No Mistress of Mine

by Laura Lee Guhrke

  He gave an exasperated sigh. “Where is the fellow?”

  “If you’re looking for your secretary,” a feminine, distinctly American voice drawled in answer to his muttered question, “he’s making me a cup of tea.”

  Denys froze in disbelief, for that voice was low, earthy, dipping on the vowels, and somehow able to lend an erotic note to what would otherwise be the rather flat accent of America’s Middle West. It could only belong to one woman.

  He took a breath, telling himself he had to be mistaken, but when he turned, the tall, voluptuous redhead standing in the doorway of his office proved he’d made no mistake.

  Her hair was the same deep, flaming color he remembered, a shade of red most women could only gain from henna dye. Atop those vibrant curls, an enormous concoction of pink feathers, crimson ribbons, and cream-colored straw was perched at an angle that defied all laws of gravity, and below it was the stunning face he’d hoped never to see again. Her eyes were the same vivid teal blue he remembered, her full lips the same deep pink. In the staid, ascetic atmosphere of his offices, she bloomed with vibrant life, like an exotic cactus flower blooming amid the sand and scrub of the desert.

  He took a step closer, scanning her face, but the powder she wore prevented him from seeing the freckles that dusted her nose and cheeks. It didn’t matter, though, for he knew they were there. He ought to. He’d kissed every one of them.

  How many times, he wondered, had he lain in her bed at the little house in St. John’s Wood, his body sated, his mind drowsy, watching her apply powder to her face, trying to conceal the freckles she despised? How many times had he watched her draw gossamer stockings up her shapely legs and dab jasmine scent to the backs of her knees? Dozens, he guessed. Perhaps hundreds. He’d thought those halcyon days would never end, but they had ended, and with bone-shattering shock.

  Looking at her, he thought of the last time he’d seen her, in her Paris dressing room. Everything came back to him as if it had all happened yesterday—the filmy white peignoir she’d been wearing, the opened champagne on the table, her face pale as milk at the sight of him. And Henry on the settee, smiling and triumphant.

  The anger he’d felt earlier began to burn inside him, as if he’d just downed a glass of cheap whisky. Although that wasn’t really an apt analogy, for Lola had never been cheap. On the contrary, she’d been the most expensive mistake he’d ever made. And the most intoxicating.

  His gaze lowered before he could stop it. She still had the same generous curves he remembered, curves shaped by years of dance, curves that he suspected still owed little to corsets and nothing at all to bust improvers, pads, or bustles.

  She was wearing a frock of pale pink silk, and he couldn’t help noticing how the color of the dress blended seamlessly into the skin of her throat and jaw. Any other woman, he thought in chagrin, would look maidenly, even innocent, in such a color, but not Lola. Pale pink silk only made Lola look . . . naked.

  Denys wasn’t usually one to curse, but in some situations, an oath was the only response a sane man could offer.

  “Hell,” he muttered, but the word seemed wholly inadequate as a vent to his feelings. “Damn,” he added, and was still not satisfied. “Damn, and blast, and holy hell!”

  She smiled a little. “It’s good to see you, too, Denys.”

  The sound of his name on her lips was like paraffin on hot coals, and all his suppressed anger blazed up, threatening to burn out of control. He pressed a fist to his mouth, working to contain it.

  “Aren’t you going to say something?” she asked after a few moments. “Beyond a few choice curses, that is?”

  He lowered his hand and took a deep breath. “It’s odd,” he murmured, injecting a level of cool detachment into his voice that he didn’t feel in the least, “but I cannot think of anything more I might wish to say to you.”

  “ ‘Hello’ might be a good start,” she suggested. “Or you could ask how I’ve been.”

  He set his jaw, hardening his anger into resolve. “That question would imply a degree of curiosity I do not possess.”

  Any trace of a smile vanished from her face with that cold reply. He was being churlish, he knew, a demeanor not at all in keeping with his position or his upbringing, but what had she expected? A warm welcome? Fond recollections of the old days?

