by Jayne Castle
Double Dealing
Jayne Ann Krentz
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter One
“My God! You’re killing me!” The therapist ignored the protest, continuing to sweep the length of her client’s bare back with a heavy hand, her palms sheathed in textured mitts. Chin resting on her hands, eyes squeezed shut against the breathtaking discomfort of the vigorous rubdown, Samantha gritted her teeth and willed herself to endure. The pain was not lessened a bit by the knowledge that she was paying a small fortune for such refined torture treatments.
“It is absolutely imperative to exfoliate the skin completely, madam,” the therapist proclaimed, making a serious effort to remove an entire layer of flesh with a single sweep of the mitts. “The skin must be thoroughly cleansed of dead cells before it can be properly cleaned and oiled!”
Samantha bit back another moan, having learned during the past twenty-four hours that it was useless to argue. The fiercely strong and fanatically dedicated middle-aged woman working over her body was not about to cease and desist because of the protests of a weakling. The client had paid good money for the spa treatments, and Miss Carson saw to it that weaklings like Samantha got their money’s worth. Miss Carson was a professional.
“I’ll kill that travel agent when I get back to Seattle,” Samantha muttered darkly. But she knew in her heart that it wasn’t the agent’s fault. It was Samantha who had come across the article on elegant spas in a fashion magazine, and it was she who had convinced her travel agent to move heaven and earth to get her reservations. Who would have guessed it was the most exclusive, incredibly overpriced torture chamber on the California coast? It had all looked so marvelously relaxing and serene on the pages of the magazine. Perhaps she could sue the publisher for misrepresentation.
All around the large, white-tiled room other women, all paying the same exorbitant rates, submissively complied with the demands of the attendants. Several were stretched out on massage tables, draped as Samantha was in only a fluffy white towel across their buttocks. Others alternately froze or steamed in the hot and cold plunges or subjected their muscles to the throb of a whirlpool bath.
At the far end of the room, glass-walled booths provided a choice of sauna or steam heat. Down a corridor to her right, Samantha had learned to her cost, was another room full of exercise machines which appeared to have been bought at a dungeon yard sale. Elsewhere on the grounds of the extravagant facility was a restaurant which served from a menu featuring largely sprouts and yogurt. Samantha had been so disgusted at not finding even the most modest of wine lists at dinner the previous evening that she had seriously considered sneaking out at midnight to find a fast-food restaurant.
If her plans for Gabriel Sinclair had not jelled by this afternoon, she promised herself silently, she would follow through on the scheme to slip away for a decent meal this evening. It would be tricky. A large, hulking type was always on duty at the front desk in the lobby, and getting past him would be a feat. Furthermore the southern California coast was rather wild and desolate in this area. No telling how far she’d have to drive in order to find something to eat besides roughage du jour.
“Now, madam, back into the hot plunge. We must open the pores one more time!” Miss Carson administered one last punishing slap to Samantha’s thigh and stepped back.
“Anything to get off this table,” Samantha muttered, trying to sit up and finding her muscles strangely rubberized. “I can’t move!” she squeaked in horror as the fluffy towel across her derriere fell away.
“Of course you can! Soon you will move better than you ever have in your entire life!” The stocky woman took hold of one of Samantha’s arms and pulled her ruthlessly away from the support of the table. The towel, which had been the only sop to modesty, fell aside completely as Samantha stumbled in the wake of her martinet of a therapist. She was beyond caring about modesty, however, other than sending up a silent prayer of thanks for the fact that the spa catered only to women. The incredible weakness which assailed her limbs was claiming her full attention.
“I’m not kidding,” she breathed in her soft, slightly husky voice. “I think you’ve ruined me. Every muscle feels crushed.”
“In you get,” the older woman ordered, ignoring the protest and the fact that she literally had to support her client with both hands under Samantha’s armpits. “You will feel much better after the hot and cold plunges. Everyone does!”
“This bath is steaming more than the last one,” Samantha observed dubiously as she carefully stuck a toe into the pool. “I think it’s a little too hot.” And then, as her toe jerked back out of its own accord: “It is too hot! Listen Miss Carson, I’m really much more of a shower person. Couldn’t we try that instead?” She turned pleading eyes on her attendant and saw no pity in the firm, determined features. Samantha was learning that the staff was obsessed with a mission, and nothing could alter the course of a true believer.
“The Swiss showers come later. Now you plunge!” Quite forcefully Miss Carson propelled Samantha into the hot water, an action which drew a gasp of startled dismay from her victim.
“I’m going to be boiled alive! Really, Miss Carson, I just read somewhere that hot baths can be dangerous. Bad for the blood pressure. Oh, Lord!” Her protest trailed off into a squeak of pain, her body now fully immersed. Up to her chin in the steaming pool, Samantha glared helplessly at her tormentor who, in turn, studied her victim’s form with professional detachment.
