number is on the paper work in the car. I’ll go give him a call. Alec, it was nice meeting you. Welcome to Alaska.” Anya waved at him and headed toward the SUV parked on the edge of the street.
Relief, mixed with a healthy dose of annoyance, had washed over Alec when he’d first spotted the unfamiliar vehicle. The new owner had shown up. Finally. For nearly a week, he’d been muddling his way through things until someone who knew what they were doing decided to join him.
Alec glanced at Zoey Hathaway standing beside him. Clearly, she didn’t know the first thing about reindeer. He couldn’t help but wonder about her relationship with Gus. Judging by the shock etched on her delicate features, she’d never set foot on the ranch before. It should have seemed strange for a student to inherit her flight instructor’s property like this. Should have, but didn’t. Not really. Zoey seemed exactly like the sort of person who skipped through life as though it were a cakewalk.
She was pretty. Long, silky blond hair...and those luminous green eyes. Even out here where the temperature dipped below twenty degrees, she was perfectly put together. She wore fur-trimmed boots, black leggings and a cheery red parka. Her winter hat was also red, decorated with—irony of ironies—prancing reindeer.
Everything about her was sweet. Too sweet. Like the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus all rolled into one perky package.
And now she was his boss.
The very idea gave him a headache.
It wasn’t a cruel enough twist of fate that he’d ended up on a reindeer farm? Four weeks before Christmas? The ad he’d answered on Craigslist for a ranch hand never mentioned reindeer. Granted, the work was in Alaska. But he’d expected horses. Or elk. Not Rudolph.
How did a boy who’d never had a Christmas tree, never sat on Santa’s knee, grow into a man who lived on a reindeer farm in Alaska?
He pushed the thought away. He was here now, so he might as well deal with it. He wasn’t going anywhere. Not without the money he was owed. “Shall I show you?”
Zoey snapped out of her daze and blinked up at him. “The reindeer?”
“Yes. Would you like to see them?”
She nodded. “Very much.”
With a flick of his wrist, he cranked the motorcycle to life. “Hop on.”
“On that thing?” She frowned at the bike.
“We’re driving all of fifty feet. You’re not scared, are you?” He offered her his helmet.
She jerked it out of his hand. “Please. Of course not.”
He watched her as she removed her hat and replaced it with the helmet. It was far too big. Alec did his best to suppress his amused grin. Something told him now was definitely not the time to laugh at her.
He scooted forward on the seat of the bike, making room for her behind him. Zoey swung her leg over and situated herself on the seat. Alec waited for her to clasp her arms around his waist or, at the very least, grab hold of his parka.
Nothing happened.
He glanced over his shoulder. “You might want to hang on. You can wrap your arms around me. I won’t bite.”
He couldn’t see a thing through the face shield of the helmet, but he would have bet she was rolling her eyes.
“I’ve known you all of five minutes,” she said.
“Suit yourself.” He released the clutch, and the tires rolled and crunched over the snow.
Alec did his best to make the ride a smooth one. Tossing his new boss out of her seat didn’t seem like a smart thing to do, even though she would have had it coming. Apparently, she was every bit as stubborn as she was cute. Great.
Despite the fact that Alec had cleared the path with a snowblower an hour or so ago, it was a bit bumpy. Just as they made their way around the log cabin, which stood at the front of the property, the bike hit a slippery groove in the hard-packed snow. The motorcycle lurched to the right. Alec corrected the steering before Zoey could take a tumble, but immediately afterward he felt her arms wrap around his waist.
I told you so, his thoughts screamed. Even so, having her arms around him wasn’t altogether unpleasant.
She held on tight until they reached the fence and Alec cut the engine. Then she hopped off. With record-breaking swiftness.
“You didn’t ride all the way here from Washington on this thing, did you?” she asked as she removed the helmet.
He took it from her and hung it on the handlebars. “How else do you think it got here?”
“It sounds a little dangerous. Not to mention cold.” She made an attempt to smooth her hair. It wasn’t all that successful.
For some reason, the sight of her—cheeks pink, perfect blond hair slightly mussed—made him smile. “You don’t like motorcycles?”
“I didn’t say that.” She didn’t have to. “It just doesn’t seem like the most practical method of transportation this close to the arctic circle. But suit yourself.”
Oh, I will. He didn’t need her permission to drive his motorcycle. He could ride around in a flying saucer if he wanted. She might be his boss, but she wasn’t his mother.
Not that his mother had ever cared a whit about him. She’d been too busy getting high and avoiding the angry swings of his father to pay much attention to him.
He stalked toward the fence without saying a word. Zoey crunched through the snow behind him.
The Chugach mountain range rose before them in jagged silver peaks. Low-hanging clouds obscured the mountaintops, and a layer of what looked like fog spread out over the base of the foothills. Then the fog rolled toward them. A spectacular set of antlers came into view. Then another, and another.
Dozens of reindeer trotted toward them, kicking up snow so thick that their legs were barely visible. They appeared to float in a snowy mist, as though carried by a cloud of glittering ice crystals.
“Oh, my,” Zoey whispered.
Alec recognized the wonder in her tone. He’d felt the same way the first time he’d seen the reindeer. As much as he hated to admit it, the sight of them still sometimes took his breath away. Even if the whole thing was a little too Norman Rockwell for his taste.
“Beautiful, aren’t they?” he asked, his throat growing tight.
“They sure are.” Her green eyes sparkled. “Are they always so quiet? I feel as if I’m looking at a dream...something that’s not quite real.”
He took a sidelong glance at Zoey and felt a wholly unexpected flicker of connection with her. “They typically don’t make much noise. I think they like the cold. They seem happy to run and play most of the time.”
Then she opened her mouth, and the moment was gone. “You mean play reindeer games?”
She just had to go there—the saccharine-sweet Christmas route. He really should have expected it.
With great reluctance, Alec said, “I suppose you could call it that.”
She laughed, oblivious to the mercurial change in his mood. “I just had no idea. Gus never told me about any of this.”
And yet the man had given it to her. All of it. “I suppose this sort of thing happens to you all the time.”
She frowned but somehow managed to look all wide-eyed and innocent. “What sort of thing?”
“Inheriting reindeer farms and the like.” He hadn’t meant to inject acid into his tone, but there it was all the same.
“Actually, no. It doesn’t.” Zoey’s eyes flashed. Alec was thrown for a minute by the fire in her gaze. Fire aimed directly at