Stormy Challenge

  “I know you,” he stated with confidence, letting his fingers slip down further to tilt her chin. “I know you very well.”

  “Why did you try to call me this week, Alex?”

  “Can’t you guess?”

  “Maybe. But I’d rather be sure,” Leya whispered with a hint of invitation she knew he’d pick up immediately.

  “When I first met you, Monica was the only thing on my mind.”

  “And I was a means to get to her?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid so,” he admitted in a tone that said he clearly expected her to forgive the deception. “It was only later that I realized what I’d thrown away in my efforts to win the wrong woman.”

  “Really?” Leya whispered skeptically. “When did you make that discovery?”

  “You have gotten hard, Leya. Was it because of me? Because of what I did to you?”

  She wanted to laugh and barely restrained the outburst. If he honestly thought she was acting uncharacteristically now, then it could only mean he’d never learned much about her true nature a year ago. But whose fault was that, she asked herself honestly. Hadn’t she always been on her best behavior around Alex? She’d never fought with him, never given him the sharp edge of her tongue. Never, she suddenly realized, pushed the relationship to the point where they would have had to discover which of them was the stronger.

  “Please don’t feel guilty about my current attitude,” she replied serenely, “I assure you I come by it naturally. You needn’t take the blame for having turned me into a bitter woman. You might be interested to know that I’m really not bitter at all,” she added, reflectively.

  “Not even a little?” he pressed, bringing his face close to hers so that his mouth hovered an inch above her own. “I hurt you, Leya, didn’t I? But I can make up for all that.”

  “How?” she asked simply, making no effort to pull away but feeling no great interest in the impending kiss. She viewed his mouth almost clinically.

  “By starting over…” He kissed her slowly, lingeringly, with all the old expertise.

  And Leya felt nothing at all except distaste. She stood very still, her arms still resting on the railing and waited for him to finish. How could she ever have been even mildly excited by his embrace, she wondered. But she knew the answer to that. It came as soon as Alex’s arms went around her waist. Alex’s kiss meant nothing now because she’d been exposed to Court Tremayne’s lovemaking. It was Court her body craved, not Alex or any other man.

  The realization was stunning and the problem it presented seemed overwhelming. But she would have to deal with it later. At the moment, it was Alex Harlow who held her and invited her with his caresses to restart an old romance. And it didn’t seem quite fair that he should escape scot-free for the way he had treated her a year ago. He had made a fool of her and it seemed only appropriate that he should suffer the same experience. The possibility of revenge made Leya’s eyes glitter with a hard platinum light.

  “Do you want me back, Alex?” she asked dreamily, mouth curving softly as he lifted his head. “Is that the truth?”

  He looked down into her uptilted face and she knew he saw only what he wanted to see there. He was convinced he had only to lift his finger and she would fall back into his arms.

  “I think we would do very well together, Leya, my sweet,” he whispered, his hands pressing her waist. She felt the beginnings of male arousal in him and was pleased. “This time we would start from scratch with no other woman involved. Yes, I want you back. Tonight. Come with me, Leya. I’ll take you out to dinner and we can sort everything out between us.”

  “That sounds very pleasant, except for one thing,” she murmured, her laughter threatening to well up and overflow.

  “What’s that?” he prodded persuasively, eyes gleaming.

  “My fianceé.” Leya dropped the small bombshell with no compunction whatsoever, glorying in the shock it had caused. “The man I’m with tonight. I’m in love, Alex, with a man who makes your kisses seem like cold dishwater. Looking at you now I can’t even imagine what I ever thought I saw in you!”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” he blazed, his hands falling away from her waist as if they had been burned. The blue eyes narrowed angrily.

  “You heard the lady,” said a hard, cold voice behind them.

  Leya swung a momentarily startled glance over Alex’s shoulder, her eyes colliding with Court’s as he walked toward them. How long had he been standing in the shadows? she wondered frantically. What would he do? She prayed he would hold up his end of the deception, take the role he’d been assigned, and not ruin her small revenge.

  “You two are engaged?” Alex demanded, stepping away from Leya and turning to face Court, who kept coming until he was close enough to slide an arm around Leya’s waist.

  “It was supposed to be something of a secret until we were ready to announce it, but I gather she couldn’t resist telling you.” Court turned his head to glance down at Leya as she stood tensely in the circle of his arm. He smiled with all the possessive warmth of a real fianceé, and she realized abruptly he was going to help her. Relief flowed through her veins, and confidence reheated her nervously cold body.

  “Why didn’t you say something earlier, Leya?” Alex snapped, his anger flaming as he caught sight of the laughter in her sparkling green eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Alex,” she apologized without any sign of contrition. “But you have to admit the opportunity was simply too good to pass up. If you could have seen the look on your face!”

  “It was all a joke? Letting me kiss you like that?” he blazed, incensed.

  “I’m afraid so. Why should I be interested in you after all this time, when I’m quite happily engaged to marry another man? Let’s face it, Alex, we didn’t exactly share an undying love!” Leya grinned, delighting in his reaction.

