Rebel's Spirit

“Here we go.” Pushing aside a soup tureen, he pulled out two stacks of gold-rimmed, red dishes. “Twenty ought to do it.” Moving back on his heels, he set the dessert plates on top of the furniture then stood up.

“Well, thank you,” she said, forcing herself to stare at the albums on the floor while she waited for her heart to reestablish a normal rhythm. Before that medical miracle had time to happen he took her hands, still raised in midair above her thighs, and pulled her to her feet.

When he held on a few seconds longer than necessary, the courteous act began snowballing into something altogether different. She tried telling herself it was the casual way his unknotted tie slid over her hands that gave the moment its intimate feel. The sensation of fine quality wool on her skin reminded her of a caress. Gentle. Masculine. And, because it had been ages since she’d had a lover, leaving her wanting more. She looked up as he looked away.

“My cleaning lady stored those albums in there by mistake,” he said, still inexplicably holding on to her hands.

The oxygen in her body seemed to be disappearing-probably feeding those sparks zipping up her arms, through her heart, into her stomach and then, heaven help her, even lower. He looked back at her as she parted her lips to draw in an extra breath.

“Are you all right?” he asked, letting go of her hands to place his around her elbows.

“I’m fine…just stood up too fast,” she said, fighting the compelling desire to lean her cheek against his chest and her forehead against that tuft of hair where he still hadn’t finished buttoning his shirt!

“Back to work,” she announced, reaching for the first stack of plates with shaky hands. Why wasn’t he saying something? Or moving away? Or taking her in his arms and kissing her silly? She squeezed her eyes shut. Was she losing her mind? What had gotten into her? Tonight was her opportunity to show him she’d changed.

“Yes, back to work,” he finally said, as he leaned down to pick up the photo albums from the floor. “I have more notes to go over before people start arriving.”

“Don’t let me bother you.” She kept her eyes on the gold circle rimming the red plate in her hand as he walked into his library.

For the next twenty minutes she kept herself busy by folding napkins, preparing coffee, mixing the cranberry punch, setting out the dessert buffet and pretending that what she’d felt when he’d been so close was nothing more than a fluky moment of hormonal insanity.

After setting a pitcher of milk on the table next to a matching sugar bowl, she glanced across the hall into the library where Raleigh paced before the fire. He’d put on music, a Bach concerto, if she wasn’t mistaken. As he read through his paper, she found herself pressing her hand to her midsection. If what she’d felt was nothing more than one fluky moment of hormonal insanity, why were her hands still tingling? Her throat still dry? And that disturbing heat still pooling where it shouldn’t be? After all these years what was it about him that she suddenly found so compelling?

She walked across the carpeted hall to the open pocket doors of the library. Without a doubt he was an attractive man. Standing well over six feet, he was broad shouldered, classically handsome and, unlike most indoor career types, sporting a healthy tan. His thick, dark hair threatened to spill over his forehead in a little-boy tousle of loose curls.

As he braced a hand on the mantel and worried over his paper, she folded her arms, leaned her shoulder against the doorjamb and quietly sighed. Who the heck was she kidding? Raleigh Hanlon was the best-looking man she’d ever laid eyes on. And there he was, in his leather-bound, gold-stamped library, so absorbed in his professorial studies that he didn’t even sense her presence.

Angling her head into the room, she strained to take in his floor-to-ceiling, book-lined shelves, his leather wing chair with the worn spot where he rested his head, and his framed degrees and certificates filling half a wall. Masculinely appointed, impressively erudite and with a tried-and-true sense of permanency, the room appeared to be a perfect representation of the man standing in it. And just as awesome to her.

She nibbled on her lip as that unwelcome sense of inadequacy sent a cold tentacle to her stomach. Before the feeling took a stronger hold, she stood up and lifted her chin. Even if her poor high school performance had kept her out of college, over the last ten years, through hard work and pure determination, she had managed to achieve just about everything else she’d wanted in her life. She had nothing to be ashamed of.

