Rivals Read online

  After seven months on that social merry-go-round, Flame had grown weary of it and rebelled. There had been some charity ball they were supposed to attend, but when Rick had come home from the office that evening, she hadn’t been ready.

  “Why aren’t you dressed?” He looked at her with some surprise and glanced at the gold Piaget wristwatch she’d given him for Christmas. “You’d better get a move on or we’ll be late.”

  “No, we won’t.” Ignoring his look of impatience, she went to him and firmly placed his hands on the back of her waist, then wound her own around his neck. “Instead of going to the ball, let’s stay home and have a romantic evening together…just the two of us.” She leaned up and nipped at his ear. “We haven’t done that in a long time. And I have a bottle of Dom Perignon chilling in the fridge, along with some Beluga caviar. Later we can fix some fettucini, or maybe a steak. You slip out of that tie and I’ll—”

  As she started to loosen it, Rick stopped her. “I love the thought, darling, but we’ll have to do it some other time. Tonight we have this charity thing. They’re expecting us.”

  “You make it sound as if they’ll cancel the ball if we don’t show up. I assure you they won’t,” she teased with a cajoling smile. “So why don’t we just skip it?”

  “No.” He set her away from him, a finality in his voice and his gesture that rankled.

  Still Flame persisted. “Why not?”

  “Because we said we’d be there and we’re going.”

  “Rick, it’s a charity ball, for heaven’s sake. How many hundred functions like it have we attended these last six months? I’m tired of them. Aren’t you?” She frowned.

  “Whether I’m tired of them or not is immaterial,” he retorted, yanking at the knot of his tie. “Affairs like this are important to me. I thought you understood that.”

  Stung by his tone, Flame was tempted to ask if they were more important than spending time with her, but she checked the angry impulse and turned away instead, feigning a shrug of indifference. “Then you go. I’ll stay home by myself.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Flame,” he snapped. “You’re a Morgan. You have to be there.”

  You’re a Morgan. How many times had she heard him say that? She’d lost count, but this time, the phrase sunk in. She swung on him in full temper. “My name is Bennett. Or had you forgotten that little detail?”

  He flushed guiltily. “You know what I meant.”

  “No.” She shook her head in firm denial. “I don’t think I do. Why don’t you explain just how you see me? Am I your wife? Am I the woman you love? Am I your life’s partner? Or—am I your social entrée?” she challenged, suddenly remembering the thousand little conversations that had taken place over the past months—and the way Rick had always drawn her family name into them. She realized that he knew more about the history of her family than she did.

  From that point on, the confrontation had degenerated into a shouting match, insults and accusations hurled on both sides. In the end, Rick had stormed out of the flat, and for days afterward they’d been cold to each other. Eventually they’d gone through the motions of making up, but it had never been the same after that.

  As the weeks wore on, Flame had gradually come to see that she’d unwittingly hit on the truth. If Rick loved her at all, it was because she was his passport into a world that would have otherwise barred him from entering. He didn’t love her, not for herself. He never had. Two months later, she filed for a divorce.

  She’d walked away from the marriage scarred but much wiser. She’d learned a valuable lesson, one that she found many occasions to apply. Over the years, she’d discovered that few people sought her company for its sake alone. Some, like Rick, saw her as a passport to power and prestige. Some were outright social climbers. Others were attracted by her beauty and regarded her as a prize to be paraded on their arm. And to others, like Malcom Powell, she represented a conquest that had eluded him. All of those people she had eliminated very quickly from her life, dropping them the instant she discerned their reason for wanting to be with her—which was much easier than most supposed. As a result, her circle of friends was small indeed. And, of them, she regarded only Ellery as her one true friend. He’d never asked anything of her and never once taken advantage of their friendship. On the contrary, Ellery had always given—of his knowledge, his understanding, his time and his company.

  Slowly Flame closed the photo album and hugged it tightly to her. That old need to love and be loved was still there, but of necessity, buried deep inside. Friends, a beautiful home, gorgeous clothes, and an unquestionably successful career weren’t enough to fill the emptiness. Without someone to share them with, they meant little. But who?

  Instantly an image of Chance Stuart flashed in her mind. Suddenly she could see again that faintly wicked glint in his blue eyes, the raffish charm of his crooked smile, and that aura of virility he wore so casually. She smiled, realizing that he’d made a very definite impression on her—and wondered if she would see him again or whether it had been a line, forgotten minutes after it was said. Probably.

  Sighing, Flame returned the photo album to its place on the shelf, her fingers lingering for a moment on its worn, leather-bound spine. As she turned, her glance fell on the horn chair. That strange visit from Hattie Morgan had started this rush of memories with all her talk about family. How odd that it had taken a stranger to remind her.

  5

  The black marble and glass of Stuart Tower loomed tall and proud, adding its own bold statement to the progressive skyline of cosmopolitan Tulsa. Like everything else Chance Stuart owned, it carried his name, emblazoned in gold leaf to gleam in the sun for all to see. More than one had suggested, not entirely in jest, that he should take that scrolled S and put a line through it, turning it into a dollar sign, because everyone sure as hell knew that the name Stuart and money were practically synonymous.

