Lovers in Hiding

by Susan Kearney

  “So why did you call Melinda?” Clay asked.

  “She ordered a case of massage oil from me.”

  “For the new salon.” Melinda nodded, but her forehead scrunched in a way Clay now recognized as a frown. “I’m stocking up on supplies, but I ordered through a wholesaler—not through you.”

  “I work for the wholesaler and wanted to avoid telling the retail company you ordered from that we screwed up, so I called you direct.” Sam hesitated. “This is kind of embarrassing, which is why I didn’t leave a message. You see, we manufacture massage oil for therapists, but we also have other…brands. Somehow the products on the last two cases in each lot got an extra ingredient. Luckily, yours were the only ones shipped before we caught our mistake.”

  Clay helped himself to another slice of pizza. “Is the extra ingredient harmful?”

  Sam squirmed in his seat. But he looked Clay square in the eyes. “The added ingredient makes the skin hot.”

  “Hot?” Clay asked, wondering if this mistake could result in a burn.

  “The skin gets hot when you apply the oil and then blow on it,” Sam elaborated with an apologetic glance at Melinda.

  An erotic massage oil? Clay chuckled.

  Melinda didn’t look amused. “Thank God I didn’t get it and use it on a customer. My reputation could have been shredded.”

  “I’m sorry. It was an honest mistake. I want to give you a full refund. Plus, I shipped a new case of regular oil—on the house.”

  The waitress placed a check on the table, and Sam picked that up, too. “My treat.”

  They polished off the pizza, and Clay realized they’d wasted time on this lead, but it couldn’t be helped.

  Sam left the waitress a generous tip. “Oh, one more thing.”

  “Yes?” Melinda asked.

  “When you didn’t respond to my phone call, I drove by your office. I mean, your house?”

  “It’s both.”

  “I saw this man peeking through the windows. He was up to no good.”

  “How do you know?” Melinda asked.

  “He ducked into the bushes when I drove by.”

  Clay downed the rest of his drink in one long swallow. “Can you give us a description?”

  “White. Six feet tall. Medium build. He wore an over-large jacket, like he might have been packing.”

  “Packing?”

  Melinda looked to Clay for an explanation. “You think he carried a holster and gun beneath the suit?”

  “Yes. His only distinguishing feature was a white tuft of hair at his temple. The rest of his hair was black. And he moved fast, his actions deliberate, not scared. Like he’s ex-military.”

  “Did you notice if he wore gloves?”

  Sam shook his head. “Sorry, I wasn’t close enough to tell. You might check with her neighbors. Maybe one of them saw something.”

  Chapter Nine

  Melinda kept waiting for Clay to make a crack about the mix-up in the massage oil. Instead, he carefully checked the parking lot before allowing her to exit the restaurant behind him. She found his precautionary measures sobering. While he focused on protecting their lives, she was thinking about erotic massage oils.

  Still, she’d bet not one in a hundred men would resist making some off-color comment that would automatically make her defenses go up. Clay just seemed to get it—no explanation on her part required. He didn’t ask how many of her clients were men or women, young or old. He didn’t ask if men ever came on to her while she worked. He didn’t ask what they wore during a massage. He had too much self-confidence to feel threatened by her work.

  She’d never met a man who simply accepted her and her profession with such aplomb. Or a man as determined to charm her into his bed. The men she dated tended to be patient. Then again, Clay Rogan was not the kind of man she typically dated.

  Who was she fooling? She didn’t date much. She’d had a fling or two several years back, but nothing serious. Nothing that revved her blood and made her so aware of a man’s masculinity. Ignoring Clay’s six and a half feet of raw sexuality was like trying to crawl out of her own skin. It couldn’t be done.

  But it was his superior intelligence that she found so seductive. The man worked as one with his computer. She wouldn’t be surprised if he thought at transistor speed or if his superior memory held millions of gigabytes of information. She’d bet he’d played chess before he’d started kindergarten, whizzed through calculus and was one of the CIA’s most valuable agents.

