Lady Love

by Diana Palmer

  His hand slid slowly over the soft skin of her back. “I want you,” he whispered softly. “I want to do what we did that night, all over again.”

  She was trembling. She couldn’t help it. The memories were blistering hot. She clenched her fingers on the fabric of his jacket. “I can’t.”

  “Darling, look at me.” His soft, dark eyes looked down at her green ones and smiled into them. “There’s no shame in what we did together, Merlyn,” he said softly. “As long as we make it right.”

  “Make it right?”

  “Get married,” he said. “For the baby’s sake.”

  “Cameron, there isn’t a baby!” she burst out.

  “I think there is,” he returned. His eyes moved down her body and back up again, searching her face. “You’re radiant. You glow. As innocent as you were, you couldn’t be expected to know—but what happened, what we felt, wasn’t quite a common thing.” His fingers came up to brush a strand of short hair away from her eye. “Darling, didn’t it occur to you that I lost control completely that first time? And didn’t you wonder why?”

  Her heart was trying to climb out of her throat. He was hypnotizing her all over again, and she couldn’t let him!

  “You needed a woman,” she said bluntly.

  He shook his head. “I’ve needed women before, and that hasn’t happened. I wanted you in an uncommon way. And being seduced by virgins isn’t an everyday experience for me. The combination blew my mind.”

  “I don’t know what came over me,” she whispered.

  “I do,” he said under his breath. His arm contracted. “I took you, and you took me. And now we’ve got to do something about it, for the sake of that tiny life we created between us. And don’t say you’re not pregnant. You are. Merlyn, we loved that night. As intense and beautiful as the experience was,” he whispered, “you have to be pregnant.”

  Her breath caught in her throat, and for an instant she gave in to her longing for him, her aching love for him. “I wanted to be,” she whispered huskily.

  “I wanted it, too,” he whispered. “I wanted it so much that I held nothing back with you.”

  That was surprising, and her eyes told him so.

  “Another shock?” he asked gently. “I could have protected you, Merlyn, if I’d wanted to. I’m not saying it would have been the easiest thing I’ve ever done, but if I’d been determined to prevent a child, I could have.” She stopped dancing, and he touched her lips lightly with his fingertips.

  “And you didn’t?” she asked.

  He held her palm to his lips. “On the contrary,” he said in a husky tone. His eyes searched hers. “I tried my damndest to make sure you got pregnant.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I…”

  Before he could finish the statement, a slightly inebriated Dick brushed against Cameron.

  “Sorry, old man—” He grinned, “—but I did have this dance planned. Merlyn, my love?”

  He swept her away, oblivious to the killing glare Cameron gave him and the shock on Merlyn’s face. People closed in around them just as Cameron started after her; the music got louder; and Merlyn came back to her senses. She had to keep from being alone with Cameron again. If she wanted to salvage any of her pride, she had to! He was only pretending to want her. Probably he’d wanted her to get pregnant for the same reason he wanted to marry her—because he needed money, and she had it. A lot of loose ends didn’t fit well into that theory, but she ignored them. She wasn’t going to risk her pride again, as she had with Adam.

  At the end of the dance she slipped away and hid upstairs until the last guest was leaving. From the deep murmur of his voice, she knew that it was Cameron. The door closed.

  “You can come out now,” her father called gaily. “He’s gone!”

  “Can I trust you?” she called after a minute.

  “Darling, I’m your doting papa!”

  “You’re a turncoat,” she accused.

  “Now, Merlyn.”

  She came down the stairs, saw no one, and relaxed a little as she moved forward. “Is he gone for good?” she asked.

  “Not a chance. He’s coming to lunch tomorrow, in fact. We’re going to do business.”

  She glared at him. “Why?”

  “Well, seeing he’s the father of my grandchild…”

  “There isn’t a grandchild,” she moaned. “I’m not pregnant!”

  “…I have to look out for him,” he concluded amiably. “Shouldn’t you be in bed? Women in your condition need to be careful.”

  She gave him a killing glare and climbed the stairs again. What was the use of arguing with either one of them? They were cut from the same cloth, and she hated them both!

