by Sandra Brown
“Don’t forget your boots,” he said from the bed.
She whirled around. “I wouldn’t dream of it. They go in a separate box. Thank you ever so much for your help.”
He wasn’t at all perturbed by her carefully enunciated sarcastic words. “Glad to oblige.”
He smiled, and for a moment Andy was spellbound by a fantasy that was projected on her mind: Lyon leaning against the headboard of a bed and smiling at her, not with derision, but with intimacy. A strange tightness compressed her throat and forced all feeling downward to ripple across her abdomen. This sensation terrified her, and she fought vainly to stifle it.
She attacked the dressing table, heedlessly tossing her cosmetics and toiletries into her smaller suitcase. Bottles and jars rattled together, and she only hoped something wouldn’t break and spill and ruin everything else. She glanced in the mirror over the basin and saw that Lyon’s eyes hadn’t wavered. He was watching each move.
“Do you take some prurient pleasure in watching this?”
“In fact I do. In my former life I must have been a peeping tom.”
“You ought to work that out in analysis.”
“Why?” His brows arched in curiosity. “Does my watching you make you nervous?”
“Not at all.” The sardonic lift to the corner of his mouth told her that he knew she was lying. She dropped her eyes from his reflection in the mirror and crammed one last item into the carrying case.
Her hands faltered when she turned to the drawers in the dresser. It was stationed directly opposite the bed. Hastily she gathered slippery lingerie that wouldn’t be grasped by her rushing fingers. She dropped a half-slip with a wide border of lace down each side. She retrieved it quickly, but not before a swift covert look in his direction informed her he had seen it. His smile was lewd with implications.
While she was stacking her notes that were lying helter-skelter on the small table and placing them in her briefcase, he heaved himself off the bed and sauntered into the bathroom. In a matter of seconds he came out carrying a raspberry-colored brassiere and panties set. She just now remembered that she’d rinsed them out the night before and hung them on the curtain rod to dry.
He carried a piece in each hand, never taking his eyes off her as he walked to within inches of her. His eyes held her pinned to the matted shag carpet. “Don’t forget these,” he drawled. Looking down at the sheer wisps in each of his hands, he assessed them with clinical accuracy. He tested their lightness by bouncing them and letting them float back into his palms. Entranced, she too stared at the garments. Through the glossy fabric she could read each line in his palm with the clarity of a fortune teller. “Not that they’d be missed that much. There’s so little to them.”
She gasped and snatched the bra and panties from his hands. He laughed as she threw them into the suitcase and slammed it shut. She lifted it off the rack, but he surprised her by coming to take it from her hand.
“Do you need to check out?” he asked, opening the door to the room.
“Yes,” she said coldly, not wanting him to know that her heart was still beating so rapidly that her chest hurt.
“Then I’ll load all this while you take care of that. I’ll meet you at the office.”
That was too convenient to argue with. “All right.” She left the room and wended her way along the outdoor corridor until she reached the office. It took an interminable amount of time for the gum-popping clerk to sort out the paperwork, which, was aggravatingly complex for three nights’ stay in a motel. As the clerk was running Andy’s credit card through the machine she happened to see the El Dorado idling just beyond the door.
She eyed Andy speculatively. “That’s Lyon Ratliff.”
“Yes, it is,” Andy said, staring at her in a way that dared her to ask any questions or make any comments.
“Hmmm” was all she said.
Andy left the office and slid into the passenger seat of the car. She liked the smell of the leather upholstery. She liked the way Lyon smelled, too. Even when he had come into the house from planting shrubbery, he had smelled of clean, musky male.
He had closed the window and turned on the air conditioner. Its hum was the only sound in the car until they reached the highway. Then he turned to her and asked, “What does Mr. Malone do while you’re chasing all over the country invading other people’s privacy?”
Stung by his insulting tone, she lashed out at him. “My husband is dead.”
His face registered no emotion, but his eyes jerked back to the road. She looked away, too, wishing his profile weren’t quite so appealing.
“I’m sorry,” he said at last, quietly. “How did he die?”
His apology amazed her. His rapid changes of mood confused her. “He was killed while on assignment in Guatemala. The earthquake.”
“How long ago?”
“Three years.”
“He was a reporter?”
“Yes.”
“Newspaper?”
“Television.”
“He traveled a lot?”
“All the time. He was a stringer for one of the networks.”
“Were you happy?”
Why the personal question? she wondered. The others he had asked had been those of a polite stranger trying to get acquainted. Her instinct was to tell him that her marital history was none of his business, but caution warned her not to. She would be asking his father questions. If she cooperated with Lyon’s interrogation, maybe he would stop trying to sabotage the interviews with the general.
In addition to that she was weary of this game of one-upmanship, especially since she felt that in the long run he would win it. Could they call a truce?
“Yes, we were happy,” she heard herself say.
He looked at her for a long time until she was tempted to take the wheel. He was still driving exceedingly fast. Finally he dragged his eyes back to the windshield.
