by Lind Howard
But he was back.
And this time, he was going to pay.
He’d have to be careful not to be seen, but he’d sneaked around out at Davencourt enough, back when he was meeting Jessie, that he knew his way around on the property. It was big enough, hundreds of acres, that he could approach the house from any angle he chose. It had been a while since he’d been there; ten years, as a matter of fact. He’d have to make sure the old lady hadn’t gotten a guard dog and that no alarm system had been installed. He knew there hadn’t been one before, because Jessie had tried more than once to talk him into sneaking into her bedroom while her husband was away on a trip. She’d liked the idea of screwing him under her grandmother’s roof and in her husband’s bed. He’d had sense enough to refuse, but damn, it had been tempting.
Assuming there was no alarm system, there were a hundred ways to get into that old house. All those doors and windows … It would be child’s play. He’d gotten into houses a lot better guarded than Davencourt. The fools probably felt safe, as far out of town as they were. Country folks just never got in the habit of taking the precautions that townspeople did automatically.
Oh, yes. Webb Tallant was going to pay.
CHAPTER 14
I think we’ll have a welcome-home party for Webb,” Luanda mused the next day, tapping her teeth with one fingernail. “No one would dare not accept, because then I’d know exactly who they were. That way they’d be forced to be polite to him, and it would get all those uncomfortable first meetings over with at the same time.”
There were moments when Roanna was forcibly reminded that, though Lucinda had married into the Davenport family over sixty years before and had, in her own mind, thoroughly become a Davenport, if you scratched the surface you found a Tallant. The Tallants were nothing if not strong-willed and audacious. They might not always be right, but it didn’t always matter, either. Put them on a path and point them at a target, and they rolled over every obstacle you put in their way. Lucinda’s goal was to reinstate Webb’s standing in the county, and she didn’t mind twisting arms to achieve that goal.
Belonging to the best circles in the Quad Cities didn’t necessarily depend on how much money you had, though it helped. Some families of very modest means were acknowledged as belonging to that select social strata, by dint of having an ancestor who had actually fought in The War, and it wasn’t either of the World Wars that was meant. Some of the younger set actually referred to it as the Civil War, but the more genteel called it the War of Northern Aggression, and the most genteel of all would delicately refer to the Late Unpleasantness.
Business associates would immediately see how things stood with the Davenports and would treat Webb as if nothing had ever happened. After all, he’d never been arrested, so why should his wife’s death be allowed to cut into the bottom line?
Those who ruled the social calendar, however, adhered to a stricter standard. Webb would find himself uninvited to the dinners and parties where so much business was discussed, which would be a disadvantage for the Davenport interests. Lucinda cared about the money, but she cared about Webb even more, and she was determined that he wouldn’t be shunned. She would invite everyone to her home, and they would come because they were her friends. She was ill, and it might be the last party she ever gave. Leave it to Lucinda to use her own approaching death as a means of getting her way. Her friends might not like it, but they would come. They would also be polite to Webb under his own roof; though it was technically still Lucinda’s roof, everyone would assume that Webb had returned home to claim his inheritance, which he had, so it would soon be his. And having accepted his hospitality, they would then be obliged to extend their own to him.
Once that had happened, they would pretend they’d never had any doubts about him at all, and he would be welcome everywhere. After all, you could hardly vilify someone you had invited into your home. That just wasn’t done.
“Are you out of your mind?” Gloria demanded. “No one will come. We’ll be humiliated.”
“Don’t be silly. Of course people will come, they wouldn’t dare not to. It went well yesterday with Mr. Whitten, didn’t it, Roanna?”
“Mr. Whitten lives in Huntsville,” Gloria replied, saving Roanna the necessity of a reply. “What would he know?”
“He knew what happened, that much was obvious from his face. But being an intelligent man, he decided that if we have faith in Webb, then those horrible accusations couldn’t be true. Which they weren’t,” Lucinda said firmly.
