SIX
“Just how far were you two planning to go to get my money back?”
Montana drove Katie to Carithers’ Chance with Cat following in her own car.
“The money wasn’t our objective. We were trying to find Carson. Sam said he was in his casino Sunday night, talking with a man with a gray limousine but nobody knows who he is. We thought if we went to work for Sam, we might learn something.”
“Did you?”
“No,” was Katie’s answer.
“Well, I did. The man’s name is Leon. The scuttlebutt is that he’s some kind of vampire who appears in the night and disappears before the sun comes up.”
“Vampire? Come on. That’s ridiculous.”
“I agree. I’m only repeating the talk along the river.”
“So what does Leon have to do with Carson?”
Katie loosened her seat belt and leaned forward. “Can’t we go and talk to him?”
“Good idea,” Montana agreed. “Know where he lives?”
“No,” Katie admitted with a frown.
“And neither does anyone else, so far as I can tell.”
“But the police,” Katie suggested. “Surely they can find him.”
“The police are looking for him too. It seems several people have disappeared after being seen talking with our mystery man.”
Katie gasped. “You mean he kidnaps them?”
Montana shook his head. “No, I don’t think he kidnaps them. Think about it, who’d want to kidnap a gambler that loses all the time?”
“But there must be someone who can help us find him. Maybe the news—a television reporter?”
Montana looked skeptical. “I can’t get anybody to publicly admit that Leon exists. The casino owners don’t know, and the gamblers won’t talk. If he isn’t a vampire, he’s a ghost. A reporter will only drive him further underground.”
Katie leaned back, making no attempt to cover her disappointment. “So what now?”
“We wait. I put out the word that there is a reward for information about either Leon or Carson. Until somebody comes forward, we’ll just have to sit tight.”
“What about Carson’s girlfriend, the showgirl?”
“She works for Mario, who used to deal for me. But she hasn’t seen him either.”
“No. She found me. She’s a very nice girl named Emily, who said that Carson left her, heading for my place to pick up his IOUs. Later he called her. He seemed despondent, told her he was a failure and a screwup. He ruined everything he touched and he wasn’t about to hurt her or anybody else anymore.”
Katie paled. “You don’t think he—”
“No, I don’t.”
“But you can’t be sure he hasn’t done something to himself, can you?”
Montana could be reasonably sure. What he didn’t tell Katie was that Carson had made several stops between Emily and the Scarlet Lady. It hadn’t taken him long to lose a good portion of the money he was carrying. But according to witnesses, he still had money at the last table where he’d gambled. Where he’d gone from there, nobody knew. If anything bad had happened to Carson, Montana was certain he hadn’t done it to himself.
Laying her head back against the seat Katie closed her eyes. “Of course he hasn’t. He’s my brother, I’d know if he was …”
She couldn’t say “dead,” but Montana knew what she meant and he couldn’t stop himself from reaching out and taking her hand. When she grasped his tightly in return, he felt a protective twinge.
“He’s not dead, Katie. He’s just missing. I’ll bet he’ll be home by the time we get back.”
At that moment his car phone rang. Releasing Katie’s hand, he lifted the receiver. “Yes?”
“Royal here, boss. A man just came by and left a note for you. It might be from that Carithers kid.”
“We’re on our way. Don’t leave the dock until we get there.” He hung up the phone and turned to Katie, who was holding her breath. “No, it isn’t your brother. But someone brought a note Royal thinks might be from him. I’m going straight to the Lady. Okay?”
She nodded.
He pulled over to the side of the road and left the motor running while he went back to inform Cat of their change of destination. “You go on home. I’ll see that Katie gets there.”
“Okay,” she agreed, “but you take care of her. She’s got a blind spot you could drive a truck through when it comes to the people she cares about. I wouldn’t want to see her hurt.”
“If Carson hasn’t already accomplished that, nobody ever could,” was Montana’s reply.
“That’s where you’re wrong, gambling man. She hasn’t figured it out yet, but you could hurt her more than her brother ever has.”
“That just might work both ways,” he said softly.
Cat let out a sigh of exasperation. “Men. How come Katie always draws the needy ones?”
Needy? Him? Cat was blowing smoke. If there was one thing Montana wasn’t, it was needy. He’d learned to do without family and commitment completely. There’d been darn few women who’d done more than pass through his life, and his only friends were his employees. The last thing he needed was a woman who filled her heart and life with needy people.
The last thing he needed was Katie Carithers.
Why then was he climbing back into his car and taking her hand? He was reassuring her, that’s why. It had nothing to do with the fact that it reassured him as well.
He didn’t need reassuring. He needed a steak, a drink, and a woman.
