How to Trap a Tycoon

by Elizabeth Bevarly

  Mack, on the other hand…

  God knew she worked hard enough to earn more for herself than what she had to show for it. She lived with her mother and didn't own a car. She didn't seem to go out or travel—as if she had the time. He knew her tuition was paid at Severn by the work she performed there as a teaching assistant, and he also knew she made a decent wage at Drake's. So just what the hell did she do with the money that she did make? he wondered. And why did she work so hard? Especially since she had a mother who lived in a posh neighborhood and who dressed like a spread out of Vogue. Why did Mack work herself to exhaustion?

  "Have a drink with me, Mack," he heard himself say suddenly. "You look like you could use one."

  She had just folded down the flaps on the last of the liquor boxes, and when she straightened, she tossed her head a bit to dislodge a couple of unruly curls from her forehead. The rest of her hair was still bound in the elaborate braid she always wore, and Adam had been itching all night to loose it. Soon, he told himself. Very soon.

  She had loosened her necktie, at least, some time ago, and now it hung from her collar. Somewhere along the line, she had also freed the top two buttons on her white shirt and rolled back the cuffs, and the casualness of her uniform, usually so starched and pressed at Drake's, made him smile.

  So she could relax when the occasion for such a thing arose, he thought. That was good. Because right now, he felt like relaxing himself.

  "All right," she conceded with a tired smile. She retrieved a cocktail glass from beneath the bar and filled it with ice, poured in a conservative amount of Johnnie Walker Black, then splashed a little water on top.

  Adam sighed with much disappointment, tipping his head at her choice of beverage. "You drink like a girl," he told her.

  She lifted the glass to her lips, sipped it daintily, then softly retorted, "Do not."

  He chuckled. "You're right. At least you drink Scotch, like a man. A man who's a total wuss, granted, drinking blended—and with water, no less—but still… At least you don't drink anything that's"—he shuddered for effect—"pink. Call me a traditionalist, but I don't think liquor was ever meant to come in pastel colors."

  She eyed him indulgently. "Gee, next you'll be complaining about the feminization of pro basketball."

  "Actually," he told her, "I've already complained about that. A lot."

  "What? You don't think women have as much right to wear silly-looking shorts, get all sweaty, and chase a ball pointlessly through a gymnasium, as guys do?" She smiled mildly. "Gosh, this'll just ruin the enlightened, sensitive, beta-male image of you that I carry tucked secretly in my heart."

  Adam smiled and enjoyed a very alpha-male swallow of his own unblended and unwatered Scotch. "You women are taking everything away from us men," he complained.

  She expelled an incredulous sound. "Oh, hang on a minute. Let me go get a bucket to catch the flow from my bleeding heart."

  He chuckled. "Well, you are. Don't you read my monthly rants in Man's Life?"

  "I don't read Man's Life," she replied readily, unflinchingly.

  "Liar," he said with a smile. "You've offered enough commentary on my views over the last few months to assure me that you read my magazine with some regularity."

  Her expression remained impassive as she said, "I suppose you feel violated by that, don't you? A woman invading your man's world."

  "Not really," he told her honestly. "Contrary to popular belief, I'm not a chauvinist, a sexist, or a lout."

  Her eyes widened in mock astonishment. "I'll alert the media."

  He laughed. "I'm not," he insisted. "Never once have I intimated that one gender is superior to the other."

  She eyed him intently now, running the pad of her middle finger slowly, methodically, around the rim of her glass. For some reason, as he watched that finger make its slow revolution, Adam's mouth went dry. Hastily, he lifted his own glass for another sip, but the mellow liquor that cooled his throat did nothing to quell his thirst. Instead, as it splashed in his belly, it only warmed him in ways that he really didn't need to feel warm right now.

  "You think men and women are the same, then?" she asked him.

  "No," he told her. "I think they're totally different from each other."

  "And you don't think that's a sexist opinion?"

