Bewitching: His Secret Agenda

by Carla Neggers

  “You look like hell,” she muttered.

  Dark circles under her eyes made them appear even wider, nervous, afraid. Her skin looked splotchy and unnatural. Her mouth was raw from biting her lips. The bruises and cuts on her wrists had turned ugly shades of red and purple. She looked done in, as if the impact of what had happened earlier today had finally hit her squarely between the eyes.

  And yet that was only a part of it.

  The rest of what had hit her, she knew, was the impact of being in love with Win Harling...and of knowing she had no choice but to tell him to take himself and his uncle and head back to Boston, where they belonged.

  * * *

  WIN LISTENED TO Hannah’s request without interrupting. She had emerged from the bathroom in a robe that was surprisingly sexy and feminine, given her penchant for androgynous flannel nightshirts. “I know I look like hell,” she’d said. That was the first inaccuracy he’d heard from her lips. Others followed.

  But he let her talk.

  Finally she finished and looked at him expectantly. He knew what he was supposed to say. Yes, she was absolutely right. Yes, he would collect Uncle Jonathan and leave immediately. But instead he said, “Let me see if I’ve got this straight.”

  “Okay.”

  He moved over on the couch and made room for her. “Have a seat.”

  “I don’t...”

  “What are you worried about? Didn’t you just say that last night was just the product of—how did you put it?”

  “Adrenaline. The excitement of the moment.”

  “Right. Then you shouldn’t be afraid of sitting next to me, should you?”

  “I’m not.”

  He patted the spot beside him.

  She flipped back her hair and sat down, as far from him as she could manage. He tried not to smile. Adrenaline, my hind end!

  The tie on her robe had loosened, so it wasn’t wrapped around her as primly and tightly as it had been. He could see the soft swell of one breast, still pink from her long, hot bath. Right now, even her feet looked sexy, designed just to torment him.

  He wasn’t leaving.

  “Okay,” he began. “You think Uncle Jonathan and I ought to leave because we belong in Boston.”

  “Yes.”

  “Does that mean we should never leave town? Never take a vacation? Nothing?”

  She scowled. “It means you don’t belong here.”

  “On Marsh Point,” he concluded.

  “That’s right.”

  “And you and I. We don’t belong together because I belong in Boston, I’m a Harling, I make too much money, I have a city job, and I would never live down falling in love with a Marsh.”

  She mumbled something that he had to make her repeat, which she did reluctantly, not meeting his eye. “I didn’t say anything about falling in love with a Marsh.”

  “Ahh, correct. You said ‘being with.’ A fine distinction, don’t you think?”

  “No.”

  He leaned toward her. “Hannah, you’re dead wrong on all counts.”

  She didn’t say a word.

  “I love Boston, but I didn’t grow up there. I don’t need to live there. I am a Harling. You’re not wrong about that, but you are wrong if you think it determines my outlook toward you or anything else. I do make a great deal of money, but how much is too much? And I don’t, as you implied, exist to make money. I could not make another dime my entire life and find ways to be fulfilled and happy. As for a city job... With computers, I can do my work from virtually anywhere. I just happen to prefer Boston.”

  Her top teeth were bearing down on her lower lip, already ragged from her ordeal with Preston Fowler. Win ran a forefinger gently over her lip, freeing it, while further tormenting himself. He shifted on the couch. Stupid to have made a fire; its heat was totally unnecessary, as far as he was concerned.

  “And that last—never living down ‘being with’ a Marsh. Hannah, I don’t give a damn what people think of who I want to be with. It’s never mattered to me and doesn’t now.” He spoke in a low, deliberate voice. “And you know that.”

  “Win...”

  “You know all of it.”

  She jumped to her feet. “I can’t let you stay!”

  “Fine. I’ll go if you want me to go. Just tell me the real reason why.”

  “Can’t you just leave?”

  “Hannah...”

  “All you have to do is get your uncle, throw your stuff into your car and drive on out of here. It’s really very simple.”

  He got up. “Okay, if that’s what you want. I’ll go pack up. Can you run over and tell Uncle Jonathan to be ready to leave in fifteen minutes?”

  “Sure. I mean...” She narrowed her eyes at him, visibly suspicious. “You’re going to leave, just like that?”

  “It’s not just like that. It’s after listening to all your crazy reasons why I should and taking you at your word. You want me out. Okay, I’m out.”

  He started down the hall.

  “Now wait just a minute!” she blurted.

  Ignoring her—and his own incipient sense of relief—he walked into the guest room, where he’d deposited his overnight bag.

  She was right behind him. “But you don’t believe my reasons for wanting you gone.”

  “That’s right,” he agreed, shoving things back into his bag. “I don’t.”

  “But you’re not going to insist on the truth?”

  “Nope.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m not a boor.”

  She was stunned into a momentary silence.

  “If a lady orders me out of her house,” he went on, “I go. It’s the proper thing to do, you know. I don’t plan to share a prison cell with Preston Fowler.”

  Hannah frowned.

  Win resisted an urge to scoop her into his arms and carry her off. She looked so tired, so damned fragile. And yet he knew it was an illusion. Hannah Marsh was a strong and independent woman who was struggling with the fact that that strength and independence had been challenged.

