Kathleen darted a quick glance at Erik and then looked back at her husband. “I… I’m sure that if Erik wanted a decorator, he would engage one,” she said safely. What had Erik just told her? What had he said? He had no wife? He had no wife! And never had!
“Oh, but decorators are so… professional. If he hires a decorator, his place will look like our living room—too perfect for people to live in.”
That was the first time Kathleen had heard Seth make even a veiled criticism of his sister. Right now, that wasn’t important. Indeed, it barely registered. Her mind was still circulating around what Erik had said. He had no wife. I’ve never been married. The words were repeated in her ears like a chant. The statement meant everything in the world to her.
“Kathleen is too busy to get involved with decorating a bachelor’s apartment,” Erik said.
Had he stressed the word bachelor?
Seth wheeled behind his desk and yawned politely behind his hand. “Excuse me,” he said. “I ate too much lunch.”
Seth seemed oblivious to the tension in the room, an aftershock that vibrated off the walls, a lingering remnant of the revelation that had been spoken moments before. “Tomorrow is Thursday, isn’t it? That’s one of your days off. Did you have anything special planned?”
“No, but I—”
“Erik, you?”
“No.”
“Great. Tomorrow you two can shop all day. When you’re finished, come back to the house and I’ll grill steaks out on the patio.”
Since neither of them said anything to the contrary, Seth considered the matter closed and went on to other things. Kathleen excused herself, leaning down to kiss Seth goodbye and nodding to Erik as she left.
That evening at dinner, the matter of the canceled order came up again. This time, it was Hazel who broached it. “I think,” she said, wiping her mouth daintily on the linen napkin, “that Kathleen has far too many responsibilities. How else could she have made such a costly error?” Seth missed the stinging implication and heard only his sister’s concern.
“I didn’t make the error,” Kathleen replied calmly.
“Darling, it doesn’t matter,” Seth said soothingly. “Everything has been taken care of now. We should have the goods within the week.”
“It does matter if someone is accusing me of being incompetent when I am no such thing,” she protested vehemently.
“Hazel didn’t mean that—”
“I’ll decide if and when I have too many responsibilities and deal with it myself. I won’t need anyone else advising me.” She stood up abruptly. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m going upstairs to play with Theron.”
Kathleen left the two of them in the dining room and didn’t go down again until she knew Hazel had come upstairs to her suite of rooms.
As she descended the last steps, Seth was being wheeled into his room by George. She was struck by the fatigue she saw around his eyes and mouth. His complexion, which was usually healthfully tanned by the hours of therapy he spent in the heated pool, was gray. Violet shadows under his eyes, which had appeared faint in the daytime, now looked drastically darker in the evening.
“Seth,” she said, squatting down so she could rest her head against his knee. She noticed that George had tactfully withdrawn. “I’m sorry if I sounded out of sorts at dinner. I can’t explain what happened, but you must know that I didn’t cancel that Polo order, no matter what other crises I may have had on my mind at the time.”
She felt the steady pressure of his hand as he stroked her hair. “My sweet Kathleen. I don’t know what happened either, but I’d forgive you no matter what you did. I love you.” His voice was soothing, and his words, which she knew he meant deep in his soul, pierced her heart. She burrowed her head closer against the legs that couldn’t feel the tenderness she felt for him.
“I’ve been worried about you, Seth,” she said quietly. “Are you feeling well these days?” She raised her head and looked closely into his eyes, which were clouded with something she couldn’t define. All she knew was that they didn’t shine with the exhilaration she usually saw there.
“I’m fine. What could be wrong?”
“I don’t know,” she said slowly. “You’d tell me if you didn’t feel well, wouldn’t you?”
“If it would guarantee your love, I’d tell you my deepest, darkest secrets.” He smiled, but his jest fell flat.
“I do love you, Seth.” She meant it. Who couldn’t love this man? He represented everything that was good and kind in the world.
His face turned serious but was warm with love. “I know you do,” he whispered. “You and Theron mean so much to me, Kathleen, that sometimes my love is painful. It’s as if my body can’t contain it, as if I’ll burst for loving you so hard. Do you understand?”
