She found herself staring at the broad shoulders beneath the camel-colored, custom-made suit jacket he was wearing. He still had a trim waist, she caught herself thinking, even after all these years of rich living.
Blaise strode forward and took her hand in his, kissing it lightly in the continental style, making Alice sigh as she looked on.
“Lady Pat,” he said fondly, using the name he had given her at their first meeting, when Roger’s father had announced their engagement. “You’ve managed to keep your incredible figure. Matter of fact,” he said, his startling blue eyes seeming to drink in the sight of her, “I think you’ve improved on it.” He smiled down at her, a wide, white smile that was framed beguilingly against an olive complexion. “I wouldn’t have believed that was possible,” he said in a rich baritone voice that surrounded her.
Pat suddenly remembered the silent figure to her left. “Sam, I’d like you to meet Blaise Hamilton, Roger’s cousin,” she said, satisfied that her voice did not quaver and betray her. “Blaise, this is Sam White Horse. He—runs everything here,” she said pleasantly, smiling at the tall Indian, who was casually dressed in comparison to Blaise.
Sam merely nodded at Blaise, and shook the man’s hand only after it was thrust toward him. Pat could see that Sam was sizing Blaise up. She knew that her tremulous reaction to Blaise’s sudden appearance was evident to Sam.
“Very pleased to meet you,” Blaise said in his genial manner, then looked back at Pat. “How are you?” he asked, and the question seemed to ask so much more.
“Well,” she replied. “I’m well.” She put her hand on the corner of her desk. “What brings you here?” she asked, trying to sound casual. She had no business reacting to him like this. It was so . . . so silly.
“I’m here to help,” he said simply. “Here for as long as I’m needed.” He gestured toward a suitcase by the door.
Was he here for a visit? she wondered. If so, whom was he visiting? He didn’t get along with the other members of the family. As a matter of fact, when she had first met him, he was called “the black sheep of the family” by a very disapproving Mother Rose. He and Roger had gotten on well enough, but Roger was gone, and besides, Blaise hadn’t even come to the funeral.
His words suddenly sank in.
“Help?” she echoed dumbly.
“Yes,” he said smoothly. “Help.”
“Who?” she asked, drawing her brows together.
“You.”
“Me?”
What did he mean? Blaise was into high finance, dealing with the powers behind heads of governments, using his extreme charm to wheel and deal—and he wasn’t above having a good time while he was at it. Pat had read that he and a contessa from somewhere had been discovered wading in one of the fountains in Rome at four in the morning. With anyone else, it would have been a whispered scandal. With Blaise, all that came of the event were patient, good-natured smiles—and the contessa’s broken heart in the long run, Pat guessed.
“Aunt Delia wrote that Rose has managed to turn the family against you, even Sara and Bucky,” he said, referring to her two college-aged children. “She thought you might like someone in your corner besides a feisty, eighty-year-old lady, bound to a wheelchair.”
Oh yes, Aunt Delia. Pat had forgotten that Blaise was her favorite and that she highly approved of his high-spirited ways, while the rest of the family, entrenched in their “traditions,” had been happy to see Blaise leave shortly after Pat’s wedding.
“I would have been here sooner,” Blaise continued, “but it took some time for her letter to reach me. I move around quite a bit.”
“I bet you do,” Pat said before she could stop herself.
Blaise threw back his head and laughed a deep, resonant laugh that could bring about a smile from a statue, Pat had once thought. “Still the spunky, outspoken girl,” Blaise remarked approvingly. He took her hand again, smiling down into her face as he towered over her by a good foot. “I’m glad,” he said warmly.
Pat cleared her throat. “I’m hardly a girl,” she reminded him.
“To me you’ll always be a girl,” he said easily. “A beautiful, blushing girl in a pale blue dress,” he added, referring to the first time he had seen her.
“I don’t blush,” she said, trying to keep her voice emotionless, mindful of the fact that Sam was still in the room.
