Earth Angel

by Linda Cajio

  “Just because of those two things?” she asked, laughing.

  “They’re the foundation of every snooty school the world over,” he replied. “They’d burn us at the stake for heresy, my friend.”

  “I still won’t understand Picasso.”

  “It’s a great investment, that’s all I know.”

  “Philistine.”

  “That’s me.”

  To her further surprise, he took her to a rowdy nightclub after the meal.

  To her horror, everyone was dancing the lambada.

  Spotlights swept over the crowd, the only illumination in the smoky room. And what they illuminated! Catherine swallowed as she watched couples gyrating wildly on the dance floor, while pressed so tightly together that a dime couldn’t be squeezed between them.

  “Could I have a drink?” she shouted to Miles above the music that vibrated sensually deep inside her.

  He paused in shedding his suit jacket to give to the coat check. Clearly he was readying himself for action. “A drink?”

  “Yes. Liquid in a glass, with ice cubes. A drink. I’m very thirsty.” She waved her hand toward the cluster of booths, couches, and tables in the seating area.

  “If you like.” He looked so disappointed, she smothered a giggle.

  “Come on. Let’s get a table before the music stops.”

  Not a single table was empty. Catherine began to panic until she spotted some space on the upper level, along a railing that overlooked the dance floor. She dragged Miles over, and they squeezed in together. People stared at them, then adjusted to make room. To her consternation, the women’s gazes seemed to linger on Miles. He snagged a harried waitress, and they ordered drinks.

  Catherine kept her back to the dance floor. She considered it necessary to her sanity. She was already shoulder-to-shoulder with Miles, and her nerve endings sizzled with awareness as his shirtsleeve brushed her skin. The hardness of his arm was all too apparent under the silk. This was nearly as bad as the dancing.

  “I’ll bet the media is camped out on my uncle’s doorstep,” she said, deciding to bring the conversation around to the original purpose of the dinner.

  “As long as they’re not on mine,” he said, watching the dancers below. He turned and grinned at her. “Or on yours.”

  She didn’t like the sound of that. “He refuses to listen to reason.”

  Miles leaned sideways, his hip against the railing. Catherine gulped in air. He was so damn close.

  “Let’s not talk about your uncle,” he said in a low voice. He was almost touching her ear with his lips in order to be heard. She shivered at the sensation of his breath on her skin as he added, “Let’s dance.”

  “I thought talking was the whole point of dinner,” she managed to say coherently. “That’s what you said this morning.”

  “I was a fool.” He gazed down at her. His features were taut. She could feel him staring at her breasts and wished her top was just a little higher. “Dance with me.”

  Her face heated. Every part of her heated. “I … we ordered drinks, remember? She’ll never find us if we’re dancing.”

  He cursed and leaned back against the rail again.

  Catherine found she could breathe once more. She had a feeling it would be a real tug-of-war to stay off the dance floor.

  “So tell me exactly what is going on at Wagner,” he said.

  “You should know.”

  “But I don’t.”

  She looked at him questioningly. He shrugged. “I’m not in on the day-to-day operations, you know that. I’m on the board as a courtesy, because of the bank’s involvement. Allan had my proxy, and I had his for his bank trustee position. You should know how the system works by now. You were raised on this stuff, just as I was.”

  She frowned. She did know, but she’d also seen Miles at too many meetings recently to believe he was a silent director. Still, if he wanted to play innocent, she could oblige. “Byrne refuses to do anything that could reduce the profits of the corporation. All the jobs that have anything to do with expanding our safety procedures, he eliminates. He’d rather save a dime than follow EPA standards.”

  “Come on, Catherine,” Miles said in a disparaging tone. “He’s not that foolish.”

  She set her jaw to keep her temper under control. “I’m perfect proof, Miles. Under my grandfather my job with R & D was to monitor operations development for potential environmental problems. When my uncle became chairman of the board, my entire team was eliminated, and now I sit in my office with a figurehead title and absolutely nothing to do.”