Andy shifted in the glove-soft seat. There was a tension between them, an awareness, that made her throat ache. A compulsion to touch him overwhelmed her. She longed to know the texture of his thick, dark hair. The cloth of his shirt strained invitingly over the muscles defined beneath it. She wanted to squeeze the muscle of his thigh just to see if it were as hard as it looked under the denim of his jeans.
“How long have you done this type of work?”
His question pulled her back into a safer realm of thought. The air conditioner was doing little to cool the blood that raced through her veins. She cleared her throat. “Since I graduated from college. I started out writing copy for commercials at a local television station, graduated to the news department, then eventually became an anchor-person.”
“But now you’re more into the investigative side of things.”
“Yes,” she said hesitantly, justifiably wary of where this conversation might lead.
“I wonder why,” he mused aloud. “You know, sometimes men who travel a lot choose that kind of work because they’re unhappy at home. Is this some kind of guilt trip you’ve laid on yourself? You made your husband unhappy, so he went down to Central America and got himself killed, and now you’re trying to make it up to him by following in his footsteps?”
He was so close to the truth that she felt she had been pierced by a spear of conscience and was dying a slow, agonizing death. But as with all wounded animals, she bristled with defiance. “How dare you say such a thing to me. You know nothing about Robert, about me. You—”
“I know all about you. You’re an overbearing, overambitious female with an inflated ego because you happen to be better looking than most.” He whipped the car off the road onto the shoulder and braked jarringly behind her car. She reached for the door handle, but his hand shot across her chest to trap her wrist in an iron grip. His face was close to hers as he bent over her. His voice was a harsh rasp.
“Don’t think because you’ve got a beautiful face, and great legs, and breasts that dare a man to touch them that I don’t know you’re as hard
as nails. Your skin may be warm and soft, but you’re a block of ice on the inside. I know your type well, Andy Malone. You’ll castrate any man stupid enough to give you the chance. I’m not that stupid. So while you’re doing these damn interviews stay out of my way and I’ll stay out of yours. Now that we understand each other, maybe we’ll be able to tolerate each other.”
He released her hand and opened the door, shoving it wide. She jerked free of his pressing weight against her side and stepped out onto the hot pavement. She slammed the door behind her, then stood in impotent rage as his tires squealed away in a shower of gravel, leaving her in a cloud of white, powdery dust.
Ten minutes later she was met at the front door of the house by a woman who could only be Gracie. Apparently Lyon had had enough decency to alert both the housekeeper and the guard at the gate that she would be arriving within minutes.
“You look like you need to freshen up before lunch,” Gracie said commiseratingly. “It’s so hot out, isn’t it? Come on upstairs and I’ll show you to your room. I’ve never seen the general so excited. He told me to roll out the red carpet. You’ve been given the largest bedroom upstairs, except for Lyon’s, of course.”
Gracie Halstead, as she introduced herself, was ample of bosom and thick in the waist. Her grey hair and happy, round face gave her a maternal aspect, as did her coddling mannerisms. “Here we are,” she said, opening the door to an airy room filled with antique furniture and bright sunlight.
The room faced the south side of the house. Rolling hills reached out to the horizon. Whiteface Hereford cattle grazed in the lush pastures. Through the nearest pasture a river wound its way across the Ratliff property. Graceful cypress trees with their feathery foliage and twisted, rope-like trunks lined the banks of the river.
“That’s the Guadalupe you’re looking at.”
“It’s beautiful here,” Andy said, meaning to include everything, the view, the room, the house.
“Yep. I’ve lived here since General Ratliff built this house soon after the war. I never tire of looking at the view. Did you see the pool? The general says you’re to use any and all of the facilities while you’re here.”
“Thank you. I will.”
“Lyon brought up your bags.” She nodded toward the luggage that Andy imagined had been thumped unceremoniously onto the hardwood floor.
“Yes. Kind of him.” Her sarcasm escaped Gracie.
“I’ll get back downstairs now and hustle up some lunch. The bathroom’s through there.” She indicated a door. “I outfitted it, but if I missed something, you come to the top of the stairs and holler real loud.”
Andy laughed. “Okay.”
Gracie smiled, crossing her arms over her stomach, tilting her head to one side, and appraising Andy from the top of her head to her feet. Obviously she liked what she saw. “I think the general was right. I think it’s going to be … interesting having you here.” Before Andy could puzzle out that enigmatic statement, Gracie went on to say, “Lunch is at noon.”
Then she was gone and Andy was alone. She stripped out of the wrinkled suit that until this morning had been fresh from the dry cleaners. She shook it free of what dust she could, muttering aspersions on the character of Lyon Ratliff.
After a quick, refreshing shower in the beautiful bathroom, which was decorated in shades of yellow and butterscotch, she dressed in a casual skirt and polo shirt.
She took her hairbrush to the window and took down her hair. As she gazed at the scenery from her vantage point on the second floor Lyon came around the side of the garage. He joined Mr. Houghton, who was kneeling in the flower beds, still planting the new shrubbery.
