Any Man Of Mine

Keena’s face toasted. “Of course not!”

“Don’t run over the curb, love. You’ll crease the tires,” Mandy pointed out.

Keena steered the car back onto the road, hating that momentary, telling lapse. “Why should I care that he comes storming down here, threatens me and then vanishes into the woodwork? It’s no worry of mine!”

“Oh, that’s obvious.”

“Besides, it’s my life,” Keena added firmly, shifting uneasily behind the wheel. “I can do what pleases me.”

“Sure you can.”

“If I want to decorate the house and give a party, it’s my own business.”

“That’s right, dear.”

“And anyway, if he cares so much, why hasn’t he called?” Keena’s green eyes flashed. “He could have spared time for a phone call.”

“He’s a busy man.”

“I’m busy, too,” Keena pouted. She sighed, the action gently rustling the blue striped scarf at her neck that complemented her navy pantsuit and white silk blouse. “He’s just sour because I’m not at his beck and call down here.”

“He’s jealous of James Harris, you mean,” Mandy remarked with a secret smile.

“There’s nothing to be jealous of. James hasn’t called. He hasn’t come by the house...” That rankled, too. She’d been a very young eighteen when she’d overheard that bitter speech of James’s, when she’d realized just how fully she’d been taken in by his teasing and flirting. She’d been too naive to realize the cruel game he was playing until it was too late. Part of her hadn’t grown past that day. And that part, the hurting part, wanted to bring the tall, blue-eyed lawyer to his knees. It was something inside her that she didn’t fully understand, but it was too strong to ignore. Nicholas might tolerate the thirst for revenge, but he wouldn’t tolerate its presence around him. He didn’t need it. Nick was above that sort of pettiness. But Keena didn’t find it petty, and she needed to see James Harris humbled, as she had once been. Now successful, full of confidence she’d never had as a teenager, she was desirable. And she wanted James to find her so, to satisfy a craving that had never completely died. She had to prove to herself that she could have him if she really wanted him. And no one, not even Nick, was going to stop her.

* * *

SHE’D JUST WORKED UP her nerve to call James and invite him over for a meal when she drove up in front of her house to find him waiting for her. Her heart jumped wildly at the sight of him in an expensive tweed coat with a sweater-vest and dark trousers. He looked sophisticated, handsome and not a day older than he had nine years ago.

“Speak of the devil,” Mandy murmured, rushing out of the car and up the steps before Keena had time to reply.

“So there you are.” James grinned, hopping down the steps as he used to, athletic and trim. “I thought you might invite me in for coffee if I showed up at your door. Quite a crowd of workmen you’ve got there,” he added, nodding toward the carpenters at work on the outside of the house.

“We’re adopting them. They’re orphans,” she told him with a straight face.

He threw back his head and laughed. It didn’t sound genuine somehow, but Keena laughed with him. “Uh, Jones said you’d borrowed quite a lot of money to accomplish this,” he added shrewdly.

She only smiled. She could have paid cash for the renovation, but it had done her good to borrow the money from Abraham Jones at James’s bank, leaving that priceless emerald bracelet as collateral. She’d expected it to get back to James. Now he was curious, and that was just what she’d wanted.

“That bracelet,” he murmured, looking at her with his head cocked to one side in that old, familiar pose. “It was real, wasn’t it?”

“Quite,” she agreed with a wry smile.

“A present?” he probed.

“No.”

He frowned, really puzzled now. “I can’t figure you out,” he admitted finally.

She smiled up at him, turning on every trace of charm in her slender body. “Can’t you really, James?” she asked softly.

Something kindled in his blue eyes, something new and pleasant. He moved toward her, removing his hands from his pockets to take her gently by the shoulders and study her lazily.

“You’ve changed so,” he remarked gently. “You were pretty before. But now...”

“Now, James?” she prodded, breathless.

He opened his mouth to speak just as the soft purr of an approaching engine broke into the silence between them.

Keena turned her head in time to see Nicholas bring the white Rolls to a gentle stop and get out, carrying a big leather suitcase in one hand and an attaché case in the other. He was dressed in an expensive tweed suit that flattered his massive physique, emphasizing his broad chest, flat stomach and powerful, muscular legs. He not only looked rich, he also looked imposing. His eyes punctuated the threat in the graceful way he moved, the way he looked at James, the way a hunter might glance toward a kitten on his way to shoot bear.

