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Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
COMING NEXT MONTH
CHAPTER ONE
A GARDEN party. Not his usual scene.
Slade Carruthers had stationed himself in one corner of the garden, a palm tree waving high over his head, his back flanked by California holly. The sun was, of course, shining. Would it dare do anything else for Mrs. Henry Hayward III’s annual garden party?
He was here on his own. As he preferred to be.
He was in between women right now; had been for quite a while. Maybe he’d grown bored with the age-old game of the chase, and the inevitable surrender that led, equally inevitably, to the end of yet another affair. Certainly for quite a while he hadn’t met anyone who’d tempted him to abandon his solitary status.
Casually Slade looked around. Belle Hayward’s guests were, as usual, an eccentric mixture of extremely rich, well-bred socialites and artistic mavericks. But every one of them knew the rules: suits and ties for the gentlemen, dresses and hats for the ladies. The two large men stationed at the iron gates had been rumored to turn away a famous painter in acrylic-spattered jeans, and an heiress in diamond-sprinkled capri pants.
The Ascot of San Francisco, Slade thought, amused. His own summerweight suit was hand-tailored, his shoes Italian leather, his shirt and tie silk. He’d even combed his unruly dark hair into some sort of order.
A young woman strolled into his field of view. Her head was bent as she listened to an elderly lady who looked familiar to Slade, and who was wearing a mauve gown that looked all too recently resurrected from mothballs. He searched for her name, realizing he’d met her here last year. Maggie Yarrow, that was it. Last of a line of ruthless steel magnates, possessor of a tongue like a blunt ax.
The young woman had broken both Belle’s rules. She was hatless and she was dressed in a flowing tunic over wide-legged pants.
Her wild tangle of red curls shone like flame in the sunlight.
Slade left his post under the palm tree and started walking toward her, smiling at acquaintances as he went, refusing a goblet of champagne from one of the white-jacketed waiters. His heart was beating rather faster than he liked.
As he got closer, he saw she had wide-spaced eyes of a true turquoise under elegantly arched brows; a soft, voluptuously curved mouth; a decided chin that added character to a face already imbued with passionate intelligence.
And with kindness, Slade thought. Not everyone would have chosen to pass the afternoon with a rude and dotty ninety-year-old. His nose twitched. Who did indeed smell of mothballs.
Then the young woman threw back her head and laughed, a delightful cascade of sound that pierced Slade to the core. Her hair rippled over her shoulders, gleaming as a bolt of silk gleams in the light.
He stopped dead in his tracks. His palms were damp, his heart was racketing in his chest and his groin had hardened. How could he be so strongly attracted to someone whose name he didn’t even know?
It looked as though his long months of abstinence were over.
If he didn’t meet her, he’d die.
Where the hell had that thought come from? Cool it, he told himself. We’re talking lust here. Plain old-fashioned lust.
As though she sensed the intensity of his gaze, the young woman looked straight at him. Her smile faded, replaced by a look of puzzlement. “Is something wrong?” she said. “Am I supposed to know you?”
Her voice was honey-smooth, layered like fine brandy; she had the trace of an accent. Slade said, “I don’t believe we’ve met, no. Slade Carruthers. Hello, Mrs. Yarrow, you’re looking well.”
The elderly lady gave an uncouth cackle. “Watch out for this one, girl. Richer than you by a city mile. Money and machismo—he’s one of Belle’s favorites.”
“Why don’t you introduce me anyway?” Slade said.
“Introduce yourselves.” Maggie Yarrow hitched at the shoulder of her gown. “Look at the pair of you—an ad for Beautiful People. California Chic. I need more champagne.”
Slade ducked as she swished her ebony cane through the air to get the attention of the nearest waiter. After grabbing a glass from his tray, she tossed back its contents, took another from him and walked in a dead-straight line toward her hostess.
Trying not to laugh, Slade sought out those incredible turquoise eyes again. “I’m not from California. Are you?”
“No.” She held out one hand. “Clea Chardin.”
Her fingers were slender, yet her handclasp was imbued with confidence; Slade always paid attention to handshakes. It also, he thought shakily, carried a jolt like electricity. He opened his mouth to say something urbane, witty, erudite. Instead he heard himself say, “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met.”