The shoulder length, seal-brown hair was drawn into a severe knot and secured with a wide terry band. The strict line revealed the gentle planes and angles of a face which, had it not been animated by intelligence and a subtle hint of passion, might have been deemed ordinary. But the lack of perfection in the features was just as well. It allowed full scope to the flare of intellect and lively awareness in the gold and brown eyes. A firm nose and chin gave evidence of the willpower which guided the basic intelligence, but there was a nuance of recklessness in the faint tilt of the tortoiseshell eyes.
At twenty-nine years of age it was a face which reflected character and a sense of self-identity, qualities which had been developed early in Samantha’s life under the auspices of a mother who had distinct, if unconventional, ideas on how to raise a daughter. Yet underneath the strong elements lay a betraying softness, a strange vulnerability that contributed an emotional element to her nature which Samantha knew she could not blame on either of her parents. It was, unfortunately, a unique and dangerous quality with which she had been cursed.
But it was the body beneath the face which was Miss Carson’s responsibility. Her assignment was to strengthen the slender form which was a bit too rounded at hip and thigh, according to the spa analysis. With an experienced eye Miss Carson identified and cataloged the small, high breasts, the full hips, and the slight curve of her client’s stomach. Too much softness, the therapist decided.
By the time Samantha left the spa, Miss Carson decided, the curve of the stomach would be quite flat, and inroads would have been made into the creeping cellulite at the thighs. But nothing, the therapist knew, would permanently slow or alter the quick impatient way her client moved. There was a sense of reckless energy about Samantha Maitland, a dynamic, almost rash force which, Miss Carson realized, was an intrinsic part of the woman’s nature. It was temporarily muted now by the extreme effects of the massage and thermal plunges, but it would return in force once Samantha had recovered. Miss
Carson idly wondered just how much energy her client burned away in simply controlling her natural impulsiveness. Inefficient.
“Come,” Miss Carson ordered briskly, stepping forward to assist, “time for the cold plunge.”
“Hell! It’s like ice water!” What had Miss Carson done before she got this cushy spa job? Interrogation for the CIA perhaps? “I’ll talk!” Samantha had the urge to blurt out as her body received the full impact of the cold water.
“Enough of the cold.” Miss Carson held out the white towel. “The pores have now been tightened again. The cleansing gel is next and then a mist of water-holding oil will be sprayed on the skin. You will feel like a new woman!”
“Good. Right now I feel like a nearly dead woman,” Samantha muttered as she struggled shakily from the tub. She was appalled at the unsteadiness of her muscles. It was a little frightening to find oneself so weak. “I also feel like I need a drink. If I slipped you ten bucks, could you find me a margarita or a cold beer?”
“The alcohol promotes cellulite!”
“You know, Miss Carson, before I came here I didn’t even believe in cellulite. I hadn’t realized that there were people like you around who have dedicated your whole lives to fighting it,” Samantha grumbled dryly.
Miss Carson permitted herself an indulgent chuckle as she settled Samantha back on the table. “Just wait until this is finished, madam. You will thank me before you leave the spa. All my clients thank me!”
Samantha withheld her private opinion on the matter, too weak to argue. What had she done to herself? But it had all seemed so convenient. So well suited to her scheme. The consummate businesswoman conducting her affairs in the plush setting of a luxurious spa was just the image she wished to project. Besides, it would be fun to treat herself while she waited for the reaction to the bait she had dangled in front of Gabriel Sinclair, Samantha had decided, and the spa was conveniently close to Sinclair’s home on the California coast near Santa Barbara.
It had been unbelievably complicated pulling even such minor details as an address for Sinclair out of the computer, Samantha reflected as she gritted her teeth against Miss Carson’s pounding. While building his financial empire, the man clearly had spent a lot of time and energy staying out of the media spotlight. The very opposite of Drew Buchanan, who gloried in having his carefully orchestrated deals reported on in Forbes or The Wall Street Journal. That thought made her frown even more than Miss Carson’s less than gentle ministrations did.
No, there had been very little on Gabriel Sinclair in the various computerized data bases she had searched. And the very paucity of information on him had intrigued her. His name had been one of only a handful of possible people.
For hours her fingers had moved across the keys, drawing forth information from the computer terminal with the practiced ease of a musician coaxing a melody from an instrument. Behind the lenses of the pair of chic designer frames she normally wore, Samantha had eyed the green words which formed on the screen in front of her. The search had been exhausting, but at long last she had managed to narrow the list of names down to five.
The winnowing process had been painstaking, the search requiring all her ingenuity and the full resources of the data bases to which she had access. But four days ago it had finally come to an end.
On that last afternoon in Seattle a gentle northwest rain had pattered on the roof of the wraparound porch which cozily encircled the old Victorian house. The roof of the porch formed a balcony for the bedrooms on the second level. The rain was a comfortable and familiar sound now to Samantha, as comfortable and familiar as the computer terminal at which she worked.
During the past three years Samantha Maitland had become accustomed to both the rain and the technology. Around her that afternoon the Puget Sound island home creaked as if it needed to yawn and stretch occasionally while waiting for the summer warmth. The house was in no rush. It had sat through a good many Seattle winters, doing its job of protecting the various inhabitants with the gracious if slightly supercilious manner of an old family retainer who knows he’ll be around to serve the next generation.