Any woman would do.
From the look in Montana’s eyes when she climbed out of the car, she realized the skimpy black cutaway and red satin shorts that passed as a waitress uniform were more revealing than Cat’s cocktail dress.
“If you ever decide to give up bookkeeping and take up bartending, you’d make a fortune in tips,” Montana drawled.
He took her arm and supported her as they walked up the ramp onto the boat. As soon as they were inside, she felt a lurch as the doors closed and the boat moved away from the dock.
“No,” she protested, turning back. “We can’t leave until we’ve read the note. Suppose we have to go somewhere?”
“We’ll just go back,” he said, gathering her closer as they made their way through the din of noise from the slot machines and the people playing roulette. They took the elevator to the third level, quiet by comparison as the more serious players concentrated on their cards.
Royal met them halfway across the floor. He handed the envelope to Montana, though his eyes were drawn to Katie and her costume.
“Don’t ask,” Montana instructed, pushing past Royal, ignoring his smirk as he led Katie down a narrow corridor that led to an entrance to his private quarters.
Inside, he flicked on the light switch, bringing the lamps beside the bed to life, then led Katie to the red couch and dropped down beside her.
“What if it isn’t from Carson?” she asked through clenched teeth.
He ripped open the envelope and pulled out the folded slip of paper and the bills it surrounded. “It is. He says he’s sorry, but this is all that’s left. He’s going away for a while and I should tell you that he’s very sorry for the trouble he’s caused.”
Every nerve ending in her body seemed to collapse. She felt numb, as if she’d been submerged in a cold mountain stream, immobilizing her so that she could barely speak. “How much is left?”
Montana counted out the bills. “Eight thousand dollars exactly.”
“Oh no! He lost ten thousand dollars of the money I won. How could he do that?”
The money you cheated to win, Montana wanted to say. “For him, I’m afraid it wasn’t hard. Whoever taught him to play cards ought to be shot.”
She wasn’t going to cry. Instead she felt as if she were splintering before him, ready to snap as her teeth chattered lightly.
“It was me,” she said. “Can you believe it? I taught him one Christmas when I was in college. We had a cabin in Colorado where we’d planned to ski, but there were avalanche warnings, so we played cards. Carson wasn’t very good at it. He always lost, unless I let him win. I never dreamed he’d do this. It’s all my fault.”
“Don’t freak out on me,” he said, taking her hands in his and rubbing them briskly. “It isn’t the end of the world. After all,” he quipped, “he doesn’t need to be good. With your special talents, you can win that back and more in one night.”
“You don’t understand,” she whispered. “It isn’t the gambling. He’s never gone away before. If there was trouble, we’d face it together. Like family.”
Montana didn’t want to argue with her loyalty. He found it honorable, though foolish. Nobody had ever stuck by him like this. If they had, they’d have helped him find Laura. Quickly he shut off that kind of regret. It was destructive. Carson had one thing right; the only person a man could depend on was himself.
If Carson had faced the trouble at the company in the first place, Katie might have managed to steer him in a direction that would have kept it from going under. She wasn’t blind about anything except her brother. From what he’d learned, and he’d made it a point to find out, Katie Carithers was a bright, hardworking woman who’d done wonders at the hospital. Why were the Carithers men too blind to see what she could have brought to the table?
One lone tear trickled down her face. She wiped it away.
“Don’t worry, Katie,” he heard himself saying. “I’ll find him.” He put his arms around her and pulled her close. “I promise.”
Commitment. The thing he’d just said he’d managed to do without. He’d jumped into it with both feet. Giving Mac his word that he’d straighten out this situation was a matter of honor. Promising Katie was something else. He just wasn’t quite sure what.
“Thank you,” she whispered, and leaned against him. She didn’t move, allowing him to hold her, to comfort her. Finally, she asked, “But where would he go? He has no money. Apparently he has no car.”
“Think about it for a moment, Katie. He didn’t gamble away all the money. He stopped. That has to mean something, doesn’t it?”
She became still for a moment. “Yes. I guess it does.”
“And he’s never done that before, has he?”
“No. I don’t think so.”
“Then, for tonight, I think we have to give him the benefit of the doubt.
“I suppose you’re right. It’s just that I’ve done that for so long. I guess I’m tired. Will you take me home?”
“Darling, Katie. I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“We’re on the river, remember? In an emergency I would turn the boat around, but not otherwise.”
His fingertips gently massaged the tension-tightened muscles in the back of her neck while his other hand clasped her to him.
“But—”
“Just relax, Katie. My guess is that you haven’t slept any better than I have since we met.”
