Cry Wolf

by Amanda Carpenter

  How strong he was, and how reliant one could become on the care with which he cloaked it. His brown eyes were vivid with the expression he would not allow his expression to reveal. They were eyes to drown oneself in, deep, searching pools that took every bit as much as they gave, multiplying the intensity of feeling inside her so that she sighed, at once a release and an admission.

  “It’s not fear, at least not precisely,” she said, her lips softened and vulnerable on the words that were quiet, yet steady. “I never did object to your invitation in itself, but I do have doubts as to how you made it. I am very wary of men who know how to manipulate as well as you do, and that’s a hard habit to break. I’m not even sure whether it’s a habit that should be broken.”

  He frowned and seemed about to say something, but then just shrugged, and smiled, and carried her bandaged hand up to press a light kiss on the small fingers that smelled faintly of antiseptic. Then, as always, he released her almost immediately so that she had no opportunity to withdraw. He turned the key in the lock for her and commented, “You look better. Still a little pale, though. Did you have a busy day yesterday?”

  The adroit change in conversation gave her a handle on recovering her poise, and she laughed, expostulating, “Very, and who do I have to thank for that?”

  “Your Peter is a rather excitable man,” said Harper smoothly.

  “I think his wife would object to your calling him ‘my Peter’,” she retorted very drily as he stood back and let her precede him up the stairs. A ghost of a quiet laugh wafted up from behind her and enveloped her in velvet auditory sensation, calling forth an answering, irrepressible grin. She smothered it quickly as she came up to the third-floor landing, blaming her breathlessness on the swift ascent while Harper showed no such physical weakness. She had to grope for some lingering sense of outrage to add acidic sarcasm to her next comment. “And yes, he is, but then one would expect him to be after how you enticed him yesterday. He feels much indebted to your business contribution, of course.”

  “How rude you are when you’re being sardonic,” returned Harper, effectively taking the wind out of her sails by jangling the forgotten keys in front of her nose. “Which one will let us into your eyrie?”

  The pertly upturned nose just two inches from his fingers wrinkled in a very haughty sniff. She indicated, and he unlocked again, and as she led him into her flat she felt a wild sense of suffocation at how the spacious room contracted almost violently with the onslaught of his dynamic presence.

  Nikki stood to one side as he prowled through the place in just a few of those distance-dominating strides. He flicked a keen glance around, noting the untidy jumble of books, the attractive hide-a-bed couch, the contradicting neatness of her art supplies in the middle of the hardwood floor, the soft canvas suitcase ready by the door.

  She hadn’t realised it before, but the flat was a very private cocoon where few people were allowed to intrude. She saw it suddenly though his eyes and felt somehow exposed, like a nocturnal animal blinking in full sunlight, and for some reason she couldn’t bear to hear him make some personal comment on the place.

  He didn’t, merely sending her a quick, brisk smile as he said, “I’ll rifle through your refrigerator for you. Want everything out?”

  “Yes, please.” Nikki hovered as he dispensed efficiently with the few perishables in the waist-high unit, jumping forward to take the open carton of milk out of his hands and dump the liquid down the sink.

  “Have you had breakfast?” he asked, straightening with the rubbish bag slung in one hand. “If not, we can stop along the way for something to eat.”

  “I’ve already eaten, thank you.” She frowned as she turned the tap to run cold water into the sink and rinse away the last traces of milk, and she couldn’t have explained the frown to save her life.

  Except, perhaps, that Harper seemed to have taken her over since he had first appeared, and that had never happened to her before. She felt distinctly uncomfortable, as if she had given away part of the independence that was so precious to her, and it was no good trying to rationalise about how much control she had theoretically over events; he had invaded her mind and dominated her thinking, and no one could do that without at least some partial co-operation.

  “I see you’ve also had your hands re-bandaged,” he observed from too close by her shoulder. She snapped the water flow off with a sharp flick of the wrist, ignoring the warning twinge from the palm of her hand at the hasty gesture, and schooled her expression to unrevealing blandness as she turned back to face him.

