Home by the Sea

by JoAnn Ross

  Lucas tried to picture his mother sending in a near naked photograph of him and decided it would be easier to believe she’d been beamed aboard the mother ship by aliens. Now Fancy, he decided, was another story. He could almost imagine his unorthodox grandmother pulling a stunt like that.

  “Then there’s best character from a historical novel,” Marianne was saying. “Along with the best from a contemporary, and the best from a paranormal—time travel.”

  “How am I supposed to know if the costumes are authentic?”

  “Oh, don’t worry about that,” she said airily. “just go with what strikes your fancy.” That said, she bustled off with a rustle of silk.

  “If I went with what struck my fancy,” Lucas murmured to Grace, “I’d undoubtedly get us thrown out of here.”

  Grace wasn’t about to touch that line. “I hadn’t realized the two of you knew each other,” she said instead. The way Marianne had been looking at him, undressing him with her eyes, for heaven’s sake, had been very dose to disgusting.

  “We met earlier in the lobby. When I was looking for you. She thought I was her missing pirate.”

  “I’m not surprised.” Grace sighed. “I was thinking the same thing,” she admitted.

  “Really?”

  “Really. And before your ego gets entirely out of control, I have to clarify that I think it’s your hair.”

  “I see.” Uncaring of any audience they might have, he skimmed a knuckle up her cheek. “And here I was hoping it was my rakish good looks.”

  Grace told herself she should brush his hand away, but the truth was it felt too good. The deeper truth was that she was dying for him to touch her like that all over.

  “Do you have any idea,” he murmured, bending his head, his words meant for her ears only, “what it does to me when you look at me that way?”

  She wasn’t going to ask what way. Because she knew that every thought, every desire, every wicked fantasy was undoubtedly written across her face in bold script. Before she could try to come up with an appropriate answer, a jarring male voice calling her name shattered the moment.

  “Oh, no,” she said with a moan.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Later, Grace would realize the flash-fire change of mood, the way Lucas had gone from sexy and flirtatious to alert and strangely dangerous. Not emotionally dangerous as he’d been before; instead he’d suddenly become the man she’d gotten a fleeting glimpse of upstairs in the concierge lounge with Robert. A man capable of violence.

  “It’s Kevin.”

  “Kevin?” Lucas watched the hunk clad in a kilt like the one Alice Vail had suggested he wear striding toward the judges’ table. “Is he a former lover?” Something that felt amazingly like jealousy clawed at his gut as he took in the almost pretty face and steely body obviously honed to perfection by hours of lifting weights in the gym.

  “Kevin?” She laughed at that, but Lucas, who was watching and listening for every nuance, caught the nervousness in the faintly shaky sound. “Hardly. I told you, I gave up men after Robert.”

  He took her icy hand in his. “Until me.”

  “Please, Lucas.” Her gaze was serious, her hand trembled. “I can handle only one troublesome male at a time.”

  He was about to ask what, exactly, was troublesome about a guy in a skirt, even one with arms like iron tree trunks, but before he had the chance, Kevin was standing in front of the table and solved the little mystery for him.

  “Is it true?” he demanded of Grace.

  “Is what true?” she hedged.

  “I was talking with Geraldine Manning backstage. She told me you’ve requested a different treatment for your next cover.”

  Grace sighed. She’d known she was going to have to face this problem, but hoped she could do it in her own way. In her own time.

  She’d planned to speak to Kevin alone, somewhere quiet, where she could explain her reasoning and assure him how much she’d appreciated him posing for all her previous covers. But using her typical bull-in-a-china-shop approach, the publisher had escalated what Grace had known was going to be a sticky problem.

  “It’s nothing personal, Kevin.” She tugged her hand free from Lucas’s and placed it on Kevin’s arm. When she felt the muscle tense like a boulder beneath her touch, she realized exactly how upset he was. “It’s just that this next book is going to be my first without Robert—”

  “All the more reason to have me on the cover,” he countered. “Especially since everyone believes Robert was the one actually writing those bodice rippers.”

