The philosophy of violence, the study of it, was apparently a way of life to him. A tiny, warning shiver went through Mercy as she wondered if perhaps Croft were equally knowledgeable about the actual practice of violence. Studying the martial arts was one thing, but in truth most karate and judo experts never used their skills outside a gym. She did not want to believe Croft had firsthand experience of his subject.
But what else could have given his hazel eyes such a dark, fathomless quality?
Mercy pushed aside her doubts until the meal was over. At that point she found herself faced with finding a subtle but firm way of terminating the strange evening. She told herself she had indulged her growing fascination with this man long enough for that night.
“You’ll be on your way back to Oregon bright and early tomorrow, I imagine,” she said with a calm she wasn’t feeling as she poured two tiny snifters of brandy. They had moved back into the living room. It seemed to Mercy that the painted cat on the screen was watching his counterpart with complacent interest.
“No.” Croft spoke with a calm that was far more genuine than Mercy’s. “I don’t think so. I owe you a meal.”
She smiled involuntarily. “Afraid of being in my debt?”
“I like to keep the Circle closed.”
“So you’ve said.”
“This is a debt I will take pleasure in repaying.” He smiled, set down the brandy glass and got to his feet. When she looked at him he reached down to pull her up beside him.
Mercy was unprepared for the small shock that gripped her when his fingers closed around her wrist. She was even more unsettled by the gentleness of his touch. The power in him was under exquisite control. A woman would always be aware of the strength in this man, she thought, but she would never fear it. Yet even as she was stunned by the realization of him, he was releasing her.
“Croft?”
“Dinner tomorrow evening?” He stood very close but made no effort to take her into his arms.
Good grief, surely that wasn’t what she wanted. Not so soon at any rate. She needed time. Once again she heard a distant chime, the faintest of warning bells. But the bells fell silent as she looked into Croft’s eyes. The reckless need to know him more thoroughly overtook Mercy.
“Dinner,” she repeated. She heard the acceptance in her own voice. “I’ll look forward to it,” she added impulsively.
“So will I.”
He moved to the door and she followed. When she opened and held it for him, he stepped over the threshold and then turned to face her. Standing just outside her apartment he seemed to be a part of the night’s shifting shadows. Something told Mercy she might be safer if she kept him outside her door. Croft regarded her silently for a long moment and then he lifted his hand.
Mercy’s fingers tightened on the wood of the door. Part of her belatedly urged her to step back out of reach, but she couldn’t move. His fingertips touched the nape of her neck, gliding softly. It was the lightest of caresses and Mercy forgot all about wanting to dodge those questing fingers. Instead she was almost overcome with the desire to turn her face into the palm of his hand to kiss him.
She was afraid the longing showed in her eyes when she looked up and saw the recognition and flare of masculine satisfaction in his hazel gaze. His fingertips moved once more across the nape of her neck, stirring the fine hair that grew there. Mercy shivered.
Croft removed his hand. “I’ve been wanting to do that all evening. Good night, Mercy.”
“Good night, Croft.” She could barely speak.
He turned away, vanishing into the darkness before she even got the door closed. She sank thoughtfully back against the wood panel and worried briefly about him walking all the way down the hill to his car at night. Ignatius Cove was a safe little town, but still...
Then she shook her head at the ridiculousness of worrying about Croft Falconer. If she was going to waste time worrying about anyone, it should probably be herself.
Croft waited for Saturday to pass with a restless impatience that was almost alarming. He wasn’t accustomed to this kind of simmering uneasiness. Inevitably in his life there was a time for waiting and a time for action. Each reinforced the other, fitting together with a symmetry that kept the Circle closed. But this period of waiting was different. It was not the kind that presaged violence, yet it contained some of the same elements. There was the familiar, acute sense of awareness and the feeling of intense physical readiness. The difference was that he didn’t seem to be able to channel or control his impatience the way he normally would.
It was because this time he was waiting for the woman, Mercy Pennington. Waiting to discover her completely. Waiting to claim her.
At dawn he found a secluded spot on the beach below the inn and tried to slide into his morning meditative trance. The results were fragmented at best. The running afterward went better, but it didn’t do much to stem the tide of urgency that was building in him.
He told himself to slow down mentally and let the course of events work its inevitable way to the ultimate conclusion. He knew what he was doing. He could control the end result. After all, he had seen the wonder and the wanting in her last night.
His fingers curled briefly in a small flare of desire as he remembered the feel of her. Touching the nape of her neck had let him know what it would be like to touch the rest of her. He doubted if she even realized just how much he had learned with that single caress. She would be soft, sensitive, vulnerable, and graceful in bed.
He wondered what she was thinking today at work. He knew she was still wary of him. He deliberately hadn’t done much to counter that and he knew why. He couldn’t tell her everything, but he found himself wanting to be as honest with her as possible.
