"Nonna!" Claudia turned from the counter to glare at her grandmother. "You can't go around asking strangers questions about money. It's not polite."
"Pah! Polite! When you are my age you don't worry so much about polite. If you are polite no one tells you nothing." She waved a dismissive hand. "Mind your own business, Claudia," she ordered, and looked back up at Reed, her beautiful black eyes bright, inquisitive and amused.
He couldn't help but smile. He had a definite soft spot for spunky old ladies, and this one was a pistol.
"So." She poked him in the arm with a stubby finger. "Are you going to give our Zoe the money for her company?"
"Well, actually," Reed hedged, unconsciously using the same gentle but evasive tone he used with Moira when she was demanding answers to questions he didn't want to answer, "nothing's been decided yet."
"What is to decide?" Signora Umberto demanded. "Zoe makes good beauty creams and lotions. The best. I know this for a fact. I have been using the cream in the little glass jar for three years now." She lifted the hand she still held to her face. "Feel," she ordered, flattening his fingers to her cheek. "As soft as a young girl, yes?"
"Yes, it's very soft," he said, wondering if it was the result of Zoe's cream or just the way a woman's skin felt, no matter what her age or the number of wrinkles she wore.
"It is settled then, yes?" She gave his hand another approving pat before releasing it. "You will give Zoe the money?"
"Perhaps," he said, unwilling to commit himself further. "Things are still in the investigative stages."
"Ah, pah!" Signora Umberto snorted derisively, than narrowed her eyes, glaring at him for a long moment before turning to follow her granddaughter out of the bakery.
* * *
Zoe's apartment was very like her—exotic, colorful, sensual, and inviting—Reed decided ten minutes later. The floor was pale bleached wood, bare except for the fringed square of faded jade green carpet that defined the living area. The walls were palest lavender, so light as to be a mere wash of color over a white base coat. The furnishings were eclectic: a white, wood-framed, futon-style sofa meant to be turned into a bed with minimum effort, piled high with plump pillows; an intricately carved Chinese chest used as a coffee table; a distressed Country French armoire; an art deco floor lamp in the shape of an elongated dolphin with a frosted white globe balanced on its nose; a pair of Regency-style chairs with curved wooden arms and yellow floral upholstery on the seats and backs. A modern, free-form glass bowl with swirling ribbons of color that echoed and reflected those in the room sat atop the Chinese chest, sharing space with an elegant, unmatched pair of old silver candlesticks.
It shouldn't have worked, but it did, all the disparate parts coming together in a pleasing, intriguing whole, like Zoe herself.
Reed stood silently just inside the open door of the apartment, admiring the room and the women in it, wondering how long it would be, exactly, before the two of them realized they weren't alone. They sat perched atop a pair of white wrought-iron stools placed in front of the counter that separated the tiny kitchen area from the rest of the apartment. Their backs were to the door, heads together over the various small jars and bottles spread out in front of them, totally oblivious to his presence.
They were quite a study in contrasts. M.E. in her classic navy suit and practical, low-heeled pumps, her gold button earrings and smooth blond bob, looked sleek, polished and professional, despite her advanced pregnancy. Zoe looked more like a gypsy than ever, slim and colorful and exotic—but somehow bewitchingly wholesome, too—in a soft white blouse tacked into a flowing skirt, the heels of her bare feet braced on the bottom rung of her stool and her flame-colored curls tumbling freely down her back.
He wondered briefly if he should teach the two a small lesson concerning the importance of keeping doors closed and locked, but decided that a fright probably wouldn't be good for a woman so far along with child. He rapped gently on the doorframe instead.
"Hello, ladies," he said pleasantly when they both started and glanced around. "Waiting for someone?"
Zoe jumped down from her stool and hurried across the room, trying hard not to appear any happier to see him than she had Mary Ellen. "Reed," she said, ignoring her sudden breathlessness and the funny way her heart was beating, wondering when and how a man in a double-breasted suit had managed to become her yardstick for measuring masculine attractiveness. "I didn't hear you buzz. How did you get in?"
