"Why are you lurking in the doorway?" Steffi demanded.
"I just decided I didn't want breakfast after all."
Lucie backed out of there on the double. She had to see Ian. She had to see Ian now.
* * *
She didn't know how she knew, but she did. He would be waiting for her in the library.
A good choice since the library was the last place Steffi would turn up.
There he was, lounging in a chintz wing chair in front of high, crowded bookshelves. Looking about as handsome as anybody had a right to, he had a newspaper propped in front of him. Reading the newspaper, hmm? Or pretending to. Once again, he was only on the front page.
"Ian?" Lucie crept into the library, leaving a good ten feet between her and the wing chair.
His dark brows lowered. The newspaper didn't.
"Okay, before you get any crankier, I'm not here to talk about this morning." She waved her hands to indicate a major change of subject. "The thing is, Steffi's still here. And she doesn't seem in any hurry to leave."
"I know. I saw her."
Hastily, Lucie asked, "You didn't say anything about last night, did you?"
"About her and Paolo, you mean?" Ian discarded his newspaper onto the piecrust table beside him. "I didn't want to show my hand. And I sure don't want to tell Kyle unless I have to."
"Exactly." She paused. "So what are we going to do about her?"
"We've got her dead to rights on the Paolo thing," Ian noted. "It's just a matter of what we do with it."
"I know. I thought that, too." She began to pace in front of him. "But the problem is it's all so sordid. Are we really going to tell people we were making love in a closet and we overheard her boinking some guy named Paolo in the hallway?"
"Uh, probably not."
"Paolo," she repeated. "Wait. I do know who that is. Delilah's busboy! How many Paolos with whiny voices can there be?" Her eyes widened. "Steffi is boinking one of the busboys from her own wedding?"
"Jeez, that's tacky." Ian let out a long breath. "That ought to be good enough for a divorce in anybody's book."
Lucie shook her head as she commented darkly, "Yeah, but we need proof. All we know is what we think we heard from the closet."
"I have a feeling," Ian mused, "if we hang around the gazebo long enough we'll trip over them." He indicated a thumb toward the French doors that opened to the gardens. "What do you say? Are you up for a little private investigating? Say, tonight?"
Lucie rubbed her hands together, already imagining the scenario. "We can wear all black, like they do on TV, and bring a video camera and one of those big microphones."
"This isn't Sixty Minutes."
"Oh, come on, Ian." She smiled. "It'll be fun!"
* * *
Black clothes weren't hard to come by, but the infrared binoculars and video camera were a little trickier. Still, Ian knew people who knew people, and when the clock chimed midnight, they were ready to go. Ian had even drawn a map of the grounds and sketched their path with X's and O's.
"Have you seen Steffi recently?" he asked.
"She didn't come down for dinner, just had a tray in her room," Lucie told him. "I checked. But I did catch her whispering on the phone this afternoon. Plus she's not in her room now. I checked that, too."
"She didn't go far. Her red convertible is in the garage. I checked that," he added.
"So I think she must be running around somewhere on the grounds with Paolo." Lucie's lips tilted up into a wide smile. "And we know it won't be the garden shed."
She wasn't exactly sure why she was enjoying this so much. When they'd discussed how they might help break up Steffi and Kyle's marriage, she hadn't imagined it would involve skullduggery or midnight eavesdropping excursions. And she certainly had no career aspirations to be a spy. But the black clothes, the looming darkness outside the French doors, and even the electronic equipment gave their mission a certain panache.
"Should we synchronize our watches?" she inquired brightly.
One of Ian's dark eyebrows arched. "Don't get too caught up in this. We're sticking together, so no, we don't even need watches. All we have to do is sneak out as close as we can to the gazebo, be very, very quiet and very, very quick, and she and Paolo will never even know we were there."
"Okay, okay. Party pooper."
"This way," he directed, sliding open the French doors and ushering her through. "Stay along the line of hedges until we get to the reflecting pond. There's a statue there and a marble bench. We'll cut across there so we can come up behind the gazebo."
He took her hand and led the way, tiptoeing like the Pink Panther or something, and Lucie had to stop herself from grinning ear to ear. It was just funny, that was all.