  And therein lay her problem. A man like him took pleasure in using his abilities to the max, testing himself against the best. He wouldn’t be satisfied with less. His workaholic tendencies fit perfectly with his getting by on only a few hours of sleep per night. He was obviously good at a job that didn’t leave much spare time for a wife.

  She wasn’t the kind of woman who would settle for so little. Never would she build her life around a man who put work ahead of family. She recalled all too well how miserable her father had made her mother. The time spent waiting for him to come home, the tearful goodbyes. And the worst part, never knowing when he’d return.

  It had been even worse when she was a child with no control over the situation. She’d never known if her father would be home to see her act in the school play or sign her report card or remember to at least phone on her birthday. Melinda’s entire early childhood seemed one of waiting for Daddy to come home.

  Later her parents had divorced. For a long time she’d believed that if she’d been a better girl, her dad wouldn’t have left. As a teen, she could have gotten caught up in that trap of seeking out male attention to make up for the lack at home. Instead, she’d found windsailing and working her way through school to be her salvation.

  Melinda wasn’t going to make the same mistake her mother had made. No child of hers would endure that kind of lonely childhood. Or go to bed thinking that if she was just good enough, Dad would come home tomorrow. She wasn’t going to fall for Clay Rogan. No matter how good a brain he had, or how pleasing she found him, she knew better.

  So why did her heart go pitter-patter when he opened her car door for her? Why did she have trouble remembering his unsuitability when he teased her, his dark green eyes glinting like the crest of a wave on a sunny day?

  She suddenly wondered what her neighbor Sheila would think of Clay Rogan. Sheila was always trying to fix Melinda up with her eldest grandson, but it was more a running jest between them than a serious plan. However, her elderly neighbor was a good judge of character, and she’d enjoy Sheila’s reactions to him.

  Clay drove through the darkening skies and an early-afternoon shower that didn’t last but a few minutes. Melinda wished the short shower could have lasted a little longer. She liked being enclosed with Clay, hearing the patter of rain on the windows, background noise to the news that Clay always listened to, flipping channels to hear the latest worldwide problems.

  When he drove into her neighborhood, she felt as if she’d never left. Children played on their backyard swing sets, rode bikes and played ball. A college student mowed his parents’ lawn and waved as they drove by.

  When Clay didn’t slow, Melinda pointed out her friend’s tiny but well-kept house with wildflowers beside a stone walkway and geraniums in the window boxes. “Sheila lives next door to me.”

  Instead of stepping on the brakes, Clay calmly nodded. “I want to scout out the area before we stop. You see any strangers?”

  Just as she was starting to relax, he reminded her—not by his manner, he was calm enough, but by his vigilance—that home wasn’t safe. She looked up and down the street, wondering what he saw. Most of the people here were working couples. Several of the moms were fortunate enough to stay home with their kids. The Bradleys down the street had just painted their SUV silver after their teenager’s fender bender last month. Carrie’s folks had insisted she take a job to pay for the damage, and she was busily sweeping their driveway of pine needles.

  “Looks okay to m
e.”

  Clay turned around and parked in front of Sheila’s house but facing the highway, just in case they needed to make a quick getaway. Melinda realized he made dozens of decisions like that for her safety every hour of the day. While grateful for his security measures and protection, his actions didn’t make her feel safe. In fact, they had the opposite effect, reminding her constantly of the possibility of danger.

  Drawing a deep breath to help her relax, she let out the air slowly. Across the street, Derrick Johnson peered at her through his window and waved. The African-American dentist was a fellow windsailer and one of her favorite neighbors. A single, handsome forty-five-year-old orchid grower, he always had a smile for her.

  Now was no different. He hurried out his front door, a package under his arm. As she and Clay got out of the car, he headed in their direction.

  Derrick waved at them, clearly eager to speak to her. Beside her, Clay stiffened, eyeballing the package. “You think that’s the papers Jake sent?”

  She frowned. “Why would Derrick have them?”

