The Stanislaski Series Collection, Volume 1

by Nora Roberts

  “Hi.” Sydney’s face brightened the moment she saw him. She carried a garment bag in one hand and a bottle of champagne in the other. “Something smells wonderful. My mouth started watering on the third floor, and…” She spotted Keely standing near the worktable with a bowl cupped in her hands. “Hello.” After clearing her throat, Sydney told herself she would not be embarrassed to have Mikhail’s neighbor see her coming into his apartment with a suitcase.

  “Hi. I was just going.” Every bit as uncomfortable as Sydney, Keely darted back into the kitchen to grab her soft drink.

  “It’s nice to see you again.” Sydney stood awkwardly beside the open door. “How did your murder go?”

  “He strangled me in three takes.” With a fleeting smile, she dashed through the door. “Enjoy your dinner. Thanks, Mik.”

  When the door down the hall slammed shut, Sydney let out a long breath. “Does she always move so fast?”

  “Mostly.” He circled Sydney’s waist with his hands. “She is worried you will seduce me, use me, then toss me aside.”

  “Oh, well, really.”

  Chuckling, he nipped at her bottom lip. “I don’t mind the first two.” As his mouth settled more truly on hers, he slipped the garment bag out of her lax fingers and tossed it aside. Taking the bottle of wine, he used it to push the door closed at her back. “I like your dress. You look like a rose in sunshine.”

  Freed, her hands could roam along his back, slip under the chambray work shirt he hadn’t tucked into his jeans. “I like the way you look, all the time.”

  His lips were curved as they pressed to her throat. “You’re hungry?”

  “Mmm. Past hungry. I had to skip lunch.”

  “Ten minutes,” he promised, and reluctantly released her. If he didn’t, dinner would be much, much later. “What have you brought us?” He twisted the bottle in his hand to study the label. One dark brow lifted. “This will humble my goulash.”

  With her eyes shut, Sydney took a long, appreciative sniff. “No, I don’t think so.” Then she laughed and took the bottle from him. “I wanted to celebrate. I had a really good day.”

  “You will tell me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Let’s find some glasses that won’t embarrass this champagne.”

  * * *

  She didn’t know when she’d been more charmed. He had set a small table and two chairs on the tiny balcony off the bedroom. A single pink peony graced an old green bottle in the center, and music drifted from his radio to lull the sounds of traffic. Thick blue bowls held the spicy stew, and rich black bread was heaped in a wicker basket.

  While they ate, she told him about her decision to promote Janine, and her altercation with Lloyd.

  “You ask for his resignation. You should fire him.”

  “It’s a little more complicated than that.” Flushed with success, Sydney lifted her glass to study the wine in the evening sunlight. “But the result’s the same. If he pushes me, I’ll have to go before the board. I have memos, other documentation. Take this building, for example.” She tapped a finger on the old brick. “My grandfather turned it over to Lloyd more than a year ago with a request that he see to tenant demands and maintenance. You know the rest.”

  “Then perhaps I am grateful to him.” He reached up to tuck her hair behind her ear, placing his lips just beneath the jet drops she wore. “If he had been honest and efficient, I wouldn’t have had to be rude in your office. You might not be here with me tonight.”

  Taking his hand, she pressed it to her cheek. “Maybe I should have given him a raise.” She turned her lips into his palm, amazed at how easy it had become for her to show her feelings.

  “No. Instead, we’ll think this was destiny. I don’t like someone that close who would like to hurt you.”

  “I know he leaked Mrs. Wolburg’s story to the press.” Worked up again, Sydney broke off a hunk of bread. “His anger toward me caused him to put Hayward in a very unstable position. I won’t tolerate that, and neither will the board.”

  “You’ll fix it.” He split the last of the champagne between them.

  “Yes, I will.” She was looking out over the neighborhood, seeing the clothes hung on lines to dry in the sun, the open windows where people could be seen walking by or sitting in front of televisions. There were children on the sidewalk taking advantage of a long summer day. When Mikhail’s hand reached for hers, she gripped it tightly.

