by Janet Dailey
"Did I? I thought I had," Lisa shrugged, intimidated by the rigid set of his shoulders. Slade pivoted to face her. "You didn't and you haven't yet."
It was Lisa's turn to look away from his compelling features, relentless in their demand for an answer. "Naturally, I agree to the arrangement. As you pointed out last night, it would be foolish and serf-defeating for both of us not to join forces." Her attempt to be offhand came out brittle and defensive. "Is that direct enough for you, or do you want me to sign some binding document complete with the 'whereases' and 'hereinafters?'"
"Stop it!" he snapped out the words.
"Stop what?" Lisa turned on him roundly, more challengingly defensive than before.
"Stop being so sarcastic." A muscle worked convulsively along his lean jaw, the line of his mouth hard and forbidding.
"I can't help it where you're concerned," she restored. "It's instinctive."
"You managed to be civil last night," Slade reminded her.
"Last night I had too much wine" Lisa defended herself. It had been the crutch she had subconsciously used all day long to explain her reaction to his kisses.
"Was it the wine?" he taunted. "I've been wondering that myself all day long."
His admission caught her by surprise. She had been on his mind all day long? She was the reason for his moody preoccupation at the office? He had been going over in his mind what had happened the night before the same as she had. It must have been an unsettling experience for him as well. The knowledge quivered through her limbs, kindling an excitement she fought hard to control.
In one long stride, Slade covered the distance between them, his hands spanning her slender ribcage. His touch sparked a flame that licked through her nervous system, making her insensitive to all but his nearness.
"I haven't had any wine today. Have you?" he asked with dangerous deliberation.
With a negative shake of her blond head, she gave him her mute answer. He slowly pulled her toward him. The hands on her ribs were firmly insisting, their searing warmth branding her skin. Her face was tipped upwards, her lips parting before he even touched them.
His questing mouth held no mercy, its fierce passion driving all resistance out of its path. The heady urgency he was arousing was more deeply intoxicating than any wine. Almost of their own accord, her hands slipped inside his jacket, sliding around the solidness of his waist.
Instantly his arms circled her, shaping her full curves to the hard contours of his body. The caress of his hands on her hips sent fires leaping high, consuming her with the scorching heat of their desire.
All men who had held her in their arms before were banished from her memory. None had ever lifted her to this towering peak that overlooked discretion and danger. The things she had resented about Slade, his strength and mastery, were the very things she now gloried in. She couldn't help shuddering in regret when he dragged his mouth from hers.
"What kind of a witch are you?" he muttered thickly against her temple, his breath warm and moist over her skin.
"A completely powerless one, I think." Without resistance or defense, she thought silently. He could have seduced her and she wouldn't have been able to stop him.
His mouth punished her hard for telling such a lie. Only as far as Lisa was concerned, it wasn't a lie. Slade was the one who possessed the magic, trapping her inside the charmed circle of his arms while he wove a spell over her soul. She reveled in the addictive prowess of his long, drugging kiss, her need insatiable.
"Take off those damned glasses," Slade growled the demand.
It was the slap back to reality that Lisa needed. She twisted out of his arms, turning her back on him and taking a trembling step away. Her heart was knocking against her ribs, her breath coming in shaky gasps. She clasped her arms about her stomach, churning from the upheaval of her emotions, volcanic and frightening.
"I don't want to become involved with you, Slade, emotionally or physically," she declared, but much too weakly. "I want this to be purely a business arrangement." Eventually she would have to expose him, and she wanted to be able to do it without pain or regret.
"Do you think I don't?" His low voice sounded strangled by the savage control he was exercising over his reply.
"I don't know," she sighed with an aching tremor.
His hands touched the sides of her waist, then slid automatically under her arms to cup her breasts. Lisa's shoulders were drawn back against his chest. The hard pressure of his thighs left her in no doubt of his male need.
