“Max won’t leave me alone. He insists that it isn’t over. He was called back to Dallas,” she explained steadily. “By the time he returned to Houston, I had already found out his real name and what he was doing here. He called, but I refused to go out with him again. So now I’ve been transferred to Dallas.”
“To his own territory. Smart move,” Martine commented.
“Yes. I know all that. I know how he reacts to challenges, and that’s all I am to him. How many women do you suppose have ever refused him?”
Martine thought, then admitted ruefully, “You probably stand alone.”
“Yes. But I have to have a job, so I’m going.” Even as she said the words, Claire wondered if there had ever been anything else she could have done. “What would you do in my place?”
“I’d go,” Martine admitted, and laughed. “We must be more alike than you think. I know I’d never let him think that he’d made me run!”
“Exactly.” Claire’s dark eyes turned almost black. “He makes me so angry I could spit!”
Martine raised a militant fist. “Give him hell, honey!” Seeing the anger in Claire’s face made Martine want to dance around the yard. Too often Claire held her emotions in, hiding her vulnerabilities from the rest of the world. Even when she had lost her baby, Claire had been pale and quiet. Only Max had ever jostled her out of her composure. Claire might not think that Max cared for her at all, but Martine had seen Max watching her sister, and thought Claire was seriously underestimating the strength of his attraction to her. There was no doubt that he loved a challenge—he had that sort of fire in his eyes, that self-confident arrogance. But Claire didn’t realize that she was an ongoing challenge, with her silences and perceptions, and the depths of her personality. If Martine read him correctly, Max would be fascinated by the complexity of Claire’s character. And, damn him, if he hurt Claire again, he’d have to answer to Martine for it!
Claire felt as if she had made a momentous decision, but she was calm, even though the thought of changing her life so completely was a wrenching one. She had lived in her quiet, cozy apartment for five years, and it hurt to think of leaving, yet she knew that she had made the only logical choice. It was just that she preferred changes to come slowly, so she could adjust to them, rather than in a confusing rush.
She sat in silence that night, looking around and trying to accustom herself to the idea of a new apartment
, a different city. She wasn’t in the mood for either television or music, and she was too disturbed to find refuge in a book. There were plans to be made, work to be done—she had to find another apartment, get the utilities turned on, pack…say goodbye to her family. Martine already knew, but Alma would be the difficult one. It wouldn’t really be goodbye, but it would be the end of easy access to her family. The distance between them would be great enough that she couldn’t just get in the car and drive over whenever the whim took her.
Her doorbell rang, and she answered it without thinking. Max filled the doorway, looking down at her with a peculiarly intense glitter in his eyes. Claire tightened her hand on the doorknob, not stepping back to allow him entrance. Why couldn’t he leave her alone? She needed time by herself to get accustomed to the sweeping changes she was making in her life.
The glitter in his eyes intensified as he realized that she wasn’t going to invite him inside. He put his hand on hers and gently but forcefully removed it from the doorknob, then stepped forward, crowding her back into the apartment. He shut the door behind him. “Are you sitting here brooding?” he asked shortly, glancing around the silent apartment.
Claire moved away from him, her face closed. “I’ve been thinking, yes.”
Strong habits had been established in the short time they had been together—Claire went automatically to the kitchen and put on a pot of coffee, then turned to find him leaning in the doorway, still watching her in a way that made her want to check all her buttons to make certain they were fastened. She would have to brush past him to get to the living room, so she opted for retaining the relatively safe distance between them and remained where she was. “You might as well know,” she said, throwing the words into the silence between them. “I’ve decided to take the job.”
“Is that what you’ve been brooding about?”
“It’s a major change,” she replied coolly, using every ounce of self-control she possessed. “Didn’t you have any doubts when you relocated from Montreal to Dallas?”
Curiosity sharpened his gaze even more. “Ah, yes, I’ve been meaning to ask you about that. Exactly how did you discover my last name?”
“I read a magazine article on Spencer-Nyle. It had a picture of you.”
He strolled into the kitchen, and Claire turned away to get two mugs out of the cabinet. Before she could turn around again, he was behind her, his arms braced on the cabinet on either side of her, effectively trapping her. “I had intended to tell you that morning, when we woke up,” he said, bending his head to take a little nip at her ear. Claire sucked in her breath and twisted her head away, both alarmed and angered by the way his slightest touch made her pulse race. He ignored her movement of rejection and nuzzled her ear again, continuing his explanation whether she wanted to hear it or not. “But that phone call interrupted everything, and by the time I got back to Houston, you’d already found out, damn my luck!”
“It doesn’t matter,” she protested tightly. “What could you have said? ‘By the way, dear, I’m an executive with a company that has targeted your company for takeover, and I’ve been using you to get information’?” She mimicked his clipped accent and saw his hands clench on the cabinet in front of her.
“No, that wasn’t what I would have said.” He pushed himself away from her, and Claire turned, clutching the coffee mugs to her chest, to find him staring at her with barely restrained violence in his eyes. “I wouldn’t have said anything at all until you were in bed with me. Trying to reason with you has turned out to be a waste of time.”
“Oh?” she cried. “I think it’s terribly unreasonable of you to think you could just waltz back into my life and pick up where you’d left off, after what you did!” She slammed the mugs down onto the cabinet, then stared at them in horror. What if she’d broken them? She never lost her temper, never screamed or threw things or slammed them down, but now it seemed as if her anger was so close to the surface that Max could bring it out every time he spoke to her. She was reacting in a way that was totally unlike herself. Or maybe, she thought grimly, she was simply discovering facts about herself that she’d never before suspected. Max had a talent for drawing intense reactions from her. Grimly she sought control again, taking another calming breath. “Why are you here?”
“I thought you might want to know more about the job before you made your decision,” he muttered, still looking furious. He admitted to himself that he was lying. He had wanted to see her—he had no other reason.
“I appreciate the thought,” Claire said, as distant as the moon. She poured coffee into both mugs and extended one to him, then took a seat at her tiny kitchen table, which was just big enough for two. Max took the chair opposite her, still scowling as he drank his coffee.
“Well?” she prompted a few minutes later, when he still hadn’t said a word.
His frown deepened. “You’ll be secretary to the general office manager, Theo Caulfield. The departments of payroll, insurance, general accounting, data processing, maintenance, office supplies and equipment, as well as the secretarial pool, are all under his control, though each department has its own manager. It’s a demanding job.”
“It sounds interesting,” she said politely, but she was being truthful. A job that diverse had to be interesting, and challenging.
“You’ll need to work late occasionally, but the extra hours won’t be excessive. You have two weeks to get settled. I would give you a month but the office is in an uproar with a lot of transfers, and you’re needed on the job.” He didn’t add that he was the reason the office was in an uproar. “I’ll help you look for an apartment. You helped me, so I owe you a favor.”
Claire’s face stiffened at the mention of his apartment; it was only an expensive prop, a part of his hoax. That apartment had given him the appearance of stability and permanence. “No, thank you. I don’t need your help.”