by Laurie Paige
“This is the wrong folder,” he said. “What did we do with the contract and those reports?”
“They were here last night.” Ken took the papers and shuffled through them. “These are blank pages. Did you put them in a file cabinet or safe?”
“No. They were right here the last time I saw them.”
“Would someone take them?” Ken asked, voicing the question that sprang into Harrison’s mind.
He shook his head, not in denial, but in puzzlement. “Why? They’re not bonds or anything worth money.”
“Except to us,” Ken reminded him.
Harrison stared at the other man. “Did I put them away? Better question—am I going crazy?” He headed for the wall safe.
“It’s probably senility,” Ken suggested blandly but with a wiseacre grin.
“Yeah,” Harrison agreed. He spun the cylinder. The safe swung open. Its newness was reflected in its emp- tiness. “Well, that rules out total forgetfulness. Dammit, I know we left those papers on the desk last night, all in a neat pile waiting for signatures.”
“Well, that’s what I thought—” Ken broke off when Isa appeared in the doorway.
“I may be of help,” she said.
Harrison narrowed his eyes and studied her. This time she held his gaze. She wore that beautiful, inscrutable mask that had intrigued him for the past month. He had a feeling he was about to find out what thoughts were hidden behind it.
“Ken,” he suggested in a level voice, “why don’t you go for a walk?”
Ken glanced from one to the other. “Uh, sure. Be back in, say, an hour?”
“That should be plenty of time,” Harrison agreed. Plenty of time for him to wring her neck and find out what she’d done with those reports and the contract that would save the company. He had to find it. The deal had to go through.
Isa reminded herself of all the righteous reasons she had for taking those papers. She returned his gaze, re- fusing to back down in the face of his growing anger.
He stalked toward her, stopping an arm’s length away. Choking distance, she thought inanely.
“Where are they?” he asked in a deadly quiet man- ner.
“In a safe place.” She folded her arms across her middle and clutched her elbows as if hanging on to her courage.
“I see.” A muscle twitched once in his jaw and was still. He stood without moving, his gaze more puzzled than hostile. “I can call the office and have new copies here within two hours.”
“Yes, but you needn’t bother. I’ll return them—”
He broke in impatiently. “I don’t have time for games.”
“In plenty of time for your meeting with Mr. Merry.” She paused for effect. “After we’ve reached an agreement.”
So far, so good. Her voice was steady and her com- posure intact, although she had to admit the killer gleam in his eyes was making her a bit nervous.
His lips curved in amusement, surprising her until she realized what it meant. He was contemptuous, mocking her paltry efforts at blackmail.
“We’ll see,” he said enigmatically and turned on his heel.
She stared at his back, stunned as he walked out. She hadn’t prepared for this scenario. She realized where he was going and dashed after him.
He was already halfway up the stairs, taking the steps three at a time in a series of running leaps. She followed his example, but jumped two steps at a time. At the top, she used the newel post to swing into the turn and en- tered her room only a couple of seconds after Harrison.
She careened into him as she rushed inside. He moved away as if her touch were distasteful. Then he headed for the bed.
With a ruthless thoroughness, he stripped the bed she’d made up an hour ago. With an admirable feat of strength, he tossed the mattress to the floor.
“There’s nothing here.” She breathed a sigh of relief. The mattress had been the last place she’d selected dur- ing the night. It was a good thing she’d moved the papers an hour ago. If he found them, she didn’t think he’d listen to her. If he didn’t find them, she had a chance to be heard and make her point.
Then he’d probably strangle her.
He methodically went through the entire room, searching every piece of furniture in and out, forward and back. And upside down for good measure.
She was glad she’d moved the nylon bag out of the closet. He’d have found it with no trouble. He checked her apres-ski boots and jacket pockets as well as every shelf.
She waited, arms crossed, for him to finish. “Let me know when you’re ready to listen,” she said with false patience.
He looked around with a frown, then went to the windows. He searched behind each drape, then checked the outside ledges.
By now, the room looked as if a demolition derby had run through it. Below, she heard the front door open. A draft of cold air swirled over her. Her glance flew to the clock.
“What time are you expecting Mr. Merry?” she asked.
Harrison slammed the last window closed and spun to face her. His expression would have done honor to a death mask.
Her death, she reflected, and suppressed an impulse to burst into hysterical laughter.
“This afternoon around three.”
“Five hours,” she reminded him.
“I can tell time.”
“Fortunately, we don’t have far to go or a long wait.”
“For what?” He looked big and mean, his fury as cold as an outdoor faucet on a sub-zero morning.
“The wedding.”
His chest lifted. His hands clenched into fists. He tossed the mattress back on the bed, then leaned against the dresser, hands in his pockets, legs stretched before him—the epitome of aristocratic hauteur. “Ours, I pre- sume?”
She nodded.
“So that’s what this was all about.” He gestured around the mussed room. Again he surprised her by smiling. “You were too impatient,” he told her.
She watched him warily.