"I didn't intend for this to happen. In fact, it's the last thing I want." Even as he made the angry statement, he was forcing her head to the side, burying his mouth in the tangle of silver silk hair at the curve of her neck.
"Me, too." But delicious shivers were racing down her spine from his rough caress.
Her hands were clutching his muscled forearms, ostensibly to end his possession of her breasts. But she simply held on to him, inviting his intimate caress by not denying it. A wave of primitive longings surged through her — powerful, inescapable and dangerous.
"It's happened, so what are we going to do about it?" Slade breathed raggedly against the sensitive skin along her neck.
"Stop it."
"Can you?" he laughed cynically.
"I don't know." Lisa closed her eyes against the fevered ache in her loins that refused to diminish.
Tightening his hold, he molded her more fully against his male length. "I want you, Lisa." A hand slid to her hipbone.
"I know." How could she ignore the pressing force of his desire, any more than she could ignore the hollow throbbing of her own?
Abruptly Slade let her go, leaving her to sway unsteadily without the support of his body. Long, impatient strides carried him away from her until nearly the width of the room separated them. Lisa stared hungrily after him, not able to deny her desire now that he no longer held her in his arms.
He took a cigarette from the enameled box on the coffee table and snapped a lighter flame to the tip. Exhaling an impatient, tasteless cloud of smoke, he raked his fingers through the thickness of his raven hair. The smoldering anger of his gaze burned her.
"What do you expect from me, Lisa?" he demanded with gritting control. "Besides a guaranteed share of your aunt's money," he jeered viciously.
"Nothing." Hot tears scorched her eyes, luckily hidden by the smoke blue sunglasses. "God, I wish I'd never met you!" she choked.
"Not half as much as I do," he growled. "Not by half."
The just-lit cigarette was crushed in an ashtray, suppressed fury in the action. He was striding stiffly toward the door before Lisa could comprehend his intention.
"Where are you going?" she breathed in confusion.
"I'm leaving!" he snapped harshly. "Make my apologies to your aunt!" Doors were slammed violently in his wake. Lisa flinched at each crashing sound, pain splintering through her, inflicting a million tiny wounds.
It was what she deserved, though, for so indiscriminately abandoning her pride and self-respect in the arms of a man who was a thief and possibly worse. There was no time to dwell on the humiliating aspects of her passionate response as Mitzi appeared in the living room.
"Gracious! Slade was really in a temper when he left," she declared. "I can't leave the two of you alone for five minutes but you're at each other's throats. What happened this time?"
"We — argued," Lisa answered tightly, her voice straining to sound natural.
"About what?"
"Does it matter?" she countered with undisguised bitterness.
"I suppose not," Mitzi sighed in reluctant agreement. "You two can't seem to see eye to eye about anything. If all else failed, you'd probably argue over the color of the sun. After last night, I'd hoped that —"
"Last night was a mistake." In more ways than one, Lisa could have told her. A fiery tear slipped from her lashes and she wiped it away with the back of her hand.
"Lisa, you're crying!" Mitzi was plainly astonished by the disco
very.
"I always cry when I'm angry." Or hurt or confused or frightened, she thought.
Her aunt's expression became decidedly grim. "I am going to have a talk with Slade."
"Don't bother. He'd only laugh," Lisa declared acidly.
"Slade —"
"You don't know Slade," Lisa interrupted angrily, releasing the pent-up frustrations of her emotions. "You don't know what he's really like! How arrogant and demanding and sexy —" Oh, God, Lisa thought. Had she really said that last? She went red with shame,
"Well, no —" Mitzi tried to hide the laughter in her voice "— I don't think I know that side of him very well."
Lisa couldn't remember having felt so mortified in years, not since a teenage girl friend had confided Lisa's infatuation to the very boy she had the crush on. She mumbled some unintelligible excuse and rushed from the room.
In her room, she locked the door, but no one came to invade her privacy. She cried out her misery and humiliation alone. But it was more than that that made her sob so brokenly with pain. It was knowing that she had found something precious and couldn't keep it.
