Midnight Jewels (16 page)

Croft kept his eyes on the winding mountain road as he drove into the dawn, but his mind was on the woman seated beside him. She was too quiet, he thought. He didn't like it. This much silence from Mercy meant trouble. It meant she was floundering inside her own head, looking for ways to put up barriers and erect defenses.

It wasn't good strategy to give an opponent too much time to mink, especially not a woman like Mercy. She had already come to some dangerous conclusions. It was time to take a firm hand.

"Mercy, if you're finished sulking, we can talk about what we're going to do when we reach Gladstone's."

"I am not sulking. I'm thinking."

"I don't want to argue the point. But I do want to talk to you."

"If you want to talk to me, tell me why I'm sitting in this car with you when I should have dumped you off at the motel and driven on to Gladstone's alone."

"You're here with me because deep down you trust me and you know it." He felt a pleasant rush of satisfaction at the drought. It was die truth, and he'd known it for certain half an hour before when she had silently gotten into the car beside him and slammed her door.

"All right, I'll concede I believe your wild story. I think you are concerned about the fact that
Valley
has surfaced after three years. I think you're wrong to suspect a link between what happened three years ago and my client, however."

He shrugged negligently. "It's very possible I am. I hope to hell I'm wrong. I was certain that Graves died in that fire. But then, I was certain his book collection had also gone up in flames. None of the other books from that collection have shown up in any of the dealers' catalogs."

"You've kept track?"

Croft nodded shortly. "When I first set out to find Graves I spent a lot of time studying what little was known about the man. His passion for book collecting was the one thing he couldn't keep completely camouflaged—not if he wanted to add to his collection. He was very careful in his dealings with booksellers. Always used an intermediary and kept his own identity secret. But rumors have a way of leaking out and I was watching for them. I used Graves' book collecting mania as a way to trace him to the island. Believe me, I learned a lot about his areas of interest. He was very selective and specific. Most of the volumes were one of a kind. Some of them dated back to the sixteenth century. Most of them were extremely
valuable simply because they were totally unique.
Valley of Secret Jewels
wasn't an important acquisition because it's not one of a kind. That's one of the reasons I remembered it when I saw your ad. There are a few other copies in existence. It's only worth a couple of thousand dollars. If someone had wanted to grab a really
valuable book the night of the fire, he would have chosen something else to rescue besides
Valley
."

"But you said most of those other copies were in the hands of European collectors. That doesn't mean this book hasn't made its way here from Europe."

"It's Graves' copy, Mercy. I'm sure of it. There's too much evidence, including an inscription on the flyleaf from the first owner to his mistress."

"All right," she allowed, "so it somehow survived the fire. That doesn't mean Graves did. It doesn't mean Graves is Gladstone or that he has come back from the, you should pardon the expression, grave to claim his copy of
Valley
."

"I know, Mercy," he said gently.

"But you want to be certain," she retorted waspishly.

"I have to be certain."

"Let's get to the important stuff," she continued after a moment. "Are you telling me all this now because of that intruder last night?"

"I mink it was too much of a coincidence that that particular motel was ransacked last night."

"Why would someone who was after
Valley
bother with a car stereo and a few wallets?"

"Camouflage."

"You've got a complicated mind," Mercy said wearily.

That annoyed him. "Just the opposite. I devote a lot of time and energy to keeping my thinking simple."

"Well, take my word for it, it only works when it comes to dealing with women. In that area, I'll agree you're very simpleminded. Outside of
that you're devious and complicated and dangerous." She paused for a second. "And I'm probably even more simpleminded for agreeing to let you come with me to Gladstone's just so you can satisfy your curiosity."

"Mercy—"

"I suppose I can write off our relationship easily enough.
After all, I'm an adult and I've had to bite the bullet before. Heck, I once had to write off an entire engagement. Compared to that, a one-night stand should be chicken manure. But, I'm warning you, Croft, this book is another matter entirely. My whole business future is about to take off and if you wreck it by scaring away my first good client, I'll never forgive you."