  She cleared her throat, breaking the silence that had fallen between them. “Denys, I’m sure my call today has caught you by surprise, but—”

  “On the contrary. The day you stop being unpredictable is when I shall be caught by surprise. Capriciousness, after all, is part of a mistress’s stock-in-trade, isn’t it?”

  That shot hit the mark, he could tell. A flash of answering anger showed in those extraordinary eyes, reminding him that Lola was not only a redhead, she also possessed the passionate temperament often associated with hair of that shade. “I wouldn’t know,” she countered with asperity, “since I was never your mistress. I was your lover.”

  He shrugged, in no frame of mind to debate the rather blurred distinctions of their past relationship. “And which were you with Henry? His lover, or his mistress? Or were the two of you just good friends?”

  She flinched, but if he thought such caustic questions would send her scurrying off, he was mistaken. Instead, she lifted her chin and stood her ground.

  “Is there any point in rehashing the past?” she asked. “It’s really the future we need to talk about, isn’t it?”

  “The future?” he echoed, baffled. “What do you mean?”

  That question seemed to take her back though he didn’t know why it should. “But surely you knew—” She broke off, catching her full lower lip between her teeth, staring at him for a moment before she spoke again. “You haven’t heard.”

  He frowned, feeling suddenly uneasy. “I heard Henry is dead if that’s what you mean.”

  “It isn’t . . . quite.”

  “Is that why you’re here? Now that Henry’s gone, you want to take up where we left off?” He knew it was absurd even as he said it, and yet he could not imagine any other reason for her presence or her words about the future. “You want me to take care of you?”

  “No man takes care of me,” she countered with asperity, reminding him of the scrappy, saucy girl he’d met so long ago, a girl who’d kept him at arm’s length for over a year and driven him nearly mad before at last becoming his. “I take care of myself. I thought I made that clear six years ago.”

  “So you did, and yet, Henry seems to have taken care of you nicely. From what I hear, the show he backed for you is quite the thing in New York. Becoming his mistress paid off handsomely for you.”

  She opened her mouth to reply, then bit her lip. “Please don’t pick a fight with me, Denys. I didn’t come all this way for a quarrel nor to see if we could take up where we left off.”

  Her words brought no relief, for if she wasn’t here to reconcile, that meant something else was in the wind. “And yet, you talk of us having a future. What could ever lead you to believe we have one?”

  She sighed. “Henry’s will.”

  “His will?” Denys stared at her, and suddenly, it felt as if the earth were opening beneath his feet, as if he were being pulled down into some dark abyss.

  “Yes.” She opened her handbag of crimson silk and pulled a folded sheet of paper from its interior. She held it up between white-gloved fingers. “He made me your new partner.”

  Chapter 2

  Lola had known calling on Denys with no advance notice would give him a shock, but she’d deemed it a wiser course than to write ahead and request an appointment. This way, he had no chance to refuse to see her.

  He could, however, toss her out the window. The grimness of his countenance told her that was a distinct possibility.

  “My partner?” he echoed her declaration through clenched teeth. “In what enterprise?”

  “The Imperial. Well, technically, I’m your father’s partner, but since you manage all his holdings for him
—”

  “You’re mad.”

  Lola rustled the sheet of paper in her fingers. “This letter to me outlines the exact details of Henry’s bequest. The week before I left New York, Mr. Forbes assured me he’d sent a similar missive to your father, along with the news of Henry’s death. Obviously, Conyers informed you of the latter, but did he not tell you about the former?”

  Denys didn’t reply. Instead, he continued to stare at her in stone-faced silence, and watching him, Lola realized all the rehearsing she’d done on the voyage over to ready herself for this meeting hadn’t done her a bit of good.

  For one thing, he didn’t seem aware of the terms of the will. She’d come prepared to face him on the assumption he’d be equally prepared to face her. That, it seemed, was not the case.

  Worse, however, was the fact that this man wasn’t at all like the Denys she’d known. That man had been easy and carefree, with an irresistible boyish charm and a deep, passionate tenderness. Lola could find little trace of those qualities in the man before her.

