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couldn’t calm her tonight. She was a wreck. Over some guy
who wouldn’t look twice at her if she wasn’t standing right in the way of his investors.
But when he’d almost kissed her? Her skin heated again at the memory.
    With a grunt of frustration, she stood and stalked back
into her cabin. She picked up her notes she’d taken on the wild buckwheat and
settled on her bed again. Leaf size, color gradient, stem width… At last her
precise notes doused any lingering want or confusion and she settled down for a
few hours’ sleep.
    ***
    Rick pressed upward, his muscles trembling from the
exertion. Sweat trickled into his eyes but he sucked in another breath and held
his position. Blood pounded in his ears and his legs flexed. One… two… three… With
a whoosh of breath, he slowly lowered his arms. The stacked weights behind his
head groaned as he released the bar. He arched his back against the bench,
easing the tug between his shoulder blades. An hour in the weight room of the
fitness center and at last his body was beginning to forget about Harmony.
    For the past four days he’d thought of little else but the
pretty plant girl. He’d golfed and swam and jogged over every damn trail this
place had and he still couldn’t get her out of his mind. The director of the
Institute finally deemed him worthy of another meet but Rick still hadn’t
learned anything of value. The fate of the scrubby plant was still under advisement
and Chapman was spinning its wheels. More than once over these past four days
his father had found it necessary to check up on him. It was obvious Bill was
scrutinizing his every move. Terrific.
    He sat up and grabbed the towel draped over the weight bench
and rubbed it over his face. God, if it weren’t for the promise he’d made his
mother he’d blow off this job and do what he wanted to. He choked on a laugh.
What the hell was that, anyway? It had been so long since he even thought about
his own dreams and aspirations, he didn’t even know what they were anymore.
    Bill officially left the family when Rick was twelve, but
it had been years earlier that the man separated himself from his family. Rick
was the oldest, with Jake following behind by three years. The youngest and only
girl, Cassie, was barely six years old when Bill left. Rick threw down the
towel. At least Bill’s support payments had visited regularly.
    From the moment his parents’ divorce was final his mother had
tried to make up for Bill’s absence. Her insistence that Rick had to prove
himself to Bill still echoed in his mind.
    Well, maybe he’d done enough to prove himself. Top grades
in high school, excellence at track, entrance into exclusive Boston College—none of it had brought anything but more money from his father. Rick hadn’t
thought about it at the time he was in school, but taking business courses and accounting
should’ve been the first sign that he’d never break free of Bill Chapman. The
job offer as field man wasn’t the end as Rick saw it, either. He wanted the top
position at Chapman. But more than that. He wanted his father to finally admit his
firstborn was worth more than the money he made the company.
    He stood and crossed to the leg press machine. He sat and
moved the pin to just beyond his last weight limit. Why let his arms and chest
have all the fun, right? Closing his eyes, he pressed and released over and
over until his thighs screamed for mercy. With a soft grunt he let the weights
settle. His whole body reverberated with a low no-pain-no-gain thrumming, and
his mind finally focused on something other than his attraction to Harmony
Brooks and his toadying to Bill Chapman.
    For the last thirty minutes or so, at least.
    ***
    Harmony returned to the Institute. Another lovely day, another
solitary ride to the Village Center. Another quick conversation with Hettie. Thank
goodness the woman didn’t know about her dinner with Rick the other night. She
wouldn’t want to guess the open