Mad About The Man

by Stella Cameron

  Jacques steered the Jeep's nose beside Gaby's back wheel and crawled. When the bike wobbled dangerously, he grinned and rested an elbow on top of his door. "Nice afternoon!"

  She wobbled even more, then gained control and kept right on riding—and ignoring him.

  "Didn't your mother tell you it's dangerous to ride a bike in a skirt?"

  "Why?"

  "It might get caught in the wheel and yank you off." He edged forward until he was beside her. "Or maybe just yank your skirt off. That would probably embarrass you."

  "I don't embarrass easily."

  He grinned. "Good."

  Gaby looked at him sharply and there was no mistaking the tinge of red in her cheeks.

  Jacques was suddenly aware of how good he felt. "So—what do you say?"

  She frowned at him "About what?"

  "Will you?"

  "Will I?" She backpedaled to a halt. "Will I what?"

  Jacques braked and backed up. "Let me entertain you? At La Place? For dinner… or whatever?"

  Gaby planted her feet on the dusty pavement. "You haven't invited me."

  "Yes I have." He tipped his face up to a sky as crystal-bright blue as only a California sky could be. "I invited you over and over again. It wasn't easy getting one of those invitations through that skylight."

  "And into my face."

  He looked at her. "It didn't hit you?"

  "It certainly did." Holding the crown of the hat, she tilted her cheek. "See?"

  Swiftly Jacques killed the engine and got out of the Jeep. "Let me see that." Before she could react, he held her face in his hands and used a thumb to prop her chin. "Well, hell, I'm mighty sorry about that, ma'am."

  "It's all right." She closed a hand over his wrist and pulled. "Think nothing of it."

  Jacques made no attempt to release her. "Afraid that's not possible, ma'am. I'll have to make amends." With that, he kissed her soft skin very gently. "Mmm. Reckon that ought to make it all better."

  He felt her tremble and lean—ever so slightly—toward him. Dropping his hands to her shoulders, Jacques looked down into brilliant green eyes that seemed vaguely out of focus. Her lips parted and she held the tip of her tongue in her teeth.

  "Is it better?" he breathed, expanding his lungs and flexing his thighs against an aching jolt.

  Gaby' s eyes slowly regained focus and grew sharper. "Oh, I don't get this." Pushing away his hands, she mounted the bicycle. "I don't do this kind of thing. I'm a mature, sensible woman who—I just don't get it." Muttering, she bent over the handlebars and stood on the pedals of the gearless machine to pump furiously.

  "I get it," Jacques said to himself. "I know exactly what this is all about." He would let her get ahead— maybe even allow her to think he'd given up and skulked away. He already knew where she lived.

  The small, picture-book-pretty, white stucco house that Gaby called home wasn't more than a ten-minute drive from the hat factory. Jacques waited until she was out of sight before inching the Jeep to the next corner and waiting again.

  Gaby took not ten, but twenty, minutes—pedaling rapidly—to reach her home. No doubt the bike was an occasional nod to fitness… not that he'd seen anything to suggest she wasn't in great shape. Jacques grinned broadly. Yeah., the lady was in great shape.

  "Hey, Gaby!" Swerving into the pink gravel driveway, he hailed her as she opened her front door. "We've got things to discuss."

  Gaby walked into the house and shut the door. Jacques switched off the ignition and got out. Something was happening to him, something different. And he liked it. He leaned against the Jeep, tossed his keys in the air and caught them. There were a host of acquaintances who wouldn't believe this scene. Jacques Ledan supposedly always waited for people to come to him. Jacques didn't chase, hadn't chased, until Gaby McGregor.

  He shrugged away from the Jeep, jammed his hands into his pockets and sauntered toward the house. Not a chase… a hunt. There was a subtle difference. And, possibly without knowing, Gaby was adding to the fascination. Country bumpkin… hayseed. Remembering Bart's sneering comments, Jacques narrowed his eyes. Without being sure why, he was convinced there was more to Gaby than the obvious—much more.

  Oleander, pink, white and peach colored, still bloomed in plantings near the house. Jade bushes glistened in groups of terra cotta pots. Jacques reached the door and knocked.