Yes, she did. She knew the emotion he was trying to convey. She had felt it for the past two years, and with as much anguish over its unrequited state as Seth’s.
“You are beautiful, Kathleen. Truly beautiful. I want to memorize your face for the time I’ll spend in eternity.” His fingers followed the path charted by his eyes as they traveled over her features.
His intensity and choice of words frightened her, and she cried softly, “Seth,” as she gripped his hand.
“Come now,” he said briskly, pulling her up to receive his kiss on the cheek. “Let a hard-working man go to bed. Besides, you’ve got a busy day ahead of you tomorrow. You do like Erik, don’t you, Kathleen?”
She could see how important her opinion was to him. “Of course. And I think what he’s going to do for Kirchoff’s is fantastic. You made a wise decision.”
The relief on Seth’s face was worth any turmoil she would suffer from being and working closely with Erik. “I’m glad you approve. I want the two of you to get along. You don’t mind that I offered your services as a decorator, do you? I know you enjoy that kind of thing, and you spend far too much time here with only me, George and Alice, and Hazel for company. Not to mention the demands Theron makes on you.”
“Don’t worry about that. You’re my family. But I don’t mind helping Erik if you want me to.”
“Good.” He seemed satisfied. “Goodnight, sweetheart.” He pulled her down and, this time, kissed her sweetly on the lips.
Sensing that their private time was over, George came out of the shadows. He said goodnight and opened the door to Seth’s bedroom, closing it quietly after Seth had steered his chair through.
Kathleen had never been invited into that room. She never questioned Seth about its absolute privacy. Perhaps the trappings of his disability were too visible in his bedroom. She accepted his decision and respected it. If she could help it, she would never do anything to embarrass or injure the man who had given her a future when she had had none.
* * *
What could she wear? Kathleen pondered the contents of her three closets. With a typically feminine anxiety, she decided that nothing she had was appropriate.
She scolded herself for acting like a silly teenager. She wasn’t going on a date with a special beau. She was only going shopping with Erik, and he had seen her both dressed to the nines and wearing the navy shorts and white T-shirt that were the Mountain View uniform. He had also seen her in nothing at all.
Kathleen blushed at that thought. Gloriously naked, she had lain in his bed, and he had seen her in his shower with soap and water combining into foaming rivers all over her body that he navigated with his hands and mouth. Did he ever remember? The stain in her cheeks became deeper. The familiarity with which he had touched her in the past few days proved that he remembered her body well.
Finally, she selected a pair of brown leather jeans that Seth had insisted she buy. He was proud of her figure and often coerced her into modeling in the lavish fashion shows she had instigated at Kirchoff’s. He was too generous with his gifts, urging her to buy at least one garment for herself from each house she visited when she went to New York.
When they went on their frequent tours of the stores, if Seth saw something in Kathleen’s size that he liked, he stripped it off the hanger and handed it to her with a beguiling smile. “You’d look swell in this, kid,” he’d say with a Humphrey Bogart slur. She never argued with him. If she could please him by wearing pretty clothes, she was all too glad to do it. There was so little she could do for him.
Kathleen felt a pang of guilt at her jittery nerves as she finished dressing. Was she being unfaithful to Seth by anticipating the outing with Erik? No, she argued with herself. Seth was the one who had planned it. She was really doing this for him. But as she looked at herself critically in the mirror, she knew that she was doing this for herself, too.
She had put on a silk shirt with the pants. The electric-blue color deepened the emerald-green of her eyes. The toes of her imported Italian boots shone with the same saddle-brown of the jeans. She let her hair hang loose so it waved around her face and shoulders like a copper scarf.
She ran lightly down the stairs just as the doorbell was ringing. It was only natural that she call out, “I’ll get it, Alice,” but her footsteps faltered noticeably on the stairs.
Gripping the doorknob as though it were a lifeline, she swung open the door before she could chicken out.
Erik stared at her over the threshold. He didn’t say anything as he raked her with greedy eyes. The muscles in his throat worked convulsively. When at last his gaze rose to meet hers, he said, “Good morning.”
