by Ann Cristy
Teel laughed and headed for her small single room on the eighth floor. She had no desire to share a room with someone. Since her return from the Deirdre she had suffered chronic insomnia. There were many nights when she tossed and turned until dawn.
In minutes she had taken a quick shower and donned the emerald green sweats with the white stripe down the sides. She could almost hear Aunt Tessa's words of approval when she'd first seen them. "Teel, my dear, the color is perfect for.. .everyone." Tessa had given her niece an impish smile when Teel had laughed and called her Irish.
Teel's aunt had spent three days with her after her return from the Deirdre. Tessa had always been able to smooth Teel's rough edges, but this time the job had been too tough. Nothing seemed to take Teel's mind from Chazz Herman for long.
She sighed and tightened the laces on her pale green running shoes. They were as comfortable as slippers. She zipped her money and identification card into an inner pocket and took the elevator to the lobby.
As soon as Nancy joined her, they left the hotel. Despite Nancy's complaint about running to the Garden, she was an inveterate jogger, and the two women found a mutual rhythm to their running almost at once.
"I didn't believe all those stories about New York until now," Nancy huffed into Teel's ear as they jogged in place at a side street, pausing to let traffic pass.
"What do you mean?" Teel puffed back as they crossed with the light.
"A really gorgeous car has been following us for the last half block. Wouldn't it be wonderful to be accosted in a Ferrari?" Nancy quipped sarcastically.
Teel gave a breathless laugh but refrained from looking at the well-heeled stalker. "Don't pay any attention. Whoever it is probably gets his kicks from intimidating joggers. Just ignore him."
Madison Square Garden came into view. At the door the two women paused to identify themselves and were shown the door for the athletes and workers.
The next hours passed in a whirl. Both Nancy and Teel acted as huggers as well as gofers for misplaced items. When a co-worker tapped Teel on the shoulder and told her he would spell her awhile, she sagged and gave him a relieved smile. She was starving. She hadn't been hungry for breakfast, and lunchtime had slipped away, but now she realized that the day's physical activity had made her hungrier than she had been since her return from the Deirdre.
She grimaced at the long line in front of the refreshment stand as she passed there on her way to the ladies' room. On her return the lines were no shorter. Resigning herself to a long wait, Teel took her place. When she felt the nudge at her back, she assumed it was someone behind her getting into line and didn't turn around.
"Damn you. Trying to convince me you were a nun, then running out on me. You must have taken me for thirty kinds of a fool, lady." The silky growl in Teel's ear made the hair on her arms and neck stand straight up and sent the blood draining from her limbs. A wave of dizziness swept over her.
She reeled in shock, and her legs wouldn't accept the command from her brain to run. Her shoes felt cemented to the floor.
"Turn around and face me, Sister Terese Ellen." The voice had the jarring effect of a jackhammer breaking through concrete. Chazz lifted her out of line with an ease that panicked her. "So what do I call you now?" he asked in a menacing tone. "Terese Ellen? Or Teel, as your aunt and the authorities at your school call you?"
Teel licked dry lips, noting that his eyes followed the movement. "You've known since the beginning, haven't you?" she said.
"Almost. Yes. Why the hell didn't you tell me yourself? I gave you enough opportunity," Chazz exclaimed, apparently oblivious of the people thronging around them,.
"Protection." Teel felt the curious stares of onlookers free herself but to no avail. "Will you let me go?" the words out of her mouth, feeling shockwaves through her at his touch. "Many of the people here are parents of my students. I do not enjoy making a spectacle of myself in front of them."
"Damn you, you lied to me! By not telling me who you were." His teeth snapped shut like fangs.
"I told you all you needed to know about me," she retorted.” My name is Terese Ellen Barrett, and that's what I told Darby. He assumed I was a nun." She glared up at Chazz. "Why are you complaining? Why didn't you just come out and tell me that you knew who I was? You're just as guilty of subterfuge as I am. Why weren't you honest with me?
"You began the charade. I just continued it."
"On board your yacht I thought it better to pretend to be a nun," Teel blurted out, trying not to shout yet struggling to free herself at the same time.
