by Leanne Banks
Talia envisioned a pair of eagle-eyed society matrons who would assess every thread of her clothing, every piece of faux jewelry and every hair on her head. In an act of defiance, she wore her hair down.
She’d chewed off her rose lipstick for the second time when the phone rang. Her stomach fluttered again. Could it be Trace?
“Hey, Little Italy,” a man said when she answered. “How’s life in the fast lane?”
Talia smiled. That nickname had been a source of torment throughout her elementary school years. The only person she allowed to call her that was Kevin. “You’re walking on thin ice, baby brother. You know how I feel about my name. Since exam week is coming up soon, I’ll assume your anxieties have rendered you temporarily insane. I’ll excuse you this time. And I’ve noticed you only call me Italia when you’re more than an arm’s reach away.”
Kevin laughed. “Yeah, well, I like my face the way it is.”
“As do all the women in Massachusetts.” She checked her watch. “So, why are you calling me on a Saturday night?”
She could picture his broad-shouldered shrug in the brief silence that followed. “I just wanted to know how you’re doing. And to let you know I’m going camping up in Vermont with a few of the guys in my dorm for a week after exams. Is that okay with you?”
Talia’s insides turned to marshmallows. Kevin had always possessed the unique ability to mold her into a complete softy. “That’s great. I’ll miss you, but I’m glad you’re getting away for some fun. How’s campus life?”
“This semester’s been tough. MIT hasn’t gained its reputation for being the top engineering school by coddling the students.”
Mentally putting together a care package of cookies and other treats for him, she said, “You sound tired. Are you worried about your exams?”
“Nah, but I’ll be glad for summer.” He paused. “Listen, Tal, I’ve got this professor friend. He teaches calculus. I told him about you, and showed him your picture—”
“Hold it right there, Kevin. If you’re going to start matchmaking, more than your face will be in danger.” She knew her brother felt responsible for her lack of dating partners during his high school years. Since she was financing his education now, too, he felt obliged to provide her with suitors beyond the realm of Barringer. “I’m doing fine,” she added. “As a matter of fact, I’m getting ready to go to the country club in a few minutes.”
Kevin gave a low whistle. “Who’s the lucky guy?”
Talia rolled her eyes in self-disgust. She’d walked right into that hornets’ nest. “Actually, it’s part of the planning for Lung Awareness Month. I’m meeting a few people for dinner.”
“Anybody I know?”
Studying her buffed nails, Talia grimaced. Kevin would be present for some LAM activities, so she’d better go ahead and break the news now. “Trace Barringer.”
The silence was heavy, fraught with painful memories. Her heart twisted, and she rushed on. “It’s not a real date, Kevin. For some reason I don’t understand, Trace Barringer has been real pushy about this. I tried to put him off, but he’s set on the idea of the mill being directly involved. If it were up to me, I’d tell him to take a flying leap, but the Barringer Corporation is one of our biggest contributors.” She was breathless by the end of her explanation, and felt incredibly guilty and disloyal.
When Kevin didn’t immediately respond, she said, “Listen, if it really bothers you, I’ll resign from the committee.”
His sigh was audible. “No. It just threw me for a minute. There probably isn’t anybody who cares as much about LAM as you, Talia. Mom would be proud of you for what you’re doing. Besides, Trace is the one Barringer who wasn’t involved in my little mess with them. Val used to talk about him. She always said he…”
Talia strained to hear the uncompleted sentence. Kevin rarely spoke of Valerie Barringer, even though he’d been wildly infatuated with her years ago.
“Just keep your eyes open,” Kevin warned her in a voice beyond his years. “We learned the hard way not to trust the Barringers.” Then his tone lightened.
I’ll see you in a few weeks, big sister. And I’m bringing you a tall, dark, handsome guy with a brain as a coming-home present. The guys in Barringer are too stale for you. I love you.”
