Not For Sale (8 page)

Still, this wasn’t the time to explain his philosophy. Besides, why would he have to explain anything about himself to anyone?

“Just get on with it,” he snapped.

Caroline tossed her head and walked into the bedroom. Lucas held the cat in one arm. That sound emerged from its throat again.

“Do not push your luck, cat,” he said in a low voice.

Then he called his driver, arranged for him to meet them at the curb. As he concluded the call, Caroline emerged from the bedroom clutching an overflowing tote bag in the curve of one arm and a potted plant in the other.

“It’s a fern,” she said coldly, before he could say anything. “And, yes, I found it on the street, too, and yes, it’s coming with me. It needs care.”

What it needed, Lucas thought, was a vial of bleach and a quick burial.

She strode past him, arms overflowing, and somehow managed to free a hand and open the door.

“I know it’s hard for you to understand,” she said over her shoulder, “but I don’t believe in letting living things suffer.”

Lucas, following after her as the cat tried to claw its way to freedom through his suit jacket, through his shirt and,
Deus,
through his flesh, could only wonder if that philosophy might yet apply to him.

A
THIRTY-TWO
million dollar penthouse. A place that could have made the pages of
Architectural Digest,
if Lucas had not been so protective of his privacy.

On the walls, an eclectic mix of Japanese woodcuts, Mark Rothko paintings and Lucas’s latest find, a moody and magnificent Edward Hopper oil.

On the floors, antique Tabriz carpets over Brazilian rosewood.

In the twelve light-filled rooms, soaring ceilings, pale cherry furniture, low white silk sofas and fresh flowers massed in beautiful Steuben vases and bowls.

Now, two new pieces had been added. The fern that looked like a Pleistocene leftover was—well, it was somewhere in the guest suite. Caroline had lugged it up the stairs after she had Oliver settled in. Lucas had offered to carry it but she’d refused him.

“I’m perfectly capable of doing it myself,” she’d said coolly.

Now, she and the fern were out of sight.

A bright red cat litter pan was not. It stood in the elegant downstairs lavatory. It was a hooded pan, for sure, but there was no disguising its purpose, especially now, Lucas thought grimly, as he made the mistake of glancing toward the lavatory
just in time to see the somewhat battered head of the cat poke out the hole in the pan’s domed cover.

The cat and Lucas made eye contact.

The cat hissed. Its ears, what there were of them, folded back.

“The same to you, pal,” Lucas muttered, and kept going.

That there was a dying fern in his home seemed improbable. That there was a litter pan seemed impossible. That he was the person who’d purchased it seemed beyond logic, but it had been that or have Caroline hand him the cat again after they’d settled in the backseat of his limo, the fern on the floor, the cat once again in her arms.

“We’ll have to make a stop,” she’d said. “Oliver will need some things.”

Lucas had decided there was nothing to be gained by pointing out that what Oliver needed was a personality transplant.

“A pet shop. Or a drugstore will do.”

Lucas had leaned forward. “Stop at the Duane Reade on the next block, please, James,” he’d said.

His driver had complied, pulling to the curb in front of the all-purpose pharmacy.

And Caroline had held out the cat.

The cat had looked at Lucas and hummed. Lucas narrowed his eyes, hoped the cat was half as good at reading minds as it was at drawing blood and reached for the door handle instead.

“I’ll go in,” he’d said coldly. “Just tell me what you need.”

It was the first time he’d ever gone up and down the aisles of a Duane Reed. Of any store, other than Saks or Tiffany’s or Barney’s, for that matter, in a very, very long time.

It was also the first time he’d stood in a queue of people waiting to pay for their purchases. It was not an experience he was eager to repeat, especially not while he balanced two
litter pans, two covers, half a dozen cans of something called Daintee Deelites, a bag of Kitty Krunchies, and two plastic things euphemistically called litter scoops.

When he’d finally emerged from the store, his driver sprang from the car, went to the rear and opened the trunk. Caroline, who’d watched him as he approached, put down her window.

“Where’s the litter?”

The litter.

His driver had coughed. Lucas had glared. And if The Cat from Hell could have flashed a feline smile, he was sure that it would have done so.

“Shall I go, sir?” his driver had asked.

But Lucas had already turned away and marched back to the store. This time, at least, he knew the correct aisle but the wait to pay was just as long.

He’d been tempted to ask Caroline if the cat would like to make a stop at Zabar’s for smoked salmon, but he had the uneasy feeling she might have said yes.

