Sandra Field – The Mistress Deal (страница 7)

She said deliberately, “I don’t believe you bought every one of the paintings and sculptures in this condo strictly as an investment.”

“You can’t take a hint, can you?” Reece said unpleasantly, taking the bread out of the toaster.

“The Madonna and child? An investment? You bought that statue because in some way it spoke to your heart.”

His back was turned to her; briefly, his body shuddered as though she’d physically struck him. Then he pivoted, closing the distance between them in two quick strides. Towering over her, he dug his fingers into her shoulders. “Stay out of my private life, Lauren. I mean that!”

His eyes were blazing with emotion, a deep, vibrant blue; his face was so close to hers that she could see a small white scar on one eyelid. She’d hit home; she knew it. And found herself longing to take his face between her palms and comfort him.

He’d make burnt toast out of her if she tried. Swallowing hard, Lauren said with total truth, “I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

He said harshly, “I’m going to be late for work. If your hand needs attention, the first-aid kit’s in my bathroom cabinet. I’ll see you this evening.” Gathering all his papers in a bundle, he left the kitchen.

Thoughtfully Lauren started to eat her toast. The ice in his eyes had melted with a vengeance. And he’d bought the Madonna and child for intensely personal reasons that she was quite sure he had no intention of divulging.

One thing she knew. She wasn’t going to be bored during the next few days.

CHAPTER FOUR

“LAUREN, what in hell are you doing?”

The chisel slipped, gouging into the wood. With an exclamation of chagrin, Lauren whirled around. “Don’t ever creep up on me again when I’m working, Reece—look what you made me do! And what are you doing home anyway? You said six o’clock this evening.”

Reece hauled his tie from around his throat. “It’s six thirty-five and we’re supposed to leave in twenty minutes.”

Lauren’s jaw dropped. “It can’t be. I stopped for lunch no time ago.”

“Six thirty-six,” he said, ostentatiously looking at his gold watch.

“Oh, no,” she wailed, “I promised I’d be ready.”

“You did.”

“Reece, I’m sorry. You’d better get out of here so I can change. I swear I won’t be more than ten minutes late.”

“What did you do to your finger?”

She glanced down at two Band-Aids adorning her index finger. “I cut it. No big deal.”

“You’re a mess,” he said.

She looked down at herself, laughter flickering across her features. She was wearing her oldest leggings and a T-shirt embellished with several holes from her welding torch; her hair was pulled back into an untidy bundle on her neck. “You mean you won’t take me to the cocktail party like this? Where’s your sense of adventure?”

“I’m starting to wonder,” Reece said with a note in his voice that brought her head up fast.

The words came from nowhere. “Don’t you go seeing me as a challenge, either,” she said.

“I’m beginning to think Wallace Harvarson has a lot more to answer for than a mere five hundred thousand dollars,” he said tightly. “Go get ready, Lauren. Pin your hair up. Pile on the red nail polish. But for Pete’s sake, hurry.”

She started to laugh. “It’ll take more than a few pins to make me presentable,” she said, and stood up, moving away from the table and stretching her muscles with unselfconscious grace.

The answering laughter vanished from Reece’s face. He said sharply, “You did that today?” She nodded, watching him walk closer to the rough carving she’d been working on for the last few hours. He said, as though the words were being dragged from him, “I can see where you’re headed—and already it’s a thing of beauty.”

“I thought I could just make a copy,” Lauren said ruefully, pulling the ribbon from her hair and shaking it in a cloud around her head. “But it got away from me.”

The lines of the emerging sculpture of a mother and child were utterly modernistic, yet imbued with an ancient and ageless tenderness. Reece said in a hard voice, “I’m going to have a shower. I’ll wait for you in the living room. I’m the host of this shindig this evening and I want to arrive on time.”

“Yes, sir,” she retorted, and watched him march across the dark-stained floors and out of the door. She put her chisel down on the table. Had she ever met a man who was such a mass of contradictions? He’d seen instantly what she was striving to create from the block of wood; and run from it as though all the demons in hell were after him.

But she mustn’t see him as a challenge.

The challenge, she thought wryly, looking down at herself, was to transform herself from a frump to a fashion model in less than twenty minutes. Move it, Lauren. You’ve got all week to figure out Reece Callahan.