"The gate at the bottom of the stairs was propped open with a brick," he said pointedly, letting his disapproval of such lax security show. "Anyone could have gotten in."
"Your neighbor did that," Mary Ellen said to Zoe as she carefully shifted around on her stool to face the door and her employer. "So you could get in as soon as you got here," she explained, looking at Reed. "I told her you'd only be a few minutes." Her glance flickered down to the white paper bag in his hand. "Is that a bakery sack?" she asked hopefully.
"It is," he said, advancing across the room as he spoke. After a quick, comprehensive glance at the cheerful clutter of bottles and jars that littered the counter, he set his briefcase on the stool Zoe had vacated and rested the bakery sack on top of it. "I thought we could have coffee and a little something to fortify us before we got on to the business at hand." He looked at Zoe as he spoke, the rising note of the last word making it a polite question, guest to hostess. "I know it's been at least a couple of hours since M.E. had breakfast, and she's eating for two, you know—" his glance flickered teasingly to his secretary for a moment, but his attention never really left Zoe "—so she's always hungry."
"Sounds good. I can always eat, too. Unfortunately." Zoe started to pat her hip, then checked in midmotion, curling her fingers into her palm as his eyes followed the fluttering gesture. Something in his expression—a sudden avid interest, an instant, all-too-gratifying heat—had her hurriedly slipping around the end of the counter into the tiny kitchen.
She turned her back to him, reaching up to open the cupboard that housed her motley collection of cups and saucers. It took a good thirty seconds of rattling china for the heat in her cheeks to cool.
"The coffee's already made," she said finally, glancing over her shoulder at Mary Ellen as if she were the only other person in the room. "It's full octane, I'm afraid." She arranged the cups and saucers on a lacquered wooden tray as she spoke. "I don't have any decaf. But there's skim milk or orange juice. I'd offer to make some herbal tea but I've only got two burners and, well…" She gestured toward the small stove where two large, shiny, stainless steel pots sat simmering over very low flames. A cloud of fragrant steam rose off the surface of each, perfuming the air with the fresh clean scent of wildflowers and herbs. "I'm making hand lotion and it's kind of at a critical stage right now."
"Skim milk will be fine, thank you," Mary Ellen assured her, her eyes focused on the pastry bag on Reed's briefcase. "What goodies did you bring?" she demanded of her boss.
Reed opened the bag, holding it up to her nose so she could sniff. "Pineapple Danish," he said, pulling the bag away as she reached for it. "Blueberry muffins and—" He craned his neck to look at Zoe, who'd hunkered behind the counter to rummage around in a low cupboard "—almond biscotti," he announced, so pleased with himself that she could almost hear the "ta da" in his voice.
Zoe looked up from her crouched position, not quite meeting his gaze over the edge of the counter. "How did you know I like almond biscotti?"
"I ran into a friend of yours at the bakery."
Zoe cocked her head, sending a stray corkscrew curl tumbling into her face. She brushed it back with a careless flick of her hand and returned to burrowing through the contents of the lower cupboard. "A friend of mine?"
"Signora Umberto." He managed to roll the name off his tongue in a close approximation of the Signora's thick Italian accent. "I'm not sure, but I think she gave me the evil eye."
Zoe rose to her feet and set a lacquered wooden tray on the counter, carefully edging th
e clutter of small glass jars and bottles out of the way. "Signora Umberto gave you the evil eye?" she asked, still not looking directly at him as she stretched across the counter to reach the nested stack of baskets sitting on the other side.
Reed manfully averted his gaze, trying not to notice how the gauzy white fabric of her blouse dipped away from her body as she leaned across the counter. "She wasn't thrilled to hear that I'm not quite ready to hand you a blank check to finance the expansion of New Moon," he said, deliberately refocusing his gaze on her hands as she fined a small basket with a pale yellow napkin.
Her hands stilled. "Oh, dear," she murmured.
He lifted his gaze to her face to find her looking at him, head tilted, eyebrows raised, bottom lip captured between her teeth, an expression of half-amused consternation in her big brown eyes.
