Flynt laughed, and she added another reason to the list of why she liked him. He didn’t take offense easily. It was as if he understood.
“Maybe we can make a real evening of it,” he drawled. “Put on The Weather Channel, track some storms. Will you bring the cat over for additional entertainment?”
“No, Casper’s allergic to animals. Mama hasn’t been able to have one in the house since he was a baby. Rascal is Mara’s cat, and I’m the favorite aunt.”
“Angelica.” Flynt paused. “I don’t want you to worry about these threats.” His voice was husky and deep. “I’ll find out what’s going on, and I’ll take care of everything.”
She believed him. It was both comforting and unfamiliar to feel such confidence in someone other than herself. Angelica wasn’t sure how to cope. Flippancy seemed as good a way as any. “I’m not worried at all, Flynt. After all, Brandon is the bogus blackmailer. You’ll find a way to prove it.”
“Brandon isn’t the blackmailer,” Flynt told Angelica as they pushed their trays along the cafeteria line.
He had arrived at her office in MetroHealth a few minutes before and asked to join her for lunch, cheerfully admitting that he’d called Mara earlier to get her schedule for the day.
Angelica vowed to have a word with her best friend about giving out personal information to the enemy. Except she didn’t consider Flynt an enemy and Mara knew it…
“Don’t let your mom ruin things for you with Flynt, Angel,” Mara had said last night, as they were getting ready for bed.
“Flynt and I don’t have a thing to ruin,” Angelica had insisted, and Mara hadn’t pressed it.
But she had given Flynt the information he asked for today and now here he was.
Flynt followed Angelica as she bypassed the specials of the day and crossed into the sandwich line where she ordered a ham and cheese on wheat bread. When he ordered the same thing, she looked at him quizzically.
“Deductive reasoning. I noticed that the only people in the hot entrées line are the visitors. The hospital personnel all head for the cold sandwiches. When in any institution, I always follow the regulars’ lead.”
“You really do pay attention to detail.” She was rather impressed.
“I also have strong instincts for self-perservation, which warn me against things labeled savory stew surprise or zesty pasta casserole.”
“A wise move.”
He insisted on paying for both their lunches when they got to the register.
“This is not a date,” she felt compelled to tell him. Because she’d spent entirely too much time last night thinking of him. Reliving every word, every nuance that had passed between them. Every kiss and touch, too. Angelica’s cheeks flushed.
She was having a hard time keeping her eyes off him, a hard time trying not to look thrilled to be with him. It was as if she were on an emotional merry-go-round, going up and down and in dizzying circles whenever she saw Flynt, whenever she thought of him. As a first-timer on this ride, she felt almost disoriented.
“No, it’s not a date,” agreed Flynt, picking up their trays and heading to an empty table. “This meal is being expensed to the Fortune Corporation. Since they’re your relatives, technically this lunch is on you.”
“The Fortunes are my relatives,” she murmured. No wonder she was disoriented! “How can that be true? I keep waiting to hear it’s just a hoax.”
“It’s not a hoax, Angelica.” He took a bite of his sandwich. “How are little Sawyer and his mother doing today?”
She wasn’t fooled by his casual tone. His blue eyes radiated intensity. “They were fine when Mara and I left the Rydells’ house this morning. We’re going to stop by later, after—”
“Don’t bother,” he cut in. “I called there myself about an hour ago. Your mother answered.”
“She gets paid to be there, remember?” Angelica bristled defensively. “She was there to take the dogs outside.”
“Romina told me the mother and baby weren’t there, Angelica. She claimed to have no idea where they’d gone, but she had no intention of reporting them missing.”
“Why would she?” Angelica countered. “They arrived out of nowhere and now they’ve disappeared—” her voice faltered a little “—into nowhere.”
“They’re now fugitives in the underground,” Flynt said flatly. “And there’s a good chance that the baby’s father, and the rest of his relatives, grandparents, everyone else, will never see him. Or maybe not until he’s grown. Your own father suffered the same fate, Angelica, and the resonance is still being felt in your life, a generation later.”