  “Today, for the first time,” she said quietly, “I felt in charge. My whole life I went along with what I was told was best or proper or expected.” Catching herself, she shook her head. “That doesn’t matter. What matters is that sometime over the last few months I started to realize that to be in charge meant you had to take charge. I finally did. I don’t know if you can understand how that feels.”

  “I know what I see. And this is a woman who is beginning to trust herself, and take what is right for her.” Smiling, he skimmed a finger down her cheek. “Take me.”

  She turned to him. He was less than an arm’s length away. Those dark, untamed looks would have set any woman’s heart leaping. But there was more happening to her than an excited pulse. She was afraid to consider it. There was only now, she reminded herself, and reached for him. He held her, rubbing his cheek against her hair, murmuring lovely words she couldn’t understand.

  “I’ll have to get a phrase book.” Her eyes closed on a sigh as his mouth roamed over her face.

  “This one is easy.” He repeated a phrase between kisses.

  She laughed, moving willingly when he drew her to her feet. “Easy for you to say. What does it mean?”

  His lips touched hers again. “I love you.”

  He watched her eyes fly open, saw the race of emotion in them run from shock to hope to panic. “Mikhail, I—”

  “Why do the words frighten you?” he interrupted. “Love doesn’t threaten.”

  “I didn’t expect this.” She put a hand to his chest to insure some distance. Eyes darkening, Mikhail looked down at it, then stepped back.

  “What did you expect?”

  “I thought you were…” Was there no delicate way? “I assumed that you…”

  “Wanted only your body,” he finished for her, and his voice heated. He had shown her so much, and she saw so little. “I do want it, but not only. Will you tell me there was nothing last night?”

  “Of course not. It was beautiful.” She had to sit down, really had to. It felt as though she’d jumped off a cliff and landed on her head. But he was looking at her in such a way that made her realize she’d better stay on her feet.

  “The sex was good.” He picked up his glass. Though he was tempted to fling it off the balcony, he only sipped. “Good sex is necessary for the body and for the state of mind. But it isn’t enough for the heart. The heart needs love, and there was love last night. For both of us.”

  Her arms fell uselessly to her sides. “I don’t know. I’ve never had good sex before.”

  He considered her over the rim of his glass. “You were not a virgin. You were married before.”

  “Yes, I was married before.” And the taste of that was still bitter on her tongue. “I don’t want to talk about that, Mikhail. Isn’t it enough that we’re good together, that I feel for you something I’ve never felt before? I don’t want to analyze it. I just can’t yet.”

  “You don’t want to know what you feel?” That baffled him. “How can you live without knowing what’s inside you?”

  “It’s different for me. I haven’t had what you’ve had or done what you’ve done. And your emotions—they’re always right there. You can see them in the way you move, the way you talk, in your eyes, in your work. Mine are…mine aren’t as volatile. I need time.”

  He nearly smiled. “Do you think I’m a patient man?”

  “No,” she said, with feeling.

  “Good. Then you’ll understand that your time will be very short.” He began to gather dishes. “Did this husband of yours
hurt you?”

  “A failed marriage hurts. Please, don’t push me on that now.”

  “For tonight I won’t.” With the sky just beginning to deepen at his back, he looked at her. “Because tonight I want you only to think of me.” He walked through the door, leaving her to gather the rest of the meal.

  He loved her. The words swam in Sydney’s mind as she picked up the basket and the flower. It wasn’t possible to doubt it. She’d come to understand he was a man who said no more than he meant, and rarely less. But she couldn’t know what love meant to him.

  To her, it was something sweet and colorful and lasting that happened to other people. Her father had cared for her, in his erratic way. But they had only spent snatches of time together in her early childhood. After the divorce, when she’d been six, they had rarely seen each other.

  And her mother. She didn’t doubt her mother’s affection. But she always realized it ran no deeper than any of Margerite’s interests.

  There had been Peter, and that had been strong and true and important. Until they had tried to love as husband and wife.

  But it wasn’t the love of a friend that Mikhail was offering her. Knowing it, feeling it, she was torn by twin forces of giddy happiness and utter terror.

