Soon other people joined the group, drawn by the laughter and the charming, beautiful woman who was at its center.
When Holly was introduced to the new people, she memorized names and faces. Often she complimented the women on some aspect of their appearance. Always she guided the conversation so that no one was left out.
When the group became too large for easy conversation, Holly signaled Beth with a glance and withdrew without leaving a ripple behind.
Eagerly Beth whispered to Holly.
“Cyn’s over there near the cheesecake,” she said.
“Hope she doesn’t curdle it.”
Beth snickered. “C’mon, let’s go see her.”
“Not yet. There are a lot more people to meet.”
Beth groaned.
“Don’t look so disappointed,” Holly said. “I like meeting people.”
“I don’t see how meeting old married couples is going to make Cyn eat her words,” Beth said bluntly.
“Watch.”
“Like I have a choice?” Beth muttered.
Holly looked around. She saw a young couple standing alone and rather uncertainly at the edge of the dance floor.
“Do you know them?” Holly asked.
Beth sighed. “I know everyone.”
“Introduce me.”
Dutifully Beth led Holly over to the couple.
It didn’t take long before other young couples were drawn like bright leaves into a whirlpool. Then several men and women who were alone also joined in.
The conversation ranged from horses to politics to the intricacies of downhill skiing and mountain trail bikes. Again, Holly became the center of an animated, laughing group. Again, it was her real interest in people rather than her beauty alone that held everyone’s attention.
Again, Holly withdrew quietly when the crowd reached the point that it no longer needed a center.
As Beth led Holly toward another area of the room, the younger girl smiled like a cat licking cream.
“I’m catching on,” Beth said.
“Are you?”
“At least two of those men left Cyn to join our group.”
Holly made a noncommittal sound and looked around the room.
Linc still wasn’t there.
She had hoped he would come to the pavilion, see her making friends, and perhaps not be so angry with her Shannon appearance.
But no matter where Holly looked, she didn’t see a man who carried himself like Linc.
With my luck, she thought unhappily, he won’t get here until we start peeling the handsome single males off Cyn.
Holly grimaced. She enjoyed meeting people. She did not enjoy being a siren.
Yet in her job as the Royce Reflection, she had learned to do both quite well.
I’ll stall a little longer, she told herself. Then I’ll do what has to be done.
By the time Holly had gathered and faded out of two more groups, Linc still hadn’t arrived. Worse, it became impossible to find new people to meet.
Holly couldn’t move ten feet without being asked to dance. Her campaign to charm the people who lived nearby and worked with Linc was an unqualified success, one that she enjoyed as much as the people who warmed themselves in her presence.
But Linc had seen none of it.
“Well,” she said to Beth, “let’s get it over with.”
“Cyn?”
“Cyn.”
“Cool. She’s still by the cheesecake.”
Together they walked toward Cyn. It took ten minutes to go fifty feet because Holly was graciously refusing offers of food or dance or conversation at every step.
“Okay,” Holly said. “I want you to distract her. I’ll come in from the back.”
“Distract her? How?”
Holly smiled gently. “Remember the mirror, honey?”
Beth nodded.
“Two of the men don’t look much older than you,” Holly pointed out.
Beth looked startled.
“Don’t you know them?” asked Holly.
“Yes, but—”
Holly waited.
“What do you want me to do?” Beth asked.
“Do you like any of the men?”
“Oh, sure. Jim’s a lot of fun, and even though he’s only nineteen, he’s the best trainer in the valley, next to Linc.”
“Then tell him.”
Beth blinked and nibbled on her lower lip.
“Go ahead,” Holly encouraged. “Nobody will bite you for being honest. Except Cyn, of course. Don’t be honest with her. Ignore her completely.”
Holly watched while Beth walked slowly toward Cyn. When the girl was only a few feet away, her chin came up and her posture straightened.
As Holly moved to circle around, she saw Cyn’s look of surprise when she saw Beth.
“Well, well,” Cyn said, “since when does Linc let you play dress up?”
Holly held her breath and hoped that Beth would hold her tongue.
Ignoring Cyn, Beth turned and smiled at the young man next to the alluring blond.
Holly couldn’t hear what was said, but it was clear that the young man’s attention was no longer on Cyn.
“Where’s your chum?” Cyn asked. “The plain one, little miss what’s-her-name.”
Beth looked up and smiled. “Right behind you, Cyanide.”
Cyn turned and looked past Holly, not recognizing her.
Then Cyn looked again. Her mouth opened, closed, and opened once more.
“Hello, Cyn,” Holly said casually.
Then she turned her brightest smile on the stranger who had his right hand possessively on Cyn’s arm.
“I’m sure I would have remembered if we had been introduced,” murmured Holly, holding out her hand. “I’m Holly.”
The man gave her the kind of up-and-down look that she found offensive. She kept her smile in place even when he took her hand in both of his and drew her closer.
“My name is Stan,” he said. “Where on earth did you come from? Or was it heaven?”
“Manhattan.”
She hoped that no one would notice that her smile was as thin as her patience with Stan’s sort of man.