“I hope you’ve got a room ready,” Nicholas told Keena without breaking stride, “I’m in a hell of a tangle with my London office.”

She stared after him, her mouth slightly open.

“Who’s he?” James asked coolly.

Keena looked up at him helplessly. For one wild second she wondered if he might believe Nicholas was her insurance agent. But with a sigh, a shrug and an apologetic smile, she dismissed the thought.

“Nicholas,” she replied instead. “Uh, I’ve got to go, James, but do ring me later on.”

“Oh...of course,” he stammered. It was the first time Keena had ever seen him at a loss for words, as if he couldn’t believe any woman would willingly part with his company.

She turned and walked quickly up the steps with blood in her eyes. Now what was Nicholas up to? And where did he plan to stay?

She caught up with him at the foot of the staircase, oblivious to the stares of the two fascinated painters on ladders in the hall.

“Where do you think you’re going?” she demanded.

“To my room,” he said impatiently.

“You don’t have one,” she pointed out.

“Yet,” he admitted, taking another step.

“This is my house,” she told him, her voice rising shrilly. “You can’t just move in like this, without even asking!”

“Think you can stop me?” he asked politely, gazing at her with that level, devastating stare that made her want to back away slowly.

“I’m not alone and defenseless,” she reminded him, turning to the nearest painter, a rugged-looking individual about Nicholas’s age.

“That’s right, lady,” the painter agreed, pausing with his brush raised to give Nicholas his best threatening look.

Nicholas lifted his hard, broad face and stared up at the man unblinkingly. “I hope your insurance is current,” he remarked politely.

The painter turned back to his work and began painting with a vengeance. “Like I said, lady, I’d give the poor tired man a room,” he murmured sheepishly.

Keena glared at him before she transferred her irritated stare to the other painter, who pulled his cap low over his eyes and began to whistle softly.

Nicholas grinned at her before he turned and started up the staircase again.

She followed along behind him, her temper exploding like silent fireworks inside her taut body, watching helplessly while he peeked into the first room he came to, then the second, before he finally settled on the third. It was, as he had guessed, unoccupied, with bed linen neatly piled at the foot of the large, four-poster bed.

“This will do,” he murmured, glaring around him at the antique furniture. He set the suitcase down and went to the window. “Nice view. Does it have a bathroom?”

“In between this bedroom and the other one,” Keena said. “But that needn’t concern you. You aren’t staying.”

He turned around and let his eyes roam over her taut figure. “God, you’re pretty when you want to bite. Come over here and put up your fists, you little firecracker,” he taunted in a deep, velvety voice.

“What are you doing here?” she challenged, feeling the ground slowly being cut from under her feet.

He shrugged. “What does it look like? I’m moving in.”

“For how long?” she demanded fiercely.

“For as long as it takes to bring you to your senses,” he replied calmly. His dark eyes searched her flushed face. “You can’t go back, honey,” he added quietly. “I won’t let you.”

Her color deepened. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Yes, you do.” He moved forward, one corner of his firm, chiseled mouth going up as he noticed her involuntary step backward. “Don’t panic. I’m not going to throw you on the bed. Not now, anyway. I’ve got work to do. Is there a study?”

“Downstairs,” she managed through her fury. “But it’s full of painters.”

“So is the rest of the house. Are they leaving, or are you adopting them?”

“They’ll be gone tomorrow,” she replied. “Nicholas, you can’t stay here,” she added, trying to reason with him. “It’s a small town. People will go wild gossiping. They’ll think you’re my lover!”

“They might be right,” he said, moving forward again. “Come here.”

“Nicholas!” She backed right up to the closed door.

He trapped her there with his big arms on either side of her head, his eyes dancing with devilish amusement, the shimmering depths secretive, mysterious. “Shy?” he murmured. “You were flirting with Harris for all you were worth. Why not try it with me?”

“Because I don’t want to be fitted with a straitjacket, and how did you know it was James?” she asked nervously. The deliciously expensive scent of his cologne settled around her like a sensuous mist, and she tried not to be so aware of the size and strength of his body, the heat of it warming her in the faint chill of the room.