Now, a handful of hours later, he stood at the wall of glass in his living room, watching the lights come on in Central Park and wondering how he, a man who had set out to confront a woman who had lied to him, could have ended up in this situation.

His orderly, well-planned life was in total disarray. How else to describe it?

There was a cat peeing, or worse, in his bathroom. A dead plant sucking up oxygen in his guest suite. The second litter pan was also there, which explained why Caroline had ordered him to purchase two.

I’d confine Oliver to my rooms with me, she’d said, but he’s accustomed to the streets. He might not take well to confinement behind a closed door.

Evidently not.

There was also a pair of Mikasa stoneware soup bowls on the Italian tile kitchen floor, one filled with the contents of a can of Daintee Deelites—which, it turned out, looked like tuna and smelled like nothing Lucas ever wanted to smell again—and the other filled with water.

“Soup bowls?” Lucas had said, and Caroline had given him a look he was coming to know and said yes, soup bowls, because he had neglected to buy dishes for Oliver.

He’d opened his mouth to tell her she had neglected to request them, but what was the point? Then she’d stroked her hand slowly, slowly down the cat’s back but the cat had ignored her in favor of burying its face in the bowl of Daintee Deelites, and Lucas had thought what a damned fool the animal was, choosing food over the soft touch of Caroline’s hand.

That was when she’d asked him where she was to stay.

He’d looked at the cat, looked at her and come within a heartbeat of saying,
Where do you think you’re going to stay? In my bed, damnit, and get yourself there right now
.

But he hadn’t. Why would he? The last place he’d ever want her again was in his bed.

She was a liar and a cheat. She was more than that, and just because she lived on the edge of poverty, just because she’d taken in a dying plant and a starving cat when dozens, maybe hundreds of New Yorkers had walked by and probably never even noticed the animal, didn’t change a thing.

It couldn’t.

She was what she was, who she was, and he could never accept that. Not that he had to, any more than he had to like the fact that she was here, plant, cat and all, messing up his life.

Lucas turned from the window, walked mindlessly through the living room, turning on lamps and chandeliers until the huge space seemed to blaze with man-made fire. Then he stood still, tilted back his head and stared at the ceiling.

“Hell,” he muttered, and he went into his study, closed the door and sank into a leather armchair.

In the dark.

The truth was—and truth mattered, if he was going to be such a damned stickler about honesty—the truth was that he was the only one to blame for this mess.

Caroline was in his life because he’d hired her to play a part. She was in his home because he’d insisted on it. What kind of man would leave a woman, any woman, in a place with doors that you couldn’t lock and an intruder who might decide to pay another visit?

Sure, he’d gone to her apartment to confront her but could he have done that after she’d flown into his arms, trembling, saying his name as if it were all that could keep her safe?

Lucas rose to his feet, tucked his hands into his trouser pockets and paced the room.

He had done the right thing. The only thing. But he had his feet on the ground. He wasn’t going to get drawn in any deeper. He knew exactly how to handle things when life threatened to turn you inside out. Take a logical approach. Determine the problem, find the solution.

He was good at that.

Better than good.

It was why he had come so far.

Even these few moments of rational thought had been enough to clarify the situation.

He knew half a dozen top Realtors. One phone call, and his problem would be solved. Caroline would probably claim she couldn’t afford whatever a Realtor found and he wouldn’t argue, wouldn’t ask what a woman who earned her living selling herself did with all her money.

Five hundred dollars is a lot of money. I needed it. And, for whatever it’s worth, I’ve never done anything like that before.

He could hear her saying those words in his head. Maybe it was true. Maybe that night she’d spent with him really had been the first time she’d put a price on sex…

Lucas scowled. What did it matter? Her finances were her business. He didn’t want to know anything about them, or her. He would simply pay a couple of months rent in advance, hell, he’d pay for the year, and that would be that.

And if he never managed that confrontation, so what? Someday, he’d look back on this entire thing and laugh. Lucas Vieira, taken in by an innocent girl who’d turned out not to be innocent at all.

Sure he would. He’d laugh.

His mouth twisted.

And if he didn’t laugh, that was okay, too. He would get past this. He was a man, not a boy. He would move on.

Lucas took his telephone directory from his desk, leafed through it, chose a Realtor he’d dealt with in the past. It was late, but so what?. Being able to call someone at virtually any hour was one of the perks of having power and money.

