Free Northern Exposure by Debra Lee Brown Page B

as I say, exactly when I say it, no questions asked. Got it?”
    She looked at him, conscious of the fact that her mouth was hanging open and both brows were raised to the ten-thousand-foot level.
    The old Wendy, Blake Barrett’s girl Friday, would have quietly nodded compliance, would have stepped into line behind him and followed his lead.
    â€œYou’re kidding, right?”
    The slight tic at the edge of his mouth and the intensity of his eyes, which had gone a dark hazel rimmed with gold, told her he was dead serious.
    She reminded herself that, regardless of the painful similarities of character, Joe Peterson was not Blake Barrett, and even if he were, she was not the same Wendy Walters she’d been a month ago.
    â€œYou know what, Warden?” She crossed in front of him, moving onto the trail and taking the lead. “I’ve already had one controlling bastard try to run my life, I don’t need another.”
    She started down the trail and heard his heavy footfalls as he stepped into line behind her. A smile bloomed on her face.
    â€œDid it ever occur to you that people, controllingbastards included, sometimes do things for your own good?”
    She snorted and picked up the pace.
    â€œThat maybe, just maybe, they know better than you do what to do in certain situ—”
    â€œNo,” she said, cutting him off. “I can make my own decisions.”
    The trail snaked downward into the long, densely wooded valley that ran the length of the reserve. It bordered the caribou habitat some forty miles ahead of them. She had a map, supplies, and knew exactly where she was going. It was comforting to know that she didn’t need Joe Peterson’s help, even if he was hell-bent on her accepting it.
    â€œSeems to me, Willa, some of those decisions didn’t turn out to be too smart.”
    The way he said her old name, the thinly veiled reference to the lies he’d read about her in the tabloids, made her stop short and turn on him.
    â€œYou don’t know anything about me or what really happened. You have no right to judge me based on a pack of lies you read, just because—” She stopped herself before she went too far.
    â€œBecause what?” He stood close to her, too close, and looked down at her, his expression now one of calm confidence. A man in control.
    God, he was good-looking. That should have been the last thing on her mind, but there it was.
    â€œBecause…” Their gazes locked, and for a second she read something overtly sexual in the way those eyes of his drank her in. It scared her a little.
    Which didn’t say much for her experience with men. Although she’d been around lots of them, she was woefully undereducated in the romance department. Not that Joe Peterson had romance on his mind. Far from it.
    She’d been close to saying that he had no business judging her just because his sister had died of a drug overdose. She was glad she’d stopped herself. He was acting like a jerk, but she didn’t have it in her to twist the knife.
    â€œWho was the guy?” he said abruptly.
    â€œWhat guy?”
    â€œThe controlling bastard? The other one, I mean.”
    She almost laughed, and felt the tension in her shoulders uncoil itself. He’d actually made a joke. It wasn’t particularly funny, but it had diffused the situation, which, she guessed, was his intent.
    â€œJust somebody I used to work with.”
    â€œOh. I thought maybe he was your husband or your ex, or somebody like that.”
    She caught something else in his eyes, then. Something she couldn’t quite discern.
    â€œNo, nothing like that. He was my boss.”
    â€œOh.” The something cooled, but didn’t entirely disappear. “You were sleeping with him.”
    She didn’t even dignify that with a response. Turning on her heel, she started forward again, down the trail.
    â€œWhoa!” He grabbed her arm, stopped her.