“I recognized the sickening adoration in your eyes, little fox,” he murmured. His dark eyes pinned hers. “You may think you can pick up where you left off all those years ago, but you’re going to find that it’s not possible.”

“It’s my life, Nicholas,” she reminded him.

“So it is,” he agreed. “But I’m not going to let that anemic snob cut you up a second time.”

She tried to get closer to the door, but the cold wood wouldn’t give under her shoulder blades.

“I do appreciate the thought,” she said. “But how are you going to spare the time?” She didn’t like the look in his eyes. It was frankly predatory. “As you’re so fond of telling me, you’re a busy man.”

His eyes glittered with amusement. “All work and no play...” he murmured, bending.

She watched his face come closer with a nervous sense of inevitability. No wonder he’d gotten so far in business, she thought dimly as his mouth brushed lightly against her forehead. He was unstoppable, like a runaway locomotive.

“You’ll go through that door in a minute,” he murmured lazily. “Why don’t you move toward me instead?”

“You’re making me nervous,” she choked. Her lovely eyes had a faintly haunted look; her black hair was brushed with fiery lights in the glare of the window.

“Is that what it is?” he murmured. He moved, holding her eyes while he eased the full weight of his flat stomach and powerful thighs down against her as he guided her slender body down on the bed. She felt the warm, heavy crush with a sense of awe. She’d never been so close to him before, felt so overwhelmed by him. The kiss they’d shared in the Rolls, as ardent as it was, couldn’t compare with the sensations this was causing. She’d never dreamed that she could drown in her awareness like this.

His powerful arms bent, and his chest gently flattened her soft breasts. His watchful eyes never left hers, reading signs in them like a Native American after tracks.

She began to tremble under the contact. He had to feel it, too.

“Nick...” she whispered brokenly.

“Fire and kindling,” he whispered deeply, shifting his powerful body sensuously against hers. “We make flames when we touch like this.”

A wave of intolerable sensation washed the length of her trapped body. Her hands, pressed helplessly against the warm front of his white shirt, began to move slowly, caressingly, against the smooth, hard muscles.

“Nick,” she moaned, her eyes half-closed, her body suddenly, involuntarily, answering his. She pressed closer, molding her body to fit the hard, sensuous contours of his. Her fingers curled under the top button of his shirt.

“Unbutton it, Keena,” he murmured deeply, searching her eyes in the blazing, throbbing silence that stretched like a blanket around them. “Touch me.”

Her eyes wandered in his while she took the pearly button out of the buttonhole and lightly touched the warm, hair-covered flesh underneath it. She felt the powerful muscles contract beneath her hands.

“You...feel like...warm stone,” she whispered unsteadily, burying her fingers in the thick curling hair on his chest.

“I feel like a damned blazing inferno,” he breathed, shifting his chest to enlarge the pattern of her caressing fingers. “My God, I’ve never wanted a woman’s hands on me so much!”

She flinched at the sound of another voice merging with his, shattering like brittle glass as the spell was suddenly broken.

“Keena, I’ve got lunch!” Mandy was calling from the hallway.

A tiny sound burst from her tightly held lips, her eyes telling him how she felt about the intrusion.

His breath was coming as roughly as hers. “There’ll be another time,” he said tautly.

She managed a slow nod. He levered his body away from hers and moved to open the door.

“What are we having?” he asked Mandy, as composed as ever, one big hand unobtrusively closing the buttons Keena’s searching fingers had loosed.

Mandy grinned at him, her hands buried in a dishcloth. “Your favorite,” she said drily, hiding a smile when she caught a glimpse of Keena’s flushed face and wild eyes. “Beef Stroganoff, homemade rolls, a potato casserole and fresh apple pie.”

“Remind me to pry you away from Keena,” he told her with a lazy wink.

“Can’t split the set,” came the murmured reply.

He chuckled. “I’m working on that.”

Keena, a little more recovered now, moved around him and followed Mandy down the hall on rubbery legs without looking back. She couldn’t meet Nicholas’s mocking, confident gaze.

* * *

JAMES CALLED LATER in the day to invite Keena to supper that night, his voice faintly caressing on the other end of the line.

“If your houseguest doesn’t mind, of course,” he added waspishly.

