Love me till the end

Chapter 1

"Why didn't you stop when I called out?" he said above her, his voice laced with more annoyance than concern. His hands shifted slightly, allowing her to move her head.

"The wolf," she whispered. She held herself stiffly beneath him. Her gaze darted everywhere around them. The wolf, where had it gone?

"The wolf," he said and Charlie's gaze was drawn back to the man. He was looking down at her, not an inkling of concern in his tone. "Won't hurt you." He got to his feet, bringing her with him.

"Who are you?"

Charlie brushed at the loose snow covering her clothes. Then pulled the hood up and tucked in her hair. She watched his gaze fall to the socks covering her hands. The faintest hint of a grin spread across his chiseled mouth but disappeared in the time it took to blink.

"Luke." His tone was flat.

Movement out of the corner of her eye caused Charlie to look at the wolf again.

"Lady won't hurt you," he repeated, obviously noticing her unease. "Look, we're losing valuable daylight. We need to go."

The impatience and hardness of his clipped words caused Charlie's head to whip back in his direction. Go? Just like that he expected her to go with him? Okay, she really had no choice, but he could at least be sensitive to her situation.

As their gazes locked it was unclear what was going on behind those watchful eyes of his. They narrowed on her slightly. She began to wonder about him, wondered if he was dangerous. Her gaze ran over his tall form, made massive by the heavy insulated snow jacket he was wearing. She couldn't tell what color his hair was because all that was visible was his rugged face. Most of that was covered with a neatly trimmed black beard. Eyes the color of dark chocolate stared at her set in a face that could be handsome if he softened it with a smile.

"I won't hurt you, either."

Did she look worried? Charlie forced a smile, when what she really wanted to do was spin around and run the other way. She was completely alone with him and at his mercy, lost somewhere in the wilds of Alaska. She had no choice but to trust him, or die.

"I'm sorry if I gave you the impression you frighten me. I'm very thankful that you came along. I didn't know what I was going to do come nightfall. How did you find me?"

"I saw your plane go down. When I came across the crash site I realized someone had survived. Your tracks were easy to follow in the snow." His gaze raked over her with amazement. "I'm surprised you survived without so much as a scratch."

"I was lucky," Charlie admitted. She shuddered a little as she recalled her frightened, helpless feeling when the plane's engines had stalled, forcing her to crash. Practices during flight school hadn't compared to the real thing.

"Very lucky," he agreed. "Why didn't you remain at the crash site? Search and rescue would have eventually found you."

"I know that's what you're supposed to do, but I couldn't count on anyone finding me." Charlie brushed a loose strand of hair out of her eyes. "I was way off course." She'd flown back and forth to Skagway enough over the years to know that. "None of my gauges were reading correctly, and before I was able to get off a distress signal they went completely dead."

He acknowledged that he was listening to her with a brief nod of his head. Then cast another brief glance at the sky. "We need to get going." He turned and began walking.

"Going where?" Charlie had to practically run to keep up with his long, brisk strides. "Is there a ranger's station close by?"

"I'm not a ranger." He continued to walk without sparing her a glance.