Manhattan Merger

by Rebecca Winters

  As they touched down, Payne unstrapped himself to help her out of the helicopter. When her arm brushed against his chest by accident, it felt like a lick of flame.

  At the same time he breathed in the delicious scent of spring flowers drifting around her as it had done in his office. The fragrance enticed rather than overpowered.

  Sam and Andy had already pulled up in the limo to meet them. Payne cupped her elbow as he made the introductions. “I’m going to show Ms. Bennett around, then we’ll leave for my sister’s.”

  He didn’t miss the speculative glance Mac gave him before the men started transferring bags and paintings from the helicopter to the limo.

  Mac had every reason to look surprised. Payne guarded his privacy with a vengeance. No outsiders. Only family, Diane’s family, his security people, the Myers and Drew Wallace were allowed. To the rest of the world, Crag’s Head was off limits.

  By bringing Rainey here, Payne had broken his own rule, another aberration that didn’t bear close scrutiny.

  Her gaze continued to study the exterior as they walked toward the north entrance. “This is your home,” she said in a quiet voice. “The lighthouse should have been my first clue.”

  “Yes.”

  “How do you bear to leave it?”

  He sucked in his breath. “I ask myself that question every morning when I climb in the helicopter.”

  She paused in front of the door, eyeing him with a directness he found exhilarating. “Now it’s clear to me where the king of glass does his inspired thinking. Your office is simply a place where you get everyone else to carry out your business.”

  How did she know so much?

  He cocked his head. “You read World Fortune Magazine?”

  “No. Grace Carlow showed me the article so I’d have some idea of the man I’d be facing in court.”

  Her mouth suddenly curved into a haunting smile. It said she understood the forces that drove him.

  The woman had second sight. Her painting was already proof of that.

  “Shall we go inside?”

  Her expectant expression gave her away. “I can’t wait.”

  Payne’s lips twitched before he used his pocket remote to gain entrance. Mrs. Myers met them in the foyer. She covered her surprise well at seeing him with another woman besides Diane.

  “Betty? This is Rainey Bennett, an artist from Grand Junction, Colorado, now living in New York. As soon as I shower and change, we’ll be driving to my niece’s for dinner.”

  “Would you like something to drink while you wait, Ms. Bennett?”

  “No thank you.”

  “What about you, Mr. Sterling?”

  “Nothing for me either.”

  “If there’s anything I can do, let me know.”

  “Thanks, Betty.”

  When she disappeared he turned to his guest. “While I’m upstairs, make yourself at home. I won’t be long.”

  Fifteen minutes later he came back down knowing exactly where to find her. Sure enough she’d rolled a stool over to his underground map of Los Angeles. She was so deep in concentration she didn’t hear his footsteps when he entered this portion of the house.

  It took the ringing of his cell phone to bring her head around. She got up from the stool. “How long have you been standing there?”

  “A few minutes.” He checked the Caller ID. It was Diane. He put the phone back in his pocket. “I do believe you find those maps as fascinating as I do.”

  “Fascinating isn’t even the word. To tunnel under a city not knowing exactly what you’ll find must provide the same kind of thrills experienced by an explorer or an astronaut.”

  “It’s a world of rats and muck,” he muttered.

  “And ancient artifacts,” she added. “Between you and Frontenac, the stories you could tell!”

  Her reference to Bonnie Wrigley’s testimony made him smile. “I have to admit it’s exciting when we find something.”

  “Ooh I’d love to be with you the next time you come across an old burial mound.”

  There she went again, infecting him with her unique brand of enthusiasm. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  An impish smile broke out on her face. “You don’t fool me. You’re no ordinary engineer. It’s obvious you love making sense out of a bewildering maze like this.

  “When I was studying art at the university, I had to take some architecture and mechanical engineering classes as part of the curriculum. I was pulled a lot of ways back then before I ended up going for my fine arts degree.

  “The fact is, I almost changed majors and went into engineering. The kind you do is probably the most challenging of all. It’s another world down there under the streets. I marvel at the way you have figured it all out and then put your vision to paper.

  “You see what nobody else sees and know how it’s going to work. It’s miraculous. What I’d give to work alongside you and learn from you.”

  Her vivacious eyes wandered over him.

  “To know what can be connected to what, and make it function means you’ll never run out of new challenges, you lucky man. Do you know how many people would kill to love their work the way you do?”

  “You mean the same way you love yours?” He moved closer to her, enjoying their conversation more than he’d enjoyed anything else in years.

  “I enjoy what I do,” she said. “But I don’t wake up every morning surrounded by this sea and this sky. I really can’t find the words, but you already know them because you were the first one to visualize everything.

  “There’s so much beauty of shape and flowing line integrated with the lighthouse, it makes me want to cry.” Tears clouded her exquisite green eyes. “If you knew me better, you’d know I cry a lot,” she confessed on a self-deprecating laugh. “That’s the way beauty affects me.”

  Payne could relate. Right now he was looking at someone incredibly beautiful both inside and out.

  “While the pilot circled your home, my mind’s eye began making sketches. Now that I’ve been inside, it won’t stop. I promise I won’t put anything to paper, but if you see me experiencing symptoms of withdrawal within the next twelve hours, have some compassion.”

