Authors: Marilyn Yarbrough
An eye for an eye, and a
life for a life; her father had preached that lesson. She demanded the same payment
for the person who murdered her brother, even if she had to become just as
heartless and unfeeling as the rest of them to receive justice.
The only person for whom
she cared was Payton. Perhaps too much. He had popped into her life so
unexpectedly, so completely, that she’d had little time to put up any defenses.
He’d found a way into her heart, and she didn’t know how to push him back out. The
other night he’d admitted he cared for her, but she couldn’t allow him any
closer.
Betsy had become suspicious
of him. If she believed he was a threat to her son, his life could be in
danger. For his own good Julia had to get him out of Sacramento, perhaps even
out of California. She didn’t want him hurt by any of Dunbar’s people.
A single floorboard
squeaked in the hallway right outside the study. Her body jumped at the noise. She
came out of her stupor. Her alertness returned.
A regular household
member would make more noise in their passage down the hall. That meant someone
crept through the house and tried not to make a sound.
She shoved the contents
back into the envelope and returned it to the drawer in the exact spot she’d
found it. Just as she attempted to close the drawer, the study door opened. She
squatted down behind the desk and held her breath.
The barely audible
sounds of well oiled hinges working, along with soft footsteps shuffling over
the carpeted floor, indicated someone had entered the room. Then she heard her
name whispered.
“Payton?” She peered over
the top of the desk. He stood in the middle of the room, his fists planted on
his hips, and a smile on his lips. A gray shirt covered his broad shoulders.
Black trousers skimmed down his muscular legs.
“What are you doing here?”
she demanded in a hushed voice.
“I might ask you the
same question.”
She hurried to the door
and shut it completely. “You have no business being in here.”
Instead of being chagrined,
he looked amused. “Apparently, neither do you.”
“Don’t be absurd. I have
every right to be here.”
“Then why were you
hiding behind the desk?”
“I wasn’t hiding. I
dropped something,” she lied, but her annoyance quickly turned to concern. “How
did you get in here? Did anyone see you?”
“I came in the back door
by the kitchen.” He held up both hands and motioned for her to calm down. “Don’t
worry. No one saw me. I slipped past the cook while he had his back to me. He
was busy anyway, cutting up a chicken and swearing in French.”
“Good.” She let out a
sigh of relief. “Now you have to leave.” She tried to nudge him to the door,
but he stood his ground.
“Easy there, Angel. When
you didn’t show up in the park this morning, I became concerned. I decided to
come over to see if you were all right.” He furrowed his dark eyebrows together.
“I saw someone leaving in a rush just as I made the corner. That worried me even
more so I ducked out of sight until the carriage passed. Then I made my way to
the back of the house.”
The worried look
dissolved from his face. A smile played on his lips. “I was relieved when I
spotted your pretty blonde head bobbing up and down at the window, so I thought
I’d come in and surprise you.”
“Well, you did,” she said
with a huff. “Now please go.”
“First, I want you to
explain why you were hiding in here.” He grabbed the back of a chair to better
position it as an invitation for her to sit down.
“Don’t do that,” she
said frantically. She moved the chair so the legs fit back into the indentions
in the carpet. “Mrs. Collins will know if anything is disturbed.”
“Then why are you in
here if you’re so worried about her finding out?”
“I just needed to get
something from the—” She remembered the opened drawer. “Why don’t you go back
to the park? I’ll meet you there when I’m finished with my work.”
“Why don’t I help you?” His
playful smile caused the dimple in his cheek to become more prominent.
“That isn’t necessary.”
She put her body between him and the desk.
“What are you looking
for?” He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her aside so he could see
the desk.
When he reached into the
drawer and lifted a stack of papers, she grabbed his wrist. “Don’t touch
anything.”
His smile slipped. “Then
tell me what you’re up to.”
An explanation didn’t
seem like a good course of action. Payton had become so protective she knew he’d
object violently if he discovered the truth. Then he’d most likely find a way
to prevent her from continuing with her plan. On the other hand, he might want
to help. That she couldn’t allow. He had a way of blatantly confronting
obstacles. He didn’t seem to know the first thing about acting surreptitiously.