It was true the house had never been called upon before to shelter anything like the consoles and computer terminals which now occupied the back parlor, but the current human resident was quite acceptable. A bit eccentric, highly independent, and capable of the Grand-Gesture on occasion and once, three years ago, a Grand Passion, Samantha Maitland felt right at home amid the quaint gingerbread trim and the underlying solidity of the old house. She knew the house liked her and was privately convinced that was the only reason it tolerated the electronic hardware she’d moved into the parlor.
But Samantha had been totally unaware of her surroundings that afternoon four days ago. Instead, with a mounting rush of barely suppressed excitement she had entered one command after another into the terminal. Finally, after taking a few nanoseconds to consider the matter, the machine had responded by reducing the names on the screen until there remained only two.
Absently she had chewed her lower lip as she viewed the final results of her search. The computer had helped her narrow the choice, sorting through the information at its disposal in response to her orders until the list had been cut down to two names. But it didn’t contain sufficient data to select between the final choices. Some human decision-making was going to be called for in the last analysis.
William Oakes or Gabriel Sinclair. The computer knew very little about either man. But as she sat staring at the names, Samantha’s frown of concentration had abruptly cleared, and her mouth had moved upward in a wry smile. A little divine intervention might be useful for what she had planned. And if ever a woman needed an avenging angel, she did. Samantha had pressed the enter key one more time and was left with only one name on the screen. It seemed entirely appropriate that her financial angel should be named Gabriel.
It was not untypical of Samantha, having relied on technology to get that far, to rely on pure intuition to make the last decision.
With a feeling of cool anticipation she had stretched out a hand to the telephone beside her. It was only as her travel agent came on the line that Samantha had remembered reading that article on spas.
Now she could only regret the spur of the moment decision which had put her into the clutches of the zealously devoted staff of health enthusiasts. And there was no immediate relief in sight. One could hardly look forward to dinner around here, and Samantha could not check out until Sinclair got in touch. This was the address she had given him in the short, hopefully intriguing note she had sent to him.
“Ouch! I thought all that was left was some kind of cleansing gel,” Samantha protested as the attack on her body intensified.
“But it must be properly applied,” Miss Carson admonished, pummeling the muscles in Samantha’s legs. “It does no good to pour it lightly over the skin. It must be worked into each and every pore.”
Gasping for breath, Samantha shut her eyes and then automatically opened them again as a collective murmur of surprise went through the room full of nearnaked women and their attendants. Even Miss Carson paused in her assault, joining to look toward the door.
A man stood there, gazing around the room with an expression of surprised interest. Several women adjusted their towels, a few nonchalantly slipping them aside.
“The owner of this place?” Samantha inquired, reaching down to her hips to make certain her towel was securely covering the rounded curve of her bottom.
“No, it’s certainly not Miss Fortune,” Miss Carson huffed. “I’m not sure who it is. Probably some lost husband come to collect his wife and wandered into the wrong room!”
Samantha was about to reply to the comment when quite suddenly the intruder glanced in her direction. Something about the intensity of the gaze made itself felt, and she instinctively reached for her glasses which were lying on a small shelf attached to the table. She prodded the frames onto her nose with an automatic gesture and discovered that the man was watc
hing her even though he was now being approached by two determined attendants.
Samantha smiled in spite of herself as the image of the stranger jumped into focus. In the white-tiled room full of white towels, white uniforms, clear crystal pools and nude female bodies, he managed to convey the impression of a satyr who has just succeeded in crashing a party of sea nymphs.
There was something very solid and substantial about him, Samantha decided as he looked away to speak quietly to one of the attendants. He wasn’t fat or soft or particularly tall, just very much there. An uncompromising, rather unyielding male presence. Then Samantha blinked in sudden intuition as the intruder followed the nod of one of the attendants and glanced again in her direction.
“Oh, no! It couldn’t be! Surely he wouldn’t just walk in here unannounced.” The words were spoken on a weak hiss of dismay as the man started toward her with a resolute stride. Just from watching him walk Samantha got the distinct impression he did everything resolutely. “Oh, hell,” she murmured in frustration.
“You know him?” Miss Carson demanded as she returned to work with a vengeance.
“I’m not sure, I… Please, Miss Carson, could you stop that for a moment? I can’t think when you’re pounding on me!”
“You are here to exercise the body, not the brain!”
Skirting the hot plunge, the stranger was rapidly nearing Samantha’s massage table. She found herself desperately wishing for more covering than the towel provided and grimly reminded herself not to raise her bare upper torso far from the surface of the table.
This wasn’t going at all as she had planned! If this was Gabriel Sinclair, things were already veering disastrously from the course she had charted. Samantha groaned to herself, and this time the exclamation was not caused by Miss Carson’s tender touch. How could everything have gone so wrong? How had Sinclair gotten past that hulking desk clerk in the lobby? Why hadn’t she been paged?
Of all the stupid, ridiculous situations! It looked very much as if she was about to be forced to begin negotiations on the deal of a lifetime while her body was being pummeled. Talk about not being firmly in control of a situation!