The hairbrush was held motionless above her head as Lyon pulled his shirttail from the waistband of his jeans and proceeded to unbutton his shirt. He peeled the shirt away from his chest and shoulders, and then hung it on the lowest branch of a pecan tree. Absorbed as he was in his conversation with Mr. Houghton, his motions were natural and unaffected, yet executed as though they were steps in a seductive ballet.
Andy’s hand covered her breast lest her heart burst through. Her speculations on what lay beneath Lyon’s shirt hadn’t prepared her for seeing it in the flesh. His shoulders were wide and rippled with lean muscles as he picked up the handles of a wheelbarrow and pushed it forward several yards. His chest was matted with dark, crisp hair that fanned out over the upper part of his torso and tapered to a sleek arrow that disappeared into his jeans. Andy’s stomach did an erratic dance when he idly scratched at a rib with his long slender fingers.
He laughed at something Mr. Houghton said and she was struck by how white his teeth looked against his dark face. The corners of his eyes crinkled into a humorous expression she’d never seen before. She had only seen him angry and insulting, hateful and vehement.
No. There was one other way she had seen him. Suggestive and insolent.
Checking her watch, she stepped away from the window and put the forgotten hairbrush aside. Apparently Lyon wasn’t coming in to lunch.
He didn’t, but Andy enjoyed the green salad Gracie had made for her. It was heaped with grated cheese and cold sliced turkey.
“You look like you eat a lot of salads,” the housekeeper observed. “And that’s all right at lunch, but I’m going to see to it personally that you’re fattened up while you’re here.”
“Please don’t go to any trouble for me. You’ll have your hands full when my crew arrives. We’ll create chaos in your spotless, serene house. I can only promise you that we’ll try to be as unobtrusive and neat as possible.”
“There’s never been a mess in this house I couldn’t clean up. You do whatever you have to do.”
“With your permission, General Ratliff, I’ll spend this afternoon prowling around, looking for the best locations to shoot the interviews.”
He was sitting at the head of the table, picking at his plate of bland food. “Certainly. You have the run of the house.”
“Where are you most comfortable?”
“I spend most of my time in the sun room where you found me this morning,” he said, giving her a wink. “Or in my bedroom. Sometimes I sit in the living room.”
“I want you to be in a natural environment so you’ll be relaxed when the cameras roll. I’ll need to check out those rooms for electrical outlets, and such. Tonight I’ll call Nashville to tell the crew what equipment to bring. They’ll probably be arriving the day after tomorrow.”
She spent several hours that afternoon examining the rooms the general had mentioned, looking not only for the most advantageous settings technically, but aesthetically as well. One thing her audience had come to expect from an Andy Malone interview was that it was scrupulously researched and planned.
Gracie provided her with a box of clippings and memorabilia that chronicled the general’s life and career in the Army. She went through the contents carefully, noticing that the newspaper articles were dated to within a few years after the war. At that time he had taken an early retirement and become the recluse he had remained for over thirty years. Her reporter’s mind homed in on that fact, but beyond the sudden cessation of publicity, she could see no significance to it. She filled two sheets of a legal pad with possible questions.
Guessing correctly that dinner wouldn’t be a formal affair, she only changed her blouse. The one she selected was an ecru georgette with a short flutter sleeve. The narrow lapels dipped deeply before buttoning together just above her decolletage. She left her hair to fall free around her shoulders.
Lyon, looking damply clean from a recent shower, was securing his father’s wheelchair at the end of the table when she entered the dining room. He looked up and their eyes met and held for an inordinate length of time before she mumbled a “Good evening.”
He was, of course, fully clothed, but she could still see him as he had looked bare-chested. Her pulse sped up perceptibly when he graciously held her chair for her, and the scent that she realized was uniquely his washed over her.
The general, oblivious to or ignoring the tension between his son and their guest, bowed his head to say grace. Andy and Lyon followed suit. A few seconds into the prayer Andy yielded to the temptation to look at Lyon, who was seated directly across from her. Long, dark lashes unveiled her eyes slowly, then sprang wide when her eyes clashed with steady gray ones that were staring at her without a modicum of timidity or shame. To avoid their hypnotic power, she quickly squeezed her eyes shut and bowed her head again.
“Andy began choosing sites for the interviews today,” the general said after Gracie had served Lyon and Andy. Another plate of food that looked entirely unpalatable had been set before the general. The housekeeper was making good her promise to fatten Andy up. The food was sumptuous and plentiful.
“Oh?” One of Lyon’s black brows cocked with interest.
“Yes,” she said. “Your father was gracious enough to give me carte blanche to use all the rooms of the house.” She had intended that as a rebuke for his own inhospitality, but saw that she had failed. The corner of his mouth twitched with amusement. “However, I think we’ll confine the shooting to rooms that your father frequents ordinarily.” She looked toward General Ratliff. “Is it possible for you to go outside? I’d like to do some exterior shooting for B roll.”
“B roll?” Lyon asked.
“B roll is an additional tape with an alternate scene. It can get rather boring to watch two people sitting in two chairs for thirty minutes. But if we have some B roll, we can electronically edit it into the interview segment.”
Lyon nodded with comprehension.