Not perfect, then, but an easy man to work for, as long as she kept his practice running smoothly, made sure that the coffee pot was never empty, and ignored his occasional dark moods.
Like the one he was obviously nursing when he came in after spending the morning with his daughter. Diana, judged Karen with the expertise of years. She placed a cup of freshly brewed coffee and five sharpened pencils on his desk and closed the glass door so he could fight with his wife in private.
Stupid bitch, she thought, and turned her attention to her computer and the proposal he wanted to get out by five.
When she took the proposal in, he had cheered up; he even complimented her on her speed. They talked through various revisions, and he looked through a stack of correspondence she had left on his desk earlier. “I hate to ask this,” he said, as he started signing some letters, marking revisions on others, “but can you come in tomorrow for a few hours? We need to work on the Charleston specs.”
“Sure,” said Karen, and mentally figured the overtime.
The light on his phone blinked, and Karen reached over to catch the incoming call. “Tom,” she said warmly, at the first sound of the caller’s voice, and Richard looked up. She liked Tom Maitland; he was a good friend to her boss, and an even better lawyer.
“I’ll be with him in a second,” said Richard, eyes racing through the rest of his correspondence. “Tell him I reserved the courts for Sunday.”
Karen relayed the message, and was a little surprised when Tom Maitland, normally the most genial of men, said brusquely, “This is urgent. I just got a call from Kevin Stone. Whatever he’s doing can wait.”
She lowered the phone and hit the hold button.
“You’d better take this. He says it’s urgent. Kevin again.”
Richard glanced up warily. Kevin’s name meant only one thing: Diana must have something new up her sleeve. Her demands had escalated over the months since her father had died: an increase in her support, a share of his royalties, his mother’s jewelry, a renewal of visitation rights. Karen had typed the first replies to Diana and her attorney, and her dislike of them both had grown with every measured response Richard Ashmore made to his wife’s demands. No, Diana wasn’t getting any more money; he refused to contribute further to her problems. No, she wasn’t entitled to any of the royalties from his architecture book; he had invested that money for Julie’s education. When he received the next demand, Richard had thrown the letter down on his desk and asked Tom Maitland to step in.
“All right.” Richard handed her the finished letters. “Send these out.”
She left the office and shut his door, honoring his unspoken need for privacy. Damn that woman, she thought, and slapped the letters down on her desk with unnecessary force. If Diana Ashmore needed money so badly, why didn’t she get a real job?
Except, of course, that Diana didn’t want money. What she wanted, as far as anyone could tell, was to make Richard Ashmore’s life hell.
Scott McIntire’s admin nodded at the hapless letters. “What’s that all about?”
“Diana,” said Karen.
“Maybe she’s been arrested again.” The office consensus, kept carefully from the senior partner’s ears, was that Diana was getting away with murder.
“No such luck,” said Karen, and then heard a sharp noise and glanced up through the glass walls.
She saw it all in an instant, but she never understood what she saw.
Her boss was staring at the opposite wall, phone still clutched in his hand, coffee spilling over the proposal draft and dripping off the side of the desk onto the muted gray carpet.
Richard Ashmore looked like a man whose world had just turned upside down.
Not Julie, she thought, and she remembered the day his parents had died. She started to rise to her feet, but no, he was moving, he was putting the receiver down, he was putting his hands to his face. She saw shock, disbelief, yes – but did she see, for a second, hope, anticipation, a brief flare of happiness?
She had never seen Richard Ashmore happy.
The next moment, his door opened, and he stopped at her desk, his blazer slung over his shoulder. “I’m gone for the day,” he said abruptly. “We’ll do the proposal in the morning.”
And he vanished out the door.
Karen sank back into her chair and stared after him. Now what on earth had Tom Maitland said to bring that look of disbelief to his face? And what had happened to make Richard Ashmore abandon his work on a busy Friday afternoon?
Not Diana, she thought. He doesn’t care enough about Diana for this.
~•~
Laura walked off the elevator on the concierge floor and saw him, waiting, staring out the windows at the Atlantic.
He heard her, and he turned. Across thirty feet, his eyes stopped her, and she stood there, breathless, her blood pounding in her ears, as he came to her.
Across space, across the years, they stared at each other, survivors of that late bloody afternoon.
Then he took that last step, and she felt his arms close around her, and he was gathering her in, and for all his calm, his heart was hammering against hers.
“Oh, Laura,” said Richard Ashmore, her brother-in-law, her childhood hero, her first love. “My dearest girl, welcome home.”
Act Two: Not All That is Past is Over
There’s blood between us, love, my love…
And blood’s a bar I cannot pass.
(“The Convent Threshold,” Christina Rossetti)
Chapter 6: Blue Eyes, Dark Heart
“LAURA.” HIS VOICE SURROUNDED HER; his hand held her against his shoulder in sanctuary. She had known this, she had dreamed this through the years, to stand in the circle of Richard Ashmore’s arms, safe, home. They stood there together, without words, with only warmth and comfort.
If you need me, I will come to you.
In time, he gently held her ever so slightly away.
“I can’t believe it,” he said, and she saw in his eyes an echo of her shock. “It really is you—”
She opened her mouth and could not speak.