  With her mind still whirling, she walked into the kitchen to find him elbow deep in soapsuds. She set basket and bottle aside to pick up a dish towel.

  “Are you angry with me?” she ventured after a moment.

  “Some. More I’m puzzled by you.” And hurt, but he didn’t want her guilt or pity. “To be loved should make you happy, warm.”

  “Part of me is. The other half is afraid of moving too fast and risking spoiling what we’ve begun.” He needed honesty, she thought. Deserved it. She tried to give him what she had. “All day today I looked forward to being here with you, being able to talk to you, to be able to share with you what had happened. To listen to you. I knew you’d make me laugh, that my heart would speed up when you kissed me.” She set a dry bowl aside. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  He only shook his head. “You don’t even know you’re in love with me. But it’s all right,” he decided, and offered her the next bowl. “You will.”

  “You’re so arrogant,” she said, only half-annoyed. “I’m never sure if I admire or detest that.”

  “You like it very much because it makes you want to fight back.”

  “I suppose you think I should be flattered because you love me.”

  “Of course.” He grinned at her. “Are you?”

  Thinking it over, she stacked the second bowl in the first, then took the skillet. “I suppose. It’s human nature. And you’re…”

  “I’m what?”

  She looked up at him again, the cocky grin, the dark amused eyes, the tumble of wild hair. “You’re so gorgeous.”

  His grin vanished when his mouth dropped open. When he managed to close it again, he pulled his hands out of the water and began to mutter.

  “Are you swearing at me?” Instead of answering her, he yanked the dishcloth away from her to dry his hands. “I think I embarrassed you.” Delighted, she laughed and cupped his face in her hands. “Yes, I did.”

  “Stop.” Thoroughly frazzled, he pushed her hands away. “I can’t think of the word for what I am.”

  “But you are gorgeous.” Before he could shake her off, she wound her arms around his neck. “When I first saw you, I thought you looked like a pirate, all dark and dashing.”

  This time he swore in English and she only smiled.

  “Maybe it’s the hair,” she considered, combing her fingers through it. “I used to imagine what it would be like to get my hands in it. Or the eyes. So moody, so dangerous.”

  His hands lowered to her hips. “I’m beginning to feel dangerous.”

  “Hmm. Or the mouth. It just might be the mouth.” She touched hers to it, then slowly, her eyes on his, outlined its shape with her tongue. “I can’t imagine there’s a woman still breathing who could resist it.”

  “You’re trying to seduce me.”

  She let her hands slide down, her fingers toying with his buttons. “Somebody has to.” She only hoped she could do it right. “Then, of course, there’s this wonderful body. The first time I saw you without a shirt, I nearly swallowed my tongue.” She parted his shirt to let her hands roam over his chest. His knees nearly buckled. “Your skin was wet and glistening, and there were all these muscles.” She forgot the game, seducing herself as completely as him. “So hard, and the skin so smooth. I wanted to touch, like this.”

  Her breath shuddered out as she pressed her fingers into his shoulders, kneading her way down his arms. When her eyes focused on his again, she saw that they were fiercely intense. Beneath her fingers, his arms were taut as steel. The words dried up in her mouth.

  “Do you know what you do to me?” he asked. He reached for the tiny black buttons on her jacket, and his fingers trembled. Beneath the sunny cap-sleeved suit, she wore lace the color of midnight. He could feel the fast dull thud of his heart in his head. “Or how much I need you?”

  She could only shake her head. “Just show me. It’s enough to show me.”

  She was caught fast and hard, her mouth fused to his, their bodies molded. When her arms locked around his neck, he lifted her an inch off the floor, circling slowly, his lips tangling with hers.

  Dizzy and desperate, she clung to him as he wound his way into the bedroom. She kicked her shoes off, heedless of where they flew. There was such freedom in the simple gesture, she laughed, then held tight as they fell to the bed.

  The mattress groaned and sagged, cupping them in the center. He was muttering her name, and she his, when their mouths met again.