“Good morning.” It took all the breath she could muster to speak, for he looked gorgeous. He was as slim-hipped as ever, as the tight jeans emphasized. A dark plaid cotton shirt was stretched over the muscles of his broad chest and shoulders. A camel-colored cardigan was knotted casually around his neck. “Come in,” she murmured, stepping aside to let him enter. She could smell his cologne as he walked past her. “Seth wanted to say goodbye. He’s having breakfast with Theron.” Erik stopped, turned around and looked at her, and then nodded. “I’d like to see him, too.”
She didn’t know if he was referring to Seth or Theron and felt it was safer not to ask. She walked a few steps ahead of Erik, leading him through the labyrinth of the first floor until they reached the bright, sunny breakfast room off the kitchen.
They were greeted with peals of laughter as Kathleen pushed open the swinging door. “What’s going on in here?” she asked brightly. Too brightly?
The center of attention was Theron, who was still pajama-clad and sitting in his high chair. In his hand, he held a long banana and was trying his best to peel it.
“Hi,” Seth said. “Alice, get Erik some coffee, please. Sit down. We’re having a time here. He’s been trying for five minutes to figure out how to get to the inside of that banana, but he won’t let any of us do it for him. Watch.”
Seth leaned over closer to the high chair and said, “Theron, let me peel the banana for you.” He reached for the fruit, but the little boy hugged it tight to him until Seth’s hand was withdrawn, and then he renewed his struggle to peel it himself.
“Isn’t he something?” Seth asked rhetorically with pride.
“Yes, he is,” Erik answered gruffly, and Kathleen whirled her head around to look at him. By the unnatural sound of his voice, she almost expected to see tears in his eyes, but to her relief there were none. He only stared at his son as possessively as he had looked at her minutes before. She knew a quickening of pity for him. How torturous it must be to see his son and not be able to claim him.
A triumphant gurgle drew her attention back to the boy as he finally conquered the banana. Within seconds, the skinned banana was being shoved into his mouth until it disappeared altogether.
“He’s the stubbornest baby I’ve ever seen,” Alice said, shaking her head, predicting dire outcomes for such hard-headedness.
“Are you going to work out in the pool this morning?” Kathleen asked Seth, whom she was glad to see looked rested and more himself than he had last night.
“Yes. Then I’m going to let Theron play in there for a while.”
“You don’t think it’s too cold?” she mused with a wrinkled brow.
“I’ll keep him in the water once he gets wet, and then rush him inside when we’re finished.”
She acquiesced, knowing that the water’s temperature was carefully maintained so that Seth and George could go through their exercises in comfort year-round. “Just be careful with him. He’s slippery as an eel and has no fear of the water yet.”
Seth’s eyes softened and he said, “You know I will. George will be right there with us all the time. I wouldn’t risk my son’s life for anything in the world.” He reached across the table and clasped her hand.
She dared not look at Erik, but somehow she knew that his body had tensed perceptibly with Seth’s words. She could feel her own tension.
“Let Alice cook you some breakfast, Erik.”
He declined Seth’s offer. “No thanks. I’m already bumming one meal off you today. I picked up a doughnut on the way over.” His smile was as genuine and dashing as ever. It gave away none of the turmoil he felt inside. “If Kathleen’s ready, I am.”
“She’s ready,” Seth said with a faint scowl. “I never have been able to get her to eat a sensible breakfast. She’s too figure-conscious.”
“I can see that,” Erik said as he looked at her appreciatively.
“You should have seen her when she was pregnant,” Seth said. Erik’s attention didn’t waver. His eyes stayed glued on her as Seth continued, “I’ve never seen a woman carry a child more gracefully. From the back, you couldn’t even tell that she was pregnant. She looked ravishing right up to the day of delivery.”
“She would have,” Erik said.
The warmth of his gaze affected her too much, and the topic of conversation was too uncomfortable. She stood up quickly and upset Theron’s cup of orange juice. Thankfully, it had a sealed cup with a perforated spout to prevent such accidents. She nervously righted it and said, “We’ll be back well before dinner. Alice, do you need anything?”