It might take a lifetime. A thought she hastily subdued.

Seven o’clock. Lauren was late. Scowling, Reece switched to the news channel, and not for the first time wondered what in God’s name had possessed him to suggest that Lauren Courtney pose as his lover. As a result, Wallace Harvarson was getting off scot-free and he, Reece, was saddled with an argumentative and thoroughly irritating woman who didn’t count punctuality among her talents. Because she had talents. That bloody statue had got him by the throat the minute he’d seen it; which she, of course, had noticed right away.

The new federal budget was due to be tabled; he tried to pay attention. Then, behind him, overriding the news-caster’s voice, he heard Lauren say, “Will I do?”

He flicked the remote control and stood up, turning to face her. She had draped herself against the door frame, her eyelids lowered demurely. Her dress was black, a full-length sheath slit to mid-thigh. A vivid scarlet-and-blue scarf swathed her throat and fell provocatively over one breast; her thin-strapped sandals had stiletto heels and her earrings dangled almost to her shoulders, little enameled discs of blue and red that moved with her breathing.

He said ironically, “You’ll be noticed.”

She smiled; her lips were also scarlet, he noticed, dry-mouthed. “Isn’t that the whole aim?”

“I guess so.” He walked closer, noticing her incredibly long lashes. “How do you keep your hair up? It’s contradicting all the laws of gravity.”

It was piled in a mass of curls, making her neck look impossibly long and slender. “Pins and prayer,” said Lauren.

“Let me see your hands.”

“You would ask that,” she said, and held them out, palms down. The hot coffee had left red blotches on the back of her left hand; she had two clean Band-Aids wrapped around her index finger.

“Do you often cut yourself?” he rapped.

“It’s an occupational hazard,” she said limpidly. “To quote you.”

“Is the cut deep?”

“Nope. But I’m human. I bleed.”

“In contrast to me.”

“You said it. I didn’t.”

“You don’t have to.” He didn’t know which he hated more, the way the black fabric clung to her breasts, or the mockery in her turquoise eyes. In a hard voice he added, “This is all very amusing and I’m sure we could stand here trading insults for the next hour. But my car’s waiting downstairs. Let’s go…and Lauren, don’t forget what this is all about, will you? Wallace—remember him?”

“Are you telling me to behave myself?”

“Yeah. That’s exactly what I’m doing.”

“You don’t have a worry in the world,” she snapped. “I promise I’ll be the perfect mistress.”

She looked as though she’d rather take a chisel to him. A blunt chisel. He checked that he had his keys in the pocket of his tuxedo and said with a mockery equal to hers, “Shall we go, darling?”

Her nostrils flared. “If you think I’m going to start this charade one minute before I have to, you’re out to lunch.”

The sudden mad urge to take her in his arms and kiss her into submission surged through Reece’s body with all the force and inevitability of an ocean wave. Oh, no, he thought, I’m not going there. Not with Lauren Courtney. Sure recipe for disaster. He said coldly, “I don’t give a damn what you do when we’re alone. But you’d better stick to the bargain in public. Or else the deal’s off.”

“Fine,” she said. “Let’s go.”

She stalked to the elevator ahead of him, and stared at the control panel all the way down. His car was a black Porsche; he held the door while she folded herself into the passenger seat, revealing rather a lot of leg as she did so. Her silk stockings were black, her legs long and slender; his hormones in an uproar, Reece got into the driver’s seat and slammed the door. Once this week was over, he’d find himself a woman. An agreeable woman without an artistic bone in her body. He’d been too long without one, that was his problem.

Nothing to do with Lauren.

In a silence that seethed with things unsaid, they drove to the city’s most luxurious hotel. Reece pulled up in front of it. “Okay,” he said, “we’re on. You’d better act your little head off, sweetheart, or I’ll pull the plug on your precious stepfather so fast you won’t know what hit you.”

“How nice,” Lauren said, “an ultimatum. Guaranteed to make me feel as though we’ve been making mad, passionate love the whole day long.”

Very deliberately he put his arm around her shoulders, caressing her bare flesh and dropping his head to run his lips along her throat. “We made mad, passionate love the minute I came home from work, that’s why we’re late…and we’re going to do the same as soon as we get rid of all these people. Right, my darling?”