  When the silver Jaguar wheeled into the entrance to the underground parking garage, the brash young attendant in the booth quickly sat up straighter, threw a one-fingered salute at the driver, then gazed after the car with a mixture of longing and envy. It rolled to a smooth stop in the space marked RESERVED, C. STUART. Chance stepped out and crossed to the private elevator. It made only one stop—on the twentieth floor, the offices of the Stuart Corporation.

  The elevator whisked him silently to the building’s top floor and opened its doors onto Molly’s office, the private entrance allowing him to avoid the public reception area and the many offices of the company’s various departments. As always, Molly was already seated behind her desk, guarding the door to his office, her chubby cheeks rounded in a smile of welcome when he walked out of the elevator.

  “Morning, Molly. Has Matt Sawyer arrived?” he asked, heading straight for his office.

  “Not yet.”

  “Show him in the minute he does.” Chance opened the door, then paused. “And let Sam know I’m here.”

  “Right away.” She reached for the intercom.

  Without waiting, Chance entered his office and automatically closed the door behind him, then crossed the bleached wood floor to his desk in the corner. He glanced briefly at the stack of telephone messages and letters waiting for his attention on the desk’s granite top. Turning his back on them for the time being, he walked to the smoke-tinted glass that enclosed two sides of the immense room.

  His corner office overlooked buildings that represented some of the finest examples of the Art Deco architecture so popular in the thirties. Once those buildings housed the offices of such oil giants as Waite Phillips, Bill Sinclair, and J. Paul Getty. Chance studied them briefly then lifted his glance to the city sprawled over the rolling hills of Oklahoma’s Green Country.

  Many had questioned his decision to make Tulsa his headquarters when he could just as easily have picked Dallas or Denver if it was a central location he wanted. Few knew of the affinity he felt for this city. It had come a long way from its humble cowtown beginnin
gs, a wide spot along a dusty trail—and from its wild and rowdy days as an oil boomtown. All its rough edges had been smoothed. Now it stood sleek and sophisticated with its alabaster skyline, a high-tech city in a high-tech world. He and Tulsa had much in common. It was more than a hometown boy coming back after he’d made good—much more.

  There was a quick rap on his door followed by the click of the latch. Chance swung around expecting to see Sam walk in. But it was Molly, a steaming cup of coffee in her hand. “I knew I had missed something. Nobody makes coffee as good as you do, Molly.”

  “You’re only saying that to make sure I don’t go on strike and refuse to make coffee for you anymore.” She crossed the room and set the cup on his desk, beaming at his praise, her round cheeks growing rounder, and reminding him of the time he had teased her about being his all-round girl—round cheeks, round eyes, round face, and round body. Then her look faded to one of faint disapproval and he knew he was about to be lectured on something. “One thing’s certain. That Lucy woman—”

  “Lucianna,” he corrected, transferring his attention to the phone messages in his hand.

  “Whatever she calls herself now, she didn’t bring you any coffee in the morning.”

  “No. Room service did.”

  Molly ignored that. “You’ve known this Lucianna a long time, I know, but she won’t make you a good wife. And it’s time you got married.”

  “What can I do? I keep asking and you keep turning me down.” He walked back to his desk.

  “You’re impossible.” She pretended to be angry with him. “When are you going to wake up to the fact that you’re thirty-eight years old? You not only don’t have a wife, but you don’t have any children either.”

  Sam strolled into the office, lanky and trim with a thatch of unruly light brown hair. “At least, none that you know about, Molly.”

  She turned. “If he had any, I’d know. Everyone would, because you can bet the mother would file a paternity suit.”

  “If it’s a child you want, Chance, Patty and I will loan you one of ours. You can take your pick. Right now I think Patty would willingly give all four of them away. It was a bad weekend at home. I’m glad I spent most of it here.”

  Chance straightened from his desk, fully alert. “Did you come up with anything?”

  Sam shook his head. “I’ve already filled you in on everything I know. Until Matt gets here…” He shrugged the rest.

  “Molly, see if Matt Sawyer’s here yet.”

  “Of course.” Easily she slipped back into the role of the efficient secretary and left his office to return to her own.

  Sam watched her go, then turned back to Chance, grinned, and shook his head in amusement. “She never gives up, does she?”

  “Not Molly.”

  Sam wandered over to the desk and sat down in the charcoal suede chair that faced it. “Did you get everything worked out in Tahoe to your satisfaction?”

  Chance smiled crookedly. “Let’s say I got everything worked out. Whether it will be to my satisfaction remains to be seen.” The Tahoe project was his most ambitious to date. When completed, it would be a year-round resort complex, with a palatial hotel and gambling casino adjacent to the marina and yacht club, and a luxury ski lodge coupled with chalet-style condominiums and an array of ski runs and trails.

  “I talked to Kiley this morning,” Sam said, referring to their construction manager on the project site. “He mentioned you had a little run-in with Nick Borrello.”

  “You could call it that,” Chance conceded. “Among other things, he accused me of stealing his casino.”

