Complete Me (Stark Trilogy, #3)(45)

“We’re not? Where are we going?”

“One of my favorite places,” he says, brushing a kiss across my hair. “I think you’ll like it.”





Chapter Eleven

The narrow mountain road twists and turns so much that I am beginning to feel a bit nauseated. It’s late, but the full moon casts a glow over the towering pines that grow so thick along the side of the road that it seems as though we are traveling through a tunnel. We are in a Jeep Grand Cherokee that someone from Damien’s staff left for him at the Ontario airport just outside of San Bernadino. It’s the least sporty car I have ever seen Damien drive, but he looks perfectly at home. In fact, I can’t remember a time when Damien has ever looked out of place. It’s that cool confidence that lets him slide into any situation, and I amuse myself by thinking of him going from a high-powered board meeting to a survivalist weekend retreat.

“You’re grinning,” he says.

“I’m picturing you in a loincloth holding an atlatl,” I admit. “Damien Stark, the leader of the tribe.”

“Please tell me this isn’t a retreat you’re planning for us,” he says. “Not unless it involves you in a Raquel Welch style fur miniskirt for a weekend.”

“Even then you wouldn’t like it,” I tease. “I believe the women were in charge of the cooking back in the caveman days.”

“Good point,” he says with a wicked grin. I don’t bother to take offense. We both know that my cooking skills take a nosedive once you get past “peel back plastic cover and set microwave for five minutes.”

“Are we getting close?” He has told me only that he wants to take me someplace before we head back to LA. Beyond that, he is giving me no clues.

“Just around this bend.” As the Jeep curves to the right, the trees break for a moment and I see the water of Lake Arrowhead sparkling like a diamond in the moonlight. I’ve only been up in the San Bernadino Mountains once, and that was when I came to visit Jamie one Christmas. Snow had come early that year, and we rented a car with snow tires and made the slow trudge up the mountain to Big Bear. In the end, neither of us had actually put on skis, but we’d had a fabulous time sitting in the lodge, sipping Irish coffee by the fire, and watching all the guys in tight snow pants.

A few more curves, and the view of the lake disappears. I’m totally turned around, but it’s obvious that Damien knows exactly where he’s going. He hasn’t told me a thing, though. So although I’ve clued in to the general concept of a mountain retreat, I don’t know if we’re going to a resort, a hotel, a friend’s house, or yet another property that Damien owns.

The beam of the headlights glance over a wooden sign indicating a private drive, and Damien turns onto it, then follows an even steeper, even more narrow road. The trees are closer on both sides of the Jeep, and in the dark I’m actually starting to feel a bit claustrophobic. Then we are cresting the rise, and all I see is an Alpine chateau looming in front of us, nestled among the towering pines. It is a stunning property, with wooden shingles and stone chimneys, and the kinds of angles and turrets that give the impression that we haven’t left Bavaria. Or perhaps that we made a wrong turn on the way home and ended up in Switzerland.

Damien slows the car at an intricate iron gate, then rolls down his window and punches in a code, thereby destroying all illusions that this extravagant place is either a hotel or a bed-and-breakfast or a mountain spa resort.

“You own this?”

He eases the Jeep through the slowly widening gap in the gate. “I wanted a weekend getaway. Something I could drive to at the last minute. Something out of the way.”

“Palm Springs not appealing? Your Santa Barbara hotel too long a drive?”

“The condo in Palm Springs is on the golf course,” he says, “and since I’m not much of a golfer I let my staff reserve time as a perk. As for Santa Barbara, it’s an exceptional property, but sometimes a man just wants to be alone. Or not alone,” he says, reaching over to squeeze my hand.

I squeeze back, amused. “You know those computer apps where you can put a little flag on a map for every town you’ve lived in or where all your Facebook friends are from, or whatever?”

“Sure.”

“We need to get one of those for all your properties.”

His answering grin is smug. “I’ll get right on that. And then we can start working our way through them, one by one. Only a few of my properties have been properly christened.”

“Is that so? Well, then. Maybe we should start with your Arrowhead property,” I say. “Maybe we should start tonight.”

“I can’t think of a better way to spend the evening. Or the morning. Or the afternoon.”

I grin as I take another look at the massive structure. “This place is huge. I say we christen these rooms first and then we can move on to other locations. That will take us, what? A year?”

“It’s not that big,” he says. “Only nine thousand square feet.”

“Practically an efficiency apartment,” I say, deadpan.

“Eleven thousand if you count the guest house,” he says, pointing to the smaller building that is connected to the main house by a covered walkway. “The caretaker and his wife live there. I told them this was a relaxing and informal week and to leave us to fend for ourselves.”