She turned to the older man who was standing on Cyn’s other side. Deliberately, Holly gave him a flirtatious look from beneath long black lashes. As her right hand was securely held by Stan, she offered her left.
“And you are . . . ?” she asked.
“Gary,” he said dryly, taking her hand. “I’m just along for the ride.”
She looked at the man more closely, then gave him a genuine smile.
“Aren’t we all?” she answered, her voice as dry as his.
He reassessed Holly in a single glance, smiled and nodded. He tucked her hand under his arm.
“You look thirsty,” he said, and began to lead her away.
Stan refused to let go of Holly’s other hand.
“Not so fast, buddy,” he protested.
Holly glanced over her shoulder just in time to see Beth quietly leading Jim and the other young man toward the buffet.
Cyn didn’t notice. She was still staring in total disbelief. Holly smiled gently at her before turning to Stan.
“I’m sure there’s more than one glass of champagne at the bar,” she said. “Why don’t you join us?”
He didn’t have to be asked twice.
Less than three minutes after Holly had said hello, Cyn was left standing alone.
By the time Holly disengaged from the disappointed men, Roger, Jerry, and three of Roger’s models had arrived.
Roger’s immaculate good looks attracted as many women’s glances as Holly attracted men’s. When they danced together, people stared. The combination of light and dark was arresting.
As always, Holly enjoyed Roger’s easy wit and conversation, but her eyes kept searching the pavilion for Linc.
“Missing someone?” Roger asked, his tone playful and his blue eyes intent.
“Mmm,” she said absently.
She noticed that Cyn had collected another group of men.
“Excuse me,” Holly said. “I have some claws to trim.”
“Will you be long?” he asked.
Her lips curved in an icy smile.
“Five minutes,” she said. “Ten at most.”
“I’m devastated.”
“Uh-huh,” she said, unimpressed. “Why don’t you make some women happy and dance with them?”
Before he could answer, she had turned away and was heading quickly toward Cyn. A few minutes later Holly walked away from Cyn, followed by several men, leaving the petite blond alone.
The scene repeated itself, with variations in the cast of men, several more times in the next hour and a half. Only two things didn’t change—Roger’s presence and Holly’s anxiety about Linc’s absence.
Roger watched with increasing perplexity and amusement while Holly repeatedly stripped Cyn of admirers, herded them to the other end of the pavilion, and went back to looking for Linc.
It was futile. He was nowhere to be found.
Holly was certain that she sensed Linc’s presence. But each time she looked, she couldn’t find him.
Roger appeared at her elbow as soon as she shed the latest admirers she had stripped from Cyn.
“Why do I get the feeling you have something against the little blond with the big . . . sequins?” he asked, laughter rippling beneath his words.
Holly smiled with some bitterness.
“Yes,” she said, “I suppose you could say that.”
“Competition for the cowboy?” he asked lightly.
Before answering, Holly looked around the pavilion once more. A certainty of Linc’s presence kept shivering across her nerves, telling her that he was nearby. Yet she couldn’t find him in the brightly lit tent.
Holly looked over her shoulder. There was only darkness outside. No one was on the lighted walkway leading to the pavilion.
Sighing, she turned back to Roger.
“It’s a long story,” she said.
One corner of his mouth turned up.
“Smashing,” he said. “It will be ten or fifteen minutes before Cyn collects enough men to make it worth the walk.”
“I’ll wait.”
Roger glanced over Holly’s shoulder and smiled cynically.
“Could be a long wait,” he said. “Guess she finally figured it out.”
Holly turned and saw Cyn leaving the pavilion on Jerry’s arm. The photographer’s smile was practiced and predatory.
“Want to make a last foray?” Roger asked.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” she said, smiling.“They deserve each other.”
“What could Cyn have done to deserve Jerry?” Roger asked.
Holly’s smile widened. Of all the people she knew, Roger was the most likely to enjoy the story of Cyn’s discomfort. Overdressed women irritated the designer’s sense of proportion.
“Cyn and Beth—that’s Linc’s younger sister—don’t like each other,” Holly said. “Cyn and I were out shopping. She called Beth a plain little thing.”
“Beth? Which one is she?”
“The young lady in the turquoise skirt and glorious golden hair standing next to the tall redhead.”
“Oh, that one. She’s ravishing, like an unopened rose.”
“Beth thought she was plain.”
Roger looked at Holly in disbelief.
“When I told Beth she wasn’t plain, Cyn asked what I could know about it, since I was as plain as a concrete slab.”
Roger’s eyes widened.
“I’m speechless,” he said.
And meant it.
“The upshot of it was,” Holly said, “that I bet Cyn I could have men standing in line to talk to me at this dance.”
Roger laughed and laughed.
“She called you plain?” he asked incredulously. “I suspected she wasn’t very smart, but I didn’t know she was blind.”
Holly’s smile was as brilliant as her eyes.
“I do look a bit different when I’m not dressed up,” she said demurely.
“That,” Linc’s cold voice said behind her, “is the understatement of the century.”
Sixteen
Roger looked from Holly’s stricken face to Linc’s narrow-eyed fury.
Holly simply looked at the man she loved.
