You Made Me Love You

by Neesa Hart

  And then he’d kissed her.

  It had been easily the most thorough, mind-stealing kiss of her life. Liza felt her temperature rising to match the heat of the room at the memory. He had incredible lips, which did unbelievably sensual things. Those hands, long and elegant, had swept up her back, and when he’d buried them in her hair, she’d almost melted into the floor. Her blood had started to sing by the time he ended the kiss. A devilish smile had played across his mouth, then he’d set her away from him and strode away without so much as a good-night-sorry-to-get-you-so-worked-up-and-then-leave-you-hanging farewell speech.

  And he had the nerve, she’d noted, both this morning and now, to look completely unruffled by the entire thing. With his hair clipped neatly at his nape, and black clothes draping his too-powerful frame, he looked every bit as daunting as his reputation. After spending two days with him, Liza guessed that the media called him The King of the Jungle for reasons other than the obvious play on his surname. He commanded attention, and he seemed to know it.

  “Liza?” She started when she heard her name. Anna Forian, Breeland’s summer program administrator, chairman of the academy’s board of visitors, and Liza’s mentor and dearest friend had somehow managed to wrest control of the microphone from Edna Prentiss, president of the alumnae association. Anna stood at the podium, looking at her expectantly.

  Liza shook her head to clear it. “I’m sorry. I—”

  With a knowing smile, the older woman indicated the audience. “One of our students has some questions about Mr. Liontakis.”

  She didn’t doubt it. From the moment Breeland had announced that they’d procured him as their summer chemistry instructor, interest in the school, and its programs, had skyrocketed. Eli Liontakis, it seemed, was the most fascinating figure to hit the scientific world since Louis Pasteur started playing with bread mold. Liza glanced at him. His expression didn’t flicker.

  Anna indicated the room with a sweep of her well-manicured hand. “I think you can answer those questions better than I can, Liza.” To the students she explained, “Most of you know that Miss Kincaid teaches dance here at Breeland during the regular term, but you may not know that she assists me with the scheduling and staffing for the summer program. She’s responsible for Mr. Liontakis.”

  Liza shot her a dry look as she edged her way to the front of the platform. “I doubt that,” she muttered to Anna, then faced the sea of expectant faces. Eli leaned against the back wall, staying in the shadow of the door. The students wouldn’t see him unless they turned to look. “As you all know, we’re very fortunate to have a man of Mr. Liontakis’ stature and achievement to lecture here.”

  “When do we meet him?” a girl called out.

  Liza remembered her from the previous summer. “Welcome back, Christine. Mr. Liontakis is already on campus.” She glanced at him over the heads of her audience, finding silent amusement in his growing discomfort.

  Another girl squirmed to the front of her chair. “I just can’t believe you got him. I mean, Liontakis. He’s unbelievable.”

  He certainly was, Liza thought as she saw a sparkle enter his eyes. Her students lapsed into a casual discussion of his appeal while she watched him. His only reaction to the somewhat ribald course of her students’ comments was a slight lift of his eyebrows. Liza sensed that the conversation was about to spin dangerously out of her control. Tearing her gaze from Eli’s, she forcibly dragged her concentration back to the students. “I’m sure the next couple of weeks will give you all a chance to ask Mr. Liontakis about his career,” she said. “Those of you in the science program will be working with him directly.”

  “I certainly want to work with him directly,” one of her students was saying. “I’m hoping for some one-on-one instruction.”

  “Oh, as if?” Lindsay, one of Liza’s best dance students from the regular term, chimed in. “Like he’s going to be tutoring you in the table of elements. I mean, geez, the guy is going to win the Nobel prize.”

  “Yeah,” Christine answered. “Did you see that picture of him on Time magazine? He is too-hot.”

  His lips twitched. Liza thoughtfully tapped a finger on the podium. “This isn’t getting us anywhere.”

  “No,” one of the girls drawled, “but it’s doing a lot for my visualization skills.”