Clea tugged her hand free, to her dismay feeling desire uncoil in her belly; every nerve she possessed was suddenly on high alert. Danger, she thought. This man wasn’t her usual fare. Far from it. Taking a deep breath, she said lightly, “I read an article recently that said beauty is based on symmetry. So you’re complimenting me because my nose isn’t crooked and I’m not wall-eyed.”
Pull out all the stops, Slade thought. Because this is a woman you’ve got to have. “I’m saying your eyes are like the sea in summer when it washes over a shoal. That your hair glows like the coals of a bonfire on the beach.”
Disconcerted, Clea blinked. “Well,” she said, “poetry. You surprise me, Mr. Carruthers.”
“Call me Slade…and I can’t imagine I’m the first man to tell you how astonishingly beautiful you are.” He smiled. “Actually, your nose is slightly crooked. Adds character.”
“You mean I’m imperfect?” she said. “Now your face is much too strong to be called handsome. Compelling, yes. Rugged, certainly.” She smiled back, a smile full of mockery. “Your hair is the color of polished mahogany, and your eyes are like the Mediterranean late on a summer evening—that wonderful midnight-blue.”
“You’re embarrassing me.”
“I can’t imagine I’m the first woman to tell you how astonishingly attractive you are,” she riposted.
“You know what? Your skin’s like the pearly sheen inside a seashell.” And how he longed to stroke the hollow beneath her cheekbone, its smooth ivory warmth. Fighting to keep his hands at his sides, Slade added, “A mutual admiration society—is that what we are?”
“From the neck up only,” Clea said, deciding the time had come for a solid dose of the truth. “I’m not going near your body.”
He dropped his iron control long enough for his gaze to rake her from head to toe, from her softly shadowed cleavage to the seductive flow of waist, hip and thigh. On her bare feet she was wearing jeweled sandals with impossibly high heels. My God, he thought, I’m done for. “That’s very wise of you,” he said thickly, and looked around the crowded garden. “Given the circumstances.”
“I meant,” she said clearly, “that I’m literally not going near your body.”
“Scared to?”
“Yes.”
His choke of laughter was involuntary. “You’re honest, I’ll say that for you.”
She gave him an enigmatic smile; at least, she hoped it was enigmatic. “Where’s home for you, Slade?”
Tacitly accepting her change of subject, he answered, “Manhattan. And you?”
“Milan.”
“So your accent’s Italian?” he said.
“Not really. I grew up in France and Spain.”
“What brings you here?”
“I was invited.”
An answer that wasn’t an answer. He glanced down at her aqua silk trousers. “How did you get past the dragons at the gate? Belle’s dress code is set in concrete.”
She said demurely, “I arrived earlier in the day and changed in the house.”
“So you know Belle well?”
“I’d never met her before yesterday…nor had I met Maggie Yarrow. Just how rich are you, Slade Carruthers?”
“I could ask the same of you.”
“Carruthers…” Her eyes widened. “Not Carruthers Consolidated?”
“The same.”
“You’re doing all that cutting-edge research on environmentally sustainable power sources,” she said with genuine excitement, temporarily forgetting that Slade represented nothing but danger. She asked a penetrating question, Slade answered and for ten minutes they talked animatedly about wind power and solar systems.
Although she was both informed and interested, it was he who brought the conversation back to the personal. “How long are you staying in the area? I could show you the project we’re working on outside Los Angeles.”
“Not long enough for that.”
“I have a house in Florence,” he said.
She smiled at him, her lips a sensual curve. “I spend very little time in Italy.”
He couldn’t invite her for dinner tonight; it was a yearly ritual that he have dinner with Belle after the garden party so she could dissect all the guests and savor the latest gossip. “Have dinner with me tomorrow night.”
“I already have plans,” she said.
“Are you married? Engaged?” Slade said, failing to disguise the urgency in his voice. He had a few inflexible rules as far as women were concerned, one being that he never had an affair with a woman who was already taken.
“No and no,” she said emphatically.
“Divorced?” he hazarded.
“No!”
“Hate men?”
Clea smiled, her teeth even and white, her eyes laughing at him. His head reeled. “I like the company of men very much.”
“Men in the plural.”
She was now openly laughing. “In the plural overall, one at a time in the specific.”