“I set aside a piece of cake for you,” she impulsively announced.

Against the Bach playing in the background, her voice sounded like a carnival barker’s. She was certain Raleigh thought the same when he removed his glasses and looked up at her for a long, uncomfortable moment. Or maybe that look was meant for something else? Had she splashed the cranberry punch on her clothes? Had they fallen off? What was wrong?

The crackling flames in the fireplace were the only sounds she heard above her pounding heartbeat. And then he smiled. That funny, forgiving kind of smile that said everything was all right. The kind of smile she’d never seen on Show-No-Mercy Hanlon.

“Which cake?” he asked.

“The one you were sniffing,” she said, relaxing enough to notice his shirt was finally buttoned and his tie knotted. “The hazelnut with the Frangelico frosting.”

“Ah,” he said, nodding slowly. “You don’t miss much.”

She smiled back as she let her gaze wander the room again. This time the place didn’t feel as threatening. “Where’s your Christmas tree?”

“Excuse me?”

“Your Christmas tree? The ceramic angels on the mantel? The candles in the windows?” Pointing upward she added, “The mistletoe? Megan said this was the first holiday party of the season, but it’s hard to tell you’ve looked at the calendar.”

He looked around before giving her a halfhearted scowl. “Isn’t that poinsettia enough?”

She scowled back. “No,” she said and they both laughed. As the sound died he kept on looking at her. When she didn’t say anything, he slid on his reading glasses and lifted up his paper.

“That must be some interesting paper,” she said, grasping at the mundane comment because she was already missing the moment they’d shared.

He brushed a piece of lint from the top of his pant leg then looked at her again. “I’m sure you wouldn’t find it very interesting.”

She forced a smile to cover the raw sting of his words. Was it so obvious to him that she hadn’t furthered her formal education? “Maybe I would. Try me.”

“Have you studied the history of the Incas?”

“Well, not formally,” she said, raking her fingers through her hair. Why were her palms sweating? He wasn’t giving her a test on the subject, but if he were, she would probably pass the darn thing with flying colors.

“Not formally?” he repeated, motioning for her to come in and take the chair by the fire. “What do you mean?”

“I’ve read a bit on my own,” she said, wondering if she should tell him how many hours she’d studied preColumbian history before leading a tour group through the ruins at Machu Picchu and the archaeological dig site on the northwest coast of Peru. The last thing she wanted to do was sound as if she were bragging, or worse, defending herself.

Raleigh raised a brow as he watched her enter the room. “Amazing. When you were my student I practically had to glue a history book in your hands in order to get you to read it.”

“That’s a good ten years in the past.”

Slowing her steps and her words, she stopped at the sofa table. As she reached down to it, Raleigh remembered what he’d left there. The yearbook of her graduating class was lying wide open to the page with her photo.

Her gaze, accompanied by a slow grin, darted up to him then back down again. “But I guess history professors have been known to spend a little time poking around in the past.”

As she picked up the book, he turned away to check his watch. Fifteen minutes to eight. If he hadn’t spent time poring over Rebecca’s yearbook this afternoon he would have finished his work, he thought, going to his desk and dropping the paper into a drawer. But he had looked at the yearbook, and the rest of his day had been filled with thoughts about her. Thoughts leading to questions. Crazy questions that kept on coming when he pictured her naked in the pool, then standing beside him in that towel.

He looked over at her now, quietly smiling as she thumbed through the pages. She looked so…grown-up. He snorted softly. Maybe she was, but that didn’t stop the questions he’d been thinking about all afternoon.

What in hell made you pull those crazy stunts in high school? Was I too hard on you? Wasn’t I hard enough? How many hearts have you broken? What’s happened to you since then? hat’s happened to me? And when did you turn into such a beautiful woman?

“Raleigh, why did you have this opened to my—?” she began at the same moment the doorbell rang.

