How To Marry A Millionaire (For Richer, For Poorer)

by Charlotte Maclay

  Settling herself at the desk, she opened a casebook on torts and flipped through the pages to a section on contributory negligence. A little smile played at the corners of her lips.

  That must have been quite a night to remember if Curt and his plaintiff lady friend had fallen out of bed. As strictly an academic exercise, she wondered who would be considered at fault? Of course, she mused, as defense attorneys they could do a re-creation of the event to demonstrate shared responsibility. A jury would love that. As Tom Weston’s assistant, Kathryn would no doubt be assigned to act as the injured woman, lying in bed with Curt, having him hold her up close to his muscular body, then kissing her with his sensuous lips, and finally...

  She slammed the book shut.

  Those kinds of thoughts were definitely not part of her homework. Perhaps for tonight she should concentrate on criminal law.

  Chapter Two

  Roses.

  Buckets of them. On her desk. On top of the filing cabinet. Stuffed into the bookcase. Filling the room with a heady perfume and spilling out of Kathryn’s office into the hallway of Weston, Lyman and Garcelli like a bright red carpet.

  A color that no doubt matched the angry flush on her cheeks.

  “I hope you like roses,” said a baritone voice behind her. “I didn’t have time to pick up any diamonds.”

  She whirled around and nailed Curt Creighton with a look meant to communicate her fury. His predatory grin and his chambray shirt, open at the collar to reveal an enticing tuft of cinnamon brown chest hair, did nothing to dissuade her.

  “This is a business office.” She added as much ice to her tone as she could manage, given the way her heart was thudding painfully against her ribs. “Not a florist shop...or a funeral parlor.”

  “I do believe you have a temper, Ms. Prim. Good for you.”

  “You have no right—”

  “It was my pleasure, Ms. Prim.” He gave her an arrogant dip of his head. “You’re more than welcome.”

  “What will people think?” she protested between tight lips, glancing across the expanse of cubicles where secretaries and bookkeepers worked behind low partitions. More than one curious face peered back at her. “I don’t even know you.”

  “I plan to rectify that oversight as soon as possible. Tonight at dinner seems like a good time to get started.”

  She sputtered. “Dinner? I’m not going anywhere with you.”

  “You have to eat. Everyone does.” He cocked one eyebrow and shifted his gaze slowly, suggestively, over her slender figure, making Kathryn wish she were wearing a plastic garbage sack instead of a tailored suit with a tight-fitting skirt. “Of course, it doesn’t look like you’d bankrupt me in that department.” His gaze lifted again to meet hers, his eyes filled with wicked amusement. “You like continental or Mexican?”

  “Neither.” She stooped, picked up a dozen flowers and shoved them hard against his unyielding chest. “I want you to take these roses back to wherever you got them.”

  “I don’t think they give refunds.”

  “Fine. Then make friends with somebody in a hospital. I don’t want them and I don’t want you harassing me.”

  “Harassing? Is that what I’m doing? And here I thought it was called courtship.” He shook his head in mock confusion. “Guess I’ll have to go back and read that book one more time.”

  He’d written the book, for heaven’s sake! It was called Seduction Incorporated, a catalog service featuring every imaginable gift a man might purchase to seduce a woman—filmy negligees, extraordinary flowers like those filling her office, chocolates so rich just looking at the pictures added two inches to a woman’s thighs, and exquisite, sultry perfumes for about a million dollars an ounce. Then came the diamonds and elegant cars, every display and gift carefully conceived to weaken a woman’s resistance while, no doubt, making megabucks for Creighton Enterprises.

  Kathryn would have popped her cork right then, except her employer appeared from out of his office.

  “Hey, buddy, you giving my associate a hard time?” Smiling, Tom Weston extended his hand in friendly greeting.

  Blowing out a sigh of relief, Kathryn let the tension ease from her shoulders and neck. Tom would get this Don Juan off her case. Her employer was a very serious guy, a bachelor who was as fully circumspect about his personal life as she. He’d put an end to Curt’s disruptive behavior in a hurry.

