Lady Be Bad (14 page)

Marlayna's eyes widened with interest. "When
was that?"

"Six months ago. I tried getting information
out of the lawyer you used and failed. Since he was in Chicago,
that's where I concentrated on looking for you, but you seemed to
have disappeared from the face of the earth.

"I had detectives check out all the
hospitals and medical labs, thinking that you were probably doing
the same kind of work, but they found nothing. Physically, I was
improving and maneuvering better. Professionally, working on a
project with King Arthur turned out to be a bonanza. But
emotionally, I remained a cripple, growing more and more morose
when I couldn't find you."

Noah chuckled, his tone self-deprecating.
"My black moods, Gwen calls them. I have one drink too many, just
sit and stare, agree to anything. That's how I ended up engaged to
Arthur's daughter."

He shook his head, as if to clear it, and
then smiled. "When I saw you standing in that hallway, my every
dream, every prayer instantly came true. A miracle. A beautiful
miracle."

His fingers pushed through her hair, his
tough, callous flesh caressed by silken curls. "I'm so thankful
that you didn't share my nightmare, Mimi, that you were able to
build and enjoy a new life."

"Build and enjoy a new life." Marlayna
repeated his words. "Build and enjoy? Build and enjoy!" As her tone
grew louder, the phrase sounded hollower. She slid out of his
embrace. "Damn you, Noah Drake!" Her balled fist slammed into the
mattress, sending shock waves rippling beneath their bodies. "I
haven't enjoyed one damn day in six stinking years. Building a new
life? I didn't do it. Someone else did it for me."

His brown eyes widened, then narrowed. "What
in hell…I don't…" Noah stammered, then caught his breath. "I think
…"

"Maybe you shouldn't," she snapped at him.
"Maybe you should shut up and listen." In a defensive gesture,
Marlayna protectively clothed her body in the pink eyelet sheet.
Her angry expression silently forbade any further
interruptions.

When she spoke again, her voice was much
calmer. "You know that magazine cover I showed you?" Noah nodded.
"Well, that is me." His upturned palms were a sign of confusion.
Marlayna made a guttural sound and tried to clarify. "I've been
nothing more than a picture of a woman. Flat. One-dimensional. More
shades of gray than black and white and, unlike that photo, I never
had any color.

"I smiled on cue. I pouted on cue. I was a
lump of shapeless dough that people molded into the particular form
that was needed that day. I enjoyed nothing. Not food. Not clothes.
Not people. Not places. Each day was a duplicate of the one before
— cloudy, overcast, heavy. No matter what the season, that was my
atmosphere. And the perfect description of my life."

Marlayna reached for a bed pillow and hugged
it close. "The outer me looked perfectly normal while the inner me,
the real me, was shattered into pieces. You said I was strong. You
said I was secure. Well, I wasn't. I broke. I cracked. I ran
away.

"I tried to get in and see you; the security
guards threatened to arrest me. None of the doctors or nurses would
tell me a damn thing. I wrote frantic, pleading notes that you
never answered. Then your lawyer showed up, with his nasty manners
and crass insinuations. All our friends suddenly vanished. No one
wanted me." She swallowed hard, resolutely trying to halt the
formation of tears. "And, silly little me, I kept wanting you."

Noah's chin hit against his chest, his voice
a thick, low whisper. "I still feel I made the right decision. Even
if you had managed to get in to see me, at that point, nothing
could have made me change my plans."

She raised her head, her tone defiant and
harsh. "Nothing? How about learning that your wife was
pregnant?"

The silence was deafening. Marlayna watched
and waited. Noah was staring at her. He made no other movement.
Even his chest had stopped rising and falling. He didn't seem to be
breathing. She focused on his face and slowly a myriad of emotions
were unleashed.

He looked stunned. But astonishment quickly
gave way to anguish. A deeper pain than she had just witnessed
before.

Then, Marlayna herself was engulfed by
despair. What was the point? A one-up-man-ship on whose six years
had been the worst? Which one of them had been tortured the most?
Both of them had sustained heavy losses. Ironically, both had come
out winners in very different ways.

She extended her arm, holding her hand palm
up. Noah hesitated a second and then curved his fingers between
hers. "You lost the baby?" She nodded. "Please tell me what
happened," came his urgent plea.