“After all this time – my God, Laurie, you’ve served up a hell of a surprise—” and then he smiled. Behind him the concierge, openly eavesdropping, watched warily this disturbance of a prize guest’s privacy. How could the woman know that, for a few seconds, the warmth of his smile wrapped around her, cherishing her as if she had been loved and missed? “And that was you this morning—”
She felt herself start to shatter.
“No, no, no, don’t cry,” he said, and brushed a tear from her cheek. “It’s all right – everything’s all right now—”
“I didn’t want you to find me,” she managed. “I’m not ready yet.”
Do you know? Do you sense it was me?
He shook his head, and his eyes upon her were tender and indulgent. “Then you went about it the wrong way, Miss Jaguar. I’m at least the third person to find out.” He put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her against his side. “Let me have your key.”
Wordlessly, she held it out to him. The concierge was still watching them, looking concerned and uncertain, but she was only human, and she melted when Richard turned his smile on her. “Could we trouble you to ring for tea?” he asked, with that exquisite courtesy he’d abandoned only once. “In Mrs. –” he looked around at Laura for confirmation – “St. Bride’s room?”
Of course, she agreed instantly to do his bidding. “I’ll have it sent right up, Mrs. St. Bride.”
The silly girl was blushing as she picked up the phone. Females had never been proof against that smile and that rich voice. Only Diana, for her own unfathomable reasons, had finally resisted him. And here she herself was melting, letting him take over and orchestrate a scene that should have been hers to direct. How could she be losing control, after all the months of rehearsing this moment? Laura started to dig in her heels, even as he led her down the hall to her suite. “Maybe I don’t want to go to my room.”<
br />
Oh, that was stupid, childish. That wasn’t what she meant. Maybe I don’t want you to hold me, maybe I don’t want you to look in my eyes as if you missed me, maybe I don’t want to know that my blood still can leap at your merest touch….
Maybe I don’t want to face that I still need you and you’ve come to me.
He inserted the key card in the slot and looked at her sidelong, and now the gentleness had given way to a quelling look. “And maybe you want to continue this out there where anyone can come trooping by. I thought you’d appreciate the privacy. We can talk in the lobby if you’d prefer.”
Those words, from an adult to a fractious child, shriveled all resistance. He was acting for her protection, after all. Laura Abbott was probably going to make a fool of herself; Cat Courtney did not need to account for it. She preceded him into the suite, aware of his every movement as he searched out the lights, and stood still for his inspection.
He was here, really here, standing before her, his eyes traveling over her, gauging the changes of the years. She had grown accustomed to the looks men gave Cat Courtney, but this man had never known her as a woman. Her crush on him had been a family joke. Diana and Francie had never considered her a serious rival, and he, unaware that such a rivalry existed, had treated her only as a younger sister to be placated with some occasional attention.
He stirred at last. “What happened to your hair?”
“My lioness mane?” She smiled. “That’s a wig.”
“Say it ain’t so!” He was reaching out, touching one of her curls. “Legions of males will be cast into deep mourning, Laurie. A great fantasy shattered.”
Cat Courtney had so often been her shield, and she stepped behind Cat now, to hide her own terrifying vulnerability. She moved away, past him, towards the French doors to the balcony, so she could breathe. “Legions of males don’t have to spend hours drying their hair, either.”
He laughed. “Now that really shatters the fantasy, Cat Courtney. You’re supposed to exist on a plane above such mundane matters.”
Cat Courtney, all that she had become, shimmered between them. Laura Abbott could think of nothing to say.
“Laura?” He had come up behind her, and his hands had closed around her shoulders. “I’m sorry. Don’t mind my teasing – I’m thrown for a loop. I didn’t expect this when Tom called. I don’t know,” he drew in a deep breath and allowed a small ruefulness into his voice, “the right protocol for this.”
“I – I don’t know, either.” She felt the palms of his hands through her shirt. “I guess that’s why I’ve botched this so badly.”
He was speaking again, quiet, gentle. “You haven’t botched anything. You’re here. That’s all that matters.” He drew her back against him, and she was weak, so she let herself rest against him. “Couldn’t you have come to me, Laurie? Or let me come to you?”
“I tried. I did, really, but you can’t go up to the door after fourteen years and say, ‘Hi, here I am, and, by the way, I’d like some tea.’”
“Of course you can,” he said, “you could have always come to me, I would never shut you out, but you didn’t believe that, did you? Although it would have been a shock, if I’d answered the door and found you standing there. When Tom said that Kevin had caught an intruder at Dominic’s and it was Cat Courtney, I spilled coffee all over a proposal I was reading. My admin will be furious.”
“Tom?” Who in the world was Tom? “I thought – Kevin Stone.”
“News travels fast.” He went to the door to answer the knock. “You ran into Kevin, didn’t you?”
“Yes.” His voice had been neutral, unthreatened by Kevin’s interest in Diana. Either he felt confident of Diana, or he didn’t care…. She ventured, “Richard, who is that man? Is he really Di’s lawyer? He had a key to the house.”