Despite his obvious anger, Linc was handsome enough to break her heart. His evening clothes had been tailored to fit the long, lean lines of his body. Every time he moved, the material outlined another aspect of his masculine grace and power.
Roger looked at the two of them, so consumed by each other that no one else existed. Yet Roger knew that Linc’s anger was as real and potentially dangerous as lightning.
With a soft curse, Roger put a finger under Holly’s chin, turning her head until she was looking at him rather than Linc.
“I don’t know why he’s mad,” Roger said, “but instinct tells me that his bite is worse than any bark I’ve ever heard. If you need first aid, you know my room number.”
She said nothing.
“Are you listening, Shannon?” he asked softly.
She nodded.
He gave Linc an unreadable look.
“If she comes to me,” Roger said coolly, “you’re a bloody idiot. I’ll wrap her in silk bandages and you’ll never see her again.”
Roger stared back into Holly’s eyes. They were tarnished gold, mysterious, sad. Wary.
“Some men are as dangerous as they look,” Roger said. “Be careful, love.”
He kissed her lips lightly, brushed past Linc, and disappeared into the darkness beyond the pavilion.
Linc made a harsh sound.
“It’s a wonder that the tame Viking isn’t immune to beautiful models by now,” he said.
As he spoke, he looked Holly over with a thoroughness that made her weak. His eyes lingered on the fine chains that dipped and quivered between her breasts with each breath she took.
“Before I even got out of the house,” he said, “people were coming up to me and telling me what a charmer Beth’s friend Holly North was. Not just the men, but the women, too. They all fell in love with you.”
Breath held, Holly waited, hoping against hope.
“So I hurried out here to enjoy you,” he said. “I couldn’t find you. I found someone else, though. What’s that name again? Shannon?”
“Yes,” she said in a low voice. Then, more clearly, “Yes. Shannon. My mother’s maiden name. My middle name. Shannon. No secret, Linc. You knew the name six years ago.”
He muttered a single, vicious word.
“No secret?” he snarled. “Christ, what kind of a fool do you think I am?”
He heard his own words and laughed with a bitterness that made her flinch. Then he looked at her with cold, hungry eyes, the eyes of a predator.
“Scratch that question,” he said savagely. “You already know what kind of fool I am. I’m the fool who thought you were a virgin.”
“I am.”
“Yeah. Right.”
Holly started to speak, but could only gasp as his fingers shot out and clenched around her wrists.
“No,” Linc said coldly. “Not one more lying word. See you at midnight, Shannon.”
He dropped her wrists and strode into the crowd without a backward look.
The rest of the dance moved by in a haze of misery for Holly. Even Beth’s transparent glee at Cyn’s rout brought only a small smile to Holly’s lips. She kept up the facade of charm and pleasure as best she could, but her heart was counting the minutes to midnight.
Linc was like the music, present everywhere.
No matter how often she turned around, he was there, watching her the way a cat watches a butterfly gliding just beyond its reach.
She could only hope that by midnight he would have cooled off enough to listen to her.
When I explain that I was dancing and flirting only to win a bet for Beth, she told herself, Linc will understan
d.
When I tell him that it was the truce he insisted on that kept me silent about the details of my modeling career, he’ll get over his anger.
When I tell him how much I love him—
Her thoughts scattered as a hand closed on her arm just below the gleaming gold chains.
“It’s midnight,” Linc said.
His voice, like his expression, was remote.
He pulled her toward the dance floor with a strength that was just short of bruising. When they were in the center of the floor, he turned Holly to face him.
“Smile, Shannon,” he said. “You’ve smiled at every other damn man tonight, why not at me?”
Her lips trembled.
“You matter too much to me for easy smiles,” she whispered.
Linc’s lips formed a cynical curve.
“Very good, Shannon,” he said. “I’ll have to compliment Roger. He’s made you a sure winner in the Pleasure Riding class.”
The double meaning of his comment went through Holly like a knife.
“Roger has never been my lover!” she said furiously.
“Keep it up, Shannon. Make the kind of scene my stepmother loved to make. I’ll give it right back to you in ways you’ll never forget.”
“You might think of Beth,” Holly said in a tight, low voice.
“The one who looks just like her mother tonight?” he asked. “I’d rather not, thanks.”
Linc’s arm closed around Holly. Moving with him because she had no choice, they began dancing to the lyric strains of the same ancient waltz that had begun the evening.
She moved awkwardly. It was impossible to dance any other way because her head was tilted back and held by the pressure of Linc’s arm over her long hair. She stumbled, wincing as her hair jerked against the vise of his arm around her waist.
When she reached back with her left hand to free her hair, he abruptly pulled her closer.
Holly tripped and fell against him. When she tried to protest, his arm closed so ruthlessly around her that she could barely draw a breath.
When she tried to break free, he simply lifted her feet off the ground.
She had always known Linc was strong, but had never thought he would use his strength against her like this. He left her just enough room to breathe, just enough leverage so that her feet didn’t dangle, just enough freedom of movement so that her imprisonment wasn’t obvious.
Desert Rain with Bonus Material Page 15
