When Lightning Strikes Twice

by Barbara Boswell

  “Why did Carla call you?” Quint demanded. “Wouldn’t calling the fire department be a more logical choice?”

  “She was trying to reach you. Maybe she thought you were at home instead of the office, I don’t know. Carla’s scared out of her mind, Quint, she’s not thinking too straight. The neighbors called the fire department and the truck’s here now. The police too. Quint, you’d better get over here.”

  Sarah paused to audibly inhale. “Nobody knows where Dustin is. Somebody said he was seen running back inside the house yelling he was going to get their dog.”

  “And he hasn’t been seen since? My God, Dustin is trapped inside?”

  Quint’s voice echoed through Rachel’s head. She didn’t know who he was talking about, but the implications of anyone being trapped in a burning building were horrifying.

  “What was the kid doing at home at this hour? It’s a Thursday, why in hell wasn’t that child at school? I know he’s not sick, I just saw him yesterday,” Quint thundered in a raw furious voice that was light-years away from his effective, controlled courtroom tone of oh-so-righteous anger. “God almighty, Sarah, why didn’t someone grab him before he went into that house?”

  “I don’t know!” Sarah shouted back. “Just get here, Quint. Carla’s running around screaming and everybody’s starting to go crazy.” A loud baby wail nearly drowned out her voice. “See what I mean? Even Brady’s getting scared.”

  “I’ll be right there,” Quint promised, and raced from his office.

  Automatically, Rachel followed him, so close on his heels that when he stopped suddenly in the reception area she crashed into him, colliding full force with his broad back. Reeling from impact, gulping for breath, she swayed backward.

  “Dammit, I don’t have my car!” Quint seemed unaware that he’d dealt Rachel a body blow equal to an offensive lineman’s sack of a quarterback. He was talking aloud to himself, oblivious to everything around him. “That damned recall—I finally took the car in to the dealership, today of all days, and now I’m stuck without—”

  “Wish I could help, but my husband dropped me off on his way to the warehouse, as usual,” Helen lamented. “Dana doesn’t have her car today either—one of her brothers borrowed it. You know how those Sheelys are always juggling rides. Should I call you a taxi, Quint?”

  “I have my car,” Rachel heard herself say.

  For a moment, she wondered if her forceful collision with Quint had left her delirious. Was that really her offering to help her avowed enemy? Then she thought of the fierce panic in his voice, the fear she’d seen in his dark brown eyes when he’d heard that the child named Dustin had run inside the burning house. She was acting on a natural humanitarian impulse, she assured herself.

  “Thanks.” Quint breathed a genuine sigh of relief. “Give me the keys.”

  Rachel’s humanitarian impulse faltered a bit. “I’ll drive you where you want to go, but I can’t give you my car. I—uh—need it later, for an appointment.”

  Which wasn’t entirely true. She had no appointment scheduled later but she wasn’t about to be left stranded without her car. Especially not in this place where carlessness seemed to be the order of the day.

  “Right, come on.” Quint grasped her arm and half dragged her from the office.

  They saw Dana Sheely across the street, standing on the corner waiting for the light to change, a cardboard carton of coffee cups in her hands.

  “Dana, hold down the fort, okay?” Quint shouted to her. “Helen will explain everything.” He turned to Rachel. “Where’s your car?”

  “There.” Rachel pointed to her dream car, a royal blue BMW convertible that she would be making car payments on for many more years. But it didn’t matter; she’d wanted a convertible her entire life and had fallen in love with the car at first sight two years ago. At the Pedersen Car Shoppe.

  And now she was offering to give Quinton Cormack a lift in it. Maybe she’d been concussed by that body slam back in his office and her thought processes were off-kilter, but suddenly there seemed to be something cyclically cosmic going on. She stared at him, her hazel eyes huge.

  “Ever put the top down?” Quint tapped the roof of the car, which was securely in place.

  “Of course. Often. What’s the point of having a convertible if the top is always up?”

  “This isn’t what I’d expected you to drive,” he muttered, climbing into the passenger side as she slid behind the wheel. “I’d’ve bet my house that your car would be something big, black and sturdy, something solid and traditional. Conservative.”

