of me twenty years from now still wrapping gifts for rich men to give to their mistresses.”

  Michon started at the tone in Traci’s voice. “You’ll get promotions,” she said, trying to be helpful.

  “I guess. It’s just that I’d like to think there’s life beyond Chantilla.”

  Traci’s words stayed with her, even after a trio of matrons came into the store and Michon busied herself waiting on them. What Traci had said was striking a cord deep inside her, one she was beginning to admit she’d been trying to ignore for too long. As she discussed the relative merits of a hooded jacket versus a velour jogging outfit with a woman who was much more interested in style than practicality, Michon let her eyes roam over Chantilla’s ample floor space. Modernistic mannequins on raised platforms served to distinguish the different departments. Elevator music and the inescapable scent of filtered air, plus the deep sound-cushioning carpeting, gave Michon the feeling that the owners were determined to keep out anything that might detract from a total aura of elegance. A small measure of sunlight was allowed in through tinted windows, but the windows were obviously second in importance to the rich fabric wall covering on the high walls, the recessed ceiling lights. Price tags were small and discreetly placed. There were no garish sale signs, no bargain tables. But what struck Michon most was that except for the staff’s ability to move about, the saleswomen and mannequins appeared to be interchangeable.

  Did her own face register as little emotion as she was seeing on the faces of other employees? Was that because they were all afraid of disturbing their carefully applied makeup, or because being within Chantilla’s walls reduced people to be stereotypes of the Chantilla image? Cool and aloof described the employees all right. The question Michon didn’t like facing was whether emotions could continue to exist in such a sterile exterior location.

  Instead of accepting an invitation to have lunch at the small deli at the other end of the mall, Michon walked through the parking lot to the tree-lined edge of Laurel Hills Park.

  There were few people in the park this time of the day, and Michon elected to sit under one of the oak trees, avoiding wrought-iron benches because the grass looked more comfortable. Her nostrils were hungry for the smell of grass and leaves and di
rt after a morning spent trying to sort through the perfumes each customer adorned herself with. Michon opened the wrapper on her diet lunch bar and bit into it. It did nothing for her taste buds, but she was so hungry she would have settled for anything. As she munched, a park squirrel ventured closer, his twitching nose zeroing in on the morsel in her hand.

  “It’s not good for you,” Michon warned the squirrel. “Probably enough preservatives here to last the rest of both of our lives. How about a trade? You bring me some peanuts and you can have this…whatever it is.”

  The squirrel balanced on its hind legs, studying Michon. In turn Michon’s mood softened. Why did humans ask so much out of life? All anyone really needed was a warm place to sleep, a winter’s supply of nuts, a tree to scamper up. “You’ve got it made, old boy, you know that?” she asked the attentive squirrel. “No car payments. No worrying about getting grass stains on your clothes. No caring whether blue eye shadow goes with green eyes.” She laughed. “You don’t even worry about keeping all your lady friends satisfied, do you? So what if you get fat on peanuts and diet bars? They don’t care. Just do what comes naturally.”

  Michon sighed. She’d been making things so complicated for herself lately by asking questions about where she was heading in her life. Why did she insist on trying to find out why she no longer woke up eager to go to work, whether she really wanted to put so much of her salary on her back?

  “Maybe I just need a vacation,” she told the squirrel. “That’s it. Everyone needs a break, a change of pace.” She opened her second diet bar, stared at it, and then impulsively broke off a piece for the squirrel. “How about a little bribe?” she asked the rodent, who’d moved back a few steps while he lunched on a combination of nuts, coconut, and preservatives held together with honey. “You go to work for me this afternoon. You smile nice for the customers. I’ll stay here and keep my eye out for handouts.”

  “That sounds like an even trade.”

  Michon started, found the source of the deep masculine voice, and stared up at the man standing over her. The sun was behind him so she had to squint, which reduced his features to a blurred, vague outline. “I—” she started and then tried again. “This was a private conversation.”

  “Kind of one-sided, wouldn’t you say?” the shadowy figure clad in dark clothes asked. “I’ve yet to meet a squirrel who was much of a conversationalist.”

  Michon scrambled to her feet, hoping the tall stranger wouldn’t guess she was doing so because she wanted to lessen the feeling that she was being dominated by his size. “Maybe not, but he’s a good listener,” she said. “How much of this did you eavesdrop on?”

  “Not much. Can anyone really get fat on that junk you fed him?”

  Not much! That was a likely story. He’d probably heard everything she’d said. Michon felt her cheeks flame and could only hope that the stranger would think it was her blusher. “I can’t believe I said anything that would interest you.”

  “Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?” he asked in a voice that reached her like the soft whisper of wind in treetops. “You’re right, you know. Sometimes that’s what we need. Someone to listen to us.”

  Michon had been feeling uneasy about talking to a man she didn’t know, especially one whose features were still partially hidden, thanks to the sun’s glare, but what he said sent a wave of understanding through her. He wasn’t laughing at her conversation with the squirrel. He understood. “Maybe we all need a pet squirrel, a permanent listening post,” she suggested as she bent over to collect her purse.

  The stranger was shaking his head as she straightened. “We’d have to keep them in cages so they’d be there when we needed them. I don’t want to cage up anything.”

  “You’re right,” she acknowledged. “Well, it was nice talking to you, but I really do have to get back to work.”

  For a moment Michon thought he was going to touch her, but he didn’t have to. His presence was enough to keep her from walking away. “I thought you didn’t want to go back to work,” he said.