  “Is it really?” Liza slanted Eli a dry look. He’d had her on edge since the night before. She couldn’t quite resist the urge to turn the tables. Just how, she wondered, would The King of the Jungle cope with a room full of hormonal teenaged girls? Stifling a smug smile, she gave a shrill whistle. The girls fell silent. “I can see you’re all far more interested in Mr. Liontakis than you are in administration.”

  “We’ll find the dining hall,” Lindsay assured her.

  “Well, then—” Liza shot Anna and the alumnae association president an apologetic look. “I’ll just turn over the podium to the man of the hour.” She indicated the back of the room with a wave of her hand.

  With a collective murmur of confusion, her students turned to face him. If she hadn’t known better, she’d have sworn the color she saw in his face was a blush. “Mr. Liontakis,” she said, “since you’ve decided to join us tonight, this will give you a chance to meet some of your students.”

  He gave her a knowing look. She’d trapped him like a rat, and he knew it. With the fifty girls watching him in rapt attention, he had two choices. He could follow her lead and take the podium, or, he could look like a fool by turning to leave. Liza waited patiently while he weighed his options.

  No surprise, he rose to the occasion. He shot her what she could only define as a look of admiration, then he strode toward the front of the room. He walked, her dancer’s eye noted, with the same feline grace as his namesake. “You win this hand,” he said for her ears only as he reached her, “but not the game.”

  Liza ignored him. “I’m sure you’ll have no trouble convincing the girls to stay while you tell them your plans for the next few weeks.”

  From the looks on the girls’ faces, he’d have to toss them out of the room before they let him leave. She met Anna’s amused gaze and indicated the door with a tilt of her head. “Ms. Forian and I,” she told the class, “have to finish getting everyone settled in.” She indicated Edna with a sweep of her hand. “If you have any questions, I’m sure Edna can help you.”

  Liza started for the door. Anna rose to follow.

  “You’re leaving?”

  “Yes. After being gone for the past two days, I’ve got over two-hundred-fifty other girls to check on.”

  “I see.” He glanced quickly at the audience, then back at her. “When can I see you again, Liza?”

  Damn him. The question was deliberately provocative and he knew it. The wide-eyed looks on the girls’ faces told Liza all she needed to know. By that evening, the gossip line would be abuzz with speculation. “At the faculty meeting the day after tomorrow,” she shot back. “My schedule’s packed between now and then.”

  The girls, sensing the challenge, turned in tandem to look at him. He leaned one hip on the edge of the lecture table, then tilted slightly toward her. “Mine is too. I’ll call you later. Don’t worry. We’ll work it out.”

  She thought about responding, then decided against it. Anything she said would just make the situation worse. Might as well leave him to deal with the questions while she made a strategic retreat to the sanctity of her office. “Fine.” She turned to go.

  “Liza?”

  Liza hesitated, then faced him a final time. “Yes?”

  “Tonight. I’ll call you tonight.”

  The rake. Liza heard Anna’s laugh, and in spite of herself, choked out one of her own. With an innocent expression on his face worthy of a Shakespearean actor, he disarmed her. She shook her head. “Welcome to Breeland, Mr. Liontakis.”

  Liza slipped into her office with a quiet sigh of relief. It felt good to be home. The trip to New York had taken its toll.

  Anna, looking frustrati
ngly unflustered, sat in the chair across from her desk. Well into her seventies, Anna Forian had the perfectly composed look of a southern matriarch. Beneath the gentle facade, however, Liza knew there lay an iron will and a survivor’s instinct. Liza frowned at her. “How do you manage to look so cool when I feel like I’ve been in the sauna? We have got to have the HVAC checked in that building”

  Anna tapped her manicured fingernails on the arm of the chair. “I didn’t just spend the last ten minutes squirming, either.”

  “I wasn’t squirming.”

  Anna’s gray eyebrows lifted. “If you say so.”

  “I wasn’t. Want something to drink?”

  “Water.” Liza pulled two bottles of water from the cool interior, then handed one to Anna.

  “Are you going to tell me about New York?” Anna finally asked.

