Nick was drowsy and out of sorts when he dragged himself from the bed. He felt hungover from frustration as well as alcohol. He, who seldom drank, had certainly made some inroads into the meager supply of scotch whisky he kept at the house.
It was Sunday. He hadn’t been to church in some years. Now he felt the need to go again, to be with Tabby. That need sent him right back to bed, and he slept without interruption until midafternoon.
Eventually he drank enough black coffee and took enough aspirins to get his mind back together. He phoned Helen to see if she’d had time to find out any morsel of information. He half hoped she hadn’t. He didn’t relish the thought of seeing Tabby after the fool he’d made of himself the night before. He seemed to have this crazy compulsion to lead her on, when he had nothing, not a damned thing, to offer her. He didn’t want her permanently. Why couldn’t he manage to leave her alone? It would be in her best interests, and certainly in his. But every time he thought of her, his toes curled.
He really wouldn’t tell precious Daniel what they’d done together the night before, but it did serve to keep Tabby guessing when he threatened it.
She’d been so sweet wrapped around him like that. He remembered her long, silky legs sliding against his and his body violently protested the memory.
He got up and paced the floor, trying to calm the heat in his loins. Nothing seemed to work. Bedtime finally came. He’d wasted a whole day being miserable. He wondered if Tabby had, too, or if she’d had other things on her mind. He noticed a strange white car in her drive way for most of the afternoon and knew without being told that it had to be Daniel. Damn Daniel, he thought as he went up to bed. The man was driving him crazy.
So was Tabby.
He got up early the next day and went over to Tabby’s kitchen, knocking on the door as soon as he saw the lights go on.
Tabby opened the kitchen door sleepily. She was so sleepy, in fact, that she didn’t seem to realize she was standing there in a thigh-length soft cotton nightshirt that revealed every line and curve of her body. With her hair long around her shoulders and her face flushed from sleep, she was enough to arouse a statue—which Nick wasn’t.
She realized suddenly what she’d done, but it was too late. Nick moved toward her with intent.
Quickly she got a kitchen chair between them and held it there, blocking him.
“Now, Nick,” she said, laughing nervously. “You just remember that you’re a confirmed bachelor. Repeat it several times.”
“I have. It doesn’t help. Move the chair, Tabby,” he said huskily.
He did look sexy with his shirt half unbuttoned, his sleeves rolled up. His hair was just disheveled enough to give him a rogueish look. His dark eyes twinkled with amusement and frank desire as he tried to go around the chair.
She blocked him again. “No good, Nick,” she commented. “I’m a dried-up spinster living in the cobwebs. Isn’t that what you told Helen after you left here at New Year’s?”
He stopped dead. “She wouldn’t have said that to you,” he began.
“She thought she was doing me a favor, actually,” Tabby replied, and she looked faintly wounded. “I’d cried all night long and she thought I was going to die eating my heart out for you, if she didn’t tell me the truth. In the long run, it was best, Nick.”
“I never knew how you felt about me when you were in school,” he said, his voice deep and quiet in the kitchen. The only other noise was the faint whirr of the washing machine on the utility porch. “You ran the other way so much that you bruised my ego.”
“I’m sorry. I was shy of you,” she said. “Much too shy to do anything or say anything blatant.” Her face lifted proudly. “But that’s all in the past, Nick. I’m engaged to Daniel. I’m going to be married.”
His dark eyes narrowed. “You don’t love Daniel.”
“I respect and like him,” she said. “At my age, that’s no bad thing. I can live without passion. It’s like flashfire—easily kindled and just as easily put out.”
He got the message at once. “And what you felt with me on my sofa last night was just flashfire?”
She nodded, schooling her face not to give her away. “Just that. Overdue passion, a residue from my hero-worshiping days. I wanted to know how it would feel if you made love to me. Now my curiosity is satisfied.”
“Not completely,” he said, his face arrogant and hard. “Why don’t you go to bed with me and get a complete picture?”
Her face flooded with heat, but she shook her head. “Too drastic. A taste was enough.”
“That was more than a taste.”
She cleared her throat. “Nick, I have to get dressed and get to work.”