“If you’d waited, you could have had the marriage without this hide-and-seek routine. I was this close to falling in love with you.” He lifted a hand and showed her how close.
She felt the pain, a bullet to the heart. She brushed it aside. He was the one playing games, teasing her with a possibility that didn’t exist, at least, not for her.
She returned his sardonic smile. “I couldn’t take the chance. Love can be…unpredictable.” And unreliable. Look at her father. Look at her fiancé.
“You obviously think taking the contract will force me into marriage. Sorry, but I can’t see the connec- tion.”
“That was to get your attention.”
“You got it.”
She chose to ignore the sarcasm. She cleared her throat and tried to remember the explanation she’d planned weeks ago. “I have to be married within a month—”
His harsh expletive startled her. His gaze jerked to her abdomen. Heat rushed to her face as she realized how he’d taken her words. “I’m not…I didn’t mean…I’m not pregnant,” she informed him with great dignity.
He visibly relaxed as if doing it consciously, the way people did in biofeedback clinics.
“No, I didn’t really think you were,” he said. “You’re too sharp to try to trap a man that way in this age of DNA testing.”
He let the thought spin into a calculated silence. She realized he was probing, searching for answers or for weak links in her armor. She wouldn’t let him find any.
“I did think of it,” she confessed with a rush of honesty. “But there wasn’t time.”
He considered that. “Right. You only have a month.” He gave her an impatient glance. “So go on.”
She smiled—mysteriously, she hoped—and refused to let him take charge. “Your time is up today. There’re only four hours and forty-five minutes left.”
He didn’t respond. Silence stretched to the breaking point.
“You planned it, didn’t you?” he finally said as if seeing the light and not liki
ng what he saw. “Every last detail.”
She thought of the hours in his arms. That had been a mistake. Loving made a woman soft and yielding. She had to be ruthless.
“Not every detail, no. I didn’t realize how strong…” She stopped, not wanting to give that much to him.
“The passion would be?” he suggested. “That, I ad- mit, was pretty incredible. You should have mentioned marriage night before last. I might have agreed.”
“But you might not.”
“What makes you think I’ll respond any better to blackmail than to passion?”
“You have too much to lose.” She was pretty sure she knew him well after a month of observation. Nob- lesse oblige, family honor and all that, he had it in spades.
“Why me?” he demanded. “You were engaged once. Surely there were other men you could have sunk your hooks into.”
Isa flinched inwardly at his choice of words. “You owe us. Your family owes my family.” She held his gimlet-eyed gaze with an effort.
“How do you figure that?” His lazy drawl and easy smile belied the controlled fury in the depths of his eyes.
“Your father and mine started the mining business together. My father was cheated out of his share…by yours—”
“The hell you say!”
Harrison was in her face before she could do more than take one step back from his threatening stance.
“My father was one of the most honorable men I ever knew,” he told her, his big body looming over hers, his fists propped on his hips in outright menace. “And he never had a partner.”
“I have the original document that proves my father was half owner of the mine.”
“Let’s see it.”
“It’s in a safety-deposit box.” She raised her chin. “Where no one can get hold of it and destroy it. How- ever, I do have a copy with me. I thought you’d insist on seeing it.” She dug into her pocket and handed the photocopy over.
She watched in fascination when he glanced at the claim, drew a deep breath and reasserted control over his temper. “How did my father pull this brilliant scam off?”
“A crooked poker game.”
Harrison looked as if he might explode. Again he controlled his fury. “I see.” He backed up a step and
crossed his arms, gesturing with the evidence she’d given him. “So why don’t you sue to get your claim reinstated? You’d get half the mine without having to put up with marriage, if this is worth the paper it’s writ- ten on.”
He watched her like a snake eyeing a rabbit. His stare was so intent, she was almost hypnotized by it. “I thought of that when I found the signed claim in my father’s papers after he died, but there was no money for lawyers and experts.”
When she’d broached the subject to her father a few times after he’d ranted about the loss and the crooked poker game, he’d told her she was stupid, that people like them wielded no power. Who would believe his word over his former partner’s?
It wasn’t until she came up against the juvenile judge that she’d understood what he meant. No matter what she said or did, the man wouldn’t let her have Rick until she was married and could provide a “stable” home.
That attitude smacked of sexism, but she’d had the sense not to say so. Instead she’d devised a plan to claim hers and Rick’s rightful inheritance and get the home they had to have.
“I have a legitimate claim on the mine,” she contin- ued. “That paper proves it. Unless you agree to mar- riage, I’ll show your investor my claim and tell him I intend to get a restraining order on any deal you sign.”
Harrison didn’t speak. He simply watched her as if she were an interesting specimen at a zoo. It made her uneasy.
“There’s one more thing,” she said.
“Now why did I suspect there might be?” he mur- mured.
She steeled herself to put on a brave front. This might be the hardest part. “My brother…Rick…”
Harrison looked mildly surprised when she brought up the subject of her brother. “Yes?” he snapped.
“He has to live with us.”
Silence greeted her rushed statement. Finally Harri- son gave her a feral smile. “Anything else?”