  “Sounds like a hearse.” Rachel turned the key and the engine purred to life. “It’s enlightening to know that even in the midst of—of acute anxiety you still have the presence of mind to insult me.”

  “I wasn’t insulting you, Rachel.”

  The sound of her name on his lips made her shiver. Desperately, she tried to tamp down the sensation. “You’ll have to direct me to your father’s house,” she said, hoping she sounded businesslike, maybe even severe.

  “It’s not far from here. Take a left at the next light.”

  She quickly became aware that the directions were leading toward Lakeview’s only marginal residential neighborhood, consisting of several crowded streets of small wooden houses on undersized lots. The neighborhood directly bordered the less desirable zip code of Oak Shade, and the aging houses in varying states of disrepair and untended yards were far more typical of Oak Shade than tony Lakeview.

  Rachel knew the neighborhood was referred to as “Lakeshade”, and the appellation was not meant to be flattering. It wasn’t a surprise to learn that Frank Cormack, that inept and unlucky lawyer, lived there with his much younger wife Carla.

  Whose house was currently on fire.

  “Who is Dustin?” she asked suddenly, her voice breaking the silence.

  “Frank and Carla’s kid. He turned seven last month.” Quint’s voice was taut. “He’s a first-grader and a smart little boy. He’d do even better in school if his mother ever gets it through her head to send him every day, instead of letting him decide when he feels like going.”

  Rachel shot him a sidelong glance. He was sitting rigidly in the seat beside her, his jacket laid across his lap in deference to the heat of the day, although he was already visibly perspiring. His eyes were riveted straight ahead, his hands balled into fists. He was virtually a body-language textbook case of nervous tension. A pang of something that felt very much like sympathy streaked through her.

  “So he is your half-brother,” she stated the obvious, for she felt the need to say something. Anything. Quint’s tension was contagious; she felt it seeping into her every pore. “Do—Frank and Carla have other children?”

  “Another boy, Austin, who’s nine. Take a right here.”

  Rachel did as bidden. “I—I sort of know Carla. That is, I know who she is. I went to high school with her. She was Carla Polk back then.” She couldn’t seem to stop talking, but even realizing that didn’t shut her up. “Carla was in the class two years ahead of me.”

  “I bet you two were never friends, probably not even nodding acquaintances. Not Carla from Oak Shade and Princess Rachel. I’m surprised you even went to the public school. I’d pegged you as an alum from an exclusive prep school.”

  His tone was unmistakably insulting, but Rachel decided not to take offense. That flash of sheer terror he’d displayed in his office upon learning little Dustin’s whereabouts—or nonwhereabouts—opened her compassionate vein, allowing her to give him a lot of extra leeway in word and deed. Who could fight with a man who feared his baby brother might be burning to death?

  “My cousin Wade went to Lakeview Academy, but my sister and I were students at good old Lakeview Public High. It has an excellent reputation,” she replied mildly. “And just for the record, my family isn’t actually rich. There is no big Saxon extended family fortune. Wade’s parents are both bankers and are well-off, but my father is a sociology professor at C
arbury College, right outside Philadelphia, and we always lived on his salary. He received only a very small inheritance from Grandfather, as did Wade’s father.”

  “So Aunty Eve is the one with the big bucks, huh? The Porsche, the jewelry, the Italian leather attaché case, the designer clothes. I’ll be tactful and not mention her Park Avenue plastic surgery which must’ve cost as much as—”

  “Aunt Eve hasn’t had plastic surgery!” Rachel exclaimed. “She wouldn’t! She believes in natural, graceful aging.”

  “And I’m Santa Claus. Come on, Rachel. The rest of you Saxons might be regular folks struggling to make ends meet, but Eve Saxon is actually rich.”

  He was mocking her family a bit too gleefully, even using her own words to do it. Rachel stiffened.

  “My aunt Eve has been very successful, professionally and financially. She followed my grandfather into the family law firm and his will heavily favored her because of her career decision,” she added defensively.

  “Bet the rest of the clan loved that.” Quint was sardonic. “Too bad I wasn’t in town then. You could’ve hired me to contest the will. You Saxons are into that, aren’t you? You get off on contesting wills.”