  “I’m as innocent as a little lamb,” Curt said. “You know that.”

  Tom shifted an interested gaze into Kathryn’s rose-filled office and back to Curt again. “I doubt Kathryn would believe that statement—even under oath—any more than I do.” Laughing, he took his friend by the arm. “Come on into my office. We need to talk about this little difficulty you’ve gotten yourself into.”

  “Right you are.” Before following Tom to his office, Curt leaned over the first partitioned cubicle and handed Marcy Higgins the roses Kathryn had shoved into his arms. “Here you go, sweetheart. Flowers for a lovely lady.” He brushed his fingertips against her wrinkled cheek.

  The gray-haired woman giggled her thanks.

  Kathryn rolled her eyes. The man was an incorrigible flirt.

  As Curt stepped into Tom’s office, he glanced back at Kathryn and winked. “I’ll check with you later about tonight.”

  Ignoring him, she turned away. “Don’t bother,” she muttered under her breath.

  There was no way she could ignore the array of roses still filling her office, however, or the way Curt Creighton left her feeling slightly breathless and oddly weak in the knees.

  * * *

  CURT MOVED with restless energy across Tom’s office. Hands in his pockets, he stopped at the window and studied the curving view of Santa Monica Bay from his friend’s twentieth-floor office. A brown smudge along the horizon marked the edge of the smog blown out to sea by a warm breeze from the desert.

  “Tell me about her,” he said.

  “Kathryn? She’s a damn good paralegal. She’ll make a good attorney, too. We’ve already offered her a job when she passes the bar, which ought to be sometime next year.”

  “Ambitious lady. I like that.” He also liked how she looked in her trim-fitting rust suit. The shade definitely accented the color of her hair, picking up the red highlights like heated sparks from a banked fire.

  Tom cleared his throat and there was a shuffle of papers. “I think you ought to leave her alone.”

  Raising his eyebrows, Curt turned to his friend. Though both men were about thirty-five, they were physical opposites, Tom being lean and wiry, while Curt carried far more height and bulk. “Why? Last night when I brought those papers by, she claimed she wasn’t involved with anyone right now.”

  “As far as I know, she hasn’t had a serious relationship since she came to work for my father twelve years ago in the mail room.”

  “So? What’s the problem?”

  “None, as far as she’s concerned. She’s a very private person. Never talks about her personal life. Never shows up late for work, as though she’s been out on the town, or brings a date to office parties. I just don’t think she’s your type.”

  “Why the heck not? Don’t make me out to be some kind of an ogre.”

  “Come on, Curt. You live on the fast track.”

  “You know that’s more publicity hype than fact. Besides, I’ve slowed down a whole lot in the past few years.” If truth be known, he’d grown tired of the party scene. Maybe he was getting old. But he’d inherited a playboy image from his father along with the wealth that went with it. It made a certain amount of marketing sense to continue nurturing that image, or at least the PR folks at Creighton Enterprises seemed to think so.

  Tom held up the copy of the lawsuit. “It doesn’t look to me like you’ve slowed down much since we were in college. Not if there’s any merit in—” he glanced at the plaintiff’s name “—in Roslyn Kellogg’s case.”

  “She fell out of bed, all right—she was pretty well soused that night, and m
aybe she even hurt her back. But I wasn’t anywhere near her at the time. I heard her scream and went running into the guest bedroom to see what was the matter. I found her on the floor.”

  “And she has a half-dozen witnesses who will testify that they discovered you, stark naked, holding her in your arms.”

  “So I sleep in the buff and I didn’t take time to put on my pants. There’s no law against that.”

  “Depends on who you’re sleeping with, I guess, and how athletic your activities get.”

