Leigh heard his feet on the stairs, heard the apartment door below her slam. She sat huddled, her feet pulled up to her chin in the wicker chair, an afghan over her. The big windows let in the pale yellow rays, the last light of day. The shadows fit her mood. Unable to tolerate being in the classroom another moment after Ty left, she had raced down the stairs and jumped into her car. She had driven home and run up the stairs, where she had paced the floor until she heard the downstairs door open.
She was being ridiculous. She should get up, turn on the light, and get that set of papers corrected. In another day, perhaps two, he would be gone. Hiding in the dusk wasn't the answer, nor was chastising herself…which is what she had been doing ever since she left the schoolhouse. There was nothing to be gained by reliving those moments in his arms and wishing they had never happened. They had happened.
It was easy to see why. He was very attractive, not only physically but mentally. She had caught a glimpse of the man underneath the hard, muscled body and lean, well-shaped face, and she had seen level-headedness, an utter lack of ego, and an endearing sense of humor. Not only that, he had the ability to forget himself enough to see other people clearly. He had kissed her, and when she had tried to make him dislike her, he’d seen through her at once. He was a perceptive man, Mr. Ty Rundell, perceptive…and dangerous. Was it possible he knew about Paul? A sickness washed over her. No, he couldn't. Paul was on the East Coast now, appearing in a play.
She threw the afghan back and walked quietly to the window to stare out into the gray light. Wisps of fog gathered over the creek. Across its narrow silver width, a weeping willow bent spidery branches earthward. She couldn't see them, but she could remember how the hollow branches broke off and fell to the ground around the tree. But the tree grew new ones and persevered. That was what she would do. She would throw off her memories…and she would persevere.
Deke sat back, watching the play of the lamplight on Eve's face. "Thank you for that meal. It was excellent."
Eve gave a faint laugh. "How excellent can sandwiches be?"
"Maybe it depends what you're comparing them to. I've been living on restaurant food for the past three weeks, and home-cooked chicken salad is a real treat."
As if his compliment disturbed her, she stood up quickly to carry the dishes away. He said, "Can I help?"
She shook her head. "There aren't that many, really." He watched the graceful, quick movements she made as she picked up their plates and cups and walked around the curving snack bar where he sat, to the dishwasher tucked under the counter.
She said, "How long have you known Ty?"
Deke thought about it. "We go back about fifteen years, I'd guess. I was an old hand in the stunt business, and he came on the lot like the young bucks do, wanting a job. I liked him. We made a few pictures together and discovered we hit it off. I knew he was a tiger, right from the first. 'When he'd learned all I could teach him, he started on the cameramen and techs. Pretty soon he knew more than I did about camera technique, lenses, set construction, and action shots. He wouldn't be the success he is today if he hadn't had such a thorough background in movie making."
He watched the firm roundness of her hips press against the green silk as she bent over to put a plate in the dishwasher. Desire stirred, low and deep, with a strength he hadn't felt since Donna died. He got up from the snack bar and went around to lean against the curving arch of the entrance to the tiny kitchen. He had to be careful, very careful. Eve had dropped her guard when he'd told her about losing Donna, but he wasn't sure of her. One move toward her would make her back away. He'd been just about to kiss her when Ty had knocked on the door. He'd threaded his hands through her hair and was pulling her toward him, caressing her nape…and she wasn't resisting. His mouth had been inches from hers when the knock sounded. He'd had to stifle the urge to curse.
She seemed to take a long time clearing away. Now she was wiping the cupboard with a terry towel. He stepped forward, said her name softly. "Eve."
She turned, her face flushed, her eyes brilliant. "Yes?" He took a step, not exactly trapping her against the counter but taking advantage of the barrier to her retreat to pull her into his arms. "Deke, please…"
He shook his head, breathed her name, and kissed her nose, her cheeks, the delicate skin at the temple where her pulse flickered at a rapid rate.