Keena’s hand clenched on the receiver. “My...houseguest doesn’t tell me what to do.” She crossed her fingers involuntarily. “Nicholas is only a friend.”

“If you say so. Does six o’clock suit you?” he added, a purr in his pleasant voice. “I thought we’d dine at the Magnolia Room.”

She remembered the exclusive restaurant well. She’d ridden the bus past it on her way to Atlanta at the age of eighteen, when she’d left Ashton behind. She’d been crying, and through her tears she’d strained for a sight of James as the bus passed his favorite eating place.

“I’d like that,” she murmured.

“See you at six, then.”

She stared at the receiver when he hung up, wondering how she was going to explain it to Nicholas. She had a feeling it wasn’t going to improve his mood.

* * *

NICHOLAS SET UP shop in the study and tied up the phone for the rest of the day. Keena could hear him growling through the closed door, and she was careful to keep out of his way. So were the painters, she noticed. Everyone walked wide around the study except Mandy, who darted in and out with coffee and pastries.

“Do you have to encourage him?” Keena asked once, only to be met by an innocent stare and raised eyebrows.

She went downstairs just five minutes before James was due to arrive, wearing a gown that she’d originally designed for a well-known actress—and then decided that something a little flashier would suit her client better. It was a green—more olive than emerald—deep, soft velvet with short puffed sleeves, an empire waist and a low neckline that relied on a hint of cleavage for its charm. The color mirrored that of her eyes, adding to the flush of her lips and cheeks, and the highlights in her freshly washed, curling short hair, an effect achieved with a blow-dryer to make the ends turn toward her face. She eyed herself critically in the hall mirror. If this dress didn’t set James on his ear, nothing would.

“Bewitching,” Nicholas murmured from the doorway of the study.

She turned around, glaring at him. He was wearing his tweed slacks, but he’d discarded the jacket, and his silk tie hung loose across his chest, the top few buttons of his shirt undone. It was one of the few times she’d seen him when he didn’t look impeccable and businesslike. His dark, shaggy mane was faintly rumpled and a forgotten cigarette smoldered in one big hand. Her fingers itched to touch him.

“Going somewhere?” he asked pleasantly.

She swallowed and straightened her elegant figure. “Out. With James,” she added defiantly.

One dark eyebrow curled upward. “Oh?”

She stiffened at that mocking reply. Only Nicholas could mingle distaste, contempt and reprisal in a single sound.

“He asked me out to dinner,” she elaborated.

He studied the wisps of gray smoke that came between them. “I hope you don’t plan on being out late,” he remarked. “Waiting up for people makes me cranky.”

“I’m twenty-seven,” she reminded him. “Nobody waits up for me anymore, not even Mandy.”

“Well, honey, I’ll have to do something about that, won’t I?” he asked with a mocking smile.

“Mandy will fix you something to eat,” she replied.

“So she told me.”

“There’s James,” she murmured, her ears picking up the sound of an approaching car.

He shouldered away from the door facing. “Have fun. While you can.”

He went back into the study and closed the door.

* * *

THE RESTAURANT WAS the very best Ashton had to offer, spacious, elegant, with a hint of grandeur that would have taken Keena’s breath away nine years ago. As it was, she murmured suitably as James seated her. But the sophisticated woman she’d become wasn’t overly impressed, despite the company she was keeping.

James stared at her across the table when the waiter had brought the menus, frowning thoughtfully, his blue eyes approving.

“What a change,” he murmured softly, turning on the old charm she remembered so well.

A tiny thrill shot down her spine, but it was hardly the surge of pleasure she’d once imagined it would be to see that particular look in James’s eyes. It was disappointing. She’d halfway expected the earth to move.

She shifted restlessly in her chair. Nicholas had upset her in more ways than one. What in the world was she going to do about him? By tomorrow his presence in her house would be the subject of early-morning gossip over half the coffee cups in town. Not that she minded gossip ordinarily, but she had plans, and Nicholas was going to upset them all if she didn’t find some way to pry him out of her guest room.

“Did I say something wrong?” James asked, his tone one of concern.