Didn’t he operate the same way with women? So why did he hate her lighthearted response? He said, “I’m not inviting you for dinner tonight because Belle and I have an annual and long-standing date.”
Clea’s lashes flickered. For her own reasons, she didn’t like hearing that Slade Carruthers and Belle were longtime friends. She said calmly, “Then perhaps we aren’t meant to talk further about windmills.”
“Meet me tomorrow morning at Fisherman’s Wharf,” Slade said.
“Why would I do that?”
Because you’re so beautiful I can’t think straight. “So I can buy you a Popsicle.”
“Popsicle?” She stumbled over the word. “What’s that?”
“Fruit-flavored ice on a stick. Cheap date.”
She raised her brows artlessly. “So you’re tight with your money?”
“I don’t think you’d be overly impressed were I to splash it around.”
“How clever of you,” she said slowly, not altogether pleased with his small insight into her character.
“Ten in the morning,” he said. “Pier 39, near the Venetian carousel. No dress code.”
“Beneath your charm—because I do find you charming, and extremely sexy—you’re ruthless, aren’t you?”
“It’s hard to combine raspberry Popsicles with ruthlessness,” he said. Sexy, he thought. Well.
“I—”
“Slade, how are you, buddy?”
Slade said, less than enthusiastically, “Hello there, Keith. Keith Rowe, from Manhattan, a business acquaintance of mine. This is Clea Chardin. From Milan. Where’s Sophie?”
Keith waved his glass of champagne somewhat drunkenly in the air. “Haven’t you heard? The Big D.”
Clea frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“Divorce,” Keith declaimed. “Lawyers. Marital assets. Alimony. In the last four months I’ve been royally screwed—marriage always boils down to money in the end, don’t you agree?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Clea said coldly.
Slade glanced at her. She was pale, her eyes guarded. But she’d never divorced, or so she’d told him. He said, “I’m sorry to hear that, Keith.”
“You’re the smart one,” Keith said. “He’s never married, Chloe. Never even been engaged.” He gulped the last of his champagne. “Evidence of a very shu—oops, sorry, Chloe, what I meant was superior IQ.”
“Clea,” she said, even more coldly.
He bowed unsteadily. “Pretty name. Pretty face. I’ve noticed before how Slade gets all the really sexy broads.”
“No one gets me, Mr. Rowe,” she snapped. “Slade, I should be going, it’s been nice talking to you.”
Slade fastened his fingers around the filmy fabric of her sleeve to stop her going anywhere. Then, in a voice any number of CEOs would have recognized, he said, “Keith, get lost.”
Keith hiccuped. “I can take a hint,” he said and wavered across the grass toward the nearest tray of champagne.
“He’s a jerk when he’s sober,” Slade said tightly, letting go of Clea’s sleeve, “and worse when he’s been drinking. Can’t say I blame Sophie for leaving him.”
Heat from Slade’s fingers had burned through her sleeve. Danger, her brain screamed again. “So you condone divorce?” Clea said, her voice like a whiplash.
“People make mistakes,” he said reasonably. “Although it’s not on my agenda. If I ever get married, I’ll marry for life.”
“Then I hope you enjoy being single.”
“Are you a cynic, Clea?”
“A realist.”
“Tell me why.”
She gave him a lazy smile that, Slade noticed, didn’t quite reach her eyes. “That’s much too serious a topic for a garden party. I want one of those luscious little cakes I saw on the way in, and Earl Grey tea in a Spode cup.”
Much too serious, Slade thought blankly. That’s what’s wrong. I’m in over my head, drowning in those delectable blue-green eyes. When have I ever wanted a woman as I want this one? “I’ll get you whatever you desire,” he said.
Her heart gave an uncomfortable lurch in her chest. “Desire is another very big topic. Let’s stick to want. What I want is cake and tea.”
Visited by the sudden irrational terror that she might vanish from his sight, he said, “You’ll meet me tomorrow morning?”
He wasn’t, Clea was sure, a man used to being turned down; in fact, he looked entirely capable of camping out on her hotel doorstep should she say no. Better, perhaps, that she meet him in a public place, use her usual tactics for getting rid of a man who didn’t fit her criteria, and then go back to Belle’s on her own.