  “Do you think someone from your team is the Earth Angel?”

  Catherine choked. “I doubt it, I really do,” she said, recovering quickly. “I told you, it’s probably the Green Earth people. Everyone on my team is working for other companies, anyway, so no one’s disgruntled.”

  He nodded at her logic. She suppressed a sigh of relief.

  “I asked my grandmother about the codicil,” he said. “She says there is one.”

  Anger boiled up inside her. She spun to face him. “Did you think I lied about it?”

  “No.” He paused. “Actually, I didn’t think about you at all. I only wanted to confirm its existence.”

  His words only angered her more. “I am not a liar, Miles Kitteridge.”

  “I never said you were.”

  “You just said you had to confirm what I had said.”

  “That’s not what I—” The waitress appeared at that moment. Miles straightened and grinned. “Ah, saved by the drinks.” He handed her a tall glass. “Here, Catherine, drink up your Perrier and cool down.”

  She eyed him narrowly as she sipped her drink. It aggravated her to realize that he could press more buttons than she ever knew she had. Of all the people in the world, she just couldn’t understand why it was he who provoked her on every level. She’d met men who were better looking, who had more charisma, and who were certainly more sensitive. But it was Miles who could drive her over the edge with one look, and cause her to lose her control with one word.

  The only good thing at the moment was that she finally had her drink in her hand and he couldn’t ask her to dance. She wondered how long she could spin this out without looking as if she were avoiding him.

  “What went wrong with your marriage?” she asked, then nearly groaned aloud. Of all the things to dredge up in desperation!

  He shrugged, apparently not offended. “Sometimes young men marry with their … They don’t think before they marry.”

  “You’re telling me you married for physical attraction?” she asked, feeling a sharp pain twist oddly through her middle.

  “No, not really. It’s just that you’re feeling like Mr. Macho Protector of this vulnerable young thing. It’s not until afterward that you realize how wearing wearing that mantle is.”

  “So you dumped her because she was a sweet young thing, and you wanted someone brighter.”

  He gazed at her, his eyes reminding her of cold ice. “Catherine, you are like talking to the razor’s edge sometimes.”

  “I was only clarifying your words for my mind,” she said, smiling sweetly. In a way, this verbal sparring was just as exciting as kissing him.

  “That wasn’t what I meant, and you damn well know it,” he snapped, turning back to the crowd below.

  Good, she thought. He was angry with her. That meant no dancing. Desperation had its hidden good points.

  “So why didn’t you marry Mr. Wonderful?” he asked after knocking back his drink.

  “Because he dumped me,” she said without thinking.

  He turned back, his eyebrows raised. “He dumped you?”

  She glared at him, angry with him for playing dumb and angry with herself for not taking more care with her answer. “Come on, Miles. You know all about it. Everyone does.”

  “All I know is the wedding never came off. You wouldn’t return any of my calls at the time.”

  “There were only two.” His lack
of interest had irrationally angered her then, just as remembering it did now. “Besides, I had no intention—”

  “—of being a notch on my belt,” he finished for her. He lifted his glass in a salute. “I got the message at the time. So what did happen?”

  “I flunked the bar for the third time,” she said, shrugging in her turn. “We were supposed to go into partnership after the wedding. I had the … financing. When I couldn’t be a true partner, Robert didn’t want to be a ‘kept’ man, so he called off the marriage.”

  A part of her couldn’t believe she was calmly telling this to the man who had caused that particular disaster in her life. But the last thing she wanted Miles to know was how strongly he affected her. It would feed his ego to learn she had been so thrown by his callous invitation.

  “I never knew you were going to be a lawyer,” he said.

  She clenched her jaw. No “Gee, I’m sorry to hear that.” No “He was a fool.” Not one shred of sympathy. Why should she have expected any from a man who had no integrity? He had wreaked his havoc and gone on his merry way. “Yes, I went to law school. I even graduated.”

