by Kay Hooper
“I guess we’ll find out.” Zach was staring toward the building’s entrance. “There’s Travers.” They both watched the silver-haired man step into a gleaming limousine that drove away without lingering. “I guess you’ll find out at least part of it tonight.”
When Leon had gone, Raven took a quick shower and got ready for bed. She habitually wore a silk and lace teddy as sleepwear, and dressed now in a violet creation that left little to the imagination. Feeling a bit chilled in the air-conditioned penthouse, she also donned a white silk robe.
She went into the kitchen and made a pot of cocoa, then carried her cup into the den and gazed around restlessly. She didn’t want to sleep, didn’t want to dream. She debated between television and a book, deciding finally to read and listen to music. But instead of using the built-in stereo system the penthouse boasted, she got a portable tape player from her bedroom and set it carefully on a low table beside a large arrangement of silk flowers.
Though it hardly looked it, the small tape player had one special quality that Raven depended on whenever she felt it necessary to confuse listening ears: it was designed to damp out reception by electronic bugs like the one planted among the silk flowers.
Raven had made a habit of playing the tape recorder whenever she felt like listening to music. Habitual behavior tended to allay suspicion; by checking with his security people, Leon would know that she was alone, and had no reason to guard against being bugged. And she also needed at least occasional moments free of the sensation of someone listening to every sound she made.
Leon had examined the player—apparently casually but with real thoroughness—after she used it the first night. After that he had ignored it. Undoubtedly his electronics experts had assured him that the tape player was harmless, that it was beyond the present state of the art to build a machine that could overcome electronic listening devices. The expert who had built this one had assured her that his breakthrough invention was top secret.
When the doorbell rang, Raven froze. The guard downstairs had not announced a visitor. Kelsey? She went quickly to the door and peered through the peephole—and the frozen sensation she’d previously experienced was nothing compared to the cold she felt now. Icy hands moved to unlock and open the door, and she stared at Josh with a horror she could not conceal.
He brushed past her without a greeting, going into the den and turning in a slow circle to stare at the blatant wealth all around him. He looked at the stark white carpet that was ankle-deep, at the plush gray pit grouping, at glass-topped tables and oil paintings and fragile lamps and vases. Then he turned to stare at her as she came slowly nearer.
“So you don’t know Leon Travers?” His voice was taut, the savagery held in check barely below the surface.
Raven drew the lapels of her robe tightly together and crossed her arms over her breasts, trying to think. “What are you doing here? How did you—”
“Answer me!”
The lash of that voice was enough, just barely enough, to jolt Raven’s mind. She thought fleetingly of the man who after several drinks had laid his kingdom wistfully at her feet, comparing that gentle man—and gentleman—with this tautly controlled but obviously savage stranger. Not two different men, just two sides of one man.
She kept her voice steady with a tremendous effort. “I know him. I’m doing some work for him.”
“What kind of work?”
Raven’s chin came up swiftly, and only years of discipline enabled her to stop herself from reacting to the scorn and disgust in that final word. But it took everything she had … much more than she had ever needed before.
She spoke in a measured, impersonal tone. “Work. Since you seem to know this is his building—which, by the way, isn’t commonly known—then you must be aware that Mr. Travers is very security-conscious. I wouldn’t have a job very long if I told anyone who asked what my work entailed.”
“This is his penthouse.”
“No. He holds the lease, but if you’re implying what I think you are, that he stays here, you’re wrong. He sublets the place on a temporary basis to people who work for him. Like me.”
“He left half an hour ago.”
“We sometimes work here. Like tonight.”
Josh wanted to believe her. God, how he wanted to. But he knew too many other apparent facts to let go of this so easily. “And the clothes?” he asked tightly, gesturing to her expensive sleepwear. “The car downstairs in the garage? Does he sublet those too?”
He watched her face drain of its remaining color, fighting the instincts urging him to go to her, gather her in his arms, tell her that he hadn’t meant it, could never think she was—
“I’m not a whore.” Her voice was very soft, toneless. The laughing violet eyes were dark and still, and her face was expressionless. “But you think what you like. You will anyway. Get out, Josh. Before I call the security people and have you thrown out.” It was a bluff; the last thing in the world Raven would have done was call attention to his presence here.
Josh reached out to catch her shoulders, all but shaking her. “I don’t want to believe it,” he said thickly. “But you’re here … dressed like this … and he just left.…” The smell of herbal soap rose from her skin, and Josh felt dizzy suddenly; his heart told him the woman he held couldn’t possibly be what the dossier claimed, but the cool brain that had added immeasurably to an empire reminded him that some dirt couldn’t be seen. “Raven …”
“Get out.” Her voice was no longer steady.
“I can’t.” He thought distantly of Zach’s warning and wondered what it would do to him if he found out she was what the report said she was. It didn’t bear thinking of. “It’s too late for me to get out.”
She didn’t understand what he meant; her mind had stopped working. And her protest was only a faint broken cry when he pulled her suddenly against him and captured her lips with an odd, despairing hunger.