  Derrick joined them and shook hands with Clay as she introduced the two men. Derrick held the box under one arm, concealing the label. “This came for you the other morning. I signed for it. Hope that’s okay?”

  Her hopes rose, but the box didn’t look like the envelope she remembered. Maybe she remembered incorrectly. Was this why the CIA agents hadn’t found the package? Because Derrick had signed for it?

  Clay took the box. “Thanks.”

  Derrick looked from Clay to her and back. He grinned, winked and gave her a thumbs-up. “You go, girl.”

  “Thanks for your help, Derrick. I appreciate it.” She found his wink odd until after Derrick left and Clay showed her the mailing label.

  The package wasn’t from Jake. It was from Sam Bronson’s company. The package was marked Fragile. And beneath the label someone had handwritten Erotic Oil.

  No wonder Derrick had winked at her. After being gone for two nights, she showed up with the hunk of the year in tow, just in time to receive her erotic massage oil. In spite of herself, she chuckled.

  “What’s funny?” Clay asked, his vigilance never wavering as he perused the street and sidewalk for danger while she placed the box in the car’s trunk.

  “Derrick’s reaction…to you…and the erotic oil. He assumed—”

  “He assumed right. I can’t wait to put this stuff to the test.” Clay peeked over his sunglasses at her, spearing her heart, testing her resolve.

  She remembered his strong hands expertly kneading the muscles of her back and shoulders, imagined those hands dipping into the oil, spreading the fluid sensuously over areas he had yet to explore. Heat rose to her face as she tried to will the images away.

  She couldn’t. And the fact that she couldn’t bothered her as much as her physical reactions to this man. It was one thing for her body to admire and lust after a prime male specimen. That was a natural and basic human need that she’d neglected for far too long. But for him to invade her thoughts and daydreams was the ultimate loss of a battle she needed to win with herself.

  She’d flat out decided Clay wasn’t the right man for her. She would not get involved, no matter how much she longed for more kisses, more caresses.

  Sheila poked her head out the door, squinting over her sunglasses. “Melinda, is that you, hon?”

  “She has cataracts and doesn’t see very well. Try not to scare her,” Melinda said softly.

  “You think I can turn myself into the incredible shrinking man?”

  She tried and failed to keep a straight face. “Try some spy dust. That ought to do the trick,” she teased back.

  Sheila met them on the front porch of her house. The frail woman wore her dog-walking gear, an oversize T-shirt, tight leggings, walking shoes, a baseball cap, dark glasses to ward off the sun and a cane to fend off attacking muggers—not that she’d ever need one with her German shepherd and rottweiler to protect her, but as she’d often told Melinda, she intended to be prepared.

  Melinda hugged Sheila while the dogs sat at her neighbor’s hand signal. “I’ve been worried about you.”

  “I’m fine.”

  While Melinda embraced and reassured her neighbor, Sheila peered at Clay. “Introduce me to your little friend, dear.”

  Melinda grinned and did as the feisty old woman asked, enjoying Clay’s attempt to keep his face polite, instead of laughing outright.

  “So you’re the reason she hasn’t been home the last two nights—not that I’m counting, mind you.” Sheila squeezed Melinda’s hand. “It’s kind of sudden, but love can come that way. Strikes like lightning or crawls like a snail. Either way, when you know, you know. And, good God, you’re glowing—even I can see that.” She tugged Melinda toward her front door. “You don’t need to be listening to an old woman’s prattling. Come in. I’ll fix us a little snack.” She glanced back at Clay as the dogs obediently followed inside. “Make that a big snack.”

  Clay shook his head, but Melinda saw the amusement in his eyes. Somehow she’d known he would enjoy Sheila’s politically incorrect chatter, but she was glad to have her hunch verified. Their relationship hadn’t had time to develop in normal ways. She hadn’t met any of Clay’s friends or family. Or he hers—until Sheila.

  “We just had lunch,” Melinda told her friend as they entered the overcrowded living room decorated with flowered Victorian wallpaper, a doll collection and pictures of husbands, children and grandchildren. They walked past an upright out-of-tune piano that Sheila’s first husband had played, which she still kept for the sentimental value.