  From inside came the muted tones of a male ballad singer.

  Jacques rested a shoulder on the jamb and waited. He knew with some deep part of him that they were both playing a game. She didn't want him to give up, any more than he intended to do so.

  Across the wide, potholed street, fence posts, linked together by sagging wires, sloped at drunken angles. Yellow brush bent in the warm, dust-laden breeze of a late-October afternoon, and on the horizon sunlight danced and glittered, turning yellow to gold: This was his country and it made him feel alive.

  He raised a hand, bowed his head and knocked again, much louder this time.

  Rapid footsteps approached. The door opened wide. "Are you bored, or what?" She crossed her arms—a pleasing sight given what happened to the thin, white cotton shirt.

  "I've never been less bored." Amazingly it was true.

  "You must lead a really quiet life."

  "May I come in?"

  "No."

  "Just for a little while? To talk?"

  Gaby raised a hand to smooth escaped pieces of hair. "Absolutely not."

  Jacques didn't even try not to look at the way her breasts—she wasn't wearing a bra—moved when she angled up her elbow. "We need to talk. We've got things to discuss."

  "We've got nothing to discuss."

  "Do you believe in… Do you think that sometimes two people are wildly attracted on sight?"

  "I think most men are attracted to anything in a skirt on sight."

  He let out an explosive laugh. "You aren't subtle, Gaby."

  "I'm honest." She stood aside. "All right. Come in and have something to drink. But I'm not going to play games with you, Jacques. Becoming a diversion to a bored city type isn't ,my idea of a good time."

  "We ought to talk about what each of us considers a good time." He paused in the act of passing her and looked down. "You have a wonderful face. Do lots of men tell you that?"

  "Dozens every day." A small smile tipped up the corners of her generous mouth. "I have to fight them off."

  "I know what you mean. So do I—fight off the women."

  "I believe you," she said and the smile left her face. "Which makes me very puzzled about you, Jacques Ledan. Why are you following me around?"

  She was tiny of stature, small-boned with slender arms and ankles—ankles were all he'd seen of her legs to date beneath the long skirts she favored. A belt, made of bold silver links, loosely circled her small waist.

  "You know why I'm following you," he said, entering a cool, white-walled foyer with woven hala rugs atop a terrazzo floor. "I can't help myself and I don't want to."

  "Tea, coffee, soda, wine or beer?" She led the way down a hallway to an airy kitchen, white again but made striking by dark green accents. "I'm having a white wine cooler."

  "So am I."

  "What is it you think we have to discuss?"

  "Our future." Instinct told him he'd have to corner her or fail—he didn't do failure at all well.

  "You think you're amusing, don't you?" Ice clinked into glasses and Gaby splashed in wine and soda. "For some reason you've decided I'd make an entertaining mouse to your cat."

  Did she really think that? "Wrong. We didn't get off to a great start. I'm sorry for that."

  "We didn't get off to a start at all. Here."

  He took the glass she handed him and tipped it back and forth. "What would you call what happened between us yesterday?"

  "A mistake."

  The tightness in her voice meant he didn't have to look at her to know she was blushing. "You embarrass easily, don't you?"

  "I told you I don't get embarr
assed."

  "Yes you do." He drank deeply. "I kissed you and you liked it. You liked it a lot."

  "Have you finished your drink?"

  Now he did look at her. Those green eyes, the instant before she looked away, were brilliant and deeply troubled. "I haven't finished my drink, Gaby. I haven't finished anything as far as you're concerned. Would you believe me if I said I was as caught off guard by what happened between us as you were?"

  She spread her fingers on the pale skin at the neck of her shirt. "I don't know you well enough to believe or disbelieve anything you say. It's getting late and—"

  "I've got all the time in the world. My plans for Goldstrike are a different issue from what's happening between you and me—"

  "Nothing's happening."

  A minor topic switch might lull her into relaxing. "Cycling is good exercise."

  Gaby frowned and shook her head.

  "It must be nice not to have to drive your car to work every day."

  "I don't have a car." There was almost a defiance in the way she told him.

  "Isn't that inconvenient sometimes? I mean, you must have to transport things occasionally."

