“But as I’ve said, I do love him, and I don’t want to hurt him.”
“And our being together will hurt him.”
“It will complicate matters.”
Thad silently reflected on her answer before continuing. “Then I’m asking you again. How do you feel about me, Darnell?”
She looked him in the eyes. “I told you that I care for you deeply.”
Thad’s stomach lurched. Again, the wrong words. “That’s good to know,” he said sarcastically.
Darnell ran a hand down his muscled arm, relieved that he didn’t withdraw from her touch. “I need time to get some things taken care of in my life, Thad.”
His eyes searched her face. “And then?”
“We can go from there. That is, if you can forgive me for doubting you earlier.”
For the first time in hours, Thad smiled. This was about as humble as Darnell would get, so he’d take it. Taking her hand, he pulled her to her feet, then bent and kissed her on the tip of her nose.
“I guess I can manage to forgive you. Just don’t let it happen again.”
She gave a mock salute. “Yes, sir.”
It was hard to believe that a few months ago she couldn’t wait to get this man out of her life. Oh, he was still a bit arrogant, but she had to admit that she was as well. He was still a little too self-centered too, but it was a flaw in character that she also possessed. It seemed that the two of them might be more alike than she had been willing to admit in the past, but there was no denying that this man had crawled inside her heart with a quiet persistence, and her life would never be the same.
As Thad pulled her toward the doorway with one hand, Darnell gripped the Sensuous script in the other one. A letter that had been tucked between the pages fell to the floor.
“Wait.” She tugged on his hand. “I dropped your letter.”
Thad turned to see her bending to retrieve a small blue envelope. “Oh, that. I used it as a bookmark. It’s just a note from some crazy fan. I get nut notes like it all the time.”
“Oh, yeah?” Darnell raised her eyebrows in mock suspicion. “Then you don’t mind my reading it?”
“Ummm,” Thad grinned broadly. “Do I detect mistrust or jealousy?”
Darnell wrinkled her nose. “Never the former, but maybe the latter.” Slipping the matching blue linen notepaper from the envelope she read aloud.
“My Dearest Love.” Darnell raised a brow. “Oh, la la!” She continued, “I think that it’s time for you to know something that I have been trying to tell you for a long time. I love you. Your deep, sexy voice. Your wide, dimple-cheeked smile. Everything about you makes me happy.” Darnell smiled inwardly in silent agreement. “My love for you knows no boundaries. There is nothing I wouldn’t do for you. We will be together someday.”
“No signature, but hot stuff,” Darnell teased. “Wish I had somebody as hot for me.”
With one tug of his arm, Thad brought Darnell’s body flush against his and placed a quick kiss on her lips. “You do.”
* * *
“I don’t give a damn what Wochev thinks!” Moody huffed as he stared out the window at Darnell’s house. “The problem with that shipment was solved. It came from the Columbians, and the subject is closed. He’s got nerve. Some little lackey rips the merchandise off, and he says he doesn’t trust me!” His voice rose as his anger escalated. This whole week had been a nightmare, and he was fed up.
Darnell’s unexplained absence over the past few days had already sent him over the edge. He had waited for days on the beach near Thad Stewart’s house watching and waiting for him. By the third day, his anger had build to the point of fury. A cruise or two past the actor’s home had revealed that it was occupied. A muscular man collected the mail, and there was a petite woman who came and went occasionally, but no sign of Darnell and Thad. Frustrated, he had gone back to Carmel, and with each day that passed his anger had increased.
Now his second-in-command was calling him with some absurd rumor about the head of the Russian cartel doubting if the entire missing shipment had been found. It seemed that the culprit who had been caught confessed to having siphoned less than was reportedly missing. Word was that others from his cartel might be involved with the rip-off stateside, but Moody was about to put an end to that preposterous gossip.
“Listen, Russ. The subject is dead. Don’t repeat this ignorance. We don’t need to defend something that didn’t happen. Let it rest!” Abruptly, he pushed the disconnect button on his cell phone and started to throw it across the room. Thinking better of that idea, he jammed it in his pocket. He didn’t have time for this.
