Three Marie Ferrarella Romances Box Set One (42 page)

“Then you did miss me,” he said against her ear, his hot breath making her pulse throb erratically and her body plead to be his.

But Pat had thought with her mind, not her emotions, for so long that there was still a thread of resolve left to cling to. And she did.

She stepped back. “Blaise, I don’t know what you’re trying to do—“

He stopped, then smiled that engaging grin of his, his eyes sensual. “I thought I was making it pretty clear. Just let me go on showing you,” he urged, coming toward her again. “You’ll catch on soon enough.”

Pat put up her hands, making a barrier in front of her. “I don’t want to ‘catch on,’” she lied. “I want to produce the Hamilton jet.”

“In here?” he asked, looking around the blue and mocha room. “How small are the businessmen using this jet supposed to be?”

“Stop laughing at me,” she ordered with a pleading note in her voice. “I’m serious.”

She slipped the nightgown back up, hiding her nakedness from his sight while he gazed at her unabashedly. She could feel the blush going up to the roots of her hair. Blaise had a habit of bringing springtime back into her life, a time when her innocence was still intact and the world was a lot lighter and happier.

“So am I,” he said under his breath. “Yes,” he said aloud, taking her hands in his, but this time it was a comforting gesture of friendship. “I know you are.” He gazed at her for a moment, as if shifting his thoughts around.

“Which is why,” he continued, his eyes kind, “you’re going to have a party.”

“A party?” she echoed in surprise. “What is it that I’m supposed to be celebrating?” she asked, wondering what he was up to now.

“Hopefully, money,” he said dryly.

“Does this riddle have an answer?” she asked, her heart still throbbing violently.

“You are going to be entertaining the about-to-be investors in Roger’s brainchild,” Blaise said, sitting down on her lounge chair in the corner of the room.

“Shouldn’t I meet them in a board meeting?” she asked, careful not to sit near Blaise.

“All in good time, Lady Pat. First, we see them through a wineglass and make nice to them. Friendly people can be touched for money much more easily than unfriendly people,” he said.

“But I haven’t time for a party,” she protested, rising from the edge of her bed and standing in front of him.

“Have you time for bankruptcy?” he asked evenly, looking up at her.

She cast her eyes down, staring at the carpet. “No.”

“Then you have time for a party. Tomorrow night,” he said. “The invitations are already out,” he added.

She looked at him in surprise. “How did you—?”

“Never ask me how. I have my ways, Lady Pat,” he said, lacing his fingers together and resting his head against them as he watched her. “You shouldn’t wear things like that. A gunnysack would be far better,” he said, “if you want to be left alone.”

“I don’t usually have parades coming through my room,” she said evenly.

“Lucky thing,” he replied as he rose and went to the door. “You rained on mine.” He stopped in the doorway. “Oh, by the way, I think I have a country for you.”

Her eyes grew wide as she fairly bounced across the room to the door, putting her hand on his to stop his exit. “Wait a minute!” she cried. “What country? Explain!”

But the look on Blaise’s face was mischievous. “I’m tired. I just flew back,” he said mysteriously. “And all this resistance has sapped my strength,” he said, stretching before her. The movement was slow, purposeful, and utterly sensual. “We’ll talk in the morning,” he said, and left.

Pat slammed the door behind him in frustration. She heard him laugh softly as the door to his own room closed.

This had to be a ploy to get her to come to him, she thought. At times, his ruthless teasing was too exasperating to bear.

Angelica came through like a trooper the next evening.

When Pat came home from the plant at three-thirty, she found that Blaise had called in a maid service and had placed three young girls under Angelica’s direction, telling her just what he wanted done. Normally, Angelica did not like having anyone dictate her movements, but Pat noted that she acquiesced to Blaise’s requests easily enough. The house was suitably decorated for the occasion, and food was being brought in from a restaurant that specialized in exotic dishes.

“Houston Fields is a gourmand,” Blaise explained to Pat as she looked questioningly at him when the caterer hurried past her into the kitchen. She grasped his arm in time to keep from being trampled by two men carrying in trays of hors d’oeuvres.