  "Goldstrike's a generous place. Everyone knows I don't have a car anymore. If I need help, I get it. That must seem odd to a man like you." She swirled the drink in her glass.

  Jacques considered. "Like me? I thought you'd decided you don't know me."

  "I don't."

  This wasn't improving. He made himself smile. "You will." And maybe he'd wise up. She probably couldn't afford a car. A single woman running a hat factory in a hick town was likely to live hand to mouth. "Were you ever married?" Oh, very smooth. "Is there anyone else now?" He wouldn't blame her for refusing to answer.

  Gaby showed no sign of offense. "There's no one else."

  So, there was no impediment there. He was free to pursue. "I used to like riding a bike."

  Gaby stared, then puffed up her cheeks. "The topic changes from marriage to bikes. Okay. When was that—when you rode bikes, I mean? Before you became a candy king?"

  "I'm not…" No. She had no way of knowing how sick he was that for most people he was a product rather than a man. "Yeah. Before I became a candy king. Just call me luscious Ledan and I'll know you're not talking to anyone but me."

  Regarding him speculatively, she sipped her drink. "What's it like to be filthy, stinking rich?"

  That was a novel approach. "Past a certain point, money doesn't have much actual meaning."

  "You haven't answered my question."

  "I think I have."

  "Mmm." She rolled her frosty wineglass against her jaw. "So, you're so used to being wealthy it doesn't mean anything anymore. And you think having the corner on chocolate-covered truffles gives you the right to have whatever you want—even if you only want it for a short while and even if you might do damage by having it at all."

  Jacques narrowed his eyes. "What are we talking about here?"

  Gaby lowered her gaze. "Nothing, I guess. I was just thinking aloud and not making much sense."

  Sure. Only he didn't believe her. And neither was he confused about her meaning. "I don't ever set out to hurt people, Gaby." The local populace wasn't the issue here. She assumed he used women as diversions and that he intended her to become his temporary antiboredom device. "We interest each other."

  "Do we?" Almost absently, she set her glass on a tiled counter and turned to look through the window at well-tended plantings in a courtyard enclosed by a white stone wall.

  Jacques went to stand behind her. "We're very attracted to each other." Her hat had been discarded. A hint of red gleamed in her black hair. "We are, Gaby. Admit it."

  She glanced back at him. "The kind of attraction you're talking about can be dangerous to the health."

  "Sometimes." He smoothed her hair carefully, from the crown of her head, to within inches of her waist. "But you aren't denying you feel it." At this first hint of victory his muscles tensed. "Good." Cautious not to make any sudden moves, Jacques slipped his hand beneath her hair to settle loosely on her nape. "This kind of attraction doesn't happen often, Gaby. We've got to make the best of it." He rubbed his thumb up and down the side of her neck.

  Gaby sighed and smiled up at him. "This is some line."

  "You and I are two magnets on a collision course. We— What did you say?"

  "I said, this is some line. You must have had a lot of practice."

  He smothered a laugh. "This is no line, sweetheart." This lady would never be dull. "I know what I feel and you feel it, too. We're going to have to do something about it."

  "You're a dreamer."

  "I certainly am." Jacques closed his eyes. "You should see what I'm dreaming. We're just going to have to make my dreams come true… and yours."

  "I'm not dreaming. My eyes are wide open."

  She was going to make this very difficult. Jacques didn't entirely dislike that idea. "Don't tell me you haven't thought, at least briefly, about how we would be together."

  "No!… Yes." The last was said as if it cost her dearly.

  Jacques grinned and turned her toward him. "Good. Now we've settled the preliminary stuff. Why don't we go up to my place?"

  "Go up to your place?"

  "We could have a nice, intimate little dinner. Swim some, maybe… or maybe not." What did he see in her eyes? "If you'd rather, we'll just light a fire, and…"

  "And?"

  Her face was turned up to his. Jacques looked at her moist, slightly parted lips and almost forgot her question. "And we could get to know each other better." Slowly he brought his mouth closer to Gaby's.

  "Better than what?" She settled her hands on his chest.

  The shadow between her breasts showed at the open neck of her shirt. A breath raised that full, soft flesh. Jacques felt his body harden. Her nipples stiffened against the thin, white cotton.

