The Tycoon's Virgin Bride (7 page)

“You wouldn't have wanted to know me,” Bryce said
dismissively. “We should get moving, the traffic might be heavy. Are you ready?”

He'd closed her out of his past as effectively as if he'd slammed a door in her face. “I wish you wouldn't come to my show,” she said with a touch of desperation.

He'd already pushed back his chair. Picking up the bill, he said, “I'll meet you at the front desk.”

“You make it very clear that your past is off limits,” she said furiously. “Why can't you accept that my future is off limits in the same way?”

“Because I don't want to,” he said.

Jenessa shoved back her chair, marched to the washroom, and maintained a stony silence all the way to the bus station. As he drew up outside, she said in a clipped voice, “Thank you for dinner and the drive. Stay away from my gallery, Bryce. Because
never
is just fine with me.”

He wrapped his fingers around her wrist. “Never's a long time,” he said, and kissed her hard on the mouth.

Her body sprang to life, burning with need. As his elbow brushed her breast, her nipples hardened beneath her thin shirt. It would have been achingly easy to have succumbed, to have leaned into his kiss and his body. With all the strength she possessed, Jenessa tore herself free and tumbled out of the car. “I won't have an affair with you!” she cried.

The sidewalk was crowded. A couple of passersby laughed, a few more stared at her as though she was just one more of the city's eccentrics. She slammed the door of the Jaguar and ran inside; it was only when the bus pulled out of the station that she remembered she'd left her baklava on the floor of Bryce's car.

She loved baklava. But she sure didn't love Bryce.

T
HE
members of Jenessa's family all arrived at the gallery within five minutes of each other, as if it had been pre-arranged.

Jenessa was standing near the back of the room, chatting to two congressmen. Her work was displayed to its best advantage, the gallery was full, the food and wine of excellent quality, and a satisfactory number of sold stickers had already been affixed to the paintings. Furthermore, the new full-length silk skirt and matching tunic she'd purchased just for the occasion suited her very well, its soft rose-pink flattering to her skin. Her hair was in a mass of curls around her face, and she was wearing the opal earrings Travis and Julie had given her for her last birthday.

She should have been happy. Ecstatic.

But she wasn't.

She'd come to the gallery this afternoon for a quick preview of the show. As she'd walked from painting to painting, she'd been struck very forcibly by an underlying similarity in style and theme. Many viewers might not notice, for her talent was real and she was technically very accomplished. But she'd noticed.

Stuck.

It wasn't the first time Jenessa had used this word. But it was the first time she'd been so convinced that it was the right, the only, word.

What could she do about it? How could she push beyond her limits, find what was waiting for her?

She had no idea. Nor was she any closer to an answer as the show opened and the crowd gathered, the energy
in the room humming around her. She felt like an actor in a play she didn't believe in. Successful Young Artist Has Brilliant Opening. Except, under the surface, it wasn't brilliant.

Charles walked through the door first, holding it open for Corinne, Julie and Travis. Two minutes later, Leonora entered. After Jenessa had excused herself from the congressmen, she crossed the room to greet her family. At least Bryce hadn't come, she thought thankfully.

“Great crowd,” Charles remarked, not quite able to hide his surprise.

“I've been looking forward to this all day,” Corinne said with uncharacteristic warmth. “Ah, here's Leonora…good evening.”

“Nice to see you, Leonora,” Charles said manfully, shaking hands with his first wife.

Julie embraced Jenessa, Travis kissed her cheek, and Leonora said, “How lovely you look, Jenessa.”

Leonora looked dauntingly elegant in a gossamer gray outfit that accentuated her poise and slender grace. As Jenessa murmured a commonplace reply, other words dropped into her mind like an ambush.
I'm frightened of my mother,
she thought, and realized it was true.

It wasn't the best of moments for such a realization. She said hastily, “Why don't all of you look around and we'll talk later?” She managed to produce a smile. “I have to circulate. The gallery owner's phrase, not mine.”

“Go circulate, Jen,” Travis said with his lazy grin. “We're in no rush.”

It was on the tip of her tongue to ask if Bryce was coming; but she didn't want Travis to know that it mattered to her. Quickly Jenessa allowed herself to be caught up by those in the crowd who wanted to explain her paintings to her, and those who wanted her to do the same thing for them. She wasn't sure which was worse; but at least it took her mind off her family and Bryce.

Half an hour later, when the noise level was at its high
est pitch, a hand fell on Jenessa's shoulder from behind. Her smile froze to her face. How could she know, without even seeing him, that the hand belonged to Bryce?