"As I recall, darling, your masquerade didn't work," Chazz drawled. Teel's neck and cheeks grew hot with embarrassment. "Shy, darling? It's a little late for that, isn't it?"
"You knew I wasn't a nun," Teel hissed. "You should have said something. Stop grinning, you...you bastard." She tried to kick him in the shin. She wanted to bury him up to his eyebrows in sand.
"Bastard, am I? After what you put me through in the last month, I ought to drag you out of here by your hair," Chazz snapped.
"Tough!" she threw back at him, fury overriding prudence.
He hauled her hard against his chest, knocking the breath from her body. She could only stare up at him, her eyes wide, mouth agape. His own mouth fastened on hers in a moving, searching caress that horrified her. Then his kiss blotted out all of her senses, blinding her, deafening her, drowning her in Chazz. There was no world but him. Her body betrayed her, and she moved closer to him just before he released her.
"You're mine," he gasped, his amber eyes leaping with liquid fire. "And I'm taking what is mine. You're coming with me to get something to eat now. You've been working too hard."
"I can't leave." Teel swayed, her voice unsteady.
"I'll have you back in a little while. I'll just make a call, then we'll go." He pulled her behind him, not looking left or right.
Teel was faintly aware of Nancy calling to her, but Chazz's rapid strides made it impossible for her to turn around. "Where are we going? I won't go." She struggled against his grip on her arm, but her efforts were useless. She sailed along behind him like the dinghy following the Deirdre.
Chazz kept Teel clamped to his side even as he dialed and spoke into the phone in terse sentences. She glanced over her shoulder and saw Nancy behind her, hands clasped anxiously.
"Should I get security?" Nancy mouthed, her throat working with concern as her eyes darted from Teel's face to Chazz's hand manacled to her wrist.
Teel had opened her mouth to say yes when she was suddenly whirled around, her back to the phone booth, Chazz at her side. "Who's this?" he growled, nodding toward Nancy.
Teel glowered up at him. "Don't you dare pull that Hitler act on Nancy," she panted, anger making her out of breath. "This isn't the deck of the Deirdre. You have no authority here."
"No?" he cooed, making Nancy jump.
"No!" Teel flung the words at him, using her free hand to try to pry the other from his grip. "You try your strong arm tactics here and I'll have you thrown into the slammer." She thrust out her jaw, itching to place a well- aimed running shoe into his midsection.
"Introduce your friend. Then we'll leave." Chazz transferred his grip to the left hand and held out his right to Nancy, who leaped backward in alarm. "I'm Chazz Herman and I'm taking Miss Barrett to lunch. Any objections?" he snapped.
"From me?" Nancy replied. "Hell, no."
"Nancy!" Teel cried, grimacing at her friend and jerking her head toward the uniformed security guard who was passing fifty yards away through the press of people.
"Survival. That's the key word," Nancy muttered, giving Teel a weak smile, then beginning to edge away.
"Bright girl," Chazz pronounced, giving Teel a gentle smile that had all the sweetness of a barracuda on the prowl.
Teel sagged in defeat as Nancy disappeared into the crowd. She looked back at Chazz, whose expression was serene, and hauled in a deep breath. "Mussolini," she hissed.
Once again Chaz
z began pulling her after him, down a long tunnel and through double steel doors to the outside. He didn't stop until he reached a Ferrari parked in a loading zone.
Teel prayed he'd been ticketed and was incensed not to find a slip of paper under the windshield wiper. "Carpetbagger," she seethed as he pushed her into the passenger seat, then hopped around the car and under the wheel before she could figure out how to open the door.
"Don't bother, love. It's locked at the wheel." Chazz smiled wickedly at her and fired the engine.
"Bandit," she growled Then something clicked in her head, and she flung herself around to face him. "Were you in the car Nancy saw following us this morning?"
He nodded. "Fasten your seat belt."
"Monster." she said. "You should be arrested. How dare you harass innocent women . "
"I didn't harass you.. I had to make an emergency trip to Singapore the week after you left the Deirdre and I just got back last night. I realized that my best chance of seeing you now was to hang around the Special Olympics tryouts. When I saw you and your friend jogging toward the Garden, I couldn't believe my luck." He shot her a quick glance as the Ferrari peeled through traffic. "Don't you know how dangerous it is to jog alone in New York?"
