Summer Mahogany Read online

"Why didn't you tell me you were married to him?" The strong line of his jaw was thrust forward at an aggressive angle.

  "It seemed unnecessary."

  "Unnecessary?" He was about to say more, but checked himself with an effort. "How much of what you did tell me was true?"

  "All of it," Gina replied stiffly.

  "Does that means you were married to him nine years ago? When you were sixteen?" Justin tipped his head to one side, skepticism and censor in his expression.

  "Yes, which is in itself an explanation," she retorted.

  "Yet you denied he was an old flame," he accused.

  "He's a dead flame as far as I'm concerned." Their chemistries still mixed with explosive results, but it was due to hostility, not passion.

  "Dammit, Gina!" His fist slammed against the desk top in anger. "You could have warned me who he was instead of letting me believe that he was someone you had a summer flirtation with years ago!"

  "If I had known he was the president of Caufield Enterprises, I would have told you about him!" Gina flashed. "As it was, you didn't bother to tell me."

  "I supposed you knew," Justin defended. "I certainly wasn't trying to keep it a secret from you. You certainly can't say the same."

  "I don't appreciate your insinuations!" She unleashed the anger that had been smoldering beneath the surface, kindled by Rhyder. "Nor do I like being cross-examined as if I were on trial for some crime!"

  "Can you blame me for feeling as if I've been betrayed?" he demanded.

  Breathing in deeply, Gina fought to control her temper. "If you prefer to have another lawyer represent you, you're free to do so, Justin."

  He didn't try to stop her as she walked out of his office. The legal firm Gina worked for had offices in a building several blocks from Justin's. The walk in the brisk autumn air cooled most of her anger by the time she entered the reception area.

  A telephone message to call Justin was awaiting her arrival. In the small cubbyhole that was her office, Gina dialed his number, bracing herself for the clipped announcement that he was hiring another lawyer. His voice was clipped, but he told Gina that he still wanted her to represent him in the negotiations.

  Professionally it was a victory, since she had been slowly building a reputation in real estate dealings. Yet she knew that emotionally it would have been better to have lost this one and not been forced to tolerate Rhyder's company.

  TWO DAYS LATER, Gina received a counterproposal in the mail from Pete Arneson on Rhyder's behalf. She had just finished reading it when her extension rang. It was Justin calling to tell her that Rhyder had scheduled a meeting for the following afternoon.

  Gina told him about the counterproposal she had received. "If Rhyder thought our proposal was unacceptable, his is ludicrous."

  "I don't think there's much doubt that we're going to have a fight on our hands to get what we want," Justin replied in a tone that said he wasn't looking forward to it.

  "So will Rhyder," she said with a decisive note of battle.

  Her opinion of his counterproposal was repeated the next afternoon to Rhyder's face. Immediately Gina ignored him to discuss some of the minor differences with Pete, choosing ones that could quickly be resolved.

  Rhyder stepped in and they became embroiled in a bitter dispute on a major issue. After nearly an hour of verbal sword-clashing, Gina tossed her pencil onto the table beside her long yellow note pad.

  "These guarantees you're asking Justin to make are preposterous!" she declared in exasperation. "From the beginning, you've been aware of the boundary dispute to the south. You can't expect him to guarantee the outcome of that."

  "I can and do." There was uncompromising hardness to the line of his jaw.

  A long, slow fuse began to burn. "Can you guarantee that after these negotiations are over you and I will never see each other again?" Gina challenged, meeting the hard steel in his startling blue eyes. "Because if you can, I will advise Justin to agree to yours."

  His carved mahogany features darkened. "I didn't think you could keep personalities out of these discussions, Miss Gaynes," he said in a savage undertone.

  Gina stiffened, paling at his harsh taunt. The burning fuse nearly reached the dynamite of her temper before she was able to check it. With controlled movements, she began gathering her papers and replacing them in her briefcase, aware of the silence that had suddenly descended on the room.

  The briefcase was shut before she looked at any of them. Then it was Pete who received the blast of her green eyes, as cold as the Atlantic in winter.

