“What do you want me to do, Gideon?” Sarah asked as Ellora plopped into her lap. “Sleep with you on demand even though you don’t trust me and won’t admit you love me? What’s in it for me?”
“What the hell do you want from me?”
“You know what I want.”
He snagged a dishtowel and began drying plates with swift, violent motions. “You started throwing yourself at me the minute I met you. I thought for a while you wanted me.”
“I do.”
“You don’t seem to be having much of a problem pretending I’m just the landlord lately.”
“That’s not true,” Sarah said. “This is as hard on me as it is on you. I’m suffering, too, you know.”
“Not as far as I can see.” He slung the dishes into the cupboard. “How does this new tactic work? If I go down on my knees and swear I love you and will trust blindly in you forever, do I get to go to bed with you?”
Sarah held her breath. “That would certainly be a promising start.”
He shot her a scowling look as he put the rest of the dishes away. “Don’t press your luck, Sarah.”
She sighed. “It’s all Savage’s fault. If he hadn’t shown up out of the blue when he did, you’d have made much more progress by now. I just know you would have. I wish he’d stayed gone.”
“You and me both.” Gideon closed the cupboard door and stalked over to stand in front of her. “Come here.” He reached down to grab her hand.
She looked up warily. “Where are we going?”
“If you’re going to act like a roommate or a summer boarder, you might as well give me a few of the benefits I’d expect from one.”
“Gideon, I told you…”
Ellora squawked in annoyance as she was dumped unceremoniously from Sarah’s lap. It wasn’t Sarah’s fault. Gideon had yanked her to her feet and was pulling her through the doorway into the living room.
“Sit.” Gideon used a hand on her shoulder to propel her into a chair in front of the chess table. He took the seat across from her and studied her as she sat scowling at him.
“You ever play chess?” Gideon asked.
“Nope.”
“Somehow I thought that might be the case. Well, if you’re going to hang around here, you’d better learn. I need a regular partner. My neighbor obliges once in a while but he’s not always around when I feel like a game.”
Sarah felt a sudden glow of pleasure at his words. Her expression softened instantly. “You want me to play chess with you? Gideon, I’m touched. It’s wonderful that you’re starting to see me as something more than a convenient sex object.”
“You were never that.”
“Never a sex object?”
“Never very convenient. In fact, you’ve been nothing but inconvenient since the day you arrived.” Gideon began setting out the chess pieces. “Pay attention. The first thing you’re going to have to learn about chess is that you can’t rely solely on your famous intuition.”
“Why not?” She surveyed the pieces with deep interest.
“Because you’ll lose if you do. Chess demands foresight, planning and strategy.”
“That’s the sort of thing you’re supposed to be so good at.”
Gideon smiled grimly. “Right. You’re going to have to work hard if you want to beat me.”
“I don’t mind learning to play, but I should tell you I don’t have the killer instinct when it comes to games. Somehow it’s just never seemed all that important to win.” Sarah was increasingly fascinated by the carved wooden chess figures. She picked up a knight. It felt good in her palm. “Did you make these?”
“Yes.” He eyed her as she fingered the knight. “One winter when I had a lot of spare time. Why?”
Sarah shrugged and put the knight back down on the board. “Oh, I don’t know. They’re just interesting. Unusual. Maybe you have heretofore undiscovered talents as a sculptor.”
“I doubt it. All right, we’re all set. You ready?”
“That depends. Are you going to yell at me a lot if I don’t learn fast enough to suit you?”
“Probably. I’m not feeling real patient at the moment.”
Sarah glared at him. “If you start yelling, I’m outta here. Understand?”
“Don’t bother issuing threats, Sarah. You’ve already got me tied up in knots. There’s not a whole lot more you can do to me.”
She reached across the table and impulsively put her hand on his. “Gideon, I’m sorry. Please believe me, I’m only trying to do what’s best for both of us.”
He eyed her laconically. “Sorry’s not good enough, remember? You told me that, yourself.”
She flushed and took her hand off his. She stared unseeingly down at the chess pieces. “I get the feeling this is going to be a perfectly miserable experience.”
“Must be your intuition at work again.”
But it really wasn’t all that bad, Sarah decided two hours later. Gideon proved to be a surprisingly patient instructor, in spite of his veiled threats. At one point Machu Picchu lumbered over to take up a position in a nearby armchair and Ellora curled up beside him. The two cats supervised Sarah’s progress with placid expressions.
“Not bad for a sex object,” Gideon said finally. “I think you’ve got possibilities as a chess partner.”
Sarah’s head came up swiftly, unsure if he was teasing her. Gideon’s eyes held a rare spark of humor, however, so she gave him a saucy smile. “Does that mean I have some practical uses, after all?”
“I could think of ways in which you’d be infinitely more useful.”
Sarah got to her feet and went around the table to kiss him lightly on the cheek. “Good night, Gideon.”
“Sarah?”
“Yes?” She halted at the foot of the stairs, her attention caught by something in his tone. She looked back and saw that he was toying with one of the chess figures.
“Never mind.” Gideon put down the chess piece and reached for the brandy decanter. “Go to bed.”