"I don't really know," she said honestly.
"At first, I didn't even guess I was pregnant. I thought it was the
flu or more likely stress from not being able to see you and then
running away to New York. I kept getting sicker and weaker. The
woman I was staying with brought me to her doctor and that's when I
found out.

"I was so happy and so sure that once you
knew, you'd see me and we'd talk everything out. I called you at
the hospital, but they said you were gone and wouldn't give me any
information. I called your doctor. Nothing but threats and to
please stop calling. I wrote, but the letters were returned. Your
lawyer wouldn't talk to me. I was like a mouse on a treadmill.
Running and running, faster and faster but never moving, never
making any progress. I decided to fly back to Atlanta, but I never
did make it."

She wet her lips and forced herself to
continue. "I started to bleed and had a lot of cramping. The doctor
put me into the hospital, but. . . there was nothing that could be
done."

"I could have done something," Noah grated.
"I could have …" He yanked his hand free, not feeling decent enough
to touch her. "I not only lost you, I made you lose our baby." He
struggled off the bed "I killed…"

Marlayna grabbed his arm and held him fast.
"Stop it, Noah! You didn't kill anybody." Her fingers turned his
face toward her. "There is no blame. It happens. No one was at
fault. Just one of those things."

His chest heaved, lungs gasping for air
under an enormous emotional weight. "What about you? Are you all
right? Any complications?"

"No, I was fine after a while."

Noah looked at her with dawning
comprehension. "But mentally, spiritually and emotionally you were
…"

"Just as crippled as you were
physically."

"We both . . ."

"Yes, we both." There was a finality in
Marlayna's tone that sheathed the room in silence, a silence that
stretched to nerve-shattering length.

Her fingers were the first to tremble, then
her hands, arms, body. That numbing helplessness once again invaded
her system and threatened to hold her prisoner. The tears that
streaked her cheeks were evident in her voice when she spoke.
"Noah, I need you. I always have. Without you, I just existed, went
through the motions. I didn't live. I didn't want to. We were
always like two halves of a perfect whole. We complimented and
completed each other. Together we were such a powerful team."

He smoothed her hair from her forehead,
gentle fingertips outlined her eyebrows, followed the curve of her
cheeks, silhouetted her lips. "I can't believe that you even want
me to share your life. Not after what I did, what I put you
through." Noah took his hand away. "I don't even feel I have the
right to touch you, let alone love you."

Soft palms cupped his face and lowered it on
level with her own. "You're the only man who has ever touched me or
loved me, Noah Drake. I don't want that to change." She cast him a
coy glance. "Besides, why did you think I accepted Arthur's
invitation?"

"Well, he is your boss."

"No, I don't have a boss. My contract with
Kingman Cosmetics has expired, and I instructed my agent not to
renew it"

His dark brows lifted quizzically. "You're
interested in remodeled castles?"

"Uh . . . uh." Her fingernail teased a path
from his cheek, down the side of his neck to his chest, where it
began to draw light circles around his tough masculine nipple.

He cleared his throat and tried not to
concentrate on the delicious shivers that coursed his body. "Why,
then?"

"When I saw your name linked with Gwen
Kingman's, I went crazy." Her eyes flared. "Just the thought of you
in bed, loving another woman . . . well. . ." She let her tongue
follow the sensual contours of his lips. "I decided to come and
cause a major disturbance."

His hands settled in the curve of her waist.
"You're doing that right now. Doing it awfully well, too."

Marlayna smiled at him. Her hand wandered
down his torso, her fingers finding the mole high on his inner
thigh. "I haven't even started yet. I just hope those
million-dollar knees hold out!"

"I've heard of breakfast in bed, but
breakfast in a sunken bathtub . . . now, this is luxury."

Beneath the swirling bubble-coated water,
Noah's toes nuzzled the soles of her feet. "After last night my
back and knees needed a little whirlpool rejuvenation." A wolfish
grin slashed Noah's handsome features. "Let's see what good old
Perkins brought us for breakfast."

Pulling the gallery tray along the carpeted
floor that flanked the tub, he eagerly lifted the quilted coverings
that cozied the food. "There are hot croissants in the bun warmer,
soft boiled eggs under the egg cozy, fresh strawberries, coffee and
assorted jams and orange marmalade." Noah lifted the glass carafe.
"Do you still take two sugars and extra cream in your coffee?"

