She wanted desperately to see him, talk to him, but dared not risk that. Too many people knew of the feud, and both she and Ian were familiar faces in the Atlanta social and business worlds. If just one whisper reached her father’s ears before she could defuse the situation between the families…
Michele squared her shoulders and went to get her purse and car keys. She was a trained investigator, and all her experience told her to start with the simplest question and work toward an answer. And she had her question.
Who would have the most to gain by setting the Logans and Stuarts at each other’s throats?
Chapter 6
Ian cradled the phone and sat gazing across his office. She couldn’t believe he’d done it, he told himself, feeling the cold fear of his own answer. Not after all they’d shared. Even with twenty years of programming against anyone named Stuart, she couldn’t really believe he was the kind of treacherous bastard someone had made him out to be.
Could she?
He wanted to call her back, to demand that she talk to him, see him. But he hesitated, because he knew what she was going through now, her brother injured in an “accident” that had Stuart written all over it and her father no doubt plotting to get even. And there had been no time for her to learn to trust him, no time for them to reach a real understanding of each other.
He had returned to the hotel, discovered she had left, and had nearly gone crazy in the hours it had taken him to get home and find out what had happened. His only consolation in those endless hours had been the certain knowledge that something had happened, that she wouldn’t have run from him without a word otherwise. Even then, he had hoped it was something simple, something not touching on the feud.
A lost hope. It hadn’t taken him long to find out what had happened, and he couldn’t bring himself to blame Michele for refusing to talk to him; even if she wasn’t sure he had caused her brother’s injuries, the doubts had to be tearing her apart. Still, he had no intention of giving up. He didn’t want to do anything to make the situation more difficult for her, and he was all too aware that this was not the moment to seek her out; one more spark between the families and Atlanta just might go up in flames for a second time.
“When did you get back?” his father asked, coming into the office.
“Late last night.” Ian looked at him thoughtfully, unconsciously searching.
Brandon Stuart was so different physically from his son that he might have been forgiven a tinge of doubt concerning Ian’s paternity, except for the fact that Ian was the image of a Stuart ancestor a few generations back. The elder Stuart had black hair distinguished by silver wings at his temples, dark blue eyes, and patrician features so fine they just missed being delicate. He was a couple of inches under six feet tall and slender.
A man who moved somewhat lazily, he tended to be calm, not given to outbursts of temper, his occasional anger usually taking the form of an icy rage as quiet as it was deadly. A reasonable man in most things, he’d been shaped by his heritage and his own experiences to regard the Logans with bitter loathing, but he hadn’t gone overboard in his efforts to instill the same feelings in his son; though he had made his own feelings very clear without mincing words, the wife he had lost only a few years before had persuaded him that it would be wrong to teach Ian to hate.
He and his son shared a suite of offices on the top floor of a downtown building, a convenience since Ian was very much a part of the family business despite a growing list of clients he worked for independently. After his mother’s death, the stately old home he shared with his father had proved to hold too many memories for them both, and they had decided to sell it. Ian had chosen an apartment near the office, while his father had moved into a condo farther out.
Close in many ways—and sharing similar temperaments—their differing personal interests and frequent disputes virtually demanded that they lead separate personal lives. If too much of their time had been spent together, they doubtless would have been at loggerheads more often than not; living apart they managed a solid relationship built on mutual respect and an often rueful understanding of each other.
As Ian had told Michele, they continued to argue from time to time, and hotly, but since neither was willing to either force the issue or back down, their relationship was never pushed beyond the breaking point.
“Did you get the project?” Brandon Stuart asked now, making himself comfortable in the visitor’s chair in front of the massive old pine desk.
“I got it. Howard wants the preliminary designs by the first of the year. He wants to start construction by spring.”
Brandon nodded, then said, “You don’t look too happy for a man who just acquired a lucrative client.”
Flatly Ian said, “Jon Logan was injured early yesterday morning at their building.” He knew damned well that his father was aware of what had happened, and wasn’t surprised by his mild reaction.
“Well, building sites are dangerous places. You’d think he’d know that at his age.”
“It wasn’t an accident.”
Calmly, Brandon said, “Naturally, they blame it on us. Not surprising, really, since they haven’t a hope in hell of completing their building on time now.”
Ian drew in a sharp breath and released it angrily. “Just tell me one thing. Did you arrange it?”
“Of course not. Explosives? I hope I have better sense than to resort to that kind of violence.”
“I hope so, too.”
Brandon studied his son and frowned. “You believe I’m capable of setting an explosion?”
“Where the Logans are concerned, I believe you’re capable of almost anything. You didn’t arrange it? You knew nothing about it?”
“I’ve answered both those questions.” A shade of responsive anger colored Brandon’s voice. “I certainly won’t say I’m sorry for the Logans’ misfortune, but I had nothing to do with it. What the hell are you so angry about, Ian?”
