by Nora Roberts
He wouldn't have judged Abra to be the kind of woman to flatter an old man, to smile and flirt with one with an eye to what it could gain her. There was no mistaking the fact that Barlow was smitten with her, or that she had just wandered off into the roses with one of the Fortune 500's best,
Cody lit a cigarette, then narrowed his eyes against the smoke. There was no mistaking the fact that she had wanted him. He might have initiated the kiss- might even have backed her into a corner, as she'd said-but her response had been full-blown. No one kissed like that unless she meant it.
Yet she'd pulled back. Each time. He'd thought it was because she was cautious, maybe even a little afraid of how strong the connection between them had become. And maybe he was a fool, and she held him off because she wanted to snag a bigger fish.
Almost as soon as the thought took root, he ripped it out. It was unfair, he told himself. He was allowing himself to think that way because he was frustrated- because he wanted Abra more than he had ever wanted anyone. And, most of all, because he didn't know what the hell to do about it.
"Excuse me." He cut Marci off in midsentence, sent her a quick smile and strode off toward the garden.
He heard Abra's laughter, a low whispering sound that made him think of the mist on the lake near his home. Then he saw her, standing in the beam of one of the colored lanterns the Thornways' staff had hung all over the garden. She was smiling, twirling a red blossom in her fingertips. The same kind of flower, Cody noted, that she had mangled on his terrace only the night before.
"There's not much meat," Barlow was saying as he grinned at her, "but what's there is choice."
She laughed again, then slipped the stem of the flower into his lapel.
"I beg your pardon."
Both Barlow and Abra turned-guiltily, Cody thought-at the sound of his voice.
– "Well, Johnson, been enjoying yourself?" Barlow gave him a quick slap on the shoulder. "Enjoy yourself more if you took a stroll in the moonlight with someone as pretty as our Abra here. Young people don't take enough time for romance these days. Going to see if I can dig up a beer."
For a broad man, he moved quickly enough and Abra found herself alone in the festively lit garden with Cody. "I should probably go mingle-" she began, but she stopped short when Cody blocked her path.
"You haven't felt the need to mingle all evening."
Her main thought was to get out of the garden and away from him, so she just gave him a vague-smile. "I've been enjoying WW. He's great company."
"I noticed. It's an unusual woman who can jump from man to man so smoothly. My compliments."
The smile turned into a look of blank confusion.
Cody found a match and cupped his hand over the flame as he lit a cigarette. "He might be in his sixties, but two or three hundred million melt the years away, I imagine."
Abra stared at him for nearly a full minute. "Maybe you should go out and come in again. Then I might understand what you're talking about."
He tossed aside the match. In heels she was eye to eye with him. "I think I'm clear enough. Barlow's a very rich man, widowed for about ten years, and one who obviously appreciates a young, attractive woman."
She nearly laughed, but then she saw the disdain in his eyes. He was serious, she realized. It was incredibly insulting. "You could say he's certainly a man who knows how to treat a woman. Now, if you'll excuse me."
He grabbed her arm before she could storm past him. "I don't find any excuse for you, Red, but that doesn't stop me from wanting you." He pulled her around until they were once again face-to-face. "Can't say that I care for it, but there it is. I want you, and whatever goes on in that calculating head of yours I intend to have you."
"You can go straight to hell, Johnson." She jerked her arm away, but she wasn't through. "I don't care what you want, or what you think of me, but because I like Mr. Barlow too much to let you go on thinking he's some kind of senile fool, I'll let you in on something. We had a conversation tonight, the way some people do in social situations. We happened to hit it off. I wasn't coming on to him, nor he to me."
"What about that crack I heard when I walked up?"
"What?" She hesitated a minute, and then she did laugh. But her eyes were cold. "That was a line from a movie, you simpleton. An old Tracy-Hepburn movie. Mr. Barlow and I both happen to be fans. And I'll tell you something else." Temper lost, she shoved him, taking him back two steps. "If he had been coming on to me, it would've been none of your business. If I want to flirt with him, that's my business. If I want to have an affair with him-or anyone else- you don't have jack to say about it." She shoved him again, just for the satisfaction. "Maybe I prefer his kind of attention to the grab-and-go treatment I get from you."