“The circumstances aren’t the same, Flynt!”
“How do you know, Angelica? Nobody knows the circumstances because the child’s mother refuses to talk. But that doesn’t stop Romina from contacting her underground pal Nancy Portland to spirit both mother and baby away.”
“We don’t know if that’s what happened,” Angelica murmured. “And Mama will never say.”
“Of course not, she’s sworn to secrecy, isn’t she? But we can certainly assume the obvious.”
“I try not to assume anything,” Angelica said loftily, and Flynt made an exclamation of disbelief.
She took a bite of her sandwich, determined to sit in silence if Flynt persisted in grilling her like a hostile witness. But she couldn’t seem to keep her eyes focused on her plate. She stole a glance at him.
He was staring at her, his blue eyes glittering with a hunger that she knew had nothing to do with the luncheon menu. The intensity of his gaze electrified her, and she felt a sweet, tight ache in her middle that radiated a glowing heat to her very core. Angelica flushed. And struggled to contain her fierce awareness of Flynt Corrigan.
She cleared her throat. “Before we got—uh—side-tracked, you mentioned you were absolutely certain Brandon isn’t the blackmailer. Do you have proof or are you assuming the obvious again?”
“In Brandon’s case, it seems like you broke your own rule about not assuming anything, to assume that he is the guilty party,” Flynt pointed out.
He reached for the salt shaker at the same moment that she did. Their hands touched. He crooked two of his fingers around hers. “I don’t want to fight with you, Angelica.”
Just that simple touch made her breathless.
“We weren’t fighting,” she countered weakly. She didn’t engage in fighting with men, she froze them out, she withdrew. Fighting was too intimate. It required a personal connection and energy she didn’t care to invest.
Flynt arched his brow before tightening his fingers around hers.
Angelica studied the sensual line of his mouth and shivered with evocative memory. And haltingly acknowledged that yes, she did fight with Flynt, even though fighting required intimacy, a personal connection, and invested energy. With Flynt she’d already established all three.
The realization disturbed her. She jerked her hand away. Flynt merely picked up the shaker and salted the tomato slice on his sandwich. It occurred to Angelica that she was staring at him like a starstruck teen in the presence of her celebrity crush.
“Tell me what you’ve learned about the threatening note Brandon got last night,” she prompted, striving for a little more dignity than that.
“I called Kate this morning. She said she was on the phone with Brandon last night when someone knocked on his door. When I double-checked at the hotel desk, I learned that it was the evening bellhop who was delivering an envelope last night. Everybody knew because Brandon gave him a fifty-dollar tip. Needless to say, every employee in the hotel is vying to make the next delivery to Mr. Fortune.”
“What does she—my grandmother—have to say about it?”
Imagine Kate Fortune being her grandmother! The thought floored Angelica all over again. She’d read about Kate Fortune. Who hadn’t? At one time the woman had secretly arranged to pretend she was dead for nearly a year while sabotage and murder were being investigated within the Fortune Corporation! Angeli
ca couldn’t help but be fascinated. After all, outside of the soap opera world, how many people “came back from the dead” as Kate Fortune had done in a spectacular blaze of media coverage?
“Kate has always been certain that Brandon had nothing to do with the threats. But she seemed a bit distracted when I was talking to her today. Apparently, her grandchildren who run the corporation called a board meeting to discuss an attempted takeover of one of the Fortune subsidiary companies.”
“Aha! Maybe that’s who is behind the threats! The fiend who is daring to mess with a Fortune subsidiary!” Angelica laughed. “Mystery solved!”
Flynt looked into her laughing eyes and had to suppress a sigh of longing as desire ripped through him. He’d spent a long time last night trying to expunge the feelings she evoked in him. Finally, he’d fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion, but obviously he’d failed at the expunging effort. Because being near her again already had him hot and primed for sensual action.