He looked at her expectant expression as the doorbell sounded again, along with the telephone. The outward composure he’d been perfecting for the past eighteen years clicked into place.

“Would you mind getting the door and showing whoever it is into the library?” he asked, as he walked past her into the dining room. Picking up the plate of sliced cake she’d left for him, he added, “I’ll take the phone in the kitchen.”

Five minutes later Raleigh hung up. As Penny had railed on with her latest litany of teenage complaints, he’d found that his thoughts had kept wandering back to Rebecca. She’d been Penny’s age when she was his student. He shook his head. Penny’s age, for godsake.

Taking his jacket from where he’d tossed it, he remembered the way Rebecca had looked in it. Even though the salt-and-pepper tweed was sizes too big for her, he couldn’t say she looked exactly childlike wearing it that afternoon. And when she’d bent down to catch her towel…The distinct tugging sensation in his manhood had him swallowing dry. He quickly shrugged on the jacket then straightened his tie. He had guests waiting.

Picking up the cake she’d sliced for him, he dragged two fingers through the frosting, then plunged them into his mouth to lick them clean. Laughing at himself for the outlandish thoughts he’d been having about Rebecca, he lifted the whole slice from the plate and took a bite.

She’d once been capable of getting under his skin, but that was strictly sophomoric and a long time ago. She wouldn’t be doing that again; he wouldn’t let her. Shoving another bite into his mouth, he closed his eyes and savored the delicate flavor. Hell, he must have been crazy there for a few hours. He was years older than Rebecca, and, just as important, she was years younger than him. Coupled with their history, anything remotely…adult was laughable.

As he reached to open the dining room door, Rebecca opened it from the other side. Her cheeks were flushed, her hair was slightly mussed and her high spirits a nearly tangible force. The beguiling sight almost made him forget his reassessment.

“Who rang the bell?” he asked, as she quickly closed the door behind her then leaned against it.

“Dean Callahan,” she said, before covering her mouth to stop a burst of laughter.

“What’s so funny?”

She pressed her hands against her bright plaid cummerbund and leaned forward to catch her breath. “Oh, Raleigh, I always thought professors were so stuffy, but that one’s not. He wouldn’t stop asking me questions about myself. I tried to explain that I was only here catering your desserts and he said, ‘Well, I never heard it referred to as that before.” ‘ Shaking her finger at him, she widened her eyes. “Your Dean Callahan is a very naughty man.”

“Naughty?” He smiled at the thought that the whitehaired gentleman could ever be considered naughty.

“Yes. Don’t you get it?” she asked with an exaggerated wink.

“Don’t I get what?” He felt his smile weakening while he silently prayed that the gods were with him tonight and what he was beginning to suspect was way off the mark.

She took a step toward him. “Oh, Raleigh, look at you,” she said, changing subject and tone as she reached up to cup his jawline in her hands. “You have frosting smeared here…and here.” Dabbing at the sides of his mouth with her thumbs, she squinted at him. “Look. Go like this.”

Her helpful gesture almost made it into the casual category until she puckered her lips. His breath caught somewhere north of his chest. Hadn’t he just convinced himself how ridiculous this illogical attraction he had for her was? Hadn’t he told himself to get a grip? And didn’t she have the softest hands and most engaging expressions?

He closed his hand around one of hers causing her fingertips to stray past his lips. Once. Twice. With her breasts brushing his chest, her gentle yet relentless thumb strokes and the liqueur-laced frosting teasing his tongue, he had all he could do not to lick her. Then her thumbnail grazed the underside of his lip, and her kind act began bordering on a kinky one. Taking a step over the line of common sense, he bypassed warm, fuzzy confusion and headed straight for the Pandora’s box of heat and lust. Curving a hand around her waist, he tugged her against his hips. “Rebecca,” he whispered. Then the doorbell rang again and both of them froze.