"Wait," she whispered. "Did you hear that?"
"No. What?"
"A soft plop. Like something hit the ground. There." She squinted into the dark night, lit only by a crescent moon that peeked through the clouds occasionally and a line of lanterns marking the high stone wall. The lanterns, bobbing in the slight breeze, signaled the boundary of the Mackintosh estate. "I saw a shadow, too," she said softly, her words barely audible. "Over there. I think Paolo just came over the wall."
Ian nodded, bending lower as he skulked around a clump of rose bushes. But his hand was still securely holding hers, carefully, unerringly guiding her along the winding path.
But then he halted suddenly, right in front of her, and Lucie knocked into him before she could stop. She made a small "oof" but caught herself immediately.
Ian held her steady. He mouthed something like, "There," and stabbed his finger in the air to indicate that Steffi and her pal were here, not in the gazebo at all, but right under their noses. A few more steps and they would've been out in the open near the reflecting pool, almost stumbling over the illicit lovers.
Concentrating, Lucie could hear moans and kissing noises, even from here. Not hard to figure out what they were doing.
Lucie couldn't help it; she had to look. Peering around Ian's shoulder, she put the binoculars to her eyes. Zeroing in, her glasses showed her dark hair and tanned skin—a lot of extremely naked skin—sharply defined against a white marble bench.
"Eeeuw," she muttered. That was a little too up close and personal. For the first time, now that it was too late, she realized what that clandestine pursuit might actually turn up. Not just proof, but in-your-face, no-possible-denials smut. "They're doing it on the bench. Wouldn't you think they'd get mosquito bites or something? Eeeuw."
Well, it was no worse than a closet, was it? Except a lot more public.
She made a few gestures of her own, trying to ask Ian if he could get them in focus from this vantage point He nodded, bringing the small video camera up to his face, whirring off some quick footage.
But he frowned. "Stay here," he whispered, and he circled around to the other side, apparently trying to get a better angle. Lucie chewed on a fingernail to occupy herself, sticking to the spot, staying away from the binoculars. The last thing she needed to see was any more details of her half sister in flagrante delicto.
Guess you should've thought of that before you came after her, she told herself. I didn't know! she argued back. I thought they'd be kissing or maybe groping a little. But not all out Erotic Olympics under a lighted statue on a marble bench!
Meanwhile, what was taking Ian so long? Surely he had enough film of the happy couple by now.
Lucie jiggled her foot and bit her thumbnail. Where was he? Did he fall in the reflecting pool or what?
But a mourning dove cooed right next to her ear and she jumped. She displaced a few twigs, making a small rustle that sounded gigantic in her own ears.
She didn't move.
Suddenly, Ian was behind her, carrying the camera. "Come on. Quick," he whispered. "They're finished. And I think they're coming this way."
"What?"
"I mean it!" a high-pitched voice cried impetuously. "It's over! I mean it, Paolo. Go back out the wa
y you came, and don't ever come back!"
Steffi. And the scraping and lurching noises indicated she had abandoned Paolo and their bench and was tromping this way.
Should they leap into the shrubbery? Confront her? What?
Ian stuck the camera behind Lucie's bottom, pushed her up against the nearest tree, and started to kiss her.
"Oh, my god!" Steffi yelled, slamming to a stop. "Here you are again, all over each other. A person comes out to…" She stopped. "I come out for midnight bird watching, and I trip over you two making out under a bush." She looked pointedly at Lucie. "What a floozy."
Steffi didn't wait for a response, didn't check the sight-lines from here to the bench, just went marching down the path with a big show of indignation and disgust.
As soon as she was gone, Lucie unwound herself from Ian, but she pulled the camera out from behind her back. Standing in the middle of the path, she said tightly, "Yeah, well, Steffi, here's a news flash. I maybe a floozy, but at least I have the class to do it with the right man."
There was a long pause. The night was still and humid, and the mourning dove hooted again, long and plaintive.
"What did you mean by that?" Ian asked quietly.
"What?"