"It was not a one-night stand and you know it. And you're not going to write it off that easily." Croft took a firm grip on his temper. She was deliberately goading him. That knowledge didn't bother him nearly as much as the fact that she was succeeding in making him struggle to contain his rising temper. He had never met anyone else on the face of the earth who could push him so easily to the edge of his self-control. "Damn it, Mercy, how do you manage to do this to me?" Even as he said the words he remembered it wasn't the first time he had voiced the complaint.

She gave him a fulminating glance. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Sure you do, but I suppose you feel you're justified. Is this your idea of revenge whenever you don't like the way things are going between us? Do you get some satisfaction out of pushing me and seeing if you can get away with it?" He realized he was genuinely interested in her response. There were times when he was sure he comprehended the pattern of thoughts and emotions that formed the basis for Mercy Pennington's actions. He felt he understood how her mind worked and knew he understood the important things about her excitingly responsive body. But occasionally Croft acknowledged that there were some areas of Mercy's mind that remained an absolute mystery.

"If you don't like the way I push you around," she said far too sweetly, "you can always get out and walk back to Denver. As far as I'm concerned we never have to see one another again."

Croft was startled. He took his eyes off the road long enough to stare at her for an instant. "That's impossible now."

"I'll admit it would be a long walk."

"I'm not talking about the walk to Denver. Lady, if you think you can get rid of me that easily, you really are simpleminded. You can't ditch me until I've discovered what it is about you that makes it so easy for you to push me to the edge of my self-control."

"Is there a danger of pushing you too far, Croft?" Her eyes were wide with brilliant, mocking interest. Mercy turned slightly to regard him more intently. She tucked one foot under her thigh and rested her left arm along the back of the seat. "I'm astonished. You seem to have been totally in control of me and the situation right from the beginning. I was just a puppet on your string, wasn't I?"

"Some puppet," he muttered. "You're already whipping out a pair of scissors trying to cut your strings. But it won't work, Mercy. You can't break the bonds between us that easily."

"We'll see," she shot back. "Tell me something. Did you ever think of playing fair with me right from the start? You could have walked into my shop on Friday and told me exactly what was going on and why you were interested in
Valley
."

He shook his head once. "No. I considered that approach and discarded it."

"Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence. Mind telling me why?"

He almost winced at the scathing tone of her voice. Then he tried to give her a complete answer. "First of all I had to be sure you weren't involved as anything more than an innocent bystander."

"Good grief! You actually thought that I might be connected with Graves?"

"There was always the possibility that you were using the ad in the bookseller's catalog to contact him. As soon as I met you, I rejected that idea."

"I suppose I didn't strike you as smart enough to be involved. I don't have the cunning mind of the true criminal, is
that it? Or was it something about my beautiful eyes that convinced you I was innocent?"

"It probably was your eyes," he said reflectively and had the satisfaction of seeing her struggle to decide if he was joking or not.

"Uh huh. And after you came to the conclusion that I was just a dumb bystander, how did you justify misleading me?"

"I decided there was no need to alarm you unnecessarily. I wanted to check out my speculations before I got you involved any deeper than you already were. I didn't want you worrying if there was no need."

"In other words, you did it for my own good?" Her tone was oddly neutral.

Relief spread through Croft.
She understood
. "That's right." He took a deep breath and began to relax. "For your own good. If everything had been on the level with this deal with Gladstone, I wouldn't ever have had to say anything. We could have had a pleasant trip to Colorado and used the time to get to know each other better, just as you wanted to do. If something did go wrong, I would be there to handle it."

"Croft, has anyone ever explained to you that the worst excuse in the world for screwing a woman is to tell her it's for her own good?"

Mercy's hand on the back of the seat was clenched into a tight little fist. Croft saw it out of the corner of his eye and decided he had been wrong. It was much too soon for him to relax. "This conversation is getting us nowhere. Let's talk about how we're going to handle Gladstone."

