Taming the Wolf

by Maureen Smith

  Startled from her musings, Samara swung her head around to stare at her mother. “Excuse me?”

  Asha winced. “Don’t sound so incredulous, darling. It’s not as if I have never apologized to anyone in my life before.”

  Samara was silent, and Asha laughed ruefully. “Perhaps it’s something I should practice more often. All right, then. It’s never too late to add items to my New Year’s resolution list.”

  “I didn’t know you kept a list. It never occurred to me that you, of all people, would have need of one.”

  “Because it seems like such a frivolous thing to do?”

  “Not so much frivolous. Normal.”

  “You’ve been reading too many tabloid stories about me, chère. You’d be surprised to hear the many ‘normal’ things your mother does.” When Samara said nothing, Asha cleared her throat discreetly. “As I was saying, I owe you an apology. You were right to be angry with me for not giving you the donation I had promised. I regret that I reneged on our deal.”

  Samara grew still, shocked into momentary silence by her mother’s unexpected words. “Then why did you do it?”

  Asha stared at the diamond twinkling on her right hand, her expression remote and reflective. “I suppose I hoped if the Institute did not survive its financial turmoil, you would consider coming to work for me. I now realize this was wrong of me. I felt even worse when I learned that the organization was bailed out by an anonymous donor that should have been me.”

  Samara fell silent again, absorbing her mother’s words. She couldn’t remember the last time Asha had been so transparent with her. She honestly didn’t know what to think.

  She turned in the seat to face her. “Let me ask you a question, Mother. Why is it so hard for you to accept that I enjoy my work, even if it’s not associated with your company? We haven’t been close in years, so please don’t say you want me there for sentimental reasons. Plenty of your designer friends have grown children that aren’t involved in the business. Why is this so unacceptable for your child?”

  Asha bristled. “I don’t think there’s anything abnormal about a parent wanting their child to take an active role in their business. Do you honestly believe that everything I’m building is for my own legacy—the clothing lines, the perfume? Will I care about being mentioned in the annals of fashion history once I’m dead and buried? Don’t get me wrong, Samara. I’m loving every minute of my success. I worked hard for it; I deserve to enjoy it. But don’t think for one second that you aren’t part of the equation, that you aren’t a motivating factor behind everything I do. When I leave this earth, I want to leave with the assurance that you are financially set for life. I never, ever, want you to suffer the way I did, or have to depend on any man for your survival. And I make no apologies for that.”

  “I’m not asking you to apologize for that, Mother! God knows I appreciate the many sacrifices you’ve made for me. If I’ve ever given you the impression that I’m even remotely ungrateful, allow me to apologize because that was never my intention. But Mother, there’s so much more…” Her voice caught on a tremor, and she closed her eyes against the predictable sting of tears.

  You will not cry, she mentally ordered. Pull yourself together and see this through.

  She drew a deep breath that burned in her lungs before continuing, “There is so much more to being a parent than providing financial security. You have far more to offer than that.”

  Asha turned her head to stare out the window, but not before Samara detected moisture in her own eyes. Asha’s profile was stony. “I don’t know what you want from me, Samara.”

  “I want you to be my mother again!” Samara cried. “I want to enjoy being your daughter again! I want to know you’ll be there for me when I need you, and that you’ll turn to me whenever you need someone to lean on. We’re all each other have left in the world, yet we’re keeping a world of distance between us. Why?”

  Asha was silent for so long that Samara feared she wouldn’t respond. “You know,” Asha said distantly, keeping her face averted, “I actually believe things were better between us when we were poor and down on our luck, moving from one place to the next. Perhaps my modeling career was the worst thing that could have happened to our relationship.”

  “How can that be,” Samara countered softly, “When it was the best thing that ever happen to you?”

  “Ah, that is the $64,000 question, is it not?” Asha lifted her shoulders in an elegant, dismissive shrug. “C’est la vie. Life is a paradox, chère. One we’re not meant to understand or examine too closely.”

