The picture didn’t do her justice. Actually, since her picture was with all the other graduating seniors she was really more a young

• 28 •


Descent

woman than a girl. A very sexy, sensuous woman. And all woman.

Staring back at Shannon was her first real girlfriend. Not one of the girls she had fiddled around with in the backseat of a car or the last row in a movie theater. Each time they were together it was as if one moment she was floating on air, then riding a roller coaster the next. Shannon remembered how completely out of her mind she was for Caroline.

She thought about her when they weren’t together, and the last thing at night, and when they were able to sneak away for some together time, she was totally focused on her and only her.

Shannon often thought she was in love with her. She was a girl with the perfect family, the knockout body, and the intelligence to match. But she also scared the holy hell out of her. Caroline challenged her in ways Shannon didn’t think possible. She made her think and stretch her imagination. She made it safe for Shannon to dream. The sex was incredible, as sex is when you’re seventeen, but it was everything else about her that drove Shannon to carelessness when it came to her.

That same carelessness was how she felt going down the mountain with nothing between her and the jagged rocks and trees below but her skill and nerve.

Shannon had tried not to think about Caroline over the years.

Their paths intersected more often than she cared but not as much as they could have. She competed on the European circuit while Caroline had remained on the American tour. When their schedules did coincide, by some unspoken agreement, they were both careful not to cross too closely. What would she say if they had? What would she say to Caroline Davis if she really took the chance?

• 29 •


• 30 •


Descent

ChaPTER FouR

The plane touched down in Montreal forty-five minutes late. Caroline grabbed her backpack from under the seat in front of her and prepared to wait while the other one hundred eighty-nine passengers jockeyed for position in the narrow aisle. She could understand those that had to make connections and, thankfully, she wasn’t one of them. After almost six hours of traveling she wasn’t quite to her final destination of the first race of the series but was close enough to still be in a hurry.

When the crowd thinned Caroline stood, careful not to bang her head on the overhead compartment. She had done that twice on this trip; the second time a nasty curse shot out of her mouth before she had a chance to stop it.

After stopping at the ladies room, Caroline followed the signs to baggage claim. The carousel for her flight had not yet started to spin, and her fellow passengers were standing three deep in anticipation of their bags passing within reach. She heard her name being called and turned to see a man in his twenties dressed in cargo shorts and a T-shirt with the phrase “I went down on Mount Brome” in red letters across his impressive chest. He was holding a handmade sign with her last name on it, signaling to Caroline he was her ride.

“Over here, I’m Caroline Davis,” she called after raising her hand.

The look on the man’s face turned from one of bored acceptance to immediate interest. Caroline cringed. She had seen that look many times. At five foot five inches, her muscular body caught more than her share of attention from both sexes. Sometimes she was flattered, proud

• 31 •


JuliE CaNNoN

of what her hard work had produced, and other times she was just plain disinterested. Since the looker was a six foot male, this was definitely one of those times. The forty-five-minute drive to the mountain was going to feel much longer than that.

“Mademoiselle Davis, bienvenue à Montréal. Je suis votre pilote Jacque. Welcome to Montreal. I am Jacque, your driver.” He repeated in English with more than a touch of a French accent.

“Thank you,” Caroline replied. Her French was practically nonexistent, but she had picked up on his greeting. When she replied, his eyes betrayed his interest and she groaned to herself. The last thing she needed was to have to dodge a suitor.

“Let me take that for you,” he said in English. “Do you have other bags?”

“Yes, I have two and a bicycle carrier.”

A voice overhead told the waiting crowd that their luggage was now available on carousel twelve. A moment later a buzzer sounded and bags of all sizes and colors started spitting out of the conveyor belt tumbling onto the circling carousel.

“Mine are blue hard case with stickers of bikes on them.” Caroline had learned early in her traveling career to make her bags as distinct as possible. It never ceased to amaze and irritate her when people could not identify their own luggage. She shook her head as a man practically took out several other waiting passengers while attempting to read the small luggage tag on a bag as it passed by.

“There is one of them,” Jacque said drawing her attention back to the luggage moving by. He stepped forward and retrieved her suitcase, lifting it as if it were filled with feathers instead of her biking gear. No matter how little she packed, her helmet, knee pads, shin guards, and chest protector took up most of the room and she needed two bags to contain all her gear. Jacque snagged the second bag.

“We must go to the other side for your bicycle carrier, mademoiselle. The oversize bags are not delivered here.”

“Yes, I know,” she snapped more sharply than she intended and immediately softened her voice. “It’s over there, isn’t it?” She pointed to the far side of the baggage claim area. God, she was irritable. Maybe she needed a nap, or a good night’s sleep. Maybe she just needed to stop thinking about Shannon Roberts. But that was easier said than done as

• 32 •


Descent

she scanned every face in the area for the one that had tormented and teased her dreams for years.

Sitting in the second row of seats in the van, her bags and bike stacked neatly in the rear, Caroline dodged Jacque’s attempt to make conversation. Finally, he got the message she wasn’t interested in him or his chatter and he turned his focus on the road in front of them. As he drove, she didn’t even pretend to observe the passing countryside on her way to Brodale, a tourist destination well known for its downhill skiing in the winter and for being the host of the first race in the mountain bike championship series. Caroline let her mind drift to Shannon.

They would run into each other again sometime during this race.

They had to. They were competing in the same event, would attend some of the same sponsor events and mingle with the same people.

Shit, she thought, there was a good chance they’d be standing next to each other in first and second place on the winner’s stand.

The last time they were together was in Boulder for the U.S.

Downhill Championships. They had managed to avoid each other most of the three days of the event, but occasionally their paths crossed.

They were polite and civil, exchanging a few inconsequential words, but nothing of real importance. The last time they had said anything even remotely meaningful was that day more than ten years ago.

v

Shannon tipped the bellman and dropped her backpack on the bed.

She needed to unpack, shower, eat, and blow off some of her nervous energy, but not necessarily in that order. She glanced around the spacious room and didn’t think twice about the size, the amenities, or the sheer luxury of the suite. She always traveled first class whether for her own personal pleasure or because her endorsement contract stipulated it.

She had more money than most. At twenty-two, she’d inherited a large chunk of money from a trust fund set up by her great-aunt and it was doubled when she hit twenty-five. In two years when she reached thirty, it would double again.

Great-Aunt Martha had been a lesbian long before it was okay to be out. Everyone in the family thought she was simply a spinster schoolteacher, but one look at her pictures and Shannon knew otherwise.

• 33 •


JuliE CaNNoN

She barely remembered the woman; she’d died when Shannon was eight, but according to her mother, Great-Aunt Martha had spent several summers with them when Shannon was small. She must have been able to tell that Shannon was going to be a lesbian even at her young age.

Why else would she leave millions of dollars to a great-niece she barely knew?Shannon stripped, left her clothes where they fell, and stepped into the shower. Her intent was to wash off the travel grime, slip into something that said “I’m showing you mine, now you show me yours,”

and go out on the town after the sponsors’ meet and mingle tonight. She had been keyed up about this race more than usual and she knew why.

“Caroline.”

The name slipped off her tongue and into the steam with very little effort, but the effect caught Shannon by surprise. Her breath stuck in her throat, her nipples tightened under the bar of soap, and the point between her legs began to throb insistently.

She would see Caroline sometime in the next week and the thought never ceased to arouse her. She closed her eyes remembering. The feel of her touch, the softness of her lips, the smooth skin in that special place where her thighs joined the rest of her body. And that voice. The sound of her own name drifting off Caroline’s lips at that moment when they were one was the sound music tried to imitate.