His aggressive manner would only attract trouble. Then he would get himself
hurt.
She decided to try one
of his tactics. “It’s none of your business.” She pushed the drawer shut and
locked it.
“Ah, when all else
fails, be rude.”
“Well, you’re forcing me
to behave that way. Can’t you just go? I’ll meet you in the park later.”
“Not until you explain a
few things.” His expression no longer looked playful. “I want to know what you’ve
gotten yourself into.”
Her only option was to
become just as obstinate. “I suppose being the captain of a ship makes you
unaccustomed to having your orders disobeyed, but need I remind you that I am
not one of your deckhands. And I am not in your employ. So do not attempt to
order me about.”
His eyelids narrowed,
and his lips thinned. He stepped closer to her. “Perhaps not, but you don’t
seem to realize you’re treading in dangerous water. I’m not about to let you get
sucked under by a deadly riptide. I think you’re working for Betsy Collins for
more than just the money. You’re involved in something, and I have a bad
feeling it’s connected to Larry Dunbar. I want to know what it is. Now.”
Shocked at his
accusation, she stared at him without speaking. His assumption of her activities
was so close to the truth she didn’t know what to say. If she admitted his
accuracy, he’d do everything in his power to prevent her from continuing with
her plan. He might even drag her off, kicking and screaming, as he’d threatened
to do the other night.
“How can you be so
unfair?” Her lower lip quivered. “I thought we agreed not to pry into to each
other’s private life. Your secrets are yours. I haven’t tried to take them away
from you. You have no right prying mine away from me.”
He took a deep breath
and let it out with a huff.
“Will you please leave?”
A long moment passed
before he relinquished. “All right, I’ll go. We can talk about this later.”
“No,” she said quickly. She
couldn’t risk letting him discover anything more. For his own good, he had to
leave California. “I don’t mean leave this house. I mean leave town. Go away
altogether. Go back to your ship.”
Julia put her hand to
her throat and pressed against it. She hoped to prevent her voice from quaking
when she delivered her final blow. “I want you out of my life completely.”
He stared at her, a
myriad of emotions playing across his face. She strove for just the opposite—no
expression at all.
“Is that what you really
want?”
“For you to go away? Yes.”
“Never let it be said
that I didn’t give a lady exactly what she wanted.” Anger flickered in his blue
eyes. His voice took on a harsher tone. “I’ll go away. Far away. Then you won’t
have to endure my prying into your life again. You can forget you ever knew me,
the same as I’m going to do with you.”
He bolted for the door. His
hand grasped the handle, but instead of opening it, he let go. Both hands dropped
to his sides. Without turning, he lowered his head and shook it from side to side.
“That’s not true,” he
said in a hushed voice. “Before I go, I want you to know one thing. I could
never forget you even if I put an entire ocean between us. All I’d have to do
is close my eyes and you’d be there.”
Tears gathered in her
eyes. She hoped he didn’t turn around. Otherwise, he would know she lied.
“I’ll only ask you once,”
he said over his shoulder. “Do you really want me out of your life?”
She pressed her hand
against her mouth to hold back a sob, but a cry broke in her throat.
When he turned back to
her, one look was apparently all he needed. He rushed to her. His arm slipped
around her waist. His other hand stroked across her face to wipe the wetness
from her cheeks. “Does this mean you don’t want me out of your life?”
“I wish I was stronger.”
She wrapped her arms around him. “Then I could fight harder to resist you.”
“You are strong, but in
a gentle way.” His finger pressed against her chin. He forced her to look into
his eyes. “I won’t try to pry any secrets out of you, but you have to promise
me that if you find yourself getting in too deep, you won’t hesitate to ask for
my help.”
“Thank you for being so
understanding, but you really have to go now. I mean, leave the house,” she
quickly clarified. “I’ll meet you in the park.”
He placed a kiss on her
damp cheek. “How soon can you be there?”