“I agree with Mother,” Lanette said. “Think of the embarrassment.”
“You always agree with her,” Lucinda replied, her eyes glittering with the light of battle. She had set her course and wasn’t about to be swayed from it. “If you ever disagreed, then your opinion would carry more weight, my dear. Now, if Roanna told me my party was a bad idea, I’d be a lot more likely to listen.”
Gloria snorted. “As if Roanna ever disagrees with you.”
“Well, she does, on a regular basis. We seldom see eye to eye on every detail of a business decision. It pains me to admit that she’s right more often than not.”
That wasn’t perhaps a blatant lie, Roanna thought, but it wasn’t exactly the truth either. She never argued with Lucinda; she occasionally saw things differently, but she would simply present her case and Lucinda would make the final decision. That was a far cry from open disagreement.
The three of them turned to her, Lucinda with open triumph, Gloria and Lanette disgruntled at having her opinion valued over theirs.
“I think it should be Webb’s decision,” she said quietly. “He’s the one who’ll have to be on display.”
Lucinda scowled. “True. If he isn’t willing, there’s no point in even talking about it. Why don’t you ask him, dear. Maybe you can get his attention off that computer screen for five minutes.”
They had taken a break for lunch and had finished eating but were now lingering over their iced tea. Webb had requested a couple of sandwiches and coffee while he continued to work. He’d been in the study until eleven the night before and had gotten up at six to resume his reading. Roanna knew because she had been awake at both times, silently curled in her big chair and counting down the hours. It had been a particularly bad night; she hadn’t slept at all, and she was so tired now she was afraid she would fall into a deep sleep when she did go to bed. Those were the times when she was most likely to wake up somewhere else in the house and not remember how she’d gotten there.
It was Webb’s presence that had unsettled her to the point she couldn’t even doze. Both she and Lucinda had worked with him last night, going over reports, until Lucinda had become tired and gone to bed. After that, alone with him in the study, Roanna had become increasingly uneasy. Did he prefer not being alone with her, after what had happened? Did he think she was pushing herself at him, by staying there without Lucinda’s buffering presence?
After less than an hour she had excused herself and gone to her room. She’d taken a bath to calm her frazzled nerves, then settled in her chair to read. The words on the page hadn’t made sense, though; she couldn’t concentrate on them. Webb was in the house. He’d moved his clothes into the room next to hers. Why had he done that? He’d made it plain, back in Nogales, that he wasn’t interested in having an affair with her. There were three other bedrooms he could have used, but he’d chosen that one. The only explanation she could think of was that it simply didn’t matter to him if she was next door; her proximity was of no interest, one way or the other.
She would try to stay out of his way as much as possible, she’d thought. Show him all the current files, answer any questions he had, but otherwise she wouldn’t bother him.
At eleven she heard him in the room next door, saw the spill of light onto the veranda. She had reached up and turned off her lamp so he wouldn’t see her own light and know she was still awake after pleading fatigue an hour and a half before. In the darkness she had leaned her head back, closed
her eyes, and listened to him moving around, picturing in her mind what he was doing.
She heard the shower, and knew he was naked. Her heart thumped at the thought of his tall, steely muscled body, and her breasts tightened. She could scarcely believe that she’d actually made love with him, that she’d lost her virginity in a cheap motel room on the Mexican border, and that it was the closest to heaven she was ever likely to get. She thought of the crisp hair on his chest and the tightness of his buttocks. She remembered how his hard, hair-roughened thighs had held her own thighs spread wide, how she had dug her fingers into the deep valley of muscle down the middle of his back. For one wonderful night she’d lain in his arms and known both desire and fulfillment.
The shower cut off, and about ten minutes later the splash of light on the veranda was extinguished. Through her own open veranda doors she had heard the click as he opened his doors to let in the fresh night air. Was he still naked? Did he sleep raw, or in his underwear? Maybe he wore pajama bottoms. It struck her as odd that she had lived in the same house with him from age seven to seventeen, and didn’t know if he wore anything to bed.