“Where is she?” His anguished cry bounced off the walls of the room.
Burying his face in his hands, he massaged tense muscles. He had to calm down so that he could think. He had to regain control of his emotions and plan his next step—the death of Thad Stewart.
Taking a deep breath, Moody removed his hands from his face and looked out the window again, just in time to see the back of a car pull through the open gates of Darnell’s estate. Although it was late, the car taillights put him on alert. They were quite distinctive to the knowing eye. They belonged to a Ferrari, and he could see that the car’s color was red. It looked as though the answer to his question about Darnell’s whereabouts had just been answered.
CHAPTER 18
Thad couldn’t wipe the grin off of his face. As he sat in Ray’s office trying to listen to what his friend was saying to him, his thoughts kept drifting back to Darnell and the time they’d spent together in Aruba. After their return from the island, he had driven her home and she had invited him to stay for dinner. He had accepted, discovering that leaving her at all was difficult.
The time that they had spent together had been indescribable, and so was she. Gone was the contentiousness of their prior relationship. It had been replaced by a growing closeness, one that Darnell wanted to keep private for as long as possible. Thad wouldn’t have objected to having her all to himself for a while, but he knew that more than the press was involved in her reasoning. She also wanted to keep their relationship private because of Lance. At dinner, she had informed him that she would tell him personally about their relationship because she didn’t want him to read about it in some trashy tabloid.
He knew that she was right, and he had tried to temper the feelings of jealousy that Lance Austin aroused in him. Yet he didn’t like the thought that she had to see Lance again. There was too much history between them. Everyone thought of Darnell and Lance as a couple, but things would be different now. He was Darnell’s man, and nobody was coming between them.
Thad was jolted out of his contemplation when Ray snapped his fingers in front of his face. “Uh, did you say something, Ray?”
“I said the building is on fire.”
Thad frowned in confusion. “The building’s on fire?”
Ray gave a disgusted sigh. “Man, where is your mind? Get a grip! That woman has you walking around here in a fog.”
“Woman? What woman?”
Ray folded his hands on his desk and looked Thad squarely in the eye. “Do I look like a fool to you?”
Thad chuckled. There was no pulling the wool over Ray’s eyes. “Aw, man, I was going to tell you about Darnell. It’s just that we need to keep this kind of quiet right now. You know, the celebrity bit and all.”
“So you were going to keep it from your best friend that you’ve got a thing going on with one of the sexiest women on earth? I’m wounded.” Ray sounded more amused than hurt. “But I do have one question. How serious is it?”
“It’s more than a thing. I can tell you that.” Thad looked past Ray, visualizing Darnell. “I’m in love with her.”
Ray didn’t seem surprised by the revelation. “I wondered how long it would take for you to admit the obvious.”
Thad frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m saying that the way you two have been going at each other’s throats, it wa
s inevitable that the heat would turn into a fire. I knew that it was only a matter of time before you would be hooked. Better you than me.”
“Your day is coming, and I hope that I’m around when it comes.”
Ray scoffed. “Don’t hold your breath. But you know you won’t be able to keep this quiet for long. You’re two of the country’s hottest celebrities, and that’s news. The press is going to be all over both of you when this breaks.”
“Yeah, I know, and she hates the press. We’ll just try to keep this quiet as long as we can.”
Ray nodded, started to say something, then thought better of it. He began to shuffle papers on his desk. Thad caught the gesture.
“All right, man, you’ve got more to say, so say it.”
Ray put the papers down. “I was wondering…from everything I’ve heard and read, Darnell’s been hooked up with that doctor what’s-his-name for a long time. I’ve never known you to make a move on another man’s lady.”
Thad bristled. “She said they’re just friends.” He rose from his seat and crossed the room to the small bar in the corner of Ray’s paneled office. He poured himself a soda, then looked back at Ray. “They’re just friends,” he repeated, not sure if he was providing information or trying to convince himself.
