“They did.”
“What did you tell them?” Melinda asked, clearly as curious as he was, her hands twisting around themselves in her lap.
Sheila’s scrawny chest puffed up with remembered anger and pride. “Those men had no business coming to my home, trying to intimidate me, asking for your personal papers. I pretended to be hard-of-hearing and they left right quick.”
“Can you remember exactly what they said?” Clay asked, trying to figure out whether or not the rogue agents knew what was inside the package.
“’Course I remember.”
“Well?” Melinda prodded, unlocking her hands and scratching the cat, clearly taking comfort from his purrs.
Clay wondered how he could get her to pet him like that. He ached for her to turn to him for comfort, but she never did. At first he’d thought she didn’t need anyone because she seemed so strong. Then he thought she just didn’t want him. But ever since that kiss, he’d known she feared intimacy with him because of the sizzling attraction.
He held on to that thought, telling himself that going slow was good. Letting the heat build to a flame would only work in his favor—if he didn’t get scorched. But he couldn’t fully contain his impatience. Didn’t she yet know that he wouldn’t hurt her?
“After the men scared Lazy Days, they said you had come by some old papers that might get you into trouble. That if I knew anything about them and didn’t tell, I could get into trouble, too.”
“Oh, Sheila.” Melinda’s eyes brimmed with tears. “You shouldn’t have risked—”
“Lazy Days has good instincts. I signaled the dogs to growl and I had my cane.”
As he pictured the frail woman shaking her cane at the rogue agents, Clay didn’t know whether to smile or frown. If she’d set the dogs on the agents, the men might have pulled their weapons. The courageous woman had gone out of her way to help Melinda, seemingly never doubting Melinda’s innocence.
“Ma’am, we’re in your debt.” Clay stood, walked over, lifted her wrist and pressed his lips to her thin-boned hand.
“Glad to be of help.” Sheila stayed in her chair as if all the excitement had tired her out. “And don’t you be worrying. If they come back, I’ll tell them you went to Chile.”
Melinda hugged Sheila. “Better if you claim that you haven’t seen us at all.”
“All right then.” Sheila cheerfully waved them out the door.
Melinda turned back and looked over her shoulder. “I’ll call when I can.”
“Don’t worry about me. Mr. Finley down the road offered to take me grocery shopping. I think he could use some of my company, don’t you?”
“She’s already working on husband number three,” Melinda told Clay as they stepped outside.
“Nothing wrong with my hearing, girl,” Sheila called after them. “I happen to like being married. Sex isn’t just for youngsters, you know.”
Clay shook his head and restrained a smile at Melinda’s blush. He really needed to persuade her into his bed soon to relieve some of the anxiety he saw in her warm topaz eyes. Nor would he mind relieving some of his own sexual frustration.
It was difficult to keep his mind on the case while a part of him remained distracted by Melinda’s every look, her every change in tone. He’d tried to remain aloof, but it hadn’t worked. He wanted her and knew she wanted him back. They had just come to different resolutions of the same problem.
She thought that maintaining a distance would break the attraction. If she kept at it, the only thing that would break would be him.
Reminding himself to stay alert, he forced his gaze away from Melinda and toward the street. Vulnerable walking to the car, he let Melinda carry the package and kept his own hands free and ready to pull a weapon if necessary. While he didn’t think they’d been followed, he couldn’t be positive.
Back on the road, Melinda extracted the papers from the envelope and looked through a stack of old pictures. “I’ll bet my parents are among these people.”
“Maybe.” Maybe not. He didn’t want to comment or prejudge the material until he had time to analyze it properly. “While I doubt there are any useful fingerprints on these documents because they’re copies, it might be better if you didn’t handle them until I check.”
“My prints are bound to be all over them already.”
“Yes, but more handling could smudge something useful.”
“Sorry. I can’t help being curious.”
“We’ll get to examine them soon enough,” he promised. “But first we need to go somewhere protected. Somewhere private where I know you’ll be safe, and I’ll be able to work.”
Her voice came out tight and nervous. “You don’t need me anymore. You have the documents. Why don’t you just let me off at the corner and I’ll walk home?”
Her question threw him into a spin that made his emotions spiral. Exasperation that she wanted to avoid spending more time with him. Fear that she’d leave herself vulnerable to those agents. Impatience that she didn’t recognize that he wouldn’t let her escape him.
He forced his tone to remain businesslike and kept driving without giving her an opportunity to get out of the car. “You can’t return to your old life just yet. It isn’t safe. Those rogue agents will return.”
Her words rushed out in frustration. “I can’t tell them anything because I don’t know anything.”
“True. But they don’t know that.”
Melinda clenched her fists, resting in her lap, so hard that the pink flesh turned pale. “Just how long will it take you to break the code?”
“Why?”
“Because I do want my life back. I have bills to pay.”
“I’ll see that you’re reimbursed for your time.”
“It’s not just the money…”
Was she finally going to admit she was afraid to be alone with him? Afraid she might act on her feelings.
“If it isn’t the money, what is it?”
“My clients will go elsewhere.”