“You have to go with me to get him.”
“Where is he?”
“In Oregon.”
Harrison leaned an elbow on the back of a chair and stroked his chin as if studying the situation. “When?” he asked.
“In a month.”
When he didn’t speak but continued to look at her with his dark brows slightly raised, she explained rap- idly, “He’s to be turned over to court-appointed guard- ians at that time, either the state or…or me, if I can provide a home.”
“Ah.” A light dawned in his eyes. She wondered how much he really understood. If he knew how hard it was to face him, how frightened she was for her brother, how desperate…
She locked her hands together. “It will be a marriage in name only, but to the world we must present a picture of marital bliss. For the judge and the social worker.”
“I see. You get a home for yourself and your brother from the marriage. What do I get?”
She had the answer. “An annulment. In one year, the parole period will be up. Then, as soon as Rick gets out of school next June, we can file for an annulment.”
He gave a snort of laughter, whether in amusement or not, she couldn’t tell. He read over the claim signed by his father and hers once more.
“It’s genuine,” she insisted.
Without acknowledging her statement, he went to the phone and punched in a number. In less than a minute, he was speaking to his attorney. She clutched her arms across her middle and waited while Harrison read every word on the claim into the receiver. After a five-minute discussion with the lawyer, Harrison demanded, “Just tell me if it could be real.”
He listened, said a succinct curse, then hung up. He turned to her, his eyes like two glacier chips. “Even if this is upheld in court, you won’t be getting much. The mining company is running on a shoestring. It hasn’t made a profit in years.”
She nodded. She knew his troubles in detail. As a business major in college, she knew how to find infor- mation.
“People will lose their jobs, their homes, if you force me to close the mine,” he added. “The jewelry-making business isn’t enough to carry the operation or pay off the money my father had to borrow to stay in business.”
She watched him warily. She knew about that, too. The E.P.A. had forced the company to invest heavily in new equipment for pollution control. It was only be- cause she knew he was over a financial barrel that she’d dared this form of blackmail. He had to have Merry’s money; she had to have a home.
“If I’m to be married, I’m going to get all the benefits that go with it.” His gaze roamed her entire body from head to foot, with several pauses along the way, and back again.
She gasped aloud. It hadn’t occurred to her that he would want to have anything to do with her, other than keeping up the remotest facade to fool the judge and social worker. “No—”
“But yes,” he interrupted. “That sample you al- lowed me Saturday only whetted my appetite for more. Marriage might not be so bad if I can look forward to you in my bed every night.”
“No, I…we can’t.” That wasn’t in her plan.
“A celibate year? Is that what you’re suggesting?” His eyes glowed like hot coals. “No way.”
She collected her poise with an effort. “I won’t cause problems or interfere in your life. If you must have companions, I won’t object…as long as you’re dis- creet.”
“Very noble of you,” he murmured. “So I’m to have complete freedom in this marriage farce?”
He pushed away from the dresser and came to her. She stayed where she was, even when he stood almost toe to toe with her.
“You should have used your powers of persuasion to talk me into marriage,” he murmured in the softest of loverlike purrs. “Maybe you should try them
now. I’ve forgotten what I’ll get in the matrimonial package. Refresh my memory.”
His breath caressed her face as he bent close enough to allow her to demonstrate her lovemaking techniques on him.
“If your memory fails, use your imagination.”
“No, we’ll do it your way. Remember what hap- pened when we kissed? Your lips trembled…yes, like that…just a little…as if it were your first time….”
He lowered his head to hers as he spoke. With the last word, his mouth touched hers. Then he waited.
His tactics were blatantly unfair. It was all she could do not to melt against him. A woman could find peace and safety in those arms. If he offered them. At the very least she might drown in his eyes. He was so close she could see the golden lines that connected the brown centers to the blue outer edges.
Isa blinked and prayed for the strength to play this tease-and-tempt game with him. She was suddenly afraid he was more ruthless than she could ever be.
The ringing of the telephone didn’t make him back off.
How long they would have stayed there, their lips lightly touching as he waited for her to make a move, she didn’t know. Ken came to her rescue.
“Uh, Harrison, that was Zeke Merry. His plane will land in about an hour. He wants to meet for lunch be- fore coming back here to go over the agreement.”
Harrison moved fractionally apart from her. “Thanks. I’ll see you in the study in a few minutes.”
“Right.”
Isa heard Ken’s retreating footsteps on the stairs. She maintained her Brigitte Bardot expression, but inside she felt equal parts relief and apprehension.
“I don’t like the idea of living a lie,” he announced. It sounded as if he was turning her down.
“The contract with Mr. Merry,” she reminded him. A sense of desolation swept over her. She couldn’t fail. She’d worked so hard to accomplish this plan. “You can’t sell off part of the company without my approval. I won’t give it.”
“Yes, there is that. Well, the company will go under, but what the hell? I’ll still have the jewelry-making business. The families that depend on the mine for their living will have to take care of themselves.”