“No. Seth’s going to do most of the cooking tonight.” She laughed.
“Well, then,” Kathleen said absently. She had suddenly run out of excuses not to leave with Erik. “Goodbye, Theron,” she said, leaning down to receive his banana-flavored kiss. “Mommy will see you tonight. Maybe I’ll bring you a surprise.”
“Bye-bye,” he said happily, waving a chubby fist.
Everyone laughed. To Kathleen’s dismay, Erik walked around the table and ruffled Theron’s hair. “Goodbye, Captain.”
Kathleen stammered the rest of her goodbyes, kissed Seth quickly, and then she and Erik were walking out the front door and down the flagstone walk to a waiting sports car.
She turned around in surprise. “A Corvette,” he said dryly. “A woman I once knew told me I was this type.” His eyes were dancing with only a ghost of their old humor.
As she slid into the sleek silver car with the rich maroon interior, she asked, “What happened to your Dodge van?”
“I still have it. But this car is good for the professional image. Who trusts a videographer who shows up at business meetings in a van with a wheezing carburetor?”
He steered the car down the tree-lined driveway and then turned onto the major thoroughfare. “I thought I’d take you to the condo first and let you see what we’ve got to work with.”
“Okay.”
That was the extent of their conversation until they reached the site of his condominium. It was in an impressive complex of garden homes. Each unit was built in a different style of architecture, but they blended well together. The grounds were well maintained and there was a pool in the center of the complex for the exclusive use of the home owners.
“This is very nice,” she commented.
“It ought to be,” Erik said. “I’m paying through the nose for it.”
He unlocked his door and stood aside. She entered the foyer of the contemporary structure. Their footsteps made hollow echoes as they went through the empty rooms while Erik pointed out features. He whispered, as one is wont to do in an empty house.
The condo was a study in glass and wood. One wall of the living room was redwood, while a stone fireplace was set between two floor-to-ceiling windows on another. The kitchen had every conceivable built-in appliance, but still retained an inviting coziness.
“Upstairs are two bedrooms and a bath for each. I’m not going to do anything to them just now. And I can’t spend a lot of money, Kathleen. I’m not as rich as your husband.” His tone was snide and she walked away in anger, instantly wishing that she had paid more attention to where she was going.
She found herself in a large master bedroom, dominated by a king-sized bed, by the look of the mussed covers, recently slept in. That was all that was in the room.
“It’s rather austere at this point,” Erik said from close behind her. She moved away, ostensibly to look out the wide, drapeless window, but actually to put distance between herself and his overwhelming male magnetism.
Kathleen gave careful attention to the skylighted high ceiling, the louvered doors that opened into a huge walk-in closet with a built-in chest of drawers. He was close behind her again, and she retreated through another set of louvered doors.
The master bathroom was sumptuous. There was a shower with a clear glass door, two basins, a private commode and a bathtub. Kathleen was intrigued by the bottles of shaving lotion, a bar of woodsy-smelling soap, an old-fashioned shaving mug and brush, and a mustache comb. A blue toothbrush hung on a brass rack. His hairbrush was tortoise shell. The grooming items were intensely personal. She quickly averted her eyes from them, though she would have loved to handle each article.
A redwood hot tub situated beside a picture window afforded an unrestricted view of a private patio, landscaped with evergreen plants and seasonal flowers, now blooming in fall colors.
“Wow.”
He chuckled. “This room was almost worth the price of the house.”
The sensuality and intimacy of the room, added to the predatory gait with which he stalked her, set her nerves on edge, and she went back into the bedroom, where she automatically looked at the bed. Had Erik slept there alone? Yes. There was only one pillow. Still, hadn’t they shared the same pillow?
“Kathleen.” She felt his hands on her arms, turning her around. He lifted her chin with his finger and looked deeply into her eyes. “How is it that you thought I was married?” His voice was gentle. He could have been speaking to a bewildered and confused child for all the tenderness in his tone.