"Deke…"
"Don't tell me to stop. Not now. Not when I've been wanting to do this all afternoon.'' He smoothed a tendril back from her ear with fingers that shook, and it was that trembling touch with its vulnerability that undid her. She turned her mouth up to him. He took it gently, tentatively, as if she were a young girl receiving her first kiss.
Her hands, pressed flat against the denim of his shirt, made an involuntary movement. The pads of her fingers brushed the light covering of hair on his chest, and he reveled in that contact of flesh on flesh. Taking it for the encouragement he needed, he moved to tighten his grip on her hips, when suddenly, her whole body tensed and she pushed at him violently. He released her, but before she could move away, he reached around her and grasped the countertop, trapping her.
"What is it?" He gazed down at the top of her head, seeing the intricate whorls and mussed fullness of her dark hair and felt an overwhelming surge of tenderness. “Tell me what’s wrong. I need to know.”
"I'm forty-one years old," she said huskily, "too old to be taken in by your good old Hollywood cowboy charm."
She lifted her head and gazed at him, her green eyes brilliant. He clamped down on his temper and met her gaze steadily. "And I'm forty-five years old, too damn old to be put off by name-calling."
She flushed and her eyes shimmered with temper. "I wasn't…"
"Sure you were," he said easily. "You gave me a label and you stuck it on my back and you're not about to look at the man underneath it."
Her slim body with its mature curves tautened. "I don't have to look at the man underneath. I know what I'd find."
“Do you? I doubt it.” Deke watched her, not missing a flicker of an eyelash, a movement of a muscle. Under the smooth skin at her throat, a pulse beat at an accelerated rate. He stood, his arms almost but not quite touching hers as he held her trapped. Underneath the green silk, her breasts pressed against the fabric. He'd gotten under her skin, and she didn't like it. She didn't like it at all.
He relaxed slightly, and Eve made a restless movement as if she expected him to release her. He didn't. “I get the feeling," he drawled, "that you've been hurt, perhaps recently," his eyes narrowed, "and in our age bracket I'd guess the damage was done by some guy who already had a wife."
She started with surprise, hot color sweeping up into her cheeks. "What happened in my life has nothing to do with you."
He contradicted her in his slow voice. "Right now," he let his eyes travel slowly over her face and wander lower to where her shallow breathing was making the silk tauten across her feminine curves, "I'd say it did."
"You don't know anything about me."
"It's the learning I'm interested in.” He moved to kiss her, but she raised her hands and stiffened her wrists to make a barrier between them. Her cool voice was at variance with her flushed face. "I've never liked one-night stands." She watched him, waiting.
"What makes you think that's what I want?"
"You couldn't want much else, could you? Our life-styles are a million light-years apart."
"I could want a lot more…" He leaned toward her again, but she pushed him away. "No, Deke. Don't. This is a road to nowhere, and I've been that route. I'm not taking the trip again."
''Tell me what happened."
She shook her head. "No. I was a fool once. I won't be again."
He dropped his arms and straightened. He had lost this round, but the battle wasn't over. He wanted her, and somehow, her resistance fired his blood rather than cooled it. He knew why. Underneath her resistance lay that tantalizing response to him, a momentary softening of her body and sweet yielding of
her mouth that made him want her all the more. He hadn't failed entirely; he knew that. He leaned forward, and before she could move away, planted a quick, hard kiss on her lips. Then he walked out of the kitchen and strode to the couch to pick up his jacket. His back to her, he missed seeing the look of stunned surprise on her face.
When he had shrugged into his jacket, she came out of the kitchen, her face more composed. He said, "Thanks again for supper."
"You're welcome."
He stood looking at her, his brown eyes clear and steady. "Will I be seeing you soon?"
She hesitated. "It doesn't seem likely, does it?"
He kept his tone carefully expressionless. "I suppose it depends on when Ty gets the car fixed."
She matched his look with a straight one of her own. "I think it would be better if we didn't see each other again, Deke."
“Depends on what you mean by 'better.' Good-night, Eve." He strode to the door and went out, wishing he felt as cool as he sounded.
