"No," Colby said, his voice cracking. He cleared his throat. "No," he said in a firmer voice. "Brandon will have to be sent away."
Elise rose like a towering Fury to lambast her husband for betraying their son, for even thinking of tearing him from her arms.
Colby's hard gaze silenced her in mid-sentence. "It's got to be done, Elise, and it will be done at once. If Duncan hadn't stepped in, Brandon's actions could have destroyed Colangco and the Lang name. We might even have seen Brandon arrested, tried, and convicted. Think of the headlines, Elise. Think of the gossip."
Elise Lang sat down suddenly in her chair, white and trembling.
"He mustn't be given another chance to ruin us," Colby stated. He had aged ten years in the last few minutes. "He won't be given another chance. I'll send him off to Australia, ostensibly to open a branch office of the company. We'll give him an allowance. I'll have people watching him to make sure he doesn't get into any further trouble. In a year, we'll formally announce his departure from the firm. By then, no one will remember Maurizio or the Giscard diamonds. No one will think his removal from Colangco is at all suspicious."
"That's pretty much the plan I came up with," Duncan said.
Colby gave him a long, hard look. "It seems to me you've been pretty busy lately."
"It's been a full day."
"I may have … misjudged you."
"It's possible," Duncan conceded.
"But what will Brandon do?" Elise wailed.
"Maybe he'll finally become the internationally famous magician you wouldn't let him be," Duncan retorted. "He might even earn enough to keep his bookies' accounts current."
"I won't have you being hateful to Brandon!" Elise cried. "I won't."
"Sometimes the truth is hateful, Mother."
"I suppose," Colby said, unable to mask the loathing in his pale blue eyes, "that you want to take over Brandon's position in the firm now."
"No," Duncan replied, surprising his father. Even now, he loved it when he could do that. "You will agree, I think, that I've pretty much rescued Colangco from disaster. I could always spill the beans to the press, of course, but unlike my brother, I find that I actually do believe in loyalty and honor. But that's not to say I don't deserve something in return for all my hard work and silence."
"What do you want?" Colby grimly demanded.
Absolution? Peace of mind? What do I want? His father had never asked him that before. "I want to head a new Colangco division devoted to criminal investigations," Duncan said calmly. "I want Emma Teng promoted to full investigator, made my partner, and fully and equitably compensated for her new position. I want a free hand in running the division, hiring and firing, and choosing what cases I take on. You can groom whoever you want to take Brandon's place, except, of course, that I must agree to your choice, and your selection understands up front that this is a salary-and-commission deal only, without hope of any kind of company ownership, because Colangco is mine, Father. My birthright, my future. Mine. I want you to change your will and the necessary Colangco paperwork so that I inherit the company upon your death or retirement."
"Is that all?"
Duncan met his father's deadly gaze. "That's all."
Colby's eyes faltered for a moment. Clearly, he had expected much more unreasonable and lengthy demands. "Very well, I agree. I'll make all the arrangements tomorrow after I … talk to Brandon." His cold expression crumbled for just a moment.
Duncan looked quickly away. He knew how devastating this was for his father. He didn't need to see it too. "I'll be around to sign whatever papers you need me to sign," he said. "Good night, Mother. Good night, Father."
He walked out of the library, and down the stairs, and out the front door of his parents' house. He made it to the sidewalk before his legs gave out. He sat down heavily on the curb, staring at the well-lit, quiet street. Life as he had known it had just come to an end.
* * *
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
« ^ »
For the next few days, when Harley wasn't making music, she was making love with Duncan. She woke up in the morning to make love. Duncan went to work and she worked on her music. Duncan came to her on his lunch hour and they made love. Duncan went back to work and she went back to her music. After dinner they made love all night long.
Her days were almost perfect, except there was a quality in Duncan's lovemaking, as if he were savoring one last sip of wine before the bottle was empty. She didn't understand. His need for her was as voracious as hers for him. His satisfaction as deep and full as her own. And over that, and through it, and beneath it, was this feeling … almost of despair.
Like her pendant, he had a hidden compartment locked deep inside of him, locking her out. Ever since the night Duncan had told his parents the truth about Brandon, that hidden compartment had been lodged between them. She could not open it. She could not move it. He would not discuss it. And that was the greater worry. He would not talk to her, not about Brandon, not even small talk. No matter how hard she threw herself against those walls, they would not come down. He would drug her instead with his kisses and his hands and then take her to bed. But even in the throes of ecstasy, she wanted to cry out at the pain of this new exclusion. Even as he taught her worlds of pleasure she had not even fantasized existed, he would not let her heart touch him with the same depth, the same intimacy, as he touched her.
He gave all of himself to her and would not let her give everything in return. That tiny hidden door within him remained shut and locked and silent.
It frightened her and angered her and confused her all at the same time. He knew a secret, and it seemed to be about her, and he wasn't telling.
The only balm was the strong feeling of union that pervaded every moment they were together or apart. They were connected, she and Duncan, not merely physically, but on every level. His silence could not change that. And in that connection there was hope. In that connection there was trust and support that she felt even as she walked onto the small Surrealistic Pillow stage on Friday night more than a little scared, because she would be performing some new material. She looked out at the audience and saw among the crowd every single member of the Rockin' Robins. Whoa. No pressure there. Then she felt Duncan's gaze warming her skin. She looked into the audience and found him easily. He smiled at her with utter confidence. Then he winked.