  “They’re not bodice rippers,” Lucas interjected mildly.

  “What?” Kevin shot him a furious look.

  “The term bodice rippers is outdated. And insulting,” Lucas explained. “I’d think that you, working in the business as you do, should know that.”

  A dark angry color rose up Kevin’s huge neck, suffusing his face like a fever. “I don’t know who the hell you are, but just stay out of this. It’s between Grace and me.”

  Turning away from Lucas, he bent forward, braced both hands on the table and leaned over Grace in a way meant to intimidate. “Do you think the people actually bought all those millions of books because of you? Or that obnoxious loser you were married to? They bought the books because I was on the cover.”

  Grace stared at his face, which was no longer cover-model handsome, but ugly, twisted with a hatred he didn’t bother to conceal. “I made Roberta Grace,” he almost growled. “Dump me and you’ll be sorry.”

  “If you don’t get away from this table now,” Lucas said in that same, quiet spooky voice Grace had heard him use with Robert, “you’ll be looking for a new occupation. Because unless someone writes a romance about a guy with every bone in his face and body broken, you’re going to have a hard time getting your picture on any more covers.”

  Grace watched the awareness rise in Kevin’s eyes, and could tell the exact moment when he realized that Lucas’s warning was not an idle threat.

  He straightened, his hands clenched into fists at his sides.

  “You’ll be sorry,” he repeated. Then, as Robert had done before him when faced with Lucas’s coldly murderous gaze, he marched away.

  He was not the only one who’d been frightened. Grace swallowed past the lump in her throat. “We have to talk about your propensity to threaten to beat people up.”

  “Not just any people,” he clarified. “Men who threaten you.”

  Terrific, Lucas mentally blasted himself. In trying to protect Grace, he’d succeeded in frightening her instead. This was definitely not the feeling he wanted her to have toward him.

  “There you are,” a voice behind them proclaimed on a distinctly British accent, forestalling any attempt at an explanation Lucas might have been planning. “I’ve been searching the hotel for you two.”

  “We sure seem to be popular,” Lucas muttered to Grace. Tamping down his frustration, he turned and watched a woman approaching in long, self-assured strides, rather like a steamer coming into port. She was tall with a firm body, good bones that spoke of pedigree, and prematurely silver hair that had been styled in a sleek cut to show off her high cheekbones. Her suit was black, obviously expensive and tailored to fit perfectly. If she’d been a few years younger—Lucas guessed her age to be somewhere in her forties—she could have easily been a runway model.

  Following in her wake was a short, egg-shaped man with thinning hair and round, metal-framed spectacles. Lucas figured him to be in his early to middle thirties. He was wearing a brown suit and a bow tie and carrying a fluffy white dog. The dog was decked out in red taffeta.

  “Grace, I’m so pleased to see you’ve finally left your hermitage.” Geraldine Manning greeted her with a kiss on the cheek. “How nice you’ve deigned to grace us all with your presence. No pun intended,” she said with a merry laugh.

  Before Grace could answer, she’d turned her attention to Lucas and held out a manicured hand. “I’m Geraldine Manning, the
new publisher of Penbrook Press.”

  “Pleased to meet you, ma‘am,” Lucas said as he shook the outstretched hand. He was not surprised when her grip proved firm and confident. “I’m Lucas Kincaid.”

  “Call me Geraldine. Ma’am makes me feel ancient. You must be the man everyone’s been buzzing about. I’d heard that Grace’s escort was dashing, but I’d never expected you to look as if you’d just stepped out of one of her books.” She glanced back toward Grace. “Aren’t you currently working on a pirate book, Grace, dear?”

  “That’s right.” Grace was moderately surprised, with all Geraldine had on her plate these days, that she was aware of her latest proposal. “Set in the Caribbean,” she added absently, trying her best not to stare at the dog.

  The publisher skimmed another look over Lucas. “Well, you shouldn’t run out of inspiration. Should she, George?” she asked the other man.

  “I shouldn’t think so,” he agreed.