  “I wish I’d knocked a few of the bastard’s teeth loose when I’d had the chance,” he said. “You?”

  Surprise flickered in her green eyes, then she gave a small smile and nodded. “More than a few.”

  “Damned humiliating, having to be rescued by those two old goats.”

  She almost laughed. “At least we got Fowler in the end.”

  “Yes, we did.”

  Then the laughter went out of her eyes, and she said softly, “It was terrifying, Win, finding him up in the attic.... I didn’t know what he’d done to Cousin Thackeray, and then, when he tackled me...and touched me...” She inhaled. “But we got him.”

  “I’m not Fowler, Hannah. I’m not the enemy.”

  “You were,” she reminded him quickly. “For a while you were, and it was fun thinking that way, but after today...it’s just not fun anymore.”

  Win zipped his bag and straightened, his body rigid. “Go warn Uncle Jonathan,” he said.

  She started to speak, then shut her mouth, nodded and went into her bedroom to get dressed.

  * * *

  COUSIN THACKERAY’S HOUSE was locked up and empty.

  Hannah peered through a living room window. The only light visible was from the dying coals in the fireplace. A stiff wind gusted at her back. The contrast between the cool night air and her still-overheated skin was enough to make her shiver.

  Where the hell was he?

  Had Jonathan Harling gone with him?

  She made a hissing sound of pure irritation through her gritted teeth and went around to all the entrances, looking for an unlocked door or a note, courteously mentioning where in blazes they’d gone.

 
There was nothing.

  Indeed, her life had been different since the Harlings had erupted into it. Of course, that had been her doing. She had gone looking for them. It wasn’t as if they had decided to hunt up the Marshes and demand Marsh Point and the Harling Collection after a hundred years. Now she was taking responsibility for her own actions.

  But how could she send the two Jonathan Winthrop Harlings packing if she couldn’t even find one of them?

  Muttering and growling, she marched back to her cottage. On the way she noticed that Cousin Thackeray’s truck was gone.

  Win had set his bag by the back door in the kitchen and was scrambling some eggs, apparently unaware of her presence. She could smell toast burning. He cursed and popped it up, just shy of being ruined. Hannah observed the fit of his sweater over his broad shoulders, the place where it ended, just above his hips. She imagined his long legs intertwined with hers.

  It wasn’t fair, this longing for him. Making love last night had only made her want him more. Made her even more aware of him—and of herself, of her own capacity for love and desire.

  Her throat tightened. She cleared it and said, “They’ve absconded for parts unknown.”

  Giving no sign of having been startled, Win looked around. “I wondered if they’d end up plotting something.” He divided the eggs in the pan and dumped half onto one plate and the other half onto a second. “Jam on your toast?”

  “Don’t you think we should go look for them?”

  He smeared butter onto the two slices of toast and put another two into the toaster. “Where would you suggest we begin our search? For all we know, they’ve decided to go fishing in Canada.”

  “They’ve gone after the Harling Collection,” Hannah said. “You know it and I know it.”

  “To what end?”

  “I don’t know!”

  “Maybe they’ve just gone out for lobster.” He put the toast onto the plates and carried them into the living room. “Let’s eat by the fire. It’s always easier to endure being shot out of the saddle on a full stomach.”

  Hannah followed him into the living room. Except for the fact that his bag stood by the door, he didn’t look like a man intending to depart anytime soon. She remained standing. “You haven’t been shot out of the saddle. I’ve just asked you to leave.”

  “Then you plan to continue our relationship,” he said.

  “Well, yeah, I guess so.”

  His eyes darkened, looking as black and suspicious as the day he had run into her, outside his house. “That’s not good enough, Hannah.”

  It wasn’t. She’d known it when she’d said it. She changed the subject. “What about Cousin Thackeray and your uncle?”

  “They’re big boys. They can take care of themselves.”

  “But why didn’t they tell us where they were going?”

  “Maybe because it’s none of our damned business.”

  He sat cross-legged on the floor in front of the fire, placing her plate next to him. He’d forgotten forks. Hannah went into the kitchen and got them, along with the second batch of toast, which had just popped up. It, too, was nearly burned. She slathered it with spicy pear butter and felt a sudden gnawing of hunger in her stomach. Dinner, perhaps, wasn’t such a bad idea.

  She took up her plate and sat at her desk chair in front of her computer. Win turned so that he was facing her instead of the fire. She groaned inwardly. Why did he have to be so damned good-looking? So rich. So successful. So Harling.

  “You look more yourself,” he said softly, the hardness gone from his eyes.

  She nodded. “I’m feeling better.”

  “Hell of a day. If you want, I’ll take a spin around the area and see if I can find your cousin and Uncle Jonathan.”

  “No, I’ll go. I know the area.”

  He said nothing.

  Suddenly she knew she didn’t want to go alone. If she had to, she could do it. But she didn’t have to. It was a choice, she thought, not a sign of dependence.

  “We’ll take my car,” she said.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  AS CARS WENT, Hannah’s wasn’t much. She explained to Win that in a rural setting high mileage, reliability and durability were more important than speed and prestige. He realized she was contrasting her car with his—in essence, her life with his. Or at least her understanding of his life. There was a difference, he thought.