  They left the flat together and Nikki waited for Harper to return from the rubbish tip, her suitcase on the ground beside her. Though she had never taken off the light denim jacket she had worn to the shops that morning, the wind sliced through both it and her sweater, and she hunched herself into a shivering huddle.

  Those dark, keen eyes saw too much, and all she had as some kind of potential defence was instinct. She would have to hide very carefully the strange, premonitory feelings that had shuttled through her like a fast midnight train, that had her wondering why her life seemed to be taking on a whole new sense of direction.

  She was only going to Oxford for a week or two. She refused even to consider why it felt as if she was going on a journey from which she would never return, for he would see it in her face. She didn’t even dare acknowledge to herself why it was so important he did not. He returned and asked, as his gaze pierced into hers and seemed to read all of her secrets, “Are you ready?”

  “As ready as I’ll ever be,” she muttered as she ducked her head, but she hadn’t meant to make her reply sound quite so grim.

  Chapter Four

  Nikki compressed her mouth into a tight line as she settled into the passenger-seat of the Jaguar and Harper reached across to pull over her seatbelt and buckle it. It was hard to avoid his observant gaze in the confines of the car, especially when he was twisted neatly around at his taut, lean waist, the broad, rolling shoulders angled towards her, one long arm resting for a moment on the steering-wheel in unavoidable confrontation.

  He was too much to take at close quarters. She jerked her head towards her window and pretended to stare out of it, while she listened to her idiotic heart thumping in mad concert with her chaotic thoughts. Too much, too large, too sure of himself with a kind of unaffected panache that came with experience and maturity, too male.

  And, of course, too accurate, as he settled back in his own seat and started the car, remarking quietly, “I know how uncomfortable you must find the restrictions at the moment.”

  She ground out a blushing admission of her intense frustration. “I just hate feeling so helpless. It hurts even to make myself a cup of tea!”

  “I’m not surprised,” he replied with studied casualness. “Your poor hands took a good slashing. But you aren’t helpless, you’re just slightly incapacitated for the time being, and I think you’re being very commonsensical about accepting some assistance. Have patience, it won’t last long.”

  Harper sped the Jaguar around Hyde Park and past Marble Arch. He coped with the Saturday traffic in London just as he coped with everything else—with a spare economy of effort that was highly efficient without being ostentatious. He was never flashy or boastful of his own capabilities; he simply got the job done with a minimum of fuss. Somewhat surprisingly, Nikki was not daunted by this aspect of his considerably forceful personality. Instead she found it soothing, rock-steady and weatherproof, something to be relied upon in a very unstable world.

  She said after a few minutes, with a slight smile, “You always seem to know the right thing to say.”

  That prompted a very satirical glance from under raised eyebrows. He said drily, “Do I? I don’t remember doing so well at it yesterday.”

  “Granted, you didn’t hit it perfectly,” returned Nikki, her smile turning somewhat sour. “You certainly ruffled my feathers whe
n you rubbed me the wrong way. But didn’t you get what you wanted in the end?”

  “Yes, I got what I wanted,” Harper replied thoughtfully. “But in marketing terms for my company, and you’re taking on the challenge of a new painting that I have high hopes for. Because you’re so much of a perfectionist, I can afford to admit to the high hopes without fearing that I’m putting undue pressure on you. But, as you pointed out earlier, does that justify the methods I used?”

  So he had taken in what she had said, and not just ignored it. Nikki remained silent, which was an answer all of its own. They had reached the western arc of the North Circular Road, where the traffic was moving at a snail’s pace. Harper slowed the car without the slightest hint of impatience, as if he had all the time in the world for this shared journey, and he flicked a quick glance at her, smiling at her troubled expression.