"Now hold on."
"You hold on." Her eyes glowed green in the light from the lanterns. "I have no intention of tolerating this kind of insult from you, or anyone. So keep clear, Johnson, if you want that face of yours to stay in one piece."
She stormed off, leaving Cody singed. He let out a breath between his teeth as he dropped the cigarette onto the path and crushed it out.
"You had that one coming, Johnson," he muttered, rubbing the back of his neck. He knew what it was to dig a hole, and he knew he'd dug this one deep. He also knew that there was only one way out.
Chapter Five
He thought about flowers. Somehow Cody didn't think Abra was the type of woman to melt at the sight of a few roses. He considered a straight-out apology, the kind of no-frills shoot-from-the-hip I'm sorry one friend might offer another. But he didn't think Abra saw him as a friend, exactly. In any case, the ice she was dishing out would freeze the words before they got from his mouth to her ear. So he gave her the only thing he thought she would accept for the time being. Space.
They worked together over the next two weeks, often shoulder to shoulder. The distance between them was as great as that between the sun and the moon. Consultations were often necessary, but Abra always arranged it so that they weren't alone. With a skill he was forced to admire, she used Charlie Gray as a buffer. It couldn't have been easy, but she avoided Cody altogether whenever possible. Understanding the need for a cooling-off period, he did nothing to change the situation. Twice he made brief trips, once to the home office in Fort Lauderdale and once to work out a few bugs in a medical complex in San Diego.
Each time he returned he stuck a toe in the waters of Abra's temperament and found them still frigid.
With his hard hat in place and his eyes shielded by tinted glasses, Cody watched the glass of the dome being lowered into place.
"A nice touch. A class touch." Barlow looked up, grinning at the light that came through the glass in red-and-gold spears.
"WW." Cody relaxed a bit when the glass settled on the opening like a cap on a bottle. "Didn't know you were back in town."
"Doing some spot-checking." Barlow mopped his face with a handkerchief. "Hope they get that cooling system going."
"It's on today's schedule."
"Good. Good." Barlow turned around, wanting to take in the entire sweep of building. It pleased him. It had the look of a castle, noble and impregnable, yet at the same time was unabashedly modern. He strolled over to study the glass arch of roof that brought the mountain into the lobby. He approved of the dramatic touch here, where guests would check in and out. First and last impressions, he thought. Young Johnson was making certain they would be lasting ones. Landscapers would plant a few desert shrubs and cacti, then let nature take over. All along the west wall were wide arching windows that let in the vast arena of desert and butte. To the west, men were connecting pipe and laying the stone pool for the waterfall.
"I'll say this, boy-you deliver." It was the kind of blunt compliment Barlow gave only when it was deserved. "I'll admit I had some bad moments over the blueprints and the mock-ups, but my son saw something in all this. I went with his judgment, and I can say now he was right. You've made yourself something here, Cody. Not every man can l
ook back on his life and say the same."
"I appreciate that."
"I'm going to want you to show me the rest." He slapped Cody on the back. "Meantime, is there a place a man can get a beer around here?"
"I think we can arrange it." Cody led the way outside to an ice chest and dug out two cans.
Barlow drank deeply and sighed. His thinning hair was covered by a straw hat with a paisley band. A porch hat, Cody's mother would have called it. It had the effect of making the millionaire look like a retired tobacco farmer.
"I'll be sixty-five my next birthday, and there's still nothing quite like a cold beer on a hot afternoon." Barlow glanced toward the health club and caught a glimpse of Abra. "Well, maybe one thing." With a quick bray of laughter he sat down on the ice chest and loosened his collar. "I like to think of myself as a student of human nature. Figure I made most of my money that way."