  It was as hot and reckless as before. Now she knew where they would go and strained to match his speed. The need to have him was as urgent as breath, and she struggled with his jeans, tugging at denim while he peeled away lace.

  She could feel the nubs of the bedspread beneath her bare back, and him, hard and restless above her. Through the open window, the heat poured in. And there was a rumble, low and distant, of thunder. She felt the answering power echo in her blood.

  He wanted the storm, outside, in her. Never before had he understood what it was to truly crave. He remembered hunger and a miserable wish for warmth. He remembered wanting the curves and softness of a woman. But all that was nothing, nothing like the violent need he felt for her.

  His hands hurried over her, wanting to touch every inch, and everywhere he touched she burned. If she trembled, he drove her further until she shuddered. When she moaned, he took and tormented until she cried out.

  And still he hungered.

  Thunder stalked closer, like a threat. Following it through the window came the passionate wail of the sax. The sun plunged down in the sky, tossing flame and shadows.

  Inside the hot, darkening room, they were aware of no time or sound. Reality had been whittled down to one man and one woman and the ruthless quest to mate.

  He filled. She surrounded.

  Crazed, he lifted her up until her legs circled his waist and her back arched like a bow. Shuddering from the power they made, he pressed his face to her shoulder and let it take him.

  * * *

  The rain held off until the next afternoon, then came with a full chorus of thunder and lightning. With her phone on speaker, Sydney handled a tricky conference call. Though Janine sat across from her, she took notes of her own. Thanks to a morning of intense work between herself and her new assistant, she had the information needed at her fingertips.

  “Yes, Mr. Bernstein, I think the adjustments will be to everyone’s benefit.” She waited for the confirmation to run from Bernstein, to his lawyer, to his West Coast partner. “We’ll have the revised draft faxed to all of you by five, East Coast time, tomorrow.” She smiled to herself. “Yes, Hayward Industries believes in moving quickly. Thank you, gentlemen. Goodbye.”

  After disengaging the speaker, she
glanced at Janine. “Well?”

  “You never even broke a sweat. Look at me.” Janine held out a hand. “My palms are wet. Those three were hoping to bulldoze you under and you came out dead even. Congratulations.”

  “I think that transaction should please the board.” Seven million, she thought. She’d just completed a seven-million-dollar deal. And Janine was right. She was steady as a rock. “Let’s get busy on the fine print, Janine.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Even as she rose, the phone rang. Moving on automatic, she plucked up Sydney’s receiver. “Ms. Hayward’s office. One moment, please.” She clicked to hold. “Mr. Warfield.”

  The faintest wisp of fatigue clouded her eyes as she nodded. “I’ll take it. Thank you, Janine.”

  She waited until her door closed again before bringing him back on the line. “Hello, Channing.”

  “Sydney, I’ve been trying to reach you for a couple of days. Where have you been hiding?”

  She thought of Mikhail’s lumpy bed and smiled. “I’m sorry, Channing. I’ve been…involved.”

  “All work and no play, darling,” he said, and set her teeth on edge. “I’m going to take you away from all that. How about lunch tomorrow? Lutece.”

  As a matter of course, she checked her calendar. “I have a meeting.”

  “Meetings were made to be rescheduled.”

  “No, I really can’t. As it is, I have a couple of projects coming to a head, and I won’t be out of the office much all week.”

  “Now, Sydney, I promised Margerite I wouldn’t let you bury yourself under the desk. I’m a man of my word.”

  Why was it, she thought, she could handle a multimillion-dollar deal with a cool head, but this personal pressure was making her shoulders tense? “My mother worries unnecessarily. I’m really sorry, Channing, but I can’t chat now. I’ve got—I’m late for an appointment,” she improvised.

  “Beautiful women are entitled to be late. If I can’t get you out to lunch, I have to insist that you come with us on Friday. We have a group going to the theater. Drinks first, of course, and a light supper after.”

  “I’m booked, Channing. Have a lovely time though. Now, I really must ring off. Ciao.” Cursing herself, she settled the receiver on his pipe of protest.