Blaise did not seem to mind in the slightest as he smiled down at Pat while one of the maids looked on enviously. “Not now, Lady Pat,” he said playfully.

She shot him an annoyed look, and the maid quickly hurried out of the living room.

“Well, at least I know the name of one of my guests,” she said flippantly.

“I’ll fill you in on the others while I help you dress for dinner,” Blaise offered, about to follow her out of the room.

Pat turned, standing her ground firmly. “I’ve been getting myself dressed ever since I was in the first grade,” she said.

“And hasn’t it been lonely?” he asked devilishly.

“Blaise Hamilton,” Pat said, half-amused and half-desperate, “you are the most impossible man I have ever run into!”

“Good,” he said, coming after her. “Now shall we go?” he asked, taking her elbow.

“I go,” she said in slow, deliberate fashion. “You stay,” she said, pointing to his chest.

Blaise snapped his fingers. “Foiled again. Okay, then take a bubble bath.”

“A what?”

“You know, that luxurious thing movie stars are always doing,” he prompted.

She cocked her head. “Why?” she asked suspiciously.

“To make you feel sexier,” he replied, a smile playing on his lips.

“It’s the jet we want to fly, not me,” she responded dryly.

“You fly what you want,” Blaise said, his eyes caressing her, “and I’ll fly what I want. Besides, Fields likes his women feminine.”

“I’m not anyone’s woman,” she said archly.

“Yes you are,” he said softly.

She threw up her hands and walked out.

“The bubble bath is on the sink in your bathroom,” Blaise called after her, stepping out of the way of a delivery man. “Half an hour should do it.”

“So now you’re an expert on bubble baths,” she said with a mocking tone as she turned back to look at him.

The look on Blaise’s face was positively wicked. “I’ve shared a lot,” he said.

Pat turned away without another word.

She had no intention of taking a bubble bath, meaning to shower quickly and be ready.
 
But Blaise and Angelica seemed to have everything under control, so, half out of boredom, half out of a desire to recapture a time when she was free to take long bubble baths, she poured the pink crystals into the sunken Grecian tub and watched the suds seductively rise up to her touch.

Tying her sunlight-brown hair up on top of her head with a ribbon, Pat gingerly slid into the steaming hot water, letting it erode the tense, tired ache from her body. Slowly, ever so slowly, she relaxed and let the bath work its magic. She closed her eyes and allowed herself to let go completely for the first time since Roger’s death. Blaise did have something here, she admitted grudgingly.

It was only after she had opened her eyes and returned to the present that she realized the noise that had roused her was the soft turning of her bathroom doorknob. She smiled in satisfaction, having locked the door before she had gotten into the tub.

“It’s locked,” she called out triumphantly.

“Playing hard-to-get only makes the sport more interesting,” Blaise said with a laugh. “Enjoying yourself?”

“Yes,” she replied.

“Good. Knew you would. Sure you don’t want your back scrubbed?” he offered, his voice sexy.

“No!”

“How about your front?”

Someone like Blaise was not above picking locks! “Blaise, if you don’t leave this instant, I’ll scream!”

“No, that only happens during . . . not before,” he said seductively, then paused. “Okay, I’ll retreat. “ She heard him go—she thought.

It was a long time before Pat left the luxury of the tub. By then, the water was cold and had lost its magic. She got out and quickly toweled herself dry, then put on her bathrobe, leaving the shelter of the bathroom carefully. She looked behind her door, expecting Blaise to pop out.

When he didn’t, she felt a little foolish, but told herself that her actions were justified. Blaise was totally unpredictable.

As she made her way through the bedroom, a question that had been raised at the press conference came to mind. A reporter had wanted to know about competition between Hamilton and other manufacturers of small passenger planes. It wasn’t so farfetched an idea that one of them could be behind Blaise’s sudden appearance. Curtailing or completely sabotaging the Eagle’s production would benefit a lot of people in the short range, she thought angrily, becoming that much more determined to withstand Blaise’s attentions. She felt it wise not to ignore the possibility of his covert deceitfulness.