“He’s helping her sell it.” He slid a bill into the waiter’s hand and closed the door, and Laura had the sudden unsettling thought that he seized the opportunity to keep his face averted from her.
She said experimentally, “He said he was going to marry Di.”
Silence. She waited.
Then Richard laughed. She watched the relaxed body language of his shoulders as he said pleasantly, “I don’t doubt that for a minute. That he said it, that is, not that it’s going to happen. Kevin is a strange bird, Laura. I hope he didn’t upset you.”
So Kevin Stone was crazy. Richard apparently took this threat to his marriage in stride – if he cared at all, after the sharpness of his words that afternoon. She watched him as he unwrapped the tray of scones the concierge had thoughtfully added. “He said he wouldn’t tell Lucy and Di. Do you—” she hesitated— “do you think he meant it?”
He reached for the pitcher of tea and poured her a glass. “Don’t worry about that. Tom talked to him. We agreed that I’d tell Lucy after I had the chance to talk to you.” He glanced at her. “To be honest, Laurie, it’s not a good idea to surprise her right now.”
But still no mention of Diana. “Did you tell Di you were coming here to see me?”
“No. I haven’t talked to her since Tom called.”
Diana stood there then, listening, her lashes hooding her eyes where a light shone that had never seemed quite right. Strange, lost Diana…. What would she think of this scene, her husband approaching Francie’s twin in a hotel suite?
Richard touched his glass to hers. “To homecomings.”
She inclined her head and sipped the tea, enjoying the coolness in her throat. He moved past her to the French doors, and she had the chance now to look at him all she wanted, to measure the changes in him. The photograph on the book jacket, in black and white, hadn’t captured the mark that time had left on him. He had been a handsome young man, sure that life would always smile on him, carelessly confident that he could handle anything fate chose to throw at him. His mother’s camera had only hinted that life and time had matured that surface beauty, silvered his temples, chiseled those cheekbones. He wore glasses now, and surely she wasn’t the first woman to notice that they gave character and gravitas to that face and defined that strong jawline even more sharply.
No longer merely handsome, he was devastating now, all Black Irish and Virginia class.
His face so wondrous fair…. The purest eyes and the strongest hands….
And she was not immune. Her eyes welcomed the maturity of his older face, the cool assessment of his slate blue eyes, the repose of his once-laughing mouth. Her pulse remembered how he had held her against that body that had finally adapted to its great height.
Deep inside, she felt a small blade of desire, trying to break through the snows of grief into life.
Black is the color of my true love’s hair….
Oh, but for all the changes, for the shadows that shielded his heart from his eyes, he was still Richard. Still her knight protector, her best friend, the all-knowing hero she had worshiped with all her heart. She had stopped confiding in him only when Francie confessed one winter night that she and Richard had become lovers….
I love the ground on where he stands….
He was still Richard, and she had loved him.
He put down his glass, took hers from her, and for a moment, they were back on that long-ago Christmas. Laurie, I need a really big favor…. But his eyes were gentle on her, and she knew what was coming.
“Laurie, your husband—”
“I got your fax,” she interrupted in a rush. “They – they forwarded it to me that night. I saw it – I don’t know, maybe an hour or so after you sent it, I couldn’t sleep and there it was. Richard, I’m so sorry I didn’t get in touch, I just had so much to do—”
“No!” He forestalled her with a quick lift of his hand. “I said not to feel that you had to respond, and I meant it. It’s just – when I saw his picture, I recognized him right away. Julie and I saw him backstage in London last year, and I heard the name. All I could think was that you had to be going through hell. I didn’t know what support you had
, if you had any at all. I wanted you to know that you didn’t have to be alone.” He gathered her hands between his. “Have they found—”
“No.” She shook her head. “We submitted the – DNA, but nothing so far. They – they did find his wedding ring a couple of months ago, so we got that back.”
“The things that survive us.” He fell silent for a moment. “Does it bother you, talking about it?”
She shook her head again. “No. You get used to a lot in nine months.”
“That’s true,” Richard said, and she saw a brief shadow in his eyes. She opened her mouth to ask him about his parents, but he anticipated her with a quick movement that told her to wait. “Do you know how he got caught there? Don’t answer if you don’t want to, but Lucy’s going to ask, you know that.”
“She knows?” But of course Lucy knew. Lucy would make it her mission to know everything.
“I told her a few months later when she recovered – what I knew about him, what your name was – and we agreed we’d wait for you to contact us, although,” he showed a glint of humor, “you know Lucy, she wanted to get on the next plane. I have to tell you that your timing is perfect, because she has run out of patience. She set up news alerts on you – she found out that you left your show, and she was hot to go track you down. So brace yourself. I understand if you don’t want to talk to me about it, but you’re going to have to tell your sister.”
His sensitivity touched her. A memory touched her briefly, Richard finding her weeping near the bodies of her kittens, comforting her with a boy’s awkwardness. Tell me, Laurie, I’ll do whatever I can. In all these months, she had talked only to the counselor in London, and he had not been interested in what had happened so much as how she was dealing with it.
She met his eyes. “He had a meeting in the restaurant at the top of the north tower.”
All Who Are Lost (Ashmore's Folly Book 1) Page 11