"Mmm-hmm," Cody responded absently. He, too, had spotted Abra. She was wearing baggy bib overalls that should have made her appear sexless. They didn't. Cody kept remembering how she'd looked in the little black dress.
"Seems to me you're a man with more on his mind than steel and glass." Barlow swigged his beer with simple appreciation. "Wouldn't have something to do with a long-legged engineer, would it?"
"Might." Cody sent him a mild look as he took out his cigarettes. He offered Barlow one, but the older man shook his head.
"Had to give them up. Damn doctors yammering at me. Took a liking to her," he continued, switching back easily to the subject of Abra. "'Course, most men take a liking to good looks, but she's got brains and grit. Might have scared me off in my younger days." He grinned and took off his hat to fan his face. "Seemed to me you two had a tiff at that do we had at Tim Thornway's."
"You could call it that." Cody sipped and considered. "I was jealous of you."
"Jealous?" Barlow had lifted the can to his lips. Now he had to set it on the ground for fear he'd drop it as he roared with laughter. Cutting loose, he rocked back and forth on the chest, mopping his streaming face with his handkerchief. "You just knocked twenty years off me, boy. I gotta thank you." He sucked in air, then let it out again in a wheeze. "Imagine a good-looking sonofabitch like you jealous of an old man." He caught his breath and leaned back, still grinning. "A rich old man. Well, well, I don't suppose the little lady took kindly to that."
"The little lady," Cody drawled, "came very close to knocking out my teeth."
"Told you she had grit." Barlow stuffed his handkerchief back in his pocket, then picked up his beer. Life still had some surprises, he thought. Thank God. "Fact is, I had her in mind for my son." At Cody's look, he chuckled and dropped the hat back on his head. "Don't get your dander up now, boy. A man can only take so much excitement in one day. 'Sides, decided against it when I saw the way she looked at you."
"That simplifies things."
"Between you and me, anyway," Barlow pointed out. "Otherwise, I'd say you were about waist-deep in quicksand."
"Pretty accurate estimate." Cody tossed his empty can in a trash barrel. "Any suggestions?"
"Better find yourself a rope, son, and haul your tail out."
"My father always used flowers," Cody mused.
"Couldn't hurt." Wincing at a few creaks in his joints, Barlow rose. "Neither would groveling." He noted Cody's expression and laughed again. "Too young for groveling yet," he said. "But you'll learn." He gave Cody a thump on the back. "Yes, indeed, you'll learn."
He wasn't about to grovel. Absolutely not. But he thought it might be time to give the flowers a shot. If a woman hadn't cooled off some in two weeks, she wasn't going to cool off at all-at least not without a little help.
In any case, Cody told himself, he owed her an apology. He laughed a little to himself as he shifted the tiger lilies to his other hand. It seemed as if they'd been bouncing apologies back and forth since the first minute they'd met. Why break the pattern? he mused as he stood in front of her door. If she didn't accept it now, he'd just stick around and drive her crazy until she did.
Each of them seemed to excel at driving the other crazy.
Besides, he'd missed her. It was as simple as that. He'd missed arguing with her about the project. He'd missed hearing her laugh the way she could when her guard was down. He'd missed the strong, uninhibited way her arms would come around him.
He glanced at the flowers in his hand. Tiger lilies were a pretty fragile rope, but they were better than none at all. Even if she tossed them in his face, it would be a change from the stiff politeness she'd dished out since the evening at Tim's. He knocked and wondered what he was going to say to get his foot in the door.
It wasn't Abra who answered, but the blonde from the photographs. She was a small, rosy-cheeked woman Cody guessed was about forty. She was dressed very simply, in a copper-colored jumpsuit that complemented her hair and her eyes, which were so much like Abra's. Cody smiled at her, as much for that as for the fact that, in her porcelain way, she was a knockout.
"Well, hello." She smiled back at him and offered a hand. "I'm Jessie Peters."
"Cody Johnson. I'm a-an associate of Abra's."
"I see." She gave him a slow, sweeping study that was laced with feminine approval. "Come in. I always love meeting Abra's…associates. Would you like a drink? Abra's in the shower."