Tears flooded her eyes. She gulped her words. “I… I saw her. I had waited all day, knowing you were hu—hurt… in pain. They wouldn’t let… tell me… I was so scared. Then she came in and said she was Mrs… Mrs. Gudjonsen. They took her right in to you… and I… I… She was tiny, and blonde, and pretty, and she…”
“Sally.”
Kathleen blinked back tears as she looked up at him. “Sally?”
“My sister-in-law. My brother Bob’s wife.”
Kathleen’s knees finally succumbed to the weakness that invaded her body with a debilitating effect and she slumped against him. He gathered her to him tightly, almost blocking off her breath with the ferocity of his possessive embrace.
“God, Kathleen, what did we do to deserve this?”
Their bodies swayed together, each giving comfort to the other. They stayed locked in that wordless, communicating embrace for long minutes while Erik whispered incoherent messages to her hair.
He kissed her. His mouth encompassed hers. His hands rubbed her back as though she were a healing lotion that he wanted to be absorbed into his skin.
Then, with a supreme act of will, he pushed her away from him. He sat down on the corner of the bed, spreading his knees wide, clasping his hands between them and staring down at his rigid white knuckles.
“How could you possibly have construed that I was married after…” She heard a touch of irritation in his voice. “Did you think no more of me than that? Dammit, Kathleen, how could you?”
“I don’t know,” she wailed. “I was overwrought, sick with worry for you and afraid, so afraid that you’d… afraid of everything.” There was no explanation. There was no remedy.
Erik knew it, too. When he spoke again, the anger was gone. “I was a raving maniac when no one could find you. I thought something terrible had happened to you, that you’d been kidnapped or something. Then, when it was finally evident that you’d left on purpose and with the deliberate intention of covering your tracks, I went through a period of rage that is probably unequaled in human history. I couldn’t figure out why…”
His voice trailed off as he stared forlornly at the tight fists his hands had formed. Kathleen was leaning against the windowsill, staring bleakly into space, seeing nothing, hearing only the desolation in Erik’s voice, which matched that in her heart.
“When I saw you the other night, I wanted to kill you.” He laughed mirthlessly. “No. I wanted to make love to you first and then I wanted to kill you.”
They were silent for a while, lost in their own thoughts. Erik was the one to break the stillness. “Why did you marry him, Kathleen?”
She took a deep breath. She could feel his eyes stabbing into her back, but she refused to look at him. If she did…
“I discovered I was pregnant with Theron.” She swallowed the lump in her throat that grew there each time she remembered her first visit to Dr. Peters’s office and the decision she had made. “At first I thought the answer was an abortion. I went to the hospital and even to the operating room. I stopped them just before they put me to sleep.”
“My God,” he breathed.
“Exactly. God was with me that day. I might never have had Theron—” She broke off when a shudder shook her entire body. When she recovered, Kathleen went on and told him about Seth’s proposal and their marriage. “He’s been so good to me, Erik. He never once drilled me about you—the father. He accepted me and Theron without censure. He treats Theron as his own.”
“But Theron’s not his. He’s mine. Mine, Kathleen.”
She spun around and faced him, the color slowly draining from her face. “You wouldn’t—couldn’t—hurt him, Erik. Please. I beg you.”
“Sonofabitch!” he cursed savagely as he stood up and crossed the room to stand beside her at the window. He didn’t look at her, but shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. He stared out the window with as much disinterest as she had done.
Suddenly, he turned and shouted, “How do you compete with a man like that? A paraplegic. Do I become the world’s worst villain and claim Theron as my own? Should I grab up the child he loves as his son when fate has already kicked the man in the teeth? What am I supposed to do, Kathleen? Theron’s my son, goddammit!” He slammed his fist into the wall of his new house, seeming impervious to the pain it must have caused him.
“It would be easier if Seth were a real sonofabitch. Just my luck. The man’s a saint.” The bitterness in his voice stung Kathleen’s ears. It was heartwrenching to witness the torturous struggle of a man’s conscience.