  “There was never a thought to contesting Grandfather’s will. Everyone was familiar with the terms beforehand,” Rachel stated succinctly. “Contrary to your low opinion of the Saxons, we’re not a greedy, money-hungry tribe.”

  “So you’re saying you aren’t like your eminent clients, the Tildens, huh?” Quint gave a decidedly nasty laugh. “Because they are greedy and money-hungry, and they do get off on contesting wills, especially a certain one about to be probated.”

  Rachel’s lips tightened. “I don’t want to talk about the Tildens right now.”

  “No, you’d rather talk about how different you are from Carla. How you aren’t filthy rich but you are genteel and classy while Carla is the stereotypical fast girl from the trashy neighborhood who was stupid enough to get mixed up with a loser old enough to be her father. Who, unfortunately, happens to be my father.”

  Rachel slammed on the brakes at the stop sign. If Quint hadn’t been buckled in, he would’ve been propelled through the windshield. A rather satisfying image. Right now she’d like to see him propelled into orbit.

  “I never said anything of the sort about Carla,” she gritted through her teeth. “You said it all.”

  “I merely stated what you were thinking, sweetie. It was written all over your face.”

  She drove through the intersection, then deliberately jammed on the brakes again, for the sheer pleasure of watching the shoulder strap nearly hang him. She saw him cast a glance at her, saw him open his mouth as if to speak. But he said nothing.

  That was fine because she had plenty to say. Rachel felt a surge of adrenaline pumping through her. “I’m going to take issue with that last statement of yours, Counselor. First and foremost, don’t ever call me ‘sweetie’ again. Second, despite your alleged talent for reading faces, I was not thinking about Carla at all. I was thinking what an insufferable, ungrateful jerk you are.” The words flowed easily; she felt charged and inspired, as if presenting the winning final summation to a jury.

  “Given the circumstances, I’ve been trying to be patient, but you don’t deserve any special consideration. You aren’t worried about your poor little brother, you’re too busy taking verbal potshots at me and my family. Well, I don’t want to hear another word out of you, the sound of your voice makes me sick! Don’t speak to me again.”

  He immediately proceeded to disregard her order. “If I don’t speak to you, how am I supposed to direct you to—”

  “I’ll manage to find the place. It shouldn’t be hard—it’s on fire!”

  Rachel drove down the street with no further directions from him. She didn’t need any. The noise of chaos and smell of burning matter filled the air, and she unerringly followed. Around the corner, flames were shooting out of a small brick house while firemen held hoses directing steady streams of water onto the blaze. The street was blocked by a hook and ladder truck, an ambulance, and two police cars. A crowd of people, growing larger by the minute, watched the fire as if fixated by the sight.

  Quint’s stomach clenched. He couldn’t stand to look, couldn’t stand to think that little Dustin might be inside that blazing house. He stole a quick glance at Rachel, who was clutching the steering wheel, looking grim. He couldn’t stand to think of the way he’d behaved toward her, either.

  She had called him an insufferable, ungrateful jerk, and he agreed that she was right on the mark. He’d deliberately been rude to her. It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t right, and she didn’t deserve it.

  He wasn’t proud of himself, though he could offer grounds. Guilty by reason of insanity. Because from the fateful moment back in his office when he’d taken one step too close to her and felt the potent wallop of her allure, his head had been spinning, his body possessed by a wild desire that obliterated all rational thought. And didn’t the absence of all rational thought constitute insanity in its purest form?

  Rachel seemed to think he knew exactly what he was doing, that he had plotted his every move like the game plan from a football team’s playoff strategy book. That was good for a laugh, but he knew the joke was on him.

  He could only be thankful she was unaware that he’d been operating on pure animal instinct, no doubt passed along in his genes from some prehistoric ancestor, perhaps some hominid species. Homo erectus came to mind. Quint nearly groaned aloud at his woefully lame reference.

  And even now, under these most difficult circumstances, hard as he tried to block the sensory images, they remained vivid. It was as if he and Rachel were still back in his office. He could still smell the enticing aroma of her perfume in his nostrils, he could feel the heat emanating from her where she stood just crucial inches away from him.