* * *
Moody was torn. When the red sports car left Darnell’s house, he wanted to follow Thad Stewart and eliminate him as a problem for good. He was just that enraged. Yet he longed to see Darnell again, to be near her. His plans to meet her hadn’t changed because of Stewart’s interference. He had learned long ago to let nothing interfere with his plans. The man was a minor inconvenience easily solved. He couldn’t possibly mean anything to her. Dismissing him, he chose to try once again to make contact with Darnell.
* * *
A week had passed since Darnell and Thad had returned from Aruba, and today was an important one for her. This was the day that her mother would meet Thad. He would be pulling up to her house any minute, and Ray would be accompanying him. The three of them planned on discussing the possibility of her co-producing Sensuous with Thad; at least that was the excuse he gave her for bringing Ray along. However, she suspected that Ray was serving more as Thad’s moral support for his meeting Bev. That was good, because he would need it.
To say that her mother wasn’t happy about her daughter’s budding relationship with the actor would be putting it mildly. Lance could do no wrong as far as Bev was concerned, and when Darnell broke the news about her blossoming feelings for Thad Stewart, her mother had been less than receptive.
She had broken the news to Bev over dinner when she came to Carmel for a visit after her mother’s return from her vacation in Africa. She had chosen one of Bev’s favorite restaurants, hoping that a delectable meal might cushion the blow about what she had to tell her.
Darnell was visibly nervous all through dinner, and Bev noticed. She knew that her daughter was sometimes edgy in public. Rarely was she able to dine without interruptions from eager fans. However, they had lucked out this evening. There were just a few tourists asking for autographs. This particular restaurant was a local hangout, and they were a breed of their own. They could care less about celebrities, so Darnell felt comfortable here; therefore it was obvious that something else was wrong.
“You’ve been kind of out of it this evening,” Bev said. Her concern about the daughter in whom she took such pride was evident. “Are you still worried about Lance? I know he’s a long way away, but he’ll be back before you know it. I bet that’s all he can think about, getting back here to you and your being here waiting for him.”
Darnell almost groaned aloud at her mother’s choice of words. She could kick herself for taking the coward’s way out and bringing her out in public to break the news. Her hope had been that she wouldn’t make the scene in public that she knew that she would make in private. She swallowed.
“That’s what I want to talk to you about, Mama. Lance and me.”
Bev had been finishing her favorite dessert—apple pie. A frown crossed her attractive face, so much like her daughter’s. She didn’t like the tone of the words, Lance and me. Putting her fork down, she sat back in her chair to observe her child more closely.
“What’s on your mind, Darnell? What is there to talk about?” Her look was suspicious.
Darnell shifted in her chair. This was not the time to lose her nerve, even under a glare that used to stop her in her tracks when she was a little girl. Darnell steeled herself.
“I’ve met somebody else, Mama.”
Bev’s jaw grew slack. “I beg your pardon?” She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Had her daughter said that she had been creeping out on Lance?
“I’ve known him for about three months…”
“Were you messing around with him before Lance left?”
“No, after. This man and I hated each other at first, but as time passed…”
“You and this Romeo grew closer.”
Darnell nodded. By this time, she had twisted her linen napkin into a wrinkled blob. Pleasing the woman who had helped make everything in her life possible was the most important thing on earth to her. She hated disappointing her.
Darnell and her mother were close. Her mother was the most important influence in her life. Darnell took pride in the fact that she had never caused her mother one moment of concern. She liked pleasing her, but Bev had taught her to live her life well and on her own terms, and pursuing a relationship with Thad was quickly becoming one of those terms.
“Who is this man?” Bev’s eyes had narrowed, a sure sign that she wasn’t pleased at the way this conversation was going. “Do I know him?”
“Yes, I think everybody knows him.” Darnell couldn’t hide the smile in her voice. “It’s Thad Stewart, the actor.”
