The Jet-Set Seduction

“Come sta?”

“Molto bene, grazie.” She gave him a dazzling smile that reduced his brain to mush. “This is a fun place, Slade, I’m glad you suggested it.”

“Popsicles,” he said firmly, and led her to the little booth decorated with big bunches of rainbow-hued balloons.

She chose grape, he raspberry. Sucking companionably, they wandered in and out of the boutiques and stands, Slade purposely keeping the conversation light. Belle was no fool, and had, in her way, only confirmed his own suspicions: Clea had been badly burned and it behooved him to take it slow.

Slow? When she went back to Europe tomorrow?

Slow. He made frequent trips to Europe.

They watched a very talented mime artist, and a somewhat less talented musician, tossing coins into their hats. Out of the blue Clea said, “Did you enjoy your dinner with Belle?”

“I did, yes. We go back a long way—she’s known my parents for years.”

“Ah yes, your estimable parents.”

“I like my parents and I’m not about to apologize for it,” Slade said, a matching edge to his voice.

“It’s none of my business how you feel about them.”

He reached over and wiped a drop of purple from her mouth with his fingertip. “Why don’t you believe in marital harmony?”

As she bit her lip, it was as much as he could do to keep his hands at his sides. “I told you—I’m a realist. Oh look, what gorgeous earrings.”

She dragged him over to a kiosk selling abalone earrings that shimmered turquoise and pink. Lifting one to her ear, she said, “What do you think?”

“They clash with your sweater. But you could wear anything, and you’d still look devastatingly beautiful.” Anything, he thought. Or nothing.

She laughed. “Oh, you Americans—so direct. The earrings, Slade, the earrings.”

“They match your eyes. Let me buy them for you.”

“So I’ll be indebted?”

“So I’ll have the pleasure of knowing that perhaps, occasionally, you’ll think of me.”

“I promise that perhaps, occasionally, I will,” she said, removing the gold hoops she was wearing and tucking them in her purse. Increasingly, she was finding it difficult not to like Slade. Didn’t that make him all the more of a threat?

“Let me,” Slade said, and with exquisite care inserted the silver hooks into her lobes. Her skin was as smooth as he’d imagined it. Deep within him, desire shuddered into life.

Her irises had darkened, as though a cloud had covered the sea. He stepped back, reaching for his wallet and paying for the earrings. “They look great on you.”

She struggled to find her voice. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure,” he said formally.

Between them, unspoken, crackled the electric awareness of sexual attraction. Slade said abruptly, “You know I want you. You’ve probably known it from the first moment we met.”

“Yes, of course I know—which doesn’t mean we do anything about it…other than enjoy each other’s company on a sunny morning in October.” She fluttered her lashes at him in deliberate parody. “Are you enjoying my company?”

“Very much. Don’t fish, Clea.”

“Where better than on Fisherman’s Wharf?” As he chuckled, she went on calmly, “We’re talking about sex between two total strangers here. Possibility is so often more interesting than actuality, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Not when one of the strangers is you.”

“You have a pretty way with a compliment.”

He said, fixing her with his gaze, “Possibility’s on a par with fantasy. Nothing wrong with fantasy—last night I had a few about you I’d be embarrassed to describe. But actuality is real. Real and risky. That’s the catch, isn’t it?”

She said through gritted teeth, “I don’t sleep with someone I don’t know.”

“That’s easily fixable. We can get to know each other.”

“Slade, I’ve been told I’m beautiful, and I know I’m rich. Consequently I’ve learned to choose my partners carefully. I already told you that you scare me—you’re the last man I’d have an affair with.”

He shouldn’t have been so direct. But he had a horrible sense of time running out, along with the even worse sense that nothing he was saying to her was making any real or lasting impression. Welcome to a new experience, Slade thought wryly. He’d never before had to work at getting a woman interested in him; fighting them off was his area of expertise.

“There’s a bakery a couple of blocks from here that sells crusty sourdough bread,” he said. “I always take some home with me.”

He heard the tiny puff as she let out her breath. “Let’s go,” she said agreeably. “Do you like to cook?”

“I do. Sheer self-defense. I eat out a lot, and it’s relaxing to stay home and cook for myself. My specialties are bouillabaisse and pumpkin pie. I’ll make them for you sometime.”