  “Grace, Lucas, this is George Dwyer, editorial director of Penbrook Press. Be nice to him, Grace,” she suggested with a wink, “he’s not only the heir to the empire, he’s directly responsible for Rainbow Romances. Perhaps you can base one of your heroes on him. You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Georgie?”

  Her deep laugh boomed out, causing the dog to leap out of the editorial director’s arms. He took off after it as it made a beeline for the door, red taffeta trailing on the floor.

  “Oh dear. Dalai is a bit nervous tonight,” Geraldine said with a slight sigh as they watched the small dog effectively dodging George Dwyer’s desperate lunges. “I believe she must still be a bit airsick from the turbulence our flight ran into over the Rockies.”

  “Her name is Dolly?” Grace asked, trying to be polite.

  “Dalai. As in the Dalai Lama. She’s a Lhasa apso. They’re from Tibet, of course, so the name seemed to fit.”

  “Cute costume,” Lucas offered.

  “It’s a copy of the dress Bette Davis wore in Jezebel. Dalai and I love to curl up in bed and watch those old movies together.”

  “It must be nice having a pet,” Grace said. Her mother had always found a dog or cat to be too much trouble. Robert, unsurprisingly, was against her bringing anything into the house that might deflect attention from him.

  “Oh, Dalai isn’t a pet, darling. She’s a member of the family. Like a daughter.” The sound of cymbals crashing drew her attention to the orchestra pit, where Dalai was now trying to take refuge. “Sometimes, admittedly, she’s a bit of a naughty daughter.”

  She shook her head. “I’d best go help George. Heaven knows, he and Dalai have never hit it off. I keep telling him that he’s trying too hard, that dogs can sense insecurity, but the poor boy doesn’t seem to listen.”

  She paused before leaving and gave Lucas one more long, judicious look. “You really are magnificent. I don’t suppose you’ve ever thought of becoming a model?”

  “No, ma’am,” Lucas said quickly.

  “That’s too bad. Because with you on the covers, Rainbow Romances would fly off the shelves.” She took a business card from her evening bag and held it out to him. “Just in case you’re ever in the mood for a career change.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” He put the card in his shirt pocket and ignored Grace’s teasing grin.

  “I don’t want to hear a single word,” he warned when they were alone again.

  “I’m not going to say a thing,” she promised, smothering a giggle.

  “Thank you. I appreciate that, darlin’.” Lucas rubbed his chin as he watched the couple trying to cut the dog off at the foot of the stage. “Old Georgie doesn’t exactly look like the heir to a publishing fortune, does he? More flunky than scion.”

  “I was thinking the same thing. And I’m not certain how much he knows about publishing, since up until his father bought Penbrook Press, which also publishes Rainbow Romances, he’d been working in the diaper-design department.”

  “The diaper-design department?”

  “Of Dwyer’s Drier Diapers. If he’s going to be the new editorial director, I may have to consider leaving Penbrook.” She sighed. Yet one more problem she didn’t need right now. “Although, to give him credit, he is the one who came up with the environmentally friendly ‘green’ disposable diaper that self-destructs in landfills.”

  “That’s admirable. But I can’t see what it has to do with publishing.”

  “My point, exactly.”

  “So you’re thinking of switching houses?” he asked casually.

  “The buyout has changed Penbrook. And so far, not for the better. Tina thinks I should move on. But I’ve had a good relationship with the company and would really prefer to stay. If we can work things out.”

  “There’s something to be said for dancing with them that brung you,” he agreed, quoting the folksy axiom he’d heard innumerable times growing up.

  “True, but…” She sighed. “It’s complicated.”

  Before he could dig a little deeper, there was a fanfare from the orchestra pit. A moment later, the red-carpeted runway filled with men and women dressed in a fantasy realm of costuming that pushed the boundaries of imagination while dazzling the senses.

  There were enough beads and sequins to have made several villages of women in India go blind from the handiwork, and Grace was certain the number of feathers adorning the various outfits would have given any bird-loving Audubon Society member a heart attack. Hair and makeup were as theatrical as any Las Vegas or Atlantic City revue. Unsurprisingly, if the applause, wolf whistles and suggestive female shouts at the wannabe cover-model hunks were any indication, the audience was already loving the show.