"I hope she wasn't too terribly rude to you."
"Not at all," Reed said, wishing he could lean over and salve that plump bitten lip with his tongue. "Merely, uh…" he hesitated deliberately, drawing it out, ridiculously delighted to finally have her full, undivided attention "…opinionated."
Zoe felt the tension flow out of her as the laughter bubbled up. "Something tells me you're being diplomatic," she said approvingly and leaned over the counter again, accidentally affording him another peek at her pale peach-colored bra and generous cleavage as she plucked the white bakery sack out of his hand. "Signora Umberto has been known to terrorize the neighborhood with her opinions."
This time he didn't even try to avert his eyes. After all, her cleavage was spectacular and he was only looking. Looking couldn't hurt—as long as he didn't get caught.
"She's a tough old dame, all right," he said, deliberately shifting his gaze from her cleavage to watch the graceful flutter of her hands as she shifted the pastries from the bag to the napkin-lined basket and arranged the charmingly mismatched cups and saucers on the wooden tray. "I liked her." His lips quirked up in a smile. "She reminded me of another tough old dame I know."
Zoe looked up from under her lashes, her eyes twinkling. "Is that any way to talk about a lovely, refined woman like your great-granny?" she asked, shaking her head in mock reprimand. "And behind her back, too."
"Not behind her back," Reed objected, his own eyes alight with an answering gleam as he sparred with her. "I've told her that straight to her face. On more than one occasion, I might add. She was flattered."
Zoe snorted. "I'll bet," she scoffed, and turned away to get the skim milk out of the refrigerator. "More than likely, she was just humoring you."
"I'll have you know, Miss Moon, that Moira Sullivan never humors anyone. She's a—"
"Tough old dame. I know." Zoe poured the milk into a footed amethyst glass and added it to the tray along with a flowered cream pitcher and sugar bowl.
"Grab the pot, will you, please, Reed?" she asked, nodding toward the coffeemaker as she lifted the tray. "I'll take this over to the living room so we can all sit down and eat where it's more comfortable and less crowded."
The coffeemaker was next to the tiny sink, behind her. Reed came around the dividing counter to get the pot just as Zoe moved forward with the tray. There was a minor traffic jam as they met in the narrow bottleneck between the minuscule kitchen and the rest of the apartment. Zoe smiled and turned sideways, her back to him, the tray held high, her hips pressed lightly to the counter in front of her to let him squeeze past.
He had plenty of room, more than enough to pass without touching her, but he just couldn't let the opportunity go by. It was, quite simply, beyond his ability to resist when giving in to temptation offered so few risks. He reached out and put his hands on her hips, very lightly, bracketing them between his palms as he slid around behind and then past her. The contact lasted only a few seconds and was, on the surface, entirely innocent.
Still, Reed's palms felt seared by the all-too-brief encounter.
Zoe would have sworn the imprint of his hands was burned into her skin.
Both of them stubbornly ignored the sensation of heat, pretending nothing had happened. Because nothing, they each assured themselves, had happened. Nothing they were prepared to do anything about, anyway.
Not yet.
Zoe moved across the room and set the tray down on the Chinese chest. Reed picked up the coffeepot, grabbed a brass trivet from a hook by the stove and followed her. Mary Ellen sat perched on her stool, stock-still, her eyes wide and round as she looked back and forth between the two of them.
Reed set the trivet on the Chinese chest and placed the coffeepot on top of it, lowering himself to the futon sofa beside Zoe as he did so.
Mary Ellen cleared her throat. Loudly.
Reed glanced toward the sound. It seemed to take him a moment to remember who she was. "Oh. Sorry, M.E." He jumped up from the sofa and crossed back to the counter, his hand graciously extended. "Are you all right? Do you need some help getting down from there?"
"I'm fine. Just a little backache is all. It's nothing." She put her hand in his, letting him steady her as she slid from the stool, and then held him there for a moment, looking up at him with a half-amused, half-concerned expression on her face. "Are you okay?" she asked, her voice hushed and low.
"Yes, of course. I'm fine," Reed said, automatically lowering his voice in response. "Why do you ask?"