Because her body was on fire.

Swallowing, she turned around. “Hello, Bryce,” she said cordially. “So
never
lasted ten days.”

“But who's counting?” he replied with equal cordiality, letting his hand drop to his side. He'd seen a lot of gorgeous women in his life; what was it about Jenessa that had the power to slice him to the core?

With a bit of luck, his reaction to her was well hidden. Because, of course, he had been counting the days until he saw her again. Today, he'd even been counting the hours.

She looked utterly and beguilingly beautiful, her cheeks rose-pink, her eyes that brilliant, combative blue, her silk outfit hinting at the body beneath. No wonder he'd been wishing his life away until he saw her.

He should keep two facts in mind. She didn't want to have an affair with him. And he wasn't willing to offer anything other than an affair.

How could he break that impasse?

By dint of a couple of casual questions, he'd found out that Travis had booked his sister into one of the city's finest hotels. “Didn't want her driving home alone late at night,” was what Travis had said.

Neither did Bryce, although for different reasons.

Jenessa said snappishly, “I wish you'd stop staring at me. Have I got lipstick on my teeth?”

He pulled himself together. “No…you look very beautiful,” he said truthfully, and watched her blush. “You also look uptight. What's wrong?”

“Charles, Corinne and Leonora are all here,” she said glibly. “That's enough to make anyone uptight.”

“I was hoping you'd given up deceiving me when you were seventeen. What's really the matter, Jenessa?”

To his horror a film of tears suddenly glimmered in her
eyes. She blinked them back. “Go away, Bryce, I'm the star of the show and I can't afford to be caught blubbering on your shoulder.”

“It's available anytime,” he said slowly. “We'll go for a drink when this bash is over.”

“Best offer I've had all night—which doesn't mean I'll accept it,” she said crisply, and gave a mauve-haired, diamond-bedecked matron a dazzling smile. Bryce, frowning, turned away. An affair meant just that: an affair. A careful distance maintained; two separate lives that met in bed to the mutual pleasure of each. And now he was offering Jenessa his shoulder to cry on?

That sort of intimacy was strictly against his rules. Always had been.

He started wandering from canvas to canvas, his height giving him an advantage over the crowd; and as he did so, his frown deepened. In the next half hour he learned a lot about Jenessa. All the paintings were exquisitely rendered, some realistic, others full of mysterious swirls of color that bordered on abstraction. Yet each of them breathed an underlying menace, a threat never explicated enough to be challenged, yet too deeply rooted to be overcome.

That she was, deep down, very unhappy was utterly clear to him. That she was a complex and sensitive artist was also clear. Both these conclusions made him extremely uneasy.

Jenessa Strathern wasn't his usual type. He liked rational, cool women who, if they had hidden depths, had the sense to keep them hidden: in the same way that he guarded his own secrets.

He hadn't been paying attention to anything other than the paintings. To his dismay, Bryce suddenly realized he'd ended up in the middle of a gathering of Stratherns that included the artist. Trying to smooth the frown from his forehead, he greeted them all pleasantly. “A fine show, Jenessa,” he said sincerely, “you're to be congratulated.”

Charles, who had obviously not understood the paintings at all, said valiantly, “Very pretty colors. Corinne and I bought one that will go with our living room in Back Bay.”

“You bought one?” Jenessa repeated, taken aback.

“We're proud of you,” Charles said gruffly.

“Oh,” said Jenessa.

She looked dumbstruck. Into a silence that was lasting too long, Travis said cheerfully, “Julie and I will have to go soon, sis, because of the baby-sitter. But we'll see you at the hotel for lunch tomorrow. Why don't you join us, Leonora?”

“Unfortunately I'm getting the night flight back to Manhattan…I'm teaching a class first thing tomorrow morning.”

“So you came all this way just for one day?” Jenessa blurted.

Leonora smiled. “I did. And glad of it.”

Clumsily Jenessa muttered, “Thank you.”

“A pleasure,” Leonora responded. “Does anyone want to share a cab with me?”

Corinne said smoothly, “What a good idea. Ready, Charles?”

“Of course. Of course, a fine idea.” He looked straight at his daughter with his faded blue eyes. “I hope we'll see you again before too long, Jenessa.”

Jenessa mumbled something indecipherable, her fingers pleating the silk of her tunic. There was a general exodus, during which Travis drawled, “Coming, Bryce?”

“I want to take another look around now that the crowd's thinned a bit,” Bryce said. “I'll talk to you tomorrow.”