  This man had Denys’s lean cheekbones and square jaw, but there was nothing boyish or carefree to soften them. This man had Denys’s brown eyes, but as their gazes met, she could see no hint of tenderness in their dark depths. She’d heard what a shrewd man of business he’d become, and looking at him now, she had no trouble believing it.

  The changes had cost him, though, for there were faint creases at the corners of his eyes and across his forehead that hadn’t been there before, lines that spoke of responsibilities the Denys she’d known had never been forced to assume. His mouth, once so ready to smile, was now an uncompromising line—though his lack of humor on this occasion might be due to her arrival rather than the burdens of duty.

  She’d hurt him, she knew that. She’d taken any affection he felt for her and shredded it. But there’d been no other way to make him see that a girl like her, a girl born beside the cattle yards and slaughterhouses of Kansas City, who’d spent her childhood amid the smells of manure, blood, and rotgut whiskey, who’d started stripping down to her naughties in front of men before she was sixteen, could never make a man like him happy.

  Pain pinched her chest, and Lola suddenly couldn’t bear the harshness in his face—harshness she knew she had put there. She tore her gaze away.

  His body, she noted as she looked down, had changed less than his face. He still had the wide, powerful shoulders and narrow hips of the athlete he’d been, and from what she could see, six years hadn’t added an ounce of fat to his physique. If anything, he seemed stronger and more powerful at thirty-two than he’d been at twenty-four.

  She’d hoped time would have mellowed any acrimony on his part, but now, she feared that hope had been futile.

  Still, there was no going back, and she forced herself to speak again. “I came here today assuming Conyers had received all the information from Mr. Forbes and that he had made you aware how things stand. But I see I was mistaken.”

  “By God, you’ve got gall, Lola,” he muttered, glaring at her. “I’ll give you that. You’ve got gall.”

  Resentment was palpable in every line of his face, in the frigid stance of his body, in the very air of the room. But she had no intention of withering in the face of his anger like some tender little hothouse flower, and Lola met his hostile gaze with a level one of her own. “This is a matter of business,” she said quietly. “It isn’t personal, Denys.”

  “Well, that relieves my mind,” he countered, and despite her intention to remain steadfast, she couldn’t help wincing a bit at the sarcasm.

  He strode forward, pulled the letter from her fingers, and unfolded it to scan the typewritten lines, but when he looked up, his expression was still implacable.

  “Not only the Imperial, but fifty thousand dollars in backing money,” he said as he refolded the sheet. “Mistress to heiress in one simple step.”

  She opened her mouth to deny his contention, but then she closed it again. What would be the point of denial? Her role as Henry’s mistress was a fiction of long standing, begun that fateful night in her Paris dressing room six years ago. It was a role both she and Henry had found convenient and one neither of them had ever seen the need to dispel. There was no purpose in telling Denys the truth now, for he would never believe her. Best to let sleeping dogs lie. “Henry was a kind and generous man,” she said instead.

  “I daresay. But I am curious. How does his family feel about this particular display of his kindness and generosity?”

  “Henry left his wife and children well provided for. The Imperial was only a fraction of his estate.”

  “Only a fraction?” He held out the letter. “Then I’m sure poor Gladys and the children didn’t feel the least bit cheated.”

  Lola bristled as she snatched the letter from his hand. “His children—who are twenty-three and twenty-six, by the way—didn’t give a damn about Henry when he was alive, and neither did Gladys. None of them had the time of day for him unless they wanted more money, of course.”

  Denys’s mouth took on a cynical curve, and his gaze slid downward. “You, I’m sure, were much more devoted.”

  Hot color rushed into her face. Playing the part of Henry’s mistress had been easy in New York, but standing in front of Denys now, there was nothing easy about it. Still, one had to live with one’s choices, so Lola took a deep breath and brought the conversation back to the present. “Perhaps instead of talking about Henry, we should talk about what happens next?”

