He smiled tightly. ‘I like women well enough. For certain things, anyway. It’s just that I’ve stopped thinking of them in terms of forever after.’
‘I’m sure that news has broken a lot of hearts,’ she said coolly. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me…’
His fingers curled more closely around her wrist. He moved nearer and she backed away instinctively, until her shoulders were pressed against the closed door to her flat.
‘What is it, Hannah? Have you forgotten that there’s some value to male-female relationships?’ He smiled. ‘For instance,’ he said, and before she could move or turn away he bent and ran his mouth lightly over hers.
Hannah caught her breath. ‘Don’t!’
‘Why not?’ he whispered. ‘Hell, if you don’t need this sort of thing, then it shouldn’t upset you.’
There was something very wrong with his reasoning, but there was something even more wrong with what was happening to her as his mouth, cool and smooth as silk, drifted across her skin. Her breath was quickening and a warmth that was soft and almost liquid was spreading through her bones.
‘Grant?’
He gathered her into his arms. ‘What?’ he said thickly, and his mouth dropped to hers again. She was waiting for the kiss. Her lips opened to his, and his tongue stole slowly into her mouth.
He murmured her name as he slid his hands under her jacket. She felt the heat of his fingers against her midriff, then on the underswell of her breasts, and when she groaned he caught the sound in his mouth and deepened the kiss.
‘Hannah,’ he whispered. His hands slid up her throat and framed her face. ‘Hannah…’
She spun away from him and turned the doorknob. Grant could have stopped her, she knew that. He was quick and strong, and she was no match for him physically. But he let her go, and when she slammed the door and fell safely back against it, trembling, her one coherent thought was that it was a damned good thing her relationship with Grant MacLean was about to be history.
Hannah felt some concern about going to work the next morning, enough that she thought about phoning the office and telling Grant she’d changed her mind about giving him two weeks to replace her.
But she needed a decent reference if she was to get another job anywhere near as good as this one, and she knew Grant far too well to think he’d give her one if she walked out and left him in the lurch.
And so she showered and dressed as if this were any other morning, even though her stomach was in knots. She clipped back her hair, dabbed a pale lipstick over her mouth, and strode out of the door, prepared to meet whatever lay ahead.
It was almost anti-climactic to find that nothing did. There was a note on her desk, terse and to the point. Grant had been called to Washington, DC on business. He would return by the week’s end. In his absence, she was to deal with the following items.
He had left her a month’s worth of work to be done in four days, which came as no real surprise. She’d half assumed he’d make her final two weeks hell, either to make sure she had no time to sneak off for interviews with prospective employers or simply to please himself. Well, she thought as she settled in at her desk, that was fine. The school at which she’d studied ran its own placement office. One phone call would set up several interviews when she was ready.
In the meantime, she’d work as hard as she always had.
On Wednesday morning, Sally appeared in the doorway, bearing an envelope embossed with the Longworth, Hart, Holtz and MacLean logo.
‘For you,’ she said, handing it over with a flourish. ‘Special from Mr Longworth himself.’
It was an invitation to a formal dinner the firm was giving on Friday evening for the Hungarian delegation.
‘Just look at that,’ Sally said, rolling her eyes. ‘Can you imagine?’
Hannah couldn’t, but when she tried, very politely, to tell that to Mr Longworth, the old man put his arm around her shoulders.
‘Didn’t MacLean tell you that the Hungarian ladies were impressed with you?’
‘He mentioned it,’ she said. ‘But——’
‘Well, then,’ he said with a paternal smile, ‘what’s the problem, Hannah? Surely you’re not going to let them down.’
Surely you’re not going to let us down, was what he meant. She was tempted to tell him that it wouldn’t matter, that in another ten days she’d be gone, but she thought better of it. She was still an employee of the firm. Besides, such an evening might prove beneficial. Who knew what kinds of employment contacts she could make?
If only it didn’t mean spending an evening pretending to be pleasant to Grant, especially under the cold scrutiny of his partners, not to mention Magda Karolyi.
‘It’s especially important you attend, Hannah, now that MacLean’s stuck in Washington.’
Her head came up. ‘Is he?’
Mr Longworth nodded. ‘I’ve just been on the phone with him. The trade commission’s giving us a bad time. He won’t be back until Monday.’
Hannah smiled. ‘In that case,’ she said, ‘how can I say no?’