Work. He remembered that he was supposed to be working, too, and on her case. He’d allowed himself to get sidetracked the night before because of his hunger for her. He couldn’t afford the luxury today.
“Yes. So do I.” His eyes ran down over her body. He wondered what her breasts looked like under that cotton. They seemed to rise without support, and he remembered how warm and firm they’d felt in his hands the night before. “Take it off and let me look at you,” he said huskily, catching her gaze. “I want to see you without your clothes, Tabby.”
His voice was as seductive as his eyes, but Tabby had enough will to save herself from that final humiliation. Nick wanted her. Men could be devious when their needs were involved. But once he’d actually possessed her, it would be the end because he couldn’t make a commitment. She’d be agreeing to nothing more than a delicious but quickly forgotten one-night stand on his part. The thought made her sad.
“I’m sure you’ve said the same thing to half a dozen other women over the years, Nick,” she replied. “Sorry. I don’t do striptease work. Just anthropology.”
“Ancient work does rather go with ancient attitudes, doesn’t it?” he asked sharply.
She shrugged. “I wasn’t raised to be licentious. You weren’t either, but I guess your early education didn’t take, did it?”
He glared at her. “I’m not locked up in outdated myths and morals.”
“To each his own,” she said without heat. “Go home, Nick. I’m busy.”
“You still look a little hung over this morning,” he told her dryly. “Wouldn’t Daniel have a screaming fit if he knew why?”
“Daniel wouldn’t have a screaming fit if I had sex with a martian on my front lawn,” she replied imperturbably. “He’s an intelligent man. He’d understand.”
“Think so? We could find out.”
“Why bother?” she asked with a faint frown. “Nick, you don’t want me, really. You’ve discovered years too late that I had a crush on you, and maybe you were as curious as I was. But that’s all it is. You don’t have the slightest temptation to settle down and have children.”
He stuck his hands deep in his pockets and his eyes grew thoughtful as he stared at her. “No,” he said honestly. “I don’t. But if I ever did want a family, I think I’d want it with you.”
She smiled. “I’m very flattered.”
He shrugged. “I’m footloose. I don’t suppose I’ll ever be able to stay in one place very long. I like detective work, police work. I like the challenge and the danger. That doesn’t really mix with a settled lifestyle. And I can’t imagine watching you go out of your mind wondering when I might end up in a hospital somewhere because I poked my nose into the wrong pot.”
“If you loved me, I might risk it,” she said. “But love isn’t a word you know.”
“It never will be,” he said. “Dodging bullets is one thing. Being at the mercy of a woman is another.”
She knew what he was telling her. He never intended letting a woman close enough to hurt him. She’d heard rumors about his lady love at the FBI getting killed, and that he’d never gotten over it. Helen, and Mary, had told her. He probably never would get over it. She couldn’t go on tormenting herself with hope that he’d care about her one day. Helen was right on that score. It was better to go ahead and marry someone and settle down.
“You’re independent,” she said. “I know how that feels. But I’m tired of living alone and depending on myself. Daniel and I get along very well. We’ll have a good life together.”
“Sure,” he said easily. “As long as you don’t have to suffer him too often in bed.”
She colored. “I beg your pardon!”
“Don’t sound so starchy. If Daniel could satisfy you, I wouldn’t have had such an easy time of it last night. You were ready for me the second I touched you. You don’t want him at all, physically, do you?”
“Sex isn’t everything!”
“Marriages stand and fall on it, or so I’m told,” he countered. “If you don’t want him, Tabby, your life is going to be hell. He’ll know it, and hate you for it.”
She couldn’t admit that Daniel already found her stiffness unappealing. Her lack of response to his infrequent kisses irritated him.
“I’ll get used to that part of it.”
“Get used to it! My God!”
“I’d rather have a man I can talk to…Nick!”
He’d torn the chair out of her hands while she was still speaking. Seconds later he had her back down on the kitchen table, and his mouth was on hers.
She couldn’t struggle. The slick Formica top made her position precarious, so that if she moved she was in danger of sliding off. Nick held her down with one big, lean hand while his mouth ravaged hers. She gave in helplessly, almost hating him for the ease of his conquest.
