“Oh?” she asked sharply. And just what sort of a “service” was he referring to?
He nodded, ignoring her tone. “I’ll have my answer and you’ll have my undivided attention on the case. At the moment, I can’t seem to gather my thoughts together coherently.”
There was no reason in the world for her to agree to this. No reason for her not to send him on his way with sharp words marking his retreat. No reason why she shouldn’t terminate their association right here and now.
No reason.
Except that something within her had secretly been wondering the same thing. And now that he had put the feeling into words, anticipation was madly zigzagging through her.
She was probably just muddled and fatigued, not to mention weak from lack of eating.
“All right,” she allowed guardedly, afraid to let him know what she was feeling, afraid to let herself feel it. “Go ahead. Get it out of the way.”
Her mouth turned up to his, Blair held very still, not even breathing. Waiting. She expected him to kiss her, to brush his lips over hers and be done with it. She expected, she realized, to be disappointed—just as she had been disappointed by everyone of late.
She didn’t expect him to cup her face so gently that it moved her. Didn’t expect to feel this almost palpable sweetness surrounding her as he slowly brought his mouth down to hers.
And she certainly didn’t expect the room to tilt.
Her first fear was that it was an earthquake. Her second fear was that it wasn’t.
Blair had no recollection of allowing her body to lean wantonly into his, no memory of rising on her toes to bring herself a little further into a kiss that was already threatening to be bottomless, endless. And absolutely glorious.
And she had no recall of running her hands through his hair as she opened her mouth to invite in all the wonderful tastes that were hovering on his lips, just a breath out of reach.
Her moan, soft, surrendering, sent a shiver through his body. Devin tightened his arms around her, pressing her to him, absorbing her warmth. His first inclination was to be careful not to hurt her, but her frailty was deceptive. There was a strength to this woman, an iron inner core masked by spun sugar.
He could taste it, feel it. Blair-with-No-Name might need him to find her sister, but she didn’t need anyone to find her identity. She already had one and it belonged to one impressive lady. This was no delicious, wilting flower he was holding in his arms.
He didn’t know what excited him more about her, the need or the strength. Right now, though, he was almost too far gone to analyze anything.
With effort, he broke from her, before desire completely overwhelmed him and urged him to take this to the next logical level.
He sucked air into his lungs, his eyes remaining on hers. “Do you have a fire extinguisher?”
It took her a minute to absorb his question and make sense of it. Things were scrambling in her brain, running for high ground in the face of a flash flood.
Blair blinked. “What? Why?”
“In case we started any fires. Because it sure felt like it.”
He exhaled slowly, wondering just how fast his pulse was actually going. It took another moment before he could trust himself not to run out of breath by the end of a sentence. Devin studied her face and could think of only one word: again.
Devin wanted to do it again. To kiss her until they were both mindless.
He was on dangerous ground here and he knew it, but shoring up beaches wasn’t going to help. Not this time. He did the only fair thing. He gave her notice.
“I think it’s only fair to warn you that this isn’t going to work like an immunization.”
He’d lost her. Blair stared at him, trying to make sense of his words.
Ever so lightly, he traced his thumb over her lower lip. It was a toss—up who was more excited by it, him or her.
“When they inoculate you, they always give you a little bit of the strain that makes you ill so your body can build up antitoxins to the disease. The down side is sometimes you fall victim to the very thing you’re trying to immunize yourself against.” A sigh escaped his lips, but there was no regret in it. “I think this might be one of those times.”
Blair pulled back. She shouldn’t have let him kiss her. And she shouldn’t have kissed him back. “That wouldn’t be wise.”
“No one said anything about wisdom.” If he didn’t leave now, he wasn’t going to. Devin felt for the doorknob behind him, then opened the door, the way he should have to begin with. “I’ll call you if I find out anything.”
She could only nod, too stunned, too disoriented to be able to engage in a coherent conversation beyond a few syllables.
“All right.”
Blair took a deep breath as she shut the door. It didn’t help. Her pulse continued beating erratically.
Oh, lord, I don’t need this now.
The rain had started again, this time in earnest. Devin didn’t notice. After getting into his car, he sat there, thinking, his key poised in his hand.
This had never happened to him before. Oh, he’d been attracted to a few of his clients, but he had always managed to keep that attraction in check, at least until after their relationship was no longer on a professional level. As far as he saw, there was nothing wrong in that. Otherwise, he had always maintained a clear separation of business and pleasure. So how had the lines gotten mixed this time?
And what the hell had happened to him back there?
Well, he wasn’t going to sort it out sitting here. Muttering under his breath, Devin inserted his key into the ignition and turned it on.
Music exploded around him like a roomful of Fourth of July fireworks going off. Wincing in surprise, Devin cursed roundly as he grabbed for the knob and twisted it to the left. The volume had seemed appropriate to him on his trip over here, but now it was jarring.
And he had been jarred enough for one day.