  Curt paced across the plush carpeting, placed his hands on the back of one of the leather chairs facing Tom’s oversize desk and squeezed hard enough to turn his knuckles white. “Roz is a kid. She can’t be more than twenty-one. I gave her a roof over her head when she didn’t have anyplace else to go, for God’s sake, and now she’s trying to take advantage. I don’t mind a little negative publicity once in a while, but I’ll be damned if I’ll let a woman take me to the cleaners just because she thinks I’ve got deep pockets.”

  “You do.”

  “Yeah, and it’s your job to keep her greedy little hands out of ‘em. Roz had started hanging around with a kind of sleazy character. Frankly, I think he may have put her up to this suing business.”

  Tom speared his fingers through his blond, neatly combed hair. “I’ll do the best I can, but I don’t think it’s going to be easy. If this is a scam, you’re a ready-made victim.”

  “Tell me about it,” Curt agreed with a grim twist of his lips. Over the years, Creighton Enterprises had paid a fortune to fight frivolous suits. It was a matter of principle not to pay out a dime unless the organization, or the individual involved, really did have legitimate liability. Recently, the legal firm they’d retained for years hadn’t been producing. Curt had decided to take his business elsewhere. Tom Weston had seemed like the right choice. “If Kathryn is as good as you say, I want her on my case, too.”

  “Can’t do that, Curt.”

  “Why the hell not? I’m paying the tab, aren’t I?”

  Standing, Tom buttoned his suit jacket. “I got the distinct impression Kathryn doesn’t want anything to do with you. I’m not going to put one of my employees, particularly a top staff person, in that kind of an awkward position.”

  “I’m not going to ravish her, man. I just want a chance to get acquainted.” Possibly on an intimate level, he admitted, but only to himself.

  With an obvious effort to terminate the conversation, Tom walked around to the near side of the desk. “We’ve got another paralegal who is just as competent to handle any necessary research and do the legwork. I plan to assign him to the case.”

  “Some friend,” Curt groused as he left the office. Kathryn was nowhere to be found. Fortunately the bookkeeper who had received the extra roses was the talkative type.

  * * *

  KATHRYN FILLED her two-cup coffeemaker with the special blend of beans she preferred. It was one of her few extravagances, one she cherished at the end of each long day. After her encounter with Curt and his roses that morning, she decided the coffee would be especially welcome.

  Just as she turned on the water tap she heard a knock at the door.

  Probably Rudy checking in, she thought, crossing the living room in her stocking feet. As sweet as the man was, Kathryn sensed he was lonely. Once he had mentioned, rather wistfully, that he had left some woman behind when he’d come to Hollywood seeking fame and fortune. Kathryn suspected there were times when Rudy regretted that decision.

  To make sure she knew the person on the opposite side of the door, she peered through the peephole.

  A headache started at the back of her skull and quickly spread.

  Curt Creighton. Looking smug in his leather jacket. Standing outside her apartment door.

  For a moment, Kathryn considered pretending not to be at home. But he seemed to be quite aware she was there, his smiling image distorted and magnified through the viewer. As usual, his wavy hair was in slight disarray, the sort of mussiness a woman’s fingers itched to comb.

  Gritting her teeth, she yanked open the door. “How did you find out where I live?” The need for privacy was why people had unlisted numbers.

  “Good evening to you, too, pretty lady.” His cheeks creased with that familiar, heart-stopping smile, and the corners of his eyes crinkled. “You’re looking charming this evening.”

  Wearing old slacks and a tatty beige sweater? The man must be blind...or think she was the most gullible woman on earth. “I asked how you knew where to find me.”

  “Oh, we millionaire playboys have our sources.” He shrugged noncommittally.

  She frowned. “Did Tom give you my address?” If so, her resignation would be on his desk first thing in the morning. There were lots of jobs in town for an experienced paralegal. Her loyalty to Tom’s father for giving her a job when she’d been desperate didn’t extend into her personal life.

  “Not a chance. In fact, he’s very protective of you. I gather he thinks I’d lead you to rack and ruin.”

  Among other destinations, she imagined, not that she’d ever give him the chance. “Then how—”

  “That’s my little secret. An honorable man never reveals his sources...or kisses and tells,” he added with a devilish lift of a single eyebrow. “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”

  “No.”