She dressed carefully, wanting to create a good appearance at the party. If these were truly investors who were popping up on her doorstep— and where had Blaise found them when all her pleadings had yielded polite “maybes” at best?— when she wanted her chance at them, no matter what Blaise really had in mind. She chose a shimmering silver-blue floor-length dress with long, straight sleeves and one suggestive slit that traveled practically the length of her left leg. The neckline was deeply cut in the back, showing off her fine, sculptured shoulder blades, and had a slight V neck in the front.
 
She brushed her hair down and then back, adding height to her appearance.

“Very nice,” Blaise said when she joined him in the living room. He was issuing last-minute orders to the three maids while Angelica was busy in the kitchen, setting things up undoubtedly to please herself.

“Thank you,” Pat murmured, pleased at his simple words.

“The dress is nice too,” he added, a wicked twinkle dancing in his eyes.

Pat laughed, looking at him fondly for a moment. “I don’t remember, were you always this glibly charming and free with your compliments?”

“Yes and no,” he said. She thought he looked particularly handsome, silhouetted by the light from the white stone fireplace. The few dimly lit lamps added to the intimate mood. She tried to concentrate on his words and not the effect he was having on her. “I was always charming. The nurse told my mother I was the most charming baby in the nursery,” he said, his full lips given to a smile.

“You probably made a pass at her,” she said, trying to lapse into light cheerfulness.

“But,” he continued, ignoring her comment. “I am not always free with my compliments. I bestow them only when they’re appropriate—and you are a vision,” he said, holding out her hands as if to drink in the full picture she made.

Pat refused to take his words seriously. “That line might have worked twenty years ago, but I know better now. The tragedy of life is that men grow better-looking as they grow older and women just grow older,” she said with a sigh.

“Need I remind you yet again of that commercial about getting better?”

“That’s just to sell a product,” she said, tossing the comment aside.

“You, Lady Pat, could sell any product you wanted,” he said, and the way he said it, she could almost believe him. “Some people,” he said, and she realized that he still had her hands and was not letting go, “like their women older.”

“Boy scout instincts, no doubt.”

“No one could ever accuse me of being a boy scout,” he said, and Pat had to smile. “And there is something fascinating about a woman who has seen a little of life. She has maturity and experience and is not a mere giggling ingenue,” he said seriously. “At twenty, there’s just the rosebud, the blush on the bloom that is to come. At your age, the promise that was is just beginning to be fulfilled,” he said, his eyes tender with a hint of something that she could not quite believe.

He took her into his arms, and this time the idea of resistance was far from Pat’s mind. His eyes sparkled as his lips brushed gently against hers, as if he was taking care not to smudge her lipstick.

“How come they haven’t made you emperor of the world yet?” she murmured, trying to deny her “ingénue-like” racing pulse.

“I’m working on it,” he replied, his voice enticing and low against her ear.

But the doorbell rang and terminated what might have come to pass. Blaise released her, suddenly becoming the worldwide financier about to entertain prospective investors.

Reluctantly, she gave up the lover who had been next to her only a moment before and joined Blaise at the door to greet her guests.

Houston Fields was a tall, wide man with a gusto for living and an even greater one for eating. He arrived with an entourage of men who were his business associates and friends, one condition depending upon the other. They brought their wives. Everyone in the party seemed to know Blaise.

Pat wondered if there was anyone whom Blaise did not know, as he led her through the introductions. Houston’s wife, Eloisa, was a Eurasian with lovely, almond eyes and a quiet, regal bearing that could easily have belonged to a princess. She and the women kept discreetly quiet while male voices were raised in friendly comaraderie. They sipped wine politely and partook of the hors d’oeuvres while a five-piece orchestra, bathed in the light from the glowing fireplace, provided soft, dreamy music.

Dinner was a success and all appeared to be going smoothly.

Houston Fields was the center of attention, a position he was used to by virtue of his girth, his millions, and his booming voice. He had, to Pat’s relief, an amazing sense of humor. The first time he slapped his knee in merriment, Pat thought he was going to knock over the table. It was barely steadied in time.

Eventually, over after-dinner drinks and dessert, the matter of the Eagle was brought up. Houston cast a round, tiny eye at Pat, as if studying her critically.

“So this paper bird of yours can really fly?” he asked, his voice suddenly serious. Business had a way of sobering everything, Pat thought as she nodded.