But she refused to admit, even to herself, what that something precious was. With her head pounding and her body aching, she finally fell into an exhausted sleep some time after midnight.
The next morning, Lisa awoke with a start. She was late for work. Then her head sank back onto the pillow. It was Saturday and Slade's office was closed. Relief trembled through her in a shuddering sigh. She would never have found the composure to face Slade today as Ann Eldridge.
A glance in the mirror told her she would have difficulty facing anyone today. Her green eyes were parched and bloodshot from the gallons of tears she had cried. Her lids were puffy and swollen with dark smudges beneath her eyes. She could hardly stand to see herself.
She slipped on her sunglasses to conceal the ravages of last night's stormy collapse. Only when the worst had been hidden did she pull on brushed denim Levis and a white tank top. Her complexion was unnaturally pale, making the pink lipstick look gaudy. She rubbed it off with a tissue and ran a comb indifferently through her silver blond hair.
Downstairs the housekeeper gave her a sighingly resigned look and said, "Mitzi is in the study working. Today is the day I polish the furniture, so if you'll be wantin' breakfast, it'll take me a while."
"Juice and coffee is good enough." Lisa still didn't have an appetite. Mildred nodded glumly, showing no relief that the request was small. "I'll get it," Lisa volunteered. "There's no need for you to bother, Mildred."
"Have it your way." Mildred shrugged and moved toward the living room.
In the end, Lisa had only a glass of orange juice before wandering aimlessly out of the back door into the garden. Listlessly she meandered under the large oaks, veils of moss trailing over the top of her hair.
Last night she had considered packing her bags and leaving — anything to escape Slade Blackwell. But that would mean leaving Mitzi to his mercy. Was she such a coward she would do that?
But if she stayed … Lisa shuddered. She was supposed to be an adult, not without some experience regarding men. She should be capable of warding off unwanted attentions from a man. The problem was that they were not unwanted. All Slade had to do was touch her and she melted like a scoop of ice cream in July.
Never, not even in her worst nightmares, had she dreamed she might fall in love with a man who embezzled from rich, elderly women. She hadn't fallen in love with him yet; in lust with him maybe, but not in love.
But that was the risk she was taking if she stayed around him much longer, Lisa realized. And if she loved him, would she have the will to expose him before he destroyed Mitzi's future security?
She was so confused and uncertain. Nothing seemed as simple as it had when she arrived. A twig of an oak brushed her cheek and she snapped it off in irritation, twirling the tiny, green-leafed stick between her fingers agitatedly.
What was she going to do? How had she got herself into this mess? How was she going to get herself out of it? Was there a way out of it — one that wasn't filled with pain or heartache?
Sighing helplessly, Lisa tipped her head backward, gazing up into the massive branches of an oak tree. Far above her head she could see a man-made platform perched on the V of two limbs. She searched the fat girth of the main trunk, finding the slats of wood nailed to the tree forming a crude ladder to the platform. It looked singularly inviting to be high up there in the tree, far above all her problems. The lofty tree house offered a temporary escape, and Lisa took advantage of it. The boards nailed to the trunk were amazingly solid. Even if they hadn't been, she discovered that she hadn't lost her climbing skill. The platform, too, was sound, without a single indication of rotting wood.
Settling into a comfortable, cross-legged position, with her elbows resting on her thighs and her hands on her ankles, Lisa felt decidedly better. There was something uplifting about sitting in a tree. If Darwin's theory was true, she thought somewhat wryly, she was probably reverting to old ancestral habits!
The sensation didn't last long as she heard the crunch of footsteps in the graveled driveway. She tensed, a sixth sense warning her of the intruder's identity before she saw Slade. The minute he came into her view, he stopped, glancing upward to the tree house where she sat.
Her heart somersaulted traitorously at the sight of him dressed casually in blue slacks and a print shirt that was opened at the throat. His hard features were expressionless as he gazed directly at her.