She went on up the stairs, Ellora trotting at her heels. Machu Picchu stayed behind, apparently feeling obliged to offer silent masculine support to the other male in the household.
Sarah lay awake a long time waiting for the sound of Gideon’s footsteps in the hall. She did not go to sleep until after she heard him climb the stairs and go past her room to his own.
THE FOLLOWING DAY Sarah awoke to a world of infinite gray. The morning fog blanketed everything just as a strange feeling of uneasiness shrouded her normally exuberant emotions.
She looked out the window and realized she could not even see the beach. She was not usually depressed by fog. In fact, as a writer, she generally found it curiously exciting and even inspiring. But this morning was different.
She felt moody and restless. It was as if she sensed something ominous hovering out there in the fog.
But it made no sense to feel this way, she told herself as she showered and dressed in jeans and a sweater. Last night had gone rather well, all things considered. Gideon had seemed content to teach her chess and she had taken his interest in doing so as a good sign. He was trying to find other avenues of communication.
So why was she feeling so strange this morning?
Out in the hall she saw that the door to Gideon’s room was half-open but all was quiet inside. Machu Picchu appeared in the opening and Ellora skipped forward to greet him. He touched noses with her and then stalked past Sarah as if she didn’t exist. Sarah had the unsettling feeling that the big cat had somehow adopted Gideon’s attitude toward her. When Ellora offered a silent apology for her companion’s behavior, Sarah smiled.
“Don’t worry about it,” she told the small cat. “I understand. Men are very stubborn at times, aren’t they?”
She followed the cats downstairs and went into the kitchen. The old Victorian lacked any semblance of cheerfulness today, even after she got the drapes open. Everything was dark, cold and depressed-looking. None of her plans for sprucing thi
ngs up appealed this morning. Sarah tried to come up with some interesting ideas for breakfast but failed.
The fog hung heavily outside the window, drawing her in some strange way. Part of her longed to lose herself in the physical manifestation of the moodiness that seemed to have engulfed her during the night.
Intuition was sometimes a curse, especially when one didn’t know how to interpret the vague warnings it was giving out. Sarah realized she wanted to go for a walk.
Without questioning the impulse, she found her windbreaker and let herself out into the chilled morning air. A few minutes later she was on the long, craggy beach below Gideon’s house. She started walking, her hands thrust deeply into her pockets. The fog ebbed and swirled around her. She felt alone in the world and at the same time, threatened by something she did not yet understand.
One by one the doubts began to creep in and take root.
Maybe she was handling everything all wrong, she thought. What did she really know about dealing with a man like Gideon? It was true that in some mysterious way he was the personification of the heroes in her books, but she was also discovering that there was a lot she did not know or fully comprehend about those heroes. They were a part of her and yet they were strangers—alien lovers about whom she understood certain aspects but not others.
She had the ability to fashion exciting stories around such male characters but the raw truth was that she could not make real life turn out as neatly as a novel of romantic suspense. She had landed on Gideon’s doorstep fully prepared to live out the fantasy of “Beauty and the Beast.”
But in real life a man like Gideon Trace was not so easy to rescue from the curse of his past, not so easy to gentle and tame. He was more complex, more unpredictable and far more powerful than any fictional hero.
Sarah came to an abrupt halt near a small tide pool as a familiar sense of tingling awareness went through her. She definitely was not alone on the beach. She stood very still, waiting.
A moment later Jake Savage materialized out of the fog, not more than ten feet in front of her. He was dressed with his usual flair, polished boots and khakis and a leather jacket that, although it appeared to be brand new, was designed to look well worn and extremely macho. His black hair was damp from the fog and his bright blue eyes were alive with an almost feverish anticipation. Sarah suddenly wished that Gideon was not sound asleep in the house.
“Hello, Sarah. I’m surprised Gid let you out of his sight. Or did you slip the leash?”
“I just felt like taking a morning walk. What are you doing here, Jake?”
“What do you think I’m doing here? I came to find you. I’ve been keeping an eye on the house since yesterday, waiting for a chance to talk to you alone for a few minutes. I caught a glimpse of someone coming down the path through the fog a while ago and decided to see if it might be you.”
“You’ve been spying on us?”
“Like I said, just waiting to talk to you. I knew Gid wouldn’t let me anywhere near you if he had anything to say about it.”
“Why did you want to talk to me?”
Jake smiled wryly. “I know it’s none of my business, but I thought you ought to be told a few facts. Call me sentimental, but I didn’t want to see you go through what Gid’s wife went through.”
“Oh, yes, Leanna. She cheated on him with you, didn’t she?”
“Is that what Gid told you?”
“Isn’t that what happened?”
Jake ran a hand through his hair, tousling it rakishly. “She was a very unhappy woman, Sarah. She turned to me for comfort. I guess I felt sorry for her.”
“But not sorry enough to marry her after she left Gideon for you, right?”
Jake frowned. “Leanna wanted rescuing and I’m not much into the role of knight in shining armor.”
“You prefer the role of seducer and betrayer.”
Jake’s eyes narrowed. “Gid really told you a story, didn’t he?”
