by Peggy Webb
Why had Ben Appleton gone out of town and left his mother in that condition? It wasn’t like him to be so careless. He was the one Matt really wanted to talk to. And he would, even if he had to storm the travel agency to find out where Ben had gone.
But first he had to deal with the enticing little tramp sitting in his chair.
“Your book’s upside down.”
She gave a guilty start, then batted her big eyes at him. For a moment he almost forgot she was a shameless vixen. Green eyes ought to be outlawed.
“Oh, I didn’t hear you come in.”
Darned if she didn’t put her hand over her chest. Another nasty ploy. All those pearly-pink nails resting on those nicely rounded little breasts.
Matt strolled casually across the room then whirled back and sat in the chair next to hers. He stretched so far his knee rested against her leg.
She jerked back as if he’d branded her with a hot poker. That would teach her to try to outfox a warhorse. He’d had years of practice in keeping his opponents off balance.
“I see you were reading one of my mother’s books.”
“Yes, I was trying to learn.”
“Learn what?”
“About love. I’m a miserable failure at it.” She did that thing with her eyes again.
“I doubt that.”
“Really, I am. Of course, I didn’t expect much from my first fiancé. Pierre was the artistic type.”
Wimpy. Weak. Matt pictured him with a certain malicious glee.
Sandi leaned toward him and he almost missed the false earnestness on her face because of the low cut of her dress.
“My second one didn’t have any staying power,” she said.
Probably some wealthy old geezer who needed Viagra. Clearly she’d been trying to kill him with sex.
“Raoul was a bullfighter.” Matt’s image of the old geezer died an ignominious death. “I think he’d had one too many close calls with a bull.”
“Maybe you’ll have better luck next time,” he said.
“Oh, but I didn’t. My third fiancé…”
“Your third?”
“Yes.”
“How many fiancés have you had?”
“Three.”
She was worse than Matt had imagined. She had to be…what? Twenty-four? Twenty-five? At the rate she was going, she’d decimate the entire bachelor population before she was forty-five.
He had a sudden vision of her on a worldwide husband hunt, selecting and discarding poor unsuspecting males the way she would cheap baubles for her charm bracelet. He applauded himself that he had more sense than to be among that number.
“I suppose you have number four all picked out?”
“Oh, no. That’s the problem. I don’t seem to have the right touch with men.”
If she leaned any farther, she was going to fall out of her chair. Or pop out of her dress. Too bad all that beautiful cleavage had to be wasted on a man-eating floozy.
“Can you educate me?” she said.
He thought he’d heard every line, but this was a new one. He couldn’t wait to see how far she would go.
“I’m afraid I don’t follow you.”
“You’re an expert. Maybe you can give me a few pointers.”
“I deal with love’s demise, not its birth.”
“Still, you know things about the way men think.”
“Obviously. I’m a man.”
Appearing completely artless, she made a clever movement and one of her straps slid off her shoulder. “Do I arouse you?”
Caught red-handed. Or steel-rodded, as the case happened to be. The scary thing about his condition was that Matt hadn’t even noticed when the power shifted from him to her.
“You can stop playing this game, Ms. Wentworth. Your little tricks won’t work on me.”
“Little tricks? How dare you say such a thing! And I was trying to be so nice.”
She jumped out of her chair, then toppled. Matt caught her with the ease he’d caught pigskin on the high-school football field. She wrapped her arms around his neck and melted all over him in a kittenish display of innocent seduction.
He gritted his teeth. “I should have let you fall.”
“Why didn’t you?” The cute little kitten turned to a tigress. Next she would be unsheathing her claws.
“Because I’m a gentleman.”
“You’re no gentleman.” She shoved at him, then looked up big-eyed and said, “Unhand me,” exactly like one of the heroines Dolly had played in B-grade movies.
“Gladly.” He released her, and she teetered toward the left.
This time he didn’t just catch her around the waist, he scooped her up and threw her over his shoulder. All night she’d been asking for a caveman, and that’s exactly what she was going to get.