  They bounced along the narrow road that led from Marsh Point into town. “This is nuts,” she muttered.

  “So, turn back.”

  She glanced at him; her hair seemed even paler in the darkness. “What about those two?”

  “At worst, Uncle Jonathan is having Thackeray take him to the Harling Collection at gunpoint. It’s far more likely they’ve gone into town for a drink after their ordeal today. Either way, if they had wanted us to interfere, they would have told us where they were going.”

  “Don’t you feel responsible?”

  “No.”

  The car slowed. Hannah gripped the wheel with both hands.

  Win stretched his legs as best he could in the small vehicle. “You’re not really worried, either. You’re just looking for excuses, so you won’t have to toss me, after all.”

  She shot him a look. “I am not.”

  “Then you still want me to head back to Boston tonight?”

  “As soon as we find your uncle,” she confirmed.

  “Suppose he doesn’t come back until morning. Suppose he and your cousin have taken off for Boston to see their old haunts in Harvard Square.”

  “Cousin Thackeray’s not that crazy.”

  “Uncle Jonathan is,” Win said mildly.

  She braked hard, swerving onto the side of the dark road. The ocean was mere yards away. Win, however, assumed she knew what she was doing, and that whatever it was didn’t include dumping him out for the seagulls to pick over.

  After a few maneuvers, she had the car heading back toward Marsh Point.

  “I’m not thinking straight tonight,” she mumbled under her breath.

  Win chose not to comment.

  When they arrived back at the cottage, Win noticed that Thackeray Marsh’s yellow truck stood in the driveway behind his house. He and Hannah looked at each other and sighed. “I wonder where they’ve been,” she said, puzzled. “We were on the only road out of here.”

  The house’s living room lights were on. Win climbed out of Hannah’s car and started up the driveway without a word, assuming she would want to ease her mind and find out where the two old men had been.

  She fell in beside him, not looking at him, not speaking. Watching her, Win nearly tripped over a rock. Her jaw was set...her eyes shining...everything about her was alive, focused, dynamic. The near depression, the preoccupation of earlier seemed to have vanished. And, Win thought, he hadn’t even gone back to Boston yet.

  As he’d suspected, he wasn’t the problem.

  He wondered if she’d figured that out yet.

  On the stone path to Thackeray’s side door, she darted past him and didn’t bother knocking before bursting in.

  “Ahh, the posse is back,” Uncle Jonathan announced.

  Hannah was having none of it. “Where were you two?”

  Thackeray Marsh answered, “We took a spin out old Marsh Road. It’s barely passable, but we managed.”

  “Thought we might see a moose,” his contemporary added.

  They were both seated near the fireplace, where Thackeray was poking at the coals, trying to restart the fire. Win saw that his uncle looked exhausted; he was also filthy and about as pleased with himself as his nephew had ever seen him. He doubted a moose sighting had done it.

  Thackeray cursed the stubborn fire and gave up, flopping into his chair. He addressed his young cou
sin. “We’d have told you we were going,” he said, “but didn’t want to catch you...well, you know.”

  Win watched Hannah stiffen and her cheeks grow red. “I was asking Win to leave,” she said starchily.

  “Tonight? After what we have all been through today?” Thackeray snorted and waved a hand. “Even I wouldn’t do that. Damned rude it is.”

  “It’s okay,” Win said. “She was bluffing.”

  “I was not bluffing!”

  “Yeah, you were. You’ve just been slow to realize it.” He smiled at her. “The perfect bluff is the one you do on impulse, when you’re not sure it is a bluff or even why you’re doing it.”

  Uncle Jonathan gave an exaggerated yawn. “Winthrop, what in hell are you talking about? Carry this woman off, will you? I’m tired. Thackeray and I have a big day tomorrow, and I need my rest. I’m not a young man anymore, you know.”

  Hannah threw up her hands. “These two are impossible!” she exclaimed irritably. “Carry me off, like he’s some kind of Neanderthal. Moose hunting. Bluffs that aren’t bluffs. Crazy Bostonians trying to kill me. Heck, I’m going to bed.”

  “Before you do,” Thackeray said, “would you and your fellow here bring in the trunk from the back of my truck? I’m afraid Jonathan and I expended ourselves getting it into the truck in the first place. It’s damned heavy.”

  “Set it in the kitchen,” Uncle Jonathan added.

  Thackeray nodded. “Yes, we’ll have at it in the morning.”

  Hannah refused to play their game and started out without demanding an explanation, but Win didn’t have her forbearance, or just hadn’t reached total disgust the way she apparently had. “What trunk?” he asked.

  “The one in the back of Thackeray’s—”

  “Uncle Jonathan...” Win warned.

  The old man sighed. “See for yourself.”

  Thackeray sat forward and shook a finger at Jonathan Harling. “Now wait just a minute. We agreed to wait until morning.”

  “I’m not breaking our agreement. All Win has to do is look at the damned thing, and he’ll recognize his name in brass letters on the front, don’t you think? I sure as the devil did.”