  He burst into full-bodied laughter. Payne couldn’t remember the last time that had happened. He couldn’t remember ever enjoying a woman this much before. They related on a level that needed no words.

  It felt good. She made him feel good. Too good.

  He felt…alive.

  “Mr. Sterling?”

  Mrs. Myer’s voice jerked him from certain private thoughts that were both exhilarating and alarming in their implication.

  “Yes, Betty?”

  “Your niece is on the house phone wondering where you are.”

  He hadn’t even heard it ring. “Tell her I’ll be there within ten minutes.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We’d better go so you don’t keep them waiting any longer,” Rainey murmured.

  She was right.

  But Payne didn’t want to go.

  He wanted…

  No.

  Don’t say it, Sterling. Don’t even think it.

  “Are you hungry?” he asked as they started for the hallway. “I’m getting there.”

  Payne had been there since the first moment he’d seen her in the courtroom. He recognized all the symptoms of an appetite that was growing out of control.

  He should have sent Mac for the paintings, but some irresistible force had propelled him to Rainey’s apartment door instead. That same force had prompted him to manufacture a reason to see her again.

  And after tonight, what then?

  The answer was simple. There couldn’t be an after.

  Tomorrow his pilot would fly her back to the city. Andy would make certain she was driven to her apartment. Payne would destroy all evidence of Ms. Bennett’s brief appearance in the scheme of things.

  With her gone, his newly fabricated life since the shooting would once again resume its required p
attern.

  But even as he rehearsed those thoughts in his mind, his hand came in contact with her silken-clad skin. Somehow her dress had ridden up while he was helping her into the back of the limo.

  Both their bodies trembled from the contact before she scrambled to the other side of the limo with a speed he hadn’t thought possible.

  His body tautened. She was as aware of him as he was of her.

  “Is your niece caught up in politics like her mother?”

  The innocuous question came after they’d left the parking area on the north side of the house. With Mac and John inside the car, she couldn’t have chosen a better topic.

  “No. She’ll be a philanthropist one day.”

  “Sounds like she takes after her uncle.”

  “Hardly. Catherine was born compassionate.”

  “What a rare and wonderful trait that is. I’m looking forward to meeting her.”

  Payne stared out the window with unseeing eyes. Like water cascading to the pool below, Catherine would gravitate to Rainey. Like Payne, she wouldn’t be able to help herself.

  “Tell me about your fiancée. Does she have a career?”

  He’d wondered when Rainey would get around to Diane.

  “Her background is English literature. Until the accident she worked for a magazine put out by Blakely College, her alma mater.”

  “I’m impressed. Blakely’s a prestigious women’s college. I had a friend who tried to get in. She was a straight-A student with lots of other credentials going for her, but she was still turned down.”

  He nodded. “It’s very competitive. What happened to your friend?”

  “She ended up at Vassar.”

  They both started to chuckle at the same time.

  This was something new for him. To be with a woman who could read his mind, who laughed and found joy over the same things. Whose thoughts were bound to his, especially during the silences.

  Phyllis’s house came into view.

  Too soon their ride was over. Now he would have to share Rainey, then let her go. She would take all the sunshine with her.

  Though she hadn’t left yet, he could already feel his desolation. It shook him to the foundations.

  “Uncle Payne!” His niece hurried across the back lawn with Lady at her heels. “We thought you’d never get here!”

  She opened the limo door to hug him. Then her gaze caught sight of the surprise he’d brought with him.

  “Catherine Boyce? Meet Rainey Bennett.”

  “Hello— It’s nice to meet you,” his niece said with a friendly smile.

  Rainey smiled back. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, Catherine. You’ve got an uncle who’s crazy about you.”

  “I love him too.”

  “Sweetheart? Rainey’s the artist who painted those romance covers including Manhattan Merger. Since you’re the one who brought that particular book to my attention, I thought you’d like to meet her. She’ll be spending the night here as our guest.”

  “You’re kidding.” Her light blue eyes stared at him. “You’re not kidding.”

  Her gaze flew to Rainey’s once more. “You did the pictures of Uncle Payne?”

  By now Mac held the door open for Rainey while the other men took the bags and paintings in the house.

  His guest remained in the seat. “Guilty as charged.”

  “You’re an amazing artist.”

  “It’s not true, but thank you.”

  “Nyla’s not going to believe it.”

  “Who’s Nyla?”

  “She’s been with our family for years. When she’s through reading her monthly mailing of romance novels, she gives them to me. The cover on Manhattan Merger worried her enough to say something about it. I couldn’t believe how much it looked like Uncle Payne, so I showed it to him.”

  A shadow darkened Rainey’s expressive features. “I’m sorry it frightened all of you so much. You have no idea how badly I feel.”

  “It’s over,” Payne declared. “I’ve assured my niece there’s nothing to fear. Why don’t we go inside and eat dinner before it’s ruined.”

  Within seconds they’d alighted from the limo and the three of them started toward the back door of the house. Payne paused midstride because Lady had made Rainey’s acquaintance and was now enjoying a nice scratch behind the ears.

