Desdemona tried to summon up some genuine enthusiasm. The last thing she wanted to do today was rain on Kirsten's parade. “The shop is wonderful, Kirsten. It turned out just the way you said it would. Very tasteful. Very upscale.”
“Tony programmed my computer for me. He's got a super inventory system on it. Low stock is highlighted in purple. Sales taxes are calculated in green. I've even got an e-mail capability.”
Desdemona smiled wanly. “Now that I've finally learned how to use e-mail, we'll be able to send each other messages.” The thought depressed her further. The only reason she had bothered to learn how to send and receive e-mail was because Stark had programmed her personal digital assistant to do so.
“I know Exotica Erotica is going to work.” Kirsten glowed with excitement. “And I have you to thank for giving me this chance. Just think, the Wainwrights now have another stable business in the family. How can I ever thank you?”
“Forget it.” Holding the book in one hand, Desdemona gave Kirsten a quick hug. “It was the least I could do. I haven't forgotten all the free labor you and Henry gave me when I opened Right Touch. I couldn't have made it without you. We're family, Kirsten. Wainwrights stick together.”
“Yes.” Kirsten froze in mid hug, her attention fixed on an object located somewhere behind Desdemona. “Well, well, well.”
“What is it?” Desdemona stepped back. She frowned at the expression on Kirsten's face. Then she turned and followed her friend's gaze.
Stark stood in the doorway of Exotica Erotica. He was dressed in his customary uniform: worn corduroy jacket, jeans, and running shoes. The familiar plastic protector full of pens, pencils, and other assorted objects was in the pocket of his white shirt. Behind the lenses of his glasses, his brilliant green eyes were unfathomable.
He looked wonderful to Desdemona.
He was here
.
“Stark.”
He turned his head in her direction as if he had actually heard her over the din of voices. He saw her and resolutely started toward her.
Henry materialized at Desdemona's elbow. “I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes.”
“I told you so,” Desdemona said with great satisfaction. “Wainwright intuition is never wrong.”
For the first time since last night she allowed herself to acknowledge just how anxious she had been. It was all very well to talk glibly about Wainwright intuition. The truth was, she had not really been sure that Stark would come through. She had a feeling that she had just rolled the dice in a desperate game.
Stark came to a halt directly in front of her. “I'll take the job.”
“You won't regret it.” Desdemona hugged him tightly.
He seemed briefly startled. But his arms closed around her with such force that Desdemona knew the contents of his pocket protector would leave imprints on her skin.
A
great, surging wave of relief rolled through Stark. It left him feeling dazed. He crushed Desdemona closer. She still wanted him. He could feel it in the way she clung to him.
He could also feel something hard pressing against his lower back. He realized that the edge of the spine of the book she had been holding in her hand was digging into him. He ignored the discomfort.
“I was afraid you weren't going to show,” she confided into his shirtfront.
“I can't make any promises,” he warned, his voice rough with the need to make certain she understood.
“I know.” She raised her head. “But the fact that you're here means you're willing to look for the truth. That's all I ask.”
Stark gazed at her, so damned relieved by the welcome he had just received that he could not think of anything to say. She looked so good, so right, he thought with a sense of wonder. And he had come so close to losing her. The realization chilled him.
Tony appeared, stuffing a cracker loaded with dip into his mouth. He glared at Stark over Desdemona's head. “Just what do you think he'll find, kid? Even if he does decide that someone else had an equally good motive and opportunity, he won't give a damn. He'll still believe that I did it. Nothing is going to change his mind because he doesn't want to change it.”
“That's not true.” Desdemona straightened the black satin lapels of her tuxedo jacket as she stepped back from Stark. “Once he starts looking at other suspects, he'll find the real thief. I know he will.”
“Bullshit. He'll pretend to do some sort of superficial investigation because he knows you won't let him sleep with you if he doesn't at least act like he's doing something.”
“That's enough, Tony,” Desdemona said very tightly. Red flags appeared in her cheeks, but her eyes were steady and her chin was firm.
Tony's mouth tightened. “What if, after his phony investigation, he tells you that I'm definitely the one who tried to get at his precious hard disk? What will you do then?”
“It'll never happen,” she assured him.
“Don't be too sure of that. Tell me, kid, what will you do if your android lover decides that you're involved, too? That we're all involved?”
Desdemona's flush deepened. “Tony, stop it.”