“You did when I danced with you,” Blaise reminded her.
He remembered that? she thought in surprise. Did he keep a catalog of all the women he had encountered in his life? She decided the topic was best dropped. Her eyes fell to the suitcase.
“Where are you staying?” she asked.
“As I remember it, your house is a sprawling hacienda with a great number of rooms in it.”
She stared at him in disbelief. Was he planning on moving in?
“Now, if I’m going to help,” he said, his arms crossed over his chest, “I should stick close by.”
“How close?” she asked archly.
“That, Lady Pat, depends entirely upon you and your needs,” he said, leaning forward slightly.
On the surface, the sentence was innocent enough, but Pat knew Blaise’s reputation and that there was simply nothing innocent about him. His meaning was all too clear.
“I, um, don’t think—“ she began.
“Of course,” Blaise continued loftily, as if she hadn’t attempted to say anything, “Aunt Rose might not approve.”
Pat’s face tightened. She knew he was goading her, but he was right. Mother Rose wouldn’t approve. But Pat took pleasure in deliberately making Mother Rose disapprove. Besides, in the long run, there was nothing wrong with having a houseguest, even if the children were away at school. There was Angelica to chaperon them. Chaperon. Really, Pat, you’re beginning to sound like you’re a hundred years old, she chided herself. Besides, nothing would happen. Here Blaise was offering her the support she so desperately craved from the family, and she was acting as if he might be offering her poison.
“You’re welcome to stay at the house,” she said firmly.
Blaise smiled, as if he had known the outcome all along. “Angelica still there?”
“Angelica will always be there,” Pat said, surprised that he remembered the housekeeper’s name and wondering if he took her hidden meaning.
Blaise’s deep smile told her that her words were thoroughly digested. “Fine woman, Angelica. Well,” he said “let me get settled and then pay my respects to Delia. I’ll be back to take you to dinner,” he promised as he began to leave the room, pausing at the doorway to retrieve his suitcase.
“But—“
Pat was about to protest that she had dinner at the office these days, working until well into the night, but Blaise seemed not to hear her as he shook Sam’s hand again and then winked over his shoulder before leaving.
“Do you good to leave on time for a change,” Sam said after Blaise had gone.
“Taken up mind reading, Sam?” she asked. “There’s much too much work to do—“
“You plan to do it all in one night?” Sam asked mildly.
“No,” she laughed, “but—“
“So there’s no harm in letting the midnight oil go out for a change, is there?” Sam asked as he walked to the door.
“No,” Pat said slowly, “I suppose not. ...”
But as Sam left the room, Pat wasn’t so sure.
She sat down at her desk. Somehow the urgency that had powered each morning since Roger’s death had faded temporarily as she tried to assimilate what had just taken place. Blaise was back, disrupting her life the way he had when he had first entered it. But she was a lot older now, and supposedly wiser. She had been a wife, a mother, a chief accountant, and now she was the apparent backbone of Hamilton Enterprises. A lot had happened in her life since she had first set disbelieving eyes on Blaise. Why did he ruin her well-earned self-confidence with just a smile?
Until she had first seen him, looking at her across a
crowded dance floor with those penetrating eyes of his, Pat had thought men who looked like Blaise Hamilton were only beautifully penned princes in fairy tales or romantic dreams. She had been on Roger’s arm at that moment, being introduced to a distant family friend, when she had first caught sight of Blaise watching her. His overpowering masculine appeal had made her catch her breath and forget all the polite words she was supposed to say, and then she had felt like an idiot when Roger’s friend stood waiting for a reply to some question or other.
She wasn’t that way normally. Patrissa Covington had been named after her mother, Melissa, and her father, Patrick, who had wanted to give their first and, as it turned out, only child a name as unique as they felt she was. She was an equal composite of both parents, inheriting her mother’s charm and good humor and her father’s brains and good looks, although for a while it had looked as if she might stay an ugly duckling forever. She had been an awkward, plain child, so she had honed her sense of humor and developed a knack of listening that endeared her to almost everyone she met.