He swore under his breath. He supposed he was self-centered to believe her every action and thought revolved around him. She had her own business, plans for her future that didn’t include him. He needed to bridge the gap, wanted her to be the one to come to him. But she seemed just as determined to stay away.
Perhaps talking would clear the air.
“I want you, Melinda.”
“You’ll get over it.”
Her words might have been flippant, but every muscle in her body tensed as if for war. Her eyebrows drew together and she refused to look at him, her spine straight and taut.
“There’s only one way I want to be over you. Naked. In a nice soft bed, with our clothes strewn across the floor.”
“Wish all you want. It’s not going to happen.”
“Yes, it is. You aren’t going to be able to resist me.”
“I have news for you…you’re very resistible.”
“And you’re not a very good liar.”
She tossed her hair over her shoulder and looked out the passenger window. Her body language couldn’t be clearer. She was going to ignore him.
But he had no intention of letting her do so, not after he’d glimpsed the simmering heat that she couldn’t disguise in her eyes.
“I’m taking you to a houseboat on the St. John’s River. It’ll be private and romantic. The boat is fully stocked with food.”
“I’m not hungry.”
He lowered his voice. “You will be.”
“Don’t you get it? I don’t want you.”
“You will,” he promised. “You will.”
Chapter Ten
They drove the rest of the way in silence. An hour later, Clay pulled off the interstate onto a two-lane highway, then turned again onto a dirt road. Tree branches scraped the car’s sides and clasped the metal like tentacles. Grandfather oaks shadowed with Spanish moss dominated the high ground; towering cypress mixed with bay and gum trees ruled the brackish low-lying areas of the
swamp.
Melinda tried to relax, but the closer they came to their destination the more antsy she became. The gloomy shadows blocked out the sun, and the confinement of the car made her eager to stretch her legs. At first she blamed her dark mood on her surroundings, then decided it was Clay’s fault.
She didn’t like his smug confidence that she would fall into his arms the moment he snapped his fingers. He’d find out soon enough that she had no intention of becoming his lover. That he seemed to read her swirling emotions and realized how hard she had to fight her own wants and needs only made her more uneasy about their shared living arrangements.
She felt as if Clay had some kind of emotional hold over her that she couldn’t break. Never before had she been so unsure of herself, as if she’d stepped into free fall with no landing spot in sight. Melinda usually set her mind to something and then went about achieving her goal, step by step. Nothing fancy. Just plain hard work that didn’t allow her to veer from her intended course.
Her feelings for Clay were far from straightforward. Sure, she liked him and admired him, but there had to be a promise of a future for her to allow herself to love him. Yet, the man was already taken—married to his work.
She half expected him to make a move on her once they boarded the houseboat. But as she stowed her bag in a large cabin with a closet and dresser that was decorated in soft creams and gleaming golds, he started the motor and cast off, piloting the boat away from the dock and onto the slow-moving river of tan water.
A quick tour of the boat revealed three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a full-size kitchen and a connected living-room area where electronic equipment sprouted from the desktop. Apparently, from the start of his assignment, Clay had planned to come here to decode the material and had his equipment ready.
She wandered past the monitors, computers and keyboards to the stern area, which had a patio table and chairs and was shaded by an upper deck. Two personal watercrafts doubled as dinghies and rested on a lift beside two sturdy life preserver rings.
Stepping out onto the patio, she watched the cypress trees go by. Wildlife teemed in the area. Herons and egrets roosted in the trees and dived after large-mouth bass, swamp jack and water-mouth perch. Overhead, a turkey vulture soared and a flock of wood ibis flitted across the treetops. Turtles sunned peacefully on floating logs. The hammering of woodpeckers on dead trees and the persistent song of a Carolina wren added to the loud guttural notes of Florida cranes and the cries of red-shouldered hawks.
She saw no sign of other human beings and realized that he’d taken her to a very isolated part of the state. Florida seemed crowded on the coasts, but the interior was relatively empty, and she imagined the river looked much as it did over two hundred years ago when the Indians used canoes to travel here.
Spying a ladder to the top deck, Melinda climbed to the cabin’s roof. From the outside cockpit, Clay piloted the boat with an easy competence that made her wonder if there was anything he couldn’t do if he set his mind to it.
She’d half expected him to at least attempt a kiss once they came aboard, but he seemed content to steer the boat. He gestured for her to take a seat, then opened a tiny refrigerator, cleverly hidden beneath a console, which revealed an assortment of drinks.
She bent down to peer inside, preferring to let him concentrate on his steering. Logs floated in the river and overhead branches leaned precariously close to the boat in this narrow part of the waterway.
“What would you like?” she asked him.
“You.” He shot her one of those charming grins he seemed to use when he wanted to irritate her most. “But I’ll settle for a beer.”
She handed him an icy bottle and took a soft drink for herself, afraid that alcohol might lower her resistance to him. God knew, it was low enough already, she didn’t need her inhibitions coming down, too.
She popped the top, let the icy liquid cool her parched throat, and played with the condensation forming on the can with her fingertip. Looking over the boat’s bow as the hull sliced through the water, she spied several large animals in the river.
“Manatees?”