His hand slid down over her breast to her stomach and then to the top of her thigh. He eased the hem of her nightie up, very slowly, making her all too aware that there was nothing under it.
All the while, she looked up at him with wide, shocked eyes that couldn’t see beyond the intense pleasure his mouth had given her, the feel of his warm, deft hand on her body.
His fingers trailed up her silky thigh. She caught her breath and shivered. She should catch his hand and stop it. She should protest. But all she did was lie there, at his mercy, waiting.
His dark eyes slid down to the hem of the nightshirt. Under it, his hand had found the soft apex of her hip and her thigh and was resting there.
She felt the caress in every pore of her body. Her legs felt boneless, her heart throbbed. Her lips parted as the lingering touch made her ache and swell.
“You aren’t wearing briefs,” he whispered. “Do you always sleep like this?”
“Yes,” she whispered huskily.
“And always alone?”
“Always.”
His hand flattened on her body, teasing, tormenting. If he moved it a few inches, it would promote an intimacy she’d never experienced. Part of her wanted that, wanted to know passion. Another part was afraid, shy, inhibited.
“You’re tense,” he said softly. “So tense. It isn’t necessary. I wouldn’t hurt you for anything in the world. Don’t you know that?”
“Yes.”
His hand moved slowly up her body until it found the taut, high swell of her breast. He touched her there, feeling her stiffen and catch her breath. His thumb and forefinger drew circles around the taut nipple, making her squirm.
“I’ve already seen you in my dreams,” he whispered. Both hands went to the bottom of the nightshirt. “Now, I’m going to make them come true for both of us.”
He eased the fabric up her body until it came to rest, finally, bunched up under her chin. He looked at her and caught his breath, while she lay there, flushed and hungry under his eyes.
“My God,” he said through his teeth. “Tabby, you’re exquisite!”
His eyes told her that she was desirable, even before his head bent and his mouth worshiped her breasts. She arched upward, welcoming his warm lips, his tongue, his teeth as he made a meal of her. His mouth was pressing down hard on her belly when the telephone rang and kept ringing.
He lifted his mouth from her body and stared at her, not quite rationally.
“It’s the telephone,” he said huskily.
“It isn’t stopping,” she murmured dazedly.
He gave her one long, last look. His lean hands smoothed over her body with possession, leaving a trail of pleasure where they touched. “I thought you were thin,” he whispered ruefully. His mouth teased around her breasts and kissed the hard tips with a warm, torturous suction that made her pulse with new hunger. “I want to make love to you,” he breathed. “I want you to lie under me and let me take you.”
“Nick!” she wailed.
He stood erect all at once, his eyes dark and possessive for several seconds before he pulled her off the table and jerked her nightshirt down to cover the body his mouth had explored so tenderly.
“You’d better answer it,” he said curtly.
She picked it up with trembling hands. “Hello?”
“Tabby, it’s nine o’clock,” Daniel said impatiently. “Your class is waiting for you.”
She gasped. “Daniel, I’m sorry! I…overslept,” she said with a flushed glance at Nick. “I’ll be right there. Can you sub for me for a few minutes? I’m going over physical anthropology and its technical terms—you know those as well as I do.”
“All right,” he said. “You’re lucky my next class isn’t until ten.”
“Thank you! You’re a lifesaver!”
She hung up and pushed back her disheveled hair.
“Forget the class and come to bed,” Nick said, his body still throbbing with hunger.
“I can’t,” she whispered. “Even if I didn’t have a class. Nick, you have to stop doing this to me! I can’t handle it!”
He smiled slowly. “You want me.”
“Of course I want you! But there’s no future in it!”
His broad shoulders shifted as he leaned against the table. “We could still enjoy each other, while it lasted,” he said seriously. “I wouldn’t hurt you.”
“I’m engaged,” she repeated.
“To a fool,” he scoffed. “He’s only using you.”
“What are you trying to do?” she exclaimed.
He didn’t like the way that sounded. “If you want to put it like that, we’d be using each other. I need a woman. You need a man. We’ve got a long past behind us, and we like each other.”