"Yup. Black coffee is one thing Paul has
never been able to talk me into."

"Paul?" The sugar spoon stopped in mid-air.
"Paul who?"

The odd inflection in Noah's voice made
Marlayna stop fiddling with the side water jets. "Paul Wingate.
Didn't I tell you about him?"

He handed her a steaming cup. "No, you did
not." His dark brows lifted. "As a matter of fact, you haven't told
me very much of the day-to-day goings-on in your life. I don't even
know where you live."

"I sublet a rather posh duplex on Fifth
Avenue in New York. The woman who owns it has temporarily taken up
residence in South America until her tax attorney and Uncle Sam can
settle a rather hefty money disagreement." Marlayna wrinkled her
straight nose at him, sipping the coffee. "It's not a place anyone
could call home. A museum, yes, but not a home. Pearl, the
housekeeper, makes sure my fingerprints don't stay on anything for
more than twenty-four hours."

"That definitely doesn't sound like you,"
Noah agreed, adding butter and marmalade to a flaky roll that he
had torn in half to share with her. "You were always propping your
feet on the coffee table or sitting sideways in that overstuffed
tweed rocker we had." A soft smile curved his lips. "I remember the
way you would curl up inside that big, fluffy blue bathrobe and sit
on the right side of the sofa and read murder mysteries while you
listened to the TV, checking occasionally to see if the action
matched the sound."

She nibbled on the pastry. "Oh, I still do
that." Her eye closed in a conspiratorial wink. "I just make sure
everything is neat and tidy for Pearl."

Noah frowned. "Why on earth did you ever
move there?"

"Paul found it for me."

"Paul again."

Her hands shoveled a hot, foamy wave over
his body. "Now don't look and sound like that. Paul Wingate has
been my anchor for the past six years. He owns Wingate Modeling
Agency but he's more than just my agent, Noah. He's been my friend
and benefactor and . . . and ..." Marlayna hesitated a moment,
loath to mention her miscarriage. "He paid all my medical bills and
helped me get back on my feet again after . . ." Her voice dwindled
off.

Noah stared morosely into his coffee mug.
"I'm sorry, honey. I should be thanking the man, not acting like a
jealous fool."

"Jealous?" Her eyebrows lifted, her vanity
piqued. "What an odd thing to say."

"I'm jealous of all the men you've been in
contact with."

"All what men?" She asked curiously.

His right hand chopped the air with vague
gestures that sent droplets of water raining every which way. "You
. . . you're a model, aren't you?"

"So?"

"What do you mean, so?" Noah knew both his
tone and manners were growing more agitated, but he couldn't seem
to control his emotions. "I bet there were hundreds of men fawning
all over you. Thousands, maybe."

"Millions, actually." Marlayna corrected
with a sublime smile. "Didn't I mention that I was in the
Sports
Illustrated
bathing suit issue and in the
calendar?" She buffed her nails against the blushing swells of her
breast. "I was Miss February."

His mouth fell open. "You . . . you're a
pinup? My wife!"

"Ex-wife," she returned calmly. "And the
pinup looks terrific. I had on this nifty bikini. I brought it with
me."

Noah snorted. "Don't sound so damn smug. I
don't like you being the subject of half-naked pictures, and I
don't like the crack about your being my ex-wife either."

She bristled at his superior tone and
chauvinistic manner. Marlayna found herself growing more and more
irritated and irritable with Noah's take-charge, put-down attitude.
She returned her empty cup to the tray and carefully spoke. "I
think I have a right to be smug. I'm damn good at my job and in
great demand." Her shoulders squared. "I'm going to be thirty this
year, and frankly, I've never looked or felt better. If you
remember, I was always rather. . . rather frumpy for a
twenty-three-year-old."

"Homey. You reminded me of Mom, apple pie
and fresh sheets."

Her eyebrows arched; her expression soured.
That wasn't the type of compliment she wanted to hear. "I was
overweight, didn't know a thing about makeup or hairstyles or
clothes. My wardrobe consisted of white uniforms or T-shirts and
jeans. I've learned a lot from the various experts that I've met on
modeling assignments, and I feel that improving my physical
appearance has also improved my self-esteem." Marlayna cleared her
throat and added, "I do happen to be your ex-wife." He mumbled
something she didn't catch. "What?"