“No. I’ve managed to piece a lot of it together for myself, thought. It’s pretty obvious what happened. Leanna was an immature, unhappy woman who was probably initially attracted to Gideon’s strength but later dazzled by your flash. I suppose one could say she got what she deserved, which was nothing, but that doesn’t make you any less guilty of betraying your partner. Why did you do it? Surely one woman more or less wasn’t that important. A man like you can probably have his pick of women.”
“Is that supposed to be a compliment?”
“No. An observation. Why, Jake?”
“That’s none of your damned business. I took what was being offered on a silver platter, that’s all. Hell, Leanna was a beautiful woman. If Gid couldn’t keep her satisfied, that wasn’t my problem.”
Sarah shook her head thoughtfully. “No, I think there was more to it than that. You were jealous of Gideon, weren’t you? Sleeping with Leanna was a way of getting even with him.”
“Are you nuts, lady? Why in hell would I be jealous of Gid?”
“Because you were nothing except a hustler without him and deep down inside, you knew it. He was the one who made the partnership work. He was the one who had the skill and the talent to find whatever you two went looking for.”
“The hell he was.”
“You knew that you were totally dependent on him and eventually you must have come to hate him. All you brought to the partnership was image and flash. Did you really scheme with those smugglers to betray him? What did you think was going to happen if you did get him killed? Savage and Company couldn’t have survived very long without him. But maybe your jealousy was too strong at that point for you to see reason. Or maybe there was enough money involved to make it worth the risk of dumping your partner.”
“You little bitch, I’ll tell you what happened that day. Gid left me behind while he escaped with a suitcase full of cash, that’s what happened. You think Carson, or Trace, or whatever he calls himself now is the nice, honest, up-front type? You think he’s some kind of good guy, a hero out of one of your books who’s going to help you find those earrings? Wise up, little girl. He’s using you. When he does find your treasure for you, he’ll also find a way to keep it for himself. That’s his real specialty, you see, looking out for himself. And he’s real good at it.”
“You’re lying.”
“You think so? Just remember what I told you. When Gid goes out on a job, he never comes back empty-handed. And people who get in the way can get killed.”
“You look very much alive to me.”
“I was damned lucky. You better hope you’re equally lucky, hadn’t you?”
Jake swung around and vanished into the swirling fog.
Sarah waited a couple of minutes, but the tingling feeling of awareness did not ease. Frowning, she turned around to head back toward the bluff path.
And walked full-tilt into a large, solid object that had been shrouded in fog.
“Gideon.”
His gemlike eyes were the only sparks of color in the swirling world of gray. “Do you believe him?”
Sarah took a step back. The depressed, moody feeling she had awakened with closed in upon her more heavily than the fog. “Does it matter?”
“Yes, damn it, it matters.”
“Why?”
“Don’t play games with me, Sarah.”
“I’m not playing games. I have, however, finally come to the conclusion that I don’t owe you anything more than what you’re willing to give me in exchange. And I haven’t gotten much trust from you, have I, Gideon?”
He caught hold of her arm as she made to step around him. “Where are you going?”
“Home.”
“Seattle, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“He got to you, didn’t he? Just like he got to Leanna.”
Sarah’s eyes stung with tears. She dashed the back of her hand across them. “No, he didn’t get to me the way he got to Leanna. You can’t even give me credit for having more sense than your ex-wife had, can you? I�
��ve told you once and I’ll tell you again. Leanna was a brainless little floozy without an ounce of common sense. Any woman should be able to tell at a glance that Jake Savage is a mirage of a man. All image and no substance. Amusing, perhaps, on occasion and definitely a sharp dresser. The kind who might look good escorting a woman to a fancy party. But that’s about the end of it.” She pulled her arm free of Gideon’s grasp.
“Damn it, Sarah, you can’t just walk away like this.”
“Don’t worry, I’m not running off with Jake Savage.”
“You’re not running off with anyone.”
“Right. I’m going all by myself.”
“Savage will try to use you,” Gideon warned roughly. “Especially if he thinks we’ve split up. Remember what I said about him using the divide-and-conquer technique.”
“I’m not going to lead him to that white rock.”
“He’ll find a way to make you.” Gideon’s voice was raw. “Tell me, Sarah, is it easy to walk away from me?”
She paused and looked back at him. His face was harsh in the gray mist. He stood there on the beach, a stark, bleak figure—a man who’d learned the trick of withdrawing completely into himself while he told the rest of the world to keep its distance.
“I was a fool to think you needed rescuing.”
“Rescuing? What the devil do you mean by that?”
“Never mind. You like being alone, don’t you? You like not having to take the risk of trusting anyone. No, Gideon, it’s not easy to walk away from you. But I don’t have much choice. Maybe you and my friends were right all along. I really shouldn’t rely so heavily on my intuition.” She smiled faintly. “At least this time I didn’t get left at the altar, though, did I? Maybe things are looking up after all. Or else I’m getting smarter.”
He made no move to stop her as she turned and started up the path toward the house.
GIDEON HUNCHED his shoulders against the chilled fog, his hands thrust into his jacket pockets, and listened to the sound of Sarah’s car pulling out of his driveway.
The Adventurer (v2.1) Page 15