In the last few minutes he'd been keeping track of all the changes of expression on Jenessa's face, from uncomfortable and disconcerted to trapped. She now looked panic-stricken. Making a mental note to make sure she
didn't slip away without him, he said blandly, “Jenessa, the gallery owner's trying to get your attention.”

“So she is,” Jenessa mumbled and walked away with none of her usual grace.

By the time Bryce had finished a second perusal of the paintings, the gallery doors had been locked and most of the guests had left. With a possessiveness that part of his brain deplored, he walked up behind Jenessa, putting an arm around her waist. “Ready to go?” he asked. “My car's parked just down the street.”

She tensed like an over-nervous race horse; then, gauche as the teenager she'd been, she introduced him to the gallery owner. Bryce said something more or less intelligent about the paintings, the owner suggested Jenessa phone her in the morning and left to supervise the caterers. Jenessa said weakly, “I should get a cab.”

“You need a good stiff drink. Come along.” Keeping his arm snug around her waist, Bryce steered her toward the door.

Outside, the air was hot and humid, the street alive with traffic. Once they reached his car, Bryce said, “There's a nightclub not far from here where they play great jazz. We'll go there.”

Jenessa, for once, didn't argue. Easing her feet out of her high-heeled sandals, she sighed, “That's better. Promise me one thing, Bryce—you won't as much as mention the word art.”

He laughed. “I-don't-know-anything-about-art-I-only-know-what-I-like…didn't anybody say that to you tonight?”

She laughed as well, wriggling her shoulders against his leather upholstery. “Nobody but you.”

Like a prism splitting sunlight, joy swooped through Bryce's chest in all the hues of the rainbow. Jenessa was sitting here. Beside him. In his car. Deep in his heart, he hadn't been at all sure that the evening would end this way. But it had. And now the rest was up to him.

Joy? Did she mean that much to him?

He wanted her in his bed; that was all.

Bryce set out to charm her, deliberately keeping the conversation low key. The nightclub, where he was a member, was understated yet beautifully appointed. The dance floor was dimly lit, the tables positioned for privacy and the service unobtrusive. They were led to a banquette, where Jenessa sank down into the soft seat with another sigh of relief. After she'd asked for a Brandy Alexander, Bryce ordered a beer and some seafood appetizers. As Jenessa tucked into the food with an appetite he found amusing, they began to talk, exploring each other's tastes in books, television and sports; while she had some strong opinions, she was also willing to consider his point of view. He discovered he was enjoying himself enormously, and was pleased to see that the strain had vanished from her face. Half an hour later, he said lightly, “Want to dance?”

Jenessa was halfway through her second drink. “Does that mean I have to put my shoes back on?”

“You can go barefoot as far as I'm concerned.”

There was a note in his voice that sent a shiver down her spine. “This doesn't look like the kind of place where you dance barefoot,” she said severely.

“I make my own rules,” was Bryce's lazy response.

He'd said exactly the same thing twelve years ago. A second shiver followed the first along her backbone. “Just don't step on my toes.”

“That would be counterproductive.”

“To what?” she demanded.

“To your enjoyment, of course…what else?”

She liked fencing with him, more than liked his rapier wit and the glint of steel in his gray eyes. Throwing caution to the winds, she said, “Let's dance, then.”

There were several other couples on the floor. The slow, smoldering melody coursing through her veins, Jenessa slipped into Bryce's embrace. One hand was splayed on
her hip; the other clasped her own hand and brought it to his shoulder. Her forehead dropped to his other shoulder, against the hardness of bone and the taut muscle beneath the fine wool of his jacket. As though she didn't have a worry in the world, Jenessa surrendered to the music and the man, allowing herself to drift in a tide of sensuality. Her hunger wasn't hot and imperative this time, as it usually was. It was slower and deeper and—she recognized this—infinitely more dangerous.

She'd played it safe for twelve long years. Was that all she wanted from life? To be safe? Could that be the root of her inability to love?

Wasn't that also what was wrong with her paintings…a fear of taking risks?

She wasn't just an artist: she was a woman. In Bryce's arms she felt her femininity fully and with a pride that was new to her. As he drew her closer, pushing her mass of hair away so that his lips could trace the long line of her throat, she trembled like a leaf in the wind; her tiny whimper of pleasure couldn't have been heard by anyone but him.

Then she raised her head to meet his eyes, making no more attempt to mask her desire than he was to hide the erection that pressed into her body. He said softly, “I want you to know something. There's only one woman I've wanted as much as I want you right now—and she was scarcely a woman all those years ago.”

Jenessa smiled, a slow, secret smile. “You mean me?”

“You don't need to ask.”