  Samara hated it when her mother resorted to riddles and clichés to avoid serious discussions. What was she running from? Would the real Asha Dubois please stand up?

  Samara suddenly felt very tired and emotionally drained. She glanced at her watch. “It’s getting late. I really need to get home and catch up on some paperwork.”

  Asha looked at her then. “No special evening plans? That’s rather surprising.”

  “Why?”

  “Because when I first saw you this evening, I swore you had the look of a woman deeply in love.”

  Samara faltered, at a loss for words. Was she that transparent, or had her mother added clairvoyance to her exhaustive list of talents?

  “So I wasn’t mistaken.” Asha’s lips curved in an intuitive smile. “A mother knows these things, darling. Who is he?”

  “You wouldn’t know him,” Samara mumbled, then felt compelled to add, “Besides, it’s not that serious.”

  “What a shame. You looked quite blissful. Flushed, even.”

  Heat flooded Samara’s cheeks as she remembered the long hours of lovemaking with Marcus in the dark, rainy night. “Do you think you could ask the driver to turn around and take me back to my car?”

  Asha sighed in resignation. “Certainement.”

  Hours later, Samara was still trying unsuccessfully to put her mother’s visit out of her mind. Asha’s sudden appearance, and her unexpected apology, had thrown Samara for a loop. Asha had never apologized to her before. Not for abandoning her as a child, not for repeatedly disrupting her life. She’d never apologized for not accepting Samara’s decision to pursue her own career path.

  And to this day, Asha had never apologized for accusing Samara of seducing André Leclerc, thereby inviting his brutal attack.

  Samara had more than enough reasons to sever her mother from her life. But try as she might, she couldn’t.

  Beneath all the pain and resentment, she was still the same little girl who’d sat at her mother’s dressing table the night of her very first fashion show in Philadelphia, giggling hysterically as her mother tickled her. She was still the same reclusive teenager who’d kept a secret collection of clippings from every magazine and newspaper Asha ever appeared in, dreaming that one day her mother would climb down from her mountaintop and realize how much she missed her daughter.

  No matter how many times Asha disappointed her, a tiny part of Samara always held on to the hope that all was not lost between

  Taming the Wolf

  them, that someday they could have a healthy mother/daughter relationship. What had Pierre called himself earlier? A glutton for punishment? He wasn’t the only one. Samara was a glutton for punishment if ever there had been one.

  Needing a distraction, she set aside her paperwork and popped in a Sex and the City DVD. She was sitting around in her bra and panties, giggling through the famous episode about Charlotte’s boyfriend with the uncircumcised dick, when Marcus called.

  “Hey, beautiful,” he said, his deep voice pouring into her ear like honey. “What are you doing?”

  When she told him, he chuckled softly. “I heard that episode pissed off a lot of people. Someone even contacted me about filing a defamation lawsuit against the producers of the show.”

  “Hmm. Well, I guess it’s a sensitive issue.” Realizing what she’d said, she started laughing at the same time as Marcus.

  When their laughter subsi
ded, he said huskily, “I miss you. What are you going to do about that?”

  Samara smiled into the receiver. “I don’t know. What should I do about it?”

  “Let me come over and show you.”

  Her toes curled inside her furry pink bedroom slippers. “You could,” she murmured. “Or I could come over there, since I’ve never been to your place before.”

  “Mmm, sounds like a plan. I’ll order Chinese.”

  “And I’ll bring dessert.”

  “Sweetheart, you’re all the sugar I need,” Marcus drawled in those dark, velvety tones of his.

  Samara’s nipples hardened. “Give me thirty minutes.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  T

  wenty minutes later, a smiling Marcus opened the door and gestured Samara inside his penthouse. The private foyer was bathed in warm buttery light that spilled across the Italian tile floor and into a large sunken living room. “Nice,” Samara murmured appreciatively.

  “Thanks. You had no trouble finding the place?”