“Popsicles and a carousel?” she said, raising her brows. “How could I not meet you?”
“Ten o’clock?”
“Fine.”
The tension slid from his shoulders. “I’ll look forward to it.” Which was an understatement if ever there was one.
She said obliquely, “I leave for Europe the next day.”
“I leave for Japan.”
Her lashes flickered. “Maybe I’ll sleep until noon tomorrow.”
“Play it safe?” He grinned at her. “Or do I sound incredibly arrogant?”
“I only take calculated risks,” she said.
“That’s a contradiction in terms.”
She said irritably, “How many women have told you your smile is pure dynamite?”
“How many men have wanted to warm their hands—or their hearts—in your hair?”
“I don’t do hearts,” Clea said.
“Nor do I. Always a good thing to have out in the open.”
She looked very much as though she was regretting her decision to meet him, he thought. He’d better play it cool, or Clea Chardin would run clear across the garden path and out of his life.
“Tea and cake,” he said, and watched her blink. Her lashes were deliciously long, her brows as tautly shaped as wings. Then she linked her arm with his; the contact surged through his body.
“Two cakes?” she said.
“A dozen, if that’s what you want,” he said unsteadily.
“Two is one too many. But sweets are my downfall.”
“Clams and French fries are mine. The greasier the better.”
“And really sexy broads.”
He said flatly, “Let’s set the record straight. First, I loathe the word broad. Secondly, sure I date. But I’m no playboy and I dislike promiscuity in either sex.”
So her tactics were almost sure to work, Clea thought in a flood of relief. “This is a charming garden, isn’t it?” she said.
For the first time since he’d seen her, Slade looked around. Big tubs of scented roses were in full bloom around the marquee, where an orchestra was sawing away at Vivaldi. The canopy of California oaks and palm trees cast swaying patterns of shade over the deep green grass, now trampled by many footsteps. The women in their bright dresses were like flowers, he thought fancifully.
Because Belle’s garden was perched on one of the city’s hilltops, a breeze was playing with Clea’s tangled curls. He reached over and tucked a strand behind her ear. “Charming indeed,” he said.
Her eyes darkened. Deliberately she moved a few inches away from him, dropping her hand from his sleeve. “Do you see much of Belle?” she asked.
“Not a great deal. I travel a lot with my job, and my base is on the East Coast…how did you meet her?”
“Through a mutual friend,” Clea said vaguely; no one other than Belle knew why she was here. “Oh look, miniature éclairs—do you think I can eat one without getting whipped cream on my chin?”
“Another calculated risk,” he said.
“One I shall take.”
Had he ever seen anything sexier than Clea Chardin, in broad daylight and surrounded by people, licking a tiny patch of whipped cream from her lips? Although sexy was far too mundane a word for his primitive and overwhelming need to possess her; or for the sensation he had of plummeting completely out of control to a destination unknown to him. Every nerve on edge, every sense finely honed. For underneath it all, wasn’t he frightened?
Frightened? Him, Slade Carruthers? Of a woman?
“Aren’t you going to eat anything, Slade?”
“What? Oh, sorry, of course I am.” He took a square from the chased silver platter and bit into it. It was a date square. He hated date squares. He said, “The summer my mother learned how to make chocolate éclairs, my father and I each gained five pounds.”
“Where did you grow up?”
“Manhattan. My parents still live there. My mother’s on a health kick now, though. Soy burgers and salads.”
“And what does your father think of that?”
“He eats them because he adores her. Then at least once a week he takes her out for dinner in SoHo or GreenwichVillage and plies her with wine and decadent desserts.” Slade’s face softened. “The next day it’s back to tofu and radicchio.”
“It sounds idyllic.”
The sharpness in her voice would have cut paper. “You don’t sound amused.”
“I’m not a believer in marital bliss, whether flavored with tofu or chocolate,” she said coldly. “Ah, there’s Belle…if you’ll excuse me, I must speak to her before I leave. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She plunked her half-empty cup on the linen tablecloth so hard that tea slopped into the saucer. Then she threaded her way through the crowd toward Belle, her hair like a beacon among the clusters of pastel hats. Slade watched her go. Prickly wasn’t the word for Clea Chardin.