“Perhaps. Occasionally,” she said, her eyes full of mockery.

“For sure. At least once.”

“You don’t like opposition.”

“Neither, dear Clea, do you.”

She laughed. “Who does? Tell me about sourdough bread—it doesn’t sound very appetizing.”

Impatient of small talk, suddenly desperate for details beyond the superficial, Slade said, “How old are you, Clea?”

“Old enough to enjoy flirtation without—how do you say it?—strings attached.” She stepped off the boardwalk onto the sidewalk at the end of the wharf. “As for—”

Shouting and swearing, a gang of teenagers surged around the nearest building. Three of them collided head-on with Slade. Automatically he threw his arms around Clea, pulling her close to his body for protection, his feet planted hard on the tarmac.

“Sorry!” one of the kids yelled. Another gave a loud whoop. None of them stopped.

Slade stood very still. Clea’s body was crushed to his, her breasts jammed against his chest. One of his arms encircled her hips, the other her waist; for a heart-stopping moment he felt her yield to him.

Her floppy hat had been shoved to the back of her head. He bent his own head and found her lips in a kiss that he wanted to last forever.

And again she yielded to him, a surrender all the more potent for being unexpected. He brought one hand up, tangling it in her hair, so silky and sweet-scented, and deepened the kiss, his lips edging hers apart. Her fingers were digging into his nape; her tongue was laced with his, teasing him, tasting him, driving him out of his mind.

As animal hunger surged through him, he forgot he was on a city sidewalk; forgot all Belle’s warnings and his own advice. Robbed of any vestige of caution, he muttered, “I feel as though I’ve been waiting for you my whole life…God, how I want you!”

His words sliced through the frantic pulsing of Clea’s blood, and brought in their wake an ice-cold dash of reality. She stiffened, then pushed hard against Slade’s chest. “Stop!” she gasped. “What are we thinking of?”

“We’re not thinking at all, which is just the way it should be,” he said thickly, lifting her chin with his fingers and bending to kiss her again.

“Slade, stop—you mustn’t, I don’t want you to.”

His gaze bored into hers. “Yes, you do.”

She sagged in his embrace, her forehead resting on his chest. He was right. She had wanted him, in the most basic of ways, her body betraying her into a response that, in retrospect, appalled her. “You took me by surprise, that’s all,” she said weakly.

Keeping one arm around her waist, he said, “We’re going into a restaurant on the pier, we’re having lunch together and we’re talking this through. No perhaps, no opposition.”

All the fight had gone out of her; she looked both frightened and defenseless. Slade hardened his heart and headed back along the pier to a restaurant that specialized in seafood. Because they were early for lunch, he was able to get a table in one corner, overlooking the bay. A table with a degree of privacy, he thought, and sat down across from her.

She picked up the menu; to his consternation, he saw how she had to rest it on the table to disguise the trembling of her hands. But by the time she looked up, she had herself under control again. Unsmiling, she said, “I’ll have the sole.”

Quickly he ordered their food, along with a bottle of Chardonnay from a Napa Valley vineyard. The service was fast; within minutes he was raising his glass of chilled pale golden wine. “To international relations,” he said with a crooked smile.

Her mouth set, she said, “To international boundaries,” and took a big gulp of wine. Putting her glass down, she said, “Slade, let’s get this out of the way, then maybe we can go back to enjoying each other’s company. What happened out there on the sidewalk—it frightened me. I don’t want a repeat, nor do I want to discuss the reasons you frighten me. And, of course, it simply confirmed what I’ve already told you—I’m not available. No sex. No affair. Is that understood?”

Banking his anger, Slade said curtly, “Of course it’s not understood—how could it be when I have no idea why I frighten you? It’s certainly not my intent to do so.”

“I didn’t say it was.” She took another reckless gulp of wine. “We’re strangers—and strangers we’ll remain. That’s all I’m saying.”

“I want far more than that.”

“We don’t always get what we want. You’re old enough to know that.”

“You kissed me back, Clea. And I’m going to get what I want.”

Heat flushed her cheeks. “No, you’re not.” Quickly she reached for her purse. It was time to produce her usual line of defense with a man who wouldn’t take no for an answer. Hadn’t she known when she’d left the hotel this morning that she’d need it with Slade Carruthers?