  “None whatsoever. I grew up here, remember? I know this city

  like the back of my hand.” Her spiky heels sank into luxuriant Berber as she crossed the endless expanse of empty space to a wall of glass windows, which overlooked a wide balcony that provided a stunning view of the Potomac River. It would be spectacular to watch the sunset from there, or to recline in lounge chairs on a sticky July evening to take in the fireworks display on the National Mall.

  “Great view,” Samara remarked, turning away from the window before her imagination could roam wild. She had to remind herself not to assume that she and Marcus had a future together—just because she now wanted it more than her next breath.

  “It is,” Marcus agreed, approaching her from behind. She marveled that such a powerfully built man could move with so little sound. Stealthy as a panther—or wolf. “Maybe tomorrow morning we can sit out here and watch the sun rise,” he bent low to murmur in her ear.

  She felt a slow, hot tingle of anticipation. “Assuming I spend the night,” she said offhandedly, knowing good and well she wasn’t going anywhere.

  The roguish glint in Marcus’s eyes told her he knew it, too.

  156Sidestepping him, she wandered over to a row of crates on which stood an elaborate stereo system. The only other items of furniture were a cherry bistro table and two matching chairs in the dining room. “Where’s the rest of your furniture?”

  “Stayed with the house in Atlanta. The renters paid extra to keep it furnished.”

  “So when are you going to furnish the penthouse?”

  “Eventually. I haven’t spent much time here yet. But I’ve got the essentials.”

  “Essentials, huh?”

  “The barest. A bed, too, if you’d like to see it.”

  She grinned. “Nice try, Slick.”

  Marcus chuckled as he headed from the living room. “It was worth a shot.”

  Samara hung up her jacket in the foyer closet before following him into the gourmet kitchen. More Italian tile, stainless steel appliances and an island in the center of the floor. A cardboard box sat unopened on the counter near the Sub-Zero refrigerator. It was labeled KITCHEN in black magic marker.

  “Let me guess. Dishes?”

  Marcus glanced over his shoulder as he rummaged through the cabinets. “There might be a few in there. My housekeeper packed that box for me before I left Atlanta.”

  “Marcus,” Samara said, unsure whether to laugh or scold, “You mean to tell me you’ve been living here a whole month and haven’t unpacked any of your kitchen items yet?”

  “Haven’t gotten around to it.” Triumphantly, he held up a new package of paper plates. “That’s why these were invented.”

  Samara rolled her eyes. “Bachelors,” she said in mock disgust. “God forbid you should take a few minutes to open the box and actually begin using real plates—oops, but then you’d have to load them into the dishwasher, too!”

  Marcus grinned unabashedly. “My point exactly.”

  Working together, they piled fragrant helpings of lo mein and vegetables and Szechuan chicken onto the plates, grabbed cold sodas from the refrigerator and settled down at the small dining room table. While they ate, they listened to slow jams and talked about anything and everything. Samara considered, then decided not to tell Marcus about Asha’s unexpected appearance at her office. Although he’d told her about his own mother’s visit yesterday, Samara didn’t want him remembering how much baggage she had.

  “I just remembered another one of your hidden talents,” Marcus drawled when he’d finished teasing her about singing at his brother’s restaurant.

  “What?”

  “The fact that you’re a tiger tamer.”

  For a moment Samara was confused. And then she remembered the premiere in New York and laughed. “I do not tame tigers.”

  “Sure as hell looked like it to me. You were the only one in that showroom not scared out of your mind when that tiger stepped onstage.”

  “As I told you and Walt, Pandora and I are old friends. She remembered me.”

  Marcus took a sip of Pepsi, catching a stray drop from his bottom lip with the tip of his tongue. Samara couldn’t look away, suddenly reliving all the ways he’d pleasured her with that incredibly talented tongue of his.

  “How’d that happen, by the way?” Marcus asked. At her blank look, he clarified, “How’d you come to befriend a tiger?”

  “I agreed to accompany my mother on a photo assignment in Johannesburg the summer before I graduated from college.” She grimaced. “Let’s just say the best part of the trip was being there for Pandora’s birth.”