  He eyed her narrowly. “You’re stropping that razor.”

  She took a deep breath to calm herself. She was not about to make a fool of herself again. “Let’s just say I don’t remember that time with joy and hallelujah.”

  “We’re getting off the subject at hand,” he said. “And the subject at hand is ‘Let’s dance.’ ”

  “No,” she said, trying not to panic. “We’re supposed to be talking about Wagner Oil and my grandfather’s codicil.”

  “That’s only what you think.” He stopped another waitress, then took Catherine’s glass out of her hand and set it on the woman’s tray. His own joined hers.

  “But I wasn’t finished,” Catherine said, watching his movements in doomed fascination.

  “Now you are.”

  Taking her elbow, he escorted her to the dance floor. Catherine went on leaden feet, knowing that to refuse would seem childish. Her brain scrambled for a reasonable excuse. None came to mind.

  “Help me, Lord,” she muttered.

  “What?” he asked, bending low. “I didn’t hear you.”

  “Miles, I don’t think—”

  As they neared the floor, the music changed from the frenetic beat of drums and guitars to a soft ballad. A plain old slow dance. Catherine smiled brilliantly and stopped a few vital steps from the dance floor. “Music’s changed. Well, that’s tha—”

  “No, it’s not.” He spun her into his arms and walked her right onto the floor. “We’ll just have to dance like this.”

  She was helpless to do anything else. Her body was breast to chest and hip to hip with his. His hand was at the small of her back, his fingers pressing her into him. Their thighs brushed together, his slipping lightly between hers. He kept her one hand wrapped in his, tucked into his chest. Her left hand rested lightly on his shoulder, and it took all the effort she had not to explore the hard muscles under the silk shirt.

  The music faded; the other dancers were barely on the edge of her consciousness. Every inch of her torso was aware of every inch of his. Every sense was aware of his breath against her hair … his scent imprinting on her brainwaves … his mouth just there for the tasting …

  She had been terrified to dance the blatant lambada with him, but this was much worse. The lambada was all sex and no tenderness. As they swayed to the gentle rhythm, she felt as if they were making love in front of everyone—slowly, prolonging the passion in a test of control before a wild burst of ecstasy erupted.

  “You feel so right,” he murmured. “I knew you would.”

  Some shred of sanity told her to keep it light. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”

  He lifted his head and stared into her eyes. The sweeping lights hid his expression. “Hardly.”

  She laughed, and it sounded like a donkey caught in quicksand. That was about how she felt. “You give a very impressive business dinner, Miles.”

  He looked down between them, obviously admiring the swells of her breasts crushed against his chest. “You are a very impressive business dinner partner.”

  The heat of embarrassment flooded her face as a deeper, more volatile heat flooded her abdomen. At this rate, she would be in his bed before midnight.

  “I think I’m going to be sick,” she groaned, appalled at her uncontrollable reaction to him.

  Miles immediately stopped dancing and stepped away from her, his hands tight on her upper arms. He peered at her intently. “You’re going to be sick?”

  She realized he’d overheard her and actually thought she was unwell. She seized on the notion.

  “Yes,” she said, slumping and letting his hands take more of her weight. “The smoke … my stomach …”

  “Right. We’ll get you home.” He hustled her off the dance floor and toward the exit.

  Catherine went along quietly. Hell’s bells, she thought in awe. She’d just performed a miracle.

  They arrived at her place in record time. There was one little hitch at the door.

  “I’ll stay awhile to make sure you’re okay,” Miles said.

  The gentlemanly gesture really did set her stomach to churning. “I appreciate the offer, but I’ll be fine with a little rest. All that smoke just got to me. Like I told you in the car, my allergy to it flares up from time to time.”

  “I don’t know.” He frowned at her, peering at her in a way Sherlock Holmes would have admired. “I have to admit you don’t look as washed out as you did on the dance floor.”