Raven tried to fight, struggling in his arms with the devastating knowledge that he believed her to be something terrible. Others had believed the same thing; she had made certain of that. But for Josh to believe it hurt her dreadfully. She didn’t want to respond to his passion … didn’t want to feel this for a man who thought her a whore.
But the seductive magic of his touch sapped even horror, and her body responded mindlessly. She felt him pulling aside the silk robe, and his lips pressed her shoulder, her throat. Her knees were weak, and she slid her arms around his neck, seeking the strength that he had and she had lost.
His mouth found hers again, his head slanting to deepen the contact, his tongue touching hers and demanding a response. He kissed her as though she were his for the taking, and he intended to take … and take.… Raven had never felt such utter certainty radiating from a man, such primitive determination, and she couldn’t fight him or the shivers of pleasure and excitement that were shaking her body.
And Josh, holding the vital, responsive woman tightly against his own hardening, heating body, knew dimly that he was again on the edge of totally losing control. He was no longer conscious of even faint surprise that she held the power to do this to him, the power to ignite his body and shake his mind. He was aware only of building need, the surging fire of a ragged and overpowering desire.
And it wasn’t just a woman he wanted. He wanted her, Raven. The muscles of his belly contracted and his legs were rigid with tension as he widened them and pulled her even closer, one hand sliding over her silk-clad back to her hips, pressing her yielding warmth into full and aching contact with his swelling body.
“I don’t believe it,” he muttered hoarsely against her skin. “I can’t believe it. I couldn’t feel this way if you weren’t what I think you are.”
“Josh …”
He was moving against her subtly, one hand pressing her hips to his strongly, the other tangled in her long hair, kissing her deeply again and again. “I want you until I can’t think straight,” he breathed. “Until I can’t see anything b
ut you, feel anything but you.”
Every breath rasping harshly in his throat, Josh held her, kissed her, touched her compulsively. But even though she responded to every touch, he could feel, at first dimly, that she was holding back. And he remembered belatedly what he had accused her of, remembered that he had all but said aloud what no man should ever say to a woman. Not something she could forget, even in the mindless heat of passion …
His tongue caught the salt of tears on her cheeks, mute testimony that he was right, and it shook him badly. “Don’t. I’m sorry I hurt you.”
Hurt. It gave Raven the strength to pull away from him, the thought of who would be hurt if she allowed Josh to distract her from what she had to do. Crying … why was she crying? She hadn’t realized. She turned away, rubbing her wet cheeks with the backs of her hands and retying her robe, then sank down on the couch with an unsteady sigh. “Get out,” she whispered.
He sat down beside her, catching her hand when she would have moved away. “I can’t, Raven. I can’t leave while you think—I’m sorry about what I said. So sorry. Please believe that.”
She shook her head a little, trying to think. “I believe you’re sorry, but you can’t take back the words. Or the doubt. It doesn’t make for a good beginning, Josh. Just let it stop here, all right?”
“No.” He lifted a hand to her face, making her look at him. His breathing was only beginning to steady, and his voice was deep and husky. “I told you I was a patient man; somehow, I’ll make it up to you for what I said tonight. I won’t walk out of your life, Raven.”
Raven looked at him and knew she was lost, knew she would do everything in her power to keep him safe—except let him walk away. She couldn’t do that. Not even to save either of them. “Then there’s something you have to understand. And something you have to promise me.”
“Anything,” he said instantly.
She glanced around at the opulent apartment. “This part of my life is separate. You can’t be a part of it. When I’m in the other apartment, I can see you. But not here. Never again here.”
He was frowning. “But you won’t tell me why?”
“I can’t. For—for security reasons. If you can’t accept that, then it’s no good.” Tell me you can’t accept that. Walk away from me before I destroy us both.
“Raven—”
“I mean it. I know it’s a lot to ask, that—that everything looks and sounds bad, but you’ll just have to decide if you trust me. And that’s all.” A lot to ask! her mind sneered at her. With the evidence all around him, no man would trust her as she asked. No man could trust her.
Josh looked into those steady, beautiful, hurting violet eyes and knew right then, in that moment, that no matter how bad things appeared, he did, in fact, trust her. Doubts and uncertainties faded away. “All right.” He smiled crookedly. “I think I forgot to mention it, but I love you.”
She was shaken, and looked it. “Josh, don’t say that. Everything is so complicated right now. I can’t even think.”
“I have to say it.” He leaned forward to kiss her gently. “But I won’t say it again until you’re ready to hear it.” He released her, then reached into his pocket and withdrew a business card and a pen. He turned the card over and jotted a number quickly, then handed her the card. “This is my phone number at the hotel. Will you promise to call me as soon as you’re back in the other apartment?”
She nodded, unable to do anything else.
He rose to his feet, then hesitated as he looked down at her. Dear Lord, he couldn’t bear to leave her! “Will it be very long?”
Raven met his look as steadily as she could. “Days. I’m usually here for days at a time.”
His jaw tightened, but he nodded. “I’ll wait.” He headed for the door, pausing when he reached it to turn and gaze at her. “No one will know I was here; I came up the back way, and that’s how I’ll leave.” Then he was gone.