  "I'm wasting my time here. It's pointless to sit here and argue when I have work to do in my office." Gina rose from her chair. "When your client is willing to be reasonable and compromise some of his impossible demands, we can resume these talks." Her gaze sliced to Justin, who was both amazed and uncertain. "I'll talk to you later."

  To Rhyder she said nothing, sweeping out of the room without a glance at him. She paused in the outer office long enough to ask Justin's secretary to telephone her office and let them know she wouldn't be returning that afternoon. Then she walked.

  Cold fury drove her for blocks. Finally she ended up, exhausted and footweary, only a block from her apartment. The problem was, her car was parked in the lot near her office building.

  Reluctantly she started to retrace her steps. With a sigh she stopped and walked to her apartment. The car was locked and would be relatively safe until tomorrow. She could take a taxi to the office in the morning. Inside her apartment, her knees began to tremble. A tear slipped from her lashes, trickling down her cheek. It was the first time she could remember crying since her grandfather had died.

  The telephone rang. Gina guessed it was Justin or one of her girl friends and let it ring unanswered. As she started to fill the bathtub, its demanding call started again, but she ignored it and added perfumed bath salts to the water.

  The telephone continued to ring intermittently during her long soak in the bubble bath. The fragrant water soothed her tired muscles and strained nerves.

  Wrapped in a short cotton robe, she walked into the kitchen and poured a glass of milk from the refrigerator. When she stepped into the living room, the telephone started ringing again. Gina stopped, frowning at the beige telephone and the persistence of her caller.

  On the sixth ring she answered it, impatient with herself for giving in to its demands, yet knowing her caller appeared determined not to give her any peace until she did.

  "This is Rhyder," the masculine voice unnecessarily identified itself.

  Her first impulse was to slam the receiver on its cradle, but she checked herself and asked curtly, "What do you want?"

  "If you're over your tantrum and have stopped sulking, I would like to arrange a meeting for this evening," he taunted dryly.

  "I'm a lawyer, not a doctor. I'm not on call at all hours of the day and night," Gina snapped. "If it's a meeting you want, call Justin and arrange it for tomorrow."

  "There is other property I can buy, not quite as ideally located as Justin's, but with the potential for development and minus the hassle I'm getting from you. You either agree to this meeting tonight or the deal is off," Rhyder promised with ominous calm.

  "Don't threaten me, Rhyder!" she breathed angrily.

  "But I am. And considering that you were the one to walk out on today's meeting after issuing your ultimatum, you'll have a difficult time convincing Justin that you're acting in his best interests by refusing to meet me tonight," he suggested complacently. "Justin stands to make a sizable profit from this sale. He isn't going to like losing it, nor thank you for causing it."

  "And of course you'll make sure he knows that you were willing to make concessions on some of your demands if only I'd met you halfway." Sarcasm honed a sharp edge to her voice. "You'll tell him that even if it's a lie."

  "But neither of you would ever be certain it was, would you?" countered Rhyder.

  "What time?" Gina surrendered reluctantly.

  "Seven-
thirty."

  She glanced at her wrist, but it was bare. "What time is it now?"

  "A few minutes before six," he answered.

  There was plenty of time to eat a cold meal, dress and travel downtown. "Seven-thirty at Justin's office," Gina said confirming the hour and location.

  "Since it's after business hours, I thought we'd meet at the apartment I've rented." Rhyder paused. "Unless, of course, you object to meeting here?"

  Part of her objected strongly. However, to admit that would also mean admitting she was allowing personalities to enter a business negotiation, the very thing Rhyder had accused her of today. She wasn't going to give him a second opportunity.

  "Why should I?" Gina returned with false unconcern. "What's the address?"

  She set her glass of milk on the telephone stand and reached for the pencil and message pad beside the phone, writing clown the address as Rhyder gave it to her. When he had hung up she tore the top paper from the pad and fingered it apprehensively.

  An inner sense warned her that she was making a mistake, but it was too late for second thoughts. She had committed herself and now had to follow through.