  “I shall confess something to you,” he said lightly, as if to indicate that what he next said was amusing, of no import. “You’re good for me. You have a very strong personality that is a challenge in itself, and those unrelentingly perceptive blue eyes of yours make me see how I have slid into a kind of behaviour that ten years ago I would have considered unacceptable. My career is concerned with results, not the morality of the method, and there is nothing at present in my personal life to curb my particular brand of arrogance.”

  “I guess I’m not surprised,” she said after a moment. “If Peter, and Duncan Chang, and Gordon, and the police are any kind of example of what you face, you must get very tired of being thrust into a demi-god status.”

  “You sound as if you’ve had first-hand experience of that sort of thing,” remarked Harper with frown.

  “I’ve certainly lived with and around enough powerful men to believe I understand it,” she replied, staring at the brooding expression that had settled over his face. He did not like what he was hearing, but at least he was receptive to it. “You have to be hard, because you make so many hard decisions that you’ve got to live with. You’ve got to be ruthless, because the people around you are ruthless. And when that spills into your personal life people around you start to look at you with more awe than respect and the distance widens between you and the rest of the world. In a lot of men that brings out all the darker side of their personalities. Solitary confinement can create quite an imbalance.”

  “I could almost wish you didn’t see me quite so well.” He said it softly, the hard white teeth gleaming at the utterance, but Nikki saw how his beautifully formed fingers gripped the steering-wheel.

  Well, exposure was sometimes painful. Her own hand went out of its own volition and rested on the rigid length of his muscled thigh. “Shall I confess something to you now?” she said, and as he heard the unsteadiness in her voice his left hand came down to curl around her wrist. “Sometimes I am afraid around you. The reason isn’t who you are or what you’ve done. I like and respect what I see in you. But you resurrect some memories that are difficult for me. I’m frightened of them, Harper. Not of you.”

  He sent her a quick, astute glance while his clasp tightened. “Was it your father?”

  “Oh, in part,” she said wearily, making a small, inadequate gesture with her free hand.

  He was listening intently, and when she didn’t continue he prompted, “He died when you were about eleven, or twelve, didn’t he?”

  She gasped in shock, then exclaimed, “How long have you known?”

  He shrugged. “I guessed somewhere between yesterday afternoon and this morning. I’m not sure when—perhaps a trick of movement on your part, or a turn of phrase. Your name was another clue, of course. Nikki Ashton—Nicholas Ashton-Meyer. Did you drop the Meyer for professional reasons?”

  “Yes, I didn’t want anyone to be influenced because of who I was.” She became aware of the tremor running through her body; he must be able to feel it, and she made an effort to withdraw.

  He wouldn’t let her. “I saw your father at university once, when he visited for a guest lecture. He was a very charismatic man, but then he wouldn’t have become such a prominent politician if he hadn’t been.”

  “We were all under the influence of his aura. It was a fairy-tale life, in many ways,” she sighed, as she leaned her head back, shaken by the intensity of her reaction to Harper’s shrewd guess.

  “Tell me, Nikki?”

  He asked gently. He asked as if it really mattered. And it suddenly did; her long silence was no longer self-protective but burdensome.

  “We went everywhere with him,” she said quietly and closed her eyes to see it all again, the brilliant parade of different places. “An entire entourage of family, private tutors, secretaries and advisers. Hong King, China for a year, here in England, Saudi Arabia, when he was involved in negotiating that old deal in the seventies, France for the nuclear disarmament talks.”

  “I remember,” he murmured, an unobtrusive encouragement.

  The scenery alongside the M40 flashed by, beautifully rolling hills and picturesque villages bathed in golden sunshine. Nikki didn’t see a thing. “When Senator Ashton-Meyer spoke,” she said drily, “people jumped. It was no secret that he was a brilliant candidate for the presidency. We were all caught up in the golden reflection. My brother Johnny and I idolised him. I wonder if he knew just how much we heard, of speculations and power manoeuvres, political decisions based on the bottom line of expediency. He could annihilate a character with such witty charm. My mother was totally immersed in his life. It crippled her when he was killed.”

  “How did it affect you and your brother?”