“Does anybody know who this fiend is?” Angelica teased.
“Er, fiend?” Flynt blinked uncomprehendingly. He’d been caught in the beginning of an erotic fantasy starring Angelica and had no idea what she was talking about.
“You know, the one behind the takeover attempt.”
“Ahh, that fiend!” He smiled at her. Their eyes met and held for a long moment, until Angelica averted her gaze and took a gulping bite of her sandwich. He made her nervous, Flynt noted, recognizing the signs of a primal nervousness, based on sexual awareness and urgency. Mingled excitement and delight surged through him.
He remembered that they were supposed to be having a conversation as they continued to communicate on a wholly nonverbal level. “The alleged fiend is Gray McGuire, and he would not stoop to cut-and-paste extortion threats,” he felt obliged to add. “McGuire’s the CEO of McGuire Enterprises.”
The name meant nothing to her. “I don’t read the business section or keep up with CEOs and their companies. The only one I know by name is Bill Gates because he’s Casper’s ultimate hero.”
“That’s unusual. Don’t most twelve-year-old boys prefer sports figures as their heroes?”
“Gates has lots of money and plenty of computers, Casper’s version of nirvana.” Angelica twirled the straw in her drink. “I worry about my little brother. He’s been so lonely since he started middle school. He’s never had a lot of friends but now he’s drifting away from the few he did have. The other kids tease him a lot, about his name and his height, about anything, I guess.”
Flynt was paying attention, but when he thrust his long legs farther under the table, they brushed against hers. She didn’t withdraw. Instead, she kept talking as he felt the warmth of her shapely legs suffuse his entire body.
“I wish Danny was around. I know Casper does, too.”
“Danny’s with the Marines in Bosnia,” Flynt said.
“That’s right.” Angelica’s face was suddenly wreathed in smiles. There was something incredibly seductive about a man who actually listened and remembered what she had said.
“Danny used to play ball with Casper and tell him all about sports teams. Things he could talk about with the other boys.”
“Guy stuff.” Flynt nodded his understanding. “As long as I’m here, I’d be willing to pitch some balls to Casper and bring him up to speed on baseball. The season is just getting underway so it’s a good time to start.”
“That’s kind of you, Flynt.” Angelica was touched. “But I don’t think you’ll have much luck. All Casper wants to talk about these days are computers and the internet and the games he doesn’t have. He won’t even go outside, he sits in the house and watches TV by the hour.”
“Which doesn’t go over big with your mother.” Flynt remembered Romina’s anger. And empathized with Casper. He knew exactly how it felt to be a kid who unerringly aggravated his mother; he also knew how much having a father who cared about him had eased the situation for him. Too bad Casper didn’t have a strong male presence in his life to offset the tension with Romina. Too bad Romina didn’t have a man in her life who cared enough about her to want to help her with the youngest son who so clearly baffled her.
Flynt wanted to help, though he recognized he was not what the pair needed. Still, he could do something…
“You know, my company is always upgrading electronic equipment. I could see about having one of the models to be replaced shipped down here to Casper. Maybe having his own computer would help the kid feel like he fit in.”
Angelica’s eyes widened. “You would do that?”
“Sure. No trouble.” Flynt decided to call the home office and arrange to have a computer sent to Casper Carroll as soon as possible.
So what if they’d only recently been upgraded? He would instruct the office manager to purchase another to replace the one to be given to Casper. It was a small price to pay for the pleasure he felt seeing the light in Angelica’s eyes, the relief on her face.
Angelica immediately felt a stab of apprehension at the glow that suffused her. “I would pay you, of course,” she said quickly.
She wasn’t accustomed to feeling so completely in sync with a man. It was scary. Even more disturbing was the way Flynt was looking at her. As if he treasured her or something. An absurd observation, a hopelessly romantic one. Flynt hardly knew her and while mothers might treasure their children, a man certainly didn’t treasure a woman. She would do well to remember the facts instead of spinning fantasies. That was Mara’s department!