Taking out an envelope, she plunked it on the table. “You should take a look at this.”

“Are you about to ruin my appetite?” he said.

“Just look at it, Slade.”

The envelope was full of clippings from various tabloids and newspapers the width of Europe. Clea was pictured in every article, hair up, hair down, in evening gowns and jewels, in skimpy bikinis, in jeans and boots. Accompanied by, Slade saw, a succession of men. Aristocrats, artists, businessmen: none of them looking at all unhappy to be escorting the rich, the elegant, the charming Clea Chardin.

“What are you trying to tell me?” he said carefully.

“What does it look like?”

“Like you date a lot of different men.”

“Date?” she repeated, lifting one brow.

“Are you trying to tell me you’ve slept with all of them?”

“Not all of them, no,” she said. It was the truth, but not the entire truth. She should have said, “With none of them.” But a reputation for flitting from man to man was, at times, extremely useful; right now she needed every weapon she could lay her hands on.

The waiter put their plates in front of them, said, “Enjoy,” and left them alone again.

Clea said, as if there’d been no interruption, “If you want to take me to bed, you should know what you’re getting into. I date lots of men and that’s the way I like it.”

Her hair shimmered in the light. Slade flicked the clippings with his finger. “So I’d be just one more guy to add to the list.”

“You don’t have to keep on seeing me if you don’t like the way I operate,” she said mildly.

He didn’t like it. At all. “Are you saying if we had an affair, you wouldn’t be faithful to me for its duration?”

“That’s the general idea,” she said, wondering why she should feel so ashamed of her duplicity when she was achieving her aim: to send Slade Carruthers in the opposite direction as quickly as she could.

Slade looked down at his cioppino. He wasn’t the slightest bit hungry. Picking up his spoon, he said, “I happen to have a few standards. I’m not into long-term commitment or marriage, but when I have a relationship with a woman I expect fidelity, and I promise the same.”

She shrugged. “Then let’s enjoy our lunch and say goodbye.”

He said with dangerous softness, “Perhaps I could change your mind. On the subject of standards.”

“You’re not going to get the chance.”

“I make frequent trips to Europe. If we exchange e-mail addresses, we can keep in touch and arrange to meet some time.”

She was attacking her sole as though she couldn’t wait to be rid of him. “No. Which, as I’m sure you know, is spelled identically in English and Italian.”

He’d never begged a woman for anything in his life. He wasn’t going to start with Clea Chardin. “Commitment is what you’re really avoiding. Why?”

Clea put down her knife and fork and looked right at him, her remarkable eyes brilliant with sincerity. “I don’t want to hurt you, Slade. And hurt you I would, were you to pursue me, because—as you just pointed out—our standards are different. So I’m ending this now, before it begins.”

He said sharply, “I don’t let women close enough to hurt me.”

Her temper flared. “Why am I not surprised?”

“You must have hurt some of those other men.”

“They knew the score and were willing to go along with me.”

Cut your losses, Slade thought. Get out with some dignity. What’s the alternative? Grovel?

Not your style.

Biting off his words, anger rising like bile in his throat, Slade said, “So you’re going to play it safe. Ignore that kiss as if it never happened.”

With a huge effort Clea kept her eyes trained on his. “That’s right.”

“Then there’s nothing more to say.” Picking up his spoon, he choked down a mouthful of the rich tomato broth.

She was eating her fish as fast as she could. She hadn’t lost her appetite, Slade thought sourly. Why should she? He didn’t matter a whit to her.

Rationally he should be admiring her for turning her back so decisively on all his money. Unfortunately he felt about as rational as a shipwrecked sailor brought face-to-face with Miss America.

Clea drained her wine. “You’re sulking.”

He put his spoon down with exaggerated care. “If you don’t know the difference between sulking and genuine passion, you’re worse off than I suspected.”

She paled. Surely he hadn’t guessed that she’d never known genuine passion? Reaching in her purse, she extracted a bill, tossed it on the table and said coldly, “That’s to pay for my lunch. Goodbye, Slade.”

Pushing back her chair, she walked away from him, her hips swaying in her flowered skirt. With an effort that made him break out into a cold sweat, Slade stayed where he was, his fingernails digging into the chair. Be damned if he’d chase after her.

He picked up his glass, tossed back the contents and addressed his seafood stew. He would never in his life order cioppino again.