"Have a good time?" Ty's voice sounded faintly mocking. There was only one light lit in the apartment, an old fashioned floor lamp designed to look like a candelabra and Ty was sitting under it in the lounge chair, his long legs stretched out in front of him, his laptop lying in his lap.
"She's an interesting woman," Deke said easily, thinking he hadn't seen Ty in a mood like this since the distribution of his last film hit a snag in Chicago.
"Yeah. There's a lot of those around."
"What did you do this afternoon?"
“Shocked corn," Ty said dryly.
Deke's lips curved in a smile. "Didn't sow any wild oats while you were at it, did you?"
Ty gave him a dark look. "Spare me the rural humor.”
Deke nodded toward the laptop in Ty's hand. "How's it going?"
"It isn't." Ty put the laptop on the table, rose, and walked to the window. He was restless with tension. He’d searched all through the internet and couldn’t find a damn thing about Leigh Carlow that would shed any light on what had happened to her. He gazed out at the squares of light that showed from Leigh's apartment.
Deke shed his jacket, sat down on the sofa, and eased his feet out of his boots. Ty turned to him, his face hard with decision. "If I can't get the car fixed tomorrow, I'm going to borrow Eve's and take you into the city. I want you to catch a plane back to L.A. and do some investigating for me."
Deke's stomach kicked in protest. He didn't want to go, not now.
"What's the big hurry?"
"I need some information."
"What's new?" Deke answered blandly. "You couldn’t find it on the internet?”
“If I did, would I be asking you to go?”
“Who do you want me to investigate?"
Ty's voice was cool. "Leigh Carlow."
Deke cocked an eyebrow and gave Ty a dryly quizzical look. "I thought you already did the groundwork on her."
“When I was in L.A, I concentrated on the relationship between her and her mother. Now I want to know about the men in her life. Was there one? If there was, who was he?”
From his comfortable position on the couch Deke gazed at Ty lazily. "Is this for the movie?”
Ty frowned, his dark brows pulling together. "No. She's out of the movie."
"Since when?"
"Since she refused to be interviewed."
"You've never let that stop you before."
Ty's mouth thinned. "There's a first time for everything."
"Looks like there is," Deke said softly. "Are you serious about her?"
Ty stared at him, raked a hand through his hair, pivoted to look out into the darkness. "No."
Deke said irritably, "You mean I'm flying across the country just to satisfy your curiosity?"
Ty whirled around, his face dark. "That's not what it is."
"Then why won’t you admit you're hooked?"
His face looked almost gray in the soft light. "Be reasonable, man. I've only known her two days."
"Sometimes it only takes a minute," Deke said implacably.
Ty turned to look out the window again, tension evident in the set of his shoulders. To the taut back, Deke said lazily, "She left Hollywood when she was fourteen to live in the Adirondacks with her stepfather. She went to college in Oswego and got a job teaching here her first year and has been here ever since. Shouldn't you be looking for a man here in New York State?"
Ty faced Deke and thrust his hand through his hair again. "I don't know. It just doesn't feel right. The answer has got to be out there. I keep grasping on the edges of something." He turned again to stare moodily out into the darkness. Deke waited. He knew better than to interrupt Ty's train of thought.
Ty stood silent for another long moment, then suddenly he whipped around and strode over to his sheaf of papers. "Wait a minute, wait a minute. Somewhere in my notes I've got something. Where is that?" His lean hands shuffled through the sheets. He read and discarded rapidly. "Ah." Triumphant, he held up a single sheet. "Here it is. Leigh was in L.A. the summer she was twenty. She went back to see her mother just before Claire died. She stayed on after Claire's death for six weeks, almost too long to register for college that fall. She had to petition for late registration. I remembered thinking that was out of character."
"Did she get back in school?"
"Yes. Her academic record was such that it was granted without question."
Deke rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Six weeks, eh? Did she stay in Mamma's mansion?"
"Yes, she did. There were things to clear up, of course, but not much. Her mother was deeply in debt, and the mansion had to be sold to pay off creditors. Leigh got nothing."