Until that moment, Ian had been half certain that his father had stepped over the line and resorted to violence. But he believed the denial—and it opened up a new and unsettling possibility. If not his father, then who?
After a moment, he said, “I managed to get hold of one of their security people early this morning. He didn’t want to talk to me, but I finally convinced him there was no harm in just telling me what had happened. He was one of the men who helped dig Jon out after the explosion.”
“So? What did he have to say?”
“Jon caught the saboteur red-handed. And the man told him that I had hired him to do the job.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Brandon scoffed. “You weren’t even in the country.”
Ian shook his head. “You’re missing the point, Dad. If that’s what the man said, then the chances are good it’s what he honestly believed. My guess is that he was paid to say I was responsible. Somebody set me up.”
“For God’s sake, Ian, all you know is what Jon said. Of course he’d pin the blame on you. It’s just the excuse they’ve been looking for to turn this into a war.”
Trying to hold on to his patience, Ian said, “Has it occurred to you that someone else could be taking advantage of the suspicion between the two families? That the objective wasn’t to slow the Logans down but to start us fighting each other so that neither building is finished on time?”
“That’s insane.”
“And a five-hundred-year-old feud isn’t?”
Brandon was silent for a moment, then shrugged. “Even supposing there’s something in this idea of yours, what the hell do you want me to do about it?”
Ian knew the question was rhetorical, but he chose to take it literally. “I want you to do nothing to aggravate the situation until I can find out what’s going on.”
“If you think Charles and Jon Logan are going to sit still after this, you’re mistaken. They’ll strike out at us, Ian, and I won’t sit still for that.”
For the first time, Ian began to understand how a feud co
uld continue for centuries. It was a blind, automatic response: You hit me and I hit back. Toss hate and suspicion into the equation and it became a never-ending circle.
“Dad, somebody has to stop this insanity.”
“You think you can?” his father asked dryly.
“I’m damned well going to try. I’m sick and tired of the whole mess. But it won’t do me much good to try and find answers unless you agree to back off.”
Brandon studied him for a moment, then shrugged. “I’ll increase security around the building so they can’t get near it, and I’ll keep my mouth shut for the time being. But that’s all I can promise, Ian. If this thing gets even uglier, I’m not about to sit still for it.”
Ian knew his father too well to ask for more. He was reasonably sure the Logans wouldn’t move immediately to exact revenge, since plans take time. At best, he’d have a little breathing space, but not much. A few days, maybe a couple of weeks.
The first thing he had to do was reach Michele. He wanted to see her so badly that it was a constant, dull ache inside him, and the possibility that she could believe he had arranged the sabotage tore at him. Intellectually, he knew that things had happened too fast between them, that with the best will in the world Michele couldn’t overcome twenty years of brainwashing in only a few short days; emotionally, he wanted her to believe in him, to trust him no matter what her family said.
Another impossible hope.
He had known that what he felt for Michele was more than passion, more than desire, but some barrier in his mind had refused to let him see the truth of his own feelings. Whether, as Michele had lightly said, it was stamped in the genes or merely in the mind, a tradition of hatred and mistrust spanning centuries was a difficult thing to surmount. Desire he could admit, but love had quite literally been unthinkable.
Until it had happened.
—
Michele came into the house a bit warily. She’d been gone all day, first to the building site where Jon had been hurt and then to her office. The company she worked for had always been tolerant of their investigative staff’s erratic work hours, and no one had been much surprised to see her appear with days still left of her vacation. She had shut herself in her office and spent hours working by phone and by computer, trying to find some proof that a third party was intent on causing friction between her family and Ian’s.
The results had been nebulous, leaving her feeling frustrated and worried.
“Michele.”
She looked up to see Jon coming down the stairs toward her, his broken wrist in a sling. He was frowning, and she felt sorry the moment she realized her extended absence had worried him. She put her purse and car keys on the hall table and waited for him.
“Shouldn’t you be in bed?” she asked lightly. “Where’s Dad?”
“No, I’m fine. And Dad’s in his study working on the books. Where’ve you been?”
She managed a smile. “Jon, when are you going to realize that I’m not a kid anymore?”
He reached the bottom of the stairs and stood looking at her, his eyes narrowed. “I asked a simple question, Michele. Would it hurt you to answer?”
Well, she’d expected it. “I suppose not. I went down to the building. I wanted to get a look at the damage and see if I could find any part of the timer left intact.”
“You shouldn’t have gone down there.” His frown deepened, and he added unwillingly, “Find anything?”
“Bits and pieces.” She knew that Jon respected her training and abilities as an investigator, even though he had never agreed with her choice of career. He didn’t like the idea of his sister poking around the burned-out remains of buildings in cases where her employers suspected arson, or dealing with people unscrupulous enough to try other ways of bilking insurance companies.
“You can’t do much with that.”
“I’ve worked with less.”
“Okay, I’ll bite. What did you figure out from the bits and pieces?”