Croft thought of the man who had used Mercy so badly in California and winced as he walked back up the beach to the inn for breakfast. Mercy would not be quick to forgive another man whom she perceived as a user and a liar.
But he had his priorities, Croft reminded himself. The book was the key and Mercy had possession of the book. Furthermore, she was not about to give it up. Nor was there any way to simply take it from her. She would know instantly what had happened and who had done it. No, Croft decided. He and Mercy were bound together for a while whether she liked it or not. He couldn’t let her out of his sight until he had followed the trail of the book and found the answers he needed.
But he was honest enough to admit that he had other reasons for not wanting to let go of Mercy. Reasons that had nothing to do with closing a Circle of justice and violence.
The image of fire blazed fiercely in his mind as Croft took the steps to the inn two at a time. An early summer sun warmed him, but in his mind flames leaped into a midnight sky and screams echoed in the warm night air.
Croft’s mood had not improved by the time he sat down for breakfast in the dining room, where he discovered he would have to make do with a tea bag and tepid cup of hot water.
As usual when he encountered such annoyances in a restaurant he didn’t bother to tip. He was not unaware of the dirty look the waitress gave him when he left, but he wasn’t bothered by it.
The second evening with Croft began smoothly enough, Mercy reflected later. She had been filled with a deep, exciting sense of anticipation all day. That sense of anticipation flowered into happiness when he picked her up in the Porsche and drove her to an excellent fish restaurant a short distance from town.
She relaxed and watched him drive, taking pleasure in his skill. He handled the car with a quiet, efficient competence. His reflexes were apparently excellent. The sense of self-control he radiated could be reassuring at times, she decided.
At other times it was a damned nuisance. Croft had the ability to put up brick walls or simply walk away from subjects and questions he didn’t want to discuss. Mercy encountered that stubborn resistance whenever she began to gently probe
his past. It didn’t take her long to decide she didn’t want to ruin the evening by forcing issues Croft didn’t want to have forced. She seriously questioned whether anyone could force a discussion on Croft Falconer.
She was halfway through her salmon when he startled her by stating calmly, “I think I’ll go with you to Colorado.”
“You what?”
“You heard me. Ι think I’ll go with you to meet Gladstone.”
She was horrified. “But you can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because you weren’t invited. Gladstone’s invitation was for me alone. I got the impression on the phone that he values his privacy. I’m sure he wouldn’t take kindly to having another guest foisted on him, especially one who’s after the same book he wants.”
“Don’t tell him I’m after it. Let him think I’m your lover and you just brought me along on vacation.”
“Well, you’re not my lover, and even if you were there would be no reason to bring you along. This is a business trip, at least the first three days are going to be devoted to business. I’m hoping it will be the start of a new direction in my career, in fact. The last thing I want to do is muck up my reputation as a professional, reliable antiquarian book dealer. Successful, reputable business people do not allow their personal lives to get tangled up in their work.”
“You haven’t got a reputation as an antiquarian book dealer,” he pointed out patiently. “This is your first sale.”
“It’s a beginning!”
“You don’t mind beginning this prestigious new career by dealing a piece of pornography?”
Mercy took offense at that. “In case you aren’t aware of it, we in the trade refer to such items as Burleigh’s Valley as curiosa.”
“It’s curious stuff all right. Most people, if they’re honest, have a certain curiosity about that kind of curiosa from the age of five on up. Forget that side of things. Even if you were an established dealer, no one would question your choice of a traveling companion.”
“Why are you so insistent on meeting Gladstone?”
He smiled challengingly. “Business reasons.”
“You want that damn book for your own collection.”
He shrugged negligently. “Is that such a crime? I’m a collector. Collectors will go to great lengths to get what they want. Remember that, Mercy.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Of course not, just a piece of advice. I never make threats.”
“Ha.”
“It’s true.” He looked surprised that she should question the statement. “Threats are a waste of everyone’s time. They leave room for doubt. They encourage an opponent to test your willpower or your strength.”
“I can see you’ve given the subject a great deal of thought,” she remarked acidly.
“There’s another reason besides my interest in Valley that I would like to go to Colorado with you.”
“What’s that?”
“I’d like to have the extra time with you.”
Now she really was alarmed. “I’m not sure I particularly want to be lumped in with your book collecting project.” She went back to her salmon with a vengeance.
“Mercy.”
She looked up warily. “Yes?”
“I’m being as honest with you as I can be. I want the book. Barring that, I want to meet Gladstone. But I also want you.”
“Are you hoping for two out of three?”
“You’re upset.”
“Damn right.”
He sat quietly for a moment and then nodded as if coming to some decision. “All right. We’ll drop the subject for now”
“Does that mean the evening is over?” she asked bluntly.
“What do you think?”
“Around you,” Mercy admitted with a sigh, “I’m never sure what to think.”
“If it’s any consolation to you, I sometimes experience the same problem around you.”