  "Of course not. I don't think either gender is better or smarter or more capable than the other. They're just different, that's all. Each has its own inherent weaknesses and strengths. Actually," he added, "when you get right down to it, the two genders complement each other ideally."

  Now she gazed at him with much interest. "What do you mean?"

  He shrugged. "Men might have greater physical strength, but women have greater emotional strength. Where men analyze a situation in terms of black and white, women can distinguish the necessary shades of gray. Where men see the quickest, most direct path between point A and point B, women see side trips that can make the journey more interesting and more profitable."

  She eyed him with frank astonishment. "Amazing," she said. "We actually agree on something for a change."

  "You think men and women are inherently different?" he asked, unable to mask his surprise. "I'd think you were one of those people who considered them to be exactly alike. You seem like such a rabid feminist to me."

  "I am a rabid feminist," she said readily. "But just because I think both genders are equally important to the global village, that doesn't mean I think they're the same. I agree with you that men and women are built differently," she told him. "They see things differently, they say things differently, and they operate differently. And only in acknowledging their differences can they put them to good use."

  "And that's the whole point to Man's Life," he said with a nod of approval. "It's a publication that celebrates what makes a man a man. It's vital information for my gender to use in furthering the cause."

  She digested that for a moment, then smiled. "Just like How to Trap a Tycoon is vital information for my gender to use in furthering the cause," she said.

  He arched his eyebrows in surprise. First that she would bring that damned book up again, when she knew how he felt about it, and second that she would actually equate it with Man's Life. "Oh, I don't think so," he said.

  "Sure it is," she retorted. "Man's Life is a magazine that celebrates all the nice things that men have. How to Trap a Tycoon is a book that tells women how to go about getting those nice things, things they don't already have because they've been denied them by men."

  Adam rolled his eyes and pushed himself away from the bar. "Oh, great. Here we go again. Men have everything and women have nothing."

  He made his way to a leather sofa near the fireplace, where a few orange and yellow flames still danced and flickered. Then he set his drink on a side table and sat down, folding his hands over his midsection. Mack wasn't the only one who had forsaken sartorial splendor for comfort. Adam had shed his jacket and shoes some time ago and had freed his own tie from its mooring, along with the top couple of buttons on his shirt.

  "Believe it or not, Mack," he continued, "I got that the first time you said it months ago. And the second time you said it. And the third. And the fourth. And the—"

  "Until the problem is rectified," she interrupted him, "it bears repeating. For thousands of years, men have deliberately denied us our rightful economic rewards. And there's no end to that tradition in sight."

  She, too, moved from behind the bar and strode across the room, taking her seat at the opposite end of the sofa without awaiting invitation. Then she kicked off her shoes and tucked her feet beneath her, leaning back into the corner of the couch as if she owned the place. Adam smiled at the picture she presented and considered her lack of inhibition to be a very good thing.

  "Hey, men don't deny women anything," he told her. Although his tone was vehement, his pose remained quite casual, and he could only deduce that it was because this was the most comfortable he'd felt for quite some time. A week at
least. Man, he'd missed his little chats with Mack. Hell, he might as well admit it—he'd missed Mack.

  He'd missed her a lot.

  "Women like being dependent on men," he added. "That's their reward for their hard work. They get protection. They get affection. They get us."

  She laughed. "You have got to be kidding. Like that's some prize."

  He shook his head. "Of course I'm not kidding. Men are a prize. That's why How to Trap a Tycoon is such a phenomenal best-seller. That's why Lauren Grable-Monroe has become such a guru to the modern woman. As annoying as I find her, at least she has the balls to come right out and say what women actually want."

  Mack smiled indulgently. "And what, pray tell, is it that women actually want?"

  "They want to be taken care of. By men. They want to be protected. By men."