  “Next?” He frowned. “I’m not sure I have the pleasure of understanding you.”

  “I own one-half of the Imperial, and though your father owns the other half, you manage it. That means you and I will be working together—”

  “We most certainly will not.”

  She studied him for a moment, then gestured to the doorway behind her. “Since we see the situation so differently, perhaps we should sit down and discuss it? A mutual understanding might be hammered out.”

  Not wanting to give him the chance to refuse, she didn’t wait for a reply. Turning away, she reentered his office, resumed her seat in the leather chair opposite his desk where she’d been awaiting his arrival, and crossed her fingers that he would follow. After a moment, he did, but his next words provided little encouragement for an amicable interview.

  “I fail to see what there is for us to hammer out,” he said as he circled his desk to face her.

  The opening of the outer door interrupted any reply she might have made, and a moment later, Mr. Dawson came bustling into Denys’s office, a laden tray in his hands.

  “Here’s your tea, Miss Valentine. I hope you like Earl Grey. Oh, good morning, sir,” he added as he spied Denys standing behind the desk. Giving his employer a nod, the secretary halted beside Lola’s chair and placed the tea tray on the desk in front of her. “I also brought some biscuits for you in case you might be hungry.”

  “Thank you.” In the wake of Denys’s hostility, the secretary’s friendliness was like a soothing balm, and she gave the young man a grateful smile. “How very thoughtful of you.”

  “Not at all, not at all.” He reached for the teapot and began to pour her tea. “I must say again how exciting it is to meet you in the flesh, Miss Valentine. I saw your one-woman show in New York last year, when I was there with my previous employer, and it was spectacular. I still remember how you kicked off the hat of that man in the front row, tossing it into the air with your toe, though how you managed to land it on your own head, I can’t think.” He laughed. “I’ll wager that chap never forgets to remove his hat in the theater again.”

  Lola didn’t tell him the man with the hat was always in the audience. “I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

  “I did very much. I hope your presence in London means you intend to do a show here?”

  “I’d like to perform here, yes.” She looked over at Denys, and his icy countenance confirmed just how difficult a prospect that was going to be. “We’ll have to see.”

&
nbsp; “I do hope you will. I should very much like to see you perform again. Would you care for sugar and milk?”

  Lola had no opportunity to reply to that, for Denys interrupted.

  “Dawson, stop fawning over Miss Valentine and find me the Calvin and Bosch contracts if you please.”

  “Of course, my lord.” Giving Lola an apologetic smile, Mr. Dawson handed over her tea, then bowed and left the room.

  Cup and saucer in hand, Lola settled back in her seat and waited, but Denys did not move to take his own chair. “Denys, do sit down,” she said. “Or I’ll soon have a crick in my neck.”

  “This conversation isn’t going to last long enough for that.” He leaned forward, flattening his palms on the polished oak top of his desk. “There is no way I shall involve myself, or my father, for that matter, in a partnership with you.”

  “You are already involved.”

  “Not for long. Now if you will pardon me,” he added before she could ask what he meant, “I have an appointment for which I am already late.”

  She tilted her head back, and as she studied him, she knew that for now, at least, this discussion was over. If a partnership between them was ever going to work—and she was determined to make it work come hell or high water—she had to begin on as amicable a footing as possible. That meant respecting his schedule.

  “Of course.” She put the letter back in her handbag and stood up. “When would you like to resume this discussion? I can make an appointment with your secretary, or—”

  “I thought I was clear, but evidently not.” He paused, and his eyes narrowed, seeming to darken their color from brown to black. “I will accept no appointment with you. I will not be discussing anything with you involving the Imperial or any other matter. Not now, and not in future.”

  “But Denys, the season is about to begin. Rehearsals for Othello begin in two weeks. There are decisions we must make, arrangements for—”

  “Of course,” he cut her off. “Dawson will give you the names of my solicitors. I’m sure they will be quite happy to keep you abreast of what decisions and arrangements I am making for the Imperial. You will, I trust, let them know where to send your share of the profits?”