  “You don’t seem to mind having a fianceé who goes around kissing other men in the moonlight,” Alex muttered to Court, clearly looking for a way of salvaging his pride. The two men faced each other across the short distance. Both were tall, but Court had a couple of inches on Alex. He also had a suggestion of strength that was lacking in the younger man. Strength and experience.

  “From what I saw,” Court replied in a leisurely tone, which was nonetheless menacing, “you were the one kissing her. Now that I do mind. In fact, you could say I take definite exception to that,” he added lazily.

  Leya felt the spring-tight tension in Court through the sinewy arm that crushed her against him. He was angry but he was in complete control.

  “How do you know it wasn’t her fault?” Alex mocked bitterly, sliding an accusing look at Leya’s cheerfully smiling face. His eyes hardened at the humor in her. There was no worse way to hurt a man than to laugh at him, she thought.

  “Oh, I know Leya well enough to know what she’s like when she’s enjoying a kiss,” Court informed him with a cool certainty that left no doubt in his listeners’ minds that he had Leya’s physical reactions well catalogued. Leya would have blushed but for the fact that she was having too much fun.

  “Is that so?” Alex began aggressively. “Well, let me tell you I knew her a long time before you came along and I…”

  “One more word and I’ll throw you over the railing,” Court interrupted with distinct intent. “Now why don’t you take your humiliation like a man and slink off somewhere? I promise to keep Leya away from you in the future. You needn’t be afraid she’ll exercise her claws on you again.”

  “Goodnight, Alex,” Leya chimed in at once. “So nice to see you again. I enjoyed it immensely.”

  “Why, you little—’

  “I know it’s a temptation, but don’t say it,” Court advised. “You know how it is—if you actually say it, I’ll have to do something about it.”

  Without a word, Alex swung furiously off into the night, heading toward the doors opening onto the terrace. In a few seconds, he had disappeared.

  For a moment, silence reigned u
nder the cold night sky, and then Leya tried to take a sip from the glass she was still clutching in her right hand. But it was no use—the laughter bubbled over and spilled out, making it impossible to swallow.

  “Oh, Court.” She grinned, twisting to look up into his face. “How can I ever thank you? That was fabulous! Did you see the look on his face? He was positively livid!”

  “Enjoy yourself, Leya?” he asked laconically, his arm still wrapping her close. Once again, he removed the glass from her fingers, setting it down on the railing this time.

  “Enormously,” she assured him, deciding not to make an issue out of his insistence on taking the drink away from her. She was feeling much too charitable at the moment. “And it wouldn’t have had nearly the effect without you showing up when you did. Perfect timing!”

  “Thank you. I’d been standing there for some time, you see, trying to decide when to make my appearance,” he murmured, his rugged features cast in an unreadable expression as he gazed down at her gleaming silver-green eyes.

  “Well, you chose an excellent moment. I’m very appreciative. That man deserved everything he got and more. Would you have really thrown him over the railing if he’d insulted me?”

  “Yes, I think so,” he said calmly.

  “Terribly energetic,” she pointed out.

  “There are occasions in life when one must bestir oneself and put forth the effort,” he observed. “Are you really feeling quite grateful for my assistance, Leya Brandon?” he added, taking a sip from his own glass.

  “Oh, yes,” she assured him cheerfully enough. She could feel the effects of the alcohol in her bloodstream, but she didn’t feel drunk, merely pleasantly high.

  “Grateful enough to let my help with your revenge this evening cancel out the grudge you’re holding against me?” He waited for her response, a quirking smile on his hard mouth.

  “What are you talking about?” she whispered, sobering quickly and twisting enough to put some space between the two of them. He didn’t try to stop her.

  “I’m talking about forgiving me for that business with the contract and letting our relationship go back to where it was before you found out who I was.”

  “You think you’ve made up for what you did by helping me out tonight?” Her voice was husky and there was a new pounding in her veins that wasn’t induced by alcohol. She was remembering the lesson she’d learned in Alex’s arms a few minutes earlier. The lesson had taught her that it was Court’s embraces she wanted. Court’s…love?

  Dear Lord! Was she going to be an even greater fool and fall in love with the man? Leya screamed silently. She saw the way he was watching her, waiting for her to say that the score between them was settled. How did he truly feel about her? How could any woman know whether a man like this had genuinely fallen for her or whether he was still interested only in controlling a potentially difficult unknown quantity?

  And how could she ever learn the answer to that question unless she took the risk of giving him another chance?

  “I think you owe me a great deal for what I let you do tonight,” he said quietly, deliberately pressing his case.

  “You mean for using you?”

  “Wasn’t that what it amounted to?” he retorted with an edge on his words.

  “I suppose so,” she acknowledged.

  “Come on, Leya. You can be more honest than that!”

  “All right, so I used you a bit. What harm did it do?”

  “None, but I want some payment for the privilege, and I think forgiving me for the way you feel I treated you in Oregon is little enough recompense.”

  She glared at him, trying to sort through her chaotic emotions. Could they start over? Had he really begun to feel something important for her?

  “And if I said we were even?” she hedged carefully.

  “Then we could take up where we left off. Get to know each other better…”

  She eyed him speculatively. “Is that what you want?”

  “Yes, it’s what I want.”