  Marcus looked faintly amused. “Africa didn’t agree with you?”

  “No,” Samara grumbled, “Being around a bunch of prima donna supermodels didn’t agree with me. Anyway, the animal trainers took pity on me and let me hang around between photo shoots. It was really cool. When Pandora was born, they allowed me to name her.”

  “Why’d you choose the name Pandora?”

  “Nothing deep.” Samara paused, distracted by the sight of a long noodle sliding between Marcus’s juicy lips. God, she envied the lo mein on his plate right now. “It was my favorite Greek mythology tale in high school. What was yours?”

  Marcus chuckled. “That would have to be Bellerophon and Pegasus. I admired Bellerophon’s gutsy arrogance when he challenged the gods and stormed Mount Olympus, even though it cost him in the end. And, hey, what can I say about Pegasus? A winged horse—what better mode of transportation could a guy ask for?”

  Samara laughed. “That was my second favorite Greek tragedy. I even wrote a short story about it for English class.”

  Marcus grinned. “Where have you been all my life, woman?”

  Although he was only teasing, Samara’s heart thumped just the same.

  When they’d finished their meals and the plates were cleared away, Marcus casually announced, “I have a brand-new deck of poker cards waiting to be broken in. That is, if you’re up for a friendly game?”

  Samara grinned. “Oh, Marcus, I’d feel really bad about taking your money. Which is ridiculous, considering you have more than enough to spare.”

  “Is that a yes or no?”

  She shrugged. “Sure, why not? It’s not like you don’t already know about my championship poker skills,” she said smugly. “I have no reason to feel guilty if you’re still willing to take me on.”

  Marcus chuckled. “Confident, aren’t we?”

  “I think I have reason to be,” she said as he disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a deck of playing cards. Samara rolled her eyes in exasperation. The man couldn’t unpack a simple box of kitchen supplies, but he had a readily available deck of poker cards. For that reason alone she’d have fun beating him.

  She dug into her jeans pocket as he began setting up at the small bistro table. “We’ll have to keep the ante low. I’m not sure I brought enough cash—”

  “We�
�re not playing for money.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me. Yesterday you promised me a game of strip poker, remember?”

  “I did not! You asked me if we had a game of strip poker in our future, and I just laughed. I never promised anything.”

  “What’s the matter, Samara?” Marcus challenged, a wicked gleam in his eyes. “Afraid you might lose?”

  She lifted a haughty chin. “Of course not.” She sat down decisively at the table. “Deal.”

  “Before we start, I’d like to establish some ground rules. When you lose a hand—”

  “If, you mean.”

  “I get to decide which article of clothing comes off.” His mouth twitched in amusement. “Considering that I’m way out of my league here, I think it’s only fair to spot me at least one advantage.”

  Samara hesitated, her eyes narrowed on his face. “Well, I suppose that wouldn’t be a problem.”

  She had no intention of losing a game of strip poker to Marcus.

  1

  An hour later, she was eating some serious humble pie—in spades.

  “Read ’em and weep.” With a look of smug satisfaction, Marcus displayed his cards on the table with a flourish.

  Samara’s heart sank when she saw his hand. An ace high straight-flush. His third royal flush. He was beating the pants off her—literally.

  Marcus leaned back in his chair with an air of relaxed confidence. “Perhaps I should consider entering a poker tournament. I never realized just how good I am.”

  Samara scowled darkly. “I’m having an off night,” she muttered.

  “Hmm. Well, speaking of ‘off’…” He looked pointedly at her angora sweater. “I believe you have some stripping to do.”

  Samara groaned in protest. “Not my sweater! Couldn’t I just remove my other sock?” She’d already lost her boots and one sock in the course of the competition. Marcus had been generous thus far, picking her slowly apart the way a hunter methodically stalks his prey. Now he was closing in for the kill.

  He shook his head slowly from side to side. “No deal—the sweater goes.”