Bless the man! She laughed and opened her set with "Nice Girls Don't." She could hear the Sweetcreek in her voice now. It was also coming through stronger and stronger with each new song she wrote. So she had been a little unsure of how this rock-and-roll crowd would react. They were her test audience, her musical guinea pigs. If she could pull off the new material with this audience, she might stand a chance with her old fans and whatever new ones were lurking out there in the wide wide world of music.
She threw in some of her favorite old rock songs, like Elvis's, "I Can't Help Falling in Love with You" and Carole King's "I Feel the Earth Move," because she loved them and she knew the audience did, too, and because she wanted to sing them to Duncan. She even dragged Mark on stage to sing the Marvin Gaye—Tammy Tyrell duet "Ain't No Mountain High Enough," flirting outrageously with him through the song and grinning when he flirted right back.
The audience went nuts and stayed nuts. Hmm. Maybe she could publicly shift musical gears and still maintain her career.
After her set, Mark and Susan and the rest of the Rockin' Robins crowded around the table she shared with Duncan, everyone talking at once, except for Duncan. He just sat back in his chair, silently watching them all, laughing at their jokes, and … glowing. There was no other word for it. His eyes met hers and she gasped, because she realized in that moment of connection that he was happy because she was fully immersed in her brave new world of new friends and new music and new ideas that had nothing to do with what Boyd had demanded from her or her mother wanted.
Tears filled her eyes for a moment and she hastily looked away. How many ways could she
find to love this man? And how could she ever break through the new wall to convince him of her love without frightening him off?
On the cab ride back to the Colangco penthouse apartment that Friday night, his hands and his mouth were all over her, igniting a fever in her blood that burned all night long. So she sang Peggy Lee's "Fever" to him the next night at the Surrealistic Pillow, his gaze burning into her heart from thirty feet away. When they walked out of the club later that night, she found the Colangco limousine waiting for them. She understood why when, with the door closed behind them and the limo pulling away from the curb, Duncan grabbed her and took her on the back leather seat, the privacy screen between them and the driver shielding her cries and her writhing body as Duncan gave her no chance to think or speak or do anything but feel him in every inch of her body and her heart.
On Sunday night, she walked out of the Surrealistic Pillow higher than she'd ever been in nine years of performing on stage. It was she who grabbed Duncan in the back seat of the limo, her hands taking him with a swiftness that drew a strangled groan from his throat. It was she who pushed him down onto the leather seat and took him with all of the energy the club's audience had just pumped into her.
When the limo stopped in front of the Sentinel Building and the driver opened the back door, they stepped out onto the sidewalk looking like any other well-groomed couple enjoying a night on the town. Except, of course, that her ripped panties were shoved into Duncan's jacket pocket and he was holding that same jacket in front of him to keep from advertising to the passersby on the sidewalk that she had deliberately aroused him again just before the limo had pulled to a stop.
"You'll pay for this," he had warned as the driver opened the back door.
"I hope so," she had sunnily replied.
The moment the Sentinel's elevator doors closed behind them, he shoved her against the back wall of the elevator, his mouth sucking at her throat, his hands ripping open her sleeveless leather vest, buttons scattering on the floor. His hands roughly cupped her breasts for his mouth as he drank in one and then the other, Harley's hands clawing frantically at his back as they sped past the fifteenth floor.
His hands slid up under her short leather skirt. "Duncan," she pleaded, her heart shuddering in her breast. "Duncan!"
Dark, flaming eyes scorched her. "Payment in full, sweetheart." He grasped her naked flesh and suddenly lifted her up off her feet. Her gasp became a sob as he thrust into her, shock and pleasure melting her across his shoulders. He thrust again and she wrapped her legs around him, saying yes to this stark taking unlike any they had shared. He pressed her hard into the elevator wall, driving rhythmically into her, her naked breasts rubbing against his silk shirt, her teeth scoring his ear, his groans filling her as the elevator doors slid open.
They were alone. With Louis and Desmond back in France, there was no longer a need to post guards around the apartment.
Still buried deep within her hot flesh, Duncan carried Harley out of the elevator, impressing her further by managing to input the proper security code on the keypad and open the door, despite the obvious distractions. He carried her two feet into the apartment and got no farther. With one hand, Harley shoved the front door closed while her eager mouth claimed him, her tongue thrusting deep into his heat.
She was vaguely aware that he had crushed her against the entryway wall. His rapid thrusts blotted out every sensation but his rough possession, his fingers digging into her, her body opening to him more and more as her desire arced into the sun.
His skin through his shirt was burning her hands and her engorged nipples. His voice was guttural as he spoke wicked words of encouragement into her ear. His breath took on a staccato beat. He was coming and carrying her with him. Coming and burying himself deep inside her, as if he would never leave. Coming and shouting her name as she shattered in his arms.
He leaned against her for support, crushing her into the wall, his breathing as harsh as her own, his muscles as weak as hers as her legs slid helplessly down him, her feet meeting the floor.