"I realize now that I could meet someone like you," Teel replied. "From now on I'll take an attack dog with me."
"That's what I love about you, Teel. You're so affectionate." Chazz chortled, then gave her another quick look. "Teel. That's an unusual name."
"My father combined the first two letters of my name Terese Ellen. The name stuck. I've never been called anything but Teel," she answered in stilted tones, her chin in the air.
"I like it."
"It is immaterial to me whether you like it or not."
"Ouch. That tone of voice would fast freeze a herd of elephants."
She gave him a saccharine smile. "Suspicions confirmed. You have a thicker hide than an elephant: otherwise you would buzz off."
"Never, darling. I've decided you're not getting rid of me." "I'm not going to be one of your prostitutes." Her voice echoed loudly in the car, the fear that he might find out she loved him trembling through it.
"Wait until you're asked, love."
Teel felt as though she had suddenly swelled to twice her size. She was about to explode in withering denunciation of all things that made up Chazz Herman when he made a sudden right turn, throwing her against her seat belt. She watched open-mouthed as the Ferrari dropped down into the darkness of an underground garage. They parked in a space marked Herman. Two other spaces were marked the same way. One held a Rolls-Royce. "Lousy capitalist," she hissed at him as he came around to open her door and released her from the seat belt that refused to separate under her own hands.
He followed her gaze toward the cocoa-brown Rolls. "Don't you like the Royce?" he asked blandly, helping her from the car, impervious to the hand that tried to pry his fingers from her arm.
"You're a selfish, egotistical, manic, pompous, less- than-human amoeba." Teel scraped her heels against the concrete as Chazz half-carried, half-dragged her to an elevator in the underground garage.
"Does that mean you don't like Rolls-Royces?" He gave her an interested glance.
"Don't patronize me!" Teel said, staring up at him ready to explode as his one arm clamped her to his side while the other hand punched the number board in the elevator.
"You mustn't get so excited. It will upset your lunch," he pointed out in soothing tones.
"Louse," Teel hissed as he pulled her out of the elevator into a foyer paneled in rich oak with a shiny oak floor. A round Kerman rug in cream, green, and pink formed the focal point of the circular room. Several doors led off from it and a stairway followed the curve of the room to an open balcony on the second floor.
Teel was staring at a cut-glass lamp suspended from the two-story ceiling when Chazz tugged on her arm, urging her toward one of the doors. "Where are we?" she demanded, digging in her heels and glowering up at him.
"Where do you think? My apartment. We're going to have lunch," he explained impatiently.
"I knew it," Teel cried. "You lured me here... you... lecher."
"Will you keep your voice down. My housekeeper will think you're crazy." He frowned at her, taking her arm again, then opening the door behind him and leading her into a beautiful room that appeared to be a lounge or library.
Teel glanced around her at the book-lined walls. "I'll bet you stole these books from the New York Public Library," she muttered, gazing at the large green Kerman rugs. The same green was repeated in silk-covered sofas that were placed at right angles to the Adam fireplace. A huge painting depicting the green sea and a storm- tossed whaling ship hung over the mantel. A ghostly white lighthouse seemed to waver in the background. "It's beautiful," Teel whispered, walking closer to check the name of the artist. "Tilda Charles," she read, turning to frown at Chazz. "Wouldn't you know you'd have an original Tilda Charles!" She sniffed. "Such ostentation. This is probably the largest canvas she has ever painted, and you have to have it over our mantel." Teel looked back at the painting, craning her neck to read the title— "'Saving the Whale Off Martha's Vineyard.' Wow. I wonder if she ever saw such a thing or if she just imagined it."
"Oh, she saw it." Chazz leaned down, grazing Teel's neck with his lips. "Don't you recognize the man standing in the bow with the hawser in his hands?" His breath sent tingles down her neck.
"I beg your pardon?" Teel struggled to keep her emotional and physical balance. It was an ordeal to be with Chazz. Her eyes didn't focus, her hearing faded, her muscles became limp, her backbone seemed to disappear. He gave her headaches and gas. God, Chazz Herman was a one-man torture chamber for Teel Barrett. She took deep breaths and kept her mind on the picture. She tilted her head as the high cheek bones, chiseled chin, hawklike nose, and dark hair of the young boy depicted in the painting all seeped into her consciousness. "You! What are you doing in a Tilda Charles painting?" she accused him, as if he had bought his place in the painting.