  When the train had come roaring down the tracks, momentarily scaring her out of her wits, he’d been permitted to experience the tangible, physical pleasure of her body pressed into his. She had reflexively reached for him and clung, seeking protection, and he’d felt the irresistible warmth of her, felt her soft curves molded against him.

  He’d seized the opportunity to hold her, relished it. His sex had swelled impossibly fast to iron-hard thickness, and he had pressed himself against her belly like a pathetically overeager teenager with his first erection.

  His instantaneous sexual response to her forced Quint to face facts. To face the unwelcome, intolerable realization of just how much he had been wanting to be close to Rachel Saxon, to touch her, to hold her.

  Since his very first sight of her!

  The revelation was humbling, it was horrifying. He wanted her madly, and she hated his guts.

  Lucky for him, his instincts for self-preservation were first-rate, enabling him to summon his considerable willpower and walk away from her. It hadn’t been easy; he’d been dangerously close to giving into the sensual fire raging within him. Before moving away from her, he had foolishly given in to that vestige of primitive impulse and run his hands over her hips in what was definitely a sexually possessive caress.

  Lord, he had wanted to do so much more….

  But already, the images were forming in his head, of Rachel and himself back in his office while the train rumbled past. He imagined yanking her classy little brown skirt up to her waist. Smoothing his palms over her spectacular long, shapely legs. Slipping his hand between them to feel the revealing wetness of her panties. And then pulling them off before finally, blissfully thrusting into her soft, moist warmth. Of course, she would be ready for him, she wanted him as much as he wanted her. He had seen that hot dreamy look of passion in her eyes when she’d gazed up at him.

  Lady Antarctica? Freezer Queen? If the image of a sexually repressed Rachel had aroused him, the reality of a passionate, hungry Rachel drove him wild.

  But then, as now, reality intruded most harshly. He knew a wallbanger in his office with Rachel Saxon was so out
of the question that he had no choice but to get away from her fast, before he dared to try it. He’d dashed to the window to stare out, studying the drab view of the tracks with fierce concentration, as if bent on counting each railroad tie, vaguely aware they’d had some sort of conversation though he couldn’t remember a thing either of them had said.

  That phone call from Sarah had sent him from sensual disorientation into a panicked frenzy. His dad’s and Carla’s house was burning down? His kid brother was inside?

  And his car was unavailable to take him to the scene. The world seemed to be unraveling until Rachel had offered him a ride.

  From that moment he had been downright rotten to her, spoiling for a fight, determined to fend off any attempt at niceness on her part because God help him, he still wanted her. Badly. That raging hard-on of his had hardly subsided. His jacket was draped over his lap to conceal the evidence of his erection; he was sweating, but his heat was sexual and had nothing to do with the warm temperature outside.

  It was outrageous, it was shameful, and he knew it. Despite the latest calamity befalling the Cormacks at this very moment, he was hard and hot and hungry for Rachel Saxon. He deeply, furiously resented her power over him.

  Knowing that she was making a genuine effort to be understanding and patient with him only made things worse. He couldn’t have her, and she was making him want her even more. He needed Rachel to be cold and cranky, not likable. Acting in sheer self-defense, he’d made her act like the bitch he needed her to be. He’d had to!

  As usual, he was very good at getting the results he wanted. Rachel had turned back into a sharp-tongued shrew, actually forbidding him to speak to her. Mission accomplished.

  “Hey, lady, you can’t drive down here!” A young policeman approached Rachel’s window, looking frazzled and impatient. “In case you haven’t noticed, there’s a fire.”

  “Yes, Officer,” she replied politely. “I’m dropping off Mr. Cormack. He’s a family member who is—”

  “Cormack?” The officer peered further into the car and saw Quint. “Thank God you’re here!” He sagged against the door, as if he needed support to stay on his feet. “We can’t find one of the kids and Carla is out of control. Way beyond our control. I know this sounds nuts, but she’s commandeered the ambulance. She won’t let anyone in, the paramedics are totally pissed, and who can blame them? Do you think you can calm her down?”