"Go away," she gulped tightly,
"I want to talk to you, Lisa," he said evenly.
"Well, I don't want to talk to you."
"Don't be childish," Slade scolded her for her pouting retort, "and come down from that tree."
"How did you know I was here?" She ignored his order.
"Mildred told me at the house that she'd seen you wandering around outside from the window. I've found Mitzi so many times in that tree house that I guess I automatically looked there first."
"Mitzi? Up here?" Lisa repeated, finding it difficult to imagine her fifty-year-old aunt climbing the tree.
"Yes," Slade said dryly, "your aunt is remarkable in more ways than one. If you don't come down, I'll come up. You'll find that platform is a little cramped with two people on it."
He would climb up, Lisa knew it, and she glared at him angrily. He took a step toward the trunk and the crude ladder.
"I'll be right down," she muttered, and slid along the platform to the boards leading down the tree.
A few feet from the ground, a pair of hands took hold of her waist, ignoring her gasp of protest, and lifted her the rest of the way down. Lisa twisted free of the hold the instant her feet touched the ground. Her pulse was still racing even after Slade had let her go.
"What do you want?" she challenged coldly But inside she was feverishly aware of him.
Slade stared at her for a long moment. "Mitzi told me you'd been crying."
His hand reached for her sunglasses and Lisa knocked it away, instinctively defending her identity. "She had no right to tell you that!" She couldn't deny the tears she had cried. Not even the tinted sunglasses could conceal all traces.
"Mitzi hasn't had many chances in her life to play mother hen. You can't blame her for springing to the defense of the little chick living in her house." He studied her thoughtfully. "Looking at you now, I can understand why she lectured me on my behavior. You look oddly vulnerable and in need of protection."
"You're wrong," Lisa denied. "You and Mitzi both are wrong. I can take care of myself."
"Can you?" Slade eyed her skeptically, his manner faintly arrogant and mocking. "It's funny, but you don't look like a hard-bitten little niece out after her aunt's money. You look like a little girl who's been hurt —"
"Will you get out of here?" she demanded hoarsely. "I don't need pity, least of all yours?
"I'm not offering any."
Lisa turned away in agitation. "What are you doing he
re? Who invited you anyway?"
"I invited myself. I wanted to see you."
"Why?" she hurled bitterly. "Were you afraid after last night that I'd renege on our deal?"
"Frankly it didn't occur to me," Slade answered grimly. "Maybe it should have."
"Yes, maybe it should have."
His hands fastened on her upper arms, pulling her around to face him. Lisa hunched her shoulders away from him, recoiling from his touch that was both torture and bliss. She kept her face averted, unable to meet his compelling gaze.
"Let me go Slade!" The strangled words were ripped from her throat. "I'm not going to go back on our agreement."
His fingers curled deeper into the soft flesh of her arms, drawing her closer. Lisa raised her hands to wedge herself away from his chest, but one hand accidentally came in contact with naked skin where his unbuttoned shirt front opened at the neck. His body warmth seared through her like a branding iron, and the dark hairs on his chest tickled her sensitive fingertips.
"Last night —" Slade began tautly.
"I'm trying to forget about last night," Lisa interrupted in a throbbing voice. "I don't want to remember it even happened."
"I came over here this morning with the intention of apologizing and to suggest that we both forget about last night." There was a sensual note in his husky tone. "But I can't. It isn't possible."
His warm breath was fanning the top of her hair, letting Lisa know how close he was to her. Her gaze was riveted to the tanned column of his neck, and the pulse beating wildly there seemed to be in tempo with her own racing heart.
"I don't want to become involved with you." Her protest was almost issued in a moan of surrender. "It would complicate everything."
"Do you think I don't know that?" Slade argued grimly.
"Then leave me alone."
He offered the opposite. "Spend the day with me, Lisa. Mitzi's going to be working and she's already told me you aren't seeing your friends today."
"No." She shook her head. "I can't. I won't!"