He’d never go to bed with Clea Chardin, either: if it came to a battle of wills, he was going to be the one in control. Not her. So he’d better forget the highly erotic fantasies that had disturbed his sleep all night.

The empty chair across from him was no fantasy, nor was the twenty-dollar bill lying beside Clea’s plate. The money felt like the final insult.

He’d give it to the first panhandler he met.

Through the plate glass window, Slade watched the waters of the bay sparkle in the sunshine. He felt as though he’d been presented with a jewel of outstanding brilliance. But before he could touch it, it had been snatched from his reach.

CHAPTER THREE

AT THREE o’clock that afternoon in his hotel room, Slade was on the telephone punching in Sarah Hutchinson’s extension. Sarah was Belle’s cook, whom Slade had known for years, and whose chocolate truffles he liked almost as much as he liked her. When she answered, he said, “Sarah, it’s Slade Carruthers.”

“Mr. Slade, what a nice surprise…how are you?”

They chatted for a few minutes about the garden party, then Slade said easily, “I’ve mislaid my appointment book—Mrs. Hayward’s having dinner with Clea Chardin tonight, isn’t she?” He waited for her reply, his heart thumping so loudly he was afraid she’d hear it over the phone.

“That’s right. Seven o’clock.”

“Just the two of them?”

“Private, that’s what Mrs. Hayward said.”

“Great—I’ll call Belle in the morning, then. No need to mention this, Sarah, she’ll think I’m having a memory lapse. How are your grandchildren?”

He patiently listened to their many virtues, then hung up. All he had to do now was decide on a course of action. Gate-crash Belle’s place? Or find a bar, get royally drunk and cut his losses?

Slade started prowling up and down the room, as restless as a caged tiger. Why had he phoned Sarah Hutchinson? Why couldn’t he—for once in his life—accept that a woman didn’t want to go to bed with him?

The answer was simple: because he wanted Clea as he’d never wanted a woman before.

Or was it that simple? Clea had been so ardent in his arms, then so frightened by her own response. Neither reaction had been fake, he’d swear to it. By touching her physically, he’d touched her emotions in a way that had terrified her.

So she’d very cleverly produced the clippings, refused any prospect of fidelity and taken her leave. She’d played him, he thought. And he’d fallen for it.

It wasn’t going to happen again. Be damned if he was going to sit back and let Clea Chardin vanish from his life. He wanted her and he was going to have her. On his terms.

All of which meant he’d better have a plan of action in mind before nine-thirty tonight.

At nine-thirty, however, when Slade pressed the heavy brass bell on the Hayward front door, he felt devoid of anything that could be called a plan. He’d have to wing it. But this time he’d be the one in control.

Carter, the butler, let him in and left him in the formal parlor, where family photographs in sterling silver frames covered every available surface. The furniture represented, in Slade’s opinion, the very worst of Victorian excess. Over the elaborate wrought-iron fireplace, a stuffed stag’s head gazed down its aristocratic nose at him.

There was a painting by the fireplace, a small dark oil. Curious, he wandered over to look at it. A man in chains, head bowed in utter defeat, was being led by three armored guards into the black maw of a cave. Slade knew, instantly, that the prisoner would never emerge into daylight again.

It was his own lasting nightmare, he thought, his palms damp, his fingers curled into fists: the nightmare that had tormented him ever since he was eleven. His limbs heavy as lead, he turned away from the painting, staring instead at an innocuous watercolor of a sunny meadow.

“Slade,” Belle exclaimed, “is anything wrong? Your parents? You look terrible!”

He fought to banish the nightmare where it belonged, deep down in his psyche. While Belle knew the reason behind it, she had no idea of its extent, and he wasn’t about to enlighten her. “I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said with real compunction. “My parents are fine. I’m here because I need to see Clea.”

Her smile vanishing as if it had been wiped from her face, Belle said, “How did you know she’s here?”

“I got it out of Sarah and you’re not to blame her. Clea and I had lunch today, Belle. But we left some loose ends about our next meeting. I head off to Japan tomorrow and she’s going back to Europe, so I figured it was simplest if I turned up on your doorstep and gave her a lift back to her hotel.”