When nature finally woke up and fulfilled the promise that had been hinted at when Pat was a child, her enchanting exterior befit the inner person, making Pat Covington’s company the type to be sought out by everyone. That was what had attracted Roger to her in the first place. She had listened to all his dreams, never scoffing at the things he proposed, things that could, as yet, not even be framed on a drawing board. She had been the initial drive that had set him going.
The children had arrived quickly, and Pat had devoted herself to being a mother during their formative years, loving her children, yet yearning to get back to Roger’s work world again. When she did get back, it wasn’t the same.
Oh, the people around the plant were the same crowd as in the beginning, and their loyalty had grown, if anything. But Roger was different. She was no longer the first person in his life. He had taken on a mistress—his work. He was in love with his planes, and the money and fame he had gleaned from producing them was not enough. He was forever improving the planes, forever tinkering with their insides. He was a chairman of the board who arrived each morning in shirtsleeves, ready to pitch in with his men, knowing every detail of what was going on.
There was precious little room for Pat in this life. Another woman might have retreated, but not Pat. She was a survivor and she hung on, making the best of the situation, getting herself as involved as she could in the large company that had sprung up under her husband’s hand. The work kept her from realizing just how disappointed she was with her life.
That was the word. Disappointed. She was not sure just what it was she had expected from married life. Certainly a closeness and an inter-dependency, but she had found that for only a few years—in the beginning, when Roger had counted on her enthusiastic support.
Pat had also expected—romance. Silly, wasn’t it? she thought. She had hoped for blissfully romantic, candlelit evenings when her pulse would race madly at the mere sight of her husband, at the mere touch of his hand. But, quite honestly, that had never been there. She loved Roger dearly. He was a good, honest, kind man without a mean bone in his body. And that, she told herself time and again, should have been enough for her. And it would have been, perhaps, had Blaise never entered her life.
And now he was back. She pursed her lips, straightening her shoulders as if getting ready to do battle. With determination, she pushed all thoughts of the man out of her head and marched outside to immerse herself in the noisy, demanding business that existed right outside her door.
Chapter Two
Pat had almost given in to the urge to dash home at lunchtime and change, but another of the Eagle’s components had failed an important stress test, and Pat’s attention had been called to the emergency. They were two months short of their self-imposed deadline—December 31st—and there was still so much to do, so many details to see to, not the least of which were the pending court battle and Hamilton Enterprises’ dwindling supply of money.
All these thoughts were racing through Pat’s mind as she hurried back to her office, hoping to have at least enough time to comb her hair and freshen up her makeup before Blaise arrived.
Deep in the pit of her stomach, a knot was tightening.
But he was in her office, waiting for her, sitting behind the desk as if he belonged there. Pat’s eyes narrowed. Did Blaise have designs on Hamilton Enterprises? Was that the real reason for his presence? Or had he made peace with the others and been enlisted to get Pat to stop her “foolishness” and give up Roger’s project?
Pat was beginning to feel that she couldn’t trust anyone, and the sensation was new to her. She did not like being on her guard so much. Even here at the plant, where she supposedly had everyone’s support, she caught herself wondering about this employee’s loyalty, or that one’s. It was all making her very tired. That was probably what Sam had seen when he had urged her to go out.
Blaise had changed, she observed. He was wearing a pearl-gray suit with a light blue shirt. A gray tie completed the picture. He looked as if he had stepped out of a Brooks Brothers ad in the magazine section of the Times. Her own two-piece, tailored outfit looked out of place as she vainly tried to envision herself on his arm.
Then she noticed a garment bag on the wine-colored leather sofa in the corner. “Are you expecting to get very dirty during dinner?” she asked dryly, nodding toward it.
He smiled. Why did that smile dazzle her so? she demanded of herself.
“I asked Angelica what sort of outfit you’d feel comfortable in, dining out with an admirer.”