“Put me down.” She battered his back with her fists.
“You’ve had too much to drink.” He marched toward the door and snapped off the lights on the way out of the library. No sense wasting electricity.
“I don’t drink.”
“That’s a likely story.” The spitfire didn’t bite back. “Or maybe it’s the truth. Maybe this is all part of your act.”
She still didn’t take the bait. Never mind, the front door lay just ahead. He would dump her outside and be done with her.
“This is the end of the line for you, Ms. Wentworth. You’ll have to find some other sucker to deceive.” She was still playing possum. “Ms. Wentworth.” He gave her backside a sharp pat. “Sandi, wake up. Game’s over.”
Dead silence. Plus, she was a dead weight. Matt slid her off his shoulder and she lolled sideways in his arms.
“Shoot.” She’d passed out. Now what was he going to do?
Lucy and Dolly and Kitty were propped up against Lucy’s headboard with their feet in fuzzy bed socks while they watched a rerun of Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr in An Affair to Remember.
“Are you sure everything went all right at dinner?” Lucy asked. “You were subtle, weren’t you?”
“Yes,” Dolly said, and Kitty snorted. “What about all that mint sauce you gave her?” Dolly retorted.
“Do you think I put a little too much muscadine wine in it?”
“What about my pie?” Lucy said. “And while you’re gone, check to see how the lovebirds are doing.”
“What if they catch me?”
“Sneak, Kitty,” Dolly said. “Sneak.”
When Kitty got back, she said, “It looks like a Mexican standoff down there.”
“Is that good or bad?” Lucy asked.
Dolly, who was the expert of the three on account of her many love affairs, pronounced the verdict.
“It could go either way.”
Chapter Three
If he didn’t have such a tender heart Matt would bundle the vixen into her car, toss her duffel bag in behind her. Then, when she got sober enough to drive, she’d be out of his mother’s house and out of his life. In spite of the fact his opponents in court and more than one woman had accused him of being heartless, Matt was really a soft touch.
He couldn’t simply dump her outside. She might be scared of the dark.
Sighing, he trudged up the staircase that had never seemed longer, wondering why this little vamp had to come in such an enticing package.
“Here we go.” When he reached her room, he shifted her off his shoulder and into his arms, then laid her out on the bed as if he were arranging a display of fine diamonds.
She wore a little black dress and not much else. Her feet were small and high-arched with toes as delicate as fine porcelain, toenails painted purple.
Matt stalked to the closet and dragged out a quilt to cover her before he made any more unsettling discoveries. In the short time it took him to get back to the bed, she’d shifted so that her skirt was hiked up to Christmas and her top was barely covering her.
Desire stabbed him so hard he was actually in pain. Gritting his teeth, he tossed the quilt over her. Unfortunately it flop
ped over her face and he had to adjust the covers so she could breathe.
She sighed, her breath soft and warm against his hand. Riveted, Matt watched her face. Nothing was more appealing than a sleeping beautiful woman.
Against his will he touched her cheek. No person had ever exerted such power over him. Matt forced himself to back away from her bed.
“Sleep tight, little succubus. Tomorrow you get your walking papers.”
He escaped to his own bedroom, tossing and turning all night with dreams of being caught in the web of a golden spider with eyes the color of the sea.
The next morning, the sun slapped Matt in the face. He bolted upright and glared at the clock. It had to be wrong. He never slept past six. Occasionally he indulged himself on a weekend and slept till six-thirty, but eight?
“Damn,” he said. Here he was lying abed while Sandi Wentworth had full range of the house. Even worse, she had time to exert her strange and mesmerizing power over his mother. It didn’t take much to fool Lucy. That’s why it was imperative that he get that enticing vixen out of the house. Today.
Matt jerked on his clothes and didn’t even bother to shave. A first for him. Rapping on the connecting door between their bedrooms, he called her name. “Ms. Wentworth? Are you up?”