  Admittedly he’d bought it from the man at a bargain price, but the casino had lost money the last three years—for a number of reasons. Poor management was one of them, and another was its location on the fringe of Tahoe’s main gambling area. As a small, independent casino it couldn’t compete with those operated by the big hotels and it couldn’t siphon away enough of their trade.

  As a casino alone, Chance wouldn’t have been interested in it. But he’d looked at its lake frontage, the surrounding forest, the jutting mountain behind it and its proximity to the gaming centers, and knew immediately that the site was—in the argot of land developers—a “Tiffany location.”

  “He’s certainly changed his tune, hasn’t he?” Sam remarked. “Not six months ago, he was so happy to have you take it off his hands that he would have gladly kissed your feet.” A smile spread across his face, boyish in its charm. “For that matter, most of your competitors were convinced you’d bought a lemon.”

  “I know.” Chance smiled back, aware that he hadn’t been quick to correct that impression either. Instead, he’d waited to announce his plans for the site until three days after the Nevada gaming commission had given him their nod of approval. At that point, he inked the lease he’d arranged with the Forest Service, giving him the mountain behind the casino. With that in hand, he held a press conference and announced his plans.

  Suddenly everybody had sat up and taken another look at the deal he’d put together. That’s when they realized that not only had he bought it at a rock-bottom price, but he also didn’t have a dime in it himself. A major hotel chain anxious to get into the area had fronted all the money, and a national insurance company was waiting in the wings to fund the rest of the project. By the time the development was completed and in operation two years from now, his profit from it would be in the hundreds of millions. Most developers had walked away, shaking their heads and grumbling that they hadn’t seen the same potential—and admitting, however grudgingly, that he’d pulled another rabbit out of the hat with typical Stuart style.

  But not the former owner, Nick Borrello, who had initially bragged about the deal he’d made. Now he was screaming foul. But Chance was used to that.

  The door to his office swung open, and Molly stepped in briefly to announce, “Mr. Sawyer’s here.” She moved to one side, allowing the man to enter.

  Few people would look twice at Matt Sawyer, and fewer still would guess that the former FBI agent had left the Bureau to head one of the more reputable private security agencies in the country. He was a nondescript man of average height, build, and coloring, but his investigative skills were widely regarded. Five years ago, Chance had hired him for the first time to locate the owner of a small but vital piece of property, whose whereabouts were unknown. He’d had his own people on it for nearly a month. Matt Sawyer had located the man in less than forty-eight hours. Since then, Chance had employed his services on numerous occasions, and he’d proved himself invaluable more than once in tracking down much-needed information.

  “Hello, Matt.” Chance came around the desk to greet him, briefly gripping his hand, then motioning toward the small grouping of sofas and armchairs where he held many of his informal meetings. “What did you come up with?”

  “Not a lot yet, but we’re working on it.” He gave his trouser legs a hitch as he sat down on the cerulean blue chair and placed his briefcase on his lap. “I did talk to Ben Canon’s secretary. She was fairly cooperative, but there was a lot she either didn’t know or wouldn’t tell me.” He snapped open the case and took out two folders. “She did confirm that Canon had a meeting with Hattie at nine on Friday, but she claimed she didn’t know what it was about. She said Canon instructed her to hold his calls and closed the door to his private office so she didn’t overhear any of the meeting. Which, according to her, lasted about ninety minutes. She was sure of the time because Canon had an eleven o’clock appointment and Hattie was gone before that client arrived.” He passed one of the folders to Chance and gave the other to Sam. “Somewhere around nine-thirty—she wasn’t certain of the exact time—Canon buzzed her on the intercom and asked her to make reservations for Hattie to fly to San Francisco that same day. And she also arranged for a cab to take Hattie to the airport. But, according to her, no explanation was given for the trip or the urgency of it.”

  “She has to know more than that.” Chance tossed the fo
lder and its detailed report on the coffee table without opening it, knowing that it would merely contain facts and he wanted impressions as well. “She’s his secretary. She sees everything that passes over his desk. She’s bound to know what he’s working on.”

  Matt shook his head. “Not the way Ben Canon operates. The way she described him, he keeps everything pretty close to the vest and never confides in her about a client. He opens all the mail himself and has a set of locked files in his office where he keeps any correspondence or paperwork dealing with current cases.” He paused, a wry smile crossing his mouth. “And you aren’t going to believe this. He has an old manual typewriter that he uses to type any important correspondence himself.”

  “Why does he even bother to have a secretary then?” Sam frowned.

  “To answer the phone, I guess.” Matt shrugged.

  Chance continued to eye Matt closely. “You found out something from her, didn’t you?”

  Matt looked at him and allowed a rare smile to show. “In addition to answering his phones, she empties the wastebasket in his office. On Friday night she found a large manila envelope in it from a Whitney or a Whittier or a name similar to that. She noticed it because the return address was Salt Lake City and she has an aunt living there. She thought the man might be a doctor—a gynecologist maybe. She wasn’t sure, but she remembered something like that being printed below his name. And I’m guessing that it didn’t say gynecologist. Instead it read genealogist.”