Stark eyed Tony with some interest for the first time. He recalled the conversation he'd had with Dane over lunch. The concept of the Wainwrights as a crime family was hard to swallow, but it was not at all difficult to envision young Tony as a member of what had once been termed the criminal class.
“I don't want to hear any more of this,” Desdemona said brusquely. “You're spoiling my whole afternoon.”
“My day isn't going so good, either.” Tony smiled thinly. “Like they say in Hollywood, I've got a hot concept for you.”
“What concept?” Desdemona asked.
“Try this, kid. There never was any attempted theft.”
Desdemona frowned. “What are you saying?”
“That Stark faked the whole thing.” Tony shrugged. “That no one tried to get inside his damned computer. That Stark invented the story.”
“That's ridiculous.” Desdemona's eyes widened in shock. “Why on earth would he do such a thing?”
“To get me out of the picture,” Tony said softly. “He wants you all to himself, kid. He doesn't like the idea of sharing you. And he thinks he's found a way to get rid of the competition.”
“Tony,” Desdemona sounded desperate. “Shut up.”
“Don't let him turn you against your family, Desdemona,” Tony said. “Remember, you're a Wainwright. The only thing Wainwrights have ever been able to count on is each other.”
He turned on his heel and walked out of the shop.
Stark watched him leave. “You know something? I'm getting real tired of his exit scenes.”
“Never mind him. He's under a lot of stress.” Desdemona grabbed Stark's hand and led him toward the buffet table. “Have some food. Doesn't the shop look terrific?”
Stark studied a display of condom packages artfully arranged amid a bed of artificial flowers. “It's different, I'll say that for it.”
“And look at the size of the crowd.”
“Desdemona, I'd like to talk to you for a few minutes.”
“Okay.” She picked up a small circle of toast layered with some sort of purple-gray spread. “Want some eggplant?”
“I don't have a lot of time.” He glanced at his watch. “Kyle and Jason will be home soon. I have to fix an early dinner. I told them I'd take them to my gym later.”
“The gym?”
“I'm going to see that they get some exercise this summer.” He shrugged. “They're both a little scrawny.”
“What are you planning to fix for dinner?”
“For dinner? Damned if I know. Maybe I'll send out for pizza again.”
“I'm starting to worry about your diet, Stark.”
“You and me both. Personally I've had enough pizza to last a lifetime, but Kyle and Jason are addicted to it. Desdemona, will you step outside for a few minutes? I want to talk to you in private.”
She gave him a sidelong glance, as if trying to assess his intentions. “All right.”
Stark took her arm and turned her toward the door. Before he could reach it, Ian Ivers bounced into his path.
Ian looked very much the same as he had the first time Stark had met him. He was wearing stylishly full taupe trousers and a silk shirt that was the same shade as Desdemona's eggplant dip. His thinning hair was in a neat ponytail, and the gold ring in his ear glittered.
“Hey, there, Stark. Good to see you again. Say, did you get a chance to look over that proposal for financing
Dissolving
? I hand-delivered it to your secretary a few days ago.”
“I haven't looked at it.”
“No problem.” Ian was undaunted. “Tell you what, I'll schedule a meeting so that we can go over it together.”
“Don't bother.”
“Backing a play is a little different than making other kinds of investments. I'll explain some of the ins and outs. Trust me, this one's a winner. Tony's script is fabulous. It's gonna rip the guts right out of the audience.”
“Sounds messy. I'm not interested.”
Ian fluttered slightly, but he did not lose his smile. “Hey, I know this isn't a good place to talk. But I'll schedule something with your secretary.”
Stark lost his patience. He walked straight past Ian and took Desdemona with him.
He finally got her outside. They came to a halt on the sidewalk in front of Exotica Erotica. Desdemona leaned back against the brick wall, one knee bent so that her small boot was braced. She looked up at him expectantly.
Stark tried to think of a subtle way to ask the question he needed to ask. “We've agreed that I'm going to look for another suitable suspect.”
“Yes.”
“In exchange, you're going to give me free catering services.”
“Right.” Her eyes gleamed.
Now what? Stark wondered. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jacket and gazed moodily at the bag lady who was investigating the contents of a nearby garbage can. “What about us?”
“Us?”
“Our relationship,” he said very carefully.
“Oh, that,” Desdemona said.
He turned back to face her. “Well?”
She pursed her lips and looked down at the book in her hand. “I've been thinking about that.”
“And?”
“And I'm wondering if we shouldn't put the personal side of our relationship on hold until we've settled our other problems.”
Stark felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him. “I see.”