“I love you,” she whispered to the dial tone, and tried to work up some enthusiasm for Kevin’s tall, dark “coming-home present.” Unfortunately she was far more intrigued by a certain blond man with green eyes. She sighed heavily and snatched up her keys.
Alternately cursing and encouraging herself, Talia drove to Hidden Hills Country Club. When she stepped from her battered Datsun, she bit back a laugh at the parking attendant’s expression of chagrin. She dropped the keys into the older man’s hand and gave him a saucy smile. “Be careful with it, the front fender’s a little loose.”
When she looked up at the club’s white columns and grand entrance, a tremor of unease swept through her. The differences between Trace Barringer’s lifestyle and her own suddenly seemed acute. On her last date, she’d gone to a miniature golf course. Before that, it had been bowling. The most adventurous date she’d had in the last year involved a trip to Richmond to see a baseball game. And while she enjoyed baseball, she would have given her eyeteeth to see the opera.
Opera and ballet. Country clubs and elegant dinners. Those were Trace’s life. Hers was ham and salami.
Still, Talia hadn’t arrived at the age of twenty-six without a large dose of practicality. This country club would likely provide LAM with a generous donation. She battled down the notion that she was a fish out of water and marched up the steps.
Nodding briefly to the doorman, she muttered under her breath, “This one’s for you, Mom.”
She was crossing the red-carpeted foyer, heading toward the desk to ask for directions to the lounge, when she felt a hand on her arm.
“Wait up, Italia,” a familiar voice murmured behind her.
Chapter Three
Talia whirled and stared up at Trace. Her heart sank with disappointment when she saw he still looked wonderful. She’d been hoping he’d grow a few warts during his time away. A man with his looks, intelligence, wealth and insufferable self-confidence needed some flaw to bring him down to the rest of the human race. And she certainly didn’t see a flaw. A charcoal silk blazer covered his impressive shoulders and chest, and well-tailored slacks fit his long legs perfectly. The light reflected off his tawny hair, and his green eyes glinted with humor.
What did he find so amusing, she wondered, then she remembered what he’d called her.
“Who told you that?” she asked as he led her down a hall.
“One of the supervisors at the mill. When I mentioned the plans for LAM, he casually passed on the information.” Smiling wickedly, Trace opened the brass-and-glass door to the lounge. “I found it…intriguing.”
“Did you happen to notice the guy’s nose?”
Puzzled, Trace thought that over as they sat at a small round table. “Now that you mention it, Don’s nose is a little crooked. Why do you ask?”
Talia smiled. “I went to school with Don. He’s my best friend’s husband. But he had this annoying habit of teasing me. I warned him to stop.”
Trace watched the spark of indignation in her eyes and drank in the force of her personality. After another fruitless week spent trying to gain custody of his son, Talia was a breath of fresh air to him.
“Outside my family,” she continued, “he’s the last person to call me Italia to my face since seventh grade. I finally had to break his nose.”
At the image of a feisty young Talia and a howling Don, Trace let out a deep laugh, feeling the tension leave his body.
“Can I get you something from the bar?” a waitress asked.
“Scotch, neat,” Trace said, and turned to Talia.
“I’ll take a Bloody Mary.”
As they waited for their drinks, Trace noticed the way she looked around the room with carefully v
eiled curiosity. Dismay seemed to cloud her eyes, and she bit her lip.
“So what made your mother name you after Italy?” he asked in an effort to regain the earlier mood.
She turned to him, the bleak expression fading. “My grandmother died in Italy the week before I was born. Mom was devastated that she couldn’t attend the funeral. And though my grandmother liked America, her first love was Italy. She was always telling my mother never to forget Italy.”
Talia paused as the waitress set their drinks on the table. “When she first mentioned the notion of naming me after my grandmother’s homeland, my father thought she was crazy with grief. But he went along with it, hoping she’d change her mind when it came time to fill out the birth certificate.” Talia smiled and ran her finger around the rim of her glass. “She didn’t. I’m just glad Grandmother wasn’t from Turkey.”