  Returning to the kitchen with her glass of milk, she made a quick salad of cold shrimps from the refrigerator, ate half of it before her appetite waned, and stacked the dirty dishes in the sink.

  Nothing in her closet appealed to her as she tried to choose what to wear. Slacks seemed too casual without a jacket, and the evening was warm. Finally she decided on a slightly flared white skirt and a scarlet tunic with a matching overblouse patterned with scarlet and pink flowers.

  She regretted her choice when the cab driver knocked at her apartment door and pursed his lips in a silent whistle of admiration at the sight of her, but there wasn't time to change. The briefcase was in her hand as Gina locked her apartment door and followed the driver to his cab. It was almost a shield against her femininity, a gossamer one, more to protect her from herself.

  The cab driver kept up a steady flow of chatter all the way to Rhyder's apartment building. She wished for silence to consider her legal strategy for the approaching meeting with Rhyder, but her monosyllabic responses didn't discourage him. Usually she was able to block out unwanted sounds, but this time she wasn't able to concentrate.

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  Chapter Seven

  THE DRIVE DIDN'T TAKE as long as Gina had expected. At twenty minutes past seven she knocked on Rhyder's door. When it opened, her senses leaped, reacting to the vibrantly male figure standing before her.

  The vivid green pattern of his silk shirt made Rhyder's eyes appear even more blue. Darker green trousers were tailored to loosely mold his hips and muscular thighs.

  "The others haven't arrived yet, have they?" There was a nervous catch to her voice as she tried to sound professional and poised.

  "No." He opened the door wide. "Come in." His gaze raked her length, a remoteness in his look. Motioning toward the living room behind him, he said, "Make yourself comfortable."

  Impossible, Gina thought as she acknowledged his invitation with a stiff smile. The room was decorated in complementing beige and peach tones with a russet shade for contrast. Highly impractical but definitely luxurious, she decided. She wondered about the view from the window, but the drapes were closed against the western sun.

  "I'm having a drink. Would you like one?" Rhyder inquired with distant politeness.

  "A glass of white wine if you have it," Gina accepted, sitting down on a plush beige sofa and placing her briefcase on the adjoining sofa cushion.

  The palms of her hands were damp with nervous perspiration. She wished Pete or Justin would arrive. The apartment walls seemed to echo the knowledge that she was alone with Rhyder. An office meeting would have been infinitely preferable to this informal situation. It brought the business relationship to a more casual level.

  Her nerves tensed as Rhyder approached. He didn't hand her the wine goblet, but set it on the end table nearest her instead. Gina was aware that by doing so he had avoided accidentally touching her.

  When he sat down in an armchair near the sofa, she knew she was incapable of small talk, especially when she noticed the brandy glass he held in his hands. Instantly her mind flashed back to the night of their wedding. She turned to the briefcase beside her and snapped it open.

  "We might as well start—"

  "Save it for later." His low voice cut across her sentence, faintly harsh but controlled.

  Gina hesitated for a split second, then closed the case. Reaching for her wineglass, she leaned against the sofa back, trying to appear relaxed. There was a slight tremor in her hand as it carried the glass to her lips. She sipped the dry Chablis quickly and held the glass in both hands. Her nerves vibrated under the watchfulness of Rhyder's gaze.

  "I've heard some glowing reports about you from your fellow members of the bar. You seem to have made remarkable progress in the short time since you passed your exams." He absently swirled the brandy in his glass, his compelling eyes not leaving her.

  "Thank you. I've been fortunate," she didn't want him to compliment her, if that was what he was doing.

  "The fact that you're beautiful brought you more quickly to the attention of the male members of your profession, no doubt, and aided the swift recognition that you were intelligent, as well." There was a hint of cynicism in the twisting mouth. Before Gina could decide if he was being offensive, Rhyder continued, shifting his attention to the amber brown liquid in his glass. "With your background, I would have thought you'd follow in your father's footsteps, specializing in marine law instead of real estate and land contracts."