  “I don’t. But I have to pay the bills.” She started to walk back toward the mall and he fell in step with her. For a couple of minutes Michon could think of nothing to say, and the man didn’t seem inclined to break the silence.

  Finally he stopped. It was as if there were an invisible thread between Michon and the stranger. She stopped too. “Do you put, you know, stuff on your hair?” he asked.

  Michon looked up at him. Now she could make out his features—thick black eyebrows, deep-set eyes, slightly sunburned nose, a little-boy quality to the smile that revealed perfect teeth, except for a small chip on one of the lower ones. “What are you talking about?” Should she be offended? It was hard to know, because she was more interested in deciding whether blue or black dominated in his eyes.

  “Well, I don’t really know.” His boyish, almost shy, grin started up again. “I mean your hair is kind of blond, but it’s almost white in places. Does hair really come that way?”

  Michon laughed, her first honest laugh of the day. “With a little help. That’s called streaking. Do you always ask such personal questions of women you’ve just met?”

  He shrugged. “I was curious. By the way, do you know where I might be able to pick up a Duluth pack around here?”

  “A what? I’ve never heard of that.”

  “Never mind. Is this where you work?” the man indicated the ornate brass handles leading the way into Chantilla. “I’ve never been inside a place like that.”

  “Why not?” Michon wasn’t just talking to keep the conversation going. She really wanted to know. A man wearing a chambray shirt with an unironed collar turning up at the ends would turn a head or two in Chantilla, especially when he filled out his faded jeans the way this man did. Somehow she couldn’t imagine him ever being comfortable in one of the raw silk jackets displayed on the male mannequins.

  He shrugged. “No reason to.”

  Unexpectedly Michon found herself laughing. What would the owners think of his casual dismissal of the cultured atmosphere they’d worked so hard to attain? “How would you know?” she teased. “Someday you might need to buy some expensive perfume or a gown for a special woman.”

  “Yeah?” He peered in the glass door a minute. “No. I don’t think so. Not much use for that stuff in a class-three rapid.”

  Michon shook her head. “There you go again, mentioning things I’ve never heard of before. What is this class-three rapid?”

  “It’s a river route with enough obstructions and geological irregularities to require scouting the course before taking a canoe through it,” he said, his tone resembling a class lecture. Then he winked. “I’m sorry. I know most people don’t know what I’m talking about. It’s just that that’s what I do. I have a way of getting carried away about river canoeing.”

  “That’s a job?” Michon stared up at him. At the moment blue dominated in his eyes.

  “Kind of. It’s rather complicated. Don’t you have to get back to work?”

  “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

  For a moment their eyes locked. She could feel the sensation along the length of her spine. “No.”

  “Oh.” Michon was used to holding her own with people. It was necessary in a job as competitive as the one she had. But a few minutes with the tall, sunburned stranger had stripped her of that skill. “Well, I—”

  He stopped her by placing his hand on her shoulder. “I don’t want to make you late. It was nice talking to you.” Before she knew it was going to happen, he’d spun lightly and was walking away from her.

  Michon stared after him, noting the athletic grace to his walk, the hard line of his legs, the powerful shoulders straining against the well-worn shirt. What was his name? She hadn’t learned that simple fact, and yet he’d affected her in a way that reminded her of what it felt like to be singled out by the football captain during the high school prom.

  It wasn’t fair! He shouldn’t be allowed to dr
ift in and out of her life so casually. But what could she do? She could hardly imagine herself running after him, telling him they couldn’t let things end like this. She might be modern and liberated, but that didn’t mean she could tell a stranger that the rest of her day was going to feel hollow because he’d left.

  Michon was barely aware of what she was doing as she went inside and pasted on a smile before waiting on a customer. She ran through the standard nonsense about understanding that the customer wanted to make a fashion statement and that it was her job to help make that statement the most effective, but as she steered the woman to a line of crushed-velvet pants, her mind was on faded blue jeans, worn shoes, and a man who couldn’t care less whether he ever set foot in Chantilla.

  It wasn’t until later in the afternoon that Michon found herself without a customer to muddy up her thoughts. Why had she let him go so easily? And yet he didn’t strike her as the kind of man who would understand a woman who batted her lashes and made veiled hints about getting to know each other better. Maybe she didn’t know his name, but instinct told her that he was a man who laid all his cards on the table and expected others to do the same.

  “If I didn’t know better I’d think you’d had a three-martini lunch,” Traci observed as the women were checking their makeup in the employees’ restroom. “You’re staring right through that mirror.”

  “Am I?” Michon responded vaguely. “Traci, have you ever looked at yourself and admitted that what you’re doing with your life is all wrong?”

  “Now I know you had those three martinis.”

  “No.” Michon stared at her reflection. He hadn’t said whether he liked streaked hair or not, but she was willing to bet he preferred his women to leave their hair to nature. “Traci, what are we doing here?”

  Traci held up a mascara brush. “Putting on our war paint. We wouldn’t want to fall short of the Chantilla image, would we?”

  Michon blinked rapidly in order to clear her vision and then stared at herself intently. Her green eyes were large and expressive, but her lashes and eyebrows needed help in the form of makeup to give them definition. Or did they? Maybe she was trying too hard. Was there anything that inexcusable about pale lashes and eyebrows that faded away to almost nothing as they neared her nose? Where was the real Michon Lycan under all that makeup?