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“Well, hell, I thought you were, too.” He slammed her door shut and strode to the driver’s side of the Cherokee.
“I just meant—”
“I know what you meant, lady.” He climbed in, jammed the key into the ignition, threw the rig into reverse, then shoved it into first. Within seconds the Jeep had emerged from beneath the hotel and joined the traffic of the clogged Portland streets. A light mist was falling, catching in the headlights and adding a silvery sheen to the streets.
“I thought we were going to be civil to each other.”
He slid her a noncommittal glance.
“Why do you hate me?”
His lips compressed as he headed east across the river.
“Zach?”
“I don’t hate you. I don’t even know you.”
“You act as if I’m poison.”
His jaw clenched visibly as he stopped for a light. “Maybe you are.”
“Why won’t you give me a chance?”
He practically stood on the brakes as the light changed at a crosswalk and an elderly couple crossed the street. Zach’s fingers drummed impatiently against the steering wheel and the instant the light changed, he tromped on the accelerator. “I’m not giving you a chance, because I don’t buy your story, Adria.”
“Why not have an open mind?”
“What good would it do?”
“Nothing. For you, I suppose.” She crossed her arms over her chest and glared out the windshield. There was no use trying to force him to believe in her when she didn’t really believe in herself. But she’d hoped that he would become her ally. She looked at him from the corner of her eye and felt an impending sense of doom. Of course he couldn’t be her friend. If he weren’t her half-brother, she would find him attractive. Long and lean, rugged and cynical, quick to anger but with a killer smile that could warm even the most frigid heart. Intense. Cocky. Irreverent. Just plain bad news.
He caught her looking at him. Shifting down, he shot her another murderous glance. “You look a helluva lot like Kat, I’ll give you that.”
“Is that a crime?”
“It should be,” he growled.
“Kat…is that what you called Katherine?”
“Behind her back.”
She leaned against the door and rubbed the kinks from her neck. “What did you call her to her face?”
He snorted. “Mommy dearest.”
“What?”
“That was a joke, Adria.” Zach’s ex
pression hardened. “To be honest, I tried to avoid her.”
“Why?” She watched as his fingers curled around the steering wheel in a death grip.
“She was trouble,” he said as he flipped on the radio and soft jazz filled the interior. So he didn’t want to talk about Katherine. Adria wasn’t surprised. Throughout her research, she’d learned very little of the woman she suspected had borne her. It seemed as if Katherine had been content to let her husband bask in the spotlight; she’d always hidden in the wings, hauntingly beautiful and supportive. Adria wondered if Katherine truly avoided the limelight or if her powerful husband had found ways to keep his family, including his beautiful wife, in the shadows.
Adria didn’t know much about London’s mother; the information had been spotty, but she’d thought Katherine and Witt had met in Canada. After a whirlwind romance, they’d been married, to the shock and horror of Witt’s entire family. That was to be expected, Adria supposed. After all, rumor had it that Witt’s divorce from his first wife, Eunice, had been messy and harsh. Accusations had been hurled and in the end, Witt, ever powerful, had ended up with his kids. No wonder Katherine wasn’t greeted with open arms.
But Adria couldn’t help making comparisons between herself and the second Mrs. Witt Danvers. As Katherine had been an outsider to the family twenty-odd years before, Adria was the outsider now. For the first time Adria felt a kinship with the woman who was supposed to be her mother, and yet she also suspected that Zach wasn’t being completely honest with her. There was something he was hiding, something dark and mysterious about Katherine. He didn’t admit it, but obviously, whenever the subject of Katherine LaRouche Danvers was broached, he grew silent and brooding.