"The right man. You said you had the class to do it with the right man." He waited. And she tried to think of a way to explain it away. She didn't suppose "Freudian slip" would get her anywhere.
"Nothing," she said eventually. "I didn't mean anything. Just that I'm with you, the man I'm supposed to be with." Not terribly persuasive. "I mean, the man people expect me to be with, given the fact that they think we're together. So if I'm in the bushes with anyone, well, it would naturally be you."
Ian edged around in front of her, forcing her to look at him. Uh-oh. In the heavy, warm June air, with only a small sliver of a moon to break the darkness, she felt awfully vulnerable. Besides, he knew how to push all her buttons.
Although at the moment, it looked more like she was pushing his.
"Lucie," he began, in a hushed, tense tone, but broke off. Clenching his hands into fists, he cursed under his breath, wheeled away, and then turned back. "Listen, I know I'm not your type—you've made that clear—but would you ever think that I am the right man? For real? Would you?"
Lucie's head was spinning. "I—I don't know what to say."
Was this a test? She searched his face for clues, but the light was too dim to tell. Did he want her to laugh it off and leap onto him and giggle that he was exactly the right man and she would be happy to prove it back in their room? No, that seemed way too dopey and infantile.
So maybe his pride was hurt because she had so unceremoniously dismissed his hypothetical marriage proposal. You're very marriable, Ian. I'm sure millions of women would love to catch you, just not me…
Condescending.
And if she blurted, I am so head over heels in love with you I can't see straight, would he shoot out of there like a jack-rabbit?
She wanted to say it, to confess her deepest feelings. But that's just not how she and Ian did things.
"Never mind," he mumbled, backing away. "That's okay. Forget I said anything. I, uh, must've been out of my mind for a minute."
As he strode away in the black night, beating a hasty retreat back to the house, Lucie lingered on the path. Feeling like dirt, she kicked at a small piece of gravel.
"Out of your mind?" she asked no one in particular. "You got that one right, Lucie."
* * *
A new day had dawned in the Mackintosh household. Except this morning, Lucie woke up alone. She thought that was what she wanted. Turned out she was wrong.
"Not the first time for that, is it?" she berated herself. "Face it, Lucie. You blew it."
Lonely, melancholy, miserable, she was swimming in a sea of all the negative emotions she normally refused to feel.
Too bad. She'd had all night to think about it. Examined and re-examined every nook and cranny of her bizarre relationship with Ian. Her conclusion?
"He liked me. I don't think he expected it any more than I did, but he really liked me. Go figure."
She sighed, tossing herself on the sunny yellow window seat. "He was terrific. He faced down my father, he brought me home to meet his wonderful family, he tried to send up a few trial balloons, and I shot him down." Savagely, she declared, "I threw his pride back in his face and now he will probably never speak to me again." She laughed bitterly. "Heck, he's probably already on the phone with Feather McStupid."
But, hey, at least she had the video tape. It lay on the dresser in her room, as big as life, a 500-pound gorilla that she didn't know what to do with.
Well, that wasn't exactly true. She knew. All she had to do was give Ian the tape, let him save his brother, and it would all be over.
As fast as that.
"Lucie," she said out loud, "you are a positive person, not a moper. So let's save Kyle and get the hell out of here."
Rousing herself, she found a pair of shorts and a cheery yellow top almost the same color as the bed linens on that luscious four-poster. Humming to herself, she energetically packed up the rest of her things and dropped the camera into her purse.
Oh, heavens. Why was she singing "Happy Birthday" again? "If I've learned nothing else from this escapade, I know now to stay away from birthday celebrations," she swore.
She took one last look at the pretty lemon-colored room, her eyes skimming past that beautiful bed. She had no excuse for this one. Maybe the first time she was drunk and the second time, in the closet, she was temporarily insane. But in the bed, when he was sweet and tender and everything went achingly slow…
No excuse.
So she picked up her bags, she closed the door, and went to find Ian. In the library, of course.
He was waiting. No newspaper to hide behind, just the damn gorgeous man himself this time.
Without wasting time on preliminaries, Lucie set down her luggage and dangled the video camera from one hand. "Well, here it is. Kyle's ticket to freedom."