It wasn’t just the fact that Blair was attractive, he thought, glancing back at her driveway in his rearview mirror. He could have handled any sexual pull he might have felt and separated himself from that. He’d done it before. It was the look in her eyes that had gotten to him and undone the fabric of his resolve. She was trying to brazen things out, but there was no disguising the hurt he saw there.
Blair was lost and he wanted to help her find her way.
Devin shook his head as he turned down an unfamiliar street, heading to see the first relative on his list. The case wasn’t even a day old and he was already getting too involved in it.
But then, he supposed, he never did things by half measures. It just wasn’t his way.
There was no one home at Stephanie Carlisle’s house, so Devin had driven the short distance to the second person on the list. All of Blair’s adoptive family lived in close proximity to one another. He thought it was damn accommodating of them.
His second attempt was luckier.
Rosalind Jennings regarded him politely but uncomfortably as Devin sat across from her in her carefully arranged living room.
Devin glanced around without seeming to. The room appeared almost unlived—in. It wasn’t nearly as warm and inviting as Blair’s living room had been, but it was just as orderly.
Neatness, Devin decided, was obviously a family obsession.
He smiled at the woman. She was nervous and he wanted her at her ease. “I appreciate your taking the time to see me, Mrs. Jennings.”
He’d introduced himself quickly at the door before the German shepherd at her side had the opportunity to take a piece out of him. Satisfied at his credentials, she had let him in, putting the dog out in the garden for the remainder of his visit.
Ellen Stephens’s older sister nodded in response to the perfunctory statement. Her tall, thin frame was clad in a deep navy blue dress out of respect for her sister’s passing.
She was of the old school, he thought. Someone who hung on to traditions because there was structure in that and tr
aditions were comforting.
Devin watched the way she laced and unlaced her fingers in her lap. She wasn’t comfortable with this conversation. He did his best to make it less painful for her.
“I won’t take up much of your time.”
Rosalind’s lips curved in a faint smile. “Anything I can do for Blair, just ask.”
He knew without being told that Blair hadn’t called any of them to say that he would be by. It was up to him to lay the groundwork. “I’m investigating the whereabouts of her sister.”
“Blair doesn’t have a—” The steam went out of her protest as Rosalind flushed. She looked at Devin apologetically. “I’m sorry, I keep forgetting we can talk about it now.”
We. So there had been an agreement among them to keep this from her. “Then Blair was right? Everyone knew she was adopted?”
“The children didn’t,” she said, referring to Blair’s cousins, “but we, Ellen’s family, Ellen’s siblings,” she clarified, “we all knew.”
If that was true, then someone had to have a clue that would lead him to Claire. He began with the most obvious question, prepared for a negative answer. “Did you know the woman who gave the twins up for adoption?”
“No, I never met her. If Ellen did, she never mentioned it. She didn’t want to bring undue emphasis to the fact that Blair wasn’t her own flesh and blood,” she explained quickly. “There was some….” Rosalind hesitated, looking for the right word, “…resistance to the adoption at the time. Our father wasn’t keen on the idea. Neither was one of my brothers. But, of course, once she was among us, we all fell in love with Blair.” Her eyes locked with Devin’s. “She is one of us.”
There was support here, he thought. And pain on both sides. He nodded sympathetically. “I believe you, but sometimes, people have to work through a shock by themselves and this information did come on the heels of her losing her mother.”
Rosalind sighed. “I should have gone through Ellen’s things first, spared Blair the grief of finding this out.”
What lengths would she have gone to in order to hide the truth in the name of love? “And destroyed the photograph?”
There wasn’t a moment’s hesitation. “Yes. Ellen would have wanted me to.”
He didn’t believe that. There was evidence to the contrary. “If that were true, don’t you think your sister would have thrown out the photograph herself, while she was still alive?”
Rosalind merely shook her head. The young man sitting opposite her had kind eyes, but he couldn’t begin to understand what this had been like for her sister. To be trapped beneath the burden of a lie, afraid that, any day, it would somehow come to light.
“You didn’t know Ellen. She couldn’t bear to part with anything of Blair’s. She worshipped that girl and was so proud of the way she turned out.” They were all proud of Blair, of the kind of woman she had grown up to be. None of them could have loved her any more if their blood actually did flow in her veins. That was what made Blair’s animosity toward them so much worse. “This would have killed her.”
“‘This?’”
“The schism.” There were no words dark enough to describe what they were all experiencing. “Blair separating herself from us, acting as if we were all suddenly strangers.”
From what he’d observed, Blair’s aunt had it all wrong. “I think, in this case, it’s Blair who feels she’s the stranger.”
Rosalind looked incredulous. “How could she?”
“People react in different ways, Mrs. Jennings. I think your niece needs to find her sister—her other self, as she sees Claire—to help her put this into perspective. To let her rest once and for all.”
Rosalind nodded and for the first time since he’d come in, she looked hopeful. She smiled broadly at him.
It lit up her face and transformed everything around her. Another trait Blair had developed, if not inherited, he thought.
“You might be right,” she said. In more ways than one.
