Envy (16 page)

"Okay. In the meantime, what do you think of my suggestion about Roark's love life?"

"I repeat, Maris, give me time."

She leaned forward eagerly. "You've already changed it, haven't you? There's more, isn't there?

Same girl?"

"Why don't you have your navel pierced?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"If you're going to wear hip-riding skirts and shirts that tie at the waist, why don't you have--was

"I heard you."

"Then why?"

"Because I don't want to."

"Too bad."

"The thought of it gives me the willies."

"A small loop. A tiny diamond stud.

It'd be sexy. Er. _Sexier." His eyes moved up from her midsection to her face. "Those glimpses of your belly button are already a major turn-on."

She squared her shoulders. "Parker, if we're going to have a professional relationship, you cannot talk to me like that."

"I can talk to you any damn way I please."

She gave a stubborn shake of her head. "Not if you want to work with me, you can't."

"You're free to go."

But she stayed seated on the crate, as he'd known she would. As he'd hoped she would.

Thunder rumbled and rain pelted the roof, but the racket only emphasized the strained silence between them. Parker rolled his chair closer to her until his knees were only inches from hers. "What did you

#tell your husband?" ##################273

"About what?"

"Being here. I assume you called him."

"I did. I left word that things were going well."

"Left word?"

"With his secretary."

"He doesn't have a cell phone? See, he strikes me as the kind of guy who would have one of those damn things practically glued to his ear."

"He was having lunch with the editor of our electronic publishing division. I didn't want to interrupt them. I'll call him later."

"As you're going to bed?"

"Possibly. What difference does it make?"

"I was just wondering if you'll be wearing a nightie tonight. Or do you always sleep sans raiment like you did last night?"

"Parker--was

"What'll you talk about?"

"None of your damn business."

"That good, huh? Or that bad?"

She drew a deep breath and said tightly,

"I'll tell him that I've discovered an extremely talented writer who--was

"Please, I'm blushing."

"Who is also the crudest, rudest, most obnoxious man I've ever met."

He grinned. "Well, that would be the truth."

Then his smile gradually faded. Giving the wheels of his chair a small push, he rolled another inch or two nearer to her. "I bet you won't tell him I kissed you," he said in low voice. "I bet you omit that part."

She stood up hastily, knocking the crate over backward. She tried going around him, but he moved equally fast and used his chair to block her path. "Get out of my way, Parker. I'm going back to the house now."

"It's raining."

"I won't melt."

"Melt down, maybe. You're angry. Or afraid."

"I'm not afraid of you."

"Then sit back down." When she failed to move, he motioned toward the door. "Fine.

G. Get drenched. Which will mean making explanations to Mike. It'll get messy but if that's what you want ..."

###She glanced outside at the downpour, ##275

then reluctantly upturned the crate and resumed her seat on it, primly and looking pissed.

"Tell me how you met your husband, Maris."

"Why?"

"I want to know."

"What for?"

"Call it creative curiosity."

"Call it nosiness."

"You're right. Euphemisms are a crutch.

I'm nosy."

Gauging her expression, he expected her to clam up and refuse to continue their conversation, but she folded her arms across her middle--no doubt to hide her navel--and said, "Noah came to work at Matherly Press. But long before that, I knew him by reputation as the brains behind a rival publishing house. When he joined us, I was thrilled at the opportunity to be working with him.

Over time, however, I realized that my feelings ran much deeper than admiration for a colleague.

I was in love with him.

"At first my father was concerned about my entering into an office romance. He was also worried that Noah is ten years older than I. He

encouraged me to date other men and even dabbled in some blatant matchmaking with sons and nephews of his friends and associates. But Noah was the one I wanted. Luckily he felt the same. We

married." She bobbed her head for punctuation.

"There. Satisfied?"

"How long have you been married?"

"Almost two years."

"Children?"

"No."

"How come?"

She glared at him and he held up a hand in conciliation. "You're right, that's too personal.

If you're sterile--was

"I'm not."

"So it's him?"

She was about to come off the crate again, but he patted the air between them. "Okay, okay, the topic of children is taboo. I won't go there."

He paused as though realigning his thoughts. "So you were seeing Noah every day at work and fell head over heels in no time."

"Actually I had had a mad crush on him even before I met him."

###"How's that?" #####################277

"I had read his book."

"_The _Vanquished."

"You know it? Oh, of course, the article again.

It referenced Noah's novel."

"Yes, but I was already familiar with it," he said. "I'd read it when it came out."

"So did I. About fifty times."

"Are you kidding?"

"No. I love it. The main character, Sawyer Bennington, became the man in my romantic fantasies."

"You have fantasies?"

"Doesn't everyone? It's nothing to be ashamed of."

"Maybe not for you. But I've had some fantasies that were pretty shameful. Want to hear them?"

"You're irrepressible."

"That's exactly how my preschool teacher described me to my mom."

"When ...?was

"When for three days straight she caught me in the boys' restroom test-driving my new favorite toy."

"I won't even ask."

"You'd be better off not to. Anyway, what were we talking about?"

"Sawyer Bennington."

"Right. Your hero and the object of your romantic fantasies. Which strikes me as strange."

"Why?"

"Wasn't he a criminal of some sort?"

"A thief and a murderer."

"Generally considered criminal."

"But his crimes were justified because of what was done to his wife and child. When he discovered their bodies, I cried buckets. I still cry every time I read it." Her expression turned dreamy and wistful.

"Sawyer is such a hard man. With everybody except Charlotte. They loved so

passionately, and it was the kind of love that even death couldn't destroy. When they hanged him for his crimes, he was thinking about ..."

Her voice trailed off. Embarrassed, she gave a slight shrug. "Forgive me, Parker.

I guess you can tell how much I love that novel."

###"You talk about the characters as though they're ##279

real."