“You’re describing what I have with Daniel as well,” she said stiffly. “I’d like you to leave, Nick.”
“No, you wouldn’t,” he replied, his eyes going like homing pigeons to her sharp-tipped breasts. “You’re still as hungry as I am.”
“But I’m back in my right mind now,” she said. “I won’t be unfaithful to Daniel.”
“That comes after marriage, not before.”
“Not in my world,” she replied. “I haven’t become cynical, Nick. I still have my golden ideals. I believe in happy marriages and long relationships.”
“Relationships don’t last. You’re as big a fool as your Daniel if you don’t know that by now.”
“All I know is that I’ve got a better chance for happiness with Daniel than I have with you,” she said, exasperated. “Please go.”
“If you insist.” He pushed away from the table and opened the back door. “I’ve got Helen doing some checking for me. The offices were closed yesterday. She’ll have something for me later this morning, I hope.” He stared at her. “I’ll need access to your office today. I have a couple of people I want to interview.”
“You won’t start any trouble?” she asked nervously.
“I’m a trained private investigator,” he said angrily. “I have a degree in law.”
“Sorry.”
“I know you’re nervous about being accused of something you didn’t do, but if it takes stepping on a few toes to clear you, I don’t mind doing it.”
“I just don’t want to make any more enemies than I have to,” she said.
“I’m aware of that.”
“Nick, how do you know I’m innocent of the charges?” she asked seriously.
“Because I know you,” he said, surprised by the question. “I’ll see you at the college, Tabby.”
Later, he wondered himself why he’d never doubted her innocence. Perhaps it was a form of telepathy, but he was certain that he’d know if she lied to him. Certainly she was lying about her feelings for Daniel. Seeing her with the man had convinced Nick that she couldn’t be in love with him. There was no spark between them, no hint of romantic interest, no physical at traction.
Between himself and Tabby, it was a totally different story. He wanted her desperately. After this morning, it was going to be hell trying to keep away from her at all.
She had the most beautiful, desirable body he’d ever seen. He wanted all of it, all of her. But her price was just too high for him to pay.
Nick went to Thorn College and set up his interrogations in Tabby’s office while she was teaching her classes. Dr. Flannery, the assistant biology professor, was high on his list of suspects. One of the few things he’d learned about the man was that he needed money, and that he’d been accused of theft while still in his teens. Tabby’s fiancé, meanwhile, had been arrested for taking part in an antiwar demonstration back in the sixties and had spent some time in jail. He’d deliberately falsified information on his record to that effect.
The computer in Tabby’s office gave out a wealth of information on the faculty. Helen, one of the finer hackers in the Western Hemisphere, had supplied Nick with the password that got him into the college’s personnel files. He was having a field day going through them. There was only one other suspicious person on the staff, and that was Dr. Day. Day was over the art department, and something of a professional layabout before, during and after college. He seemed to always have money, but the things he owned didn’t jibe with the salary he was paid to teach. The Lamborghini, for instance, was a bit above the average college professor’s salary.
Nick narrowed his investigation down to those three men, and proceeded to carefully and warily dig out any information he could about them. He discovered, not to his amazement, that Daniel was the only one of the three whom most everyone on campus disliked. Daniel soon became his number one suspect, but Nick had to keep his suspicions to himself for the time being. Tabby might not even believe his accusations, or she’d attribute them to jealousy.
He couldn’t blame her. His behavior had been erratic and unbelievable, even to himself. He’d sworn to keep away from her, but more and more he was getting in over his head with her physically. One dark night, he thought irritably, he was going to steal into her bedroom and seduce her. That would certainly complicate an already impossible situation. She was bent on avoiding him after their interlude at her home. He sighed as he worked. Back to square one. It was no less than he’d expected.
Meanwhile, Tabby was trying to come to grips with her behavior of the morning. Allowing herself to be bent back over a kitchen table and fondled like some harem girl didn’t sit well on her conscience. Ever since he’d come back, Nick had gone out of his way to make her aware of him. He’d been almost jealous of her relation ship with Daniel, and frankly protective.