“You’ve had trouble?”
“Yes. I’ve had trouble. It isn’t every day that a woman comes on board and”—cheats me out of my boat and my money—“and jumps over the side,” he finished.
She smiled. “I suppose not. I’ll bet you have to throw most of them off. I don’t know why you’re helping me. Not after … after what happened.”
Because I gave my word to Mac, he could have answered. But that wasn’t the full truth. He hadn’t even called Mac to give him a report. “I’m not sure I can explain,” he finally said. “For now, let’s just say I’m offering you a place to rest for a while.”
“I can’t. I have to keep looking for Carson.”
“For once, let someone look after you,” he whispered, stroking the curve of her cheek and her neck as if she were a small child who needed reassurance. “Just pretend I’m a member of your family and stop worrying. I’ve left word all along the river. If Carson turns up, anywhere, I’ll be notified.”
Neither of them said anything for a long moment. Katie knew she ought to push him away, but she couldn’t force herself to move. She’d never felt so protected, so safe, and it scared her.
Little by little she melted against him, relaxing until he was supporting her completely.
“Why? Why are you really doing this?” she asked again.
Sliding his hands beneath her legs, he lifted her into his lap. She tensed for a moment—
“It’s all right,” he whispered, taking her hand in his and holding it loosely.
—then relaxed again as the smooth rhythm of his heartbeat against her ear reassured her.
“I don’t understand,” she murmured.
“Don’t try. I think, just for tonight, you need a friend, someone who isn’t asking for anything in return. Let me take care of you, Katie. I won’t harm you, I promise. Trust me.”
She didn’t know how to answer, so she didn’t. She was just too emotionally exhausted. For once, she’d let someone else take charge. She just sat, encircled in his arms, feeling his strength and allowing a strange sense of calm to settle over her.
“I’m going to put you in bed now, Katie, just to let you rest. Nothing more.”
She heard his words, but didn’t feel threatened. Warmth spread through her body, relaxing her even more. His movement only added to her feelings of safety, safety that was abruptly threatened when he laid her down and started to move away.
“No,” she cried, her voice sounding husky and strange in her ears. “Don’t.” She looped her arms around his neck and pulled him back. “Don’t leave me.”
Montana groaned. All kinds of alarms were going off in his head, alarms and misgivings and pangs of responsibility that he didn’t want to feel for this woman who had crashed into his life and left it reeling in the wake of his obligation to Mac. She was a cheater who would go to any length to protect what was hers. She was even willing to forgive the brother whose wrongdoing would be the final act of destruction against one of the oldest families in Louisiana. He didn’t understand that kind of family loyalty. But he couldn’t dismiss a grudging respect for the woman he was holding.
Desire. Not just sexual desire, but a deep, desperate longing to have someone feel that kind of loyalty to him.
She made a small soft sound and pressed herself closer.
“You don’t know what you’re asking, Katherine Carithers,” he said, smelling the sweet jasmine scent of her hair, feeling the subtle movements of her body against his.
“I just want to be close to someone,” she said, a kind of muted desperation evident in her voice. “Just for a while. Please hold me, Montana. Tonight I want … I want to forget about everything.”
“All right,” he finally said. “Let go of me, just for a moment while I take off your shoes.”
She allowed her arms to slide limply to the bed. Montana stood. He pulled off her shoes and eyed the waitress costume skeptically. The long-sleeved cutaway was twisted around her.
“Let’s take off this jacket,” he said, and waited for her to object.
She didn’t. Instead she let him lift her and slide the coat off her shoulders, leaving her with only the glittery tube top and the satin shorts. When she unzipped the shorts and lifted her bottom, a shocked Montana peeled the slinky garment away, revealing a pair of lace panties that didn’t begin to conceal the dark silky hair beneath.
He groaned.
Until now she’d kept her eyes closed. They opened and Montana caught his breath. Her eyes were smoky, glazed almost with what he recognized as need. Sexual? He didn’t know. But they beseeched, speaking without words. And he couldn’t refuse.
Moments later he flicked off the lights, removed his frock coat, his tie and boots, then lay down beside her. She moved toward him, nestling her head on his shoulder, pressing her lithe frame against him. They lay for a long time without moving or speaking. He listened to the sound of her breathing, felt the familiar movement of the boat in the water, and reveled in the knowledge that in spite of what had happened, she trusted him.
He didn’t know how much time passed. She was asleep, or so he thought, when she nestled her fingertips at his nape and said softly, “Montana, do you find me desirable as a woman?”
His pulse went into double overtime. “Yes, Katherine, I find you very desirable.”
“Men don’t, usually.”