  Thank goodness for stark lighting, she thought. She turned her various keys in the right locks and opened the door. “Just getting out of there helped. I’m really sorry about this.”

  He waved his hand. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Good night, Miles.”

  “Good night, Catherine.” He stepped forward …

  She quickly shut the door on him before he could kiss her. If he did, he’d discover how unsick she really was. She pressed her ear to the hard wood until she heard his footsteps fade from the stoop, then she leaned back and sighed in relief. It had been a narrow escape. And one she would never repeat.

  Next time she would risk looking stupid and silly rather than go out on another “business” dinner with Miles.

  That decision made, she went off to bed.

  • • •

  Things didn’t go quite as he’d expected, Miles mused, but the evening had turned out to be extremely profitable.

  He tucked his arms under his pillow and stared at the ceiling. Sighing, he admitted his wasn’t the bed he’d been hoping to wind up in. Despite that, he couldn’t help feeling he’d made quite a bit of progress with Catherine that night. She had opened up to him, especially about her failed wedding.

  He made a face at the thought of her disappearing fiancé. The stupid, self-righteous bastard. He would love to have the man in front of him right now for making such a mess in Catherine’s life. Mike Tyson would be envious of the result. He’d always thought Catherine deserved better than her fiancé, but he never would have wished for her to be hurt like that. She must have been humiliated.

  A wave of protectiveness rose in him, deeper and stronger than any he’d felt before. He wouldn’t have expected to feel protective of Catherine. She didn’t seem to need it. He wondered, though, just how much hurt she hid under her armor.

  He sensed that despite her easiness with him during the evening, some barriers were nowhere near ready to come down. It would take a long time at this rate. Maybe his grandmother was on the right track about helping Catherine find the codicil. Miles grinned.

  It would be interesting to see just how grateful Catherine would be.

  • • •

  Catherine carefully examined the sideview mirrors for any early morning traffic on the back road, then slowly drove the truck into the brush. The small dump truck made its own track through the wooded area, crushing bushes
and underbrush under its large-tread tires. She silently begged forgiveness for the destruction, but knew the woods would cover her “road” within a week.

  She had thought sleep would come easily that night, after her evening with Miles ended so precipitately. But she’d tossed and turned, Miles Kitteridge at every view. She decided in the early hours of the morning that if she couldn’t sleep, she might as well get moving on Earth Angel’s next assignment.

  Damn that man, she thought. The whole evening had backfired on her. First she’d lost the controlling hand, then she’d nearly lost control of herself. If she hadn’t uttered those mindless words …

  Miles could hurt her badly and walk away without a backward glance. There was a calculating coldness under his charm. He was only interested in her because he had a second opportunity with her, and she had denied him once before.

  He was up to something about Wagner Oil, she mused. Who did he think he was fooling with all those supposedly innocent questions? He was the banker. He had to know what her uncle was doing. She bet her salary he was in cahoots with Byrne.

  She reached the creek before she expected to, and had to stand on the brakes when the bank came up in a rush.

  The two-ton truck stopped with plenty of room to spare. Catherine got out and observed her objective. The creek narrowed nicely at the bend in front of her. She was about a half mile down from Wagner’s Wissahickon paint subsidiary, outside Philadelphia. The previous week, the county had detected leakage farther down the creek, nearer the city. There were enough businesses and sewage treatment plants along the banks that they weren’t able to trace the culprit before the toxins were diluted by the water.

  Catherine smiled grimly. Earth Angel knew.

  She climbed into the cab again, grateful that the dump truck, even fully loaded, was only slightly harder to handle than a pickup. She carefully backed it around, weaving in and out of the trees. Even more carefully, she brought the rear end of the truck nearly to the bank.

  She got out of the cab and walked to the back of the truck, humming the “1812 Overture.” When she reached the part where the cannons fired, she pressed a button.