Clay eased back the throttle, cutting their speed to an idle. “Looks like a full-size calf.”
A tail flipped up and the mother nuzzled her baby, urging him alongside. Melinda could see scars along the larger one’s back, evidence of past run-ins with boat propellers. The only natural enemy these large, gentle beasts had was man.
With No Wake Zone signs in effect for speedboats, the endangered animals were making a comeback throughout the state. As Melinda watched the mother and baby frolicking in the water, Clay beside her, just as awed as she by nature’s display, she realized that she couldn’t keep fighting herself. And him.
This man was almost everything she thought she wanted. And when she saw the happy light in his eyes as he watched the manatees frolic, her last wall of resistance fell.
No one was perfect. Least of all…her.
She could no longer deny to herself what he’d seemed to know all along—that she wanted him with a hunger she’d never felt before. She must be crazy out-of-her-mind in lust, because suddenly she didn’t care and couldn’t remember why they were wrong for one another. Longings too strong to suppress surged to the surface.
Leaning over, she placed one hand on his shoulder and peered down into the water. He wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her into his lap. “If we head upriver, there’s a spring where the herd gathers during the winter. We might find a few more manatees still there.”
“Can we swim with them?”
“We can feed them. I have lettuce in the fridge.”
She leaned against him and sipped her soft drink, dreamily wondering how long it would take him to kiss her. He didn’t, leaving her on the edge, about to dive off a cliff.
Instead, he inched the throttle forward, increasing their pace, and tugged down the brim of his hat to shade his eyes from the setting sun. “I’d like to anchor before dark.”
“Anything I can do to help?”
“You know anything about computer equipment?”
“Huh?” Startled, she looked into his eyes to see that he was serious. “I was thinking more along the lines of opening a glass of wine, maybe barbecuing a steak on that grill I saw hanging off the stern.”
“Once we find a safe anchorage, I need to work. The galley’s stocked. Help yourself.”
“What’s her name?” she asked him several minutes later as he lovingly uncovered his equipment and plugged in cables, cords and satellite uplinks.
“Whose?”
She’d found a bottle of white wine in the fridge but no fresh meat. There was steak and chicken in the freezer. She took two wineglasses from the cabinet, uncorked the bottle and poured them both a glass. “Your machine’s name?”
“Lolita.” He shot her a sheepish grin. “How did you know?”
She handed him a glass of wine. He took one sip and carefully set it down on a table so if it slipped, the fluid couldn’t possibly damage his equipment.
“I imagine you and Lolita spend more time together than most married couples.”
He shrugged. “My work is also my hobby.”
His work was his life. While the meat thawed, she sat on the sofa and watched him work. First he booted up his machine, entered a bunch of codes and pressed a thumbprint on the screen before he was cleared to continue.
“Could you hand me your mother’s diaries, please?”
She did and watched as page by page he scanned in the entire contents of her mother’s hand-written notes. Next he scanned in the photographs and finally the letters. He worked meticulously, methodically, never taking another sip of his wine.
She figured he typed over a hundred words per minute, and she took great pleasure in watching his fingers race over the keys with the control of a concert pianist. His jaw occasionally clenched and the muscles in his neck sometimes tensed, but for the most part he appeared totally relaxed.
A
nd unaware of her. He seemed to concentrate so deeply that she could have set the boat on fire and the smoke would have had to disturb his breathing before he’d have noticed.
After all his talk about sex, she hadn’t expected to be ignored and couldn’t decide whether to be amused or insulted. When her stomach growled with hunger pangs, she remembered the chicken thawing on the counter.
She found charcoal and lighter fluid by the grill and lit it without difficulty. Returning to the galley required walking past Clay, who didn’t look up from the numbers fanning across his monitor. She found fresh lettuce and the makings for a salad, placed two potatoes in the microwave oven and set the timer to start in about twenty minutes, figuring it’d take the chicken thirty minutes longer than that to cook.
A half hour later, she’d set the table, tossed the dressing into the salad and removed the barbecued chicken from the grill. Clay still worked at the computer, seemingly oblivious to her or the scent of grilled meat.
“Clay?” she murmured softly as she poured herself another glass of wine. “Can you take a break to eat?”
“Soon.”
Ten minutes later her chicken was getting cold and he was still typing. “Clay?”
“Give me a minute.”
“I’ve given you ten.”
“Go ahead and start without me. This is a delicate moment.”
Her hunger suddenly disappeared. Here she had been ready to go to bed with him, ignore her principles and just do what she wanted for a change—and he didn’t have time to notice.
She cut her chicken into tiny pieces, determined not to let him upset her. Why should she be so surprised? Had she thought the man would change because he wanted her? Bitterly she realized she should have known better. Clay’s personality had been set in stone a long time ago—way before they’d met. He’d admitted that his workaholic tendencies had ruined his first marriage, and he hadn’t changed.
As she finished her dinner alone, she realized that someday he might find a woman willing to put up with such neglect, but she didn’t happen to be made that way. Any man who needed to work twenty-four/seven might be a good provider, but he wasn’t good husband material, and he certainly wouldn’t make a good father.
Lovers in Hiding Page 13
