“I, uh, I think I’m allergic to—that stuff,” she said.
“How would you know?” She’d been a virgin.
“At the hospital where I volunteered, we had to wear gloves, and they made me break out.” At the end of the aisle, the young man crashed his cart into a shelf of feminine hygiene products, sending pink-wrapped packets flying across the linoleum. Lisa didn’t notice.
“Rubber gloves or plastic ones?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Maybe they’ve got hypoallergenic condoms.” Ryder poked through the rack until he spotted a package marked “For Sensitive Skin.” “This ought to do it.”
Lisa nodded mutely. The young man, his face scarlet as he shoved fallen products back onto the shelf, watched with longing as she and Ryder departed.
In the grocery section, the cart quickly filled with supplies. Salmon filets, the makings of cream sauce with capers, crisp butterhead lettuce, tomatoes, croutons, blue cheese dressing, baked potatoes large enough to stuff and cheddar cheese to stuff them with. “Isn’t that a lot of food?” Lisa asked as they headed for the checkout. “Won’t it take hours to fix?”
“Sure,” said Ryder. “We’ve got all day, haven’t we?” With his peripheral vision, he spotted the clumsy young man heading for the same checkout stand, trying to angle ahead of them through the clutter of promotional displays. Ryder sped up, despite a protesting twinge from his ankle.
“I never imagined cooking with a man,” Lisa said. “What a lovely idea.”
“We’ll have to clean the kitchen first.” He should have considered that before the tomato sauce hardened. Too late now. “I’ll admit, you’re not exactly dressed for it.”
“Then I’ll undress for it,” Lisa responded a bit more loudly than he might have wished. A crash made them both flinch.
Cans and boxes flew every which way, and shoppers turned to stare at the overturned display table and the young man whose face was nearing a terminal shade of purple. Whistling under his breath, Ryder proceeded to the counter and began unloading their purchases.
Chapter Six
“She intends to get pregnant?” Driving with one hand, Boris adjusted the volume on the mobile phone. He would never have believed the spoiled young heiress capable of such duplicity. “Does she think that would stop me from marrying her?”
“She believes that what her parents really want is an heir, not a son-in-law,” responded Lothaire’s voice.
“It is absurd! Are you sure you have the right girl?”
“Win himself arranged for her fake driver’s license. She is using the name Lisa Schmidt.”
“But he doesn’t know who she was meeting in Denver?”
“He claims not to know anyone in the entire state of Colorado,” said Lothaire. “Apparently she made the contact herself. A resourceful girl, this Miss De La Pena.”
Boris wished he had his hands on Lisa’s resourcefulness right now. Or, failing that, on her neck. Furiously he jerked the leather-covered steering wheel, which was not a good idea at 120 kilometers per hour on the Autobahn. The car swerved and the earpiece popped out of place.
“Mr. Grissofsky?”
“Here!” he snapped, replacing the device. “What else have you found out?”
“Her flight from Denver arrives in New York Monday afternoon.”
“So what? We already know she’s leaving for Paris that night.”
“She arrives at LaGuardia Airport,” Lothaire went on as if he hadn’t heard. “To catch her plane to Paris, she must take a taxi from LaGuardia to JFK. This is the point at which she will be most vulnerable.”
That sounded promising. “Vulnerable to what?”
“I am flying to New York today,” Lothaire continued in his maddeningly level voice. “I will arrive early enough to make certain arrangements. I suggest you meet me there as soon as possible.”
“In New York?” Despite the turmoil in his brain, which had risen to near panic levels in recent days, Boris recalled that cell phone conversations were easily intercepted by eavesdroppers. But while certain things could not be spoken, he had to determine Lothaire’s meaning. “As you know, I came to Germany to close a lucrative deal. There is no way—”
“This marriage, Mr. Grissofsky, is the deal of a lifetime,” his associate reminded him.
“I hardly think the sight of me will inspire Miss De La Pena to abandon her baby scheme or whatever she’s planning,” Boris scoffed.