  With her tail wagging in excitement, it appeared Ms. Bennett had just acquired another admirer.

  “I cooked hamburgers and potato salad for us, Uncle Payne. You should have told me you were bringing company. I would have made something special.”

  Rainey caught up to them. “Hamburgers have always been a favorite around my house,” she spoke up. “In fact my brother still lives on them. If you tried to feed him something like chicken cordon bleu, he’d slip it to our dog.”

  Catherine laughed. “What kind do you have?”

  “An English bulldog.”

  “Oh how cute. Uncle Payne once had a bullmastiff.”

  “I know. I saw the picture of him on his desk. The two dogs’ faces look a lot alike.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Winston.”

  “Of course. Winston Churchill. How funny.”

  “I agree.” Rainey chuckled. “There are moments when my dog looks just like him. Once Craig bought a cigar and put it in Winston’s mouth while I took the picture.”

  They both laughed.

  “I’d love to see that!” his niece said.

  Rainey’s eyes swerved to Payne’s. “I have a picture in my purse.”

  “Can I look?”

  “Of course.” Rainey opened her handbag and handed her the framed picture showing Winston with the cigar.

  Catherine broke into more laughter. “This is hilarious. He’s darling!”

  “I think so too. He’s the dog I put in the painting. Just being with Lady makes me homesick for him.”

  His niece darted Payne a relieved glance before handing the picture back to Rainey.

  “Lady’s one of the reasons I didn’t go to Mexico with my family.”

  Payne put his arm around Catherine’s shoulders. “What’s the other reason?” He knew there had to be one.

  “It probably has to do with a boy,” Rainey inserted. “I can remember missing a few trips to hang around my brother and his friends.”

  Catherine smiled without saying anything. It was as good as an admission. She opened the door so they could all go inside the house.

  Being an artist obviously made Rainey an excellent judge of human nature. But being around her had knocked him off base until he didn’t recognize himself anymore.

  He took a fortifying breath. “Where’s Diane?”

  “I left her on the west patio. We’ll be eating out there.”

  “Good. Why don’t you show Rainey where to freshen up while I go find her.”

  “I’ll be happy to. Come through here, Rainey.”

  “Your home is fabulous, like walking into a page of Architectural Digest. And it’s so big! My studio apartment could fit in this one room alone.”

  “Where do you live?”

  Their voices grew faint as Payne made his way to the patio. He would love to eavesdrop on their conversation, but Diane was waiting.

  “At last!” she cried when she saw him in the doorway. “I tried to reach you on the phone.”

  I know.

  She wheeled around the table and lifted her arms to him. “It feels like two years instead of two days.”

  He wished to heaven he could say the same thing back to her, but he couldn’t. It wasn’t in him. All he could do was give her a quick kiss and hug.

  As the opening line of Manhattan Merger had stated, Logan Townsend wasn’t in love with his fiancée.

  Payne wasn’t in love with his fiancée either.

  He’d never be able to say the words she wanted to hear.

  Guilt and the need to find a cure for her had prompted his proposal of marriage. He’d told her he would take
care of her and protect her. He owed her that much.

  The grand plan was to help her walk again. Since their engagement he’d been working toward that goal with a single-mindedness he wouldn’t allow anything to overshadow, especially not Diane’s defeatist attitude.

  What he hadn’t counted on was Rainey Bennett entering his life.

  “Are you sure everything’s all right?” Diane asked when he straightened.

  After pushing her wheelchair back to the table, Payne sat down next to her and reached for her hand.

  “As I told you on the phone last evening, you don’t need to worry anymore. To prove it, I’ve invited someone to dinner who will put any fears you have to rest.”

  Her face closed up. “You brought company here?”

  “Yes. Catherine will be out with her in a minute. Her name is Lorraine Bennett. She’s a freelance artist from Grand Junction, Colorado, who designs greeting cards and does paintings that appear on some of the covers for Red Rose Romance. She’s the one who painted me.”

  “She confessed to it in court?”

  “Yes. But when you hear the whole story, you’ll understand it was an honest mistake.”

  Her eyes flashed in anger. “How could it be an honest mistake when she did it without your permission?”

  “It’s complicated. You’ll just have to trust me.”

  Diane’s hand clutched his. “I wish you’d asked me before you issued your invitation.”

  “It’s because of your reaction right now that I didn’t,” Payne explained in a calm voice. “When the hearing started, I felt exactly like you. I was convinced someone would be arrested by the end of the day. We can thank God the reverse was true.”

  Her lips tightened. “For once I think you used the wrong judgment by bringing her here.”

  Payne happened to agree with her, but not for the same reasons she was thinking.

  “I had another motive in mind, aside from the hope that meeting her would help you and Catherine to forget this incident.”

  “What motive?”

  “Ms. Bennett feels terrible for what happened. It might help her to recover faster if she can see we bear no malice.”

  “She should feel terrible.”

  Payne knew it was her helplessness that made her less forgiving than she would otherwise be.

  “Try to put yourself in her place, Diane. Throughout the hearing she felt the burden of being the one who not only implicated herself, but the author and the whole company.”