  Jacques brought his lips even nearer to Gaby's. "Better and better. Just better and better." He cupped her breasts, closed his eyes and drew her bottom lip gently between his teeth. "So much better." His thumbs found the rigid centers of her nipples. He stroked back and forth until she gasped, and then he trapped her hips between the counter and the part of him that was too hard and heavy to ignore.

  "Gaby, maybe we should just stay here." One empty house was as good as another if the company was perfect.

  "Maybe—" she tried to turn her head aside "—maybe we shouldn't stay anywhere."

  The uncertainty in her voice brought him satisfaction. "I don't think you mean that."

  "There are one or two things… one thing you don't know about me."

  "Only one?" he murmured. If she thought he hadn't guessed that she was one passionate woman, she was wrong. "Kiss me, Gaby."

  The sound of the front door slamming reverberated through the house. "Didn't you close that?" He brushed the backs of his fingers across her cheek.

  "Yes." Before he could react, she ducked from his grasp.

  Footsteps clattered in the hall leading to the kitchen. "Mom! Where are you?"

  "In here," Gaby called.

  6

  "Mom, there's a truck out front." The small girl who burst into the room needed little introduction. Jacques wiped any sign of surprise from his face and put on his best benevolent expression for Gaby McGregor's daughter.

  "Jacques," Gaby said, glowing with obvious parental pride. "This is Mae."

  He put his hands in his pockets. "Hi, Mae. How are you?" So much for his assumptions about lack of impediments and empty houses.

  The child accepted a hug from Gaby without taking her dark brown eyes from Jacques's face. Once released, she wrinkled her nose and asked, "Who's he?"

  "Mae! Don't be rude." Gaby planted her hands on her hips, but chuckled fondly. "This is Mr. Ledan. The truck is a Jeep. It belongs to him."

  "I remember him! He's the one who sat at The Table at Sis's."

  "Your mother and I are friends." He deliberately relaxed his clenched jaw. "Y
ou can call me Jacques, if you like."

  "Mommy doesn't like me to call people by their first names if we don't know them."

  Jacques looked at Gaby. "I just told you your mother and I are friends." Gaby bit her lip and didn't quite suppress a smile. She was enjoying his discomfort, damn it.

  Mae braced her thin legs apart and accomplished a ferocious frown. "Is he from Los Angles, like Daddy?"

  "Um—"

  "Yes." Jacques cut Gaby off. "At least, I have a house in Los Angeles. But I've got one here, too."

  "No, you don't."

  Enough of the kindness-to-little-children bit. Jacques frowned right back. "Yes I do."

  "No you don't." Mae McGregor approached, her familiarly sharp little chin thrust forward. "If you lived in Goldstrike I'd know where your house is. I don't. So you don't."

  Gaby cleared her throat. "Mae—"

  "Have you ever seen the house just outside town? The one all on its own up in the foothills?"

  For an instant Mae's frown grew even darker. Then her finely drawn eyebrows rose. "The os-osterentious monster… monsterous… Does he mean that one, Mommy? The osterentious—"

  "Mae, hush," Gaby said.

  Jacques gave her a wicked grin. "That's the one, Mae. Ostentatious monstrosity? Is that what your mother calls it?"

  "Uh-huh. A lot of people do." She shook her head, whipping a shiny black ponytail back and forth. "I've never seen it. I know it's big, though. Too big to be useful—that's what Mommy said. But that's probably because you aren't from around here, so you don't know what your house is supposed to be like. Sophie always says it's nice to try to make excuses for other people when they do dumb stuff."

  This time Jacques didn't trust himself to meet Gaby's eyes. "That's very generous of Sophie. And very nice of you, too. But I do come from around here, really. My grandfather built La—he built the house you're talking about. That was just before I was born and I've been spending time there since I was a boy."

  "Jeez." Mae's frown slid back into place. "It's a real old house, then. I 'spect it's a whole lot older than ours, huh?"

  "I wouldn't be surprised." He'd never had much to do with children. Until today his excuse would have been lack of opportunity—after this encounter the explanation was likely to be markedly different.