"She's my aunt."
"Oh!" Teel closed her eyes, then looked blankly from him to the painting, and from the painting to him.
Chazz put his arm around her waist. "She and I were staying at my place on Martha's Vineyard when a sperm whale beached itself. Some of the locals and I struggled for hours to get the animal into deeper water. It returned twice. The third time out we circled it until it seemed to orient itself and swim away. Of course we have no way of knowing if it beached itself someplace else, but I can't describe to you the exhilaration we felt when that whale began to move smoothly on its own. We celebrated all night. It was wonderful. Aunt Tilda stayed on the beach the whole day watching, and I suppose sketching too. The first I knew that she had painted the scene was when this"—he pointed upward—"was delivered to my door." He sighed. "The sea was just that color." He smiled down at Teel. "You and I will go there soon." He leaned down and pressed a hard kiss on her open mouth. "But for now, it's time you had lunch. I have to get you back. I've already volunteered my services for the afternoon, so I'll be with you for the rest of the day. Tonight, I'll take you to dinner and a show."
As Chazz spoke, he led her through double doors into a very large dining room that could easily seat thirty people. Teel looked up at him questioningly. Chazz laughed. "No, we're not going to eat here. We'll eat in the morning room. It's smaller and cozier. I think you'll like it."
"Does it matter?" Teel asked, feeling as though she were walking on air as Chazz carried her along at his side.
"Don't be testy. It isn't good for your digestion," he soothed, leading her out into another hallway, then through more doors into a circular room with a glass wall that overlooked a large terrace with a swimming pool and garden. The view of New York City was breathtaking. Teel heaved a sigh of satisfaction. The round table in the middle of the room was set for two. The table and chairs were of rich rosewood, as was the paneling on the walls. On the floor was a round Chinese rug in deep blue and cr
eam. Teel studied the room carefully, turning slowly. "I wonder what a psychiatrist would say about your penchant for round rooms," she mused. "It's probably your emperor complex surfacing."
"No doubt," Chazz agreed smoothly. "Won't you be seated, Empress?" He smiled at her, then turned to greet a portly woman who entered through swinging doors from the kitchen. She had salt-and-pepper hair and wore an apron that belled out around her form like a small circus tent. She clasped her hands in front of her and looked at Chazz expectantly. "Ah, Mrs. Pritchett," he said. "This is Miss Barrett. She is the lady I told you I was bringing for lunch."
"How do you do, Miss Barrett."
"It's nice to meet you, Mrs. Pritchett." Teel felt a sudden discomfiture at the assessing look the housekeeper gave her.
"I'll bring lunch right along sir. I made it light, as you ordered."
Mrs. Pritchett disappeared, but before Teel could say anything to Chazz, she was back with a tureen of soup. As the fragrance of the home-made mushroom broth reached her nostrils, she realized that she was ravenous. When she sat back a few minutes later, after finishing her bowl, Mrs. Pritchett seemed to answer some unheard signal. This time she appeared with two large bowls of julienne salad, which she placed with care in front of Teel and Chazz.
"I've added cubed chicken breasts and tuna steak instead of ham, sir. I think it makes the salad more piquant," Mrs. Pritchett announced proudly. She pointed to a cut-glass cruet. "That's my own celery seed dressing," she told Teel. "But of course, if you prefer, I also have commercial dressings."
"I would much prefer the homemade, Mrs. Pritchett. Thank you." Teel smiled as the older woman nodded once and her cheeks flushed. She looked at her employer.
"It's high time you were bringing one home. Your taste is better than I thought it would be." Mrs. Pritchett turned and left the dining room.
Teel looked at Chazz, unable to stop the laugh that bubbled up. "She's certainly an original."
He shrugged. "She worked for Aunt Tilda for years, then decided she wanted to work for me." He grinned. "I assure you I had little say in the decision. She just turned up one day and stayed. She runs the house like clockwork and handles the few parties I have here with aplomb, but she's quick to point out my faults."