“I’ll have to wait until
Mrs. Collins returns.” She gripped his arm and ushered him to the study door. “I
don’t know how long she’ll be gone, though.”
“I think I know.” He cracked
open the door. His ear pressed to the opening. “She’s here now. It sounds like
Sylvia Morgan is with her.”
Her hand went over her
mouth to stifle a shriek. “If she finds us in here, I’ll surely be dismissed,”
she said in a strangled whisper.
He shrugged his
shoulders, as if resigned to just that fate. “Sounds like they’re coming this
way. They’ll spot us if we try to go out the door.”
After the emotional
scene she had just had with Payton, she couldn’t handle a confrontation with Betsy.
“We can go out the
window,” she said in a frantic attempt to put off the inevitable.
He smiled and shook his
head.
“Please help me,” she
begged. “I’ll do anything.”
One dark eyebrow arched
in contemplation. “Anything?”
“Yes.” She no longer cared
what that encompassed as long as she didn’t lose this job.
Without warning, he
swept her up into his arms. He walked briskly across the carpeted floor.
Julia had visions of him
throwing her bodily out the window. She only hoped he’d open it first. The
sensation of being tossed made her gasp. Her body traveled weightlessly through
the air for a moment. But instead of landing in the shrubbery outside the
window, she landed on the leather couch.
Payton followed.
“Get off me.” She pushed
at his body which sprawled over the top of her.
He gave her a look of
devilish delight. “You said you’d do anything.”
“I didn’t mean now.”
His hand thrust beneath
her petticoats. His fingers traveled up her stocking clad leg.
“Stop that,” she demanded
in a loud voice, no longer concerned with being discovered by Betsy.
He wrapped her leg
around his hips just as his mouth closed over the sensitive flesh on her neck.
She let out a squeal,
along with several unladylike remarks just as the door to the study burst open.
Chapter Fourteen
“Good God!” a voice said
from the doorway.
Payton lifted his head
from Julia’s neck and peered over his shoulder at the intruders.
Sylvia had her hand to
her mouth in an attempt to hide her laughter. Beside her stood a woman he
assumed to be Betsy Collins. Betsy did not look amused.
“What are you doing in
here?” she bellowed.
He moved into a sitting
position and pulled Julia up with him. “Given your prior profession, I’d think
it was fairly obvious what we were doing.”
“I can explain, Mrs. Collins.”
Julia moved her leg from Payton’s lap and pushed her skirt down over her ankles.
Betsy gave her a hard
look. “You know you’re not allowed in the study without my permission.”
“Yes, I know, but I, ah,...
We were, ah,...”
She directed her
frustration at Payton. The hem of her skirt was trapped under his leg. She tugged
at the material in an attempt to free it. When he didn’t move, she smacked his
arm with her fist.
Payton had never been
pleased with Julia working for Betsy. His first inclination was to say nothing
so she would be dismissed, but he’d promised his help.
He put his hand over the
spot she’d just punched and rubbed at it as though to relieve the pain. “You’re
a feisty little thing. I like that in a woman.”
She let out a huff. Her
hand slapped the top of his knee. She kept it there for leverage so she could
climb off the couch.
Angrily, she shook at
her skirt and petticoat. She glared at him while she fussed with her loose
strands that had pulled free of the circle of hair pinned at the nape of her
neck. He winked at her and hoped she realized he’d reverted to playacting
again.
“If your house was any
bigger,” he said to Betsy, “I might not have caught her. She gave me a merry
chase before I cornered her in here.”
“I believe I heard my
secretary protesting your advances when I came into the room.”
His lips curved into a slow,
lazy grin. “Women always say no when they mean yes. I like that. It makes the
blood burn hotter.”
Betsy hobbled across the
carpeted floor with the aid of an ebony colored cane. After she plopped down
into the chair behind her desk, she reached into a silver box. She pulled out a
slender, already rolled cigarette. “Care for one?” she asked Payton.
He watched her light it,
suck in a heavy draw, and break into a thick, wet cough. “No, thank you. I’ve
always considered smoking a dirty habit.”