She mentally pinched herself. “Of course not.” She created just the right smile and reached out boldly to touch his long-fingered hand. “I’m having a marvelous time. Remember when this restaurant first opened? Mayor Henderson cut the ribbon, and the lieutenant governor was the first guest...”

“He was a friend of Max’s,” he recalled, referring to the restaurant’s owner, Max Kells.

And not in my league back then, she thought drily. “Tell me, how is Max?”

He shrugged. “Fine, I suppose. I’ve been too busy lately to socialize much.” James stared at her thoughtfully across the table, breaking the gaze only long enough to give the waiter their order.

“You really have changed.” He repeated himself. “Velvet gowns, sophisticated, worldly. Do you really work in textiles?”

“I started out there,” she admitted. “But not on the floor. I’m a fashion designer now. My casual line sells to some of the most exclusive stores in the country—and abroad.”

“So it isn’t your...houseguesťs money that’s keeping you up?” he asked with careless bluntness.

It would be an obvious conclusion for someone who didn’t know about her unusual relationship with Nicholas, but it brought back James’s cruelty of years past with full force.

“No,” she replied coolly. “Nicholas doesn’t keep me.”

“Nicholas?” he fished.

“Coleman,” she provided. Her long, well-manicured fingers toyed with her crystal water glass. “Of Coleman Textiles,” she added.

Both his eyebrows arched toward the ceiling. “Exalted company,” he murmured.

“Isn’t it?” she replied with a smile. Nicholas’s vast holdings were hardly fair comparison for James’s small company, which he ran along with his modest law practice. In fact, Nicholas could have bought it all out of what he’d term petty cash, and James knew it.

“Is he your lover?” James persisted with an interest that seemed casual, but that Keena knew wasn’t. His fingers were idly rearranging his silverware, his blue eyes glancing at hers restlessly.

She only smiled. “How have things been with you?” she replied, ignoring the question.

He shrugged, acknowledging the slight with that tiny gesture. “With the factory? Well, it could be worse. With me?” he added with a soft laugh. “Life can be lonely.”

“Can it?” she asked absently. “I don’t have time for loneliness. I’m much too busy.”

“Are you staying for good, Keena?” he asked suddenly.

She met his eyes. Along with the cruelty, memories came back of the few good times, of James laughing, teasing her, of the first time he’d kissed her, of long walks in the woods. And then inevitably she recalled that last evening, her initiation into womanhood at his careless hands...

“Goodness, Keena, I’ve missed you,” he said gently, reaching for her hand. Smiling, he caressed it slowly.

Don’t fall for it, she told herself firmly. Don’t listen. But the pull of the past was strong, and James was handsome, and she was falling ever so gently under his spell. More by the minute.

“I’ve...missed you, too,” she replied hesitantly.

The waiter, standing patiently with his tray, finally caught James’s eye and began to serve the oysters Rockefeller that James had ordered along with a magnificent salad, filet of sole and dainty little croissants with butter.

James cleared his throat, his long face betraying his obvious interest in Keena to an outsider. Keena looked up from her salad, her eyes wary as they searched his intent face. He was looking at her in a new and exciting way. She smiled at him. The evening was suddenly full of promise.

“After we leave here,” James murmured sensuously, “how would you like to drive over to the lake?”

That had been one of their favorite haunts years ago when he took her out. Her eyes involuntarily sought his mouth. He had nice lips. Almost too soft to be a man’s, and she remembered the faintly chaste feel of them. She wondered if he’d learned to be more patient with women. Involuntarily, her mind went back to the way Nicholas had kissed her in the Rolls, and she flushed suddenly.

James, thinking the blush was due to the question he’d asked her about the moonlight drive along the lake, smiled confidently.

“How about it?” he murmured over his wineglass.

“Uh—” she began.

“Excuse me, sir,” the waiter interrupted delicately, “there’s a call for you.”

James muttered under his breath as he got to his feet. “Excuse me, darling?” he asked possessively.

Darling! “Of course,” she murmured breathlessly.

Her eyes followed him to the phone at the desk. She studied his long, elegant back while he spoke into the receiver, made a sharp gesture and hung up. His face was troubled when he came back to the table.

“We’ll have to leave, I’m afraid,” he muttered, pausing long enough to take one last sip of wine before he helped Keena out of her chair. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I’ll drop you off on my way to the plant.”