“Miss De La Pena will not see you. I will be driving the cab,” said Lothaire.
“What cab?”
“The one she will catch at LaGuardia.” Finally Lothaire’s drift became clear. They were going to kidnap the heiress! No doubt the young man would arrange to have a suitable drug on hand to subdue her and a chartered plane waiting on a nearby runway.
“Do you have a destination in mind?” Boris asked.
“A Caribbean island that I would prefer not to name over the phone,” said Lothaire. “There is no waiting for marriage ceremonies, and no questions asked.”
In the year and a half since the young man had started work for him, Boris had learned to rely on him absolutely. “Very good.”
The German deal would have to be postponed. It was a shame, because it involved black market trading, which meant off-the-books profits free of taxes and duties. On the other hand, Boris suspected that his would-be partners were ex-members of the Stasi. If he ended up in debt to them, he would have the Yakuza, the Russian mob and the former East German secret police on his tail.
He wasn’t sure even the prospect of Annalisa Schmidt De La Pena’s vast inheritance would be enough to stave them off. “I’ll meet you wherever you like,” he said.
*
Somewhere between cooking caper sauce and watching Lisa gyrate to the New Orleans-style zydeco music on the CD player, Ryder realized he was falling in love. Hopelessly. Stupidly. With a woman he knew he shouldn’t trust and yet somehow did.
During the course of the afternoon, she had drawn him out about his childhood and his struggle to succeed in the world. Every bit of information seemed to fascinate her. The only things he’d learned about Miss Lisa Schmidt were that she came from Switzerland and had rich, overprotective parents.
And yet, clad in a beige apron with a teddy bear stitched on the front, she had pitched in cheerfully to clean and cook. Despite her inexperience, she followed directions intelligently and did her best make the process more efficient. If he didn’t know better, Ryder might have said she had executive ability. Then, every once in a while, he would see a flash of innocence, just enough to throw him off guard and dig the fishhook deeper into his heart.
She was reeling him in. He wondered why he didn’t mind.
At last the potatoes were in the oven, the caper sauce ready for the final touches, and the salad cooling in the refrigerator. They wouldn’t be able to finish their work for another hour.
Lisa hung her apron in the pantry and swung toward him. “What now?”
Ryder refrained from suggesting they take another shower, or skip the shower altogether. He wanted to learn more about her, and that required staying out of bed. “How about a glass of something?” He indicated the wine rack.
This morning, after confirming Joe Ortiz’s capture, he’d wired Nina McNally a bouquet with the good news. The widow had phoned to thank him and to urge that he enjoy a bottle of her wine in celebration.
Lisa shook her head. “It’s all domestic. I only drink French.” She wrinkled her nose. “I’m sorry. That sounded snobbish.”
Ryder studied her, bemused and torn. “I was impressed because it’s good stuff from California. I keep forgetting how different we are.”
She laid one hand on his arm. “Surely every couple has different tastes and experiences that have to be worked out. After all, how many people these days marry the boy next door?”
At the word “marry,” his breath caught in his throat. Ryder didn’t know whether he felt alarm over the possibili
ty of being tied down, or relief that she might consider staying.
The image of his parents’ rundown home, of jobs that led nowhere and children who always needed new shoes lurked at the back of Ryder’s mind. It had motivated him to survive boot camp, to be the hardest-working cop on the force and to stay blessedly and permanently single.
Would it be so terrible to have a woman like Lisa to come home to? Or travel with, when his work wasn’t too dangerous? Cooking with her had been fun, not a chore.
He could hardly wait to introduce Lisa to the rest of his life: dancing at nightclubs, barbecuing at the beach, attending the oddball festivals that popped up nearly every weekend somewhere in Southern California. She brought such zest to everything she did, it would be a pleasure watching her go through life.
A woman like her could open new horizons to him as well, Ryder mused as he uncorked a bottle of cabernet sauvignon. He was curious about art and dance, foreign films and classical music, but he had a healthy dislike for making a fool of himself. What he needed was a guide. Possibly someone like Lisa, who had mentioned that she and her mother enjoyed attending the theater.