  “Oh, astonishment, numb disbelief. We were too young to discover any feet of clay to our idol, you see, and didn’t recognise until we were much older how narcissistic he was, and how dependent he was on the adulation of everyone around him. Don’t get me wrong; he wasn’t a bad man, just selfish. It was hard to conceive that someone so invincible could die. All the magical impetus that put the sparkle in our lives was just—gone. Mother was like a ghost for nearly a year.”

  “Then she remarried right about that time, didn’t she? To Kane Heissenger, the rich German art collector?”

  “Yes,” Nikki said, her voice very wry. “Then she married Kane.”

  Harper’s expression was neutral as he asked, “So you and Heissenger don’t get along?”

  Her resultant smile was tight; how many times had she already seen how astute he was? He noticed every slip, every crack in the façade. “Quite the contrary,” she said ironically. “My relationship with Kane is extremely polite.”

  She felt rather than saw the keen stab of his enquiring glance. “Then what did he do to alienate you?”

  Nikki smiled and lifted her shoulders. “Absolutely nothing. Kane is simply as my father was—seduced by his own glamour and not particularly interested in another man’s children, except for the possible value they might have as adornments to his lifestyle. By that point in my life I was more than happy to go to boarding-school in Paris, and return to the States for holidays and Christmases. Home just didn’t feel like home any more. At least not the kind I was used to.”

  “And you stayed to carve a life of your own.”

  “And I stayed,” she agreed. “You see, reflected glory has such a limited appeal. What kind of real success would I have were I to rely on my stepfather’s influence? What kind of independence? Neither he, nor my mother, really understands. They view my insistence on living within my earning power as an amusing personality quirk, and are just waiting for the day when I tire of my working-girl status and return to debutante balls and discreet flirtations with elegant young men from very acceptable families. How very eccentric of me not to concede.”

  Harper grinned, a blade-slash of wicked amusement. “Indeed,” he murmured drily, almost to himself, “and the last piece in the puzzle.”

  “What do you mean?”

  The firm hold he had on her was
at once an anchor and a lure, for suddenly she surfaced from that backward dive of reminiscence into the present. Again she tried to tug her arm away, a small and furtive effort to reclaim her own space; in response Harper rubbed the ball of his thumb along the sensitive skin of her inner wrist, producing a convulsive shiver down the back of her spine.

  “Only that I can now see the reasons why you’re so prickly about your independence,” he replied after a moment. “For you it isn’t a given—you’ve had to fight for it every step of the way.”

  “Oh, it’s not so bad,” she said, her light shrug a disguise for the shrewd glance she sent him. “Their motives might be misguided, but their intentions are good, I think. I just happen to believe that expediency is not the bottom line, the easy road isn’t always the best one, and I know how much self-respect can get lost when you’re involved with powerful people. I won’t pay that price again, because the morality of the method always matters, Harper. It always matters.”

  No matter how quietly it was said, the warning was crystal-clear, and it shot home. She peeked quickly at Harper to find him in a frozen state that had nothing to do with driving along an even, straight road. Then came the thaw, and vivid reaction, and he said, sounding queerly rueful, “Sharp as a tack and ruthlessly honest to the death. My dear girl, I don’t misuse the influence I have. I’m a protector, not a destroyer.”

  “Yes?” she murmured almost dreamily as she stared at him, half in inexplicable longing, half in trepidation. “But what about your enemies? What about the people in your life who dare to say no?”

  Deafening silence greeted that, and if he had seemed frozen before, now the tough line of his profile was encased in ice. “If you think to set yourself up as some kind of judge over my behaviour,” he bit out acidly, “I advise you to stop right where you are. I give no accounts for what I do, and you are not my keeper.”

  A dark simmer of explosive emotion roiled inside her as he threw a quick glare at her, and Nikki sat back in her seat, at once intimidated and fascinated by the eruptive anger she had provoked. “My father never could stand to be crossed or questioned either,” she breathed, unable to help herself, and if anything his anger intensified.