“I don’t believe you. You always think you know what you’re doing.” She waved a fork at him. “That’s a bad habit, Croft. It can lead to all sorts of problems.”
“Is that right?” He didn’t seem worried, merely amused.
“You better believe it.” It wasn’t much, but she did get a small amount of satisfaction out of having had the last word on the subject.
Croft didn’t take her home until after midnight. Nor did he linger on her doorstep. But just as she decided he was going to leave without anything more than a polite good night, he touched her as he had the night before. The white, scoop-necked knit dress she was wearing left her throat and the hollows of her shoulders bare and vulnerable. This time his fingers traced the faintest of patterns against her skin. Involuntarily Mercy trembled.
The caress seemed somehow more intimate than the one the previous evening. How ridiculous, she thought wildly. By any standard the light touch should have been classified as casual, almost impersonal.
Yet when she felt the gentle tremor that went through her senses and looked up into Croft’s eyes she experienced a disorienting sensation of having just had a glimpse into her own future. It was almost as though she had read his mind. He wanted her. Mercy knew that with a woman’s absolute certainty.
But she knew it with something more than a woman’s intuition. She felt Croft’s desire with a new sense of awareness that was unfamiliar. It was almost as if she really had read his mind.
She didn’t know whether to turn and flee or throw herself into his arms.
He turned and descended the stairs before she could decide how to handle the eerie, tantalizing sensation.
It wasn’t until she was sliding between the sheets of her bed that night that she realized he had made no mention of seeing her the next day. Sunday was her day off.
She ought to spend it packing for the trip to Colorado, Mercy told herself firmly. She didn’t need to spend it traipsing around with a man she didn’t fully understand. She wasn’t at all sure she wanted to understand Croft, anyway.
Somehow she didn’t think it would be safe to do so.
She lay awake in bed for quite some time, studying the night-darkened ceiling. Her thoughts drifted from Croft to the valuable book that was temporarily housed in her kitchen cupboard. Her mind and body were wide awake and she was feeling restless. The evening had ended on a note that had jangled her nerve endings the same way the shop door bell chimed its warning.
There was an unfamiliar, oddly uncomfortable sense of physical awareness rippling through her. When she realized its source she was wryly shocked. She wasn’t given to lying in bed at night aching for the touch of a man.
Her normal bedtime thoughts usually revolved around sales receipts, book orders, accounting bills and business taxes. It had been two years since she had lain in bed and seriously thought about a man. And two years ago thoughts of her fiancé certainly hadn’t done this to her body. This strange ache between her thighs was unsettling.
A glass of milk might give her senses the distraction they needed.
She got out of bed, wandered into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. Light spilled out into the dark room. She peered inside and realized she had forgotten to buy a fresh carton of milk. Scratch that idea.
As she started to close the refrigerator door, the shaft of light swept over the kitchen closet door and she remembered Valley. Mercy recalled Croft holding the book in his powerful, sensitive hands, turning the old pages with great care.
Before she could give herself time to think about it, Mercy closed the refrigerator door, switched on the overhead light and went to the closet.
Valley of Secret Jewels was where she had left it, snuggled innocently into its protective box. The worn leather binding gleamed dully in the kitchen light. It wasn’t just age that had given the leather that burnished patina, she knew. Valley had been through a numbe
r of eager hands, and not all of those hands had belonged to respectable book collectors of the twentieth century. In the late seventeen hundreds and well into the eighteen hundreds, Valley had undoubtedly been frequently read for its original intended purpose, which was, of course, outright titillation. Such usage could prove extremely wearing on a book.
But, Mercy reminded herself, she was a book dealer with a legitimate interest in antiquarian treasures. She wasn’t the type to mar the cover of Valley with sweaty hands. Her interest in the volume was purely professional. After all, the book was worth a couple of thousand dollars and represented the start of a new direction in her career.
She lifted it out of its box and carried it into the bedroom to study for a while before sleep claimed her.
Mercy rose early the next morning, padding into the shower with her eyes only half open. It was a luxury to be able to take her time waking up. Six days a week she made herself bounce out of bed and scurry through an efficient, organized routine of showering, dressing and eating breakfast. On the seventh day she wandered far more slowly through the same routine.
It was as she dawdled over her second cup of coffee that she allowed herself to think about Croft Falconer.
There was, of course, a very good possibility he had given up trying to get her to introduce him to Erasmus Gladstone and had left for Oregon.
On the other hand, he had said he would be going with her to Colorado, and while Mercy had no intention of letting him accompany her to the mountains she was convinced he wouldn’t give up so easily.
He had said he wanted the time with her as much as he wanted to meet Gladstone.
Maybe he had lied.
Mercy was packed for the trip to Colorado by ten o’clock. She was considering a quick visit to Pennington’s Second Chance to check that everything was ready for Dorrie to take charge on Monday when she glanced out her front window and realized what a perfect scene was captured within the confines of her small scrap of view.
Midnight Jewels Page 5