“We have half an hour with Luke’s undivided attention before the reporters come,” Gilly said, then prodded. “You all brought questions for Luke, right?”
“I did, I did!” exclaimed Samantha Dunwoody, an unusually self-possessed child. “Why do you take so many gray pictures and not colored ones?”
“And what about a camcorder? Do you have a camcorder? We have a camcorder,” chimed in Kendra, Samantha’s best friend.
The ice was broken. Gilly hung back, letting Luke lead. He was a little distant, a little protective, but very kind and charming. He showed them his favorite camera, talked about his photos, answered the same questions several times and let each child take a picture or two.
He was warming up, she could tell, and a sparkle seemed to return to his eyes as he began to snap pictures of the children himself. He was just lining them up for a group photo when the first of the reporters arrived.
Gilly started to warn Luke, but the reporter caught her arm. “No, this is great. Let him go.”
Luke turned, instantly aware of the media presence. He glanced over, but went back to his photography as one and then another reporter filed in. Gilly wasn’t surprised to see Devon Drake in the pack, giving up on her search for Nightshade long enough to cover the return of a local hero.
“Hey, Luke!” Kendra called out, squirming on the couch, front and center in the posed photo. “Do you have that one picture of the bull? We all saw that. But it’s not here with all these big poster ones.”
“Actually no, I don’t,” he murmured.
“I do!” Samantha cried, lurching forward just as he clicked the shutter. “I cut it out of the paper. I love that picture! I brought it so I could get your autograph. Can I get your autograph, Luke? I have Frank Thomas and Harold Baines at home. Do you know Frank Thomas and Harold Baines? Have you ever taken their picture?”
“No, I’ve never met them.” He stood, tensing, as the little girl shoved a piece of newspaper at him.
His picture of the bull.
Gilly watched nervously, keeping one eye on Luke, one eye on the phalanx of reporters. What would he do? Would he wig out like he had at the Minoan exhibit?
He held the newspaper clipping in his hand and stared down at it for long moments. Finally, when Gilly had just about fainted with the rising tension, he said, “Pretty good picture, isn’t it?”
“I like it,” Samantha agreed. “I like bulls.”
Swiftly Luke signed his name across the bottom of the paper and handed it back to the girl. But intrepid little Sam wasn’t finished yet.
“How did you get out when you were stuck in the cave?” she persisted. “Did you see the Minotaur?”
“They, uh, learned about the Minotaur in mythology last week,” Gilly explained.
“I bet you left a trail of bread crumbs, right?” Kendra piped up, not wanting to be outdone by her friend.
Gilly could read the discomfort on his face. He’d never even discussed his sojourn in the labyrinth with her, let alone a roomful of kids and reporters. Moving fast, she interceded with, “That’s enough for today, kids. Luke has been really nice—”
“No, no, we want to know!” they chorused. Sam started jumping up and down with excess energy.
“C’mon, Luke, answer the kids.” a reporter in thick black glasses said impatiently. “Everyone wants to know. How did you get out of that place?”
There was a long pause. Gilly didn’t know what to do. Should she rescue him? Or let it go?
You decide, she thought, sending him a telepathic message. It’s up to you.
Luke bent down to Sam’s level and took back the clipping. He gave it another good look and then began, “It was very dark and very quiet. I didn’t know what to do.”
“Were you scared?”
“Yeah, I was really scared. I didn’t know if there was a way out.” His voice was deep and melodic, as if he were telling a fairy tale, and the children were rapt. “I don’t know if any of you have ever been stuck in a closet, or maybe just in your room after the lights went out. The dark can be pretty scary.”
Wide-eyed, the children nodded quickly.
“But I remembered where the painting of the bull was. And it was like there was someone with me, and I wasn’t as scared anymore,” he told them softly. “I knew there was very powerful magic there, because the painting was very old and somebody who knew a lot about magic had put it there.”
“Like a wizard?” one of the boys asked.
“Merlin?” Kendra tried.