“The men you know must be blind, deaf, and dumb.”
“No, they just see the woman I am. Your lady in red was a figment of Cat’s imagination.”
“You can’t change a person into someone who isn’t there to begin with,” he said, trying desperately to keep his body from announcing how much he desired her.
Katie stirred restlessly, her fingertips moving back and forth across his chest, ranging lower and lower.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. You’re lying here, in my bed with almost nothing on. That makes you vulnerable. You’re playing with fire, my lady in red.”
She gave a nervous little laugh. “You know this bed is what sent me overboard the night we gambled.”
He started. “This bed? Funny, when I was trying to figure out why you bolted, I never considered that.”
“It was there behind you, all red and obvious. Then I saw all those condoms in your drawer and I—I panicked. Do you make love to a lot of women here?”
“Contrary to what you may think, Katie, I’ve made love to damned few women here. It’s more a matter of being prepared for a situation before you get in trouble. I learned that a long time ago.”
One by one, she unfastened the buttons of his shirt, her fingertips dancing across his skin like a skittish colt trying to make up his mind to accept a carrot. With one finger she drew a line across his breastbone and down to one hard nipple. “You’re talking about her, aren’t you, the girl who died?”
“Yes.”
“Did you love her?”
His simple yes said it all.
“And she loved you?”
“She said so.”
“So what happened?”
He waited a long time, then surprised himself by answering. “We were just lonely kids and we found a way to make that loneliness go away.”
“What happened?”
“She got pregnant. They sent her away.”
“And you?” Katie continued to play her fingertips across his chest.
“Me? I went crazy. Almost killed her father.”
“Yes. But I never found her.”
“And then she … died?” Katie asked.
“Yes. But I didn’t know it for a long time. Nobody bothered to tell me. That’s when I knew I didn’t want to belong to that kind of family. I left and I never went back.”
“What about your mother?”
“It was too late. I would only have hurt her.”
Katie laid her check on his chest, snuggling into the curve of his arm. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Losing someone you loved must have been hard.”
“That’s a surprising reaction. Considering your background, I would have thought you’d tell me we were too young to be in love. That I was foolish to think a high society girl like that could ever be in love with an outsider like me.”
He wouldn’t have revealed so much, but talking was the only way he could keep himself from rolling over and taking what she was so innocently offering.
“Why do you call yourself an outsider?”
“I was. My mother was from West Virginia originally. She always wanted to be a Southern belle, but her family was dirt-poor. I never knew my father. When she got pregnant with me, she ran away to Atlanta and went to work for my stepfather’s firm. When she caught my stepfather’s eye, she got smart. Marriage or nothing. He married her and took her to Charleston. She would have loved Carithers’ Chance.”
“So how did that make you an outsider?”
“Even now, Charleston is another world. If your family doesn’t go all the way back to the original land grants, you’ll never belong.” He laughed. “Though she married my stepfather, who adopted me and gave me his name, Stewart, that didn’t make either one of us belong. In fact, I tried every way I could not to belong. Anything that made a family name more important than the person wasn’t something I wanted.”
This time it was Katie who felt the pain Montana had bottled up inside him. He was a victim of family, just as she was. The difference was that he’d turned his back on his and she’d taken on the weight of hers. In the end, the result was the same; they were imprisoned by their pasts. And each was alone.
She ought to get up and leave. She ought to be concerned about her brother instead of the man who could be responsible for his disappearance. Lifting her cheek from Montana’s chest, she studied his face in the darkness. As her eyes became accustomed to the shadows she could see that he was frowning, tension making lines like a caricature meant to show stern determination. She understood that kind of tension, she’d felt it so often herself and tried to contain it.
Her heart started to pound. Katie turned away, lying on her back, and instantly regretted the distance she’d put between them. “Don’t you ever wish your life had been different?”
“Wishing doesn’t make it so,” he replied gruffly. “It’s just an exercise in regret. And regret is destructive.”
“And how do you deal with regret?”
“I try not to put myself in that situation. If I want something, I go after it. I may be sorry I got it, but I’ll never be sorry I didn’t try.”
Katie thought about that. There had been so many regrets in her life, many of them because she’d allowed herself to be turned away from what she truly wanted. And what she wanted now was this man. “Montana, will you kiss me?”
“For Christ’s sake, Katie, what are you asking? You’re playing with fire.”
“I don’t mean a passionate, run-for-the-hills invasion. I mean just a sharing, ‘I understand’ kind of kiss. Please?”
He was going to regret it. But he couldn’t refuse. Slowly, he turned on his side, lifted himself to one elbow, and looked down at her. The darkness added a dreamlike surrealism to the room, almost as if it weren’t really happening. “This isn’t smart, you know.”
