Finding Zoe (Atlantic Divide) by Diane Saxon

to track her down at work too.
    Rapidly losing patience with him for telephoning and herself for being pleased he had, she smacked the telephone three times against the table.
    “What in hell’s name is that?” he yelled.
    “Oh, I’m sorry. I’m trying to dissect a bullock.”
    “Uck. Not a nice job, but what’s the noise?”
    “It’s the meat cleaver; I have to use it to get through the bone. You know, rather than saw it; I have to… chop it.”
    “Jesus Christ, Zoe, you’re sick. I have to go.”
    “Of course you do.”
    She replaced the phone, sat back, and forked another piece of cake into her smiling mouth.

Chapter 6
    She was fooling herself if she thought she could avoid him any longer. It wasn’t fair. To her, her dad, Mac, or Ryan. It was stupid. She’d manipulated her workdays so she was absent when he arrived, and her father had said nothing. In his quiet, diplomatic way, he’d allowed her to do what she wanted, but it wasn’t healthy. For any of them.
    She’d abided by the rules and made sure she stayed out of his way. But it was Mac. He kept phoning her. Initially it was on the days he had seen Ryan to give her an update, but now he seemed to be tracking her down wherever she was and whatever time of the day suited him.
    She needed to sort things out with him. And not just over the phone. It was too easy for him to get away from her. Every time she tried to have a serious conversation with him, he found an excuse to hang up. The best way was to go and see him. Without letting Ryan know.
    Uncomfortable she’d actually considered telling her dad a lie, she stared at herself in the mirror. She’d thought to tell him she was meeting a couple of her girlfriends for a drink, maybe something to eat, but the lie had stuck like a claw in her throat and nearly choked her. But when she’d told him she was going to meet Mac, she’d wished she’d been able to lie. His steady, wise gaze made her want to run and hide.
    She’d changed her clothes three times, and now she looked at herself critically. Pale blue blouse, slim-fitting jeans, and gold sandals. Waist-length hair, loose, curling madly to frame her pale face in a cloud of red. He used to love it when she wore it loose. Sighing, she turned away from the mirror and considered tying her hair back.
    She was supposed to be going to sort him out, not turn him on.
    * * * *
    She knocked on the trailer door. Waited. Her heart hammered. Perhaps she should have phoned first. Impatient, she rapped her knuckles against the door again, louder, and then stepped back feeling foolish. He had obviously gone back to the hotel.
    The door swung open, and there he stood in a pair of faded denim shorts and nothing else. His charcoal-black hair gleamed wet and dense. Droplets of water scattered across his shoulders and dribbled down his chest.
    Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth as her eyes traced a single teardrop while it drizzled a lazy line down the center of his chest, over his glowing tawny skin, gathering speed as it raced farther down to his muscular belly to be sucked into the denim material resting low-slung on his hips.
    Her gaze trailed lower and paused for a moment where the bulge in his shorts appeared to expand. Small, shuddering breaths jerked in through her lungs as her gaze tracked still farther, down the long length of his thick muscular thighs and bulging calves, onward to his long, slim, naked feet.
    “Did you want something?” Her eyes shot up to meet his gleaming obsidian ones. He raised one arm and leaned it negligently across the top of the doorway, exposing the tender underside of his arm and stretching his chest muscles out for her delectation. One quizzical black eyebrow rose as he perused her.
    Swallowing, she tried to open her mouth to speak, gulping uncontrollably. Jesus, he was beautiful. So beautiful her eyes ached, and she could feel the violent throbbing in every pulse in her body.
    He adjusted his stance, waiting for her to