No answer. Which turned out to be a very good thing, for Matt Coltrane had done the unthinkable. He’d forgotten to put on his shoes.
“Damn,” he said once more. Not only did he put on his shoes—he shaved. What did fifteen more minutes hurt?
He knocked again, the hall door this time. He wasn’t about to get trapped inside a bedroom with her. Fifteen minutes had given him time to regain his composure. Another first for him. He never lost composure.
“Sandi. Rise and shine.” When he got no response, he pushed open the door. The bed was neatly made and her duffel was out of sight. The only evidence that she had been there was the perfume that lingered in the air, that heady fragrance that was going to be his undoing.
Matt backed out of the room and hurried to the west wing to have a heart-to-heart talk with his mother. Portrait or no portrait, Sandi had to go.
“Mother,” he said, and Lucy held up a hand. “Shh,” she said. “Sandi’s at the good part.”
The vixen sat on the side of the bed, transformed. She was wearing a little blue-and-white sundress with an honest-to-God sailor collar. She looked like a schoolgirl of sixteen. Totally innocent. Never been kissed.
“Good morning, Matt.” Her smile lit the whole room.
He didn’t smile back. Didn’t dare. “Morning.” He gave her a curt nod, then skirted around her so he could kiss Lucy’s cheek. “How are you feeling this morning, Mother?”
“Much better now that Sandi’s reading to me.”
He glanced at the book—Gone With The Wind. Wouldn’t you know? A thousand pages. And she was on page ten.
“You don’t have to do that, Ms. Wentworth.”
“Oh, but I don’t mind. In fact, I love it.”
“So do I. Sit down, Matt, and stop scowling.”
“I need to go to the bank and get papers for you to sign, Mother.”
“Kitty’s gone to do that.” Lucy patted the bed. “Sit down and visit a minute.”
He sat on the edge of the bed and took his mother’s hand. The sight of her red-painted fingernails almost broke his heart. Lucy had always been so full of life. It didn’t seem possible that she was dying.
“Where’s Aunt Dolly?”
“Gone to buy Chinese lanterns.”
“Chinese lanterns?”
“To swing across the courtyard.” Lucy stroked his hand. “Don’t look so disapproving. I thought a festive alfresco dinner with music would do us all a world of good.”
“Music?”
“Yes. Dolly’s hiring a band.”
“Good God, Mother, you’re not up to a party.”
“I know, dear, but it will make me feel better to think of the rest of you having a good time.”
Matt became unsettled just thinking about being around Sandi Wentworth in the romantic setting.
“I think Ms. Coltrane looks better already,” Sandi said. “Just look at the roses in her cheeks.”
“That’s the flush of sickness.” He strode across the room, as far as possible from Sandi. “Ms. Wentworth, I need to talk to you. Alone.”
Lucy pouted. “She’s not finished reading. I want her to read, and I want you to go downstairs and fetch me a nice cool glass of lemonade. Bring one for Sandi, too.”
As he stalked out, his mother said, “He’s not really such a bear.”
Sandi said, “I know. Underneath that gruff exterior he’s kind of sweet.”
Sweet? Sweet! The next thing he knew she’d be tying a pink ruffled apron on him and calling him domestic.
As he poured lemonade he thought about Chinese lanterns, moonlight and music. “Turn your back for one minute,” he muttered.
He would have to be more vigilant. While the cat wasn’t watching, the mice had revolted and were threatening to take over.
He’d have to a build a mousetrap, that was all. And he knew the perfect one….
Sandi needed advice, and she needed it now. She called C.J.
“C.J., I’m in love.”
“Not again. Who is it this time?”
“Not who. I’m in love with this house. My room has the greatest old four-poster bed, walnut. The canopy is crocheted, hand done. I keep picturing myself lying there with a baby. Matt’s baby.”
“Matt? As in Matt Coltrane?”
“Yes.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“That’s terrible. He hates me.”