That was flattering, but it wasn’t love. It wasn’t even something permanent. Nick was on a case and she was handy. Perhaps he hadn’t had a woman in a long time. She wished she knew more about his late woman friend.
During a slack period during the morning, she called Helen just to talk, because she wanted to do a little prying of her own.
“How’s Nick doing?” Helen asked.
“All right, I suppose, he’s very close-lipped about what he’s finding out. Helen,” she added slowly. “Tell me about Lucy.”
“Ah. I was wondering if you’d ever ask,” the other woman said gently. “Nick started going with her just after you turned down that skiing trip with us.”
Tabby’s heart skipped. “You asked me…”
“On his behalf. I even told you he’d wanted you along, but I guess he’d rejected you so much by then that you didn’t believe anything he said. I’m sorry.”
Tabby tangled the telephone cord around her finger and watched it curl. “So am I. Nick said that Mary had told me a lot of lies.”
“Mary!” Helen ground out. “Yes, she did, and I knew nothing about it until you’d gone off to college and she laughed about breaking up your crush on Nick. She wanted him herself, but he didn’t want her. It was pure malice. I wish I’d known.”
“She didn’t get him,” Tabby said with quiet satisfaction.
“No, she didn’t,” Helen said curtly. “She wound up with a bald banker twenty years her senior and the last time I saw her she looked older than he did. She hasn’t had a good life.”
“Poor Mary,” Tabby said.
“Poor you,” came the reply. “If it hadn’t been for Mary, you might be married to Nick by now.”
“Not likely. He isn’t the marrying kind, is he?”
“I don’t know. I think he was, before Lucy got killed, but her death frightened him. He learned that it hurt to lose people you cared about, even if they weren’t people you loved. He’s afraid to risk his heart. Especially,” she added thoughtfully, “on someone he could love obsessively. He’s growled about you ever since we were here the first of the year. But he hasn’t been the same, either.”
“I…noticed that he’s less brittle.”
“Our Nick?” Helen chuckled. “Pat yourself on the back. He’s been breakable out here.”
“It’s the case. I don’t flatter myself that it’s me. He enjoys a good mystery.”
“Is that all he’s enjoying?” came the bland reply.
Tabby remembered his eyes on her nudity that morning and blushed to the roots of her hair. “What was Lucy like?” she asked, putting the knife into her own heart with the question.
“Dainty and beautiful and devil-may-care. She burned like a candle flame, and went out just as easily. She was reckless and liked taking risks, just like Nick.” Helen paused, because she was thinking, as Tabby was, how he liked risk and how easily he put his life on the line. He could wind up just like Lucy with no trouble at all. It was a frightening thought.
“Did he love her?” Tabby asked.
“He was fond of her. I think he found her exciting and sensual, and I’m pretty sure they were having a hot affair. He mentioned marriage, but without any real enthusiasm. I’ve never said this to him, but I always had the feeling that he would have broken it off in the end. He wasn’t committed to her, even if he did find her vividly desirable.”
“I suppose…women like that appeal to sophisticated men like Nick,” Tabby said dully.
“In bed, sure.” Helen laughed. “But not as prospective wives. Nick was raised to believe in all the virtues, even if he doesn’t practice them. He’ll settle one day, but it won’t be with some vivid butterfly who likes the social life. He’ll want a pipe and an easy chair and his children on his lap at bedtime to read stories to. You mark my words, he’s got all the makings of a family man. He just doesn’t know it yet.”
“I wish…” Tabby began fervently.
“Don’t give up on him,” Helen said gently. “I know I tried to put you off him for your own good, but he’s changed since January. He really has. Give it a chance.”
“He wants me,” she blurted out.
“Good. That’s a step in the right direction. Just don’t give in to him. That’s the best way I know to classify yourself with his other women and turn him away.”
“I know that. But it’s hard,” she confessed. “I do love him so, Helen.”
“So do I,” his sister admitted. “I think he’s pretty special. But, then, so are you, my friend. Keep in touch. And don’t brood, about Nick or the spot you’re in. It will all work out. Really, this time next year, you’ll hardly remember it.”
“I hope you’re right,” Tabby said. But long after she put the receiver down, she remained unconvinced.