“He’s been generous beyond my wildest hopes in loaning me money to start my business. It wouldn’t have been possible to buy the equipment and rent the building I needed without his backing. Not only that, he’s put me in touch with all the businessmen in San Francisco who are potential clients.” Erik leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes. Frustration was evident in every line of his body. “Now, how should I repay him for all that? Walk out with the child he considers to be his and tell him I have a terrible lech for his wife?” He dug into his closed eye sockets with the heels of his hands as if he wanted to block out every thought pattern, wipe the slate of moral score-keeping clean, erase all the scruples he was battling. He released his breath slowly, lowered his hands and looked at her. “You can’t imagine what a sacrifice you’re asking of me, Kathleen.”
She looked deeply into his eyes. Her voice was ragged with emotion as she said, “Yes, Erik. Yes, I can.”
He heard the words and in her swimming eyes he read the ones left unspoken. Erik cupped her face between his palms and his soothing thumbs stroked and stilled her trembling lips. Resting his forehead against hers, his eyes closed against the torment of holding her and not being able to have her.
This is hell, he thought. For over two years she had ruled his thoughts, both conscious and subliminal. He knew her body better than he knew his own, for he had studied it more and it had been indelibly recorded on the pages of his mind. Time hadn’t dimmed the sensation of being held within her. No woman had ever held him so tightly, surrounded him so sweetly, entrapped him so completely.
He had loved her for that. And he had loved her spirit and the bravery with which she had overcome the adversities of her childhood. Ironically, he loved her now for the commitment she gave her husband. He couldn’t speak to her of love now. He couldn’t have her. He wasn’t a thief and he wouldn’t take what didn’t belong to him. But, God! How was he to survive giving her up?
“We’d better go,” he said at last, and released her, opening a chasm of regret between them.
* * *
In the most poetic recesses of Kathleen’s mind, she deemed the day “star-kissed.” By tacit agreement, they pushed all their heartaches aside and reveled in the day they had been granted alone together.
Kathleen made the first attempt to talk about something other than the painful past and the hopeless future. She chose a subject she knew would interest Erik greatly.
“Guess what? Jaimie has been adopted,” she said, thinking she would surprise him. He was helping her into his car.
“I know,” he replied lightly, shutting the door.
“You know!”
As Erik got behind the wheel, he laughed at her shocked expression. “Yeah. And before you did, I’d bet. Who told you?”
“B. J. and Edna, of course,” she answered, still dismayed by the twist in the conversation.
“But they didn’t tell you who adopted him.”
“No.”
“Bob and Sally.” He enjoyed the thrilled smile that lit up her whole face. “He’s a Gudjonsen and is wild about his uncle Erik. He has a baby sister named Jennifer.”
“Oh, Erik, how wonderful. Sally and Bob have truly been blessed.”
“Yes. They have.” Only a touch of bitterness tinged his words.
As they drove through the city, Kathleen launched into a variety of ideas for Erik’s condo, until he laughed and said, “I don’t care what you do, short of decorating it in pink and purple satin. I’m sure your taste is as good as mine.” He dug an elbow playfully into her ribs as he pulled the sports car to a stop at a traffic light.
“But what do you like?” she asked in exasperation.
He slid a glance in her direction that more than suggested what he liked, but he refrained from making the sensual comment that came to mind. “I like browns, you know, different shades. I like that rust color like maple leaves in fall.”
She smiled. “Earth tones?”
“Yeah. That oughta do it.” She shot him an impatient, disparaging look, then they both laughed.
By the time they reached the shopping area, her head was whirling with ideas. She gave him a crash course in decorating. Erik stood back and let her take charge. She selected linens for his bed and bathroom, picked out twin love seats for his living room. A coordinating chair, a large coffee table and two end tables were also selected. She asked his opinion on lamps. He picked up one with a china base of a seventeenth-century shepherd and shepherdess in a tight clench. Kathleen stared at it in horror, but one look at his twinkling eyes over the frilly shade, and she knew that he was teasing her. They settled on two with clay urns and linen, pleated shades.
At lunch they ate in a restaurant on Fisherman’s Wharf that provided a panorama of the Bay and, in the distance, the Golden Gate Bridge. As they ate, Kathleen’s heart was over flowing with happiness. Mere days ago, she had thought she would never see him again. Now he was here, across the small table from her, his knees touching hers under the curtain of the tablecloth. They were breathing the same air. She could look at him all she wanted to and didn’t have to worry about curious eyes that might intercept those looks so unguarded and filled with love.