His lips curved into a smile. “Someone like that.”
“So what did you do then?”
“Sometimes, when you concentrate really hard, when you try your hardest,” he said, “even if it’s very dark and you’re all alone, you can still find a way if you just remember that the magic is there to help you.”
“Like Tinker Bell!” Kendra interrupted, knocking Luke’s leg with her fist in excitement.
Luke’s smile was so sweet it made Gilly weak in the knees just to see it. “Kind of like Tinker Bell. So that’s what I did. I concentrated, I gathered my strength and I found a way. One step at a time. It was very hard and very dark, but I found a way.”
“Great story,” Devon Drake said, scribbling to get it all down.
“I think that’s it for today, kids,” Gilly announced, and this time she wasn’t allowing any objections. She rounded them up and made them sit still long enough for the reporters to get pictures, and then she turned to Luke. “Did you have anything you wanted to say before we let you get back to your, uh, work?”
“Luke, listen, we have a million questions,” a reporter interjected. “How did you really get out? What was all that about magic?”
“I’m not taking any questions,” Luke returned carefully. “I have nothing to say about my getting out except what you just heard. As far as I’m concerned, it’s all in the past, and I’m looking toward the future now. And by the way, for the record, I hope that future includes the continued good health of the Benedict Academy, where I myself spent some very good years.”
“How long have you been back in town?” someone shouted.
“What have you been doing all this time?” another one yelled, raising his voice to be heard over the first one. Gilly winced, remembering how sensitive Luke was to loud voices.
But he just ignored the reporter. “I plan to be very active in the fight to save the West Riverside neighborhood, and especially Benny’s Academy. I hope you will all print that at the top of your stories.”
“What about the labyrinth? Any lasting effects?”
“No more questions,” Gilly declared, stepping in front of him. “You heard what he had to say. Lucas Blackthorn is back, and he’s back to help us save the Benedict Academy. Once again he is acting like a hero, don’t you agree?”
Aunt Abigail and Uncle Fitz shooed the reporters out, but they kept firing questions all the way, paying no attention to the fact that no one was answering.
Gilly looked at Luke. “You’re not going to get a moment’s peace here now,” she noted regretfully. “You were right. And I should have known it would happen.”
He shrugged. “It would’ve happened sooner or later, anyway. I knew they’d figure out where I was as soon as they really tried.” Mischief lit his blue eyes. “I did pretty well, didn’t I?”
For a moment it was as if the two of them were all alone, even though the room was full of exuberant children. “Luke, you were fabulous.” She knew her own eyes were shining with pride and joy and…love. She didn’t care.
Stretching up on tiptoe, she kissed him on the cheek, warmly pressing her lips to that sculpted jaw.
Luke hesitated a second, and then, to her surprise, he laughed out loud.
“Thank you,” he said as if she had just given him his very own signed copy of the Mona Lisa. “I feel great. Do you believe it? I feel great.”
“Of course I believe it.”
But as she shepherded the students back
outside to the bus, she couldn’t help wondering why he was so shocked.
Chapter Twelve
“I feel great,” he insisted as Abigail frowned.
“We’ve gone over it and over it, and that’s all I can tell you—I feel great.”
“You had earplugs.”
“Yes, I did.”
“It was very short-term. And we controlled the lighting.”
“Yes, we did.” He smiled recklessly. “So what? Don’t you see? There were people and noise and questions and that little girl pounded me on the knee and Gilly kissed my cheek, and through it all, I felt great.”
“It’s nothing you can depend on,” she maintained.
He shook his head. “You don’t understand. I was right the first time. The meditation and the sensory-deprivation tank, plus some extra sleep—it really works. I can control it.”
“You don’t know that. This Snow Ball thing is completely different.”
“Abby,” he chided, shocking her by dropping a kiss on the top of her head, “don’t you see? For the first time I have real hope.”