"God, Duncan," she said at last, "where the hell is your bedroom?"
Chuckling, he took her to bed.
All of the ferocity seemed to have been burned out of him, but none of the fire. He made love to her for hours with a tenderness that pierced her soul as he brought her to one leisurely climax after another, different from any she had known. They built slowly, almost dreamily, their sudden violent conclusion easing away into another slow, steady buildup of pleasure that seemed to have no end. She began to drift in and out of consciousness, sharp pleasure rousing her, gentle hands soothing her once again. She felt his mouth pressing a gentle kiss to the palm of her hand before sleep finally claimed her.
She woke the next morning just as slowly. She could still feel the smile on her mouth. But she couldn't feel Duncan beside her.
She woke up with a vengeance, looking wildly around the room, and finding it empty.
"Duncan?" she called, afraid and not knowing why.
He walked into the bedroom through the living room door. He wore black jeans and a black T-shirt. He was barefoot. His black hair was askew. His black eyes were shuttered. "Awake so soon?" he asked.
He had stopped in the doorway. His face was taut and expressionless. A mask. He was not coming to her to touch her, to hold her, to kiss her good morning. Ice sheeted her skin. "What's wrong?" she whispered, holding the silver comforter against her breasts.
"It's been two weeks, Harley. Holiday's over."
She realized she was shaking. For a moment she couldn't breathe. "The holiday's over," she repeated. It must be some sort of code.
"Time for you to pack up and get on with your life," he said quietly.
"Oh," she said in a small voice. So this was why he'd been pushing her away these last few days. "I always knew there'd come a day when you got tired of me, I just didn't think it would be this soon." It was hard to make her jaws move properly for the words. "But then, I'm no Comtesse Pichaud. Or is it that we've just run out of variations on the theme and it's time for you to move on? No, don't answer that. It was stupid of me. You just don't want me anymore and that's all there is to it."
"Harley—"
"It's all right, I expected this," she said, dying inside. "I won't make a scene. I won't even make a fool of myself. I can't make you want me again if the connection is gone."
"Harley, will you shut up?" Duncan barked at her. She jumped a little in the bed, staring at him in confusion. He seemed so angry! "This has nothing to do with wanting you or not wanting you," he informed her. "It's simply that you planned a two-week holiday and the two weeks are up. Time for you to fly back to Los Angeles and make an album."
Her teeth felt as if she had just tried to bite through a rock. "You've decided this?"
"It was always your plan, Harley. I'm just helping you keep to your schedule."
Her gaze never leaving Duncan's masked face, Harley slid out of bed, picked up her green robe from the armchair in the nearby corner, and pulled it on. She was shaking like she had malaria. "I didn't know there was a schedule for us too."
"A summer fling is, by definition, short and sweet."
She felt as if he had just sucker punched her. "Is that what I am to you?"
"No. That's what I am to you."
She blinked. Then she got mad. "And who the hell told you that?" she demanded.
"I'm a detective. I deduced. It's what I do."
"Well, you deduced wrong. How dare you walk around deciding what I feel and what I need? You act like God on high dictating what I will and will not do and I'm not having it, Duncan. I'm not!"
"Harley," he said in that maddeningly calm voice, "you lived for nine long years without romance and adventure. You finally break free and what do you do? You take a lover. Your first. You start a new life and a new career. It doesn't take a very big stretch of the imagination to realize you're going to want new lovers in that new life."
"You know," Harley sai
d, stalking toward him, "there are times when I really just want to belt you one."
"That's only because I'm right and you know it."
"I don't and you're not!" she yelled, hands clenched in fists at her sides. "Man, when you go off on a wrong tangent you really go whole hog. You are not and have never been a fling, Duncan Lang! You are my love. You are my other half. You are the man I want to sing to for the rest of my life. Don't you get it, you flaming moron? I love you."
The mask slipped badly for a moment, but a quick breath put it firmly back in place. Still, that brief glimpse had told Harley everything. This was no by-the-book brush-off. He was in agony.
"Duncan," she said softly, her fingertips caressing the planes of his beautiful face, "how could you think I'd make love to you without loving you?"
He took a quick step back to escape her hand. "A first love affair is always highly emotionally charged," he stated. "The passion and the feelings are real, but they burn out, Harley. They burn out much too fast."
"You've had a lot of experience with affairs—first and otherwise—I know that, Duncan. But what we have is different. I'm not like those other women. I'm your kindred spirit."
His hand reached up, as if he would touch her. Then it suddenly dropped to his side. "And I'm just your first of many lovers."
She wanted to scream! "Look, I didn't come to you as an innocent. Being a virgin and being innocent aren't the same thing! I had lots of boyfriends in high school. I know what lust feels like and what infatuation feels like. I've had summer loves. Boyd may have scared off potential lovers, but I've met hundreds of men in the last nine years and none of them—none of them, Duncan—moved me or touched me or connected with me the way you do. None of them drew me the way I was drawn to you the first moment our eyes met. I knew almost from the beginning that you are the love of my life and that conviction has only grown stronger every day since."
STOLEN MOMENTS Page 26