“Tell me how much we owe for the used computer, and I’ll send you a payment each month,” she said, eager to put the transaction on an all-business footing.
“I have no doubt that you would.” Flynt smiled wryly. “But suppose I ask for something else instead of money?”
Angelica rolled her eyes. “Of course, here it comes. The inevitable proposition.” What a naive idiot she’d been, even for a moment, to consider any other motive on his part. “Forget it, Flynt. Much as I love my little brother, I’m not going to bed with you to get him a computer.”
“Don’t worry about it, Angelica. Much as I’d like to take you to bed, I wouldn’t touch you under those conditions,” he returned. “If and when we go to bed, you’ll be there of your own free will.”
Scalded with embarrassment, she looked down at her tray. And was surprised to realize that she’d finished her lunch. When she was with Flynt Corrigan, she tended to be unaware of anything else but him.
“Then what are you asking for?” It was a real effort to sound blasé, and she didn’t think she’d pulled it off.
A group of student nurses sat down at the table next to them, laughing and talking. Flynt glanced from the girls to Angelica. “I’ll tell you later. Right now I’d like to talk privately with you—about your father.”
She was not about to let anyone eavesdrop on a conversation about Brandon Fortune. Angelica gave a quick nod. “We can use my office. My next patient isn’t scheduled until an hour from now,” she said, getting up and heading for the door.
When they reached the office suite, it was completely deserted because everybody was on their lunch break. They could’ve talked in the brightly wallpapered waiting room, but Angelica automatically led Flynt into her small private office.
It was where she talked with patients and their labor and delivery coaches, but was barely big enough for her desk and the two comfortable armchairs across from it.
“Sit down,” she invited, feeling nervous as Flynt closed the door. It suddenly occurred to her how completely alone they were.
“I was going to suggest that you do the same,” said Flynt. “Because I have some news you probably ought to be sitting down for.” He placed his hands on her shoulders. “Just hear me out and don’t launch into a Romina-esque attack of hysteria.”
“I never get hysterical.” The pressure of his hands made her sink into the armchair.
“That’s good to hear.” Flynt took the chair next to her.
“All
right, what is it?” she demanded. Anxiety swept through her like wildfire on a prairie. “What has Brandon done now?”
“Nothing, it’s what I’ve done,” Flynt said, visibly bracing himself for her reaction. “I reported last night’s extortion threat to the police.”
Angelica waited for some kind of feeling—rage? fear?—to strike. But she felt…nothing. Even her anxiety was dissipating. Instead of jumping to her feet in outrage, she settled back in the chair. “I bet that was an exercise in futility.”
“True,” Flynt said ruefully. “At my insistence, they filed a report. End of concern, end of incident. It was frustrating.”
“That can’t have come as a surprise. After all, there hasn’t even been a crime committed,” she reminded him.
“You’re as nonchalant as the police and Brandon and Romina are about the threat.” Flynt was exasperated. “Aren’t you remotely curious as to why I decided to go to the police?”
“Maybe you miss the good old days in law enforcement and wanted to experience the atmosphere of a station house again?”
Flynt ignored her sarcasm. “There is a troubling discrepancy in Brandon’s story about the note, Angelica. He told me he found it in his room, shoved under the door. He told his mother—and the hotel staff confirmed—that a bellhop delivered a note to his room. When I arrived at your mother’s house last night, something seemed…odd. I felt Romina and Brandon knew something about the new note, but when I tried to question them, they both clammed up. Claimed no knowledge and refused to discuss it at all.”
He shook his head and grimaced wryly. “No wonder the police didn’t take me seriously. I have nothing but a hunch that something is fishy.”
“Fishy, huh?” Angelica chuckled. “Did they write that down on the police report?”
“Go ahead and laugh. If you weren’t involved, I probably wouldn’t give it a second thought, either. But since you’re the focus of the threats…”
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