"Because I've worked for you for eight years and I've never seen this side of you before."
"What side is that?" he asked, his attention already wandering back to the sofa where Zoe sat pouring out two cups of coffee.
"You're always such a perfect gentleman."
"Yes," he said, watching as Zoe stirred one spoonful of sugar into his cup. "So?"
"So, with her you aren't."
That got his full attention. His gaze snapped back to his secretary's upturned face. "I beg your pardon?"
"You looked down her blouse, Reed. Twice."
He opened his mouth to deny it, found he couldn't and closed it again, hoping to hell he wasn't blushing.
"Don't worry. She didn't notice," she assured him. "I wouldn't have noticed, either, except that I know you so well and you've been acting so strangely lately."
"Strangely how?"
"Let's just say, if you'd ever once looked at your fiancée the way you look at her—" she tilted her head toward their hostess "—you wouldn't still be Boston's most eligible bachelor." She grinned when he scowled at her. "Face it, boss. You're smitten. Big time." She reached up, giving his cheek a motherly little pat, much the way Signora Umberto had done in the bakery. "I think it's sweet," she said, and stepped around him, leaving him standing there, feeling like a fumbling schoolboy and wondering where all his savoir-faire had gone.
Smitten, was he? Well, okay, that was as good a word as any. Better than some. She could have said besotted. Or obsessed. Smitten wasn't so bad. He could live with smitten. But business first, he reminded himself sternly, reaching up to smooth his tie with the flat of his hand. Smitten or not, there would be no more lapses. No more sneaking peeks down the front of her blouse. No more letting himself get distracted by her smile, or the graceful way she used her hands, or the way the sunlight coming in through the window turned her hair to fire or—
"Reed, would you please pull that chair a little closer to the table so M.E. doesn't have to reach so far?" Zoe asked as he approached the table.
"Yes. Certainly." He put his hands on the back of the graceful Regency chair and shifted it closer to the Chinese chest. "M.E.?" he said, holding it steady for her.
Mary Ellen leaned back, putting both hands on the arms of the chair, sending a pointed little smile at him over her shoulder as she lowered herself into the seat.
Reed just as pointedly ignored it.
"Tell me about your operation," he said to Zoe, as he seated himself on the futon sofa beside their hostess, absently reaching out to accept the cup of coffee she offered. "I want to know everything about how you make your cosmetics. Walk me through each step from beginning to—
Marbles?" he said, his attention suddenly caught by the contents of the free-form glass bowl sitting on one end of the large chest. He set the cup and saucer back on the lacquered wooden tray with an audible click. "May I?" he asked, his hand already hovering over the bowl.
"Be my guest," Zoe invited, glad to have a few extra moments to gather her scattered thoughts before she tried to answer his questions about New Moon. "Everything" was pretty all-encompassing. She stirred cream into her coffee and then sat with the cup forgotten, cradled in her hands, as she watched Reed sift through the contents of the glass bowl like a man on a mission.
He'd scooted to the edge of the futon sofa and leaned forward, forefinger extended to explore through the jumbled marbles. The eclectic assortment was a small boy's dream and a collector's nightmare. Mixed in with the mostly machine-made dearies, slags and various swirls and cat's-eyes were some fine handmade examples of the marble-making art. A cursory inspection yielded a Joseph's Coat swirl, an End of Day onionskin and a banded lutz, any one of which could be worth two hundred dollars or more in mint condition, which was highly unlikely given the way they were jumbled together. He plucked one of the tiny glass spheres from the bowl to examine it more closely. It was about an inch in diameter, opaque white with two wide, swirling bands of blue and six narrow pink bands, grouped by threes.
"Did you know this is a very rare peppermint swirl?" he asked, holding it up to the bright sunlight shining in through the window.
"Rare how?" Zoe asked, her gaze on his face rather than the marble, intrigued by the look in his eyes. She'd seen the same avid expression on the faces of the neighborhood boys when they hunkered down after a cutthroat game of potsies to count up the marbles they'd won from each other.
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