As he found two wineglasses in the cupboard and filled them, Ryder began to hum. He didn’t want to be tied down; that hadn’t changed. But until today, it had never occurred to him that a relationship might set him free instead.
He handed a glass to Lisa. She sniffed it, then sipped. “It’s good.”
“You’re just saying that.”
She frowned. “It is good. I never joke about wine.” Picking up the bottle, she studied the label. “It’s from the Napa Valley. I’ve heard of that, but I don’t know this particular winery. Well, live and learn.”
He lifted his glass. “To living and learning.” They clinked, and drank. It was, Ryder thought with uncharacteristic hopefulness, a beginning.
*
By her second glass of wine Lisa felt a bit too relaxed. Having grown up in a culture where imbibing was a normal part of dining, she didn’t take into account, until nearly too late, the fact that she was drinking on an empty stomach.
She set her third glass on the coffee table, untasted. “I’ll save that for later.”
They were stretched on the couch, Lisa nestled between Ryder’s legs and reclining back against him. “Tell me more about Switzerland,” he murmured from behind.
The casual intimacy of their position, and the buzz from the wine, encouraged openness. “It’s beautiful. Spectacular mountains and picture-postcard villages. Like the cliché says, the Swiss are very clean and as orderly as clockwork.”
“You said ‘The Swiss,’ not ‘we,’ ” he observed, his baritone voice vibrating into her spine.
Oops. “My family has several homes.” Lisa paused, reluctant to juggle any more half-truths. She ached to melt into Ryder until they understood each other by osmosis.
“Several homes,” he repeated. “As in mansions?”
“In Paris, we have an apartment,” Lisa said. “It’s fairly spacious, if you count the servants’ rooms.”
“You’d have trouble adjusting to my place in L.A. Compared to my one-bedroom apartment, this chalet is the Taj Mahal.” There was a question behind the statement, and even in her mellow state she caught it. He was checking to see if she would consider staying there with him.
Lisa’s heart swelled at the implication. “I’d rather have a small place where I could feel at home, than a castle where I’m treated like a prisoner,” she said.
His grip tightened around her. “That’s how your parents treat you?”
“Sometimes.”
“Then you aren’t going back,” he said.
You aren’t going back. The words echoed happily in her mind. She closed her eyes, blotting out the sunlight that streamed through the blue-and-white room. Now the only thing she sensed was Ryder: his musky aroma, the heat from his chest, the beating of his heart.
He pulled her more snugly against him, and she felt him harden. Lisa wondered if people could make love in this position and hoped she was about to find out.
A timer went off in the kitchen. Its insistent beep-beep broke the spell, and reluctantly she scooted forward. “Time for round two in the kitchen.”
Ruefully Ryder swung to his feet and helped her up. He retrieved the potatoes from the oven with tongs. “They need to cool before we can scoop them out and stuff them,” he said. “The salmon won’t take long to broil, and the sauce just needs to be heated.”
“We’ve got a little time?” Lisa said. “Did you have something specific in mind?”
He arched an eyebrow.
“When you’re around, it’s hard to think about anything else,” she confessed. Seeing his half amused, half dubious expression, she explained, “I like holding you. I like watching your reactions to me. Most of all, I like it when you lose control.”
“That appeals to you, does it?” he teased.
“Maybe it’s because you’re so strong and self-contained. When you open up and let me inside, it means something special.” Lisa wasn’t sure it was wise to speak this frankly; Nicola had advised her to keep men guessing. But then, Nicola hadn’t had much luck finding the man of her dreams.
“When you let me inside, it means something special to me, too.” He hadn’t blurted the words: he meant what he was saying.
No longer skittish around him, Lisa crossed the floor and placed her hands on Ryder’s shoulders. Although she was tall, he rose a good six inches above her. He lowered his head slowly, gauging her reaction, delaying until at last their lips met. Then he caught her hips and drew her against him.