“Oh, Lucas…” His housekeeper sounded soft and motherly. “I just don’t want you to get your hopes up and then get hurt. We don’t know enough about this…thing. What if something really goes wrong and we can’t fix it? What if we can’t fix you?”
“I feel great,” he repeated with a careless shrug. “A few phone calls, a meeting or two with a politician just to remind them what the Blackthorn name has always meant in this town—I’ve done it all over the past few days, and it was a breeze. Gilly really thinks the tide is turning in our favor.”
He didn’t tell Abigail that he had also carefully refrained from any prolonged contact with Gilly. He knew he was afraid to be alone with her, afraid of what would surely happen. Chicken. But as long as he didn’t blow any circuits, he could pretend that it wasn’t going to happen again.
It isn’t going to happen again, he told himself. I’m much better. And if he could make it true by sheer strength of will, it would be so.
Tonight. The Snow Ball. The big gala to show off the school to every bigwig in town. He had pulled in a few old political favors left by his father and his grandfather, but he had helped Gilly make the Snow Ball into what she wanted. He would be there, dressed up like a penguin, willing to dance for perhaps the first time in his adult life just to make the evening perfect.
And tonight, after this final test, if he was still feeling well, he planned to make his move.
He planned to make love to Gilly.
And then he would tell her about his strange powers, about Nightshade, everything.
“You’re riding for a fall, Luke.”
He fiddled with the knot on his tie. He was practically pain-free, if it hadn’t been for the damn tie. “Stop being such a ray of sunshine, will you? And Abby—you and Fitz need to get on the road if you’re going to make it to Springfield by midnight. You have to be at that antique fair first thing in the morning, or the Chippendale table I want will be gone.”
Her frown was etched deep in her narrow face. “We don’t have to go tonight. There’ll be other Chippendale tables.”
“We’ve been through this. I want that table. It’s exactly like the one that used to be in the front hall.”
It was just a ruse, and he figured they probably both knew that. But if his life was going to take a great turn tonight—or even if it was going to shatter into bits—he’d rather they were out of sight when it happened. He wanted neither congratulations nor I-told-you-so’s from his household staff. And even if they didn’t want to go, they couldn’t refuse a direct order. In many ways he might be their charge, even their child, but he was their boss, too.
“Go,” he commanded. “Have fun.”
As she hesitated, Luke glanced at his watch. In another sign of progress, for the first time since the accident he could wear a watch without the incessant ticking driving him nuts.
“I’m already late,” he noted. “Gilly is probably biting her nails wondering if I’m going to show at all.”
Abigail fixed him with one last disapproving look. “Be careful,” she said, and then she finally consented to leave him alone with his tie and his watch and his jumpy nerves.
GILLY WAS IN HEAVEN. Well, at least as close as she could be without Luke. Where was he? She craned her neck, scanned the crowd, but he wasn’t there.
The music, the flowers, the steady stream of donations to the Save Benny’s fund—it was all going very well indeed.
But where was Luke? He wouldn’t punk out on her tonight of all nights, surely? He’d been so terrific the past few days, calling people, haranguing the mayor, taking on just about anything she asked.
Of course, she hadn’t seen much of him herself. But all that would change tonight.
She was wearing a white dress she had borrowed from Suzette, who had a much better wardrobe than she did. It was not her usual style, with its short, frothy skirt and fitted bodice, and she had occasional moments when she looked down and felt like an impostor. Still, it was a beautiful dress, and several of her students had been shocked to see her in something other than her usual jeans, T-shirt and blazer. She wasn’t sure anyone at school had ever seen her legs! Especially not in heels, which made them look longer and all the more unfamiliar.
“Wow, Ms. Q!” Even cooler-than-a-cucumber Tony was impressed.
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” She smiled at him, still feeling awkward. All this attention was fun, but awfully strange.
“Is that him? The hero?” a nearby society matron whispered loudly. And then Gilly heard the rush of whispers, the oohs and ahhs, and she knew Luke had arrived.