His mocking tone sparked Michele’s temper. She crossed her arms over her breasts and spoke deliberately. “Well, I figured out that the device our saboteur used didn’t come from around here. It’s state of the art and right now you can only find it on the West Coast—if your connections are good enough, and you’re prepared to pay through the nose.”
“So? It’s the jet age.”
“True, and therefore I did some checking. The Stuarts haven’t had anything shipped in from the West Coast for more than three years, their jet hasn’t been west of the Rockies in nine months, and no employee has been out of Georgia at all this year.”
Jon was honestly startled. “How in God’s name did you find all that out?”
“It’s what I’m trained to do. I piece together puzzles, Jon, and since insurance companies work with the police sometimes, I have access to a lot of computer data banks.”
He scowled. “Then you missed something. One of them called and ordered the device, or went after it and used a commercial flight.”
“No calls to the West Coast, on their business or private lines, in the last year. And neither of them has been out there on any commercial flight this year.”
“Then they hired somebody to get it!”
Michele drew a breath. “Why would they? Why be devious on that end and then hire an explosives man who knew exactly who he was working for? It doesn’t make any sense. And another thing, Jon, who tipped you?”
“What?”
“Somebody called and told you to keep an eye on the building; who was it?”
“How the hell should I know?”
“Didn’t you even stop to wonder? Didn’t it bother you just a little bit that for the first time in my knowledge you were tipped hours ahead of time that something was likely to happen?”
“Maybe one of their employees got cold feet.”
“Know your enemies; after five centuries, we certainly do. We don’t involve employees in the feud; neither do they. In fact, it’s strangely out of character for them to hire an explosives man.”
After a moment, Jon turned and went into the living room. Michele, feeling the first glimmer of hope that she was getting through to him, followed and sat on the arm of an overstuffed chair near the door. She watched as he went behind the bar in one corner, waited patiently while he fixed himself a soft drink.
“I could use something stronger,” he muttered, “but the doctor said not to for a few days.”
“Jon, don’t you see that the sabotage at the building just doesn’t fit the Stuarts’—or our—way of fighting? Sure, our families killed each other right and left at first, but there hasn’t been a death or serious injury caused by the feud on either side for more than a hundred years. And no open destruction, not like that, not something that could easily get the police involved. There aren’t any duels anymore, or outright murders. We fight in other ways now. Subtle, sneaky ways, unethical certainly, and sometimes illegal, but not violent.”
He was staring down at his drink and looked up only after a long silence. His gaze was searching, his expression seemed troubled and faintly anxious, maybe even wary. When he spoke, his voice was matter-of-fact. “All right. I’ll do some checking myself. If there’s somebody else in this, they have to be after the Techtron project, like you said. The number of builders who could handle the work is limited; I should know something within a few days.”
Michele almost held her breath. “And Dad? Can you keep him from doing something crazy?”
“I’ll try.”
She nodded, weak with relief. “Good. Maybe one of us can find some proof.”
“Misha?” Jon was looking at his glass again. “What did happen to you?”
Not for the first time, Michele acknowledged that her brother read her face and her moods too well; he knew that this intense and stubborn defense of the Stuarts was new, that it had to have been caused by powerful events or feelings. Maybe he even felt the change in her, or saw some sign of it. She wondered if she looked diffe
rent but didn’t ask him that. And she didn’t tell him the truth, because he was still unconvinced and she dared not risk an admission that would both shock and enrage him.
“I told you,” she said finally, steadily. “I don’t want to be a lemming. Five hundred years is five centuries too long to hate.”
Jon might have probed deeper, but the phone out in the hall rang just then and Michele welcomed the interruption. “I’ll get it,” she told him.
He nodded, still looking at his glass.
She went out into the hall and picked up the receiver. “Hello?”
“Michele. Don’t hang up.”
Driven by urgent necessity, she had managed to keep her thoughts off Ian, but now the sound of his voice, the way he said her name, was like the shattering of a dam holding back floodwaters. The feelings swept over her so powerfully that she could only endure them in silence, her eyes closing as she fought the urge to blurt out her love and pain and fear.
“Michele? Dammit, talk to me!”
She opened her eyes and glanced toward the living room, very aware of the quietness in the house and her brother’s keen hearing. In a voice that was little more than a whisper, she said, “I can’t. Not now.”
“Baby, I didn’t do it. I swear to God I didn’t.”
She swallowed hard. “I know.”
“I have to see you,” Ian said intensely.
“It isn’t possible.”
“We can meet somewhere. Now, tonight.”
“I can’t.”
He hesitated, then said in a flat tone, “Then I’ll walk up to your front door and ring the bell.”
It might have been an empty threat; Michele thought it probably was, because he knew the risks as well as she did. But the fact that he made it at all told her something of Ian’s state of mind. She tried to weigh the risks in her own mind, but all she could think of was how badly she wanted to see him. Needed to see him.