"Sure." He remembered Abra's wine. "Something cold, if you have it."
"I've just made some lemonade. Fresh. Make yourself at home." She disappeared into the adjoining kitchen. "Was Abra expecting you?"
"No." He glanced around, noting that the apartment had had a swift but thorough tidying.
"A surprise, then. I love surprises." She walked back in with two tall glasses crackling with ice. "Are you an engineer?"
"I'm an architect."
Jessie paused for a moment. Then a smile wisped around her mouth. "The architect," she murmured, gesturing for Cody to sit. "I believe Abra's mentioned you."
"I'll bet." He set the flowers on the newly dusted table.
"She didn't mention you were so attractive." Jessie crossed her legs and settled back. "But it's like her to keep a thing like that to herself." She ran a fingertip down her glass as she summed him up. Her hand was pretty and fragile-looking, like the novelty magnet in Abra's car. There was a diamond on her finger, a small one in a rather ornate setting, but no wedding band. "You're from the east?"
"That's right. Florida."
"I never think of Florida as the east," she commented. "I always think of Disney World."
"Did I hear the door? I- Oh." Abra came out of the adjoining bedroom. She was wearing baggy white pants and an oversize sweatshirt with a pair of battered-looking sandals. Her hair was still damp and curled from the shower.
"You have company." Jessie rose and gathered up the flowers. "Bearing gifts."
"Yes, I see." Abra dug her hands into the deep pockets of her pants.
With her bright smile still in place, Jessie buried her face in the blooms. She recognized tension and romance. As far as she was concerned, one was wasted without the other. "Why don't I put these in water for you, sweetheart? You don't happen to have a vase, do you?"
"Somewhere."
"Of course."
Abra waited until Jessie went into the kitchen to search for it. Cautious, she kept her voice low. "What do you want?"
"To see you."
Abra's hands tightened into fists in her pockets when he rose. "You've done that. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm busy this evening.". "And to apologize," Cody continued.
She hesitated, then let out a long breath. She had gone to him once with an apology, and he had accepted. If there was one thing she understood, it was how difficult it was to try to mend fences temper had broken.
"It's all right," she said, and managed what she hoped was a casual smile. "Let's forget it."
"Wouldn't you like an explanation?" He took a step forward. She took one backward.
"I don't think so. It might be best if-"
"Mom…"
"Mom? You've got to be kidding." The genuine astonishment in Cody's voice had Jessie beaming.
"That's the nicest compliment I've had all day," she said. "If I didn't love her so much, I'd deny it." Raising up on her toes, she kissed Abra's cheek, then brushed lightly at the faint smear of lipstick she left behind. "You two have a nice evening. Don't forget to call me."
"But you just got here."
"I've a million things to do." Jessie gave her daughter's hand a squeeze, then offered her own to Cody. "It was lovely meeting you."
"I hope I see you again, Mrs. Peters."
"Jessie." She smiled again. "I insist that all handsome men call me Jessie." The sweep of her lashes was the gesture of a practiced flirt. "Good night, sweetheart. Oh, you're almost out of dish detergent."
Abra let out a huff of breath when the door closed.
"Are you sure that's your mother?"
"Most of the time." Abra tunneled her fingers through her hair. Jessie always left her feeling bewildered. "Look, Cody, I appreciate you coming by to clear the air."
"Now clear out?"
"I don't want to be rude. I think both of us have used up our share of rudeness for this year, but it would simplify things if we kept our contact limited to working hours."
"I never said I wanted things simple." He took a step closer. Her eyes stayed warily on his as he toyed with the damp ends of her hair. "But if you do, fine. 1 look at you and I want. It doesn't get much simpler than that."
"For you." If it was difficult not to step away, it was much more difficult not to step forward. "I don't want to get into all of the reasons, but when I told you that I wasn't ready I was being perfectly honest. Added to that is the fact that we just don't get along very well. We don't know each other. We don't understand each other."