  Was he telling the truth or was he still worried about the threat she represented to his control of Brandon Security? But she sensed that his desire for her, at least, was honest. Could they build something lasting out of such a fleeting emotion? All her instincts urged her to take the risk of finding out. She could never be satisfied with herself or with life if she didn’t seek to know the true limits of this relationship.

  The sudden knowledge answered all her questions. She would take the challenge and the risk of discovering the truth about his feelings for her.

  Warily, as if she were reentering the lists for another round of combat, Leya inclined her head once and whispered, “Yes, Court. I’m willing to start over again. That is,” she added in a small voice, “if it’s true that you deceived me because you really wanted to pursue our relationship and not just to get my signature on the contract.”

  “It’s the truth, Leya,” he told her huskily.

  He stepped forward, sweeping her into his arms. “Leya, my maddening little shrew. I know how you must have felt when you discovered I’d deceived you. I would have felt the same. But I was so sure that once I had you in my bed nothing else would matter! I’m glad you’ve had your revenge by using me. We can put it all behind us. I handled you all wrong, I know that now. You’re a lot like me, and I should have.”

  “There you two are!” Keith’s voice called cheerfully into the darkness. “We were wondering where you’d disappeared. I take it everything is settled? I’ll have to hand it to you, Court! You sure know how to tie up loose ends!”

  There was a distinctly admiring note in his voice. One that finally made Leya lift her head from Court’s shoulder in sudden alertness.

  Still clasped in Court’s arms, which had tightened at the sound of Keith’s words, she looked past the massive shoulder and directly into her brother’s smiling gaze.

  “What are you talking about?” she demanded, in a tone of voice she hadn’t used on him since eighth grade, when she’d finally learned little brothers were more easily handled with cajolery than threats, especially when they started getting bigger than their sisters.

  “Your, er, relationship with Court, here,” Keith returned, picking up some of the vibrations but not yet paying them sufficient heed. “The last thing Court said to me before slamming out of the office to find you at that inn up in Oregon was that he had an awful premonition he’d been fated to tame the green-eyed witch who was laughing at him from the picture on my office wall. He said the one sure way to control a troublesome female was in bed. I’ll admit I didn’t expect an engagement so quickly. But Alex Harlow is telling everyone…”

  Keith broke off, grinning at his sister’s stunned expression. “Haven’t you learned yet, sister dear, that the only thing that prompts Court out of his easy chair or his workshop is a challenge? He’ll do whatever he has to do in order to win. Why do you think I wanted him on the side of Brandon Security?”

  “A challenge,” Leya repeated, the metal in her eyes glowing with white heat as she stepped back out of Court’s slackening embrace to face him.

  “That’s what this has been about all along, hasn’t it? You did come up to that inn in Oregon intending to seduce me because that seemed like the easiest way to overcome the challenge I represented. You didn’t take one look at me and suddenly decide our relationship was more important than the contract. You established a relationship in order to get that damned document signed! To control me!”

  “Leya, listen to me,” he began determinedly. “You’ve got it all wrong! Your brother doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about. You and I—”

  “No, he doesn’t. He automatically assumed you were planning to marry me,” she exploded violently. “Me, I know better. I know you’d never get that carried away with a mere challenge. An amusing little affair, during which you made certain I kept my interfering hands off Brandon Security, would be more to your taste, wouldn’t it? Well, just in case you’re not getting enough
excitement out of the diversion, let me spice things up a bit!”

  With that, Leya grabbed the half-full glass standing on the railing and hurled the contents at his yellow shirt. As the alcohol and ice soaked him, she whirled and walked off the terrace.

  Six

  Her exit scene lacked only a small touch of practicality to keep it from being perfect, Leya reflected a moment later as she swept into the party and realized she didn’t have a convenient ride home.

  It was the little things that could so easily trip one up in life! In disgust, Leya grabbed a drink off a passing tray, reminding herself she hadn’t been allowed to finish one yet, thanks to Court. She was making her way over to a far corner of the room, where it might have been possible to stay out of sight until her brother reappeared from the terrace, when Susan Adams glided up to her. Why were half the women in California blonde?

  “I was wondering where you’d hidden yourself, Leya.” Susan’s eyes were lit with an interest that didn’t fool Leya for a second.

  “I’ve hidden Court outside on the terrace,” Leya told her sweetly. “But as you can see, I’m not the least bit hard to find. Don’t worry, Susan, I’m sure he’ll be back in a moment.” The thought bred an unpleasant anticipation in Leya’s own mind, however. What was she going to do when he returned from the terrace and came gunning for her?

  There wasn’t much he could do to her in a room full of people, she told herself bravely and wondered exactly how much her own brother would be on her side. Keith’s admiration for his newfound mentor seemed very high. So high that he was happy to consider Court as a brother-in-law! Of course, that event was unlikely in the extreme, Leya thought glumly, taking a swallow of her drink. Court might bestir himself for a challenge, but something told her he had enough sense of self-preservation to keep from being so caught up in the battle that he’d go to those lengths!

  “He’s a very fascinating man, your fiancée,” Susan was saying chattily, her bright eyes on Leya’s brooding expression. “I must say the news came as a surprise, though. I had no idea…”