“Finally,” she breathed, making her way as quickly as she could through the crowd. She wanted to get to him before the mayor or some other hot dog nabbed him.
He was standing just inside the door to the school gym, underneath the big paper snowflake they’d hung as a decoration. His hair was still too long, but it framed his elegant face beautifully, and he was wearing a white dinner jacket with black tie and black trousers. He had one hand in his pocket as he stood there, lazy, casual, gazing around at the crowd, a funny halfsmile playing about his narrow, sexy lips.
And then he saw her. His smile widened. His hot blue gaze swept over her, from head to toe, brushing and teasing her with its flames.
And Gilly’s breath was gone, knocked right out of her.
Everybody there looked pretty spiffy tonight, but nobody held a candle to Luke. And the way he was looking at her. Only her.
“Hi,” she murmured, feeling like an idiot for not having anything better to say. “You look…delicious.”
He laughed. But she was completely serious.
“You look delicious, too.” He took her hand, leading her skillfully through the crowd, finding the most shadowy corner. And then he pulled her hard into his arms, faking a step or two, making it look vaguely as though they were dancing when all she was doing was holding on for dear life.
His arms tightened. “I like the dress,” he murmured in her ear. “Kind of like whipped cream.” And then he pulled her even closer, touching just the tip of his tongue to her ear. “Whipped cream. So…lickable.”
Her heart dropped to her knees. Luke, making naughty small talk? What twilight zone was this?
You know what? she answered herself. I don’t care. Tonight is tonight, and that’s good enough.
When she was sixteen, she’d prayed every night to St. Anthony, patron saint of lost causes, to make Luke look at her this way, just once. Okay, so a few years had passed, and neither of them was really the same person. She’d given up on St. Anthony—and on men—a long time ago.
But here they were, and he wasn’t just looking at her—his eyes were devouring her. No way was she going to let this opportunity slide.
She could see the gleam of amusement, of desire, in his gaze, but she closed her own eyes and nestled closer, vainly listening for the music to guide her. All she could
hear was his racing heartbeat. He was lean, hot, his body thrumming with tension under her fingers.
His lips were so close; it was only an extra fraction of an inch to edge nearer, to lift her mouth to his. The kiss was soft, forgiving, gentle at first. But soon he stopped any pretense of dancing, framing her face with his long, clever fingers. He deepened the kiss, drawing her in, exploring her lips, serving plenty of hard, inescapable notice that there was more behind this kiss than mere friendship.
Gilly felt as if she were falling under a spell. She couldn’t pull away, could only kiss him back with every ounce of passion and joy she felt racing through her veins.
It was the same as the kiss in the museum, and yet so different, too—not as rushed, not as frantic, even more dazzling. And yet familiar in a strange way—
“Ahem.” A woman cleared her throat expressively. “Excuse me, you two, but this is a school function. No making out, please.”
Aflame with embarrassment, still dizzy and tingling, Gilly broke away from Luke and wheeled around to face her punishment “Suzette. Hello.” She saw that her friend’s eyes were sparkling with merriment, but it didn’t help. Luke moved securely behind her, very close, very solid, as if protecting her. That helped a little.
“You want me to have to get out the ruler to separate you two?”
“That won’t be necessary,” Luke promised, straight-faced. Gilly could feel that he had tucked up her skirt just a little in the back and was tickling her thigh. She bit her lip, but his fingers continued their insidious path.
“Luke,” she tried, her voice coming out unnaturally high. “Can you behave yourself, please?”
“Looked to me like neither of you were doing too well there,” Suzette interjected. “Never happened when I wore that dress, I’ll tell you.”
“I’m sure it’s lovely on you, too,” Luke said politely, but his hand was creeping up to where it should not have been. There was nothing but a wall behind them, so no one could tell that he was taking liberties with the curve of her bottom under the flouncy skirt. But Gilly could certainly tell. And when he hit the lacy line of her panties, she let out a tiny squeak of protest
Touch Me Not Page 16