“What?” Bev looked as if she had been struck in the face. “Are you crazy? What is your problem?”
Throwing her napkin on the table, Bev jumped up from her seat. In the restaurant, conversation stopped, forks paused in midair. The headwaiter hurried over to the table in a panic, certain that the food or the service was the cause for this sudden commotion.
Darnell assured him that everything was fine as he urged Bev to be seated, then scurried away as she eyed him as if he were a lamb ready for slaughter. Breathing hard and with nostrils flaring, Bev plopped back down in the chair and slammed two tightened fists on the table, waiting for an explanation from her daughter.
Darnell held her mother’s steely gaze, unimpressed by her attempt to intimidate. Well, so much for avoiding a public display. She forged ahead.
“I have strong feelings for Thad.”
“Strong feelings!” Bev snorted. “Like lust? Because from what I hear, that’s all Thad Stewart’s got going for him. I’ve heard and read that he’s very good in that department.”
“You can’t believe everything you read in the paper. You of all people should know that. There’s much more to Thad than his sexuality.”
“Oh, really!” Bev spat out the words contemptuously, leaving no doubt about her feelings about the man.
She went on to recount every playboy exploit that she had ever read or heard about him, expressing her disappointment that the child in whom she had instilled such high standards would stoop so low as to “play around” on a good man like Lance.
The criticism hurt, but Darnell remained poised, refusing to allow her mother the satisfaction of a temporary victory. Their eyes continued to lock. Bev was livid.
“What has Lance done to you for the last ten years except love you and be there for you. He’s done everything he could for you.”
“Mama, please! Anything either of us got out of our relationship has always been mutual. He got as much out of being with me as I got out of being with him. But it’s about Thad now, and the beginning of a new relationship with him. I’d like you to meet him.”
Bev stiffened in reaction to her request. “So I’m suppose to be a coconspirator in t
his deception? Is that what this is about?”
“No, I’m only asking you to meet the new man in my life. I think that you’ll like him. He’s funny and charming. I’ve invited him to come to Carmel next weekend, and I’d like you to come, too. I’m asking you to do this for me, Mama, because I love you and because your opinion is very important to me.”
Bev was hesitant. “It sounds to me like you’ve already made up your mind about him. I don’t know why you want my opinion.” There was a long pause as she considered the invitation. “But I love you, too, and I want you to be happy.” She agreed to the meeting.
Now, the time for their first encounter was at hand and all Darnell could do was hope that this first meeting between her mother and Thad would at least be amicable. As far as she was concerned, that would be a small victory. Meanwhile, she had taken precautions to assure some pretense of civility on Bev’s part at their meeting. She looked across the living room to where Trevor Reasoner, Colin’s younger brother, sat at the piano, picking at the keys.
Darnell had turned the meeting between Bev and Thad into a cookout and had invited her cousin Nedra, her husband Sinclair, and their three children to share steaks grilled outside by the pool. With the Reasoner family and Ray, there should be enough people present to prevent Bev from making a scene—again. Yet her beautiful, vivacious mother was an independent spirit, and she was full of surprises.
* * *
Thad’s heart was pumping overtime in anticipation of seeing Darnell again. It had been a week, and as far as he was concerned, it was a week too long. They had spoken on the telephone every day, sometimes twice a day, but nothing could replace his seeing her. He had chattered about her so much on the drive to Carmel that Ray had threatened his life if he didn’t stop talking.
Darnell had been coming down the stairway when they entered the house. Stopping at the last step, she and Thad stood grinning at each other like two entranced teenagers, unsure of what to do next. She was the first to break the silence.
“Hello. Glad to see me?”
That was his cue. Thad closed the gap between them and stood before her. Placing his hands around her trim waist he lifted her from the bottom step as Darnell’s arms encircled his neck. He brought her down to the floor slowly, her body pressed intimately against his own. “Hello,” he whispered huskily as his lips grazed her lips, “and, yes, I’m very glad to see you.”
Singing a Song... Page 14