Raven stared at the door for long moments, still aware of the warmth of his touch, still seeing the sudden gentleness of his eyes. She was vaguely conscious of the music that had played steadily while he was with her, the machine automatically restarting itself after playing one side of the tape. And in the back of her mind, a small voice spoke up wryly. No wonder Hagen said I’d be no good to him once I fell in love.
She had taken that step; there was no going back. None of her painfully won defenses had been able to stand against him; she couldn’t fight what she felt. And Raven wondered what—and whom—she might have sacrificed to love a man.
“No more cavorting in parks,” Kelsey told her cheerfully when they met quietly two days later. “You seemed a bit distracted, so I thought you might have needed reminding that we’re on a tight schedule.”
“I’m glad you did.” They were in a museum, and Raven was gazing at the large abstract painting on the wall near the bench on which they sat. The huge room was deserted except for them.
Kelsey sent her a thoughtful look. “I couldn’t help but wonder who he was.”
“Don’t give me that. You ran his license plate.”
He chuckled. “So I did. Car’s a rental.”
“Yes. So?”
“So,” Kelsey said softly, “I got back a lot of gibberish from the computer.”
Raven turned her head slowly and stared at him. “The rental company would have had an agreement—”
“You’d think. But I couldn’t trace that plate. Oh, the company acknowledged the car was theirs, but they said it was being serviced, not rented.”
The hollow feeling inside Raven grew. “His name is Joshua Long,” she said quietly. “At least that’s what he told me, and I saw an ID.” She remembered then, and added slowly, “Just a business card with his name and a phone number. A New York number, I think.” He’d given her a card, but Raven didn’t have it with her and couldn’t remember the phone number.
“Rings a bell.” Kelsey frowned. “He’s not from L.A.? Where’s he staying?”
She told him. She was simultaneously close to laughter and tears now that it was her turn to suspect Josh of being something other than he seemed. She didn’t like the uncertainty. She didn’t like it at all.
“How’d you meet him?”
“He’s the man I knocked down in the hotel.”
Plainly worried, Kelsey ran fingers through his hair. “I’ll check him out. Meantime, I hope you sent him on his way.” When she remained silent, his voice sharpened. “Raven?”
“I’ll see him only at home,” she said softly, not about to tell Kelsey that Josh had found her in Leon Travers’s penthouse.
Kelsey felt faint surprise, but only because it hadn’t happened until now; he’d always known Raven would fall hard when she finally did fall. “I’ll check him out—quickly,” he said.
“I still don’t understand what I’m doing here,” Rafferty Lewis complained to Zach as they sat in the den of Josh’s suite. “I’m an attorney, not a detective.” His humorous brown eyes flicked a glance at the third man in the room, a rather strikingly handsome gentleman with a leonine mane of blond hair and sharp blue eyes. “Lucas is the detective.”
“You’ve got to remember,” Lucas Kendrick told the lawyer in his curiously compelling voice, “that the boss didn’t send for us. Zach did. And though I’ve been here only a day, I agree with him. There’s something very fishy going on.”
“Well, what?”
Zach, never stirring from a deep chair where he somewhat grimly contemplated the remainder of the brandy in his glass, told the newly arrived lawyer everything that had happened up until that day, finishing with, “Lucas has been following the lady; he’ll tell you the rest.”
The chief investigator for Josh’s empire took up the story. “I asked questions about her at the apartment building where the manager denied to Josh that lady lived there; she made the same denial to me. Claimed the place was empty. Then I checked out the other apartment, and it is leased to Travers, not sublet. The staff wouldn’t talk.
Rafferty’s normally humorous face was sober, as was his voice. “And then?”
“Then she returned to the garage, changed back to her glamorous self, and went back to the penthouse.” He shook his head, frowning. “I managed to find a talkative maid in the cleaning service for the building—not easy, believe me. Their security is pretty tight. But the maid said Raven Anderson is very quietly known as the Ice Maiden. She’s been there only a few weeks. None of the staff believes she’s Travers’s mistress; they think he’d have more luck with a glacier.”
“And domestic help usually knows that kind of thing,” Rafferty observed almost to himself.
“Damn right they do.” Lucas sighed. “So it looks like the boss was right about that, anyway.”
Zach stirred a bit and looked at the other two. “Maybe he’s right about the rest. When he came out of the penthouse the other night, he believed her. Somehow, she’d convinced him. And we all know how many women have tried to con Josh in one way or another through the years. He’s nobody’s fool. I think he’s right about her background being fabricated.”
Rafferty looked at him sharply. “Because Josh believes in her? Or was there something that finally turned up in her background? You said it checked out.”
“Oh, it did.” Zach nodded morosely. “On the surface. We dug deeper, and it checked out. Then we kept digging—and a funny thing is happening.”
“Don’t keep us in suspense,” Josh drawled from the doorway.
The three men watched as he came out of his bedroom and moved to lean against the desk. None of them got to their feet, but only because Josh disliked formality. Besides, their respect for Josh needed no outward signs to be apparent.