Trace grinned and watched the motion of her finger around the glass. “Imagine how many more noses would have been broken.”
Her hands were small, he mused, but capable-looking. She wore no fingernail polish, yet they still looked feminine. It was probably the way she fluttered them expressively when she talked. She trailed a finger through the beaded sweat of the glass, and his throat tightened. Amazing how sensual that gesture seemed.
“What are you staring at?” she asked.
He gulped down some Scotch. After debating how to answer, he opted for the truth. “The movement of your hand and fingers. I was imagining them in a different setting.”
Her hand stilled abruptly. She wrapped it around the glass and took a sip. He could tell she was remembering his assessment of her breasts, and longed to pick up where they’d left off that day. He figured if he did that, though, they’d never make it to the dining room.
Keeping her expression blank, she said, “Tell me about who we’re meeting tonight.”
He complied with both requests, one spoken, the other unspoken. She wanted to keep the conversation platonic. He could handle that. “Two spinster sisters. The backbone of the country club. Martha and Prudence Fitzgerald.”
“Oh.”
Her tone had him studying her. What he saw surprised him. She wore a look of sheer dread. The realization dawned on him that she was nervous. He would never have believed it. She seemed so indomitable.
“Hey, they’re not so bad,” he said. “The only problem is that they both have memories like elephants. Prudence never fails to bring up some embarrassing incident from my childhood.”
“Backbone of the country club,” Talia repeated miserably. “Memories like elephants. In other words, if I spill my wine or drop my fork, they’ll never forget it.”
“Never ever,” he said cheerfully. “But you don’t need to worry. They’ll be too busy telling you all about me. I don’t suppose you’ve met them,” he added hopefully. When she shook her head, he gave an exaggerated sigh. “I was kinda hoping you could take some of the heat.”
His playful attitude teased a smile from her. He took that as encouragement to move to the dining room. After draining his Scotch, he stood and pulled her to her feet. “Come on. It’s time to move into the trenches. By the way, you look great. Keep your legs out of my sight and I might have half a chance at saying something coherent.”
An hour later, Talia was enjoying herself immensely. Though regal in manner, the two older women insisted upon being called by their first names. They also expressed interest in helping with LAM. And they dominated the conversation with stories about Trace.
Prudence shook her fluffy white head and clucked. “Yes, Trace had the worst case of diaper rash for the first six months of his life. It nearly gave his mother a fit.”
Trace caught Talia’s eye and put on an expression of great suffering. She bit back a laugh.
“Oh, I think his chicken pox was much worse,” Martha said. “After all, he couldn’t wear a stitch of clothing for three days.”
The sisters bantered back and forth, each trying to outdo the other with their memories. After the tenth story, Talia had to admire Trace’s indulgence of the sisters.
“Then again,” Prudence said over coffee, “there was the incident with the poison ivy.” She proceeded to expound on that particular ailment.
Talia smiled mischievously and leaned over to him. “Just think,” she whispered, “if you were in outer space, you could scream without anyone hearing a sound.”
Beneath the table, he snatched her hand and gave it a warning squeeze. Though he glared at her, she noticed he was fighting a smile.
It seemed peculiar to her that she could be so attuned to his feelings. She found it even more peculiar the way they’d taken turns studying each other throughout the evening. The glances said, “I like you” and “I want to know you better.” In spite of her grudge against the Barringers, she couldn’t resist Trace’s sexy appeal.
She allowed him to lace his fingers with hers, enjoying the sensation of her hand being swallowed up by his. His was not the hand of a laborer. The skin was smooth, the nails well tended. But it was a strong hand. He rubbed his thumb against her wrist, and a tingle ran down her spine.
Glancing at him, she saw in his eyes a curiosity that matched her own. He moved his clever thumb again in a caress that caused a tightening in her stomach. He could see her surprise. She didn’t know how she knew that, but she did. Clever hands, clever eyes. Her gaze fell to his mouth, and she couldn’t help but wonder.