Although she claimed never to have been married, some guy had sure pulled a dirty on her. Recently, by the sound of things, and far from superficially.
He’d like to kill the bastard.
Maybe Belle would fill him in on the details at dinner tonight. After a couple of glasses of her favorite Pinot Noir.
He wanted to know everything there was to know about Clea Chardin.
CHAPTER TWO
THAT evening, Slade waited until he and Belle were halfway through their grilled squab, in a trendy French restaurant on Nob Hill, before saying, “I met Clea Chardin at your party this afternoon, Belle.”
Belle’s fork stopped in midair. While her hair was unabashedly gray, her shantung evening suit was pumpkin-orange, teamed with yellow diamonds that sparkled in the candlelight. Her eyes, enlarged with lime-green mascara, were shrewd: Belle harbored no illusions about human nature. Slade was one of the few people who knew how much of her fortune went to medical clinics for the indigent.
“Delightful gal, Clea,” she said.
“Tell me about her.”
“Why, Slade?”
“She interests me,” he hedged.
“In that case, I’ll leave her to do the telling,” Belle said. “The sauce is delicious, isn’t it?”
“So that’s your last word?”
“Don’t play games with Clea. That’s my last word.”
“I’m not in the habit of playing games!”
“No? You’re thirty-five years old, unmarried, hugely rich and very sexy…why hasn’t some woman snagged you before now?” Belle answered her own question. “Because you know all the moves and you’re adept at keeping your distance. I’m telling you, don’t trifle with Clea Chardin.”
“She struck me as someone who can look after herself.”
“So she’s a good actor.”
Belle looked distinctly ruffled. Choosing not to ask why Clea was so defenseless, Slade took another mouthful of the rich meat and chewed thoughtfully. “Maggie Yarrow was in fine form,” he said.
Belle gave an uncouth cackle. “Don’t know why I invite her, she gets more outrageous every year. Nearly decapitated one of my waiters with that cane of hers…which reminds me, did you see what the senator’s wife was wearing? Looked like she ransacked the thrift shop.”
He knew better than to ask why Belle had slackened her infamous dress code for Clea. “Will your lawn recover from all those stiletto heels?”
“A whole generation of women crippled,” Belle said grandly. “What’s a patch of grass compared to that?”
He raised his glass. “To next year’s party.”
She gave him the sweet smile that came rarely and that he cherished. “You be sure to be here, won’t you, Slade? I count on it.”
“I will.”
His affairs never lasted more than six months; so by then, he’d no longer be seeing Clea. Game over.
Oddly, he felt a sharp pang of regret.
The next morning Slade was walking along Pier 39 past the colorful moored fishing boats. It was October, sunniest month in the city, and tourists still thronged the boardwalk, along with buskers joking raucously with the crowds. The tall spire of the carousel beckoned to him, the lilt of its music teasing his ears. Would Clea be there? Or would she have thought the better of it and remained in her hotel?
He had no idea where she was staying. Added to that, she was going back to Europe tomorrow. If she was determined not to be found, Europe was a big place.
He walked the circumference of the fence surrounding the carousel, his eyes darting this way and that. No Clea. She’d changed her mind, he thought, angered that she should trifle with him. But underlying anger was a depth of disappointment that dismayed him.
Then movement caught his eye. A woman was waving to him. It was Clea, seated on the gold-painted sidesaddle of a high-necked horse, clasping the decorated pole as she went slowly up and down. He waved back, the tension in his shoulders relaxing.
She’d come. The rest was up to him.
The brim of her huge, flower-bedecked sun hat flopped up and down with the horse’s movements. Her legs were bare, pale against her mount’s dark flanks. Bare. Long. Slender.
As the carousel came to a stop, she slid to the floor. She was wearing a wildly flowered skirt that fell in soft folds around her thighs, a clinging top in a green so vivid it hurt his eyes and matching green flat-heeled sandals. The skirt should be banned, Slade thought. Or was he even capable of thought through a surge of lust unlike any he’d ever known?
Clea walked toward Slade, her heart jittering in her chest. He was so overpoweringly male, she thought. Tall, broad-shouldered, long-legged, with an aura of power that she was almost sure he was unaware of, and which in consequence was all the more effective. She came to a halt two feet away from him. “Buon giorno.”