  "I seemed to have a natural aptitude for this field and chose it," was her only explanation.

  Rhyder drank a swallow of brandy and gave her a considering look. "You mentioned at the clambake that your grandfather was dead. Has it been long?"

  His bland questions expressed a polite interest in her, yet Gina felt agitated by them. Courtesy demanded that she answer them. She had to either keep up her part in this tension-charged truce or begin the quarrel that would destroy it.

  "Eight years." Giving in to the restless stirrings caused by unwelcome memories, she rose from the sofa and wandered to the fireplace, a combination of rust- and sand-colored stone.

  Rhyder didn't make any gesture of sympathy, probably remembering her rejection of his previous attempt at the clambake. "What did you do afterward?"

  "I sold the house and went to college." It was several seconds before Gina realized she had condensed eight years of living into a few short sentences.

  Drinking the last of her wine, she held on to the empty glass. It gave her hands something to do. She glanced covertly at her wristwatch, wondering when Justin and Pete would arrive. Soon, she hoped. The atmosphere was beginning to be stilted.

  "More wine?" Rhyder offered, rising from the armchair to walk to the bar to refill his own glass.

  "No, thank you," she refused.

  "How long have you known Justin?" Something in the cobalt darkness of his look across the room made Gina uneasy. The question did not sound as politely indifferent as the others. Warily she hesitated.

  "I met him shortly after I came to Portland to work for my present firm," she answered finally. "I've represented Justin in several land transactions similar to this one."

  His mouth twisted cynically as he lifted the brandy glass to within inches of it. "'Do you mean it's a business relationship you have with him?" he asked over the rim of his glass.

  Her tongue quivered with the urge to tell him it was none of his business, but if she held her temper a little longer, Justin or Pete would come and the conversation would leave these personal topics.

  "I do see Justin socially," she admitted. Rhyder had to have known that. Justin had made it fairly obvious at the clambake.

  "Often?" He moved leisurely to where she stood in front of the fireplace.

  Her chin lifted to a defiant angle, letting him know he had
no right to question her, but she answered him anyway, coolly, concealing her anger.

  "I suppose several times a week could be considered often."

  He held her gaze. "Do you sleep with him?"

  The tight rein on her temper snapped, it unleashed her hand in a swinging arc, her opened palm stinging numbly against his hard cheek. When her green eyes focused on the slowly reddening white mark near his jawline, she realized what she had done. She took a quick step backward, expecting the swift retaliation she remembered so well.

  Rhyder didn't move. He was a statue, carved in hardwood, not blinking an eye, yet intimidating Gina until her heart raced in panic.

  "Does that mean yes or no?" he asked levelly.

  "That means it's none of your business!" she retorted, breathing rapidly.

  "It is my business." Rhyder drained the brandy glass and set it on the mantelpiece. "Don't forget, Gina, that I know you, too, and your methods."

  More than ever before, Gina didn't trust him. "What's that supposed to mean?" she asked guardedly.

  "It means I'm wondering how far you'll go in forcing me to agree to Justin's terms," Rhyder explained, his expression hardening in contempt.

  "Forcing you?" Bewilderedly Gina shook her dark head, caution in her frown. "The terms are to be negotiated."

  "Will blackmail be part of the negotiations?" His sardonic query chilled her to the bone.

  "Blackmail?" The word was repeated unknowingly.

  "Don't pretend you haven't heard of the word," he mocked her savagely. "You've used it before." Gina paled. "But it can be dangerous," Rhyder continued. "I don't think you'd risk it unless you were deeply involved with Justin."

  "Blackmail?" Gina repeated, angrily this time. "How on earth could I blackmail you?"

  "That innocent act won't work, Gina," he jeered. "You were hoping I wouldn't know, but unfortunately I do."

  "Know what? You're talking in circles!" But Gina felt she was the one caught in the maelstrom.

  "You're a lawyer." Rhyder towered above her, dark and cynical, his powerful maleness a threatening thing. "You know as well as I do that our annulment isn't worth the paper it's printed on."