  She dodged Cameron the next day by going shopping, but he was still there when she came home. And so were baskets full of flowers, from one end of the living room to the other.

  “The flowers,” Cameron offered, grinning at her. He was wearing a white shirt with a yellow sweater and gray slacks, and he looked wickedly handsome.

  “What flowers?” she asked nervously.

  His eyes were disturbing as they ran down the length of her body. “As in candy, flowers, and serenading.”

  She cocked her head, determined to sound poised. “What about the candy?”

  “It’s in your bathtub.”

  She blinked. “What?”

  He turned away and lit a cigarette. “Go look.”

  With a quick glance at her father, who was trying to stifle a grin, she went cautiously up the staircase and into her bedroom. She opened the bathroom door.

  The tub was lined with lace-rimmed red satin and filled to capacity with boxes of chocolates of every kind imaginable. She stood gaping at it for a long minute before she turned and walked back downstairs.

  “The best part’s still to come,” Cameron offered.

  “You’re going to serenade me?” she asked. Her eyes flashed. “Better have an umbrella handy,” she said with a mocking smile.

  “Better have a big bucket of water,” he returned on a laugh.

  She went into the study and locked the door. When she came out, he was gone, but her father had a strange look on his face.

  “I’m going to check into a hotel,” she announced as she went upstairs to bed. “I am not going to stay here and become a target. Maybe if I leave, he’ll go back to Charleston and marry that Delle person!”

  “Not a chance,” her father replied, laughing.

  “Care to bet?” she threw back.

  “I’ll bet you a Mercedes convertible for a wedding present,” he said obligingly.

  She turned on her heel and stalked upstairs. This is getting out of hand! she thought. And she felt queasy. The sight of the candy in the tub had unsettled her stomach.

  With a sigh, she donned her blue silk nightgown and matching robe and sat down to comb her short hair. That was when she heard the noise. It sounded like an orchestra tuning up.

  Frowning, she opened the door to the hall and listened. Yes, there it was again. She smiled. Probably her father was listening to a concert on the education television channel. She closed the door and went back to the vanity. She’d just lifted the brush again when the opening bars of the Capriccio espagnol by Rimsky-Korsakov shattered the night in orchestral splendor.

  She cried out. The brush went flying. The orchestra sounded as if it was in the room with her, and she realized suddenly that the music wasn’t coming from the hall at all. It was coming from the lawn!

  She dashed to the window, opened it, and stepped out onto the balcony. Cameron was standing below, just in front of the conductor, and Merlyn realized with wide-eyed fascination that the entire Atlanta Symphony Orchestra was playing magnificently in her backyard on the neatly clipped lawn!

  Cameron bowed, grinned, and blew her a kiss. He was wearing a black tuxedo himself and carrying a violin. As she watched, he raised it to his neck and nodded toward the conductor. As the background music softened, he began to play. />
  He was terrible. Absolutely terrible. Merlyn gritted her teeth. Several members of the orchestra, especially in the string section, looked as if they were trying to find earplugs.

  “Oh, stop!” she wailed.

  “Marry me, and I will!” he yelled up.

  “Never!”

  “It gets worse!” he threatened. “You haven’t heard what I can do to a French horn!”

  Chapter Twelve

  He continued playing. Lights were beginning to go on all around the neighborhood. The people next door poked their heads out of an upstairs window.

  “What’s that horrible noise?” somebody yelled.

  Cameron paused, violin and bow in hand, and glared in the direction of the voice. “I’ll have you know I studied violin for two years!” he yelled back.

  “Yes,” the voice answered, “right up until your teacher committed suicide!”

  Cameron drew the bow across the helpless violin strings with a vengeance.

  “Please stop!” the voice yelled. “If you’re the enemy, I surrender!”

  “I don’t take prisoners!” Cameron shouted.

  “In that case, buy some armor!” the voice threatened.

  Merlyn was laughing almost hysterically at the exchange. She could hardly believe the evidence of her own eyes and ears. If only Delle could see him now, she thought wickedly. Cameron Thorpe, staid bank executive. She giggled even more.