  Liza cringed. What’s to tell? she thought. I’m wiped out. He blew me away. I’m still crazy, and I don’t know why you thought otherwise? She took a sip of her water as she looked for a place to begin. “Eli told you that he hadn’t seen a lot of his daughter in the five years since his divorce?”

  “Yes. We discussed that in our initial interview.”

  “Evidently, she’s been withdrawn and sullen since she came to live with him. She’s definitely hurting. That much is obvious.”

  “He’s willing to do whatever’s necessary to help her,” Anna assured her. “I knew that right away.”

  Liza studied the expression on Anna’s face. In the years she’d known the older woman, she’d developed a deep respect for her insight and discernment. “You like him, don’t you?”

  “Very much. You will too, when you know him better.”

  “I’m trying.”

  “Seeing him in New York didn’t help?”

  “New York didn’t help,” she admitted.

  “Ah.” Anna drank some of her water. “Did you go to Joshua’s grave?”

  The mention of her infant son sliced a wide gash in Liza’s heart. “Yes.” Her voice thickened.

  “I’m sorry you went alone.”

  “I always go alone.”

  “I’m sorry for that, too.”

  “I know.” She twirled her water bottle. “I keep thinking it will get easier.”

  “You don’t just get over something like that.”

  Liza nodded. “I suppose not.”

  “But I had hoped it would give you a special sensitivity to what Eli’s going through with Grace. You know what it’s like to lose a child, Liza. Can you imagine losing one that’s still alive and will accept nothing from you?”

  “I’m sure it’s very hard.”

  “But you still don’t trust him?”

  “I trust him. I just have serious concerns about how well he’s going to fit in here.”

  “I don’t.”

  “So you’ve said.”

  “And if you don’t trust him, at least trust me. I’ve been running this program for a long time. I know what I’m talking about.”

  Liza hesitated. “He’s very—charming,” she said quietly.

  Anna’s laugh—an amazingly young sound—reminded Liza of wind chimes. “Good heavens,” she said. “I’m seventy-three years old. You don’t think he bowled me over, do you?”

  Liza winced. “No. It’s not that.”

  “I’m not a muddle-headed old woman, you know?”

  “I know. And I didn’t mean to insinuate that I don’t trust your judgment.”

  “But you don’t want him here?” Anna insisted.

  “Let’s not forget that it was my idea to bring him here in the first place.”

  “Which you started to regret almost the minute you saw him start popping up on the news every night.”

  Liza resisted the urge to cringe. If she’d had reservations before she’d met him yesterday, she now had stark terror. How was she supposed to explain the effect he had on her? “I just don’t want him to disrupt what we have here. Since this is the first year Breeland’s had a male on the faculty, I know everyone’s going to be watching. To make matters worse, his presence is going to bring the press down on our heads. I liked it when we had nice, quiet summers.”

  “Our budget didn’t like it.”

  Liza nodded. “I know. I know this is good for business and good for the program. We’re much higher profile with him here.”

  “But you couldn’t resist playing that little trick on him this afternoon.”

  “What trick?”

  Anna laughed. “I might be old, but I’m not that old. You deliberately baited those girls, then tossed that man into shark-infested waters. What did he do to you in New York to deserve that?”

  Kissed me senseless and left me to founder, she thought. “Nothing.”

  Anna looked at her skeptically. “Really?”

  “Of course really. I told you, I went to the lecture. I went to his apartment. We had dinner. I met his daughter. We flew here. That’s the whole trip in a nutshell.”

  “I think you’re leaving out the highlights.”

  “There are no highlights,” she lied.

  “If you say so.”

  “I do.”

  Anna shook her head. “So you weren’t getting revenge just now.”

  “Of course not. You saw how curious the girls were. I thought he’d like to answer their questions.”

  Anna’s expression told her she wasn’t buying it, but she didn’t press her. “How do you think he’s doing?” Anna asked.

  A tiny smile played at the corner of her mouth. “I’m sure he’s charming their bobby socks off.”

  “I don’t doubt it.” Anna glanced beyond Liza’s shoulder through the small window that overlooked the hub of the campus. “Best I can tell, he’s drawing a crowd. Looks to me like word is spreading across campus like wildfire.”