"Noah did such a fantastic job of drawing them that sometimes I forget they're fiction. I actually start missing them. When I do, I open my copy to any page and read a few

paragraphs, and it's like I've visited them."

"Didn't they make a movie?"

"It was junk that didn't do the book justice.

But to be fair to the movie makers, I don't think any movie could have. Some critics touted _The _Vanquished as the best historical novel since __Gone with the _Wind."

"Strong praise."

"But, in my opinion, warranted."

"So what'd he follow it with?"

"He didn't." Her exuberance waned considerably. "Noah got very involved with publishing _The _Vanquished and decided that his calling was in that arena, not writing. And, I suppose, when your debut novel receives such critical and popular acclaim, the thought of following it with something equally good is daunting.

Even terrifying. He never wrote again. Not until recently."

Parker's gaze sharpened. "He's writing again?"

"He's set up an office specifically for that purpose. I'm very pleased."

But she didn't look very pleased, or even moderately pleased. A shallow but distinct vertical line had formed between her eyebrows.

Parker doubted she realized how revealing her facial expressions were or she would school them better.

After a quiet moment, he asked, "What other fictional characters have played key roles in your fantasies?"

"Several," she admitted with a light laugh.

"But none to the extent of Sawyer Bennington."

Parker leaned forward in his chair and spoke only loud enough to be heard above the pounding rain.

"Maris? Is it remotely possible that you fell in love with the character and not the author?"

Her expression turned angry, but the anger came and went with the speed of a lightning flash. She smiled with chagrin. "Considering the way I've carried on about Sawyer, I suppose that's a fair question. I've had authors tell me that readers frequently superimpose them onto a

#character they've created, and that when readers #####281

meet them at book signings, they're disappointed to find that they're ordinary people. They don't live up to the larger-than-life image the reader had formed of them."

"Good discourse, but it didn't answer any question."

Her irritation returned. "Don't be ridiculous. I fell in love with my husband.

His talent first and then the man himself. I'm still in love with him."

He stared at her for a long moment. "What was he thinking?"

"Who, Noah?"

He shook his head. "The hero of the book.

Sawyer. You said when they hanged him he was thinking

..."

"Oh. He was thinking about the first time he saw Charlotte."

She hesitated, but Parker motioned for her to continue.

"Noah wrote that passage so vividly, with such detail, that I could see the orchard, smell the ripening fruit, feel the heat. Sawyer had been traveling for days, remember? He comes upon Charlotte's family's farm, where he hopes to get water for himself and his horse.

"No one is around, the place seems deserted. But as he makes his way toward the water trough, he spots Charlotte sleeping on a pallet of quilts in the shade of a peach tree. A baby is sleeping beside her. Sawyer assumes the child is hers." Maris smiled and added softly, "He's glad to learn later that the child is her baby brother."

Parker was entranced by the cadence of her voice.

He felt himself being pulled into the scene.

"Charlotte is the most beautiful woman Sawyer has ever seen. Her long hair was unbound. Descriptions of it, her complexion, her lips, go on for paragraphs. Because of the heat, she had raised her dress as high as her knees, and she's barefoot. Sawyer is a lusty young man. Seeing her bare calf and foot inflames him. She might just as well have been naked.

He's fascinated by the breathing motion of her bosom. And yet, there's a reverent aspect to his admiration of her, as though she were as untouchable as the Madonna.

"He should have been a gentleman and politely

#withdrawn the moment he saw her. Instead, ##283

he stays and gazes at her until he hears a wagon approaching, announcing the return of her family, who had gone into town for supplies.

"Charlotte never knew that Sawyer had watched her sleeping that day. He never told her, which I think was particularly dear of him. It was too special a memory to share even with her. It was so special that he called it forward on the day of his execution. He was reliving it when the trapdoor of the gallows dropped open beneath him. Because it was the most pivotal day of his life, he died reliving his first sight of Charlotte."

Parker had listened. Motionless. Intent on every word. For several moments after she stopped speaking, they just looked at one another. Neither was capable of dispelling the mood, or willing to.

When he finally spoke, his voice was

abnormally husky. "You should have been the writer, Maris."

"Me? No," she said, shaking her head and laughing softly. "I envy the gift. I can recognize it in those who've been blessed with it, but I'm a facilitator, not a creator."

He pondered that for a time, then said, "Do you know what made that scene so erotic?"

She tilted her head inquisitively.

"It was his having that much access to a woman, his having cerebral intimacy with her, without her knowledge."

"Yes."

"His eyes and mind had touched what his hands and lips wanted to. He hadn't seen much, but he felt guilty for looking at all."

"The forbidden."

He nodded and said in an even lower voice,

"The strongest sexual stimulant of all. What isn't good for us. What we can't have. What we want so badly we can taste but can't touch."

Maris drew in a shaky little breath and exhaled it slowly. For the first time becoming aware of the loose strands of hair on her neck, she raised her hand to them, but repair seemed beyond her. She lowered her hand back to her lap, but not before it made a brief stop at that button she had fiddled with before. This time, she merely brushed it with her fingertips as though to reassure herself that it was still there. But Parker's gaze fastened on it and remained.

Suddenly she stood up in the narrow space separating them. "I'm going back now. The rain has stopped."

###That wasn't altogether true. It had ######285

stopped coming down so hard, but it was still raining lightly. Parker didn't argue, however. He let her pass.

Almost.

Before she could take a full step, he reached out and stopped her with his hands. They clasped her just below her waist, the heels of them pressing her hipbones, his fingers curved back toward her hips. He was eye level with that alluring strip of bare skin between blouse and skirt. Slowly, his eyes moved up.

She was looking down at him, startled and apprehensive. Her arms were raised, her hands in front of her shoulders as though she were unsure where to place them, what to do with them.