Pat felt her throat go dry. “What made you do a thing like that?” she asked, forcing herself to go over to the garment bag and open it, just to have something to do to avoid his eyes.
“Well,” Blaise said, and began ticking the points off on his fingers, “number one, according to Delia, you’re working yourself into a frazzle, keeping long hours, so I knew you wouldn’t be home to change, and I knew that most ladies don’t like to eat out in their work clothes.”
“Number two, I am an admirer of yours. I always have been,” he said significantly in a tone that was half a note lower than his usual voice, “and number three, Angelica doesn’t utter more than three words at a time except under torture, so I knew she wouldn’t repeat any part of my statement. There, does that cover all bases?” he asked genially, coming toward her.
“Quite,” Pat said. Part of her wanted to retreat for some unknown reason, and the rest of her, her stubborn side, told her to stand fast—which she did.
She opened the bag to find a pretty navy and white wraparound dress with a soft floral design. She hadn’t worn it in years. What made Angelica pick this? she wondered, glancing up suspiciously at Blaise, who smiled at her innocently. “Angelica didn’t pick this out,” she declared. “You did.”
“She showed me where your clothes were,” he said. “That counts for something.”
Pat sighed. Well, there was no harm in it, she supposed. “Wait here, I’ll be right back,” she said, stepping into the adjoining office, which had been hers before Roger had died and she had inherited the bigger office with her new title.
“Need any help with those buttons?” Blaise offered considerately.
She glanced down at the simple shirtwaist she was wearing. “The buttons are in front,” she pointed out.
“Yes,” he said, “I know.”
Pat was more than a little unsettled as she shut the door firmly behind her.
He took her to one of Albuquerque’s most elegant restaurants, where the plush decor and subdued lighting bespoke intimacy and romance. But Pat’s mind was occupied by problems at the plant and the upcoming court battle contesting Roger’s sanity at the time that he “chained” her to this commitment. Then she looked into Blaise’s intense eyes. The butterflies in her stomach turned into Hamilton jets and kept growing, though she kept reminding herself that she was a mature woman and that he, after all, was merely a man.
&n
bsp; Merely a man.
That was like saying that the Grand Canyon was just a hole in the ground, or that the Taj Mahal was just a building. Roger had once told her, with obvious affection for his cousin, that while Blaise was regarded as a black sheep by the family, his rugged, almost perfect good looks had made him a subject of female prey since the first grade. A giggling, pigtailed girl had eluded her mother and followed him home, hiding in the back seat of the family car when Blaise’s governess had picked him up. He had been a beautiful child and had grown up to become probably the handsomest man most people had ever seen.
“Well, it’s been a long time,” Pat said finally, hating the stilted way that sounded. She had hostessed huge parties for Roger, keeping conversation flowing among scores of people. Why was she so tongue-tied now? She resented Blaise for the effect he had on her. But then, no woman except for Mother Rose could resent Blaise for long. He had that inordinate charm about him that made women from six to sixty forgive him countless trespasses.
“Ten years,” Blaise said. “And you’ve gotten more beautiful.”
“And you’ve gotten even more honey on your tongue,” she countered, toying with her wineglass.
“Honey is to catch flies,” Blaise said. “I’m not after flies.”
“Oh?” she asked, cocking her head. “Just what is it you are after?” There was no coyness in her voice. She wanted a straight answer.
He looked as if he were about to respond, then hesitated. Finally he replied, “Right now, to help you.”
“Why?”
“Why not?” he said with a guileless smile.
“I asked first,” she persisted. She didn’t want to play games. The project was too important.
“I believe in fighting for the underdog—no physical comparison intended,” he said mischievously, his eyes playing with the decolletage created by the crisscross pattern of the wraparound dress. The fullness of her breasts was emphasized by the tininess of her waist, a feature she was proud of after bearing two children. A feature that she had earned from hours of rigorous exercise at the gym—another method of filling her lonely life.
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