  She lifted a hand to her forehead and shook her head slowly, as if she was having trouble processing the words he was saying. "Oh, please," she finally replied. "You have no idea what women want. You have no idea what it's like being a woman in a man's world, nor do you have any idea what it's like to not have money. Not only have you been wealthy from the day you were born, but, well…" She shrugged. "You're a guy."

  Adam eyed her thoughtfully for a moment, thinking that the two of them were finally getting around to something they should have gotten around to a loooong time ago. "Gee, Mack, I thought you'd never notice."

  "Adam…" she murmured, the warning in her voice unmistakable.

  He held up his hands, palm out, in surrender and returned to the matter at hand. "And you do, I assume," he said. "Know what it's like to do without money, I mean," he quickly clarified. "The being a woman in a man's world part, well…" He couldn't help making a slow perusal of her person, taking in the loosened necktie, the open collar of her man-style shirt, and all the soft, round places of her body that her masculine attire did nothing to hide and everything to enhance. "Well, that goes without saying, doesn't it?" he concluded.

  She pretended to ignore his perusal, then, just when he thought she was going to ignore that comment, too, she told him, "Yeah. I know what it's like to do without money. I'm a woman, after all."

  "So I've noticed."

  "Adam…"

  "Is that why you majored in sociology?" he asked, this time ignoring her—or, at least, her warning. "Because of your economic disadvantages?"

  He was honestly curious about her answer. He really had always wondered why Mack had chosen the major she had. She was a smart woman, certainly capable of excelling at whatever topic she decided to study. Why sociology? Why not something that would enable her to, oh … make a living, perhaps? Just a thought.

  She shook her head. "No. I chose sociology because of my own gender disadvantages."

  He threw his hands up in mock surrender. "Oh, boy. Here we go again."

  "Hey, you asked."

  "So I did," he conceded, dropping his arms to fold them back over his midsection. "And I suppose the least I can do is allow you to respond."

  Dorsey eyed Adam with a mixture of longing to be close to him and a desire to escape him. How on earth had they wandered down this road? The last thing she wanted to talk about was why she'd chosen her field of academic study.

  She sighed fitfully and shoved a handful of curls off her forehead as she propped an elbow on the back of the couch. It really was much too late to get into this tonight. She should just go home and forget about how nice it felt to be with Adam again. Forget about how much she had missed being with him this way, just talking. Forget about how much she wanted to be with him in another way, too. Forget about how wonderful it would be to sit here all night with him, just talking. Or … something.

  Instead of forgetting all that, though, she heard herself saying, "You know my mother, of course."

  Adam nodded. "She's a charming woman."

  "Yes, Carlotta is that," Dorsey agreed.

  He considered her with much interest. "Why do you call her Carlotta?" he asked.

  "Oh, gee, I don't know," she replied mildly. "Maybe because that's her name?"

  He chuckled. "No, I mean, why don't you call her Mom?"

  She grinned. "Does Carlotta honestly seem like a Mom to you?"

  He thought about that for a moment. "Well, no, now that you mention it, I suppose not. But it's still kind of unusual."

  "Maybe. But I've never called her anything else. I guess she just always referred to herself as Carlotta when I was a very young child, so I learned to call her that, too. But we digress," she said pointedly.

  "Yes, we were talking about how charming your mother is."

  Dorsey nodded. "That's because being charming is Carlotta's life's work."

  "And why is that?" he asked.

  She sighed heavily, set her drink on the end table beside her, and dropped her hand into her lap. "Because being charming—among other things—is pretty much how my mother makes her living."

  A flare of bewilderment crossed Adam's face. "What do you mean?"

  Dorsey inhaled deeply again before continuing very carefully, "My mother has … made her way in the world by … being kept. By whatever man will have her, whatever man can afford to keep her for any length of time."

  "Kept," Adam repeated, his expression clouding a bit more. "I'm not sure I follow you."

  Dorsey smiled benignly. "Oh, I bet you do. You're a smart guy. Think about it."

  He opened his mouth to speak, said nothing for a moment, then ventured, "Are you saying that your mother has spent her life as a man's mistress?"