  After the parade came a lavish song-and-dance number. Then the introduction of the judges by the master of ceremonies, a popular game show host who’d won fame and fortune by setting up blind dates, then sending a camera along to capture every—hopefully—embarrassing moment.

  The judges were an eclectic mix. Along with Grace and Lucas, there was an eccentric painter renowned for his romance novel covers—and infamous for his torrid affairs with several of the models, who were young enough to be his granddaughters. There was a representative from a California vineyard specializing in sparkling wine, a former Miss America, and Geraldine Manning, making her first appearance as publisher of Penbrook Press and, of course, the M.C. pointed out, as publisher of Rainbow Romances.

  Because of the seating arrangement, Grace was the next-to-last judge to be introduced, right before Lucas. As she heard herself called “one-half—the better half—of Roberta Grace,” she pasted a professional smile on her face, stood up and faced the fans, whose enthusiastic applause almost made this very public appearance worthwhile.

  After a brief introduction of Lucas, the first competition, the cover-model contest, began, to the driving beat of the Village People’s old hit, “Macho Man.” The parade of near naked male flesh had the women going wild, as Indians, cowboys, pirates, Scots Highlanders, warriors, knights and outlaws strutted their stuff for the crowd. One masked man was twirling his six-shooters, firing blanks up at the ceiling.

  Over the driving disco beat, Grace thought she heard the sound of wood splintering just above her head. Before she could react, she was thrown to the ground and Lucas was lying on top of her.

  CHAPTER 6

  FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, Grace was back in her suite with Lucas. But they were not alone. Geraldine, George, Tina and Jamie, along with two San Francisco detectives who’d shown up after Lucas had called the shooting in to the police, were also there.

  Shooting. The word continued to reverberate in her head like the gunfire that had splintered that nearby pillar. Someone had actually tried to kill her. Or at least frighten her to death, which, if that had been her assailant’s intention, he’d almost succeeded in doing.

  “Hey, Kincaid.” A tall man with a lantern jaw and pewter crewcut, who’d introduced himself as Detective Robert MacDonald, greeted Lucas. “I thought you’d quit the bodygua
rd business.”

  “I was planning to.” Lucas glanced over at Grace, who was curled into a corner of the ivory brocade sofa, holding the cup of tea Geraldine had ordered from room service. “But something came up.” Although his words were directed at the detective, he didn’t take his gaze from Grace. “Samantha was in a bind. She needed me to do this one last job.”

  “Grace,” Tina asked, “is this true? You actually hired a bodyguard?”

  “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” The teacup rattled as Grace lowered it to the gilt-rimmed saucer.

  Although she’d made a feeble protest when Lucas had scooped her up from the carpeting, held her against his chest and carried her through the excited throng to the elevator, truthfully, she’d been relieved, since she hadn’t been all that sure that her legs, which were shaking like the rest of her, would have been capable of holding her up.

  “I don’t understand,” Geraldine complained. When she took a cigarette out of her bag, George jumped up to light it. “Why on earth would you hire a bodyguard? Not that he’s not lovely to look at,” she amended. Then, realizing that was perhaps not the most politically correct thing to say, she glanced over at Lucas. “No offense intended, darling.”

  “None taken,” Lucas agreed easily.

  “It’s a bit complicated,” Grace said. “I’ve been getting these letters—”

  “The people in the mail room tell me you receive the most fan mail of any of our writers. Even more than the mystery author who writes the whodunits featuring the lesbian black medical examiner.”

  “Well, these aren’t exactly fan letters.”

  “They’re threats,” Tina revealed flatly.

  “Threats?” George asked, his eyes going wide behind the thick lenses of his glasses. “As in death threats?”

  “That’s right. And although I’m a little miffed that Grace didn’t see fit to reveal Mr. Kincaid’s true reason for being at the conference, L for one, am grateful he was here,” Tina continued.