She called home from the restaurant and talked to Alice. Seth had gone to the office. Theron had been fed and was down for his nap. “He’s fine and not missing you a bit,” Alice assured her.
“I know,” Kathleen said with a pout. “That’s what bothers me.”
On their way again, Erik took her hand companionably as they strolled through the shops of Ghirardelli Square, avoiding Kirchoff’s Boutique. Erik looked longingly at all the amenities that he couldn’t yet afford to add to the meager furnishings he had already picked out.
In an art gallery, he expressed a liking for a wall hanging done in woven yarns of brown, beige and sienna. Kathleen sent him on an unnecessary errand and tried to purchase it for him as a housewarming gift from her and Seth. She was disappointed to learn that it was only a sample, but another one could be ordered from the artist. She placed the order and left her telephone number where she could be contacted when it was finished. It would look perfect on the redwood wall of his living room and give some warmth to the room.
Selecting window treatments was tedious, and Erik was happy to leave it to Kathleen and a decorator who agreed on a time to meet him later in the week at the condo to take exact measurements.
“You may want a headboard later on, but for now you might consider painting the wall behind your bed a vibrant color and then tossing hundreds of bright pillows against it.”
“Hundreds?” he teased as he slurped his chocolate soda. They were taking a break in Ghirardelli’s Chocolate Manufactory.
“Well, maybe only dozens,” she conceded with a smile as she licked the last foamy sweet drop off the end of her spoon. When she looked up, she was alarmed to see that Erik was watching her mouth, as though envying the right of her tongue to disappear inside it. The blue eyes raised slightly, seeking hers, and there was a moment of sexual awareness that rocketed through them.
“What’s next?” he asked hoarsely, trying to reestablish the ease with which the rest of the day had passed. His eyes, however, were mutinous, and lowered to take in the agitated rise and fall of her breasts. Sensing his eyes on them, her nipples communicated an enticing message all their own.
“Well, as I was saying about the bedroom,” Kathleen said breathlessly, all too aware that his interest was wandering in a dangerous direction and that she was following his lead right to the edge of the enchanted abyss. Safety lay in meaningless, idle chatter. “Let’s pick out the color you want on the wall, buy the paint, and then we’ll search for pillows. We may get lucky and find an inexpensive chair to go in there, too. What would you think about a wicker trunk at the foot of the bed? That’s a functional piece, and decorative as well.”
He leaned over closer to her and placed his lips directly on her ear as he whispered, “I can think of only one decorative and functional item I want near my bed. She’s got auburn hair that shines in the sunlight like fire. Her eyes are green and radiant and bewitchingly outlined with dark lashes. And if she didn’t want me to talk like this, why did she wear a silk blouse and tight leather pants that fit her sexy little fanny like a glove?”
He pulled away from her, and Kathleen caught herself before she swayed against him. She was held hypnotized by his words and the tone of his voice. His eyes were glowing with desire and his mustache twitched around an insolent curl on his lips. He knew he had disoriented her. She wanted to pay him back.
“There’s something I always wanted to ask you. Do you have a dimple under the right side of your mustache?”
“Maybe, maybe not. Why don’t you find out,” he challenged.
Suddenly, the tables had turned again. She wasn’t taunting him as was her intention. He was still one point ahead. But who cared? The game had its own reward. “I might sometime,” she promised softly as they stared at each other.
“I’ll look forward to that.”
* * *
They completed their shopping within the next two hours and headed for his car, Erik grumbling that he hoped he could remember when he was supposed to meet which delivery man.
When they drove up the lane at the Kirchoff estate, they were still basking in the warmth of each other’s presence. He came around to the passenger side of the car and opened the door for her. She was looking up into his face as they walked toward the front door, but intuition caused her to glance toward the side yard. Her heart lurched to her throat, and she shoved away from Erik as she broke into a dead run.
“Theron!” she screamed.