  “Well, are you going to marry me or not?” he yelled up at her.

  “I’ll keep an open mind!” she called down, clutching the thin robe around her. “Cameron, I have to go in. I’m cold!”

  “Go ahead!” he called up. “We wouldn’t want the baby to get sick!”

  She glared at him, then went in and closed the balcony doors. Minutes later, when she was tucked in bed, the exquisite strains of the famous Brahms lullaby filled the house. And the yard. And the neighborhood. And then there was the ominous sound of a police siren.…

  ***

  Sunlight streamed in the window and awakened Merlyn. She stretched and sat up with a sigh. With the end of sleep came memory, and she laughed. Only a madman would hire an entire symphony orchestra to accompany his pathetic serenade, she decided. But a lovely madman.

  She got out of bed, feeling faintly queasy, and went to get a drink of water. Then she dressed in jeans and a blouse and went downstairs.

  Cameron was sitting at the breakfast table with her father, looking half-asleep. He was wearing tan slacks and a striped, open-throated shirt, and he looked as rakish as a particularly sexy pirate. The open neck of the shirt displayed tanned skin and the beginnings of a thick pelt of hair. She remembered the feel of that hair against her bare skin and went weak-kneed with memory. Her eyes met his dark ones, and he lifted an eyebrow at her smile.

  “Feeling good, are we?” he taunted.

  “My, someone’s sour this morning,” she returned, bending to kiss her father’s forehead as she passed him.

  “You’d be sour, too, if you’d spent the night in a police station,” Cameron sighed, sipping his coffee. “Don’t I get a kiss, too? After all, I’m the father of your child.”

  “I am not pregnant!” she ground out.

  “Have some bacon,” her father interrupted with a wicked grin, and offered her the platter.

  She swallowed and averted her eyes.

  “As I was saying,” Cameron continued, chuckling, “how about my kiss?”

  “You can’t refuse him,” her father observed. “After all, he was arrested on your behalf.”

  She stared at her father, aghast. “I didn’t ask him to stand outside my window and make those horrible noises!”

  “They were not horrible,” Cameron defended himself.

  “Of course not, to the tone-deaf,” she agreed. She smiled impishly. “It was kind of sweet, though.”

  He cocked a heavy eyebrow. “Does that mean you’re going to marry me?”

  Her father cleared his throat, stood, and put down his napkin. “I have just remembered a pressing appointment somewhere,” he announced. “I should be back around dark, if anyone calls.”

  “You’re going to be a super father-in-law,” Cameron observed.

  “You bet I am.” Her father grinned and winked at them. “By the way, just in case there’s anything to celebrate, I’ve made a reservation at Chez Moi for tonight. See you!”

  Chez Moi was a very elegant, wildly expensive French restaurant on Peachtree Street. Merlyn stared at Cameron with narrowed eyes.

  “Confident, isn’t he?” she asked deliberately.

  “Yes, he is,” he agreed. He searched her eyes. “Sadly, a hell of a lot more confident than I am.” He sipped his black coffee and put the dainty china cup back in its saucer. “Don’t you think it’s time we sat down together to discuss things?”

  She started to make light of it, but his eyes were dark and quiet, and she thought better of it. The way she was beginning to feel was no joke.

  “All right,” she said after a minute.

  He took her hand and led her out through the patio door, into the morning sun. It was warm outside, and the tall oak trees provided abundant shade. Interspersed around the yard were beautiful pink and white dogwood trees, in full bloom. A birdbath with three tiers and a fountain splashed noisily in the midst of blooming shrubs.

  Cameron’s fingers fit themselves between hers in an intimate, possessive gesture. His hand was big, a little callused, and very strong. She liked its strength.

  Her eyes darted up to his broad, hard face and searched it quietly.

  “Are you going to marry me?” he asked.

  “Because I might be pregnant?”

  His fingers contracted and he smiled ruefully. “That,” he said, “is probably a pipe dream. I was grasping at straws. But we could make it real, Merlyn. We could get married and build a life together.”