  Liza followed her gaze. A steady stream of students and faculty were hurrying across the lawn toward the academic building. Several girls stood outside the window of the lecture hall, straining on tiptoes for a peek at the genius. “Great. I can’t get eighty percent attendance for a scheduled session, and all he has to do is walk down the hall to have the masses fall at his feet.” A clamoring noise from the corridor captured her attention.

  “Good grief.” Anna glanced over her shoulder. “What’s going on out there?”

  “I think the King of the Jungle is inciting the natives to riot.”

  The door of her office flung open. Eli, trailed by several members of the faculty, edged his way in, then shut the door on the din. He gave Liza a piercing look. “Well, that was just charming, Liza. Thanks.”

  “Anytime,” she purred.

  Eli glowered at her, then his gaze turned to Anna. Liza saw the instant warming of his expression. “It’s very nice to see you again, Anna.”

  Anna beamed at him. “It’s good to see you, too.” Her blue eyes twinkled. “Even if you are wreaking havoc in our well-ordered world.”

  His gaze swung to Liza. “I’m not the one stirring up trouble.”

  She choked. “Excuse me? What was, ‘I’ll call you tonight’?” She dropped her voice to mimic his husky tone.

  That won a slight chuckle from him and from Anna. Eli propped one hip on her desk. “It was payback. You set me up in there. You didn’t think I’d let you get away with that, did you?”

  “A girl can dream, can’t she?”

  The clamoring noise outside her office grew louder. Anna gave them both a knowing look. “I’d better go deal with that. What did you do to those girls, Eli?”

  He shrugged. “Nothing I can think of, though that woman from the alumnae association was shooting me poisoned looks by the time I got out of there.”

  Anna laughed. “Oh, don’t mind Edna. It’s not personal. You’re just too masculine. That’s what got her riled up.”

  Liza was having trouble breathing. Eli gave her a shrewd look. “You don’t say.”

  “Yes,” Anna assured him. “You’re shaking things up around here, Eli. You k
now it, but you don’t have to act like you’re enjoying it so thoroughly.” She slipped out the door to deal with the din in the hallway.

  Eli leaned closer to Liza and twined a strand of her hair around his index finger. “Oh, but I am enjoying it,” he said, his voice a dark whisper. She wouldn’t be surprised if the windows in her office fogged over. “I’m enjoying the hell out of it.”

  4

  Liza winced as she felt the pull of an underused muscle. “Stretch high over your head,” she prompted her class, leading them in a cool-down exercise. “You don’t want to let your muscles tighten up.”

  “Too late,” Lindsay quipped from her left. One of the older students who helped teach the class, Lindsay had been taking summer dance lessons from Liza for over eight years.

  Liza sent her a wry smile as she adjusted the stretch. “I know the feeling. I’ve been doing too much paperwork lately and not enough dancing.” And too many sleepless nights, she mused, and not enough rest. Eli had persuaded her to have dinner with him and Grace last night. She’d been delighted to answer Grace’s questions about her classes, the school, and the program, but had found the pressure of Eli’s constant gaze flustering. He’d walked her to the door of his tiny apartment—it seemed so much homier than his lavish penthouse in New York—and stolen a quick kiss while Grace was still in the other room. Too soon, they’d been interrupted, and Liza had found herself, again, lying awake most of the night with thoughts of leonine eyes and elegant hands.

  Now, she forcibly pushed the thought from her mind as she finished the routine, then faced her class full of glowing, flushed girls. “Great job, today. We did a lot for the first day.”

  The girls responded with nods and groans as they moved to collect their gear. Unlike the academic track of the program, which separated the girls into age-based classes, the fine arts classes were segregated by skill. With her administrative responsibilities, Liza only had time for one class in the summer. It was easily her favorite part of the day. She glanced at Grace, who had shown considerable promise during the class, but who now somberly collected her belongings. At the back of the room, Liza noted, Anna Forian stood, also watching the child’s progress.