Tonight Belle was wearing a rust-brown linen dress that did little for her complexion. Rubies gleamed in her earlobes. She looked like a highly suspicious rooster, Slade thought with a quiver of amusement, and said truthfully, “I don’t want Clea to disappear from my life—there’s something about her that really turns my crank.”

Belle said flatly, “If she doesn’t want to drive to the hotel with you, I’m not pushing her.”

He hesitated. “She dates a lot of men, so she told me. But when I kissed her, she acted like a scared rabbit. Do you have any idea why?”

“If I did, do you think I’d tell you?”

“I’m not out to hurt her, Belle.”

“Then maybe you’d better head right out the front door.”

He said tightly, “You’ve known me since I was knee-high to a grasshopper. Have you ever seen me chase after a woman before?”

“I’ve seen you treat women as though they’re ornaments sitting on a shelf—decorative enough, but not really worth your full attention.”

He winced. “Clea gets my full attention just by being in the same room. So she’s different from the rest.”

“That’s what they all say.”

“You’re an old friend, and I’m asking you to trust me,” Slade said, any amusement long gone. “Clea’s knocked me right off balance. No other woman’s ever come close to doing that. All I want is the chance to drive her back to her hotel—I’m not going to jump on her the minute she gets in the car!”

“And if she says no?”

“She won’t.”

Belle snapped, “If you hurt that gal, I’ll—I won’t invite you to next year’s garden party.”

It was a dire threat. “Belle, I’ll go out on a limb here. I want Clea, no question of that, but I have this gut feeling she’s not really running away from me, she’s running from herself. And I don’t give a damn if that sounds presumptuous.”

For a long moment Belle simply stared at him. Then she said, “I’ll ask her if she wants a drive back to her hotel.”

The massive oak door swung shut behind her. The stag’s upper lip sneered down at him. Turning his back on the dark little oil painting, Slade jammed his hands in his pockets and stared down at the priceless, rose-embroidered carpet. He felt like his life were hanging in the balance.

How melodramatic was that? Sex was all he wanted. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Five minutes later—he timed it on his watch—the door was pushed open. Clea marched through, followed by Belle in her rust-brown dress. Clea’s dress was ice-pale turquoise, calf-length, fashioned out of soft jersey; her hair had been tamed into a coil on the back of her head. With a physical jolt, Slade saw she was still wearing the earrings he’d given her earlier in the day.

Clea said crisply, “I said goodbye to you this morning.”

“It wasn’t goodbye. More like au revoir.”

“My hotel is exactly four blocks from here—I can walk.”

“If you won’t go with me, you’re going in a cab.”

Clea glared at him, then transferred that glare to Belle. “This man is your friend?”

Belle said calmly, “If he wasn’t, he wouldn’t have made it past the front door.”

Clea’s breath hissed between her teeth. When had she ever felt as angry as she did now? Angry, afraid, cornered and—treacherously, underneath it all—ridiculously happy to see Slade. Happy? When the man threatened to knock down the whole house of cards that was her life? “All right, Slade, you can drive me to my hotel,” she said. “But only because I don’t want to waste my time arguing with you.”

“Fine,” he said, unable to subdue his grin.

She said furiously, “Your smile should be banned—lethal to any female over the age of twelve.”

Belle smothered a snort of laughter. “You’ve got to admit he’s cute, Clea.”

“Cute?” Slade said, wincing.

“Cute like a high voltage wire is cute,” Clea snapped.

“Certainly plenty of voltage between the two of you,” Belle remarked, leading the way to the front door, where she took a lacy shawl from the cupboard and passed it to Slade. Dry-mouthed, he draped it over Clea’s shoulders.

Belle leaned forward to kiss Clea on the cheek. “We’ll talk next week.”

“Monday or Tuesday.” Clea’s voice softened. “Thank you, Belle.”

“Slade’s a good man,” Belle added.

Clea’s smile was ironic. “Maybe I prefer bad men.”

Slade said in a voice like steel, “Good, bad or indifferent, I really dislike being discussed as though I don’t exist.”

Belle said lightly, “Indifferent wouldn’t apply to either one of you. Good night.”

Slade and Clea stepped out into the cool darkness, which was still scented with roses, and the door closed behind them. He reached over and plucked a pale yellow bloom; she stood as still as one of the marble statues flanking the driveway as he tucked it into her hair. “I think that’ll stay,” he said, tugging on the stem.