"Yes," Mercy said rashly, "let's talk about that. It just, so happens I have a few ideas on the subject. But let's find a place to stop for breakfast first. It's been a busy night. I'm hungry."

Twenty minutes later Mercy sat across the table from Croft in a small cafe they had found in a tiny mountain community on the edge of another ski area. She waited patiently while Croft ordered his morning tea with as much care and as many precise directions as possible. The middle-aged waitress, wearing scuffed sneakers and a stained uniform and still half asleep, listened to the instructions with weary patience. Mercy, who had listened to the same relentless list of directions the morning before, empathized with the poor woman.

"I assume you haven't any loose tea," Croft said grimly. "And if you did, it would probably be lousy. That means a tea bag. Please put it in the pot first and pour boiling water over it. I would prefer
that you heated fresh water and make sure it actually boils. It has to boil in order to extract the full flavor from the tea, do you understand? Please don't use the warm water you keep in that pot on the coffee machine. Boiling water, please. It would be a great help if you rinsed the teapot out first with hot water before adding the tea bag and the boiling water."

When the tea arrived a few minutes later, the water in the cup lukewarm, a tea bag slung negligently onto the saucer, he accepted it with stoic resignation.

Mercy felt her first humorous lift in hours. She sipped her weak coffee and grinned at Croft over the rim of the cup. "Sometimes you have to be adaptable."

He didn't look up as he dunked the tea bag in the lukewarm water and tried to coax some color and flavor out of it. "You mean sometimes one has to compromise. But there are some things that are ruined with compromise. A cup of tea is one of them."

"Is that another aspect of your philosophy?"

"I guess you could say that."

He didn't seem to want to discuss the matter. Mercy therefore was perversely interested. "What are some of the other things that are ruined with compromise?"

"Honor, vengeance and love."

Mercy's eyes widened. "I can see you've given the subject some thought."

"Yes."

"Have you ever compromised on any of those things?"

He looked up from the pale tea. "I'm not totally inflexible. This isn't the first time I've had to compromise on tea. Does that answer your question?"

But she would bet he had never compromised on honor or vengeance, Mercy filled in silently. She should let this drop right now, she told herself, but she couldn't. Not quite. "What about love? Haven't you ever had to compromise in that department?"

"No."

"Have you ever been in love, Croft? Somehow I can't see you overwhelmed by such an emotion."

"You're right. I've never been in love. I can't see myself overwhelmed by it, either."

"Ah ha. Then you can't say whether you'd be willing to compromise in that area or not."

"Don't look so triumphant. I find it unpleasant at this hour of the morning to watch you glowing with triumph. Having to drink this lousy tea is bad enough."

She ignored the warning. "I'll accept that your philosophical standards are probably set in granite when it comes to tea, honor and vengeance, but it's obvious you can't speak from experience on the subject of love. You shouldn't make rash statements, Croft."

He raised his eyebrows. "It's possible to have an under standing of the nature of something such as love without having actually experienced it. The obligations, risks and rewards are all quite comprehensible intellectually. And you, lady, are the last person who should be handing out lectures on the danger of making rash statements. You have a reckless streak in you that leaves me breathless. Are you going to eat the rest of that toast?"

She eyed the two slices of toast that remained on her plate. "No, I don't think so. Help yourself."

"Thanks." He reached across the table and scooped up the two slices. "Let's talk about a more critical subject."

"The visit to Gladstone?" She would rather have argued about love, Mercy realized. She was certain Croft needed some straightening out on the subject. But it was obvious he wasn't in the mood for an extended discussion on anything that esoteric. Not at the moment, at any rate. "I don't see any problem. We behave in a perfectly normal, reasonable, honest manner. We're not going there to do undercover spy work. At least I'm not. I'm simply there to sell the man a valuable book and get a start in the antiquarian book business."