  While Sheila had a large and extended family, none of them lived nearby. Melinda had taken it upon herself to watch out for her neighbor and had enjoyed their friendship. “I’ve been a little busy lately, but wanted to stop by and make sure you’re okay.”

  Sheila took her favorite seat in a lounge chair, the dogs curled up at her feet as she waved her guests to a soft pink couch. She peered through cataracts from Clay to Melinda, her mouth quirking in a pleased smile. “Now I know why you didn’t answer my phone calls.”

  “We aren’t having a romantic tryst,” Melinda said firmly, avoiding Clay’s eyes. “Someone’s after me, and Clay is trying to protect me.”

  Sheila raised one speculative eyebrow. “That’s not romantic?”

  Clay chuckled and Melinda wanted to kick him. The last thing she needed was for the two of them to gang up on her. Obviously Sheila thought they’d already slept together, and Clay couldn’t have acted prouder.

  Ignoring Clay as best she could, Melinda scooped Lazy Days, Sheila’s cat, onto her lap. She scratched behind the cat’s ears and was rewarded as he purred with contentment.

  “So why did you call me?” Melinda asked.

  “I called three times. The first time I thought I’d walk on the beach while you sailed.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t get the message in time.”

  “No problem.”

  “The second time I called because I was worried about you. But I see you’re in good hands.”

  Clay chuckled again. “Glad you think so.”

  Melinda ignored the implications of those double entendres. “Why were you worried about me?”

  “Well, you were kind of upset.”

  “I was?”

  “I may be old but I’m not senile. You were all upset over that package your brother sent you.”

  “I don’t remember discussing it with you.”

  “Well, I do.” Sheila’s tone remained tart but she looked puzzled. “There’s nothing wrong with my memory, is there?”

  “Of course not.” Sheila’s sister had Alzheimer’s, and as a result, the elderly woman worried unduly about losing her own mental faculties. “I had a car accident,” Melinda explained, “and banged my head. I’m the one who can’t remember what happened that day.”

  “Oh, God! Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. I was hoping you might have seen a stranger lurki
ng around my house. A friend said he saw someone.”

  “Nothing. You know how bad my eyes are. Unless someone is as big as Clay, I’m afraid…”

  “Ma’am, you mentioned you called a third time?” Clay reminded her.

  “Oh, that was odd. Her machine didn’t pick up. I figured the recorder was full.” Her last call must have been made after the CIA swiped Melinda’s tape. “I just phoned to see if Melinda wanted any of my canned tomatoes. I grow them in the backyard.”

  Clay kept his tone mild. “Can you tell us why Melinda was upset after receiving her brother’s package?”

  “She’s afraid of having a family. She doesn’t like letting people get close to her. I’m surprised she and you…Don’t mind me. I’m just an old woman. What do I know?”

  “That’s all we talked about?” Melinda asked.

  “You had a client. You left in a hurry and said we should talk later.”

  “She didn’t say anything else about what was in the papers she received?” Clay pressed gently.

  “Learning she has a brother and a sister shocked her. I assured her having siblings can be a wonderful thing. I thought she was calmer when she left, but apparently she still wasn’t thinking straight.”

  She wasn’t sure she wanted Clay to hear her conversation with Sheila about having a family. Although she couldn’t remember their conversation that morning, she knew Sheila’s feelings on the subject quite well.

  “Why do you say that?” Melinda asked.

  “Well, dear, you rushed off so fast that you left your things behind.”

  “I did?”

  “What things?”

  “The items your brother sent you.”

  CLAY COULDN’T RESTRAIN his grin as Melinda accepted the envelope from her neighbor. He’d never expected the old lady to just hand over the files and photographs, had trouble believing Sheila hadn’t already been questioned by the rogue CIA agents.

  Before Clay could move on to decoding the documents, he preferred to have all the facts. Although this puzzle was solved, he liked for all the pieces to be filled in.

  He turned to Sheila. “Did any government officials question you about Melinda?”