“Sandi, nobody hates you. You’re sweet and wonderful and kind. You’re smart and beautiful….”
“He thinks I’m a tramp.”
C.J. started laughing.
“I don’t see what’s so funny.”
“Men. The harder they fall, the faster they run.”
“You mean, he pretends he hates me because he likes me?”
“Yes. Some people are scared of love, Sandi. Clint was.”
“I remember that. But you were always in love with him. I’m not in love with Matt. Just his house. Though he is wonderful to his mother. This morning she asked for lemonade, and he brought roses, too. He picked them in the garden. Don’t you think that’s kind of sweet?”
“I do.”
“And then he kept saying he had to leave and take care of her business affairs, but he puttered around her desk the whole time I was reading to Lucy. I get goose bumps just thinking about his stolen glances.”
“Stolen glances? You’ve been reading romance.”
“Yes. One of Lucy’s. Tender Is The Plight.” Sandi’s skin flushed thinking about romance and love and babies and Matt. Especially Matt. “Tonight there’ll be a band and Chinese lanterns and a full moon. Oh, C.J., what am I going to do?”
She supposed she sounded desperate, and maybe she was. How many chances did a girl get? Besides, she wasn’t even sure she wanted a romance with Matt Coltrane. She wanted a man to adore her. She wanted a man to love her every moment of every day, no matter what. She wanted love requited and unconditional.
“Don’t do anything, Sandi. Don’t try to figure angles, don’t play games. Just be yourself. Be honest and follow your heart. The universe will take care of the rest.”
In the background she could hear Clint’s deep voice then C.J.’s soft, muffled giggle. Sandi felt guilty taking her away from her husband with idle chatter about her own problems.
“Thank you, C.J. Tell Clint hello for me. Sorry I kept you so long.”
“Call anytime, Sandi. I mean that. Call me.”
“Okay.”
Sinking into the deep comforting folds of the bed, Sandi imagined herself in a pink satin bed jacket, continuing her dream.
Mood music drifted up from the courtyard, and from his window Matt could see Sandi Wentworth in the soft glow of Chinese lanterns. Wearing white
. Looking demure and virginal and helpless.
“How am I going to force her to show her true colors with her looking like that?”
He’d expected vampish red with slits that showed lots of leg and a plunging neckline that showed lots of breast. Not that soft, diaphanous skirt that made her look as if she was walking on a cloud. Not that high neckline that showed not a single shred of cleavage.
“She looks like a bride.”
Matt was furious. He jerked on his tuxedo jacket and raced downstairs. Before dinner got cold. Before he could change his mind.
“Matt.” Good God. Sandi practically glowed when she said his name.
To make matters worse, she touched his cheek. Once. Briefly. A butterfly’s brush that lingered just long enough for him to be almost overcome with that siren’s fragrance that wafted off her hair, her skin. What diabolical game was she playing now?
“I thought you weren’t coming,” she said.
“I never miss dinner.”
“Oh.”
She feigned disappointment so well, he almost believed her.
“Will you excuse me? I have to talk with Aunt Kitty.” He left Sandi beside a potted hibiscus and bolted toward a fountain.
“Aunt Kitty.” Matt was so happy to be in safe territory, he practically fawned over his startled aunt.
“Why, Matt. What’s put you in such an expansive mood?”
“Our guest, I hope,” Dolly said.
“She’s not my guest. She’s mother’s.”
Dolly swatted him arm with her Japanese fan, a theatrical touch she’d added to her long embroidered silk kimono. “You’re more fun when you smile.”
“I’m smiling.” He made a grimace in her direction, and was turning to ask Kitty about the papers from the bank, when Dolly grabbed her arm and raced toward the wrought iron table. “Matt,” she called over her shoulder, “escort Miss Wentworth to dinner.”
What had gotten into her? Dolly Wilder’s manners had always been impeccable. Was she getting senile? At this early age?
Sandi gave him that megawatt smile again. He could almost believe it was genuine.