“The thing is,” she continued very earnestly. “We're in this pickle because we mixed the business and the personal. They're all tangled up together at the moment.”
“Yes. They are.” Chaos.
“It might be simpler if we untangled them for a while.”
For some reason, perhaps because he did not know where else to look, Stark glanced at the title of the book she clutched.
Secrets of the Female Orgasm
. The memory of the way she had climaxed beneath him the other night crashed through him. He took a deep breath.
“You think it might be simpler to get your next one out of a book?” he asked. “Or to use one of those gadgets Kirsten gave you?”
She frowned. “My next what?”
“Orgasm.”
She blinked. Then she turned a lovely shade of pink and glanced hastily down at the book she held. “Good heavens, Stark. What a thing to say in public.”
“I seem to recall that you made a very public speech on the subject in the hallway of your own apartment building.”
“Yes, well, I was not myself at the time. I was feeling a little giddy.”
Something in her voice told him that she might be teasing him, but he could not be certain. He wished he could read her more clearly, but he had never been very good at reading women.
Stark took one hand out of his pocket and flattened it against the wall beside her head. The bricks felt warm and pleasantly rough beneath his palm. He could smell the faint fragrance of Desdemona's shampoo and the enticing scent of her body. He wanted her. God, how he wanted her. What was he going to do when he had to tell her that he could not find another suitable suspect?
“I know it's messy trying to combine the business and the personal,” he said quietly. “But my specialty is complexity, remember?”
“This is not a mathematical problem.”
“I have to know where I stand, Desdemona. Please don't play games with me.”
She searched his eyes intently. “You're telling me that you want us to continue with the personal side of our relationship even though this other thing is going on?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He stared at her, uncomprehending. “Why?”
She nodded and looked expectant again.
Stark had no idea what he was supposed to say next. “What kind of a question is that? I want you, and I think you want me. We're attracted to each other. We have been from the beginning. Isn't it obvious?”
She sighed. “Yes, I suppose it is.”
He knew he had failed to give her the answer that she wanted, but he had no idea of what to do about it. He flicked an impatient glance at his wristwatch. Macbeth would be on his way home with Kyle and Jason.
“I have to go,” he said. “Is this thing settled or not?”
“Gee, Stark. It's tough to know how to respond to such a romantic proposition.”
A jolt of raw, primitive fear threatened to tear his insides to pieces. “I'm screwing this up, aren't I?”
“I wouldn't go that far, but I would have to say that you're not showing a great deal of finesse.”
“Damn. I'm sorry.” He fought to slam the lid back down on the boiling cauldron. “I wish I knew a better way to handle it. I don't know how else to ask the question except straight out. Do you want to go on with this affair? Yes or no.”
Without any warning she gave him her most dazzling smile. “Yes.”
He sucked in his breath, momentarily warmed by the laughter in her face. Cautiously he removed his palm from the wall. The lid was safely back in place. “Okay. Thanks. That's all I wanted to know.” He glanced at his watch once more.
Desdemona opened her mouth to say something, but at that instant Henry came out of the shop. He held a black and gold box in one hand.
“Hi, Stark. How's it going?”
“Fine,” Stark said.
“Glad you could make the opening.” Henry came to a halt. “What do you think of Kirsten's shop?”
“Very interesting.” Stark reflected briefly on Desdemona's position as cosigner on the loan papers. “Let's hope it works.”
“It will. Kirsten will give it her all, and I'll help her. So will the other members of the family.” Henry tossed the black and gold box into the air and caught it neatly. “Desdemona tells me you're working for her these days.”
“Working for her?” Stark glanced at Desdemona, whose expression turned suspiciously demure. “I hadn't thought about it in quite those terms.”
“You'll be glad to know she's a great boss. Here.” Henry tossed the box in Stark's direction. “Compliments of the management.”
Stark caught the box and saw that he held a package of multicolored condoms. “I don't know what to say.”
“Don't say anything,” Henry advised. “Just prove that Tony didn't try to filch your hard disk.” He disappeared back into the crowded shop.
Stark dropped the package of condoms into his coat pocket. He looked at Desdemona again. “I'll call you.”
“Okay.”
“My evenings are a little tight these days. I don't like to leave Jason and Kyle at night any more than is absolutely necessary.”
She smiled. “How about your mornings?”
“Mornings?”
“You can stop by my place after Macbeth picks up Jason and Kyle for the day. I'll fix you some blue-corn pancakes.”
“Stop by your place?” His brain seemed to have short-circuited. “In the mornings?”