When the kiss ended, he studied her for a long moment. “You belong to me. Not like a possession. But I feel as if we fit together.”
“I know.” Lisa, usually ready with words, could find nothing eloquent to add. Instead, she said, “Are we going to stand here shooting the breeze all day?”
With a whoop, Ryder caught her waist and started to hoist her into his arms. Abruptly, he staggered, and they nearly crashed into the door frame. “Damn! I forgot about the ankle!”
“Let me rub it.”
“You can rub anything you like.”
They went into the bedroom arm in arm, stopping in the doorway for another kiss. “Let’s postpone the rubbing,” said Lisa.
“Of my ankle, anyway,” he agreed.
“The way we were sitting on the couch...”
“You want to try that position?” he asked.
“Could we?”
“I’d like nothing better.” He led her to the bed, sat on the edge and reached for her. When she leaned over him, deft hands unworked her slacks, lifted the fuzzy pink sweater and unhooked her bra. His mouth closed over one erect nipple, while he cradled both breasts. Feverishly Lisa buried her face in his hair, wanting so many things at once that she could scarcely sort them out.
They eased onto the bed. Her pants slid down her hips, and she kicked them off. She unbuttoned Ryder’s shirt and knelt above him, bending to trace a line down the center of his chest with her tongue. He tasted of salt and desire.
A moan welled from his throat. Beneath her fingers, the bulge in his pants assumed massive proportions. A tug at his buckle freed the belt, and Lisa helped him shed his jeans. Her sweater and panties joined his underpants on the floor.
Would he remember the condoms? The unwelcome thought cooled her for a fraction of a second, and then Ryder propped himself against the pillows and pulled her backward on top of him. “This was the way you wanted it, right?” Without waiting for an answer, he held her above him and thrust upward.
He filled her entirely from this position, and then one hand reclaimed her breasts. Lisa was surprised at how completely she felt within his power, and at the razor-edged pleasure that ran through her. Steadying herself with both hands on the bed, she shifted tentatively at first and then with growing confidence along the length of him. Her hair fell wildly around her shoulders, and she lowered her head to swing it across his legs.
From underneath, Ryder pushed into her, faster and tighter. It required her full cooperation to hold their position, and, as she braced to assist him, Lisa could feel the power flowing between them. They had become partners, united in ecstasy.
His sighs intensified, and then she realized that some of the joyous noises were coming from her. She couldn’t stop to analyze her response; it shone bright as the sun. His rapid thrusting became an unstoppable force. It made the luminescence around Lisa pulsate and expand, and then she was part of Ryder, infused with him, dissolving into him.
She wasn’t sure when they stopped moving together, or when the fire ebbed into a soft glow. She lay by his side, his arms holding her. If only this closeness would last forever!
Before they could take their relationship to a new stage, she had to reveal why she’d really come here. He had a right to know the truth. Before she found a way to begin, Ryder gave her an opening. “We forgot the condom,” he said. “Honey, I hope you’re not pregnant.”
“Would that be terrible?” she asked.
A stillness came over him. “You want to have a baby?”
“Well, eventually,” Lisa said. “Don’t you?”
From where she lay with her cheek against his shoulder, she could feel his head shake. “No.”
“Never?” He couldn’t mean it.
“Never.” The hollowness in his tone bordered on anger. “I’m not father material, and I wouldn’t be cruel enough to wish myself on some hapless child.”
Lisa couldn’t swallow. He sounded furious and final. “Maybe you’re not ready to be a father yet—”
“I’ll never be ready, and you might as well get used to it,” Ryder said.
“What if—I mean, we did take a chance this weekend,” she reminded him.
A muscle jumped in his jaw. “I’d pay child support, of course. But I—well, I’d have to urge you to consider adoption. A child deserves two parents, and I don’t have it in me to be one of them.”
There must be some old, deep hurt behind his words, because in Lisa’s opinion this energetic, tender man would be an ideal father. But he obviously didn’t comprehend that. “You might change your mind one of these days.”
Let's Make a Baby! Page 7