  Dorsey smiled again, though it wasn't as happily as before. "Actually, I think Carlotta prefers to think of herself as a courtesan, and she's actually been more than one man's mistress, but… Yes. For the most part, my mother"—she adopted her best Blanche Dubois, crushed-magnolia voice—"has always depended on the kindness of strangers."

  Adam said nothing for a moment, just seemed to mull that over for a bit before continuing. Dorsey let him mull, because she knew it wasn't every day that a man found himself chatting with the product of an illicit love affair. If, of course, one could call Carlotta's relationships love affairs. Which, of course, Dorsey didn't. Had there been love involved in any of them, neither she nor her mother would be alone these days. Carlotta's relationships had been founded for economic reasons, at least on her part. As to why her benefactors had entered into the union, well…

  Dorsey still wasn't quite sure what they'd gotten from the arrangement, other than the obvious—sex. They certainly hadn't entered into the relationships out of love.

  "Your mother mentioned that night at your house that she had never been married," Adam said, stirring her thoughts.

  "No, she hasn't been," Dorsey agreed.

  He hesitated a moment before continuing, "Even so, I assumed that she and your father…" But he left the statement unfinished.

  Not that it needed finishing, she thought. She had known this was coming, had set herself up for it. It made sense that Adam would be curious about such a thing, and neither Dorsey nor her mother had ever tried to hide the circumstances surrounding her birth, though they never named Reginald Dorsey specifically as her father.

  And it wasn't like this was the first time Dorsey had had to explain to someone the absence of a father in her life. Ever since she was six years old—the last time she'd spoken a word to her father—she had been spinning one tale or another to explain why he wasn't around. First for her friends, then for herself. Somewhere along the line, though, she'd forgotten which of those tales was true and which were wishful thinking.

  What it all boiled down to was that Reginald Dorsey had been one of her mother's patrons for almost ten years. It was evidently as close to a love affair as Carlotta had ever come. During that time, she had become pregnant with Dorsey. Reginald had been attentive enough to his daughter those first six years—when he'd been around—but once he'd tired of Carlotta, he had, of necessity, shed his daughter, too. Since then, Dorsey hadn't exchanged a single word
with him.

  Oh, she knew quite a bit about him, and not just through Carlotta's recounting of the past. He was a prominent local businessman who had been happily—to the outside world, at least—married until his wife's death more than a year ago. He claimed three grown legitimate children, all older than Dorsey, and lived alone now save the servants in a big, beautiful Tudor mansion in Hinsdale .

  In fact, since he and Carlotta traveled in the same social circle, her mother still ran into him from time to time. On those occasions, according to Carlotta, the two of them would exchange polite conversation for as little time as they could manage. Rarely, though, did he ask about his—other—daughter.

  Dorsey's social circle was considerably less affluent than Reginald's and Carlotta's was, so she never ran into the man. Nor did she ever ask after him, either. Carlotta had forgiven him for his abandonment of her two decades ago, ascribing it to hazards of the job. Dorsey, however, had never been employed by Reginald. Therefore, she had always reasoned, she didn't have to forgive him.

  "My father," she told Adam, "was one of my mother's benefactors. Many, many years ago," she added unnecessarily.

  "You say that in the past tense," he noted.

  She nodded. "That's because all of it is in the past."

  "He's not a part of your mother's life anymore?"

  "No."

  "Not a part of your life?"

  "No."

  "Do you know who he is?"

  Dorsey felt herself coloring and fought the heat back down. She had no reason to feel embarrassed, she told herself. She wasn't responsible for her illegitimacy. And these days, there was little stigma attached to such a birth. Had it only been that way when she was a child, too, things might have been a little easier.

  "Yes," she told Adam. "I know who he is."

  "And he knows about you?"

  "Yes."

  "Yet he's not a part of your life."

  "No."

  "Nor your mother's."