  “But I’ve brought dinner. Since you didn’t like the idea of either continental or Mexican, I picked up some Chinese.”

  He held up a brown paper bag that no doubt contained Louie Garden’s equivalent of Family Special number three, egg roll included. In fact, Kathryn caught the scent of soy sauce and spare ribs when he raised the sack. Her stomach growled.

  Hungry or not, under no circumstances was she going to eat dinner with Curt Creighton. Certainly not alone with him in her apartment. The guy was too aggressive by far, his constant presence a warm torment that managed to settle low in her body every time he showed up.

  And that cocky grin of his! He needed to be put in his place, but good. Did he really think every woman in town would fall all over themselves for one of his sexy smiles? Or because they thought he had a big bank account?

  Of course he did, came the irritated response in her head.

  But Kathryn wasn’t going to add her name to what was no doubt an unending list of his conquests. One run-in with a tabloid photographer was plenty for her.

  Eating, however, was a whole different ball game. She hadn’t had time to go to the store in days and, except for a frozen vegetarian lasagna, the cupboard was bare.

  Lifting her chin to a determined angle, she extended her hands. “Bringing me dinner was very thoughtful. Thank you.”

  Because Curt had been raised a gentleman, he placed the sack of take-out in Kathryn’s hands. Then he watched in shock and growing frustration as the door silently closed in his face.

  He blinked, staring at the bronze number 206 on the door for a full thirty seconds before the realization of what had happened finally set in.

  “Hey, no. There’s enough for both of us.” He rapped his knuckles firmly on the door. “Kathryn! That’s not fair, you know. You’re supposed to invite me in.”

  Silence was the only response he got.

  He knocked again. “Come on, Kathryn,” he soothed. “I’m harmless. And I’m hungry.” Playing on a woman’s sympathy usually worked. “I didn’t get any lunch today. My stomach’s shrunk clear back to my spine.”

  Continued silence. Irritating as hell. And downright damaging to a guy’s ego. She was sure good at doing a vanishing act when he was around.

  The next time he knocked, the door to the apartment across the hall opened and an old guy not much taller than Kathryn peered out at him. “There is something you wanted?” the old guy asked in a phony accent.

  Curt glanced at Kathryn’s closed door and then at the neighbor. The evening wasn’t going the way he’d planned...a quiet dinner, intimate conversation, maybe a little bit more. Nosy neighbors didn’t he
lp.

  For now, he figured he’d better chalk up this round to Kathryn. “Naw, I was just leaving.” But he’d be back. She could count on it.

  As he marched away from the door, a determined smile curled his lips. Courting Kathryn was going to be fun. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so intrigued with a woman, or felt so challenged. Women like Kathyrn gave a man a reason to get up in the morning.

  A few minutes later he’d found a pay phone and dialed the number the bookkeeper had given him. “Cute, pretty lady. Real cute,” he said when she answered the phone.

  Kathryn’s hand squeezed the telephone and her stomach tightened. This guy didn’t know when to quit. With a discouraged sigh, she leaned against the kitchen counter where she’d been munching dinner right from the take-out cartons.

  “There are laws against stalking a woman,” she stated.

  “Do you really find me that repulsive?”

  Not likely. The opposite was closer to the truth, which was why she didn’t want anything to do with Curt. “That’s not the point. I’m simply not interested in seeing you socially.”

  “But a strictly business relationship would be acceptable?”

  Kathryn suspected Curt was thinking about monkey business, but she didn’t say so. “You’re one of the firm’s clients. If our paths cross in that context, I can see no objection.” None she would voice, except to Tom, who would certainly get an earful.

  “Good.”

  She didn’t much like the sound of his all-too-easy agreement. He sounded far too pleased with himself.

  “So how’s the sweet and sour?” he asked.

  Stabbing a bite of pork with her fork, she chewed thoughtfully. “Excellent. Very tender. The ribs are delicious, too.”