Crashing back to reality, Raleigh found himself staring into her eyes. He knew his boundaries; he’d set them up a long time ago. “You were saying something about Dean Callahan?” he asked, as he let go and took a step backward.

She gave him a puzzled look that, after a few nervejangling seconds, transformed itself into a focused, knowing smile. “He thinks I’m your latest.”

“Latest what?” he asked as the doorbell rang again. He laughed out loud; this couldn’t be happening. Where was a lesser god when you needed one?

“Lover.” She cocked her head when he didn’t respond. “Did you hear me? I said he thinks we’re lovers.”

“I heard you.”

“Then why aren’t you laughing anymore?”

He started around her. “Miss Barnett, I have to get the door—”

Her arm shot out, effectively blocking his way as she slapped her hand against the door frame. “And whatever happened to you calling me Reb? I thought we’d come so far, but—”

“Obviously, we haven’t,” he said, wondering why the hell he’d allowed her to put her hands on him in the first place.

“We haven’t?” she asked, her head turning and her eyes twinkling with womanly mischief.

From the other side of the door, Dean Callahan called out cheerfully, “I’ll get that.”

“Miss Barnett, that will be all for tonight.”

She opened her mouth to speak.

“Go,” he said, then cocked his chin when she hesitated. As she walked around him and headed for the back door, his gaze tracked her like radar on enemy aircraft. He felt his body quickening to alert status when she paused with her hand on the knob. Looking over her shoulder at him, she made a new and old and needy ache start up in his heart.

“Raleigh?”

“Yes?”

She touched a fingertip to her lips. “You still have some…”

His hand began drifting up toward his mouth before he came to his senses and, instead, pointed at her. “Out! Now!” he said, managing to hold his ground even though the floor beneath him felt like quicksand when she grinned.

“Just like old times…Mr. Hanlon.”

Her voice echoed through him, soft and sexy, sure and seductive. As she closed the door behind her, he slowly pressed his fingers to where hers had been. After a moment he shook his head and headed for the dining room. “Old times were never like this, Rebecca.”

Three

As Raleigh fastened the last spring lock on the pool cover, he took another look toward the garage apartment. Two days had passed since that rub-and-tickle moment with Rebecca, and he was still battling over what to do about her. Ignoring her presence seemed like the most sensible and least bothersome solution, he decided, as he stored the pool equipment in the cabana. After all, how much trouble could one woman cause in a month? He seriously considered giving Rebecca the benefit of the doubt.

And then he came to his senses. She wasn’t just any woman. She was Rebecca Barnett, complete with a shared history and enough sex appeal to melt the leather elbow patches off his tweed jackets. And she was living a few feet across the driveway from him.

Staring up at the apartment again, he came to the conclusion that while she might be able to stay out of trouble, he was the one with the problem. He couldn’t ignore her presence because he couldn’t put those moments with her in his kitchen out of his head.

Wiping his hands on his well-worn jeans, he headed for the gate. There was only one course of action he could take, he decided, as he closed it behind him. Rebecca Barnett would have to find alternative lodging. And as soon as he saw her-” Finally got that pool closed, did you?”

She was sitting on the second-floor landing of the garage steps, a pair of mud-coated sneakers next to her feet. Her rosy cheeks made him think she’d been outside as long as he had, and her smile made him certain she’d been having more fun.

When he didn’t answer her quickly enough, she thumbed up the suede brim of her baseball cap then leaned her elbows on the step behind her. Propping a sock-clad foot over one knee, she stared down at him. The jocklike posturing accentuated the length of her legs, the womanly curves of her hips and, where her athletic jacket fell open, the distinct pearling of her sweater-covered nipples in the cold afternoon breeze.

“Well, closing it’s for the best, I guess.” She shrugged. “Or who knows what I might have been tempted to do next down there.”

Her smile said she was teasing but that didn’t stop the images from coming into his head. Was there such a thing as nude ice-skating? He rubbed at his brow. This had to stop.

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