Then there was silence. Was he in bed, or was he standing there looking out at the peaceful night? Had he stepped out onto the veranda? He would be barefoot; she wouldn’t be able to hear him. Was he standing there even now? Had he glanced to the right and noticed that her doors were open?
Finally, her nerves raw, Roanna had crept to the window and peeked out. No one, naked or otherwise, stood on the veranda enjoying the night. As quietly as possible she had closed her doors and gone back to her chair. Sleep had escaped her, though, and once again she had endured the slow passage of time.
“Roanna?” Lucinda prodded, and Roanna realized she’d been sitting there daydreaming.
Murmuring a vague apology, Roanna pushed back her chair. She had a meeting at two with the organizers of this year’s W. C. Handy Festival in August, so she would just stick her head in the study door, ask Webb his opinion of Lucinda’s plan, then escape upstairs to change clothes. Perhaps, by the time she returned, he would have tired of paperwork and she wouldn’t have to endure another evening of exquisite torture, sitting at his elbow, listening to his deep voice, marveling at the speed with which he assimilated information—in short, reveling in his presence—while at the same time wondering if he thought she was sitting too close, or making too much of every opportunity to bend over him. Even worse, had he wished she would simply go away and get out of his hair?
When she opened the door, he looked up inquiringly from the papers in his hand. He was leaned back in his chair, the master of his space, his booted feet propped comfortably on the desk.
“I’m sorry,” she blurted. “I should have knocked.”
He stared at her in silence for a long moment, his dark brows drawing together over his nose. “Why?” he finally asked.
“This is yours now.” Her reply was simply made, without inflection.
He took his feet off the desk. “Come in and close the door.”
She did but remained standing there by the door. Webb stood and came around the desk, then leaned against the edge of it with his arms crossed over his chest and his legs stretched out. It was a negligent position, but if his body was relaxed, his gaze was sharp as it raked over her.
“You don’t ever have to knock on that door,” he finally said. “And let’s get one thing straight right now: I’m not taking your place, I’m taking Lucinda’s. You’ve done a good job, Ro. I told you yesterday that I’d be a fool if I shut you out of the decision-making process. Maybe you thought you’d get to spend your days with the horses now that I’m back, and you will have more time for yourself, I promise, but you’re still needed here, too.”
Roanna blinked, dazed by this turn of events. Despite what he’d said to her after the commissioner’s meeting, she hadn’t thought he had really meant it. A part of her had automatically dismissed it as the type of thing Webb had done when she was little, reassuring her to keep her from being upset, pretending that she was important to anything or anyone. She had stopped letting herself believe in fairy tales on the night she had stumbled into a pool of blood. Very likely, she had thought, she would bring Webb up to speed, and then her usefulness would be at an end. He’d handled everything by himself before—
Her mind stopped, startled. No, that wasn’t true. He had taken most of the work on his shoulders, but Lucinda had still been involved. And that was before he’d had his property in Arizona to oversee as well. Silent joy spread through her, warming the corners of her heart that had already begun to chill as she prepared herself for being replaced. He really did need her.
He’d said she had done a good job. And he’d called her Ro.
He was watching her with a sharply intent gaze. “If you don’t smile,” he said softly, “then I can’t tell if you’re pleased or not.”
She stared at him, perplexed, searching his face for a clue to what he really meant. Smile? Why would he want her to smile?
“Smile,” he prompted. “You remember what a smile is, don’t you? The corners of your mouth turn up, like this.” He pushed the corners of his mouth up with his fingers, demonstrating. “It’s what people do when they’re happy. Do you hate paperwork, is that it? Don’t you want to help me?”
Tentatively she stretched the corners of her mouth, curling them upward. It was a hesitant, fleeting little smile, barely forming before it was gone and she was regarding him solemnly once more.