Mr Longworth insisted she buy a dress and charge it to the firm. ‘It’s not an expense you need assume, Hannah,’ he said in kindly tones, and Hannah knew he was suggesting, in the most diplomatic way possible, that she might not own something suitable for such an elegant evening.
‘And he’s right,’ she told Sally, who’d agreed to help her find a dress.
‘Let’s get something that’ll knock their socks off,’ Sally said as they poked through the rack in a little shop during the lunch hour.
In the end, they compromised, choosing neither the calf-length black jersey Hannah had selected nor the tiny, sequin-studded concoction Sally sighed over but, instead, a dress in chocolate velvet, with a short skirt and a deep V of a bodice.
Too short—and too deep, Hannah thought now, as she stood before her mirror on Friday evening. The dress was stunning, she had to admit that. It was beautiful and feminine; it even softened the look of her oversized glasses. But there wasn’t enough of it. The neckline was cut down to there, the skirt up to here—and, in between, the velvety fabric clung to her every curve.
She glanced at the clock. The firm was sending a limousine for her, but she had ten minutes to spare. Surely there was something else in her closet, a dressy suit or——
The doorbell pealed.
Hannah blew out her breath as she hurried to the door. ‘You’re early,’ she said as she yanked it open. ‘And I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to wait while I change my…’ Her words trickled to silence. It was not a uniformed chauffeur who stood in the doorway, it was Grant, dark and tall and incredibly handsome in a black dinner-jacket.
‘Good evening, Hannah.’
‘What—what are you doing here?’
He smiled. ‘I’ve come to take you to the party.’
‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘No, that’s—it’s impossible. You’re in Washington.’
‘I assure you,’ he said, his smile broadening, ‘I’m here. May I come in?’
She stepped back, speechless, and he moved past her, his arm just brushing hers, bringing with him a faint drift of cool night air and lemony cologne.
‘I don’t understand,’ she said slowly. ‘Mr Longworth said——’
‘I managed to tie things up sooner than expected.’ She watched as he strolled slowly through the tiny living-room, pausing now and then to glance at one of the framed prints on the wall or to brush his hand lightly over some of the little glass animal figures she collected. ‘No lions, I see,’ he said with a little smile.
Hannah blinked. ‘No what?’
‘Lions. Which reminds me, Tommy sends his love and says Brian is just fine.’
‘Brian?’ she echoed foolishly.
‘Brian the Lion.’ Grant swung towards her and smiled. ‘Marilyn swears she had nothing to do with naming the creature.’
Lions. Tommy. Marilyn. It was all to much to comprehend, especially when she was still trying to
deal with the fact that she was, apparently, going to have to spend the evening in Grant’s company.
Or did she?
Hannah smiled brightly. ‘Well,’ she said pleasantly, ‘I’m glad to see you made it back in time for the dinner party.’
He smiled again, but differently this time, in a way that made her breath suddenly uneven. She felt the weight of his gaze as it swept over her, lingering on her face, her breasts, the long length of leg visible beneath the ridiculously short skirt of her dress.
‘Are you?’ he said softly.
‘Yes. Of course.’ She cleared her throat. ‘I was only going because you weren’t. Well, I mean, Mr Longworth felt it was important that one of us be there, but now that you’re back——’
‘Get your wrap, Hannah.’
Her smile wavered a little. ‘You didn’t let me finish,’ she said. ‘You’re here, you see, so I——’
She fell silent as he moved towards her. When he reached her he stopped, looked into her eyes and gave her a cool smile.
‘Do you still want that letter of reference?’ he asked.
And that was how she came to be standing on a terrace outside a small, exclusive club in Sausalito, overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge and the San Francisco skyline, several hours later.
It was midnight, which meant the evening was almost over and she could afford to relax. Somehow, perhaps because she’d come to the party accompanied by Grant, her role this evening had taken on a new dimension and she’d found herself at the centre of one group or another all night, with Grant at her side, his arm lying lightly around her waist or her shoulders. Now, with few guests remaining, she’d finally been able to slip away for a quiet moment and a breath of cool night air.
She felt as if she’d been riding a roller-coaster. You could shout and scream, but the ride kept going. The best you could do was hang on for dear life—and perhaps find, at the end, that you’d had fun.
She sighed as she leaned her arms on the railing. And she had, that was the amazing thing. She’d been stiff with indignation at first, but how indignant could you be when you were at a party where the guests were charming, the conversation stimulating, the food delicious…?