"So." He set his jaw. "This is what we've been waiting for."
"Are you going to show the tape to Kyle or Steffi?"
"Neither." He stood, walking past her, neatly stripping the camera out of her hand without so much as touching her. With a flat smile, he popped the cassette out of the side. "I think I'll just take it straight to your dad. Kill two birds with one stone. He hands over Pandora's Boxers and talks Steffi into a quick, cheap divorce or I put the video on the Internet. That ought to do it. Game, set and match. We win."
Lucie blinked. "But Ian…" This wasn't what she wanted. Getting back Pandora's Boxers fair and square, sure. Saving Kyle from Steffi's evil clutches, sure. But blackmail? Showing her father a video of his beloved princess schtupping a busboy? "Ian, I don't think that's the way to go. It's just so ugly."
He shrugged. "It's ugly however it works."
"Not if you tell Kyle what's on the video and let him talk to Steffi himself," she argued. "I'm sure she'll see reason and my dad would never even have to know."
"In the first place, I don't think she'll see reason. And in the second…" Sending her a level stare, Ian slid his hands into his pockets. When did he get so cold and ruthless? She'd never seen him like this. "Lucie, you're packed and ready to go. So we don't have the couple card to play anymore. Without extra leverage, your father is going to hang on to Pandora's Boxers and your dream is going to shrivel up and die. Do you want to back off and let him win?"
"I don't really care," she insisted. "Making my father miserable has never been high on my agenda."
"I thought you wanted to win."
"No, I wanted my mother's company back." She frowned. "If my dad sees that tape, he's going to be devastated. You know, Steffi always accuses me of trying to ruin her life. And that would be exactly what I'd be doing. Just for spite."
Ian shook his head, implacable. "The deal was that you helped me get rid of Steffi and I helped you get Pandora's Boxers. One for on
e. That was the deal. I'm not letting this go only half-finished."
"But I don't want it this way." She tried to reason with him, but it didn't seem to be having any impact at all. "Listen, Ian, when Kyle gets his casts off, he can confront Steffi and ask her for a divorce like thousands of men ask thousands of women for divorces every day. They can handle this. It's not our place to mix it all together with my company into this big, nasty blackmail stew—"
"Lucie," he shot back, "this is what we wanted. This is what we planned. Trust me. It's the right thing to do—for Kyle and you."
"It's not what I planned."
But he kept going. He paced nearer, he took her shoulders in his strong hands, and he spoke softly, urgently, as if she were very dim-witted. Or maybe as if she were his wife. Lucie felt a chill seep into her bones. "I know you're angry with me," he said. "You think I pushed you into a sexual relationship that you didn't want. Well, you were there, too, Lucie. You know as well as I do that it was amazing between us. And if that's all it was—a fling—well, so what? Time to get over it and move on."
"I can't believe you're saying this," she whispered.
"But what we did or didn't have together has nothing to do with how the saga of the dirty video plays out," he insisted. "This is what we both knew would happen if we filmed Steffi and Paolo in the act. You're just chickening out at the last minute. It's like a habit. You've let your father and stepmother and bratty sister treat you like a doormat for so long, you don't know any other way to behave."
"Thank you for painting such a flattering portrait." Lucie licked her lips. "So, doormat that I am, I don't even get to decide what's right for me, apparently."
"Not if you're going to be ridiculous about it," he growled.
"You sound exactly like my father."
He exhaled abruptly. And he said again, "You have to trust me on this."
"Why should I? I don't even know you."
He didn't offer a word in his own defense. She tried to tell herself that this wasn't the real Ian, that he was in a truly awful mood and he would regain his sanity in a few hours or a few days. But what was she supposed to do in the meantime?
If he walked out and rescued his brother and resurrected her company, it really would be all over. Done. Finished. Complete. Up in her room, that had sounded like a sane and rational way to go. Down here, looking at him, with his familiar, clever, sinful hands on her, the idea sent her into a tizzy. She wanted to weep and tell him that he was who she wanted to take her to Paris and forget about boxers or babies or that damned Steffi. I just want you. I don't want to be done!
JUST A LITTLE FLING Page 14