But evidently that was what he’d wanted. “Good,” he said, straightening from his relaxed perch on the desk. “Are you ready to get back to work?”
“I have a meeting at two. I’m sorry.”
“What kind of meeting?”
“With the organizers of the Handy Festival.”
He shrugged, losing interest. Webb wasn’t a jazz fan.
Roanna remembered why she was there. “Lucinda sent me to ask what you think of having a welcome-home party.”
He gave a short laugh, immediately realizing the implications. “She’s going on the attack, huh? Are Gloria and Lanette trying to talk her out of it?”
He didn’t seem to need an answer, either that or her silence was answer enough. He thought it over for all of five seconds. “Sure, why the hell not? I don’t give a damn if it makes everyone uncomfortable. I stopped caring ten years ago what people think of me. If anyone thinks I’m not good enough to deal with them, then I’ll take Davencourt’s business elsewhere; it’s up to them.”
She nodded and reached for the door handle, slipping out before he could make any more strange demands that she smile.
Webb returned to his chair, but he didn’t immediately pick up the file he’d been studying before Roanna’s entrance. He stared at where she’d been standing, poised like a doe on the verge of fleeing. His chest still hurt as he remembered that pathetic excuse for a smile, and the look almost of fright that had been in her eyes. It was difficult to read her now, she kept so much hidden and gave so little response to the world around her. It grated at him, because the Roanna he remembered had been as open as anyone he’d ever known. If he wanted to know how she felt about anything now, he had to pay intensely close attention to every nuance of her expression and body language, before she managed to stifle them.
She had been stunned when he’d told her that he still needed her help. He silently thanked Lucinda for giving him the key to handling Roanna. The idea of anyone needing her got to her faster than anything else, and she couldn’t help responding to it. For a split second he’d seen the wonder, the pure joy, that had lit the depths of her eyes, and then it had been so quickly hidden that if he hadn’t been deliberately watching her he wouldn’t have seen it at all.
He’d lied. He could handle everything without her help, even with the added burden of his properties in Arizona. He thrived on pressure, his energy level seeming to increase with the demands made on his time. But she needed to feel needed, and he needed her to be close by.<
br />
He wanted her.
The phrase beat like a refrain through his mind, his veins, every cell of his body. Want. He hadn’t taken her in Nogales out of revenge or because of that damned bargain he’d made with her, or even to keep from hurting her feelings by pulling back after going that far. The simple fact was he’d taken her because he wanted her and was ruthless enough to use whatever means necessary to get her. The tequila was no excuse, though it had relaxed his control over his more uncivilized instincts.
He’d lain awake in his bed last night, thinking of her in the next room, wondering if she was awake, his damned imagination driving him crazy.
Knowing that he could have Roanna any time he wanted was more powerful than any chemical aphrodisiac ever discovered or invented. All he had to do was get out of bed and walk out onto the veranda, then slip through the French doors into her room. She had insomnia; she would be awake, watching him come toward her. He could simply get into bed with her and she would take him into her arms, her body, without question or hesitation.
Erotic dreams of that one kiss they’d shared so long ago had haunted his sleep for years. That had been bad enough, but the dreams had been only imagination. Now that he knew exactly how it felt to make love to her, now that reality had taken the place of imagination, the temptation was a constant, gnawing hunger that threatened to shred his self-control.
God, she’d been so sweet, so shy, and so damn tight he broke out in a sweat remembering how it had felt when he’d entered her. He had looked down at her as he made love to her and watched the expression on her face, watched the delicate pink of her nipples darken with arousal. Even though he’d hurt her, she had clung to him, arching her hips up to take him even deeper. It had been so easy to bring her to climax that he’d been enchanted, wanting to do it time and again so he could watch her face as she convulsed, feel her body flexing and throbbing around him.
The night had been exquisite torture, and he knew he would be fighting the same battle every night, with his frustration growing by the minute. He didn’t know how long he could endure it before his self-control broke, but for Roanna’s sake he had to try.