A question from Prudence drew their attention back to the sisters. “Yes,” Trace answered, “both of my parents are—” Talia swept her own thumb across his palm. He stumbled and threw her a threatening glare. “—doing fine. Father is—”
She ignored the glare and experimentally stroked between his fingers. This time he glanced at her through hooded eyes, his gaze clearly saying, You will pay. He laced his fingers firmly through hers. “Father plays golf every day. He’s nearly fully recovered from his second heart attack.”
Talia simply smiled. She’d learned something new about Trace that night. His hands were extraordinarily sensitive. And he didn’t like losing control of a situation.
“Trace,” a man said.
Trace looked up and saw his younger brother and wife approaching their table.
“Philip, Cynthia, what brings you here?” His hand automatically tightened around Talia’s when she pulled against him. He didn’t want to get into a wrestling match under the table, though, so he released it. As the sisters greeted Philip and his wife, he stole a glance at Talia. Her shoulders were stiff, her expression frozen. But her eyes flashed with such vivid emotion, he could tell it was an effort for her to control herself.
After charming the Fitzgeralds, Philip turned to Talia. Trace watched in amazement as Philip, the epitome of smoothness, faltered.
Coming to his brother’s rescue, he stood. “Talia McKenzie, this is my brother, Philip, and his wife, Cynthia. Talia’s in charge of Lung Awareness Month.”
Philip nodded and pulled at his collar. Talia rose, her stance very erect, her speech clipped. “We’ve met.”
Trace looked from Philip to Talia in bewilderment. An ugly feeling gnawed at him. “Oh, so you know each other.”
Talia didn’t spare him a glance, but held Philip under her steady gaze like prey. “We met six years ago.”
Even Cynthia seemed to sense the tension. She slipped her elegantly manicured hand through the crook of Philip’s arm. “Philip joined my father’s law practice last year after we married.” She smiled at her husband. “We’re expecting big things from Philip. Don’t be surprised when you see him entering the political arena.”
“Politics.” Talia raised an eyebrow. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”
Philip nodded again, but Trace noticed he didn’t meet Talia’s eyes. Philip cleared his throat. “How’s Kevin?”
“He’s a junior in engineering at MIT.” The pride practically burst from her. “He earned a partial academic scholarship, and he makes the dean’s list every semester.”
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“So, he’s doing well?” Philip asked, sounding relieved.
A sea of emotions raced through Talia in the long silence that followed. She chose her words carefully. “Injustice does funny things to people. As a lawyer, I’m sure you know all about that. Some wounds never heal.”
Trace was baffled. Following this conversation with all its underlying messages was like walking through a maze. At first he’d wondered if Talia and Philip had once been romantically involved. They were about the same age. Philip had never had any trouble attracting women, and Talia was the kind of woman who made a man gut-wrenchingly aware of his sexuality. Now, with all this talk about Kevin, he wasn’t so sure.
“It was a pleasure meeting you both,” Talia said to the Fitzgeralds, and grabbed her purse. “Please let us know what you decide about Lung Awareness Month. Thank you again.”
She nodded in Trace’s direction. “Good night.”
He frowned. When she turned toward the door, he grabbed her arm.
“Wait. We’re not finished.”
She pulled away. “I’ve got to go. Thank you for dinner.”
He suppressed a howl of frustration at her blank expression and cool, polite manner. In spite of her erect posture, her eyes looked as though she’d been through a war and lost. “I’ll call you,” he promised. He also vowed to get to the bottom of what was between Talia McKenzie and his brother.
After watching her leave, he turned to Philip. “I want to talk with you.”
Philip shook his head. “There’s no need, Trace. It’s water under the bridge. Cynthia and I were just leaving.”
Still, Trace noticed Philip wouldn’t meet his eyes either. He would have pursued it, but neither the time nor the place was appropriate. When he wanted it, he knew he’d have all the information he needed. Letting it go for the moment, he escorted the Fitzgerald sisters to their taxi.