“Probably not. But maybe I’d like to do something that isn’t smart. Maybe I’m tired of being careful. Maybe, for once, I’d like to be a little wild and crazy.”
“I’m not sure I know what an ‘I understand’ kind of kiss is.” He lowered his face until their lips were only a breath apart.
“Improvise,” she whispered, reaching up, and pulled him down.
Their lips touched, lightly. He only meant to linger for a second, then pull away. But that was before he touched her and felt the shattering of his control. Eagerly she returned his kiss, parting her lips, using her tongue to draw quick little swirls on the inner lining of his mouth.
She moved herself snugly beneath him as her fingertips danced up and down his back. It was as if she’d been freed, as if the cork had been removed from a bottle of champagne, allowing it to explode.
Montana tried to draw back, but she was having no part of that, and this time it was he who shifted his body so that he could touch her the way she was touching him. He still wasn’t certain what an “I understand” kind of kiss was, but he knew that even if their thinking processes weren’t in complete agreement, their bodies were.
He moved away. Their gazes locked, the air between them crackling with desire. She was so beautiful. He couldn’t hold back a smile.
“Don’t smile at me like that, Montana.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s different. It’s a real smile, not a pose. I don’t want to think of you as real.”
“Are you saying you can deal with whatever this is between us as long as you see me as some smooth-talking devil who seduces the innocent bystander?”
“Yes.”
Then slowly, with both of them aware of what he was asking, he lowered his mouth again. No matter how they justified it, the feel of her in his arms was so right. As he leaned in to touch her mouth with his, he saw a flash of uncertainty for a second in her eyes; it disappeared as their lips came together and he deepened the kiss.
A new intensity awoke inside him. He burned with the unexpected need not just to be inside her, but to make love to her. He sought the smooth silk of her neck, her shoulders, sliding his hand lower, shoving the tube top down so that he could reach the small firm breasts that pressed against his palm, exploring, claiming her with his touch.
He slid his knee between her thighs, nudging that part of her that responded and invited entrance. Montana wanted her with an urgency he might have found unsettling if he’d allowed himself to admit it. Instead he felt her turn to liquid beneath him, asking, offering, giving back touch for touch as she pushed his shirt from his shoulders. Then it was gone and she’d pulled away, planting kisses down his chest and back to his face.
On the verge of losing control, Montana rolled away and stood. “Are you sure about this, Katie?”
There was only a brief hesitation. “Yes.”
Then slowly, Montana unzipped his trousers, peeling them and his briefs down his legs as he framed what he was about to say. “This probably isn’t the smartest thing I’ve ever done,” he said. “I want you like I’ve never wanted a woman since”—he swallowed Laura’s name and said—“I was a kid. But I won’t go any further unless you tell me. I said you needed rest, and if you tell me, I’ll put my clothes back on and leave right now.”
Leave? Katie felt a sudden breath of cold air. No matter how hard she’d tried to hold them close, people had been leaving her all her life. First her father, who turned his back on her offer to help him in the business, then an accident took both him and her mother, and finally Carson’s disappearance. She was in dangerous territory here, but she’d been pushed as far as she would go.
Just once she’d stand firm. Just once, she’d get what she wanted. This was a man who wasn’t refusing her, who wanted her, who was ready to take what she had to give.
“I want you, too, Rhett Butler Montana.”
“Maybe we’d better talk about it,” he hedged.
“No talk. No conditions. No tomorrow. Just tonight, my gambling man.” She held out her arms.
She heard him as he opened the drawer to the table by the bed and withdrew the protection he promised. She swallowed a moment of panic as, moments later, he lay back down, pulling her gently into his arms. He touched her, tracing the curve of her shoulder, across her neck, and over the top of her breasts. In the time it took for her to take a deep breath, he’d rekindled the low flame smoldering just beneath the surface, turning it into a raging wildfire.
Someone was moaning. She thought it was herself, but it might have been him. He bent his head, taking her nipple into his mouth, pulling on it, nuzzling it, then moving to the other. Every place he touched burned, sending out uncontrollable nerve spasms to her lower body. He slid his leg over her and she could feel him hard and pulsating as he nestled between her legs and rubbed himself against her.
“Montana,” she whispered urgently. “Please!”
Then he was inside her, his fingertips digging into her hips, lifting her as he plunged into her again and again. Over and over they rocked against each other, fell away, and met once more. Then they were both flying, shooting through time and space like a comet, burning white-hot, disintegrating as it fell. Until there was nothing left but the afterglow.
And the perfect sense of togetherness that might never again be so real.