  He drew her closer and pressed her open palms to his chest. “I know you think it’s only because of your money,” he said. “But if you’ll ask your father about our business deal, you might discover that I’m slowly and surely erasing my father’s debt. I won’t lie to you, I’m not a wealthy man. I’m well-to-do and not much more. But,” he added with a grin, “I’m ambitious and stubborn and I’ve got prospects. I’ll make it. We’ll make it.”

  She stared up at him, hesitant.

  He sighed and framed her face with his hands. “Merlyn, if I were poor, with no money and no prospect of having any, would you love me less?” he asked pointedly.

  That shocked her. Her eyes scanned his face—his black eyes, his jutting brow. “Oh, no,” she confessed softly. She reached up a hand to trace the line of his lips. “No, I wouldn’t care what you had. I never have.”

  “Then why can’t you believe that I want you for yourself?” he asked. “I wouldn’t care if you were poor, either. It wouldn’t matter. If it will convince you,” he added, “have your father disinherit you. Then we’ll get married and raise children and see if we can build our bank into the biggest in the state.”

  “You’re serious!” she burst out.

  “Of course I’m serious,” he said with failing patience. His eyes grew, if possible, even blacker and his arms went around her suddenly, crushing her body into his. “My God, can’t you see it? For an intelligent woman…Merlyn, for God’s sake, I love you!”

  Her eyes dilated until they looked like saucers. “Me?”

  “You, you crazy, outlandish, flamboyant little seductress,” he growled. “You teased me and tempted me until I couldn’t even add a column of figures without seeing you, and I’ve chased you and done everything but beg, and I still can’t make you see!” His eyes closed. “Merlyn, I’ll do anything short of murder to get you. Didn’t the orchestra recital tell you anything? Damn it, I’ve stopped wearing musk cologne—haven’t you had a sniff of me yet? I doused myself with British Sterling before I came over here. I’ve traded in my black car for a red one. I’ve got new shirts—stripes and colors, and new
ties…!”

  Her fingers against his mouth stopped the passionate tirade. She smiled slowly, lovingly, as it all began to make sense. “If I agree to marry you,” she said, “will you let me seduce you once in a while?”

  His chest rose and fell heavily. “Any time you like,” he agreed.

  “And you won’t make fun of me if I wear outlandish clothes once in a while?”

  He shook his head.

  Her hands spread out over his chest in a lazy, caressing motion. “And is Delle out of the picture forever?”

  “Delle was out of the picture the night I met you,” he breathed. He bent and passed his lips lazily over her closed eyelids. “I wanted you on sight. And it got steadily worse. At that party, when we were dancing, I thought I’d go mad if I couldn’t kiss you. Did you think I made a habit of dragging women into closets?”

  “No,” she admitted. She looked up at him. “Cam, you don’t have to go overboard with it. I don’t want to change you. I just want you to let me be myself. If you love me, that’s all that matters. That’s everything.”

  “I love you, all right,” he murmured huskily. His arms tightened. “Oh, God, I do love you so! And that night after you’d been so wild in my arms, you walked out the door with that damned drummer and wouldn’t even look at me!”

  “And there you were, kissing Delle!” she grumbled.

  “Trying to forget you,” he admitted, watching her. “And it didn’t work. She was afraid I’d muss her hair or smudge her lipstick. It was your mouth I was kissing, anyway. Delle hasn’t half the passion you have, my darling.”

  “I was so afraid that night,” she whispered fervently, meeting his gaze. “I wanted you, you see. I ran out with Dick because I was so vulnerable, and I was sure I couldn’t say no to you. He’s just a friend; that’s all there’s ever been between us.”

  He smiled slowly. “I’m glad to know that.” He traced her nose with his finger. “That night…were you trying to compete with Delle, when you led me into the bedroom and had your way with me?”

  She nodded. “Yes, I think I was,” she murmured. She laughed shyly. “I never believed I could do that with a man.” Her eyes lowered to his chest. “But I thought you were going to marry Delle, as you’d said you were, and that one night with you was all I could ever expect. I wanted it to be a night to remember.”