Rosalind leaned forward on the sofa, new interest entering her eyes as she placed her hand on top of his. Blair could do well with a levelheaded young man like this at her side. It didn’t hurt things that he was so good—looking, either.
“Tell me, Mr. Quartermain, are you married?”
5
Benjamin Rothwell slowly blew out a sigh of relief as he looked at the necklace and earrings that were spread out on his desk. The pieces were resting elegantly against a black velvet cloth Blair had placed there.
The jewelry was absolutely exquisite. The perspiration that had threatened to pop out on his lined brow evaporated as if by magic.
“Beautiful, really beautiful.” There was relief in every complimentary syllable as he picked up the necklace. “I know Mr. Baylor will be pleased. More important than that, Mrs. Baylor will be pleased”
Blair pressed her lips together. There was a lot riding on this. “I certainly hope so.”
The widowed Mrs. Arliss Baylor, with her well deserved reputation for being a very shrewd barracuda, had the controlling shares in the prestigious chain and no matter what the chairman of the board or her son, Arthur, pretended, it was she who had the final word on everything that mattered.
Blair released the breath she had been holding, pleased with the compliment and with the fact that she could in all probability begin to think of herself as being on Baylor’s prestigious staff. The association would benefit her reputation greatly, not to mention that Baylor’s paid well for what they wanted.
Though she always gave everything she worked on her full attention and her utmost passion, there was always the chance that what she created would not appeal to the buyer. It had already happened to her several times.
Blair kept the pieces that had failed to please her clients in a safety deposit box. There they were set aside for either future customers, or, with any luck, for the day when she could afford to actually keep such pieces herself and wear them without qualm.
Rothwell picked up one of the earrings and watched, fascinated, as the stones toyed with the light coming in through the window. He looked at her hopefully. “How soon can you have more of these?”
He made it sound as if she could just churn jewelry out, like a chicken laying eggs. “I thought the whole point of this was to keep each piece unique.” And unique took time.
“Yes, yes, subtly unique, of course, but once Mrs. Baylor sees these, she’ll want to have us make arrangements with you to create more.”
With the greatest of care, the earring was placed beside its twin. Only then did he raise his eyes to her face again.
“The operative word here,” Blair said with a smile, hoping that he didn’t think she was trying to be difficult, “is ‘create.’ This is going to take time, Mr. Rothwell. My jewelry doesn’t come sliding down a conveyor belt or an assembly line.”
“Perhaps your people—”
She interrupted him before he could get any further. “I am my people.”
He cocked his head, as if hearing Blair for the first time. “You actually do this yourself? Alone?”
“Myself, alone,” she echoed.
Maybe he didn’t remember their discussion several weeks ago when he had given her the opportunity she’d petitioned for. She’d explained all this to him then, that she worked alone and liked it that way. Not to mention the fact that until very recently, there hadn’t been enough money available for her to pay anyone else to work for her. In the beginning, she’d barely been able to afford the specialized tools she’d needed.
It was her family, she remembered with a swift pang, who had thrown a party for her and between them, provided the equipment.
Rothwell stroked his chin and just a hint of a graying goatee as he studied her thoughtfully.
“Well, my dear,” he began in the affected accent he had carefully cultivated while hovering on the outskirts of Arthur Baylor’s country club circle, “perhaps you should consider expanding. Hiring people to work under you.”
Maybe. Someday. But not now. She wasn’t in a financial or emotional position yet to hire people and share this responsibility. Her work was what defined her. It was the one thing about her identity that was unshakable. Considering the crumbling circumstances around her, Blair meant to hang on to that.
“It’s a lot simpler being just the boss of me. If there’s a mistake,” she explained, “it’s mine. If there’s a triumph, that’s mine, too.” And that was the way she wanted it.
Rothwell inclined his head, apparently accepting her reasoning. “Interesting pioneer philosophy. It’s obvious that one can’t argue that you get the results you want. More importantly—”
“—the results that Mrs. Baylor wants,” Blair concluded with an amused smile.
Rothwell returned the smile, holding her gaze just a moment too long. Then buzzed for his secretary. “Peters, I have something here that I’d like you to deliver to Mrs. Baylor’s offices as quickly as possible.”
Before he removed his thumb from the intercom, the outer door to his office opened. An impeccably dressed man, looking as if he’d been constructed out of all long planes and angles, walked in and crossed to his desk.
Peters barely spared Blair a glance. “Yes, sir?”
“I’d like you to take this up to Mrs. Baylor for me, Peters.”
Mrs. Baylor occupied the tower suite of offices, just as her husband had before her. Though her son was now the head of the chain, she had yet to relinquish her physical position in the offices. Everyone employed by the store doubted she ever would.
Rothwell carefully folded the cloth over the necklace and earrings, then handed the velvet packet to his secretary. The latter held it in his cupped hands as if he were about to transport a day old kitten.
“She’ll be expecting this,” Rothwell informed him just as Peters left the room. Mrs. Baylor was very adamant about deadlines and punctuality.
Rothwell turned toward Blair eagerly.
Desperately Seeking Twin... Page 6