The call was brief. He wanted an apartment for a friend. In the fifties. On Madison or Park, or just off those streets. One bedroom. A building with a doorman, of course, as if there were any other kind in this neighborhood. And a security system. Yes. Cameras, video, whatever was current. Price didn’t matter.

He hung up and felt relieved.

Why mention it to Caroline until it was a done deal? he decided, and after a few minutes, he stood up and paced the room some more.

Time dragged by.

He listened for any sounds from upstairs. Nothing. There was a woman in his home and he might as well have been alone.

Which was fine.

He liked it that way.

Still, Caroline was here. Didn’t she intend to come down and say something? Say anything? What about eating? He was hungry; he hadn’t had a thing except coffee and that was hours ago. She had to be hungry, too.

Was she waiting for an invitation?

Maybe so. Maybe she expected him to knock on her door and invite her to join him for dinner.

He could take her out to dinner, instead.

There was a quiet little restaurant a couple of blocks away. It was small. Intimate. Candles on the tables. The kind of place where the owner came by and told you what was on the night’s menu. He’d only been there once. With Elin, but Elin hadn’t liked it.

“I never heard of this place,” she’d said with faint but perceptible disdain. “And I don’t see a person I know.”

He suspected Caroline wouldn’t say anything remotely like that. If her lover took her to a dimly lit restaurant, her lover’s face would be the only one that interested her.

Lucas snorted. Who cared what she would say or do? Besides, he thought coldly, the word “lover” didn’t have much meaning in her life. She would say or do whatever a man wanted her to say or do. That was what she’d done the other night, wasn’t it? Starting in the hotel lobby, going right through dinner…

And ending in his bed.

“Hell!”

How many times was he going to go over this nonsense? Enough was enough, he thought, and strode toward the kitchen. Whether she ate or not, what she did or didn’t do, wasn’t his business. Right now, his business was to put food in his empty belly.

This was his housekeeper’s regular day off. No problem.
There were always neatly marked packets of ready-to-heat things in the freezer, eggs and bacon in the refrigerator and, better still, take-out menus in the kitchen desk drawer.

Lucas reached the kitchen, opened the fridge, took out a bottle of Corona…

The cat came barreling out of the darkness and shot between his legs. There was no telling which of them was the more startled—but Lucas was the only one holding a glass bottle. It slid from his grasp and shattered against the tile floor.

He jumped back.

Too late.

The cold beer splashed over his shoes and trouser cuffs, splattered the stainless steel door of the refrigerator and the pristine ivory walls. Lucas stared at the mess and then he raised his arms, hands knotted into fists and wagged them at the ceiling.

“That’s it,” he shouted. “I’ve had enough. More than enough!”

“What happened?”

The kitchen lights came on. He swung around and saw Caroline in the doorway. She was still wearing the baggy sweats, her hair was flattened on one side, her eyes were bleary. One look, and he knew she’d been asleep.

Asleep while his life got turned upside down. While he tiptoed around his own home like a stranger, while he dealt with a psychotic cat, while he wasted time trying to figure out how an ordinary, perfectly normal man could have got himself into a situation like this.

She didn’t look beautiful anymore, she looked like a woman who needed to comb her hair and put on makeup and some decent clothes, and how could that make him want to haul her into his arms and kiss her until she was breathless?

Her gaze flew to the broken glass, then to his face.

“Oh. Did Oliver…?” She swallowed. “Lucas. It isn’t his fault. I told you, he’s terrified of—”

“Is that the only living creature you give a damn about? Oliver?”

She was pale. Frightened. He could see it in her eyes but he didn’t care. He was frightened, too. Of going crazy, because that was what was surely happening to him, he was going freaking crazy, trying to make sense out of what was happening to his carefully organized life.

“Please. Tell me what happ—”

“I’ll tell you what happened,” he snarled, because anger was an emotion he understood and he sure as hell didn’t understand much else, not anymore. He walked quickly toward her, shoes crunching over glass, and stopped an inch away. “I hired you to translate for me and instead, you—you—”

“I what?” she said in bewilderment.

“Instead, you—you…” Lucas clasped her shoulders. “Damnit, Caroline,” he growled, and he pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

Kissed her hard. Deep. Kissed her again and again, clasping her face between his big hands, thrusting his tongue between her lips, forcing his kisses on her.

Until he realized that he wasn’t.

She was kissing him back.

Her lips were parted to his. Her hands were knotted in his shirt. She was standing on tiptoe, soft, exciting little moans coming from her throat.