"Which made it more imperative than ever that she finish her education."
"Exactly." He shoved the papers back into their original place in the pile. “What I want to know is, why did she stay out west so long?"
"That's what I'm to find out, I take it."
"Yes. Find out who she saw, who she talked to. There must have been a maid, or a hairdresser, or somebody who was a regular in Claire's house who could tell you something."
"You don't want much, do you? That was seven years ago.”
Ty stared at him. After a long moment of assessment, his mouth curved upward. "If I wanted something easy, I wouldn't send you."
"One of these days, Rundell," Deke said lazily, "that line isn't going to work."
Ty said, "You really don't want to go." Deke made no answer. Ty's keen blue eyes raked his tall form. "Got a little something going on the side, have you?"
Deke half closed his eyes and drawled softly, "Let's just say that it’s been so long since I've seen something I want, I’m afraid I’ve forgotten how to go after it."
"It'll come back to you," Ty said dryly.
"I can't do much if I'm three thousand miles away."
"There are telephones," Ty reminded him. “Text her.”
Two days later, Ty was just as unsympathetic. Tuesday morning he drove with Deke in the newly repaired car to the city airport and purchased Deke's ticket. Then, with a firm hand on the older man's elbow, he guided him into the line waiting to board. Suitcase in hand, Deke tried one last protest. "Is this really necessary?"
"Call Eve every night or whenever you like," he said shortly. "Maybe absence will make the heart grow fonder.”
“Yeah,” Deke said. “Fonder of my absence.”
“Have a little faith in yourself, man. One thing about it. She’ll still be here when you get back. And I doubt if she will have found a new suitor in the meantime. Just get my job done. And call me the minute you find out anything."
"You paying the tab for the hotel and my meals?" Deke asked as he surrendered to inevitability and walked through the metal detector to the final boarding area.
"Don't I always?" Ty asked dryly.
At the door Deke turned back. "Be careful of that new brake line on the way back into Springwater." His eyes gleamed as he planted the final jab. "Don't get hung up on the curves."
"I'll try not to," Ty said, a slight smile lifting his lips, knowing Deke was really referring to Leigh's shapely form. “Thanks for the great advice.”
Deke laughed at Ty's dry tone and pivoted to walk through the door that took him out to the plane.
At Springwater Consolidated School, the halls reverberated with the sound of moving feet and chattering voices. Leigh breathed a sigh of relief that it was seventh period, her free hour of the day, and opened the door of the faculty room. She stepped in and pulled it closed, shutting the noise out, making the oval burnt-wood sign that said ‘Decompression Chamber’ rattle. Eve, sitting at the table leafing through the daily newspaper, glanced up. Leigh got her mug, filled it with coffee, sat down across from her friend and asked the question that had been on her mind all day. "Are you seeing Deke again tonight?" At the moment they were the only two occupants of the long, narrow table. Ben Harris lounged in his usual corner of the worn, yellow plaid couch, well out of earshot.
Eve shook her head, her eyes bright. "He left for L.A."
Leigh felt her stomach give an odd little twist. "You mean they're gone?"
"Not they, just Deke. He is flying out this morning. Ty isn't going with him. He still has some unfinished business here, Deke said."
An odd jangle of annoyance and relief sang through her. "When will Ty be leaving?"
"I really don't know." Eve glanced up at her through dark lashes. "Want me to ask Deke tonight when he calls?"
"No." The negative came out crisply. Aware of Eve's curious and faintly amused look, Leigh brought the heavy mug, its side initialed with a big L, up to her lips. "I mean, I don't care, really, I was just curious." She sipped the hot liquid and then set the cup down carefully. "Deke is calling you tonight?"
Eve colored slightly and nodded.
Leigh's eyes were bright above her cup. "Do you like him?"
Eve gave an overly casual shrug. "What's not to like? He's an interesting guy."
"I thought you were off men."
Eve shot her a straight look. "I thought you were, too."
"I've been seeing Hunt…"
One Magic Night Page 8